Page 3 of Twins for the Mafia Heir

“His son is being born!” Raleigh pleads.

Nowthat… That might just be the only excuse I’ll entertain.

Because no force on earth could come between me and my daughter the night she was born.

“Please,” Raleigh says again. “The pregnancy took a turn for the worse. She’s been in labor for twelve hours and we don’t know if-” Her voice chokes off. Her pale cheeks and neck are blotchy with red as she desperately tries not to cry in front of me.

I look over the three people in the room. The man, Paul, dripping red onto the polished floor. Iris, radiating fury but unable to move with a gun trained on her mistress.

And Raleigh, putting her life in my hands in order to quell further bloodshed.

They’re already waiting for bad news about their boss’s wife and a child that could be their heir. And now here I am like a bloody hurricane.

If I take this deal, then Fantasia will be forced to wait even longer for a resolution to this issue. But Raleigh is the perfect hostage. Aside from whatever woman Thomas has gotten with child and the baby they’re having, she’s Thomas’s only living family to my knowledge. And anyway, a resolution that avoids violence would be more conducive to a working relationship between our disparate groups.

This isn’t mercy, I tell myself. It’s not weakness. This might prolong the process, but ultimately, this will secure Fantasia’s victory.

“Come here,” I order.

Raleigh sucks in a sharp breath, but she does as I tell her, coming to stand within arm’s reach of me. I grip her by the shoulder and turn her to face Iris and Paul, resting the barrel of my gun against her temple.

“Now then. It’s only polite to escort us out,” I tell Iris.

At first, I think she’s too enraged to reply. But Iris keeps her head. Her jaw tight, her skin ashy, she steps around her desk toward me. Paul follows, still pressing a hand to his wound to staunch the bleeding. What a loyal dog.

The two of them walk ahead of me through the house and down the gravel drive. Anyone we meet along the way instantly moves to let us pass, bewildered and alarmed. At one look from Iris, though, they subside.

At the gates, I circle around them, keeping them in front of me and Raleigh between us. “Your princess will be returned to you once the tithe is paid,” I tell them as the gates whirr open behind me and I back through them. “Do not keep us waiting, or you’ll be paying with more than money.”

Chapter 2

Emma

Achilles Warwick has no idea that the woman he’s bringing home to London isn’t Raleigh, younger sister of Thomas Warwick and prime pawn material. She is, in fact, a terrified nobody named Emma Clarke. And she-I- am already regretting my decision to act the hero.

But what else was I supposed to do when I saw the blood start to soak through Paul’s sleeve? Without him, I wouldn’t have had a single friend or guide on the Warwick estate after Raleigh settled in her country home with her husband. Paul, Iris’s husband, showed me around the place, made sure I ate at reasonable hours and didn’t just hole up in my room. Most importantly, he’s been the most willing to believe that I can be more than just a street thug adopted through Raleigh’s charity.

And now, I have the chance to prove just that. While Thomas is stuck in the hospital for god knows how long, Iris may be holding down the estate, and Paul might be supporting her, but now I have a role too.

I can be their decoy.

Everything I told Achilles about the baby boy was true, except for one detail. It isn’t Thomas’s child being born today. It’s Raleigh’s.

Raleigh, who took me off the street and gave me a job and a home, who’s been nothing but a friend to me when my own hubris could have ruined her life. I owe her everything. So the least I can do is buy her and her family time while she’s fighting for her life and the life of her baby.

A sleek black car is parked just a little down the road leading up the estate, and Achilles walks us swiftly to it without the barrel of his gun budging an inch from my head. Once I’m in the passenger seat and he’s behind the wheel, he keeps the gun in his lap, prepared to aim at me any moment as he drives.

He doesn’t try to break the silence or even look at me, which I’m grateful for. His narrow jaw is tense, but it doesn’t seem to be from nerves. Irritation? Is this just one big inconvenience to him?

I don’t know why I thought we’d hop on a commercial flight to London. After we’ve woven our way through the bustling airport, Achilles’s gun thankfully tucked back into his jacket pocket, we make our way to a private terminal where a sleek jet sits waiting.

God. If I’d known this morning that I was going to become a hostage on a nine hour transatlantic flight, I’d have made a point to eat breakfast.

Then again, I’ve never been in a plane before. It’s entirely possible that whatever I ate might come back up the second the landing gear leaves the tarmac.

Achilles puts me ahead of him as we walk up the stairs into the plane. I don’t want to be in awe of the luxurious white leather seats and the space in the cabin, but this is easily the fanciest thing I’ve ever been inside. Along one side of the cabin stretch long low couches, and on the other there are two small tables bolted down with two broad chairs each. Achilles puts me into one of the chairs, then settles onto the couch.

“Your cooperation is much appreciated,” he says with a sigh as the crew closes up the plane and prepares it for flight. They’re the first words he’s spoken to me since he told me tocome here, but he just sounds exasperated. This whole situation- the flight across the ocean, the intimidation, shooting a man and then taking a hostage- seems like an irritation for him, like an unexpected errand that interrupted his routine.

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