Fall For My Ex's Mafia Dad novel Chapter 76

Shrugging, I skip back down the steps and decide impulsively that if I’m denied knowledge of the storage centers above, I might as well explore those below. Without stopping to let myself think much about it – lest I chicken out – I hurry down the stairs and push through the kitchen door.

I walk confidently across the kitchen, not avoiding eye-contact with anyone, but not initiating it either. Instead, I simply glide through as if this is precisely what I’m supposed to do – as if, in fact, Kent expressly told me to do it.

My tactic works and I smile as I push through the little white door, heading downstairs. Nobody stops me and – I think – nobody really noticed me going by.

As I reach the hallway below, I realize that this place doesn’t hold any terror for me anymore. My experiences yesterday got rid of those, replacing them with…well, with a little tremor of excitement that pulses through me.

I consider this, for a moment – consider whether that’s healthy, really. Honestly, a girl like me should have a healthy fear of the mob boss’s torture chamber basement. I was still naïve and new to this world – there was still so much danger here for me, and yet here I was, walking through without a care.

Really, seriously, who was I anymore?

As I come to the end of the hallway and push through the door into the archives room, I realize that a big part of me…doesn’t really care about the changes that I’m going through. That I like myself like this – this bold, somewhat careless new Fay.

Maybe this new version of me was just some kind of trauma response to what happened yesterday? But, I shrug as I stand in the middle of the room. Whatever. It’s better than being terrified all the time.

I take a minute to look over the stacks of porn sitting in the corner, but then I shake my head, deciding against it. I am definitely curious – especially knowing that some of it is Kent’s homemade stuff – but…no. Not today.

Instead, I move to the opposite side of the room, to where the photo books are. Some of them are very old – a hundred years or more, even. The academic historian in me wants to explore those early photographs, but instead I reach for the newer bindings further down, hoping for some information about Daniel and his upbringing.

I take a few volumes over to the little chair, flipping through.

I smile, recognizing Daniel’s face in a few of the first photos, but then frown when I realize that they’re too old – grainy old photos, with fashion from the 1980s…