Page 132 of Filthy Lies

“No. He doesn’t know I’m here.”

“Bullshit.”

“I swear on your mother’s grave.” His voice softens. “I came alone.”

My knees feel suddenly weak, and I sink onto the threadbare couch. The gun rests in my lap.

“Why?” I manage to ask.

Grigor takes the chair opposite me. “Because you fled in the night with my only grandchild. And you chose this place—my family’s place—to hide. It seemed like… an invitation.”

“I didn’t know you’d come.”

“Didn’t you?” He studies me, head tilted slightly. “The same way you didn’t know Vincent would suspend his operation against me the moment you disappeared? The same way you didn’t know you’d eventually need to talk to someone who understands what it means to love a monster?”

“Vincent isn’t a monster,” I snap instinctively.

Grigor’s mouth twitches, just shy of a smile. “And there it is. The contradiction that’s been eating you alive. You run from him, yet you defend him. You fear what he might do, yet you love what he is.”

“What do you know about it?”

“Everything.” He strokes his beard. “I’ve loved a St. Clair woman, too.”

I slump back against the couch, more exhausted than I can ever remember being in my entire life.

“Tell me about her,” I demand lifelessly. I’m suddenly desperate to hear about my mother through his eyes. “Anything you remember.”

His gaze drifts toward the window, toward the ocean beyond. “Margaret was…” He exhales slowly. “She was the sunlight breaking through storm clouds. Brilliant, warm, uncompromising. She walked into my restaurant one day, and the world simply rearranged itself around her.”

I bite my lip hard enough to taste blood. “She said you were complicated.”

A dark laugh rumbles from his chest. “That’s a diplomatic way of sayingdangerous.” His eyes find mine again. “But she loved me anyway. At least, for a while.”

“Until?”

“Until she discovered what loving me would cost her.” He leans forward, elbows on his knees. “The same choice you’re facing now.”

The parallels aren’t lost on me. My mother fled from Grigor to protect me. I fled from Vince to protect Sofiya and, ironically, to protect Grigor himself.

History just keeps repeating its fucked-up cycle.

I’d like to get off this carousel, please.

My heart constricts. “Why didn’t you find us?”

“Because she made her choice.” He scrubs a hand across his face. “What kind of father would I have been if I dragged you both back into danger just to satisfy my own selfish desires?”

Isn’t that exactly what I’ve been fearing from Vince? That his need to control would outweigh what’s best for Sofiya?

“So instead, you watched from a distance,” I continue. “Little gifts here and there, like that would make up the difference.”

Grigor nods, something suspiciously like tears gathering in his eyes. “It wasn’t enough. It was never going to be enough. But it was what I could offer without endangering you.”

“And yet, here I am anyway,” I gesture around us, at the gun still in my lap, at the beach house where I’m hiding from my husband. “Neck-deep in the very world she tried to protect me from.”

“Life has a bitter sense of humor,” he agrees.

A soft cry from the other room interrupts us. I stiffen, my maternal instincts flaring. I set the gun aside and stand. “I should?—”

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