Page 22 of Broken Princess

"Lorenzo, I—"

"Don't," he mutters. He sounds furious, which I can't say I'm surprised by. What I am surprised by is the fact that, for some reason, I actually care.

Can you have Stockholm syndrome if it's from the person who rescued you?

"There's something I need to say, before you say anything," he begins.

Tempted as I am to argue, I figure I owe him that. "Okay… what is it?"

"What you did was foolish and reckless," he says, starting in already. "It's a damn miracle that we found you, let alone in time. Anything could've happened, to you or the baby. Milo is fucking insane, and he's exactly what I was talking about. He despises your father, and he wouldn't have hesitated to kill you."

"I know," I murmur.

"You know," he taunts. "You know, but you ran anyway."

"I didn't have a choice," I mutter.

"And how do you figure that?" he demands.

"Because you would've found out about the baby, for one thing," I answer. "You and my father." My heart skips a beat as something else dawns on me. "Does he know?"

"No," Lorenzo says. "Not right now."

I look over at him, not sure if that's a threat or not. He glances over, too, and the stony look in his gaze doesn't help make the answer to that any clearer.

"Don't pretend like you have no idea why I wouldn't want you to know about this," I say. "Or that you even wanted to know."

"Of course I want to know," he seethes. The force of his anger catches me off guard. "It's my baby, Amelia. Or are you going to deny that, too?"

For about half a second, I'm actually considering it. I don't know why, but I can't. Maybe it's just because I don't want to taint this baby with a lie. I tried running, because I didn't want them to grow up the way I did, but maybe inadvertently, I ended up doing the same damn thing in a roundabout way.

"No," I finally respond. "I'm not. It's your baby, but that doesn't change anything."

"The hell it doesn't," he snarls. "What, did you think I was just going to be some deadbeat?"

I hold myself, even though the physical chill has given way. "That's not what I meant."

"Then what did you mean?" he challenges. I can tell he's not going to let me get away that easily.

"You're not ready to be a father, Lorenzo," I finally reply. "You're not even ready to be a boyfriend. At least, not mine."

His knuckles turn white on the steering wheel. "So that's it? You were never going to tell me?"

"Be honest with me, did you really want to know?" I ask. "All this can do is make your life more complicated, and you don't like complicated. What would your parents think?"

He grips the wheel harder, and I can feel the rage coming off him, even though for once, I'm not actually sure I understand it.

"I don't fucking care what my parents think," he snaps.

He sounds more certain about it than he possibly can be. He might think he doesn't care right now, but I know when it comes to the practical reality, from the power he's set to inherit from his parents to the day-to-day inconveniences of being the black sheep of the family, he is going to care.

A lot.

"That's not the world we live in, Lorenzo," I murmur. "Not caring isn't a luxury that either of us has. I'm not attacking you, for the record. I understand now, more than I did before. This world is hard to escape. It follows you, whether you want it to or not."

He falls silent, and it occurs to me that we're turning down a relatively quiet road. Come to think of it, I'm not even sure where we're supposed to be going. He finally pulls over onto the side of the road and turns to face me.

"Listen to me," he growls.

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