Page 12 of Secret Baby for the Mafia Don

“Elio,” I manage to choke out through the lump in my throat.

“It’s time to go now, love,” he says to me, reaching toward me.

I dance away from him, my heart leaping to life in my chest. “No, Elio,” I say, shaking my head. “I’m not going anywhere with you.”

“Oh, you want to stay here with Marco, I suppose?” Elio says, his deep voice as smooth as velvet sliding across my skin.

“Actually, no,” I say breathlessly, dodging past him again. “I just want you all to leave me alone.”

“You’re still my betrothed,” Elio says to me, his voice hardening and his eyes narrowing. “I have remained faithful to you all this time, even if you haven’t been so loyal to me.”

“I’m not going anywhere with you, Elio,” I insist vehemently, backing toward the doors behind us so I can make my escape. His words rattling in my head.

Marco is going to be useless to us in his current state, but I do know a few of the guards. I just have to grab Mateo and find a guard I know so that we can get out of here.

I reach behind me, feeling for the rough wood of the carved door that Grazia and I just passed through before blundering into this mess. I’m momentarily confused when I can’t feel it with my questing fingers. I take a bigger step backward, still groping blindly for the doors.

Suddenly, a muscular arm wraps around my neck, and I go completely still as I feel cold metal pressing against my temple.

I watch Elio draw to a stop and see relief wash across Grazia’s face as she finally manages to get to her feet. She looks down in dismay at the beads from her wedding dress scattered all over the floor.

“No one is going anywhere,” Luca Baldini says firmly, and I hear him cock the gun that is pressed against my temple.

Chapter Five

Elio

As soon as I feel my fist connect with Marco’s face, I lose myself to my rage.

Seven years of anger is coursing through my body, and each time I strike Marco, it feels like my rage just increases. I land a sharp kick to his ribs and hear the breath whoosh out of his lungs.

It feels good to give into my fury and to allow it free rein. Each blow feeling just and deserved for all the lies and embarrassment that Marco and Kate have caused me.

I distantly become aware of a woman shouting. I feel hands clutching at my body, but I sweep them away with a sharp movement.

Whoever was grabbing at me falls to the floor in a heap and there is the tinkling sound of beads or some other kind of small object hitting the floor as they fall. My brain doesn’t have time to care about what that means as I continue beating Marco’s prone form.

And then I hear it. The voice I didn’t think I would ever hear again.

I feel like I have been doused in cold water, my rage slipping away immediately. I turn toward the sound of Kate’s voice, taking in the sight of her standing before me, shock and horror on her beautiful face.

Her warm, caramel eyes immediately lock with mine, fear warring with regret in their depths.

She looks even better than she did when I saw her last. She’s matured, growing into herself in the nicest possible way. She’s added a few curves here and there, but she’s still fit and trim.

My cock throbs in reply to her presence, but I push that aside for now. This isn’t the time for distractions. I have a small window of opportunity to get Kate out of this hotel and onto my plane that is waiting at the airport.

“It’s time to go now,” I tell her, stalking closer to her. I hold out my hand, not sure if she will take it or not.

I feel like a snake charmer, and I hope that her desire to escape Marco’s gilded cage will be enough for her to be willing to come with me now.

“No, Elio,” she says, shaking her head. “I’m not going anywhere with you.”

“Oh, you want to stay here with Marco, I suppose?” I say to her. The thought makes me unexpectedly angry all over again.

Marco isn’t the kind of person that I should be jealous of. He’s no one, an adopted ward who was taken in by a powerful family. I should be able to disregard him like a piece of gum stuck to my shoe.

It infuriates me that he continues to stand in my way like this.

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