His father shook his head in return. “She’s a smart child, Kyle,” he argued. “I know she’s not mistaken, so you may as well not waste your time denying it.”
“I’m fine,” he lied. “I’m not having nightmares.”
That was an even bigger lie.
Don’t get him wrong, he would talk about it with his father, when the time was right, but right now, Kyle wanted to make sense of the dreams himself. He wanted to really figure out if they were dreams … or memories.
So, being the ever smooth operator he was, Kyle decided to let his father torture him about something other than his dreams.
“I’ve … uhh,” he started, then hesitated, suddenly regretting his decision to deter the conversation. Maybe he had time to put the focus back on the dreams.
“You’ve … what, son?”
Kyle looked up from his thoughts when his father said the words, and paused at the even deeper concern he saw in his eyes.
Dammit.
No, there was no way he could discuss those dreams with his father, at least not tonight. Taking a deep breath, Kyle moved forward with his original plan. His father seemed in good spirits tonight, there was no need to tamper with old wounds.
“It’s … a woman,” Kyle confessed. It wasn’t as if it weren’t true. Kyle had been sleep deprived this week because of a woman … two women actually, just for very different reasons. Aniyah, because he didn’t want her, he wanted Reanna; and Reanna, because he didn’t have her, and he wanted her more and more with each passing second.
Okay, maybe the reasons weren’t that different.
“A woman?” his father asked in disbelief.
His disbelief was understandable; Kyle didn’t talk about his love life much … actually, he didn’t talk about it at all. He kept his private life very private, even when it came to his family. Kyle didn’t even think his father knew he was seeing anyone.
Nodding his head, Kyle sat back in his seat. “Yes, a woman …” He cleared his throat.
“The secretary?” his father asked.
Kyle frowned. “Yes … and how did you know that?” He hadn’t remembered telling his father about Aniyah.
His father smirked, a smug smile in his eyes. “I know everything about you, Kyle. Even the shit you don’t want me to know. I’m your father …”
Kyle’s lips pressed into a line. Okay, maybe he wasn’t too good at keeping his private life private after all.
“What about the girl, son?” Cesare continued. “You’ve been with her for a while. Do you think you’re finally ready?”
A brightness entered his father’s eyes when he asked the confusing question.
“Ready for what?” Kyle asked, slightly cocking his head to the side.
Cesare chuckled, reaching over to slap Kyle’s leg. “Ready for what … To settle down, boy! What do you think? Anastacia and I didn’t buy this mansion for just she, Cami, and I. We want more grandchildren.”
When Kyle’s eyes widened slightly at the mention of more children, Cesare rolled his eyes, then continued to ramble.
“We figured you were our only hope for more since Nathan and Carter already have four, Gabriel’s unwed, and your brother’s still fucking around with that chef every now and then. We’ve been waiting for you to bring her by, but you’ve barely said three words about the girl, and Sofia said she doesn’t even know her.” He frowned. “That surprises me, too, son. If you’re in love with the woman, you may want to introduce her to Sofia.” He smiled. “To see how the two interact with each other, eh? After all, she will be the child’s mother once you marry her—”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa!” Kyle exclaimed, waving his hands in effort to stop his crazy father’s babbling. “Calm the hell down, Pop. Let me get word in, will ya?”
The man was cackling on and on, and Kyle had no damn idea what the oldie was taking about in the first place! Who in fiery hell said he was in love with Aniyah? He didn’t love that woman … hell, as of late he couldn’t even fucking stand to be around her. She’d been getting on his fucking nerves, calling him all hours of the goddamn day. And demanding shit that he just couldn’t give to her; time, attention … more than what he’d already given. She’d made the mistake of trying to turn their easy, limited relationship into something more than what it was. Now Kyle couldn’t stomach being around her.
“I am not in love with Aniyah, Pop.” Far from it. “I haven’t even talked to her in weeks.”
Jesus! The old man and his wife were insane when it came to the possibility of having more grandchildren to run around their oversized mansion—
His brief thoughts ended with an abrupt shout when his father, full force, smacked him across his head.
Looking up, Kyle held the back of his head and stared up at his father in outrage. What the fuck? When the hell had the old motherfucker gotten out of his chair?
Kyle huffed. That son of a bitch. “What in all the fucking hell— Wait!”
Again!
The motherfucker reared back and smacked Kyle again, then again, and again … Kyle had to jump up from his seat and run to the opposite side of the damn office. Once he got away, he whipped around and pinned the old man with a glare.
“What the fuck, Cesare?”
Straightening himself, Cesare smiled. “Is everything all right, son?”
Kyle blinked. “What the fuck is wrong with you?” he shouted. “Have you lost your mind?” Was the man teetering on the edge of insanity? Did he forget to take his meds? Was he having a ‘senior moment’?
His head cocked to the side. “Oh,” he chuckled, “did I hurt you?”
Violently raking his fingers through his hair, Kyle growled. “Yes!” he shot through clenched teeth. His head was fucking pounding.
“I apologize. I didn’t mean to hurt you, just teach you.”
Teach me? “Teach me what?” What the hell could spontaneously beating the shit out of him teach him?
He clasped his hands in front of him and shrugged. “Just a small lesson on how much it hurts …”
Kyle’s frown of confusion only deepened at that. He was lost. “What hurts?”
That’s when the smile disappeared from his father’s face, and his expression once again became serious. “Losing the woman your heart truly desires,” he answered, never taking his eyes from Kyle. “Actually, take that and multiply it by ten.”
Kyle paused for a moment, still confused by his father’s point. He’d told him he didn’t love, Aniyah. “Pop, I said I’m not—”
“I am not talking about the damn secretary, Kyle,” Cesare interjected. He crossed the room and stood directly in front of Kyle, prompting him to take a step back. “You think I’m stupid?” He lightly slapped his head once more. “I’m your father, Kyle!” he yelled, then pressed his finger to Kyle’s heart. “I know everything about you. Even what you do not know about yourself.”
After staring him down for a long, silent moment, Cesare turned away from Kyle, walking back to his seat.
“You cannot even deny it, though your eyes tell me you wish you could. You are in love with a woman that you will not allow yourself to have. This is why you suffer …”
Kyle shook his head. “But there has to be some other explanation than that,” Kyle argued in obvious denial.
Cesare nodded. “Then tell me how you feel about her, Kyle.”
Kyle flinched in disgust at the command. “How I feel?” Fuck no. Kyle didn’t discuss feelings; it was a waste of time. Instead, he kept them buried, just like any other self-respecting man would.
“Do as I say, son,” his father ordered, narrowing his eyes on him. “I’ll get the truth out of you one way or the other …”
Kyle rolled his eyes. Fine. If talking about his fucked up feelings could get his father to be a little less violent then so be it. “My feelings don’t make any sense to me. I don’t know what it is about her, I just …” His features tightened as he shook his head back and forth. “I can’t stop thinking about her.
I can’t eat, sleep … sometimes I feel like I’m suffocating when she’s not around. It’s fucking confusing. I don’t understand how she has this much power over me.”
He looked to his father to gauge his reaction to his words and was met with the man’s deadpan expression.
“Kyle—”
He cut off his father with a swipe of his hand. “No, Pop. Love is a … huge word. I’m not ready for it.”
“Son, you are both in love, and you are ready for it. More than ready.”
Kyle sighed, and tried to appeal to his father. “Pop, while I’m not dismissing the possibility of love developing between us, do you not think that saying that I love Reanna is a bit much? I mean, I’ve never even kissed the woman before.”
“I fell in love with Ana before I even kissed her cheek, Kyle.” He shook his head. “A kiss has nothing to do with it. You can kiss anyone.”
“But—”
Cesare gave a wave of his hand, cutting Kyle off. “But nothing, boy. You love her. Listen to me, you know I’m right.”
Kyle frowned. So what if the old bastard was right? Just because Kyle may have been in love with Reanna didn’t mean he should be.
His features tightened once again as he looked away from his father. “Loving that woman is wrong,” he said softly.
“Loving that woman is wrong,” Cesare repeated, sitting back in his seat. “The same words I spoke when I fell in love with my wife thirty years ago …”
“But not the same situation, Pop,” Kyle argued. “Reanna is innocent.”
Cesare nodded in agreement. “But Reanna also knows who you are. Yet she still loves you.”
Kyle shook his head. “She’s just caught up in the excitement of the thought. It’ll fade.” Women enjoyed the idea of being with the bad guy, but reality was never as good as the fantasy. Reanna was too good for him. She deserved a normal life, a normal love … an uncomplicated love.
“It’ll fade and what?” Cesare asked. “You’ll just let her go … be with another man.” He laughed as if just the thought was ridiculous. “Let the sweet girl go be with a man that can give her a nice bullshit life.”
Kyle frowned. “It’d be better than the life I would give her.”
“Wrong, son,” he argued. “This world is not a fucking Disney movie, Kyle. And trust me when I say that this girl knows it. You’re not even giving her a chance to show you that.”
Kyle gave a violent swipe of his hand. “No,” he said firmly. “She deserves better … hell, she probably wants better.” That was most likely the reason she’d barely spoken to him in the last couple of weeks
Of course, Cesare shook his head in disagreement. “I’m afraid you are wrong, Kyle,” he sighed. “The longer you push her away, the more you hurt the poor girl. Eventually she’ll move on, but she’ll never be happy.”
“That’s not true, Pop!” Kyle yelled, hating the idea of Reanna’s unhappiness. “Don’t say shit like that. She will have better than me. She deserves it.”
“She deserves what she wants, Kyle! And that is you and Sofia.”
“She deserves someone that’s not …” Kyle’s features tightened as emotions hit him suddenly, causing his heart to twist in a knot. “She’s deserves a man that’s not so fucking … damaged.”
Eyes widening at Kyle’s words, Cesare once again stood to his feet. “Kyle,” he breathed, a mixture of disbelief, intense concern, and sadness falling over his face, “you are not talking about your scars …”
“Yes I’m fucking talking about my scars!” he shouted, hitting his fist against his chest. “I’m fucked up, Cesare!”
His family thought he was okay with the way he was because he feigned confidence on the outside, but in truth, Kyle had always struggled with accepting the man he was, both past and present. He’d become an expert at putting on a show, but with Reanna … he wasn’t able to do that. She brought the truth out of him, and he feared that one day she’d see too much of his truth and run away from him, leave him.
“Scars both inside and out. I am …” He swallowed the sudden lump in his throat. “I’m incapable of loving anyone.”
“Yet you do!” Cesare yelled, storming over to Kyle. “Your child! Your brothers, me; you love your step-mother, Gabriel, Angelo, Carterina, your nephews and niece. The list goes on, Kyle.”
“It’s not the same!”
“It is the same!” he shouted. Reaching forward, he cupped his son’s face. “Why is it so hard for you to accept love, when so much of it is given to you so freely, Kyle? Why do you still fear it?”
“I don’t fear it.”
“You do,” he said, dropping his hands. “Love does not always have to be pain, son. This woman, this Reanna has given you what you’ve always wanted. Real, true, genuine love that’s unconditional, and you still fight her as if she’s doing something to hurt you. Do you realize how badly you are hurting her … hurting yourself?”
Kyle remained silent.
“Do you not think she hurts the way you do?”
He still said nothing.
“Son, I know you may think that you’re doing you both a favor, but all you are really doing is prolonging the inevitable.” He pointed at him. “You will be with that woman.” He shook his head. “You will not stand by and allow her to be with anyone else because it is not in your nature to. It is not in any man’s nature. No matter what, Kyle, instinct will kick in, and you will do everything in your power to get her, and make her yours. And the longer you push her away, the more time and attention you give to a woman that is not her, in her face … the harder it will be for you to win her back when she leaves you. Because she will leave you. There is only so much a woman will take, son. Even one who loves you as much as that girl does. She’ll leave, you will suffer, and so will my granddaughter who loves that woman the way a child loves their mother.” Cesare shook his head again. “Are you even thinking about how it would affect Sofia if you let that woman run off into the sunset with another man? She will suffer just as much as you will, Kyle …”
No, Kyle hadn’t thought about the effects on his ladybug. He’d been selfish, only thinking of his own fears.
“If not for yourself, son, let your fear go for my granddaughter.”
“I love my daughter, Pop,” Kyle said softly.
Cesare nodded. “I know that, son.”
“And I know how badly she’d hurt, but I can’t …” He let his words trail off as he frowned and swallowed the lump in his throat. He shook his head. “I … don’t know how to be what she needs,” he confessed. “Reanna. I don’t know how to love her the way she deserves to be loved. I’ll fuck it up. I’m not romantic. Hell, I’m not even nice. I’m convinced that my daughter only loves me because I’m all she has. I’m a fucking monster.”
“You are,” Cesare agreed. “You are a monster, just like me. Mean as a snake.” He chuckled, placing a hand on Kyle’s shoulder. “We don’t give a fuck until somebody comes along to make us give a fuck.”
“I don’t want to hurt her, Papa,” Kyle whispered. Slowly, he brought his hand to his heart. “If I hurt her, I’ll fucking die. And what if I …” A pained expression fell over Kyle’s face as he lowered his eyes. “I’ve hurt a lot of women. Looked away from many tears, and each time I felt like I couldn’t control myself. I was angry for no fucking reason. Those women did nothing to me, yet there I was, making them feel like shit. What if I do that to Reanna? What if I fuck up? Reanna doesn’t put up with that shit, she’ll leave me. And it won’t be like when Faith left. When Faith left I only cared that she left my daughter alone, and took my shit, but if Reanna left she’d fucking …”
Kyle’s words died off again. He didn’t know if he’d be able to shake the pain of losing Reanna so easily. That would devastate him. The way he felt for her now was crippling enough, he could only imagine how much deeper his … feelings for her would become if he actually let his guard down; let himself fall for her.
Gently, his father pushed his shoulde
r until Kyle brought his eyes back to his.
“I know, Kyle,” he said, giving a nod of his head. “If anyone knows what it’s like to lose the woman he loves, it’s me …”
Kyle frowned, lowering his eyes. That was true.
Cesare gave Kyle’s shoulder a pat. “You need to give that woman the benefit of the doubt, Kyle. You can’t just expect her to tuck tail and run when things get a little messy. And don’t insult her by comparing her to Faith.”
“I didn’t.” Kyle shook his head. “I know she’s not Faith, Pop. That’s not what I meant.”
“Then what’s this, eh?” he asked, a soft smile pulling at his lips. “What is keeping you from giving me sweet-faced grandchildren with big brown eyes, then?”
Despite himself, Kyle chuckled at his father’s not-so-subtle description of Reanna and his fictional children, then he shrugged. “Me,” he answered honestly. “My feelings for her are a bit … intense, intimidating even.”
“Stronger than the feelings you had for Carterina?”
Kyle shook his head. “I’m not even sure if what I felt for Carter was love anymore. At least not the kind of love I’d thought it was. I’ve never felt anything like this before.”
Smiling wide, his father put his arm around him. “Then take it slow, bambino. Take it slow. Reanna will understand.”
“That is if she decides to give me a chance,” Kyle said doubtfully. “We aren’t even together yet and I’ve already fucked up more than once. She has the right to make me suffer for that. Hell, she is making me suffer …”
Two weeks. Two whole fucking weeks.
Aniyah had been both a distraction from his true desire and a wall he’d put up between him and the woman he really wanted. He wasn’t sure if Reanna would forgive him for being such an insensitive jackass for the past two years. He wasn’t sure if she’d take the time to understand why he’d been so hesitant to be with her, why he’d been trying to push her away.
“I agree,” Cesare said with a nod. “You’ve fucked up quite a bit.”
Kyle frowned, pressing his lips into a hard line. “Is that supposed to be encouraging me to go for it, get the girl? If so, you suck ass at it.”
Dangerous Beauty: Part Four: Beautifully Broken Page 10
