“Yes.” At the risk of sounding like a broken record, I nodded. “Let him come and fight us. It will be my honor to kill him for her. It will be my duty to remove him so we never have to face him again.”
“Are you determined to right the wrongs like this because she carries your child?” He raised his brows.
“I am determined to keep her by my side and protect her because she is mine. Because I love her.”
For a long, heavy moment, he stared me down.
Then, with a quirk of his lips, he sighed and stood. “I won’t waste my breath telling you that you have my permission.”
I smiled.
“Because you’d do what you want anyway.”
“I’d never betray the family, Father. I will always adhere to my duty.”
He nodded. “I’m relieved that you understand that both matter. Dutyandfamily,” he said, gesturing at her before shoving his hands into his pockets. “You have my permission to do whatever is necessary to finish this.”
To finishhim. Roberto Giovanni’s life would be ending while Sofia and I were just starting a whole new life together.
“Haven’t you realized it’s better to ask for forgiveness than permission?” Roman joked as he knocked quietly and entered the room.
My father shot him a wry smirk. “Not always.”
He acknowledged me. “Oleg and I were in the control room, and it sounds like Giovanni's getting ready to contact us.”
I frowned, knowing I needed to be present there and head up this fight. But I didn’t want to leave Sofia alone. I wanted to be there the second she woke up.
“Go.” My father sat back down. “I’ll make sure she’s not alone.”
I smiled at him, glad that he was the one I could call my parent, my boss. Sofia would have a learning curve to getting to know him, but I wouldn’t stand in the way of her figuring out how she wanted to befriend him and how he’d manage to accept her and welcome her to the family as a future daughter-in-law.
“Thank you,” I told him as I left to meet with the others and begin this response to our enemy.
I meant it from the bottom of my heart. With my father doing his part to let Sofia know she wasn’t a threat or outsider, she’d have more reason to believe that I intended on a lasting future with her, one not only out of duty but also love.
Roman spoke with one of the soldiers as we walked toward my security room, but I struggled to leave Sofia behind, in my room where she could rest. The memory of how quiet and shuttered she was in the car ride here bothered me. Doubt had shone too clearly in her eyes until she snapped and fought with me, giving us the fire and tension we’d turned into passion in the shower.
I don’t blame you.
I can’t blame you for being so jaded.
Her uncle had used her and treated her like a pawn for so long. Her misinterpretation of my questions, when I’d asked her about the baby because I saw how worriedly she’d covered her stomach, wasn’t hard to accept either.
But there will be a way forward for us.
There has to be.
And that way forward would start with war. A final fight, a conclusion to the trouble her uncle had tried to give us for too long.
We will have nothing but love to count on, sweetheart.
I would promise her that day and night until she could truly convince herself of that dream.
Dream?
No. The future we’d have to embrace and build on would bereal.
Because now, as I would need to switch gears and concentrate on how to kill her uncle, I knew what real love was. And I’d hold on to it with both hands and never let it—or her—go while we grew our family.
