shake my head and walk into the house, heading for my office, where I check a few emails while I wait for Alexis to appear for my scheduled haranguing.
Several minutes later, she knocks on my door with three sharp taps and I call her in.
Alexis is still wearing the tasteful yet somehow still delicious little burgundy number she wore to lunch. The dress is tailored around her exquisite curves, highlighting the flare of her hips and her ample chest. She stomps into the room, heels clicking against the wood floor, and slams the door behind her.
“That was not okay,” she growls. Her eyes are burning lakes of crystal blue. “You used me.”
I shrug. “If I’d asked, you would have said no.”
She stands in front of my desk, arms folded, and her lip twists into a scowl. “You don’t know that.”
“Please.” I indulge in an uncharacteristic eye roll. “Your favorite thing to do is tell me no. Of course, you wouldn’t have agreed.”
“So you manipulated me? Lied to me? Threw me into a situation I was woefully underprepared for?” Her expression tugs down a notch, the fury flickering with sadness. “That was low.”
Guilt gnaws at my belly. I used to feel it so infrequently that it took some time before I was able to recognize what exactly that unpleasant ache represented. With Alexis in my life, guilt has become a familiar feeling.
As I always do, however, I ignore it. I am the boss. I do not have room for guilt, because it impedes me from making the impartial decisions I need to in order to run both the mob and my business effectively.
I rise to my feet and walk over to Alexis, stopping with only a few inches left between us. I grab her chin in my fingers and hold her gaze.
“If it’s that important, next time I’ll warn you, but make no mistake—I will be telling, not asking.”
Alexis wriggles out of my grasp. “No, you will ask,” she insists, her voice brimming with authority. “I am not some tool that you get to use when you feel like it and then discard. I am a person worthy of respect.” She points a finger at me. “For the record, so is your son. How dare you exploit him like that?”
Alexis has always been feisty, but ever since I got her back, she has been something else too. Assertive. On a good day, I used to be able to make her cower with a look, and she would listen to me even if she complained about it the whole time. Something has changed in her. She presents a challenge to me now in a way she never did before. It’s like she came back a different person.
She’s right, too, I realize. It was wrong of me to use her and Harry like that, but what choice did I have? I couldn’t risk her refusing.
“I did what I had to do,” I say. “I made a judgment call, and I won’t apologize for that.”
She shakes her head. “If we’re going to do this, Gabriel, you can’t keep playing me like this. You need to start trusting me. More than that, you need to treat me with respect.”
Her eyes sear into mine, plump lips pulled into a frown. Pink flushes her cheeks, and if she didn’t look so downright ravishing, she’d probably look intimidating.
“I’m never going to be the man you want me to be,” I tell her. “I don’t ride a white horse and I don’t make promises.”
“I’m not asking you to be a prince or even just a nice guy. I know that’s not in your wheelhouse.” She sighs, running a hand over her face. “I just need to be able to trust you. And rely on you. That’s all I ask.”
“You keep throwing around the word trust as though that is something either of us is capable of,” I remark.
She frowns. “You don’t think we can trust one another?”
“Why should I trust you, Alexis? And for that matter, why should you trust me? I’m the monster waiting in the shadows, and I always have been for you. Let’s not complicate this arrangement with the pretense of trust.”
Something shifts in her gaze, and I wonder if my words hurt her. Then there it is again, that pesky guilt.
I swallow and push past it. “There’s a fundraiser dinner on Friday. I would be obliged if you and Harry would attend with me.”
This is as close as I will come to asking nicely, though