Page 76 of Aaron's Patience

“No! No! I never–”

“Don’t fucking lie to me!”

“I swear! I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Releasing her, I took a step back and stared at her intently. She shook like a leaf.

“Who’d you have do it? Who’d you send to Oakland to attack her?” That fucker was going to die a slow, painful death. I prayed to whatever God there was to grant me that ability to kill someone twice.

“N-no one! I didn’t even know she was in California!” Alicia ducked when I advanced on her again.

“She’s telling the truth, Aaron!”

I peered up, toward the corner of the empty basement of a supposed abandoned house. Townsend Industries owned the home via dummy corporations on our real estate side. It was untraceable back to me but useful for situations such as this one. It wasn’t the first time I’d found myself down in this dank basement but this was the most meaningful.

Emma.

She stood at the corner, worried eyes on me. “Don’t do this. Alicia’s telling the truth. She didn’t have Patience attacked.”

My chest heaved up and down as I let her words sink in. I stepped back, turning my gaze from Emma to Alicia who eyed me warily.

“Please, Aaron. I-I didn’t do it.”

Again, her pleas barely stirred up any emotion in me besides rage but I took another step back. I’d never trust my ex, but Emma…she was a different story.

“You’re still partly to blame for what happened,” I seethed. “If you wouldn’t have sent her away, she would’ve never been in that fucking city. Alone.” I was nearly choking on my anger and helplessness. “That, I won’t forgive.” I shook my head at the impossibility.

“Wh-what does that m-mean?” she stuttered.

“I’m calling the Razzioli family.”

“No!”

“Aaron, don’t!” both Alicia and Emma shouted.

“Your protection by the Townsends has ended. Our debts to your father have been paid in full. We’re done!”

The Razziolis were one of the most notable crime families in the country. Alicia and her father had screwed the family over nearly ten years prior. She was only granted the opportunity to live this long because of my family. That had just ended.

“Aaron, pl–”

“Don’t say my fucking name! Ever again!” I stormed over to the wall where I’d tossed my suit jacket and Patek Philippe, not giving a fuck that it alone was worth more than the entire house, picking them up.

I moved to the door, yanking it open to see my head of security standing there. Even I had to look up to meet his eyes. His stern look went from me to over my shoulder, and narrowed when he saw Alicia.

“Call the Razziolis,” I instructed before brushing past him, not giving a solitary fuck about Alicia’s cries and yells for me not to do this. I had sacrificed myself for my family and the business once before and it nearly cost Patience and my children their lives. If she had been with me, she never would’ve been attacked. I was due into the office but there was no way I could hold it together in the state I was in.

Instead of having my driver take me into the office, I had him take me home. There I let off the anger that continued to radiate through my body by going nine rounds with my punching bag. When my arms felt too heavy to lift any longer, I opted for a five mile run. Not until I reached the house did I begin to feel the anger lifting ever so slightly. It also helped that at the same time I received a text from my head of security that the package had been delivered. Meaning, Alicia had been taken care of.

“She didn’t deserve that you know.”

I slammed the refrigerator door shut in the kitchen and angrily pointed the bottle of water I held in my hand at Emma. “Trust me, that’s not half of what I wanted to do to her. And if you were more than just a figment of my goddamn imagination, I would’ve done more to you, too!” I growled.

Emma sighed, shaking her head. “After all these years, that’s all I am to you? A figment of your imagination? Aaron, you know that isn’t true.”

I grunted, slamming the bottle onto the kitchen counter, and brushed past Emma, heading to the front of the house toward the stairs, to take my second shower of the day.

“Aaron, listen to me!”