“Whenwe survive this—” I correct her.I can’t let any other thoughts exist.
“I don’t want it to befakebetween us,” she says.She steals one more kiss before I have time to answer.
After what happened between us earlier, it could never befake.
She grabs the little boy’s hand and runs into the forest in the direction I told her to go.
I exhale a nervous breath and dart in front of the camera, making sure I’m the one who is being seen, my motions obvious and obnoxious as I head for the front of the building and toward my car.
Moreno opens the front door with Ashton right at his heel.He must have woken him up.Harper was reasonably quiet, and I made sure to silence the alarm.Ashton couldn’t have woken and known what was happening on his own.Someone had to involve him, but why?
“Stop, before you get yourself killed,” Moreno bellows out, and I pause at the front door of my vehicle, the keys in my hand.I contemplate jumping in and hightailing it out of there, but the wrought-iron fence isn’t going to magically open.There’s zero chance Moreno is going to order the guard at the gate to let me go free, not if they’ve realized their prisoner is missing.
And they must know, or else they wouldn’t care about me sneaking off into the night.
“Hear him out,” Ashton says.“He’s trying to save your life.”
“Save my life?”I scoff and step away from the vehicle.“Why does my life need saving?”
I’m trying to buy time for Harper so she can slip away unnoticed.Although I’m sure they’ve noticed her, but I don’t hear them running through the forest.
Shit.
I do, however, hear the metal gates groaning as they open.Three vehicles with my father’s soldiers are driving out of the compound, most certainly planning on stopping her when she gets over the fence.
Fuck.
I can’t stop all of them.I’m not sure I can even stop Moreno and Ashton on my own.Not when Moreno has a weapon on his hip.I can see the glistening gun in his holster under the outside lights.At least he hasn’t drawn it and pointed it at me.I should feel grateful.
“You’re going to get yourself killed,” Moreno warns me.“I’m trying to help you.”
But I don’t care about myself.I only care about Harper.
“Listen to him,” Ashton says and slowly comes around to approach me.
I exhale a heavy breath.I already don’t like where this is going.The front door opens, and Dante storms outside, fuming.
“Kill the girl,” Dante shouts orders at Moreno.I imagine he already gave the orders to his men who drove out the front gate.“But bring me the child, alive.”
“No!”I lunge for Dante, ready to kill my father with my bare hands.He’s truly a monster, the worst kind imaginable, murdering an innocent girl.
Ashton holds me back.
“Think twice, son,” Dante warns, snarling, unpleased with my lack of obedience.“I can have you buried right beside her.”
Dante lifts his gun, un-cocking the trigger as he holds it up to my face.
“Would you honestly kill your only son, your heir to the throne?”I ask, knowing how to get inside his head.“Mom,Nikki,would hate you for the rest of your life.”
He stares at me, taken aback by the mention of her name.He seems slightly puzzled, almost befuddled by the realization that I may be right.He shakes the cobwebs from his thoughts away as quickly as they come.“You’ve never wanted this,” he says and gestures to the compound, his paradise.
“I never wanted to becomeyou,” I say.Although, in truth, I don’t want any of his life or to be a part of the horrible things he’s involved with.That’s not who I am.
“Consider your options, Luca,” Dante says.“Kill the girl, or if you refuse to obey, which I know you love to do, then your buddy Ashton has orders to kill you both.”Dante hands over his gun to Ashton, giving him the opportunity to execute me if need be.
I glance back at Ashton.
He wouldn’t?
