Page 4 of Labria

“How long have you been standing there?”

“Long enough.” I dropped my shoes on the hardwood floor and crossed my arms below my chest.

“How was your day?”

The nerve. “Okay, until now.”

He finally recognized my curtness and stopped packing to regard me carefully. “I’m sorry. I have to go on a quick trip back to Chicago. It’s business.”

“Bregoli business?” I shook my head from side to side. What I wouldn’t give to never hear that surname again.

He continued putting his things in his suitcase. “Yes, but while I’m there, I will go check in with Christian to see how everything’s going with my companies. I can also go visit Gram. It’s a quick trip. I’ll be right back in a day or so.”

When I didn’t bother to respond, Lord stopped packing and stood at the foot of the bed regarding me cautiously.

“Bria, are you okay? Talk.”

“Hell no, I’m not okay. Do you look okay?”

“You look beautiful.”

I rolled my eyes. “I heard your conversation.”

Lord’s neutral face drooped a little, but his eyebrows hitched high on his forehead. He clinched his jaw. If I were to guess, I would guess he was thinking up a lie.

“What did you hear?”

“It doesn’t matter what I heard. It’s what you need to tell me. You need to be forthcoming with information.”

“We had an agreement. You said you didn’t want to know. So I wasn’t going to involve you in this mafia business. We agreed it was best that you don’t know anything. If you’re ever questioned by any law enforcement agencies, you can honestly not have any answers.”

I chuckled a little. This joker always had an answer. He knew I didn’t give a shit about this mafia business. What I overheard had to do with my personal safety and well being. I cared about myself. I cared about him. I didn’t give a shit about the Bregoli’s and this bullshit empire they created.

“That agreement is void if it has to directly do with me, or affect me.”

“Now you want to change the agreement. I’m not a fucking mind reader. You told me to leave you out of Bregoli Mafioso business.”

“Lord, what you’re not gonna to do is twist shit around on me.”

“I’m not trying to do that.”

“I am only alive, here in this house, talking to you, because my sister decided to drop me off at Midway airport. Don’t act dumb. If I would’ve gotten into the car with Lefty, I would be fuckin’ dead.”

“But you didn’t get in the car with Lefty, and you are alive and well. You’re here with me now. That’s all that matters.”

I wanted to run toward him and claw his blue devil eyes out of the sockets. “You can’t be serious.”

“Look Bria, I can’t turn back time. I wasn’t even there when this shit happened.”

“You can tell me the truth so I can watch my back.”

“I’m not trying to have you live in fear for your life. We started a life here together. I don’t want you to be afraid twenty-four-seven.”

“Haaa.”

“You’re not a target. No one was trying to kill you.”

“It doesn’t matter who they were trying to kill. I was supposed to be in that car. I could’ve died. I don’t understand how you can just go on with your day, your weeks, your fucking months like I didn’t need to have this particular information. We talked about this. Withholding information from me is the same as lying.”

---