Page 51 of Unforgiving Queen

I should fucking call Kian and demand Darius be fired. It wouldn’t work, but fuck, it would give me a good excuse to go after their company. Darius even refused to collect a fee. I kept sending it, but he returned it each time without fail. We’d been playing this game for the past three years now.

Ironic, really. When my brother was kidnapped by Father’s rival, he’d refused to pay the fee.

My mind drifted back to that dark time. I should have been with Dante the day he’d been kidnapped. Instead, I was busy averting my cousin’s fucking disaster of a shipment that almost drowned fifty women he was trying to smuggle into Japan for his prostitution ring.

My gut twisted every time I remembered the footage of his kidnapping. Dante was ambushed on his way out of this very nightclub in Trieste. He’d fought like hell but ended up overpowered by a dozen men dressed in combat clothes and black balaclavas.

I watched as he was whacked on the side of his head. He attempted to fight, but his strength failed him, as did his blood-soaked face. They dragged him away and shoved him into a black van. He was gone for two weeks.

I went to pay the ransom myself—because our father refused—in exchange for my brother’s life. The brother I got back afterwards wasn’t the same. Father laughed it off, calling it the best thing that could have happened to Dante. He claimed it made him stronger.

It’d definitely made him crazier.

I’d tried to get him help and failed. Our mother had remained with him in the castle, ensuring he wouldn’t go days without eating. Or inflicting pain on himself. My brother thrived on pain in those days—his own as well as others’. He wanted to be in hell—no,neededto be in hell. Mother was the only one who could keep him from spiraling sometimes.

After that, he actually preferred to sleep in the basement. In the dark and cold, away from the world.

I’d visited as much as I could, but I’d rather have gouged my eyes out than sleep in that cursed home. The last time I slept in that fucking place was when I was sixteen.

A doorbell rang, pulling me from the memory of those dark times.

“It’s open,” I called out. I had a suspicion who it was. Only Dante, Hiroshi, and my mother had access to this building.

“Hello,musuko.” My mother’s soft voice traveled through my penthouse.

Taking a swig of water, I steeled myself and turned around, only to be greeted by her tension-filled eyes. We had grown distant over the last three years. I couldn’t look at her without seeing Reina’s shattered face. The way her shoulders had slumped and her soft sobs filled my Paris apartment. The images of her bloodied on the pavement and in the hospital haunted me every night. They were terrible enough without the reminder of who had caused this whole mess.

“Mother.”

She hadn’t changed. The years had been good to her despite the darkness that seemed to always surround her. The two men—Romero and Leone—who’d twisted her life into what they wanted.

I loved my mother, but I couldn’t forgive her for keeping such a big secret from me. Not because I gave a shit who my father was—one was no better than the other—but because it destroyed the little girl with hearts in her eyes.

“Are you here on Omertà business?” She nodded. “Dante said you two have been making progress eliminating human trafficking.” Dante had a big mouth. For the past three years, he’d wondered about the riff in our relationship, but my mother kept her promise. Only we knew the truth about my parentage.

“I went to Japan with Hiroshi and got new kimono designs,” she continued when I remained silent. She took a hesitant step forward, her face softening.

“I know, he only slacks on his duties when he’s with you,” I remarked, although there was no bite to my tone.

“I keep telling him maybe he should retire.”

I nodded, knowing full well Hiroshi would do whatever he wanted. “Are you two planning on getting married?”

She shook her head. “I’m still legally married to Romero.” And there it was. The dark cloud that hovered over us, unresolved and ominous.

“He won’t be around much longer,” I deadpanned. It didn’t matter whether I killed the old man, he would perish on his own. His cancer was eating him up.

Bitter amusement passed through me as silence stretched, masquerading as a calm acceptance, but it couldn’t conceal the volatile edge to the tension that bubbled between us.

“If I could go back and change it all, I would,” she said.

My mother hadn’t changed a bit in recent years. Or the last twenty years for that matter. Her dark hair was pulled up in two perfect buns on her head, similar to theodangostyle that had become popular in Japanese fashion. But it was the color of her kimono I hated. I had trained myself to ignore the color pink over the last three years. And the scent of cinnamon just about sent me into a fit of rage.

Yes, I had come to earn my fucking nickname.

“Amon, when will you forgive me?” She took another step forward, her posture stiff. “Please,musuko.It’s beenyears.”

Forgiveness. If only it were that easy.