I silence her with a hand to her face, cupping her jaw, careful not to touch the bruise. “I know,” I whisper. “I know now.”
Her eyes fill again, spilling over with disbelief. “How?” she chokes out.
“My brothers talked some sense into me.” I glance over my shoulder at them as all four come to a stand to scan the warehouse, looking for any remaining threats. “I was too angry to see it, too scared to face the truth. I was such an idiot. I’m so sorry, Sora.”
She sobs harder, seeming overcome by the entire situation, and I’m desperate to hold her, but first, I need to free her.
Picking up the Russian’s blade, I cut through the zip ties on her wrists and ankles, then pull her gently into my arms.
She clings to me like I’m the only thing tethering her to reality.
Maybe I am. I don’t care. I bury my face in her hair and just breathe in her calming scent.
“God, I’m sorry, Princess. I’m so, so sorry. Can you forgive me?”
She nods against my chest, her fingers fisting in my shirt as she clings to me and cries, and even if she didn’t say the words, the relief her answer brings me is so intense, it nearly knocks me on my ass.
But as the shock and chaos in my mind slowly start to settle, something nagging at the back of my mind rises to the surface.
“Sora?” I ask softly, pulling back slightly. “Earlier, when you were pleading with these pigs. You said… Are you…?” I can’t bring myself to say the word. Because if she is pregnant, that would mean she knew before now and didn’t tell me.
“Pregnant?” she breathes, looking anxiously up at me through her thick, dark lashes. Then she nods, ever so slightly. “I’ve known for a while. I was going to tell you—really, I was. But then I heard you… talking to your father. And I thought…” She pulls back just enough to look me squarely in the face, her eyes wide with remembered pain. “I thought you didn’t love me.”
“What?” I ask, frowning in confusion and disbelief. How she could possibly think that is beyond me, and after last night, I don’t see how there could be any doubt in her mind.
I’ve spent hours thinkingshe’sthe one who didn’t loveme. And if she overheard me talking to my father, she must know everything I gave up for her—for us.
“You said I wasn’t useful. That I was just another tool in the game, and you didn’t have feelings for me. I couldn’t—” Her voice cracks. “I couldn’t stay, Leo. Not if it meant raising our child in a place where I was just leverage. So I went to my family to figure things out. But when I got there, it all went to hell. They… they said our marriage was a ploy from the start. That I wasn’t supposed to get pregnant and that I should get an abortion and remarry after you were gone…”
My heart clenches as Sora sobs, and I pull her closer, horrified by what her family told her—and by what she thought she overheard. I remember my conversation with the don vividly.
I can recall perfectly the words I said, but taken out of context, I can see why she would have interpreted them the way she did.
At the time, I was being sarcastic, pointing out how unrealistic my father’s expectations were, but to Sora, they sounded like a truth I’d kept from her.
And how could she think otherwise when I spent the first half of our relationship treating her exactly like the tool I said she was?
“I was…” I swallow a painful lump in my throat as I search for the words to explain myself. “I didn’t mean a word of it, Sora. I was trying to point out how ridiculous my father’s expectations were. I told him I didn’t care about the empire,” I insist. “That I was done playing by his rules. I gave it all up. My inheritance, my role as don. I didn’t want any of it if it meant I couldn’t have you, so when he forced my hand, I walked away from it all.”
Her breath catches. “You did?”
I nod. “I was trying to protect you, Sora. I didn’t mean for it to sound like… like you didn’t matter. You’re everything that matters to me.”
Tears stream down her cheeks again. I’ve never seen her cry like this—never seen her so emotional and undone. Even after she nearly drowned. But there’s a raw honesty between us now, a truth too painful to avoid.
“I thought I’d lost you,” I whisper.
“You almost did,” she says, her voice shaking. “And if you hadn’t come when you did… our baby?—”
I press my forehead to hers.
“I’ll never let my doubts put you in danger again,” I vow. “You or our child. No matter what. I swear it.”
She lets out a shaky breath, her fingers curling in the torn collar of my coat. “What happens now?”
“I’m done with this life,” I say quietly. “If you’ll come with me—if you want—we’ll go. We can leave all of it behind—the Mafia, the blood, the legacy. I don’t want any of it. I just want you. And I want our child to grow up free of all the violence.”
Her eyes widen. “You’d walk away?”
