“I’ve never been ashamed of anything I’ve ever done, including marrying Eden. Ava, I swear to you. It had nothing to do with her.”
She surprises me when she jumps up from the chair shaking her head. “I need to go find her. She can’t be alone right now.”
As she hurries off, leaving me with just my brothers, I think about how this day has gone. The woman I love served me with divorce papers. My sister-in-law, who up until today I would have counted as one of my biggest fans, slapped me across the face and likely hates me. My brothers haven’t said much, but I get the feeling that’s because they’re in shock.
And everything about my life has descended into pure shit. Hell of a day.
Kellen is the first to break the silence with a low chuckle before he says, “Well, I guess I am going to be the last one to get hitched.”
Matthias, Ronan, and I look at him in disbelief that out of everything that’s happened todaythatis his takeaway. Then again, Kellen always does like to play the clown.
“Dude, read the room,” Ronan chastises him.
Matthias pulls up a chair and sits down in front of me. He hesitates, opening his mouth and closing it a few times, before he finally asks, “What’s this all about, Marius?”
That’s a loaded question. It’s also one I know the answer to all too well.
I start to explain, but Ava comes rushing out of the house again waving her phone in front of her. “Where is she? I’ve called her five times, and she’s not answering. I called her parents’ house, and they say she hasn’t been at their house for more than an hour or so in months. Where is she, Marius? I need to go to her.”
Grabbing a white napkin off the table, I look at Matthias. “I need a pen. Do you have one?”
He hands me a pen, so I write down the address of our building and hand the napkin to Ava. “She’ll be here. I’ll contact the lobby staff and tell them to let you up. It’s the penthouse.”
She stares at me for a long moment and then turns to Matthias. “Honey, I need you to look after the boys. Lynn can handle most of it, but I need you to make sure they’re okay. I have to go find Eden.”
He kisses her and smiles. “Go. I’ve got everything under control here.”
Ava hugs him and then turns to leave, but not before she throws me a nasty look. “You better hope she’s okay, or I’m going to have something to say about it.”
Great. Now the one person who I know has always liked me now thinks I’m public enemy number one. This day can’t get much worse.
“And just in case you don’t know who Eden’s father is, you should know he’s not going to be happy when he finds out about this.”
She doesn’t explain that any further before storming out, and when I look around for someone to tell me what she meant, Matthias says, “I’m guessing you haven’t met your father-in-law yet?”
Shaking my head, I shrug. “No. Why?”
Ronan chuckles, and Matthias looks uneasy. “I’m assuming you know Eden’s maiden name, right?” Kellen asks.
Nice. Like I’m some asshole who marries a woman without even knowing her full name. “Yeah. Giordano. So?”
Once more, Matthias looks like he’s unsure he wants to have this conversation. “Let’s put it this way. Family is very important to Mr. Giordano, particularly his only daughter.”
“Mr. Giordano? Who is this guy that we have to be so formal?” I ask, still fucking confused about why I should care about who my wife’s father is.
Before Matthias can say another word, Kellen exclaims, “Family, dude! He’s a fucking mobster! Have you been living under a rock? Everyone under the damn sun around here knows about the Giordano family.”
Fucking super. Now I’ve got the problem that my father-in-law is probably going to put a hit out on me. This day just keeps getting better.
“Somebody needs to start explaining what the hell is going on because I’m lost,” Ronan says.
When I don’t say anything, Kellen chimes in. “As far as I can tell, Marius is married to Eden, but for some reason he wanted to keep that a secret. Not sure, but I think she didn’t like that, which resulted in that process server giving Marius divorce papers. Oh, and Eden’s father doesn’t know his only daughter and the apple of his eye married this guy, and since he’s a mobster, our brother is probably living on borrowed time as of tonight. Did I miss anything, Marius?”
I shake my head since he actually encapsulated this entire mess pretty well. “Nope. That about covers it.”
“Yes, you did miss something,” Matthias says, sounding particularly confused. “Why the hell did you want to keep this from us? You told Ava you weren’t ashamed of being married to Eden, so why not share the good news?”
That’s a much harder question to answer.
