Page 72 of Her Reluctant Hero
“How long before we can start looking again?”
He tossed the bottle cap on the dashboard and sighed. “Bella, the problem is, we don’t know where to look.”
“I should have let those men at the hotel take me,” she said, bitter regret choking her words. They would have taken her to Santiago, and though she’d be back in the life she’d escaped, she would be with her son.
“What makes you think they would have taken you to your son? Saldana separated you in the first place. I doubt he’s looking to reunite you. You wouldn’t do Hector any good dead.”
She pushed her hair from her face as her stomach tightened. Santiago would have punished her somehow, she knew. “You don’t know they were going to kill me.”
Alex snorted. “I’m thinking they weren’t there to court you.”
She couldn’t let go of the what-if. “But you could have followed and rescued me, and we could have found Hector and this would all be over.”
He chuckled without humor. “Amazing, the faith you have in me.”
“You wouldn’t have let him get away with it. Even if he’d killed me, you would have found my son and made sure he was safe.”
He didn’t say anything, just took a long drink of his Coke. “I’m going to protect you. That’s my first job. All right?”
“I want Hector to be your priority.”
“I can’t do that.”
“Alex, listen to me.” She turned in her seat and rested her hand on his arm. “He’s just a baby. He needs your protection more than I do. If anything happens to me—”
The muscle in his jaw jumped but he kept his eyes ahead. “Nothing’s going to happen to you.”
“I know. I trust you to keep me safe.” How could she think otherwise, after all he’d pulled her through, even after he had the opportunity to walk away back in Honduras? But those men last night had had guns. Santiago had sent men after her to Jorge’s club. People had died. There were no guarantees here. “But if something does, I do not want Hector to go with Santiago or any of his family.”
Alex shifted his weight, breaking away from her touch.
“It’s not that I want you to take him,” she said quickly. “Though I’m sure someday you’ll be a good dad and all that. I’d just never ask that of you after you’ve done so much for me. But I want you to see that he’ll get to someone who will love him.”
“Your parents?” he asked, glancing sharply at her.
Those words caused more pain than she expected. They brought back images of another lifetime, one she never should have left behind. Only if she’d followed that path, she wouldn’t have Hector now and she wouldn’t give him up for anything. She glanced at the newspaper in her lap. “No, they won’t—I mean, they’d love him, but they’re not young. And—”
“They don’t know about him,” he finished for her.
She looked up at him. “No, I haven’t told them.”
“I wouldn’t know what to do with a little kid, providing the authorities let me do anything at all. But it doesn’t matter, because nothing is going to happen to you, all right?” He glanced over, his eyebrows drawn together, intense, as if he could drill that belief into her head. “You and Hector will be safe, this will be over, we’ll all go to Disney World.”
She stopped the thrill that ran through her. Wasn’t that what everyone said when they achieved a goal? “I’m going to Disney World?” She would not take it personally.
He turned on the ignition, and the voice on the radio startled them both. Alex reached over and snapped it off. “Remind me. How long has he been missing?”
“Four months.”
He blew a breath through his nose, almost a surrender, she thought. “We’re going to find him, Bella. I promise you.”
What did that cost him, to promise her something he had no way of guaranteeing? She didn’t know how to tell him she appreciated it, either.
“There’s a diner. Let’s eat there,” she said instead, pointing to the low-roofed restaurant that must have been built before she was born. Her growling stomach reminded her she hadn’t eaten before he took her back to bed.
He grimaced. “We have food at the trailer.”
She wanted to bounce in her seat in frustration, like Hector would. She could smell the fries and her mouth was watering. “But it’s right here, and I haven’t eaten at a diner in forever.”
