Page 82 of Hostile Secret
Is this Giovanni’s son?
“Gio is my good friend. He’s looking after me for a few months and then I’ll leave Blackwater to live with his brother again.”
“Yanni looks after me too. And so does Lola,” he murmurs after a moment.
“Is she your mother?”
He makes a face at me like I’m dumb for asking. “No.”
“Oh, right. Where is your mommy? Is she here?”
“I don’t have a mommy,” he says without a tremor of sadness.
I fold my arms across my midriff in a self-hug. “Me too, little guy.”
“Really?” His brows pop and he unclamps his fingers.
“Yeah. And I don’t have a daddy either.” Leo scrubs his eyes and yawns. “Oh dear. Does that mean Yanni is like your daddy, too?”
Thankfully not. My father lost his way in life, but that doesn’t give me daddy issues. Reno more than made up for the loss.
“No, no.” I shake my head, oddly blushing. “We’re just really good friends. Is he your daddy?”
The bedroom door swings open and Giovanni freezes in the doorway, his god-like presence switching to dark and dangerous. Daenis shoots in from behind him and circles my ankles.
He was with my dog?
“Leo!” His electrified eyes automatically assess every limb on the boy's body and his sharp gaze cuts to me briefly before moving back to Leo.
A haunting look passes over his shocked expression, making my belly churn.
“What are you doing in here, buddy?” His feet unstick and he storms closer, scooping the kid into arms and putting space between the two of them and me. “Where’s Lola?”
The boy sets his little hand on Giovanni’s cheek and my heart explodes. “She’s sleeping,” he whispers as if he doesn’t want to wake her.
“That’s because it's late, buddy. You should be sleeping too.” Giovanni glances at the secret doorway and sighs. “What have I told you about wandering around on your own?”
“I was scared.” Leo nuzzles his face into the crook of Giovanni’s neck and wraps his arms around him. “I thought you’d gone away again and didn’t tell me,” he mumbles.
Giovanni visibly controls his breathing, his bare chest rising and falling like an unsettled storm is raging through him. He glances over his shoulder, quietly considering me for the longest moment.
I cross my arms and cock a brow at him, ready for the fallout of this unexpected bombshell.
Rather than losing his temper, he ruffles Leo’s hair and offers him a devastating smile. The rarest of grins that stir so many emotions within me.
“You know I’d never leave without telling you first.”
“But you weren’t in bed.”
“I couldn’t sleep, and India’s dog needed to go outside.”
“Can I stroke the dog, Yanni?”
“Not tonight, buddy.”
Ignoring me, he does a swift one-eighty and stalks barefoot across the room, almost pretending there isn’t a small boy in his arms.
“We’ll talk tomorrow, India. Do not follow me.”
