Finding Fate

by Charisse Spiers

  Gabby’s dad starts rolling up his shirt sleeves, looking more like the devil than anyone I’ve ever seen. Fuck. With Maddox’s moral compass being so strong yet still having a temper with as much bite as bark, it’s like a reenactment of God and Satan going toe to toe before he was thrown out of Heaven for trying to overthrow God for power. This isn’t going to end well. I could understand this pissing contest for the girl if both were wanting her, but a father and her fiancé seems out of place.

  I look down at Sayler, who’s staring wide-eyed. As if she can feel me looking at her, she meets my gaze. “Go in another room. Presley too. Get my baby out of here.”

  “But—”

  “Now,” I snap, but Presley is already grabbing her hand and leading her toward the master bedroom, because she’s likely already picked up the dark vibe in the room. I follow her with my eyes as they walk toward Presley’s room, not taking my eyes off her until she’s out of sight.

  Konnor stands from where he’s been watching on the couch and walks around when Gabby’s dad takes a step toward Maddox, who’s stepping off the staircase. “I’m tired of you fucking my daughter. I thought I got rid of you, but you’re obviously too stupid to take a hint.”

  “Whoa, bruh,” Konnor says, like he’s talking to someone our age instead of someone old enough to be our dad. Probably his love for recreational weed use talking. “Don’t insult my friends in my house.”

  Maddox laughs sadistically, still walking forward, and all I can do is stare. It’s terrifying if you know him personally, because it’s out of character for him. Even at his angriest, he’s still the good guy with a temper. This version is dangerous, because I have no idea what to expect. He’s unpredictable, and with a guy of his size and temper, that’s not good. I’ve seen Maddox fight when he had nothing to lose and have never seen him come out on the losing end. With the way he’s acting, his love for Gabby being threatened, I’m afraid he’ll kill someone. “It’s cool, Konnor. It’s nothing more than salt on a wound. He cut me the day he said I raped her. Bet it pisses you off to know she jumped on my dick before I ever tried anything with her . . . Good pussy too. The best. Got me hook, line, and sinker before I even fell in love.

  A-done-ai? Adonis swings out, his knuckles striking Maddox’s cheek bone, throwing his head to the side from the impact. “I should bury you alive, boy.”

  Maddox hunches over, his back bowing out and muscles pumping up like he’s getting ready for a full-on fight. The one thing that holds true about Maddox—he never swings first. That way, he can ease his mother’s mind by telling her it was self-defense. But I really think it’s a trigger for his anger to take the first punch.

  He comes running at her dad, throwing his back into the closest wall so hard it shakes, his forearm pushed against Adonis’ throat as he puts all his weight into it. “What’s the matter? Scared I’ll get her pregnant again?” He laughs darkly. “Too late. Already fucking done that too. Maybe you should have put her on actual birth control instead of manipulating her so you could keep tabs on her location without her knowing. Diggin’ a deeper grave, pops. I loved her right. We’ll always find our way back, only this time, I’m not a scared eighteen-year-old. You’ll be lucky if you get to lay your eyes on my kid through a goddamn window. Put a finger on it and I’ll be the one doing the burying.”

  “You son of a bitch.” Her dad throws another punch, catching Maddox off guard enough to grab him by the neck, and places him in a headlock. “She was fourteen and pregnant, you little shit. On the verge of ruining her entire future. She clearly can’t think with you. She’s in too deep. She’ll amount to nothing and she deserves better! I did what was best for everyone.”

  Maddox growls out and elbows him in the stomach, causing his hold to loosen from his neck, and with the extra space his body twists around until he drives his shoulder into Adonis’ body like a football player, forcing him across the room. “I’d give her everything! I love her.”

  Glass shatters from something getting in the way of a swinging limb and falling to the hard floor. Me and Konnor both go running. It’s escalating. Konnor gets the door open just in time, a shoulder clipping the frame and they push and shove and hit, taking their brawl outside. Fists are flying so fast it’s hard to keep up with who’s hitting who, grunts and growls rotating back and forth.

  Konnor steps outside into the garage when his Tahoe takes a body in the door, before they end up in the driveway just beyond the raised door, on the ground. I press into the doorframe, the outside of my right arm running up the frame like a vine. I watch, staying put as Maddox uses his leg like a whip to force her dad to the ground, instantly straddling him. “Stop!”

  A piercing cry comes from behind me, and the second I glance back at her she’s running forward and trying to shove past me. Roping my arm around the front of her neck I pull her back to my front. She’s sobbing as she watches Maddox lay into her dad with punch after punch, not letting up. She grabs ahold of my forearm. “Please let me go, Riggan,” she cries hysterically. “Maddox!”

  “No. This has been coming for years. Let him get it out, Gabby, if you want him to be the best man for you. This is how men solve problems. We don’t do all that talking shit. And you’re pregnant. You’re crazy if you think I’m letting you anywhere near that. You fall and miscarry because you’re in the way and he’ll hate himself. You won’t pull him out of that.”

  She relaxes into me, her body shaking from how hard she’s crying. I hold her up. “I love them. I need them both. I can’t lose Maddox again, but he’s my dad. I know he has a sorry way of showing it, but things haven’t always been this way. What if he kills him?”

  “He knows when to stop.” I hope.

  As the thought runs through my mind, Maddox stands, his chest heaving, and then when her dad rolls to the side, he kicks him with his bare foot for good measure. “Find my fucking son before I press charges. I’m a Florida resident now. You don’t have pull here. I didn’t sign my name to shit. Better yet, fuck the charges. Find him or I’m putting a bullet in your skull.”

  He starts walking backward, and when he gets about halfway between her dad and us, he turns around, halting when his eyes lock on us. He finally starts walking again and stops a few feet short. His lip is bleeding and his face is swollen. His eye is starting to bruise already, and his cheek has a shiner. Blood is smeared across his chest.

  He’s barely holding it together inside. I’ve known Maddox my whole life near about. “If you leave with him after everything he’s done to us don’t come back and don’t contact me unless it’s to tell me to come to the hospital to watch my kid being born. I’ve done nothing but love you. I’ve been good to you. And I want to grow old with you. I want to give you kids. I’ll give you everything I’m capable of. Never step out on you. But after everything”—a tear slips down his cheek—“I don’t deserve to come second to someone out to destroy me all because I took one look at you and knew you were it for me. If that’s a crime I’ve done my time. I’m tired of being crucified. I’m ready to move on with my life . . . with you or without.”

  He shoves past us and keeps walking. Gabby places her palms on her face and silently sobs. Finally, she holds her head high and wipes her face, before pulling away to step outside. I let her go, stunned to see her walking toward her dad. “Gabby, are you serious?”

  She turns around, still walking, only backward, and shrugs her shoulders. “He’s my dad, Riggan. What do you expect me to do?”

  My brows rise, and when she turns away from me, I step inside and shut the door. I can’t watch anymore. The less I know when I have to tell him she left is better, because if he breaks this time there is no putting him back together. He’ll be in a braindead state of mind.

  Forty-Four

  Gabby

  I’ve never heard Maddox say anything remotely close to that in regard to me, and it hurts. The thought of him walking away from this is enough to make me question if I want to live another day. He’s one thing I�
��ve always been sure of, and he’s right. He doesn’t deserve any of the shit my dad has done to him. He’s never harmed a hair on my head. He’s never taken things further than I wanted them to go. He’s also a good guy in all areas that it counts. It’s time for me to make some choices I don’t want to have to make. It will never end if I don’t deal with it once and for all.

  I glance at my engagement ring as I walk toward my dad. I haven’t taken it off since the night Maddox slid it on my finger. I haven’t wanted to. There were plenty of times when I thought I’d never be here, so I sure as hell don’t want to go back. I’m going to wear his ring ‘til the day I die. If I can’t wear it for everyday activities, there is no sense in having it.

  My dad is sitting with his head bowed like he just needs a minute to recuperate. He’s no longer as young as us, and Maddox is strong. I’ve heard stories about him beating the shit out of guys double his physical size that depend on steroids for their muscular profile. There is no comparison to someone that works for their strength the old-fashioned way. Real muscle is a way of life, not a phase.

  I stop in front of him, silence opposite of peaceful for the first time. I hate that it’s come to this. I’ve stuck around through all of his bullshit because he’s my dad. I told myself he did some of the things he did for my own good, because of my age, regardless of how bad it hurt, but now I’m a grown woman. He can’t keep doing this and expect me to remain in his life. “Dad.”

  His jaw hardens, but then he finally looks up at me, and I have to take a deep breath when I see that his face looks worse than Maddox’s, even though my dad can hold his own. I’ve always known he wasn’t all bark. He used to tell me stories about how my grandfather would make him box with him to keep him sharp and hard. Weak men are frowned upon in my bloodline, but Maddox had a lot of pent-up anger, which means he was fighting with purpose.

  “Gabrielle,” he says, almost in relief. It adds another cut in my already broken heart. I swear on everything, when he takes me in, his eyes gloss over. “Your hair. It’s you.”

  I close my eyes. There it is. He hated when I dyed it black. Said I ruined my God-given beauty, even though his is black. His blonde-haired, brown-eyed little girl was perfect in every way. The rebel, not so much. He never told me no until I asked to be with Maddox, to then keep my son. After that I wanted nothing from him. He would give me any sum of money if he has it, but the things that mattered I couldn’t have. It’s a hard pill to swallow, even still. “I didn’t do this for you.”

  His eyes narrow. “For him?” he spits back at me like he has a bad taste in his mouth.

  “You aren’t the only one that likes me for who I am,” I tell him. His lips part, and I take his silence for a window. “Maddox is a lot like you in many ways, but you’d know that if you actually gave him a real chance. Most people don’t hate someone until they have a reason to, Dad, and for the life of me I can’t figure out why you’ve always hated him.”

  “He took the virginity of my thirteen-year-old! My little girl. You were too young. You can never get that back.”

  I laugh, already rolling my eyes as the night plays out in my mind. “He didn’t take anything. He didn’t even try to touch me! So many guys would make inappropriate comments at school, yet he didn’t make a single one. Talked about everything under the sun but getting in my pants. I wanted him to like me the way boys at school liked girls. I didn’t want to be his friend. It was all me. I gave it to him. It’s my body. I can do whatever the hell I want with it.”

  “We have traditions,” he barks. “And beliefs. It should be a gift to your husband on your wedding night.”

  “Dad! Would you stop living in the past? For most people that concept is ancient history! Just because I didn’t want to wait for marriage doesn’t mean I’m a whore. I’ve only had sex with one guy. We love each other. I’m tired of having to defend us to you. We want to be together, and we will be. Regardless of how many years go by our feelings will never change. He asked me to marry him. I’m going to whether you get on board or not. You can support my dream of getting married in a cathedral like you and Mom, like grandpa and grandma, or you don’t have to be involved at all and we can find somewhere to do it. I’m done with your smallminded thinking just because grandpa raised you that way. You can beat me, you can kidnap me, and you can trick me into things, but the fact of the matter is I’m an adult now. You have no control over me anymore. That’s the beauty of being born an American. I was free the day I turned eighteen, and I’m going to exercise my rights. I’m cutting you out of my life until you prove to me that you deserve to be in it.”

  “You wouldn’t.” His eyes harden on me, just like mine do so many times. I realized years ago that looking into his eyes is like looking into a mirror. Even though he doesn’t admit it, he knows we’re just alike, and I think that’s why he fights me so hard for control. He doesn’t like for me to have as much power as him. It would probably be different had I been a boy.

  I laugh. “Oh, but I would. I don’t need you or your money. I haven’t in a long time. The good memories kept me hanging on for you to change, but clearly you never will. I love you, Dad, but I was done the second I found out you had a chip placed under my skin.”

  “That was for your benefit! Do you know how many girls go missing to sex trafficking? Especially blondes?”

  “It was for yours! Had it been for mine you would have been honest with me. You told me it was birth control! Do you realize how many horrible things could have happened? I will never trust you again.”

  “You knew I didn’t believe in birth control. Your mother was never on it, and just because she had a bastard child doesn’t mean I changed my values. I can’t help that you don’t listen.”

  “I had just had a baby out of wedlock! As a teenager! Excuse me for thinking you wanted to prevent it from happening again. What if I had trusted the wrong person?!”

  “You’re a Thanos. You hardly trust anyone. You like your control too much.”

  While that may be true . . . “Because I’m just like you?”

  He snaps his jaw shut and rears his head back like I slapped him. “Loving someone doesn’t justify giving them everything, Gabrielle. Wake up and look around. You want me to tell you things? Isn’t that what you’ve always said? To be honest with you? Well, I’ll tell you that I fell in love with your mother before we were arranged to be married. I conned your grandfather into choosing her. Did my research. She had the background that would appeal to him. It took months of manipulating him to look at her. And you know where that got me? Marrying for love? She made a fool of me. She gave another man something that was mine. When I confronted her about the affair, she cried and begged for me not to leave her. I chose to forgive her. Then she fell pregnant. I gave her two options. She could get rid of it and we start over, or she could leave, but either way, she wasn’t taking you with her. She stepped out of our covenant, not me. I wasn’t raising another man’s kid. You know what she chose? She left. Just like that boy inside.”

  “You forced him! Don’t you dare compare him to Mom. He didn’t do anything wrong.”

  He pushes off the pavement and comes toward me, his shoulders square with mine. “I don’t want the same thing to happen to you. You were in too deep! That boy was nothing more than an undertow, quickly pulling you under. You had the same look in your eyes I did when she begged me to stay with her. I was protecting you! Did you really think you’d marry the boy you met at thirteen had the two of you stayed together? Use your head, Gabrielle. He was going to hurt you the second he graduated.”

  “He was different.”

  “They’re all the same. They want to sow their wild oats while they’re young. That involves girls in number. Boys will tell you anything to get what you were giving. I put it on me, so you didn’t have to experience that kind of pain.”

  I start to cry. My mind is overwhelmed. “That wasn’t for you to decide! Even if he had, it’s called growing pains, Dad. And maybe in your
mind you really believe you were protecting me, but that doesn’t explain you taking my son from me. I kept it from Maddox hoping you’d see how bad I wanted him and let me keep him. He was your grandson and you gave him away like he was a puppy. We could have raised him together. I know you wanted a son to carry on the family name. I’m not stupid.” My voice cracks and tears fall. Dad and I haven’t discussed Madden since I went back to school after he was born.

  “A son would have been fine had your mother been faithful. I don’t want one if it meant replacing you.” His eyes bore into mine like a killer. One look from him can instill fear into the most dangerous. “I gave that boy the length of your pregnancy to come for you. To stand up to me for you. To show me you were worth the risk and consequence. For you, not some circumstance like an illegitimate child. I’d calmed down by the time you found out you were pregnant.”

  I blink at him, my throat so thick I can’t swallow. “What?”

  “Had Maddox shown back up for you at any given point during your pregnancy like a man, despite the fact that I could press charges on him, I would have let you keep him. You think I was going to give him a jumpstart with a reason? You were the reason! He never came back. You were fifteen, goddammit! You weren’t going to make all the sacrifices while he partied and lived it up. You’re my priority. If it makes me the bad guy to make sure you have a future, then so be it. Just because you don’t know all the gory details of the adoption doesn’t mean I didn’t do my part when it comes to my blood. Any man that deserves you will do anything to get you. And everything I did to get you out of that mess was for nothing, because here you are pregnant again.”

  My mouth opens and I stare at him, tears streaming down my face. “How did you know?”