Page 60 of Secret Baby for the Italian Mafia King

It’s not supposed to go like this. It’s supposed to be subtle, but Ren doesn’t havesubtlein him right now.

“I haven’t asked you for anything, Ren.”

“Exactly. So, ask.”

The corner of Salvatore’s lip lifts. It’s not a smile. It makes his face darker as he leans back in his chair, appraising Ren with the same look that Ren is giving him.

“How much are they worth to you?”

Ren opens his palms. Leaves the number unquantified. Holds that fierce, bitter stare.

Salvatore takes another bite of the rare steak on his plate.

“Anything?” he prompts.

Ren scoffs bitterly.

“Dellucci already sent one of his dogs to make that offer. And we both know I can’t take it. It’s not really an offer at all—”

My head perks up, trying to piece together what they’re talking about. It’s not subtle, but it’s just vague enough to leave me in the dark. Ren just keeps sayinglet me take care of it, let me take care of it, it isn’t your place.Well, it’s my life. It’s my daughter’s life. I didn’t even know Dellucci made him an offer—and herejectedit?

“Of course it isn’t,” Salvatore agreed.

“Just give me something better than that,” Ren says, his voice low, urgent. Desperate? “What do you want, Mori?”

“I want exactly what I asked you for the first time. A good reason.”

Ren’s eyes flick to Harper, his expression burning.

“…If I haven’t given you one, then we have nothing else to talk about.”

Salvatore Mori nods, and the table descends into silence, except the tiny sound of Harper tapping her nail against the bowl as the resurrected fish swims in trapped, tight circles, around and around.

18

Ren

Nadia and I pile into the car. Harper sits between us. A clueless barrier. She’s still talking about Tessa’s baby. Some stakeless argument about whether she was or wasn’t ever that little. She refuses to believe it. I wouldn’t know.

She’s six years old.

Almost seven!her proud voice echoes in my thoughts, the way it has all dinner.

I glance at her, my thoughts acid eating away at me. There are only two possibilities: Either Harper is mine, or Nadia moved on right away. Maybe while we were still together.

I never asked her why she cut me off in the week leading up to my parents’ murder. Why, no matter how I tried to reach her, she wouldn’t answer me. There isn’t a lot that frightens me, really. Fear is one of those emotions that lands numb inmy chest. But the answer to that question—that lingeringwhygnaws away at me inside—I don’t know if I want the answer to it. I am afraid of what it might bring out in me.

If she told me that she knew it was going to happen to my parents, if she could have warned me and changed everything, could I handle that? A suspicion is just a suspicion, and I’ve held that one for a long time. If I learned that for a fact…

The thing that sometimes takes over stirs under my skin again. Like a shadow under the surface of the water. The car rumbles over a pothole, jostles me out of my thoughts that are swirling down and down, drawing me deeper into my own head.

I always thought she knew. But maybe it was something else entirely. Something more innocent for a teenage girl. Maybe she was just fucking done with me. My hand throbs. For the first time in days, pain has taken up residence in my arm again. I felt it all through dinner. I rub my hand against my knee, try to chase out the growing ache pulsing under my skin.

Or the other option…I look at Harper, and I can’t even consider it. Nothing that good would come from me. It couldn’t. I look at her, I just see Nadia—Nadia and some stranger.

I want to ask her about him.

I want to kill him again, even though he’s already dead.

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