85

Allison
Gregory is relentless on the flight back to Portland.
He drills me, over and over, from every conceivable angle, until my head’s aching and I’m exhausted.
“Tell me again the suppliers your father prefers,” he says, flipping through a notebook filled with his tight, neat handwriting. “Start from the top.”
“I can’t do it anymore,” I complain, spreading my legs out and leaning back. “We’ve been talking for three hours straight. Please, I need a break.”
“You’ll have a break when Paul’s dead and I own the marijuana business on the West Coast.”
“Maybe I’d be better off dead then. I think I married the wrong guy.”
“We’re very high up in the sky, you know.” His face is utterly deadpan as he speaks. “If you’d rather get off the plane, we can arrange that.”
I wave him away. “Don’t tempt me.”
“Tell me the suppliers.”
“Doctor Seuss. Donald Duck. Magic Johnson.”
“Wife.” He says the word like a growl in his throat.
I laugh sharply at him. “Oh, now you’re going to play the marriage card? I thought you were the emotionless robot that doesn’t care about family, babies, or any of that crap?”
“I care about what’s important. Right now, this is important.” He jabs his pen at the book. “Suppliers. Now.”
“I’ve never met someone so disconnected from reality in my life. Seriously, you were like a totally different person out at dinner with your family.”
“I don’t want to talk about them anymore,” he says through his teeth. “I want to talk about the suppliers your father uses.”
“I tell you that your brothers are interested in your happiness, and that it’s going to break their hearts when you and I split up, and your response is basically, so fucking what. Who the hell thinks like that?”
“Allison,” he says, tone warning now. “Enough.”
“I know you’re not exactly running around emoting all the time, and that’s totally fine. But the guy I know has at least some-” I hesitate, not sure how to describe it. “You have feelings. They’re there.”
I saw them. Hell, I felt them, just the night before. The man I slept with was passionate, starving for me. Maybe that’s not the normal, day-to-day Gregory, that’s only the night-time Gregory, the ravenous animal Gregory feeding on his pretty wife-slash-prey, but even still.
He was so strange at that dinner. Like he turned off all his outward expressions and let the meal happen around him. When I tried to push back afterward, tried to get him to see that his family cares about him and maybe he should care about them too, he all but blew me off.
At least I pissed him off. Anger’s annoying, but it’s an emotion at least.
“My relationship with my family is complicated,” he says after a long pause. “I would very much appreciate getting back to the job.”
I close my eyes and shake my head. “No thanks. We’ve got about an hour left. Wake me up when we land.”
I expect him to fight me. He’s done nothing but impose his will on everything I’ve wanted since we got married. This time, he says nothing, and when I peek at him, I find he’s reading over his notes and ignoring me the best he can.
Which I consider a small victory.
“From now on, this will be home.” Gregory unlocks the door to an incredible turn-of-the-century house right in the middle of the Alphabet District. Tall, wrought-iron fence draped with greenery and vines separate the gorgeous brown-and-tan facade from the city. I stare at the original hardwood floors, at the details that have to be at least a century old. Fireplaces with ancient tiles, an updated kitchen alongside a narrow living area, and more rooms and hallways than any modern house.
“Since when did you have a place like this?” I laugh stupidly as I help myself to a little tour. “Last I saw, you were living out of a suitcase in a rundown motel.”
“I had my people in the city purchase this for me.” He says it as if buying a multi-million-dollar home in a day is no big deal.
Which it probably isn’t for a guy like him.
“You realize this place is obscene? You could’ve gotten, like, a condo or something. It’s not like we’ll be raising a family here. We don’t need all this space.”
“Did you want a condo?” He walks up the stairs. “It’s not too late. I can buy one of those as well.”
“That’s not what I meant,” I say quickly, not too proud to backtrack. “This place is amazing. Seriously, it’s almost a little too amazing.”
He shows me the large master bedroom. There’s only one piece of furniture: a large, four-poster bed, already with crisp dark sheets. There’s a big closet, an updated bathroom, and a lovely bay window overlooking the street.
“We sleep here,” he says, gesturing to the bed. “Which side do you prefer?”
“That’s it? You’re just going to grunt it at me like a caveman? I could always take a different room, you know.”
“No, you can’t. Don’t forget our contract.”
“Did you really put in language about what bed I’d sleep in?”
“Absolutely. Yes.”
“Great. You’re a dream.” I walk to the window and look out. Down below, people walk past, going about their lives, unaware of the enormous change happening inside of me. “It’s weird being in here, you know.”
“How’s that?”
“Portland’s my city. I grew up in this place. My father’s business is here, my life used to be here. But now it’s like I’m an invading stranger.”
“I’m the stranger. You’re the local. That’s why I married you.”
I resist the urge to tell him off, which is a first. I must be growing. “You know what I’m saying.”
“You’re concerned,” he says, the understatement of a century. “This is difficult for you.”
“Are you doing your robot thing again?”
His eyes narrow. “I’m trying to empathize.”
“You’re terrible at it.”
“Don’t be difficult for no reason. I’ll drag you over here, lay you across my knee-”
“And what?” I say, glaring now. “You’re going to spank me?”
“Damn right I am.” He slowly stands up.
I back away, heart racing. Based on the look he’s giving me, I’m pretty sure he’ll do it.
And the sick part? I might actually want him to.
“Let’s skip the corporal punishment,” I say quickly, turning away to look out the window again. I really need to get myself together. If I’m going to freak every time he says something vaguely menacing and sexual, I’m going to be on edge a whole lot. “What do we do now that we’re back?”
“First, we need to meet with your father and find out where he stands.”
I let out a sharp, surprised laugh. “We both know where that is. He stands with a bunch of thugs that tried to murder us.”
“That was a day ago. Things change. I’ve already learned that there’s tension between your father and Paul.”
“How the hell do you know that?”
“I haven’t been sitting around biding my time. I built a network.”
“A network.” I press my forehead against the glass. It’s cold and smooth. “Great. A network.”
“This is going to work, princess, but we have to act fast.”
“I don’t want to see my father.”
“Too damn bad. I’ve already set the meeting for later today.”
I whirl on him. “Without asking me?”
“I knew you’d react like this.” His face shows me nothing. The man can really shut it down when he wants to, which is beyond infuriating.
I advance on him. “I’m not going.”
“You absolutely are.”
“No, Gregory. You’re not springing big meetings with my own damn family on me out of the blue without discussing things first. We’re partners in this.”
“Actually, that’s where you’re wrong.” He meets me halfway, grabbing me roughly by the lower back as he pulls me into him. I release a surprised whimper. I expected him to keep his distance, but instead, he’s grabbing onto me like he’s about to do something very filthy. Like follow through with that spanking threat.
“Is that how this is going to go? You do whatever you want and I’m expected to follow along? I thought you were offering me revenge. Not letting me watch while you took care of everything.”
He makes a small noise in the back of his throat as his thumb brushes down my cheek. “Tell me something, and please, be honest. If I had Paul here in this room down on his knees, and I gave you a gun, would you be able to pull the trigger? Could you take the man’s life?”
I try to squirm away, but he doesn’t release me. “That’s a stupid scenario.”
“That’s what we’re doing.” His voice hardens. “I’m not putting you in that position, princess. I’m taking the burden away. I’m the trigger and the gun. All you have to do is help point me in the right direction.”
I stop fighting and look into his face. I think there’s a glimmer of something beneath the mask, a painful emotion, like a tension’s underpinning everything. I cock my head, trying to find another glimpse, but he’s under control a second later, and I’m not sure if there was ever something at all.
“All right,” I say after a tense moment.
“All right, what?”
“We’ll meet with my father.”
He releases me. “That was never in question.”
“Prick.” I put space between us. “I need things. Clothes, toiletries, that stuff.”
“Make a list. I’ll pass it along to my people.”
“You keep mentioning people, a network, whatever. Where was all that when we ran from the wedding?”
“Busy. You do recall we met on a whim.”
“Good point.” I rub my face. “This is all so messed up.”
“I’m sure it seems that way from your perspective. From where I’m standing, this is just another job.” He moves to the bedroom door. “You have an hour. We’re meeting your father at a cafe in the middle of downtown.”
“Where are you going?”
“To scout out the location and start hiring more muscle. We have the Callahan family backing us now, my pretty little wife. It’s time to start tearing this city to pieces.”
He leaves me standing alone in the bedroom. I cross my arms around myself, looking away. “Dramatic,” I mutter, but chew on my lip.
My emotions are still frayed and seeing my father won’t make anything better, but Gregory’s right. We need to know the situation, and if there’s anyone involved in this city that might possibly be willing to help, Papa’s still our best shot. And even if he’s not interested, I suspect Gregory can get what he wants out of him, and there’s a part of me that wants to see it happen.
“Now, to make this place look less like a haunted prison and more like a home,” I say with a sigh, and start on that list.