Page 37 of Forbidden Surrogate

His eyes flicker with warmth that he has to immediately quell to drag me out of the room alive.

“Come,” he says to me with a deep, commanding voice that I wouldn’t dare to disobey. I’m not hurt from the bombing aside from a somewhat deep scrape on my thigh that I can’t even feel. I don’t dare reveal the bleeding scrape when he asks me if I’m hurt.

I want to get out of here without witnessing a murder and Luigi’s dark demeanor, not to mention the enormous weapon he cradles suggest to me that he might err towards being trigger happy.

“I’m fine.”

He seems doubtful, but responds with a stiff nod. His firm palm closes around mine as he leads me out of the dark closet where the men held me captive and into the light. I’m blinded from being in the dark for so long and my eyes run with thick tears, so heavy that I can’t even see my captor’s faces. I just cling to Luigi, trusting that he’ll get me out of there.

Trusting that if I just hold onto him, he’ll protect me until it’s all over…

He warns the men. “Go back to Pittsburgh and tell your family the Tavianis will see them soon.”

Are we going to Pittsburgh? Is he?

It’s better to sit in the passenger seat of the Chevy Tahoe than the back, honestly. But it doesn’t feel good sitting next to Luigi. My hearing hasn’t come back all the way yet. I have cuts and scratches all over my arms. I lost my heels, so my feet are freezing cold…

I’m happy to be alive, but I’m scared and frankly… numb.

Luigi turns the heat up and he stays quiet for five minutes of our drive back to… I assume the lake house, but I don’t really know.

“I have to leave for Pittsburgh tonight,” Luigi says in a calm voice. There’s no room for negotiation or change. “You can’t come. Angela will look after you.”

“Are we going to the lake house?”

“Not yet. A meeting point.”

So it’s serious.

“Are you sure I wouldn’t be better off on my own?”

“I’m sure,” he says. “Angela will have a private security team by tomorrow morning and the lake house will be the safest place for both of you.”

“Fine.”

Pittsburgh is only three and a half hours away. He could be there and back in a couple of days at the latest.

“My job there will take at least ten weeks,” Luigi says, dropping the real bombshell. I’m still too numb from everything that happened tonight to process that he’ll be away for at least a third of my pregnancy. If I’m pregnant.

“Okay.”

“I won’t come back. I won’t be able to do anything except maybe… send emails.”

“Emails?”

“I’ll need updates on your well-being.”

He looks over at me with eyes that send a shiver straight through me. Attraction. Confusion. Desire. He makes me feel fucking everything, even if I want to deny Luigi any ability at all to influence my emotions. We have a fucked up baby contract. That’s it.

“Okay, sure. Send me an email.”

He sighs. “I’m glad you’re okay. If they hurt you… they would have been dead.”

Just when I find him so unbelievably frustrating, he does something that betrays his hidden feeling and yanks me right back into my own confusing maelstrom of emotions.

It shouldn’t be romantic that he wants to kill people at all, even if it’s for me, but in a world that doesn’t give a shit about protecting women like me, it’s mind-blowingly addictive to be around someone who does.

“Thanks for coming to get me.”

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