Page 74 of Fierce King (L.A. Ruthless 1)

Alana

Alejandro openedthe car door and took my hand, helping me out. He’d told Jacob to park down the block so that we weren’t pulling up in his fancy car outside a shelter where the residents had very little. The fact that he’d thought of that surprised me. Maybe he wasn’t such an uncaring monster, after all?

He wasn’t dressed in his usual suit either, but was wearing jeans and a polo shirt, so his muscular arms and some of his tattoos were on display. Even dressed casually, he still looked hotter than the sun.

He kept hold of my hand as we walked down the street. I swallowed as we neared the shelter.

‘Are you nervous?’ he asked me.

God, why did he have to know me so well! ‘A little,’ I admitted.

‘Do you think I’m going to embarrass you?’ he said with a cock of one eyebrow.

‘No,’ I replied. ‘It’s just this has been my world for the past eight weeks, and now you’re going to see it, and it feels kind of strange.’

‘It will be fine,’ he said and then he leaned in and gave me a gentle kiss on the cheek. My heart almost stopped beating. It was such a tender act that it unnerved me.

This wasn’t him. It certainly wasn’t him and me. We fucked and we fought. We didn’t do this real husband and wife stuff. Had I made a huge mistake bringing him here? I supposed it was too late now.

A few seconds later, we were standing outside the shelter.

‘You ready?’ Alejandro asked.

I nodded.

As soon as we walked through the doors, we were accosted by Kristen, the shelter manager.

‘Alana!’ she shouted as she pulled me into a hug.

I hugged her back warmly. I loved Kristen. She was warm and fun and kind, and she had devoted her life to helping other people. She stepped back and smoothed her hair back from her face as she looked at Alejandro.

‘Kristen, this is my husband, Alejandro,’ I said with a feeling of pride that completely blindsided me. What did I have to be proud of? It wasn’t like any of what me and him shared was real. But, I felt it anyway.

‘Kristen,’ Alejandro said as he took her hand and kissed it. ‘It’s a pleasure to meet you.’

‘Oh, the pleasure is mine,’ she blushed.

‘This place looks great,’ Alejandro said as he looked around. ‘You must be doing an excellent job.’

Kristen put an arm around my shoulder. ‘Well, there is no way we’d be standing in this fine building if it wasn’t for your incredible wife. I think she must be our guardian angel, because before she showed up, we were about to be evicted from a building that was, quite frankly, falling apart.’

‘Kristen!’ I said as I felt the heat creeping over my neck and cheeks.

‘She’s awful at taking compliments, isn’t she?’ Kristen laughed, and Alejandro laughed too.

‘Yes, she is,’ he said and winked at me.

‘I can’t thank you enough for bringing her into our lives anyway, Mr. Montoya. I honestly don’t know what we’d do without her. You must be very proud.’

Alejandro looked at me and smiled and I felt my heart hammering in my chest. ‘Oh, I am,’ he said and if I didn’t know him better, I would have sworn he meant it.

‘Alana,’ I heard a voice behind us shout, breaking the moment. I turned to see Lucy walking towards us.

Lucy broke my heart. Sixteen years old, pregnant and with no family at all. Not that anyone else knew she was sixteen and pregnant – she had false documentation stating she was eighteen, and I still hadn’t worked out what I was going to do about it.

I hadn’t been able to get details of the father of her baby, other than he was older than her and his name was Blake. But, he sounded like very bad news. I’d spent so much time with her over these past few weeks, and I was growing to care for her deeply. She was such a sweet kid who had been dealt a crappy hand in life.

‘Lucy,’ I said with a smile as I gave her a quick hug. ‘I’d like you to meet, Alejandro.’

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