Coming Home (Morelli Family 6)

His cool eyes narrow. “What did Meg do?”

That only makes my stomach sink harder. “And she’s Rosalie’s mother, and she’s having your son, and not because of any emotional connection with you or anything, but I think the kids of this family have lost enough mothers. Let’s not go down that road again.”

“What. Did. She. Do?”

I ramble faster. “And I know she’s really sorry, and this is in part why I wanted you to give her a loyalty test. I still think you should, but I think that’s sufficient. I know ordinarily it might require further punishment, but I was just thinking, you know, maybe it’s enough this time because she’s really sorry—”

“Mia,” he snaps.

“She told Vince I would be at the bakery that day.”

His face goes completely blank and terrifies the living fuck out of me.

I inch forward, shakily grabbing his hand, watching his face for some sign of change. “It was the sister wives thing, she couldn’t take it anymore. We were barely sharing by that point. You spent almost every night with me. Vince came when we were in the Bahamas and Meg saw him. She didn’t think he would hurt me.”

Yanking his hand out of mine, he lowly utters, “Bullshit.”

My heart pounds as he rises off the bed and strides across the room, his jaw clenched. I scurry off the bed to follow him. “Mateo, please. I understand you’re angry, I was angry, too, but—”

Swinging around, he glares. “Did he tell you, or did she?”

I take a tiny, cautious step back. “She told me. After we found out…” I trail off, not really wanting to remind him of the pregnancy he didn’t want when he’s clearly pissed off.

His gaze drops to my stomach anyway.

I want to flee again, but I stand my ground. There’s nowhere to go, anyway. He’s accepted the pregnancy. I remind myself of that. He was disarming himself before this—he’s not going to go back on his acceptance. I guess he could, but he won’t do that. He’s just mad right now, and that’s perfectly understandable.

Bringing his fiery gaze back to mine, he shakes his head. “She better be glad you waited until we were halfway across the goddamn world to tell me this.”

It’s the worst feeling in the world when Mateo’s angry at me. This is not how I wanted to start our honeymoon. I should’ve waited. I don’t see how I could have, though. He gave me the perfect opening. How could I repay his openness, his honesty, with secrets and lies?

“I’m sorry,” I say, my heart in my throat. “I just, I don’t want to keep secrets from you. When she told me that one, things were still really rough between us and you hadn’t made up your mind about my pregnancy. I didn’t want to make things worse.”

“I want to rip her fucking throat out.”

He’s still radiating anger, but it hasn’t crossed the line into violence, so I take a tentative step forward. Catching my movement, his gaze slides to me, but it’s narrowed and cold, not warm. My skin crawls, but I move closer anyway. I feel like I’m about to hug a pissed off lion, but I remind myself this is the same man who loved me intensely five minutes ago.

“I’m sorry,” I say again. “I’m so sorry. I know I should have told you right away. I promise I won’t keep a secret like this from you again. But please… please don’t do anything crazy.”

“Is it crazy to punish someone who could have cost me everything?” he asks, taking an aggressive step forward. I almost fall back a step, but he grabs a fistful of my hair—no tenderness right now, just anger. He’s not playing. I’m a little scared.

I snake one arm around his waist, then the other. He doesn’t let go of my hair, but I pull him close anyway. “I’m sorry.”

“Show me,” he says, a bit shortly.

My heart continues to pound a furious beat in my throat, but I sink to my knees on the floor in front of him. It must be the right move. He looks down at me as I unzip his pants and free his cock, grasping it in my hand and caressing him. I look up to make sure he’s pleased. His gaze is hooded, still angry. His cock is hard in my hand, though, so I lean forward and take the smooth, perfect tip of him into the welcoming warmth of my mouth.

After I’ve worked his cock for a couple minutes, Mateo suddenly asks, “Do you remember the first time you were on your knees for me, Mia?”

I don’t expect him to ask that—I’m not even sure which time he’s referring to. The time he had his gun pressed to my forehead and he threatened to kill me if I lied to him, or the time he made me suck his cock in his bedroom during my four days of hell. Neither time is an especially treasured memory.