Chapter 2: Empire of Desire: Chapter 1

“Dad!”

I run down the stairs and toward the front door, my sneakers slapping on the marble with each step.

At the sound of my voice, he stops and turns to me with a questioning gaze and a smile.

There’s always a smile on Dad’s face whenever he looks at me. Even when he’s mad at me, he soon forgets it all and smiles.

Our housekeeper, Martha, says I’m the only one who makes him smile from his heart. So I’m kind of proud of having the superpower of making the “savage devil,” as the media dubs him, smile only at me.

But the media is a bunch of assholes, because they forget that he’s been such a devout single parent ever since he was young.

My dad hasn’t aged much. At thirty-seven going on thirty-eight, he still has a strong build that fills out his suit. He’s tall and broad and has an eight-pack. No kidding. He’s the healthiest man I know. But he also has a few age lines that make him the wisest ever—aside from a certain someone.

Also, the look in his blue-gray eyes, the same eyes that now look at me with love, can kill. I can tell why many people find him intimidating and absolutely brutal. When someone has his fortune, looks, and personality, people either bow or stay away.

But once again, I have the superpower of being his only flesh and blood.

“You forgot your phone.” I wave it in front of him and take a slurp of my vanilla milkshake—which is my version of a morning coffee.

Dad sighs as he takes the phone. He’s not the type who forgets, ever—his memory is like an elephant’s, but it feels as if he’s been preoccupied more than usual lately.

Maybe it’s an important case. Or his unending legal battles with my step-grandmother, Susan. I swear, neither of them will let go and it’ll just go on forever in court until one of them dies.

After he tucks the phone in his pocket, he pinches my cheek. “What would I do without you, my little angel?”

I pull back. “Hey! I’m not little anymore. We celebrated my twentieth birthday a month ago.”

“You’ll always be little to me. Besides, a vanilla milkshake is still your favorite drink, which proves my theory.”

“It’s my happy drink.”

“Uh-huh.”

“I’ve really grown up. See how tall I am?”

“How tall or old you are doesn’t matter. You’ll always be little to me.”

“Even when I’m old and wrinkly and taking care of you?”

“Even then. Deal with it.”

“You’re hopeless, Dad.”

“Gwyneth Catherine Shaw, who are you calling hopeless?”

I fix his crooked tie and feign sadness. “A certain Kingsley who’s getting old yet refuses to settle down with someone.”

“I have my little angel and, therefore, I need no one else.”

“I’ll leave one day, Dad.”

“Not if I have a say in it.”

“Are you going to keep me single forever?”

“Hmm.” He stares at me thoughtfully, as if he’s trying to figure out the ending to humanity’s misery. “Hypothetically, no, because I want grandchildren—eventually. But I don’t like the journey that leads to that outcome.”

“There could always be a surprise pregnancy.”

Dad stiffens and I internally curse myself for not keeping my mouth shut. This, of all subjects, isn’t something he’s a fan of—because of my mother, I guess.

He hid it from me until I was eight. Up until that time, he used to tell me that she’d died, but then I overheard him talking to Nate and that’s when he told me the sad reality.

Ever since then, we made a pact to never lie to each other.

“Are you pregnant?” His voice loses all humor.

“What? No, of course not, Dad.”

He grabs my shoulders and leans down so his eyes are level with mine. “Gwen, if you are, just tell me.”

“No…”

“Is it that kid with the bike? I’m going to fucking murder him.”

“It’s not Chris. I was just kidding. I’m sorry.”

“Are you sure? Because that motherfucker is going to have a surprise visit from me and his Grim Reaper.”

“Don’t, Dad. I’m really not pregnant. I promise.”

He releases a breath, then staggers backward as if he’s been punched.

What I just said must have reminded him of how I ended up at his door. My mystery mother—who’s a taboo subject around here—abandoned me in front of Grandpa’s house when Dad was still in high school with a measly note that read “She’s yours, Kingsley. Do whatever you want with her.”

And that’s how I came to life. Abandoned. Discarded.

She didn’t even tell him to take care of me. Just “whatever he wanted.”

“Don’t joke about things like that, Gwen,” Dad tells me in his no-nonsense voice.

“I know. I didn’t mean to.” I grin up at him in an attempt to change the mood. “Aren’t you forgetting something else?”

He places his briefcase on the floor and opens his arms. “Come here.”

I dive in, wrapping my arms around him. “I love you, Dad.”

“Love you, too, Angel. You’re the best gift I’ve ever received.”

Moisture gathers in my lids and it takes everything in me not to be all emotional and tell him stupid things like how it hurts that I’m not Mom’s gift, too. That she considered me trash to be discarded. That she’s a coward who abandoned both of us.

Because, in a way, I’ve always had a hunch that he was waiting for her. Twenty years later and he must be exhausted. He must be at his limit.

Maybe I’m at my limit, too. Despite all Dad’s love, I’ve always felt that a piece of me was missing, lost somewhere I can never reach.

That could be the reason I grew up to be a hollow person with barely anything at my core. Someone sweet on the outside, but completely and utterly empty on the inside.

Someone with a dysfunctional brain.

Someone who needs lists and coping mechanisms to stay afloat.

“Did you change your shampoo, Gwen? It’s still vanilla, but is it a different brand?”

I roll my eyes as I pull back. He has a super sensitive nose, like he can smell when I’ve had a drink behind his back, even after I brush my teeth and consume copious amounts of mouthwash.

“I mixed two brands together. Seriously, Dad, you have a weird sense of smell.”

“It’s for when my angel decides to drink when she’s not supposed to.”

I make a face and Dad ruffles my hair, sending the auburn strands flying.

“Not the hair!” I jerk away and smooth the stubborn thing down.

“You still look beautiful.”

“You’re only saying that because you’re my father.”

“You got my genes, Angel, and that’s not something trivial. Anyone would find you beautiful.”

Not Nate.

A jolt rushes through me for just thinking his name. It takes all my resolve to say goodbye to Dad without turning a furious shade of red.

After he leaves, I sit on the steps, place my milkshake beside me, and grab my bracelet. The one he gave me for my birthday two years ago.

The same birthday where I kissed him and he rejected me so cruelly, I still feel flushed to my bones thinking about it.

If I thought Nate was turning cold around my eighteenth birthday, he’s now as hard as granite. He doesn’t speak to me unless it’s absolutely necessary. We rarely see each other, and when I go to the firm at the pretense of getting my father lunch, he just ignores me.

He doesn’t do it in a rude way that would make Dad notice. He’s subtle yet efficient. I can now count the number of times I’ve seen him over the last couple of years.

Crossing paths—about twenty.

Conversations—zero. Aside from the stray “How are you?” that’s detached and without warmth.

It’s not like he was always present when he was Uncle Nate. He was there for Dad mostly and didn’t pay me much attention, as if I were background noise.

A wallflower, maybe.

A kid.

But I could at least exist in his vicinity without feeling like I’d detonate from the inside out.

After I kissed him, I ruined the easygoing relationship we’d had for eighteen years.

But I don’t regret it.

Because I’d hoped I would be more than a kid to him. I’d hoped that he’d see me in a different light.

All my hopes are up in the air now.

But I need to plan Dad’s birthday in the next few weeks, and that means he’ll be there.

I gulp, my heart hammering in my chest.

Though it shouldn’t be, because I got over him, you know. It’s for the best, anyway, since Dad would go berserk, so everything is fine.

I’m fine.

I’ve been telling myself that for two years, but it’s never felt true. I guess that’s because he’s Nate.

The same Nate who taught me to control the emptiness inside me and turn it into a strength.

“That hollowness never goes away. It’s part of who you are now, whether you like it or not,” he said on my fifteenth birthday when he found me hiding in Dad’s wine cellar. That’s what I do when it gets to be too much and I don’t want to upset Dad—I hide.

That day was one of those overwhelming days. I hated it, my birthday, and myself. I felt like that abandoned newborn baby on the side of the road again, even though I remembered none of it. I felt like an unwanted presence and it made me empty. So empty that I couldn’t breathe and had to hold in the tears when Dad sang me Happy Birthday.

It was the day I realized that despite having the best father in the world, I didn’t feel complete. I thought I was weird because all I kept wishing for was a mother.

On every birthday, that’s the only thing I wished for. A mother. My mother. I wished she’d come back and explain why she did that to me.

But Dad was so happy that day, like on all of my birthdays. He always made them an event that he planned for weeks in advance. So I couldn’t be an ungrateful bitch and start bawling in front of him.

That’s why I sneaked into the wine cellar and did it alone, in silence.

Until the door opened and he appeared. Uncle Nate. He was still an uncle at the time, an intimidating one who would put a bully’s parent in their place with a few words. He’d done that once, when I was ten and a girl called me uneducated because my mother was a whore. It’s been an ongoing rumor; Kingsley Shaw fucked a whore and had to become a single parent when said whore disappeared.

I didn’t tell my dad, because I knew he’d be loud and cause drama, but Nate picked me up from school that day on his behalf and noticed something was wrong. He interrogated me until I confessed everything while ugly crying. That same evening, he visited the girl’s home and told the mother she would either keep her daughter under control or he’d sue her for everything she owned.

“You don’t cover up for people who hurt you, Gwyneth, do you hear me? That’s the exact attitude that will encourage them to continue hurting you and others. If you don’t want King involved, you come to me. Understand?”

I remained silent in his car, still a bit stunned about how the bully and her mother looked genuinely scared. At that moment, I almost idolized Nate as much as I did Dad.

“Do you understand?” he insisted in that firm voice, and I finally nodded.

“Good. Now, let’s go somewhere you can forget about all of this.”

He took me to the amusement park and bought me vanilla ice cream. It was one of the happiest days of my life.

The following morning, the bully apologized to me. That’s when I realized people fear Nate not only because of who his father is but also because he always keeps his promises.

What happened on my fifteenth birthday was a bit similar to the bully incident. Nate found me and crouched by my side, but he didn’t touch me.

“But I hate it.” I hid my face with my hands. “I hate that something is missing inside me.”

“Are you going to let it rule you or are you going to bring it to its knees in front of you? Because those are your only two options, Gwyneth. It’s up to you what you decide to fill it with. Strength or weakness.”

I chose neither.

I chose to fill it up with him.