Page 65 of Savage Proposal

I smiled, and surprisingly enough, it was real. I hadn’t seen Father David in more than a year, but he used to be a staple at our dining room table. My father adored the priest: he had been my father’s personal confessor for most of his adult life, and Father David had done the last rites when he finally succumbed to the cancer that had taken him from us.

“You’re always welcome here, Father,” I said.

The older man chuckled. “You could invite me yourself if you ever got yourself to Mass.”

“Father.” Cristian came into the house behind him. “You said you’d wait until after dinner to start guilting him.”

The man laughed. “It’s the Catholic in me,” he said. “We can’t help it.”

I beckoned them to follow me. Amalia had set up a charcuterie board as an appetizer of sorts. “Can I get either of you some wine?” I asked. There was a bottle of red and white set up on the sideboard.

“Please,” Father David said as he picked up some of the crackers and cheese. “Red, if you have it.”

“I’m driving,” Cristian said.

I picked up one of the bottles of water and tossed it to him, and then poured a glass of red for Father David.

The priest sipped at his wine. I could feel his eyes on me. “Cristian said that you had some things to tell me,” he said.

I snorted. “Right for the throat, Father?” I asked.

“Have I ever been any other way?” he shot back.

That was true: Father David wasn’t the type to pull punches or deflect. It made his sermons popular at the Church, and it was one of the things that Cristian said he admired the most about him. It was also one of the things that made me not want to go to Mass after Sienna died. I didn’t want anyone asking about her, nor did I want Father David’s words of advice or comfort. The brashness would only piss me off, and while my morals were somewhat skewed, accidentally murdering a priest was a touch too far.

“I’m going to be a father,” I told him.

Father David’s eyes grew bright, and he smiled. “Wonderful!” he said and clasped my shoulder. “Cristian didn’t tell me that you were seeing anyone.”

“Oh, I’m not.” The words fell flat between us. I could almost see them hitting the floor with asplat.

“Lorenzo.” Cristian was set to argue, but when I looked at him, he closed his mouth with an almost audible click.

I looked back at the priest, who was frowning now. “I hired a surrogate,” I explained.

His frown deepened into a harsh slash across his face. “Youhiredsomeone to have a child for you?”

“More or less.”

He tipped his head to the side, as if he was trying to see into the depths of my mind. “What does ‘more or less’ mean, Lorenzo?” His words were measured and calm, but I could feel the force of his disapproval like a physical push against my chest.

“She’s in the house, Father,” Cristian jumped in. “You’ll meet her at dinner.”

Father David’s eyes never left me. It was unnerving as fuck. “Do surrogates usually live in the same house as the people who are paying them to have their children?”

“I don’t know,” I admitted. “It’s just how it works for us.”

He hummed and took another long sip of his wine. He turned and took a piece of cheese off the board that Amalia had made. “Where did you meet this woman?”

“Isabella,” I said. “Her name is Isabella.”

Father David let out a little sound of acknowledgment. “Isabella,” he said, as if in agreement. “Which surrogacy company did you meet her through?”

The tension in the room was almost cloying. “You know that I didn’t go through a company, Father,” I said after a moment.

His mouth tightened. “Is this one of those things I need to close my eyes to?” It was a question that he had asked me before, and I knew it was something that he’d asked my father when he played confessor for him. He had to “close his eyes” to the things that happened in the Cosa Nostra that went against Catholic teachings, especially when he knew that no matter what he said, it wouldn’t change anything.

“Probably so,” I said with a nod. He gave me a look, and I held my hands up in an “unarmed” gesture. “I don’t have her shackled in the basement, Father. I promise she’s being well looked after.”

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