I giggled. “And you have your own security business?”
As soon as I asked, I wished I hadn’t. Jared’s eyes instantly clouded over into familiar twin storms.
“I brought you here tonight to be honest with you, Nina.”
“I know,” I said, trying to sound braver than I felt. Whatever it was I would listen, believe, and figure out a way to live with it. I had no other option versus the alternative. Now that I’d met him my life would never be the same again. It would be something too peculiar for anyone else to accept, but I had seen enough in the past months to know anything was possible. “I want you to tell me everything.”
Jared looked away. “You may feel differently before the night is over.”
I tilted my head to draw his eyes to mine. “After everything that’s happened, you don’t think I know there is something abnormal going on? I’m here, aren’t I?”
Jared leaned over and touched my cheek with the palm of his hand. I couldn’t help but lean into it, his skin was always so warm that it radiated into my bones.
“Okay, then. The truth.” He took a deep breath, “My father has been…close to your father for a long time.” He watched my expression, but that part I was somewhat prepared for. He continued, “My father served as protection for your father and, as you can imagine, Jack was a full time job. He made a lot of the wrong people very angry on a regular basis.”
I winced. I had come to this conclusion after reading the Port of Providence file, but hearing it from Jared rubbed salt in the wound.
“I’m sorry, Nina. I don’t like telling you this; it goes against the very principle I was raised on.” Jared reached his hand across the table to mine.
“What do you mean?”
“That’s what my family does, Nina. We protect your father. And your mother…and you.”
I shook my head. “I don’t understand. Your family protects mine? Since when?”
“My father has known Jack since before you were born…before he married your mother.”
I felt my eyebrows pull in. “Why haven’t we met before?”
Jared squeezed my hand. “We have. One of my earliest memories is of Jack encouraging you to take your first steps. We went on family vacations with you; I watched you blow out the candles on your birthday cakes; I saw you drive your first car; we were always in the background.”
I shook my head. “When we had lunch I asked you if we’d met. You said we hadn’t.” Frustration made my words sharper than I had intended.
“We hadn’t met in the way you were inquiring,” Jared pointed out. “The moment I sat beside you on that bench I’ve been very careful not to lie to you, Nina. I promised myself that if the day ever came that I could finally be in your life—in a real way—I would always be honest with you.”
I narrowed my eyes at him. “Your father protected mine?”
Jared nodded.
“Who is your father?”
“Gabe Ryel.”
“Gabe is your father? But…I don’t remember you. I spent time in his home. You weren’t there.”
“Claire and I were away. We had to start our training early to be ready in time. Bex is eleven and he’s already finished school. He’s been in training for the last eighteen months. It’s just the way it works.”
“It’s the way what works?”
Jared winced at my irritated tone. He was struggling with each piece of information, now. He spoke as if he expected me to run away with every new fact he revealed.
“I’m getting to that,” he shifted nervously.
I pulled my hand from his and lowered it to my lap. “I don’t remember any of that.”
Jared watched me pull away from him with a pained expression. “You weren’t supposed to. Your father did everything he could to keep you from the dark parts of his life. He did love you, Nina.”
I shook my head, trying to keep the tears at bay. I couldn’t think of any words. Jared stared at me for a moment and spoke again, “Are you sure you want to hear this?”
“Yes. I’m sure.” Knowing something real, even if it was hurtful, was far better than living a lie.
Jared sucked in another breath. “About the time I was ready to work alone, you were becoming more independent. It was thirteen months before there was a need for my training. Up until then, I’d pretty much felt like a babysitter.”
I cringed at his choice of words.
“Five days before your sixteenth birthday Jack had begun a deal with the cops you saw in the surveillance photos. My father told Jack it was a bad idea, but the bottom line was always the money, and those men—,” Jared spoke with disdain, “—were the easiest way to bypass the system.
“Once Jack realized that dirty cops are a different breed of criminal with even less regard for the law, it was too late. Jack was used to being targeted, but he wasn’t prepared for them to go after you. No one had ever been stupid enough to push Jack that far.”