Page 71 of Twin Deception

He wasn’t, but this was just so much to take in.

“Don’t be nervous,” he advised.

“I’m… I’m not.” I took his free hand and held it between both of mine. “I had been starting to think about forever with you and wasn’t sure how it could work. I didn’t know if a hitman for the Cartel had kids or wanted families.”

“I’ve wanted a family for a long time,” he admitted.

“Me too. Having a husband and children have been a distant dream for me for so long. I always wanted someone to share life with, to be with.”

He lifted my hand to kiss my knuckles again.

“I’ve always felt like half of me was missing. Like something or someone could be out there to complete me, to make me feel whole again.”

“I’ll be your soul mate, sweetheart.” He gave me such a serious look of heat and intense affection that I wanted to crawl back over and kiss him again, but that’d lead to fucking on the hood again, and I was sore. I needed a slight breather.

Yet, as he said those words,soul mate, it didn’t sound right. He was. Without a fragment of doubt in my mind, he was my soul mate. I knew no other man could ever compare. No one else would sync with me and mesh into my life like he did. That was a fact.

But his analysis and interpretation of what I said didn’t really make sense. His assumption of my referring to a soul mate wasn’t what I felt.

“It’s just that I’ve always felt lost. Not only because of how Louis gave me a chaotic and unsteady childhood, but like there was always something more to me than what I represented.”

His brow furrowed as he drove.

It was confusing. This sense of feeling lost, this idea of not being completelyme, was a perplexing concept that I often wanted to dismiss as an unresolved curiosity about my identity from a coming-of-age time.

When I said I felt like half of me was missing, it wasn’t a statement of needing to find love. But myself?

Every time I let the mystery of my funky mood and feelings affect me, I figured it was loneliness, a yearning to find a man whom I’d want to look at as my permanent partner.

And you’ve found him. Stop overthinking it.

My childhood and youth weren’t typical. I was raised in a broken home and without the love from a family, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t heal and grow with Miguel to embrace it with him as we started a future together.

“You really want to make this official?” I asked, hating how nervously those words left my mouth. I laid my hand on my stomach. “It’s like, the time that Icouldbe knocked up in my cycle.”

He grinned, sure and smug. “Yeah, I am serious. Official and all.” Driving faster, he glanced at me. “Don’t worry. I’ll propose. I just need to remove the threat off your head first.”

I smiled, settling back against the seat. “My mother was always so worried about me finding a man. I think because sheassumed, like her, I would be sold off to a man, arranged in a marriage that could benefit Louis somehow.”

“She never tried to protect you from him?”

I shook my head. “She was too weak. She has struggled with mental issues for as long as I could remember. Memory issues like forgetting my name. Confusion and paranoia, like another woman was supposed to take her place. Then the drugs…”

I grew quiet, reminded of how she was nearing her death even faster. It’d be a mercy for her now.

She’d never know any son or daughter Miguel and I could bring into the world. Any sons or daughters we’d love and cherish. Miguel was a hard man, a killer, but I couldn’t wait to see how he’d soften up for our children.

I frowned, stuck on that specific thought.

Daughters…

My mother had said it like that several times when I was little. That she had to get her daughters ready. Not just one. Not just me. Even in my little girl mindset, I was observant and noticed her slip. It made me assume she’d lost a child before. Maybe in death, and I hated that she could’ve suffered for so long, for a lifetime.

I was only just embracing the idea of starting a family, and the worry of losing a baby for any reason destroyed me.

“What are you thinking about?” Miguel asked, noticing how quiet I’d become.

I shook my head. “Just… thinking. About how life can change so much.”

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