Page 45 of Entangled

“So, she says she’s pregnant, that it’s your child, and you just believe her, no questions asked?”

“I’m trying really hard right now not to get pissed off at you, but you’re making it difficult.”

“Why, because I’m asking you hard questions?” Dom asked.

“No, because you question her, asshole.” Gian looked back in the way Cara had gone, wishing she had stayed right where she was instead. “You question the motives and morals of a woman who you don’t know from a hole in the ground. You question her actions and her behavior with me because of me, Dom, because of the choices I made. You’re so easily willing to think ill of her because I love her, not because she’s done anything to deserve it. That’s why you’re pissing me off. It has fuck all to do with me, and everything to do with her.”

“You said yourself that it’d been three months since you two were together. Then what, one night does the trick?”

Gian sighed, and rubbed a hand over his face.

He needed a fucking shave.

“I’m just saying,” Dom muttered, “because the last woman who told you she was pregnant with your kid—”

“The last woman was Elena, and Cara Rossi is the furthest thing from her. The two are not comparable. Cara has no motives to lie to me, Dom, not like Elena did.”

“One would think you might be a little more careful.”

Gian shook his head. “It’s my child and she’s mine, too. You don’t have to like it, you don’t have to approve of it, because you don’t matter where she and I are concerned. It would be great, if you and a lot of other people learned that fucking lesson, and fast.”

“What about everybody else?” his brother asked.

“What about them?”

“Ma and Dad. Your wife. When do they get to learn you’ve got a child on the way with your mistress?”

Gian bristled at that title being so easily thrown at Cara like she deserved it. Maybe it was then that Gian could truly understand why the details bothered Cara so much. It was never him that would be questioned for their choices or the results of their behavior together, it would always be her that needed to answer for it.

That was unfair.

“All right,” Gian said, standing from the table, “I’m done here.”

He gestured at one of the guards.

Dom stood, too. “Gian, you owe me—”

“I owe you and everyone else, fucking nothing. That’s why I’m the goddamn boss, and no one else is. I answer to those I choose to and you are not one of them.”

“And your image, your respect, your wife, or our family? What about that? How do you think Ma is going to feel when she finds out you knocked up some woman when she’s spent the last couple of months trying to befriend your wife?”

Dom didn’t get it.

He wasn’t listening like he needed to.

“I gave you the button too soon,” he told his brother. “I spent decades under Corrado, learning how to be this man who didn’t question what he was told to do, or how to do it. I learned how to not speak out of turn, even when it killed me to stay quiet, and who knew his place amongst other made men. Decades of my life were spent this way, Dom, from the time I was a child, until he gave me my button, so that I could sit where I am today, and have my given respect. Clearly, you could have benefitted from that same upbringing, but because you didn’t, I have to deal with your disrespect and bullshit. I should have listened to my instincts instead of my feelings where you were concerned this past summer. You’re not ready for a button—to be a made man—when your disrespect clouds a discussion with your boss.”

“You’re my brother first.”

“Then, when you were unmade and just a man, you were my brother first and could afford to have a damn opinion about my life,” Gian snapped back harsh and fast, uncaring of who heard him say the words. “Then, I was your brother first, Dom. Now, I am your boss. Learn the fucking difference. Learn it fast, before you force my hand and my gun. If I were any other boss, you would not be alive right now. Do not forget that the next time you feel as though your opinion should be shared.”

Gian didn’t wait to hear Dom’s response or for the guard to make his way over. He headed toward the guard, meeting him in the middle with his wrists already out and ready for the cuffs, so he could be transported back to his cell.

He would rather spend the rest of the day in his cell than deal with his ignorant brother.

Another day, he told himself.

There would always be another day.