Coming Home (Morelli Family 6)

Mateo taps out a text message, sending it, then looks over at me. “Hopefully he doesn’t.”

I quirk an eyebrow. “You’re rooting for him now?”

He rolls his eyes at me. “No. You’re rooting for him and, where possible, I like to give you what you want.”

I grin, leaning in to kiss him. “You’re the best.”

He smirks. “That’s why you love me.”

“There are a lot of reasons. Want me to list them all? We can stay here all day and play with our baby instead of going to this dumb thing. I think that’s a good plan. Let’s do that. Ego stroke, cute baby. When he takes a nap, I’ll throw in a blow job and as much naked Mia as you want. Whaddya say?”

“Nice try.”

“I clearly need to up my blow job game,” I state, shaking my head.

“Your blow job game needs no improvement. This just has to be done. We won’t have another opportunity like this to test him. I’m running out of people close to him to kill.”

I choke out a short, vaguely horrified laugh. “My god, the problems you have.”

After a few minutes Dominic pops off. I right my dress and put him on my chest, leaning into Mateo. He puts his phone away so he can wrap his arms around me. Dominic starts batting at his arm.

I grin. “Tell Daddy, say, we want to stay home. We don’t want to be bait.” Dominic grins at me, which I take as agreement.

“Should’ve been born into a different family, then,” Mateo says with an unapologetic shrug.

“Bite your tongue,” I tell him, tilting my head back to give him a light glare. “We would both be lost without him and you know it.”

Mateo rolls his eyes, but he doesn’t bother arguing. Instead he reaches over on the end table and grabs Dom’s favorite elephant toy. Dominic’s whole body stiffens with excitement when he sees it and he has a hard time keeping it together when Mateo finally hands it to him. Into his mouth it goes—instant slobber fest.

“I hope you put the second suit in the diaper bag,” Mateo states.

I slide a look of disbelief Mateo’s way. “He’s a baby. It doesn’t matter if he gets a little slobbery.”

Mateo apparently does not agree, as he climbs off the bed and walks into Dominic’s bedroom for the second suit.

I sit Dominic up on my tummy and smile at him. “You’re daddy’s a crazy man, isn’t he? A crazy, crazy man.”

“I heard that,” Mateo remarks, walking back into the room with the change of clothes.

“It’s nothing you don’t already know,” I point out.

Apparently unconcerned, my big bad mafia boss tucks Dominic’s baby suit into the diaper bag, then slings it over his shoulder and looks at me. “You ready to go?”

Sighing, I put Dominic on my shoulder and climb off the bed. “As ready as I’ll ever be.”

Deleted Scene

In the book, this takes place while Mia is missing.

Meg

I stand outside of the bedroom, staring at the white door. I’ve been inside this room plenty of times before with Mia, but never without her. Certainly never with Mateo. He’s brought her into our room on occasion, but he’s never, ever brought me to their space.

I haven’t even looked here the past four nights. I assumed he was working late into the night in his study, trying to find Mia. I’ve left him to it. I understood he needed to. This morning when I saw him at the breakfast table, I saw how tired he was. The dark smudges under his eyes told me just how much sleep he was getting. Adrian’s solemnity told me they still hadn’t found anything. Mateo barking at everyone, even Maria, discouraged me from asking about it.

I figured I’d wait him out, but I don’t know how much time I have. I have no idea where Vince took Mia, and I have no idea if Mateo will find him. I remember when Francesca disappeared and he was searching for her, but that time the trail had gone cold. This time he started searching right away. When Mia didn’t show up for dinner Saturday night, Mateo knew something was wrong. Adrian told me she sent Mateo a text message, but when they tracked her phone, they wound up at a bar. Someone had left it behind, the bartender said. Then Adrian persuaded them to let him see the security tapes, and it became clear it was Vince.

I was a little afraid they figured it out so quickly. To be honest, I was hoping they would fail this time. They wouldn’t be able to find any leads. I can’t believe Vince ditched her phone at the place he actually took her. What a fucking numbskull. He could’ve ditched it in a Dumpster somewhere, but he just leaves it at the bar where he bought her a drink?