Page 32 of Born a Queen

Chapter Nineteen

Mateo broke the kiss and, in one smooth move, swung Raina away from the vehicle far enough that he could open the rear passenger door and lift her inside. Raina was so stunned by the kiss that she barely noticed as he pulled the seat belt around her and latched it, his shoulder brushing hers as he leaned across her body.

"Where are we…?" Raina started to ask, but Mateo slammed the door on her question and strode around to the other side of the vehicle.

She watched curiously as he had a conversation with two of his men before climbing in the back with her, slamming his door shut and buckling his own seatbelt. Two of his men got in the front while the rest made their way to the rear vehicle.

"Where are you taking me?" Raina tried to hide the fear in her voice.

Mateo always had a rhyme and reason for everything he did, but when she didn't know what that was, he came across as unpredictable. Raina didn't like unpredictable. And now she was completely at his mercy. She doubted he would give her another opportunity to run away.

"Home," he said shortly.

The vehicle began moving, taking a left out of the bar parking lot and onto the highway, away from the direction that would take her back to the farm.

"Not the farm, I'm guessing?”

"Not the farm," he confirmed.

"Can you please give me a little more?" she demanded, her voice rising. "Are we driving, are we taking an airplane, a train, a bus? And where exactly is this home that you're taking me to? Venezuela?"

Mateo turned to look at her, his deep chocolatey eyes gleaming in the darkness. "Not Venezuela."

Raina was bewildered. If they weren't going to Venezuela, then where were they going? For some reason Mateo was being even shorter with her than usual. Almost purposefully evasive.

She narrowed her eyes at him. "Are you hiding something from me?"

He looked at her for a while, as though really seeing inside her head. Some of the tension released from his body and he relaxed against his seat. He sighed deeply and ran a hand over his face. He looked tired. Like really, really tired. As though he hadn't slept in weeks.

A stab of guilt pierced her. He hadn't slept because he'd been following her around Italy and then following her back to America as she ran away from him, playing a silly game. Though she had a valid reason for not wanting to go with him, she still cared about his well-being.

"You need to get some sleep," she murmured.

He shrugged. "I'll sleep when I'm dead."

She smirked. "Warren Zevon. Now tell me what you're keeping from me."

“Warren who?” Mateo gave her a strange look.

“Singer songwriter. The first person to write the lyric, ‘I’ll sleep when I’m dead’.”

Mateo’s lips twitched in amusement. “And you know this because?”

Raina shrugged and tried not to return his semi-smile. She was trying to be mad at him, trying to grill him on their destination. “Because I spent two years of my childhood in hospitals and my dad distracted me with movie and music trivia.”

“And you remember everything you hear?” He seemed genuinely curious, as if charmed by learning this new facet of Raina he hadn’t known before.

“Only the random stuff,” she countered.

Raina thought maybe Mateo was avoiding the previous topic. There was something up and it was making him edgy and evasive. Mateo was always on high alert, but this was different. He seemed distracted instead of his usual hyper focused.

She was surprised when he started speaking of his own volition without having to be prompted again. "Your stepfather is giving me Miami."

Raina thought she must not have heard him right. "Sotza is giving you a city? Like a whole city? Is that even possible?"

Mateo looked over at her, his lip still curled in a half smile. "Yeah, he's giving me a city."

"Are you being sarcastic?" Raina demanded.

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