Page 104 of Fight Me Daddy

He gazed over at me. "Well, yeah. There's nothing for me here. Not anymore. Once I found out about the fires, I just decided it was better to move on. I've let this place keep me prisoner for years. There's no reason to keep it going." He paused. “It’s kept you a prisoner too. Maybe destruction was a good thing.”

I nodded and walked in silence beside my father. There was still tension, but I wasn't naive enough to think that things would go back to normal overnight. And maybe he was right. We’d both damn near sold our souls to keep the gym in one piece and look how that had turned out.

"Over here, Dad," I nodded to the black car waiting by the sidewalk. “We can sit in the back." I opened his door and he smiled.

"Thank you."

Gabriele grunted. "So I have to sit in the front by myself?"

"Yes," I said through gritted teeth. "Don't start acting crazy or I'll cut you off."

He raised a brow. "Is that what you think is going to happen?"

"It's what I know will happen."

"We're talking about this when we get home," he said as he walked over to the open passenger-side door where the driver waited patiently. "A lot."

"I look forward to it."

The glare he gave me made me want to chuckle, but I didn't want to die when we got home. I slipped into the backseat and closed the door. My father was staring at me and I shrugged.

"Don't ask."

"I don't have to." He chuckled. "I have to say when I found out about the two of you I wasn't all that surprised."

I stared at him in disbelief. "What? How? Because I was shocked and I've been here to live through it."

He laughed. "Back when he and Niccolo used to come to the gym, he always stared at you. He would pretend he wasn't, but I could see him out of the corner of my eye."

I looked up at the rearview mirror. "Excuse me?"

"Yeah. He used to just stare for the longest time. Whenever you looked at him, which was rare, he'd go back to doing his job. But other than that?" He shrugged. "I always figured he had a thing for you and it used to scare the hell out of me. But I can see you're okay."

"I'm great," I said, my gaze not leaving Gabriele's now narrowed eyes. "Especially now."

"Gonzalez," he growled. "Unless you want to walk the rest of the way to your hotel, I suggest you keep your mouth shut."

"No, no, no," I said as I leaned forward. "You were staring at me so much that my father noticed? Do you know how out of it he usually is at work, but he noticed that?" I whistled. "You were obsessed with me even back then."

"I will kill you, Calix."

"You won't," I said fully confident that he would throw himself into a burning building head first if he ever lost me. "But it's cute that you were practically a puppy for me."

Gabriele nodded and I watched a nerve tick in his jaw. He didn't say anything more to me. Oh, he's fuming. Can't wait to deal with that later. I chuckled as I turned back to my father.

"Thanks for telling me that. I needed to hear it."

He grinned. "Don't make fun of him too much. That's how I was with your mother. She thought I was a weirdo."

I tried to imagine my mom being weirded out by my dad and I couldn't. They'd been so in love I thought it had always been that way.

"I never knew that."

My dad nodded. "That's my fault. I haven't been able to talk about her for so long and that's not fair to you. We should do that more often, talk about her. And everything we miss."

"I'd like that." My heart squeezed.

It felt like I was getting my father back. Finally. I'd missed him more than I admitted to myself. Even after all the shit, we went through I just wanted things to go back to normal. I saw the remorse in his eyes and maybe I was a little soft but if it wasn't for him...

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