Page 54 of Mafia Doctor's Secret Baby

“Ask me again at the end of this road trip…”

The conversation flows easily between us as we drive to Harrotsville, and I can’t help but feel a little twinge of sadness knowing that I won’t be able to just call her up and invite her over like I used to when we were living in the same city. In the last year, more has changed than I can wrap my head around, most of it for the better—but the thought of being so far from my best friend, the woman who has functionally made up my family over the last couple of years, is a lot for me.

“It’s going to be strange,” I admit to her, after we pull over to grab some iced coffees before we hit the road again. “Being part of a family again.”

She frowns, a dark shadow flitting over her face—she knows about what happened to my parents, of course, but she does her best to dodge that conversation wherever she can. It’s not as though I go out of my way to talk about my family, the weight of all I’ve lost hanging too heavy over my head for anything like that.

“What do you think your parents would make of all this?” she asks softly, and I snort with laughter.

“I think they would decide I’ve gone crazy when I told them everything that happened,” I admit. “I mean, if I even told them about it at all. My mom would do everything she could to try to hate on Luca, but when she actually met him, she wouldn’t be able to keep that up for long. And my dad…well, all he wouldcare about was making sure that Polly and I are okay, and just as soon as he’s certain we are, he would come to terms with it.”

I press my lips together as I lean against the car, the straw of my iced coffee hovering a few inches from my lips.

“I wish they had been here to meet her,” I murmur, as I look back toward Polly. “When she came into the world, I thought it was just going to be her and me…”

“Hey, and me,” Cara cuts in. I nod my head, conceding the point.

“Of course, and you,” I reply with a grin. “But I thought when it came to family, she wouldn’t have anything in the way of real blood relatives. And now, she’s going to be surrounded by them. Me, Luca, his brother, his father…”

“And she’s going to grow up to be a perfect little mafia princess,” she teases. “She’s going to be so spoiled, I just know it.”

“Hey, no way, I’m not going to let them spoil her,” I protest. “She’s going to be down-to-earth. Well, as much as she can be, with Luca as a father.”

“He’s good with her, isn’t he?” she asks, frowning slightly. She still hasn’t had a chance to meet Luca in person properly yet, and I guess it’s natural that she has her doubts, given everything I’ve been through.

I nod. “He’s amazing with her,” I reply. “He adores her. I don’t think he would have been able to cope if I decided to stay in Pensacola, he would have missed her too much.”

“No wonder he put the ring on your finger…couldn’t stand to be away from you.”

I glance down at the band on the ring finger of my left hand. Luca told me that if I wanted something different, I was more than welcome to change it, and he wouldn’t have taken any offense to it, but there’s no way I’m going to replace it with something else. No, this is the ring he has gifted to me, the ring that he chose to mark this transition into the rest of our lives together, and it’s perfect the way it is. Plus, anything bigger, and I’m pretty sure I would have a hard time lifting my hand to so much as hold a pen.

“And what a ring,” she adds when she catches me looking down at it with a grin on my face. “He really didn’t want another man so much as looking in your direction, huh?”

“Oh, you know me anyway,” I reply, sipping down the last of my iced coffee and tossing the container into the trash. “Never had much time for guys. Always had bigger things to think about. Speaking of, how about the rest of this journey, huh…?”

We hit the road once more, and turn up the music once Polly is awake. Cara reaches back to her to squeeze her hand as she sings along tunelessly, and Polly seems to be utterly delighted by the whole thing, cackling like she can hardly contain herself.

By the time we finally reach the city, I’m exhausted, but too excited at the thought of laying eyes on my new apartment to let it get to me. I spring out of the car, biting my lip once we pull up on our new street—and to my surprise, a doorman steps out from behind a large wrought-iron gate to greet me.

“Ms. Kincaid?”

I nod, raising my eyebrows and casting Cara a surprised look—I know Luca said he had gotten us somewhere good, but I had no clue it would be quitethisover-the-top.

“Come with me,” he tells me. “Mr. Mariana is waiting inside for you…”

I scoop Polly out of the car and follow him toward the house, Cara in hot pursuit—I can already tell she has a million smart comments about the kind of luxury I’m living in right now, but I will deal with those when I have to. For the time being, all I care about is laying eyes on my new home, once and for all. Mercifully, I don’t have to wait long.

Just inside the gates, a huge house stands towering against the Harrotsville skyline—it looks more like some Italian villa than a home that belongs here, in the suburban sprawl of the city, but I’m already in love with it. Tall white stone walls reach up toward the blue sky above, and blue and green tiles circle each doorway and window. It looks like it could have been plucked straight from some vacation brochure I might flick through at the dentist’s office, without an ounce of belief that I might ever actually live in something like this myself.

“Holy shit!” Cara exclaims, and the sound of her voice breaks my reverie.

I turn to her, an incredulous laugh escaping my lips. “I know, right?” I murmur as I head toward the door. “This is…”

“Everything you wanted it to be, I hope,” a voice cuts in—a voice that sends a shiver rushing down my spine at once. My face lights up in a smile, and Polly holds out her little arms in Luca’s direction as he emerges to the front door.

“It’s so good to see you,” I murmur, and I dive toward him for an embrace before I can so much as think twice. Polly gets a little squished between us, but she doesn’t seem to mind too much, as happy as I am to be in his company once more.

“I missed you two so much,” he remarks, as he drops a kiss on my cheek, and then does the same to Polly.

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