by Hamel, B. B.
I shoved my chair back and got to my feet. I stormed around the table and headed toward the door, heart racing.
I couldn’t do this after all, couldn’t stay with a man like Matteo, not when I knew he was a killer, not when I was sure his whole purpose was to pick off my family one by one. I didn’t love them and they’d never treated me well, but that didn’t mean I wanted them dead.
I hurried to the door and the shoe rack—
But Matteo appeared behind me. He grabbed my wrist and held it tight. I tried to pull away, but his grip was too strong.
“Easy,” he said.
“Don’t talk to me like some scared animal,” I snapped and made my fingers into claws, ready to tear out his eyes. “Let go of me.”
“All the reasons you came inside are still valid. You run out there and you’re going to step in some deep shit.”
I clenched my jaw. I knew he was right. “Let go of me.” I stared death at him and was inches away from attacking.
This was all way too much and I felt lightheaded. He released my wrist and I pulled away, but didn’t try to run. Instead, I sat down on the couch and pulled my legs up against my chest.
He remained standing, giving me some space. “I know you’re upset,” he said.
“Upset?” I laughed once. “Upset doesn’t begin to cover it. Upset isn’t in the ballpark. Upset? Are you kidding me?” I shook my head wildly. “I’m pregnant, okay, and that means my family’s going to kill me. That’s first and foremost. But you’re also a Valentino, which makes you my enemy, and you’re also try to kill people I know, maybe people I care about. So yes, I’m upset, but I’m also really pissed off and really confused and I wish you’d stop looking at me like that.”
He grinned. “Like what?”
“Like you think I’m going to fuck you again.” I spit the words at him. “It’s not going to happen.”
He shrugged a little and walked back over to the table. I wanted to scream and settled for shoving a pillow over my face instead. I held it there, blocking out the light for a few seconds, before lowering it back down.
He sat in a chair next to the couch with the whiskey glass in his hand.
“I know this is a problem,” he said. “I totally get it. But I want you to understand something.”
“What?” I asked.
“I’m going to make sure you’re safe,” he said. “You and that baby matter to me, Sam. I know we barely know each other, and our relationship was based on a misunderstanding—”
“You mean based on a lie,” I said, interrupting.
“Lie, whatever,” he said smoothly. “But that’s my baby growing inside of you, and I’m not the type of man to walk out on family, no matter what. So understand that it doesn’t matter if you hate me, and it doesn’t matter if your family wants me to dead. That’s my child, and I’ll make sure you’re safe.”
I stared at him and tried to make myself understand.
I was his enemy. Daughter of a Healy, cousin of more Healys. Friends of mine have probably tried to kill friends of his, and probably succeeded. He might’ve killed people I knew. This whole city was at war, and our families were right in the middle of it.
And he talked about protecting me.
“You can’t possibly mean that,” I said. “How do you think you can keep me safe, huh? When my dad finds out about this baby, he’s going to beat the shit out of me. Do you get that?”
His jaw clenched. “He won’t touch you.”
“He will,” I said, laughing wildly, even though it wasn’t funny, wasn’t funny at all, but my reactions to stress were more than a little skewed at the moment. “I’m supposed to be a good, clean Healy girl. He wants to marry me off to someone important one day, or at the very least use me for leverage somehow. You think he’s going to be happy that his only daughter got pregnant by some random guy?”
“He won’t touch you,” he said again, eyes hard and tone scarily neutral. I almost believed him.
Almost, but he didn’t have any power in the family.
“What do we do now?” I asked finally. “I can’t go home yet. So what the hell do we do?”
“You can stay here. I have a guest room. Figure out what you want to tell your dad. Give him a call if you want, I don’t care. I’ll get you something to eat if you’re hungry.”
“I’m not sure sleeping under the same roof as you is a good idea.”
“I’ll keep my hands to myself,” he said, sipping his whiskey. “Unless you crawl into my bed tonight.”
“God, you’re such an asshole.” I shook my head, at a total loss. “But you know that already and you probably don’t care.”
“You’ll stay here,” he said, as if that was final, and stood. “I’ll set up the guest room for you, then I’ve got to run some errands.”
“You’re leaving me alone?”
He nodded. “I figured you’d like that, right?”
“Matteo—” I started, then stopped myself. The idea of being alone right then was strangely unappealing, but he was right, I should’ve wanted it.
And I didn’t want to give him the satisfaction of knowing that I needed him around.
“I won’t be long. Make yourself at home. There’s food in the kitchen if you’re hungry.” He walked over toward the stairs. “But stay here and wait until I get back.”
“I should run back home, you know. You’re a lying bastard Valentino.”
“That’s true,” he said. “But you’re the mother of my baby. So you’ll stay right there and you’ll wait.” Then he climbed upstairs and I heard him fussing around for a few minutes before he came back down, shot me one last look, and disappeared outside.
I sat alone on the strange couch surrounded by houseplants and hugged myself. I grabbed my phone and read a text from Nessa. Don’t get yourself knocked up a second time LOL.
If only she knew.
God, if only she knew, maybe she could help.
But I couldn’t tell her right then. I loved Nessa like a sister, but she cared about the Healy family more than I did. She had her loyalties, and if she knew that Matteo was Valentino then she might do something stupid.
I couldn’t take that risk.
So although it drove me crazy, I stayed right where I was, and I waited for him to come back.
5
Matteo
I knew I shouldn’t leave Sam alone in my apartment.
But I also knew I had to figure out what I was going to do with her and quick.
She wasn’t the sort of thing I could hide from the Valentino family. She was much too important—and much too dangerous. I couldn’t just keep her at my house for the next nine months until she gave birth. Sooner or later, her family would find out about me, and then hostilities would only get worse.
No, I had to tell the Don, and I had to tell him right now.
I drove out of the city, going faster than I should’ve. I sent a quick text to Don Valentino’s phone, which was an emergency-only sort of thing, just to tell him that I was on the way. He didn’t respond, and I had to hope he was at home.
The Valentino mansion was out on the Main Line where all the rich, old families of the Philadelphia region lived. It was set back down a long driveway in the middle of a heavily wooded region. The house itself was big with a white vinyl and stone facade, and a massive wrap-around porch. It was a huge house with more rooms than I could even count, plus a gorgeous pool in the back and more grass and hiking trails through the forest beyond.
I grew up a poor Philly kid. The only thing I knew about hiking was how to get from Broad Street to just about anywhere as efficiently as possible. I loved concrete and brick, not grass and trees. The house was worth more money than I’d ever see in my life, even with this lucrative damn Valentino job working undercover to kill as many Healy guys as possible. I was richer than I ever dreamed I would be, and I still wasn’t in the same league as the Don.
But that was how life went. I had what I wanted and what I needed
, and it was enough. I wouldn’t know what to do with a house like the Valentino manor.
I walked up the front steps and knocked at the door. An older woman answered, white hair, bright eyes, big smile. Bea wore an apron over her white shirt and khaki pants, and always seemed excited to see me, like I was her favorite mafia guy in the whole world.
“What a pleasure,” Bea said.
I kissed her on the cheek. She was the Don’s housekeeper, but everyone knew she as much more than that. She practically ran the family when the current Don’s father was still alive, though I suspected she had less pull now than she used to. Still, she sat in on most meetings I attended, and I knew the Don listened to her.
“Is he around?” I asked.
She nodded. “He’s expecting you. Did something happen?”
“It did, but it’s not necessarily bad.” I smiled a little, rubbing my head. “You mind if I tell him about it?”
“Right this way,” she said, and led me into the entry hall. It was wide open with a big crystal chandelier hanging from the room. My steps echoed off the tile as she took me down a hallway, over thick carpets and past wood paneling, ancient statues, and oil paintings. There weren’t enough plants for my taste, though. We stopped outside of the Don’s office, she knocked once, and then opened the door.
Don Valentino sat behind his desk smoking a cigar. He puffed away at it, frowning at me from beyond the smoke. He was a young man, good looking, dark hair, muscular frame. His second-in-command, Gian, was there, sitting with his legs crossed, arm casually slung over the back of his chair.
“Matteo,” Don Valentino said. “You texted.”
“I did, Don Valentino.” I stepped into the room and nodded respectfully to Gian. These men gave me this life, raised me up from the ranks, taught me everything I knew, and yet I still felt a twinge of uncertainty.
I didn’t know how they’d react to this news. I slept with a blood Healy girl and got her pregnant, and I had no clue what they’d think of that. It wasn’t on purpose, but it still happened, and now I had to deal with the consequences.
No matter what though, I’d make sure she was safe. If they talked about hurting her in any way, I’d get her out of the city somehow—but I didn’t think that was a real possibility.
“Sit down,” Don Valentino said. “Cigar?”
“No, thanks,” I said.
“Drink?” Gian asked.
I hesitated and nodded. “Please.”
He got up, grinning, and poured drinks for everyone. When I had my whiskey and slugged half of it down, I finally wiped my mouth with my sleeve and looked the Don right in the eye.
“I fucked a Healy girl and got her pregnant.”
It wasn’t the most eloquent way of saying it. Maybe I could’ve dressed it up a bit, made it seem a little classier, a little gentler.
But I wanted to get the words out as fast as I could, and there it was.
Don Valentino’s eyebrows shot up. Gian made a curious grunting noise.
“How the hell did that happen?” Don Valentino asked.
“Well, when a man loves a woman,” Gian started, but the Don interrupted him.
“No jokes,” he said, still staring at me. “Explain, Matteo.”
I told him the whole story, starting with finding out about the party, through forging the invitation and sneaking inside, right until the moment that I brought Sam into that bedroom. They didn’t know the graphic details, so I glossed over them.
“She found me just today. Told me she was pregnant.”
“You believe her?” Gian asked.
“I’ve got no reason to call her a liar. She’s shaken up. You should see her right now. This is for real.”
Don Valentino leaned toward me. “I should see her right now?” he asked slowly.
I grimaced and stared down into my glass. “She’s at my place.”
“Oh, goddamn it,” Gian said. “Matteo, what the hell were you thinking?”
“You brought a full-blood Healy family member into your home,” Don Valentino said. “It’s bad enough you got her pregnant, but you brought her into your home.”
I glared at him then at Gian. “It’s my baby,” I said. “And I like her. I’m not fucking with her.”
“Nobody’s asking you to fuck with her,” Gian said. “Nobody said we’re hurting the girl.”
“You still could’ve been more careful,” Don Valentino said. “Does she know who you are?”
I let out a slow sigh. No reason to lie. “I told her.”
“Goddamn it,” Gian said, throwing up his hands. Some whiskey spilled on the carpet. “Are you kidding me?”
“That’s not good,” Don Valentino said. “That’s not good at all.”
“She doesn’t get along with her family,” I said. “She’s not about to go tell them that she slept with a Valentino hitman. They’ll kill her themselves.”
“She knows where you live now,” Gian said. “You get that, right? She could sell you out whenever she wants to.”
Don Valentino took a long drink. “Gian’s right, she knows too much.”
“We’re not hurting her,” I said sharply.
“Nobody said we are,” Don Valentino said, holding up his hands. “But we need to think of something to do with her. Something that’ll keep you safe.”
“Maybe we can use her against the Healys,” Gian said. “I’m sure she knows where guys live, safehouses, shit like that.”
“We’re not using her. It’s not about the goddamn war.”
“It’s always about the war,” Don Valentino said, staring daggers at me.
“You could always marry her,” Gian said, grinning. I knew he was joking, but the idea twisted my stomach into knots. The thought of Sam as my wife, pregnant with my baby, living in my home—
“That’s not a bad idea,” Don Valentino said.
I stared at him. Gian laughed.
“I was joking,” Gian said. “You can’t be serious.”
“Think about it,” Don Valentino said. “If Matteo marries her, that puts her in our control. We can protect her better if it’s official.”
“She’ll never go for it,” I said. “She cares too much about her family, even if she says she doesn’t.”
“You don’t know that,” Don Valentino said. “You’re a charming man. You’ve lied your way into worse situations. What’s one more lie?”
“No,” I said, harder than I’d intended, but my fingers were turning white as I gripped the whiskey glass. I took another drink to try to drown my anger. “I’m not lying to her anymore.”
Gian gave me a curious look and shrugged. “She won’t marry him anyway,” he said. “We need other ideas.”
“Ask her,” Don Valentino said. “Tell if that if she married you, I’ll put you both under my personal protection. That means you can come live here, in the manor, until she has the baby and the war’s over.”
“Don,” I said, shaking my head. “That’s too much.”
“Talk to her,” Don Valentino said. “Give her the option at least. If she wants to have this baby safely, then marrying you is a good way to do it.”
I should’ve argued. I could’ve told him I didn’t want to marry her, didn’t want to get involved like this. I wanted to protect her and keep my baby safe, of course—but marriage?
That wouldn’t be true though.
It scared the hell out of me, the idea of marrying her. I shouldn’t want it, should run the hell away instead. I never wanted to settle down and get married before. That was never an option for me.
I was a nothing. Two deadbeat parents, a dad that drank too much and wasted his life in some factory job, and a mother that was a waitress during the day and took pills at night to numb herself. I loved my parents, but I didn’t want to end up like them.
So I joined the Valentino family and dedicated myself to getting stronger, faster, and smarter.
But now I had a chance at something more than just the existence of a mobster. Ma
king money and killing enemies was one thing, but a baby and a wife was an entirely different existence that I never really pictured for myself.
Sitting in that room with the Don’s smoke curling around the ceiling, I could just see it, could almost make out waking up in the morning to Sam’s smile while the baby cried in the other room, could smell breakfast cooking, could feel my baby’s skin against my cheek.
That was a life, a real life. I could have that, if I convinced Sam to marry me.
It might be fake at first. Just a marriage of convenience. But we could turn it into something more.
We could have a future.
“I’ll ask her,” I said suddenly.
Gian stared at me in surprise, but the Don only nodded his head, satisfied.
“If she says no, we’ll find another way,” he said. “But hurting the girl isn’t an option, you have my word.”
“Thank you, Don.” I stood up suddenly, finished my drink, and handed it to Gian. He seemed too bewildered to argue.
“Be careful,” Don Valentino said. “I don’t know this girl and neither do you. From the sound of it, she’s smart, and this might be a trap. You’ve killed more than your fair share of Healy men, and this might be their way to catch you.”
“I don’t think so,” I said, “but I’ll keep it in mind.”
“Needless to say, your cover’s blown,” Gian said, carrying my empty glass to the drink tray. He gave himself a refill while he was over there. “I guess it was bound to happen.”
“We’ll get someone else on the inside,” Don Valentino said. “For now, your mission is to marry that girl.”
“I’m not sure she’ll go for it, but I’ll try,” I said.
“Good luck,” Gian said, grinning to himself. “Marriage is great. You’ll love it.”
I nodded at them and left the room. I stood in the hall for a few seconds, gathering myself.
The Don wanted me to marry Sam, and now I wanted it just as much.
For different reasons though. The Don thought having her in the inner circle would be beneficial to the family. I couldn’t hold that against him—he was the Don, after all, and he had to think about the family over everything else.