“Victor, please!” she pleaded with Victor. “I don’t want anybody dying because of me.”
Dawn’s voice broke through his red haze. She was begging…
Begging for him to let go of the man she really wanted to be with after May 25th.
“I was warned about you before we began this partnership. A former Red Diamond told me that you were brilliant at crime. But stupid when it came to a girl once. So I decided to give you a woman. A beautiful one with an outstanding pedigree and background. My own daughter. But I suppose that American saying is true. ‘You can’t fix stupid.’”
Kuang regarded him from across the table of the very public and well-lit bar Victor had chosen for this conversation.
Phantom shifted in his seat. He was acting as Victor’s translator for this meeting since Han was still in Hawaii. But diplomacy wasn’t his cousin’s strong suit. He looked over at Victor, not sure how he should respond to Kuang’s insult.
Victor simply repeated to Kuang what he’d said at the beginning of their conversation, making signs that Phantom translated in real time: “I cannot go through with this marriage, but our partnership can continue to thrive without it. I will do whatever it takes to ensure that. Simply name your price, and you will have it.”
Kuang dipped his head, seeming to consider Victor’s counter offer. But then he said, “There are consequences for stupid actions. That’s something you must learn. Someone will have to teach you that lesson, once and for all.”
With that not-so-thinly-veiled threat made, Kuang then stood up and left without a further word.
“Well, that went well,” Phantom said in Kuang’s wake. “Guess The Silent Triad wasn’t so great at this buddy-buddy shit after all. Lucky for you, I still excel at fucking up bitches who to try to cross us.”
Victor smiled at his cousin’s coarse-yet-accurate summation of their current situation with Kuang.
“Thank you for your continued loyalty, Hak-kan,” he signed to his cousin with a solemn head bow.
Maybe because Victor so rarely called him by his Cantonese name, Phantom returned the bow. But then he picked up the beer he ordered and grumbled, “Hope she’s worth it.”
“She is,” Victor assured his cousin before signaling for the check.
Yes, things with Kuang would most likely become messy. But choosing Dawn again…it felt right in his chest.
That evening, he had to put some necessary extra protections in place and call Han back home from Hawaii. There was a surprising reluctance on his chosen brother’s part, but in the end, he agreed to return to Rhode Island. And the following morning, it had taken hours with their accountants to ensure that The Silent Triad’s fortunes would not be disrupted by the sudden dissolution of their ten-year partnership with Kuang.
But after Victor was done with all of that, he returned to the Providence house with alacrity. Eager to see Dawn and tell her the truth he’d been denying for over a decade.
He loved Dawn. He could finally admit that again. That was why he could forgive her for what she’d done when she was a young woman. Why he’d chosen her again. And why he always would.
Less than twenty-four hours after choosing Dawn a second time, Victor ceased hitting Asher. The man she’d held in her heart while Victor had been helplessly falling for her all over again.
Victor had thought something real had arisen out of their game of pretend. He’d given up his partnership and taken on a formidable enemy for the chance to be with her beyond May 25th. He’d assumed she had felt the same. Why else would she have asked for his forgiveness?
But the sex…the cherry blossoms…her saying that she truly had loved him the first time around…every emotion he thought he’d felt sparking between them had been a lie.
She had simply been biding her time with him until she could be with the man she truly wanted. Acting…just like she had in Japan.
A cold, weak feeling washed over Victor as he rose to his feet and took a step back.
Asher also came to a stand. His nose was bleeding, and his face was a mess of bruises.
“You’re a fucking psycho!” he yelled at Victor. “No wonder Dawn’s so desperate to get out of this marriage!”
Words. Just words. But they hit Victor the same as a punch thrown. He flinched, then raised his fists, ready to fight again.
However, Dawn got between them before he could throw another punch. With her back to Victor, she pushed at Asher urgently. “Just go, Asher. Please.”
Asher’s expression softened when he looked down at Dawn. “I’m sorry,” he wheezed through his possibly broken nose. “I didn’t mean to get you in trouble.”
“It’s okay. I just need you to go,” Dawn answered, glancing back at Victor as if he were a volcano that could erupt at any moment.
