Chapter 9
CARA
I watch his expression as he takes it all in, and I know it’ll only be a matter of time before he puts all the pieces together. The blood pulses in my veins as I stare up at him, holding my breath, willing this conversation to be over already...
“That girl,” he murmurs, his voice so low I can almost feel it vibrating through my body. “Is she... Is she mine?”
He gestures to the next room. For a second, I wish I could take it all back.
Shit, maybe confessing to having been working for his enemies would be better than the look he is giving me right now, the way he is glaring at me as though he cannot believe what he is hearing.
Is hiding a child from him the worst thing I could have done?
That’s certainly what it feels like, as he stares down at me, the shock taking a moment to register on his face.
I nod slowly. “Yes.”
“You’re sure?”
“There was no one else it could have been,” I reply. “I know she’s yours. She has to be.”
He stands there for a long moment, taking it in. I don’t even want to think what must be going through his head right now. It’s hard to tell.
He’s standing there before me, his fists scraped up, his face and shirt covered in blood that I don’t know belongs to him or someone else. But even with that, I won’t let him intimidate me.
At least, not any more than it already has.
Finally, he speaks, his voice strained. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I had no idea who you were,” I protest, swallowing hard. “It’s not like we exchanged names and home addresses, in case you’ve forgotten...”
He pauses, mulling it over, and then comes back sharper. “Then why didn’t you tell me the second you saw me again?”
I shake my head. “I–I was too shocked to say anything. What was I supposed to do when I saw that tattoo, just announce in front of the kids that we had been...?”
“And that’s why you wanted to go,” he mutters. “Because you didn’t want me around your daughter. Our daughter.”
I could have sworn that I heard an inch of hurt in his voice, like he is stung by the idea that I wouldn’t want him around. But I’m not going to just roll over and feel sorry for him, not when he’s come at me like this.
“Well, you can’t exactly blame me, can you?” I argue, challenging him. “The way we met, it doesn’t exactly speak to you being the most amazing, caring father figure for a child...”
He glares at me. “You never even gave me a chance.”
“You had your son by then, right?” I shoot back. “You should have been at home with him, not out and about with some woman you had never even met before—”
“Don’t you tell me how I should raise my son,” he warns me, his voice hot with anger, looming over me in a way that reminds me he could snap me in half.
“I didn’t mean it that way,” I retreat, trying to calm him. “I–I’m sorry.”
He steps back slightly, catching his breath, and I draw in a long, shaky lungful of air, trying to calm myself as best I can.
He has every right to be angry at me. I can’t even imagine how I would feel, if I learned I had had a child out there I knew nothing about.
Even the thought of being kept away from my daughter is enough to make my heart ache.
“Max, does he have any idea?” he asks quietly.
I shake my head. “I didn’t say anything to Nina, and I don’t think they’ve noticed how... how alike they are,” I reply. I have though. It’s hard not to notice how similar they look, even the tone of their voices sounds the same. And they’re both the sweetest kids, so they have that in common, too.
“So you noticed it, too?”
I widen my eyes. For some reason, I didn’t think it would have clicked with him as swiftly as it did with me, but the way he is speaking, it’s like he’s already sure of what he’s saying.
“I can’t believe this,” he mutters, running a hand through his hair. “You...” His voice trails off as he turns to me, and his face darkens. Whatever was briefly open in him before snaps shut, right there before my eyes. “You’re not going anywhere. Either of you.”
“No, please, Alex, this is what I was scared of—that you would try to make Nina part of this world...”
“She doesn’t have a choice,” he fires back. “She’s already part of it. Whether you like it or not.”
I squeeze my eyes shut, trying to block out the words, but I know it’s pointless.
Whatever I try to hide from, whatever I try to deny, the truth is that he is her father, and there’s nothing we can do to dodge that.
And a man like him—a man with his power, his influence, his lifestyle—I know he’s not going to let her just slip through his fingers as though it’s nothing.
“So what does this mean for her?” I breathe, trying to contain myself and hoping he can’t see how much I’m shaking right now. “That means she can’t leave, or—”
“That means I’m doing the right thing keeping her here,” he replies harshly. “And she’s not going anywhere I can’t keep a close eye on her.”
“But—but nobody so much as knows who she is,” I protest helplessly. “There would be no point, nobody would ever think to look for someone like her in all of this…”
“It’s only a matter of time before the truth comes out,” he replies, his voice dark and laced with a profound warning I can’t ignore. “And I’m not going to stand by and leave my daughter to the wolves when I should be the one stepping in to help her.”
“She doesn’t need your help, neither of us do,” I plead with him. “We’ve been just fine till now. Nobody had any idea, nobody even imagined—”
“Things change,” he cuts me off. “Now that she’s under my roof, she stays here.
And so do you. You don’t understand the kind of threat that could be out there, the kind of people who might want to get their hands on you…
” He stops himself in his tracks, but his words leave little to be misunderstood.
Still, protective or not, I’ve worked so hard to provide for Nina for so long, and the idea that my choice to take this job—the decision I made to step through this door—it sits heavy in my chest, impossible to ignore and impossible to deny.
“If we go now,” I whisper. “We can be gone before anyone else knows about anything-”
His jaw ticks. “They know.”
“What?”
“If Marsha clocked that there was something up, someone else will have, too,” he replies bluntly. “You haven’t exactly been subtle. And this isn’t the kind of thing you can just brush under the rug. If someone finds out…”
“But everyone who works here, you trust them, right?” I point out hurriedly. “I mean, you wouldn’t have them under your roof if you didn’t. All the stuff you did for me before I even set foot in here, that goes for everyone else too...?”
His jaw clenches as he listens to me speak, and I can tell that I’ve hit a nerve. “You’re staying. That’s the end of it.”
He crosses his arms over his chest and nods to the door. “Now, you should check on the kids. I need to get cleaned up.”
I think of arguing with him further, but I can tell that whatever stake I might’ve had in this has been wiped out. As far as he’s concerned, I’m rooted to this place.
I turn and push open the door, and I notice that my hands are still trembling as I go to make my way through to check on Max and Nina.
Siblings… God, now that he knows it, it seems to have brought it home to me with a stark suddenness I can’t ignore.
They’re related to each other, a part of each other, even if they don’t know it.
As I stand in the door and look down at them, my heart sinks.
Not because I’m not happy to see my little girl bonding so well with someone her own age, or because I think that they’ll be anything other than the best of friends, but because, even if none of that happens, Nina’s going to be stuck here anyway…
And there’s nothing I can do about it.
I plaster a smile on my face, determined not to let either of them see what is going through my head. Nina turns to look up at me with a huge, warm smile, and I stoop down to see what they’re watching.
“This good, huh?” I murmur to her, pressing a kiss into her head. And, as I pause there for a moment, I try to remember what this feels like; what it feels like to let myself remember how much I adore this little girl, how far I’ll go to keep her safe.
And I pray that I haven’t just made the biggest mistake in my life by taking this damn job.