The Pattels

by S. K. Hardy

  “I agree,” Lucas commented. “Since he’s the only male heir, Antonio thought he should’ve been the one to take over the operation once their father died, but that was never going to happen. Raul knew that Melania was the best person qualified to take his place and run their business. He always felt that his son was too weak, too soft.”

  “He is,” Isaac said. “Be that as it may, I can see why he betrayed his sister and took out his own family. He suspected all along that Melania was responsible for their father’s death. When he stumbled across information that confirmed it, he went to the rest of the family to expose her treacherous act only to find out that his mother and sisters were already aware of it. It was clear their loyalty was with Melania.”

  King shook his head and looked at Angel. “Luckily, when Antonio discovered her plot to kill your brother, he came to you and suggested you work together to take Melania out.”

  Angel nodded. “Antonio knew that if they killed his father they would one day turn on him. At that point, his family became collateral damage.”

  “Something has to be done about him,” Joseph interjected. “He needs to be eliminated. Antonio’s inability to lead such a powerful organization is hurting all of us.”

  “Luckily, the Loero’s feel the same way. They don’t want to lose our business, because I made it clear, subpar product or not, we’ll go somewhere else for our supply if it comes to that. I’m meeting with them in a couple of weeks to reiterate our position.” Angel glanced around the table. “Do we stand on solidarity with this?”

  Isaac nodded and answered for the Pattels. “Yes. We look forward to hearing the outcome of the meeting. The sooner, the better.”

  “Good. Now that we’ve finished that bit of business, I’d like to move on to something more personal.” Angel divided his attention between Joseph and Isaac. “My sister-in-law, Raven.”

  “That’s right. I heard she left the city,” Isaac said casually, leaning back in his chair.

  “She has. My wife is actually spending time with her now.”

  Hawk grew alert at that bit of information but forced himself to remain silent.

  “Good, good,” Isaac replied. “It was probably for the best that she get out of New York for a while.”

  Angel tilted his head to the side. “Really. Best for whom, Isaac? You? Your family?”

  CHAPTER 5

  This time it was Joseph who answered Angel’s question. “Best for everyone involved. I don’t think Ms. Randolph realized exactly what she was getting into when she began working for the DA’s office. It was no secret that we were going to do whatever needed to be done to regain the control we lost after Mills won the election. I’m sure you understand that, Angel. We waited long enough to make our move.”

  “That I can understand. But that doesn’t explain how the hell Raven got mixed up in your agenda to regain your standing. Mills should’ve been your target. You get control of Mills, you control his ADA’s.” Angel’s eyes narrowed. “Yet, you bypassed him and went directly to Raven. I want to know why.”

  “The fact that your sister-in-law aligned herself with the District Attorney’s office pitted her directly against the Pattels–and you, I might add. I would think those facts alone would’ve been reason enough.”

  “It was being dealt with.” Angel glanced at Hawk before directing his attention back to the elder Pattels. “My question is at what point did you feel it acceptable to drag Raven into your plans?”

  “Acceptable?” Isaac snorted. “Angel, I know she’s your wife’s sister, but please don’t make the mistake of thinking we were obligated to go through you to get your permission. We don’t owe you any explanations, my friend.” Isaac’s features hardened like stone “We handle our business however we see fit.”

  Angel’s eyes flashed molten hot before his thick lashes lowered briefly to shield his thoughts. He didn’t speak for several seconds, but once he began his tone told them exactly how furious he was. “So let me get this straight. The way you decided to ‘handle’ it was by using a member of my family to head up the DA’s office and report back to you? Is that what you’re saying?”

  “Come on now, Angel,” Isaac scoffed. “Since when have you considered Raven Randolph a part of your family? Everyone in this room knows how you feel about the woman.”

  “Let me spell this out as simply as I can put it for you.” Ignoring the anger that darkened Isaac’s face, Angel’s eyes never wavered. “Raven and I have had our differences, yes. But I don’t give a fuck what personal feelings I may have for her, by way of my wife, she’s part of my family. Going to her apartment and blackmailing her was bad enough. However, putting your got damn hands on her and threatening her?” Angel leaned forward, his eyes boring into Isaac’s. “Did you really think that would be okay with me? That I would just let that go? ”

  Hawk sat quietly listening, his anger simmering all over again with every word spoken but his head jerked up when he heard the last part of Angel’s statement. His eyes fell on Angel’s face. “Wait, what did you say? Who put their hands on Raven?”

  Angel’s head slowly swiveled around to give Hawk a piercing stare. “You didn’t know.”

  “Didn’t know what? Did someone...” Hawk’s glare bounced back to his uncle. In his head, he played out the scene he walked in on that night at Pattel Manor. Isaac towering over Raven with fists clenched, the gleam of murder glowing darkly in his eyes. Raven cringing in the chair, obviously shaken and scared, but still defiant...

  Hawk’s body grew taut with one muscle tightening at a time. He had been angry before but this time was different. This time it wasn’t a raging fire. It was a frozen fury that was disturbingly conscious. Deliberate. He didn’t see the person in front of him as his uncle; he saw him as a man who tried to harm his woman.

  “What did you do?” Hawk asked Isaac with dangerous intensity.

  Isaac remained seated. He returned Hawk’s stare with a touch of amusement but didn’t answer. His attitude melted Hawk’s anger. He sprang out of his chair, his focus was on one thing and one thing only: getting to Isaac.

  “Hawk!” Lucas jumped up and grabbed his brother, but let out a string of loud curses when Hawk drove a shoulder into his chest and knocked him out of the way. “Fuck!”

  Two of Isaac’s men jumped into action and surrounded the unconcerned patriarch who still remained seated. Hawk didn’t pause. He’d go through all of them if necessary, and would have if King hadn’t grabbed him from behind.

  Knowing how lethal Hawk could be, King snapped at a couple of other men in the room. “Can I get some fuckin’ help here?”

  Hawk had almost broken free when two more burly bodyguards converged on him as well. He managed to land a couple of well-placed punches before they finally managed to subdue him and pin him against the wall.

  “Alright, alright!” Hawk growled, struggling to get free. “I’m good. Let me go!”

  “Not until you calm down!” King grunted. “This ain’t the way to deal with this!”

  “I’m good, King. Now get the fuck off me!”

  “Let him go!” Joseph slowly rose from his chair. He was so angry the veins in his neck bulged at his skin’s surface. His eyes stayed locked on his youngest son as he walked towards him. The two men restraining Hawk’s arms hesitated before carefully releasing him and stepping back.

  King was the last to let go. “You good?” he asked in a low voice.

  “I’m fine,” Hawk snarled.

  “Hawk–”

  “I said I’m fine, King!”

  Exhaling slowly, King reluctantly let go of the hold he had on Hawk, but made sure to remain close.

  Joseph’s lips barely moved when he spoke. “What in tha’ hell is wrong with you? All of this over a woman who wants nothing more to do with you?”

  “And why is that, huh!” Hawk snapped, pacing back and forth, his eyes trained on Isaac. “What do you think happened that finally pushed her over the edge, Pop? Tell me.”


  “Raven Randolph has been nothing but trouble from the moment you met her. Look at the way you’re behaving. She’s not even here and she’s coming between this family! What is it going to take to get you to see that?”

  “She’s coming between us? And I guess the two of you had nothing to do with that, right?” Hawk’s eyes bore into his father as he tried to downplay their part in it.

  “The woman’s exaggerating,” Isaac said dismissively. Standing up, he shoved his soldier out of the way so that he could look at Hawk face to face. He ignored the storm brewing in Hawk’s eyes that told him he was treading on very dangerous ground. “Did she look as if I’d hurt her in any way when you arrived? No. She didn’t.” He turned his glare towards Angel. “And if any threats were made they were made by your sister-in-law. Maybe my temper momentarily got the best of me, but I didn’t do anything you haven’t done yourself.”

  Hawk stood with his chest heaving and stabbed a finger at Isaac. “We’re not talking about him we’re talking about you!”

  He was trying so hard to quell the rage hissing through his veins because if it broke free and struck out at his uncle the consequences would be fatal to their family. Deliberately unclenching his fists, he flexed his fingers and edged back a step to put some space between them.

  “I’m begging you. Begging you. Please, please don’t make us revisit this conversation again.”

  “Boy, this is the second time you’ve more or less threatened me about that woman. Words alone with nothing to back them up are meaningless,” Isaac taunted. The tension in the room kicked up a notch because everyone there knew a challenge had just been issued. “They lose their credibility unless you plan to take tangible action.”

  Although his temper hung by a thread, Hawk’s lips tugged upwards in an intentional smirk. “You taught us a long time ago that empty threats are the same as pointing a gun at someone and not pulling the trigger.” The smirk he wore slowly turned to a snarl. “Touch her again. We’ll see how ‘meaningless and credible’ my threats are then.”

  Teeth bared, Isaac took a menacing step forward, but a question from Angel brought him to a sudden halt. “I’m curious. Exactly what kind of threats did Raven issue that would set you off like that?”

  Turning around, Isaac’s brows drew together and bunched over the narrowed slits of his eyes. “Maybe you should ask her.”

  “Oh, I don’t think that’s necessary. As a matter of fact, I think you and I understand one another.” The whisper of a smile shadowing Angel’s mouth hinted that he knew more than he disclosed. “I’ll be in touch after I find out what’s going on with our connect. Until then, take care gentlemen,” he said, standing to leave. His eyes slanted towards Hawk as he started for the door. “Walk with me.”

  CHAPTER 6

  Hawk hesitated, his gaze still on Isaac, but reluctantly followed Angel out the door. They were silent as they made their way through the restaurant. Once outside, Big Dre, Angel’s long time driver, got out of the car and stood by the back door with hands clasped in front of him waiting for his boss. Angel lifted his chin to indicate he’d be a minute. He and Hawk slowly started walking down the sidewalk with two of his bodyguards following several feet behind.

  Angel gave him a quick glance. “You look like shit.”

  Hawk responded sarcastically. “Thanks. Appreciate that.”

  Silence sat between them until Angel spoke. “So you didn’t know how far things went that night.”

  “Of course I didn’t. I never got a chance to find out. Everything moved so fast. I planned on going to Raven’s apartment later on, but...” He cast a veiled look Angel’s way. They both knew how that worked out.

  “You know, the first time I saw you and Raven together, I noticed the attraction between the two of you even though you were both busy taking shots at each other.”

  Hawk smiled reluctantly. “I remember.”

  “Raven is normally cool and collected, but with you she was anything but. That’s why I came to you and suggested you distract her as a way of keeping her occupied. After you saw her at Giuliani’s trial, you called me, told me you wanted to cancel the arrangement. I had a feeling why so I respected that. Things seemed to be going well between the two of you, then months later my wife gets a hysterical phone call from her sister. She’s inconsolable, Raven’s inconsolable...” Angel shook his head. Ignoring the late night crowd flowing like water around them, he stopped and turned to look at Hawk. “I asked you before but you wouldn’t answer me so I’ll ask again now: What happened that night? And where the hell were you?”

  Hawk stared over Angel’s shoulder before finally sighing heavily and meeting his direct gaze. “They waited until I was on the jet to Miami to do that. When Raven called and told me what was going on, I turned the plane around midflight. I told her I was on my way back and to wait for me at her apartment, but of course she didn’t listen.” Hawk’s clenched teeth cut off the remainder of thoughts. He still remembered the feeling of helplessness at being thousands of miles away and unable to protect her. Swallowing hard, he looked away and forced himself to continue. “By the time I made it to Pattel Manor all hell had already broken loose between Raven, my father, and my uncle. I knew some shit had popped off but I didn’t know what.”

  Hawk’s chest grew tight when he thought about how scared Raven must have been, how alone she must have felt. It ate at him that he hadn’t been there to shield her from his family. Her safety was the reason he’d put eyes on her. With the life he led, he never knew who might be watching them, trying to get to her as a way to hurt him. Men in his position were constantly on the alert for trouble. He was used to it. Even even though he knew Raven took precautions because of her profession, his lifestyle was on a completely different level and a lot more dangerous. Hawk did everything in his power to keep her safe. Looks like the people he should’ve been trying to protect her from were his own damn family.

  “What did she say happened?” Hawk forced himself to ask the question. He had to know. “What did they do?”

  “He was more rough with her than anything else, but even that is unacceptable. Luckily for Isaac it wasn’t worse than that.”

  “Yeah, he and I still got some unfinished business. The same with my Pops. I’ll deal with them when I go back, but as for Raven...she saw a side of me that I think she’d convinced herself didn’t exist.” Hawk pictured the disgust on her face right before she left. It haunted him every night and refused to give him peace. “I don’t know how to fix this, Angel. I’m not even sure that I can.”

  Angel was silent for several seconds before answering. “It’s not going to be easy. I went through the same thing with my wife when she realized it wasn’t as simple to get out of this life as she anticipated; it inevitably came between us. We separated for a while because she refused to accept who I was and I wasn’t going to change.”

  “But she got past it, obviously.”

  “Yes. Nikki and I had the advantage of history, though. We’ve known each other since we were kids. She knew me before I was a crime boss who went by the name of Angelo LaCroix. That helped.” His expression turned thoughtful as something occurred to him. “Nikki and Raven were raised so far from this type of life that it isn’t funny, yet...”

  “Yet they fell for men who are imbedded in it so deep that even if we wanted to leave, it would damn near be impossible.” Hawk finished Angels sentence because the thought had occurred to him as well. “Not to mention it’s been Raven’s number one priority to put us in jail from the moment I met her.”

  “Yes. There is that,” Angel said with a touch of amusement as they turned around to walk back in the direction of his car.

  “I’m sure whatever walls I was able to knock down have been rebuilt with concrete enforcement by now. I don’t even know where to fuckin’ start to chip away at them again.”

  “I won’t sugarcoat things. It’s going to be hard to get past the defenses she’s had time to build. She was determined to lea
ve that night, Hawk. At least this way, I knew she was safe. Protected.”

  Hawk had never looked at it that way. It made a lot of sense. If she’d left, running away from him and something happened before he could get to her he never would’ve forgiven himself.

  “Hawk, listen to me. You’re right. The fact that she was forced to resign from a job she worked her entire career to build will make things more difficult–but not impossible. Raven cares deeply for you. I saw how she reacted to you at my son’s party. The way she sounded when I spoke to her the night she left told me this affected her in a way that only a woman in love could be hurt.”

  “You think Raven’s in love with me...” The skepticism was thick in Hawk’s voice. At one time he may have believed that but not now.

  Angel let out a chuckle as they came to a stop by his car. “I know women, my friend. She was in love with you before even she even realized it. Nikki said the same thing.”

  Hawk was quiet for a moment and let that sank in. “So how am I gonna fix this?”

  “For one thing, you can’t ‘chip away’ at the bricks of her defenses. You’ll never get through. You need to use every arsenal you possess to get her back. She might not like your tactics, but hey...” Angel shrugged. “You do what you have to do.”

  He glanced at Big Dre and gave him an imperceptible nod to let him know he was ready. However, before he got in the car, Angel pulled out his cell and started typing. Seconds later, Hawk’s phone buzzed. Hawk frowned when he saw that it was a text from Angel that contained a phone number.

  “She’s still on my island,” Angel said. “You can reach her there.”

  Hawk stared at the number for several seconds. His heartbeat accelerated at the prospect of finally hearing Raven’s voice in a few short moments. He glanced up at Angel. “Thank you. I appreciate this.”

  “I know. Just don’t fuck it up.”

  With those words, Angel slid inside the back of the luxury car. After Dre closed the door and got behind the wheel, they pulled out into the flow of the ever moving Manhattan traffic. A black SUV with dark tinted windows that carried his soldiers inched closely behind.