Fated Blades (Kinsmen #3)(39)

She picked up a pebble and tossed it at him.

“Was it worth it?” he asked.

“No. I didn’t want to marry Gabriel, but Father threatened to excise me, and he was stubborn enough to go through with it. Karion had just lost his arm, and Santiago kept getting into dumb fights and creating legal issues. I had to stay. A year later I forced my father out.”

He thought her father had peacefully retired. “How did you manage that?”

“I had help from my mother. She’d wanted to retire for a long time. And my father didn’t resist very much. He was in his late fifties when he had us. By the time I took over, he had worked on behalf of the family for seventy-two years. The day after he retired, we were out of the relucyte business.”

“How did he take it?”

“Surprisingly well. He believed in trial by fire. In ancient times, my father would have thrown me and my brothers in a pit with wolves to fight over scraps to toughen us up. He later told me that I had been too passive. Forcing me into a marriage I hated ‘galvanized’ me into action. When I had gotten the better of him, it just confirmed in his head that he had done everything right. The relucyte was no longer his problem. He settled into his forced retirement. Occasionally he calls me and nags me about producing some grandchildren.”

“Why didn’t you have any? You like children.”

“I didn’t want to have Gabriel’s children.”

The finality in her words struck at him.

“It’s not because he didn’t want to. Gabriel would have loved to have a little version of himself. It was a punishment.”

Inwardly, Matias recoiled. He’d never understood why he and Cassida were childless. They’d slept together often enough, at least in the first two years. Neither of them was infertile. Now he knew. Cassida didn’t want to have his children. She had written him off.

“What kind of man is Gabriel?” he asked.

Ramona sighed again. “Charming. He is easy to talk to. He’ll greet you with a welcoming and genuine smile. He makes you feel like he’s really glad to see you and very interested in whatever you have to say. You’ll talk to him for fifteen minutes, and half an hour later you can’t recall exactly what you’ve discussed, but you’ll be left with this vague pleasant feeling. And if somebody asks you about him, you’ll tell them Gabriel is the nicest guy.”

That explained volumes.

“At first I tried giving him a position with the family. Nothing too important, but enough to keep him busy. He had a nice office and his own team. He played businessman for about three months. He was openly distracted during meetings, he forced his subordinates to make decisions for him, and he gave his team no direction, but he charmed the four female employees into his bed. One of them was almost three times my age.”

“Why?” Why would a man married to Ramona be with anyone else?

“Because he could. Cheating is pathological with him. I quietly replaced him and told him to direct his attention away from the family’s employees. Having your husband screwing everybody who works for you tends to damage one’s standing.”

He knew kinsmen who would’ve killed for less. “Did he ever try to justify it?”

She shook her head. “He didn’t feel he had to. The first time, when I was angry and hurt, he waited until I vented enough, gave me that charming smile, and told me he’d made reservations for a special dinner the next day.”

“Did you go?” He would bet his life she hadn’t.

“No.”

A shadow flickered across her face. Gabriel had hurt her. She hid it quickly. She was a proud woman, but Matias had seen the knot of pain, outrage, and sadness that for a moment twisted her mouth and dulled her eyes. He would have to be careful in Adra. If he got his hands on Gabriel, the urge to wring his neck might prove too tempting. Ramona wouldn’t mind being a widow, but he couldn’t rob her of the satisfaction she would feel when she made her husband sign the annulment.

“Gabriel agreed to the marriage because the alternative was, in his words, ‘too messy,’” she said. “I thought that if we couldn’t love each other, at least we could try to be a team since we were stuck together. After the fight, I knew we would never be a couple. So I settled for leading separate lives. I made him comfortable.”

For some reason, that word made him violently angry. “Why didn’t you divorce him?”

She gave him a small sad smile. “The agreement my father signed has a ten-year noncompete option. If I divorce Gabriel before the ten years are up, his family will cancel my shipping contracts. If I attempt to hire a different shipping company, I will owe his cousin a huge amount of money in compensation. It will cripple our family financially.”

He had a rotten feeling. “And if Gabriel dies?”

“Funny you ask. If Gabriel dies, I will also be fined. Although this fine will be one-tenth of the amount I’d have to pay if I divorce him. His existence is inconvenient to his family. They want him dead without staining their own hands with blood. They expect me to murder him to cut myself free.”

Rage swelled in him. “Your father—”

“As I said, he thought I was too soft. This was his lesson about hard choices.”

He wasn’t sure who he wanted to strangle more, her father or her husband.