Bringing his mouth a hairbreadth from mine, he whispers words over my lips. “I bet you would’ve pulled the trigger too.”
I lift my chin to hold his gaze, ignoring the heat of his skin that burns through our clothes and focusing on the stony look in his eyes, eyes that are so similar to Noah’s. “If it’s me or you, then yes.”
He lets my neck go to grip my wrists in both his hands and pin them on the wall above my head. “Is that what you think? That I’m here to kill you?”
The action flattens my breasts. My nipples, which are naked under my T-shirt, rub over the steel-like muscles of his torso.
“Why else?” I bite out. “Didn’t you come here to finish what you’d started?”
For a fleeting moment, something like guilt flashes in those cold amber eyes, but then they turn hard, and his frosty smile is back in place. “I waited five years for this moment. Do you really think I’m just going to kill you?”
I swallow at that, regretting that I couldn’t see my plan through to shoot him. “What do you want? Haven’t you already taken everything?”
His reply is dark, filled with a sinister promise. “Not everything.”
I’m about to tell him to go to hell when a shadow falls through the open doorway over the floor.
No.
Please let the landlord be home. Please let it be him. He could’ve heard the noise and decided to investigate. But my hope is futile, and my prayers are unanswered, because a moment later, Jazz appears on the threshold, taking in the damage to the door with terror-stricken eyes.
I give a single shake of my head, urging her to run, but Dante’s senses have always been sharp.
He glances over his shoulder without letting me go. “Jasper.” The corner of his mouth that’s in my vision tips up as a grin stretches his lips. “What a surprise. How long has it been? Five years?”
She looks from him to me and back at him, her mouth opening and closing but no sound coming out.
No, no. Please, not this.
How can this be happening?
And then I know. I’ve been followed. I know that with deep-seated intuition. It was a terrible mistake to have ignored my instinct.
I think about that red truck, about what the guy could’ve seen. I kept the curtains closed. The truck wasn’t there when I arrived or left. He didn’t see Noah with me and Jazz. He wasn’t parked close to my house, or I would’ve noticed the truck. This street has no trees. There’s nothing to hide behind. No one broke into my house and discovered a little boy’s clothes. He can’t know about Noah. As long as Jazz hasn’t said anything, there’s still a way out for Noah.
I plead with my eyes, begging my friend to take Noah away, but then my baby walks up behind her with his ball under his arm, and it’s too late.
Dante stills, clearly taken aback. “Who’s the kid?”
At the same time Jazz finds her voice to say, “He’s mine,” Noah drops his ball, runs to me, and throws his arms around my legs from the side, hugging me fiercely while forcing himself between Dante and me as he utters one distressed little word.
“Mommy!”
Dante’s gaze locks on mine over the sound. Confusion sets into his features, followed by disbelief. Jazz stands frozen to the spot, looking on helplessly as the truth is blown open like a landmine, the destruction imminent.
My knees threaten to give out as my heart stops beating. My breathing grows shallow. There’s a very good reason I kept Noah a secret. His father is a monster who murdered my family before stealing our assets and taking over my father’s territory.
That’s why Dante has been hunting me all these years. That’s why he’s put a price on my head. There’s only one way I’ll never be able to make a claim on my inheritance, and that’s if I’m dead. And now he knows he has an heir, someone else he can take away from me. He won’t be happy with only the money and the shares. Because Dante Morici has never settled for less than everything.
Chapter
Two
Dante
* * *
“Mommy!”
