Chapter 3
Antonio
It’s just after seven in the morning when the nurse wheels Jasmine to the entrance. I’ve been awake for thirty-one hours, running on vending machine coffee and takeout.
My eyes burn. My back aches from the chair I tried and failed to sleep in. But none of that matters because Jasmine is alive, and I’m about to take her to my lake house.
Deus me ajude.
I pull my car around to the pickup zone and shift into park. The nurse is already wheeling Jasmine toward the passenger side, so I step out and circle the hood to meet them.
Jasmine moves carefully as I help her from the wheelchair, wincing when she twists wrong. The bruises on her face have deepened overnight, blooming across her cheekbone.
The cut on her forehead is held together with butterfly bandages. Her left wrist is wrapped in a brace, and she holds it close to her body.
I open the passenger door and guide her inside. Once she’s settled, I lean across to grab the seatbelt before she can protest.
“I can buckle my own...”
“Got it.” My knuckles brush her stomach as I click the belt into place, and I freeze.
There’s a baby in there. My baby.
I pull back too fast, nearly cracking my head on the doorframe.
Jasmine’s eyes meet mine, and I straighten, closing her door. I walk around to the driver’s side, taking longer than necessary to compose myself.
Jessa and Meesha had shown up at six with a packed duffel bag of clothes and belongings for Jasmine.
My sister had hugged me in the hospital hallway and whispered, “Take care of her, Tony.”
As if I’d do anything else. I climb in and pull away from the curb.
The drive to the lake house should be about an hour and fifteen minutes, but Jasmine doesn’t see the city fade behind us. She falls asleep within the first ten minutes, her head tilted against the window.
The doctor said exhaustion was normal after trauma. Her body needed rest to heal.
I contacted my assistant before leaving the hospital and redirected all tasks that couldn’t be managed remotely. Any meetings requiring my physical presence would be postponed or covered by Jaxon or Kamal.
The highway stretches ahead, and I drive fifteen under the speed limit because I can’t shake the image of her car spinning through that intersection.
Every few minutes, I glance at her.
The bruises look worse in daylight. The purple has spread toward her temple, and there’s a scrape along her jaw I hadn’t noticed before.
She’d come so close to dying. If I hadn’t followed her from the dinner party, if I’d been even a few minutes slower calling 911...
I can’t think about it. I’ll lose my mind if I think about it.
In sleep, the tension leaves her face. The woman who acts as if Vegas never happened is not here right now.
Instead, I see the Jasmine from that night. The one who laughed at my terrible jokes. Who challenged my taste in art, and whose tight muscles clenched around my...
I grip the steering wheel harder.
This isn’t the time. She’s injured, she’s pregnant, and she’s made it abundantly clear that one night doesn’t make us anything. I need to focus on being useful, not on reliving that night.
But the morning after surfaces. I’d come back to the room that morning with coffee and croissants. I had this whole plan—breakfast on the terrace, maybe a walk, and then convincing her to go to Europe with me that very evening.
The bed was empty and her things were gone.
My eyes drifts to her stomach.
Seventeen weeks, the doctor said. The baby is the size of a pear now, with tiny fingers and toes, and a heartbeat we heard on the monitor this morning. I’d stood in that ultrasound room with my heart in my throat, watching the image on a screen, and felt my chest crack open.
I’ve never thought about being a father. Not seriously.
Kids were something that happened to other people. The idea of being responsible for an actual human being, shaping their life, and being the person someone calls pai never crossed my mind.
Now I can’t think about anything else.
A daughter. A girl who will grow into a woman. Who will date people like me someday, if I’m being honest about who I’ve been. The thought makes me want to lock her in a tower until she’s forty.
But beneath the protective instinct, there’s terror. I know nothing about raising a girl. I know nothing about raising anyone.
What if I say the wrong things, give her complexes? What if she needs me and I don’t know how to show up? What if I hurt her somehow, just by being me?
And with that comes the fear I’ve been pushing down since the moment Jasmine said the baby was mine.
What if I’m like him?
My father is a good man in many ways. Charming, warm, generous with his time and attention.
Every summer I spent in Brazil, he was present.
Teaching me to surf in Florianópolis, taking me and Tiago to football matches, staying up late to talk about life and dreams and what it means to be a man.
He never missed a birthday call, never forgot to ask about school, never made me feel like anything less than his beloved son.
But he destroyed two families with his inability to stay faithful. First Tiago’s mother, then mine. He loved m?e, but he loved other women too, and couldn’t seem to stop himself from reaching for whatever was in front of him.
M?e had cried for months after she found out. Then packed up everything and moved us from Brazil to Miami to get away from false promises and to start over.
I was ten. Old enough to understand what had happened and to hate him for it, even as I still loved him.
Lousy husband. Present father.
Is that my fate too? Is there some genetic inability to commit, be loyal, and be the partner someone deserves?
I’ve never cheated on anyone. Never even been tempted, really. But I’ve never been in love either, though I came close once. A girl named Beatriz, whom I met one summer while visiting my father in Brazil.
Since then, I’ve kept things casual, kept my options open, kept one foot out the door in every relationship I’ve ever had. And now there’s Jasmine... and a baby.
Last night she’d said she was scared, but she never said of what. Scared of me? Of being a single mother? Of disrupting her life?
I have no idea what goes through her head. She left that morning without a word, and for months she’s acted like Vegas never happened.
Jasmine stirs as I turn onto the private road that leads to my property. Her eyes open slowly, taking in the trees, the glimpses of water through the branches.
“How long was I out?” Her voice is rough from sleep.
“About an hour.” I take the exit, following the familiar curves toward the lake. “We’re almost there.”
She straightens in her seat, wincing as the movement pulls at her bruised ribs. “You didn’t have to bring me here.”
“We’ve established that you can’t stop me.”
“I’m too tired to fight with you right now.” She closes her eyes briefly. “I’ll try again tomorrow.”
“Looking forward to it.” I pull into the driveway and cut the engine. “Welcome home. Temporarily.”
The house stretches out in front of us, all five bedrooms on a single floor. I bought it three years ago when my accountant said I needed more real estate holdings and m?e said I needed a retreat.
Turns out I’m terrible at retreating. The place has sat mostly empty, maintained by a weekly cleaning service.
“It’s beautiful,” Jasmine says.
“Thanks.” I kill the engine. “It’s quiet, at least. Good for recovering.”
I’m out of the car before she can respond. “Wait here. Let me grab your bag.”
“I can walk.”
“Don’t move.”
She scowls but stays put. I round to the backseat, grab her duffel, and sling it over my shoulder before heading to her side of the car.
When I open her door, she’s already trying to maneuver herself out. She moves stiffly, one arm wrapped around her midsection to brace her ribs. Every shift, every breath look like it hurt.
“I will carry you,” I say.
The look she gives me could curdle milk. “Touch me and die.”
“I’m not asking for permission.”
“Antonio—”
“You can yell at me once we’re inside and you’re in bed.” I bend and scoop her into my arms before she can protest further.
Inside, the house smells faintly of the products the cleaning service used yesterday.
Sunlight creeps through the windows, flooding the open living space with warmth. Beyond the glass, the lake stretches out silver and still, with early morning mist hovering above the water.
Jasmine turns her head to take it all in. “This is your idea of a lake house?”
“What’s wrong with it?”
“Nothing. It’s just...” She shifts slightly, wincing. “Huge!”
“My mother’s idea. She was convinced I’d need room for...” I stop, suddenly aware of the irony. “Family.”
Jasmine’s hand drifts to her stomach. Then she drops it back to her side.
“The guest room is down this way.”
I carry her past the kitchen, past my office, to the guestroom at the end of the hall.
It’s the nicest one besides the primary, with a queen bed, cream linens and a reading chair positioned by the window to catch the lake view.
I’d asked the cleaning service to make it up fresh, and someone had added a vase of wildflowers on the nightstand.
“Just so you’re aware, there are cameras set up in the main areas and my office,” I say as I lower Jasmine carefully onto the edge of the bed.
She nods, already sinking into the mattress with a sigh of relief.
“Your bathroom’s through that door.” I nod toward the en suite, then set her duffel on the luggage rack by the closet. “Let me know if you need anything. Extra blankets, pillows, whatever.”
“Thank you,” she says. “For everything. You didn’t have to do any of it.”
“Yeah, I did.”
She looks at me then, and I see exhaustion and confusion. It causes pressure to build under my ribs.
The doorbell rings.
“That’s breakfast,” I say, already backing toward the door. “Give me a second.”
I jog to the front entrance and grab the bag from the delivery driver. I ordered it on the drive here, right after Jasmine fell asleep in the car.
When I get back to her room, she’s still sitting on the edge of the bed, looking like she might topple over.
“You ordered food?”
“You need to eat.” I set the bag on the dresser and pull out containers. “Doctor’s orders.”
I don’t mention that ordering food is going to be our primary survival strategy for the foreseeable future. My kitchen skills begin and end with coffee, and even that’s questionable without the machine.
I’d already set up accounts with every delivery service that reaches this far out of the city. The nearest town has a café that does breakfast, a bistro that handles lunch and dinner, and a grocery store that delivers. Between the three of them, we won’t starve.
“I’m not hungry.”
“Eat anyway.” I hand her the container of scrambled eggs with a fork balanced on top.
She takes it but doesn’t open it. “Why are you doing this?”
I stop unpacking the food. “Because you’re carrying my daughter,” I respond.
It’s the simplest answer. The truest one.
She nods slowly and opens the container.
I take a step back toward the door, then pause. “Do you need help changing out of your clothes?”
“I can manage.” She ducks her head.
“Alright.” I linger in the doorway. “Eat, then sleep. I’ll be right down the hall if you need me.”
She doesn’t respond, just picks up the fork.
I close the door behind me and let out a breath.