“It was like all those things I see other couples feel, all those things that always seemed a million miles away, suddenly they were right in front of me. They were in you. But it was more than that, is more than that.”
I can’t speak. My eyes fixated on him. My heart is drumming so freaking hard.
“It’s primal,” he goes on, holding me tighter. “The feeling goes deep, Lena. It goes to a level I didn’t even know I had. When I saw you, I knew you belonged to me. I didn’t know your name, but I knew you were mine. I couldn’t let you marry anybody else. I couldn’t let anybody hurt you. Because you were, you are going to be the mother of my children.”
His words rush out as though he can’t stop, his tone becoming more intense.
“I don’t care how it sounds anymore,” he growls. “You belong to me. No other man can touch you. That’s why I don’t care you’re a virgin. It means you’re –”
“I’m yours,” I whisper and then raise my voice louder, his words hitting me with their full effect. “I’m yours. Luca, tell me this isn’t….”
I trail off, struggling to think how this could be a joke, a trick, why he’d go through this effort.
No, he wouldn’t.
Is it possible?
“You feel it too,” I whisper. “You really want all that too?”
“Wait, too?”
“Boss.” A man appears at the door, a silver tooth showing as he grimaces. “We have to go.”
Luca glances at him. “One minute. Wait in the car.”
The man disappears, and Luca turns back to me.
“Say it,” he growls. “Tell me you feel the same.”
“I want it all.” I squeeze onto his chest, curling my hand into a fist, clutching onto his shirt. “The first time I saw you, Luca, I started dreaming about it. About a future. A family. I thought I was crazy. But….”
“We want the same thing.” He shakes his head, grinning as though he can’t believe it. “You’re going to be the mother of my children.”
“Yes,” I say passionately. “I want that so much.”
From deep within, my core sends trembling signals through me. It’s the sort of thought that would’ve seemed ludicrous before Luca told me he wanted the future I envision.
He wants the same image I have of him sitting on the porch, grinning as I try to paint him.
“I want you. I want our family.” I stand on my tiptoes, staring into his eyes. “And I want to ask you to stay, but I know you won’t. You won’t abandon your cousin. You won’t let other men fight your battles. So please, please, Luca…don’t let anything happen to you. Come back to me. I can’t learn this and then….”
“It’s you and me,” he says fiercely, resting his forehead against mine. “Forever. Nothing can change that.”
“Forever,” I whisper.
I kiss him as he kisses me, our lips fusing in a conflagration of devotion and desire. He snarls through the kiss, pressing down on my lower back and pushing our bodies together.
I whimper and wrap my arms around him, holding on tightly, clinging on even as he makes an effort to bring the kiss to an end.
“I have to go,” he says. “I have to end this.”
“What if –?”
He kisses me again, cutting off my words.
“I can’t say too much,” he whispers softly. “There’s danger with me telling you, but try not to worry. Try to remember – I know what I’m doing. I’ve been doing this for a long time, keeping the streets as bloodless as I can. I mean for it to stay that way.”
He turns and walks away before I can ask what he means because none of it makes sense to me.
Jackson tries to pad after him, so I scoop him up, cradling him in my arms as I run through the house to the front window.
I watch as my man, the future father of my children, ducks his head into the car and disappears down the road.
CHAPTER
TWENTY-ONE
Luca
I push down on the pedal, driving the car quickly down the country road toward the city.
My thoughts are clouded with everything that just happened between Lena and me. It’s difficult to focus on the task at hand, to push away the way we fused, the words we spoke.
She feels the same. She wants a family too.
It’s unfair to the Family, the men, and Patton, but part of me wishes I didn’t have to go.
Part of me wishes I could stay with Lena, hold her tightly, and talk with her about all the joy we will share in our lives.
No, life, because it’s going to be one thing.
Ours.
I say nothing as I slow my pace, joining the regular traffic of the bridge.
“He gave us a meeting point?” I ask Matteo.
He nods. “Yeah, same place as last time.”
“He wants to brag about getting his hands on Patton.”