Page 76 of Chris

Everything about this terrified her.

Trust me.

His words rang in her mind.

Valeria wouldn’t soon forget them.

She couldn’t.

Glancing across the table again, she found Chris tipping his coffee up for a drink. Over the rim of the mug, while everyone else around them was trying to avoid Jorge’s morning wrath, Chris watched her with a knowing glint in his eye.

That look said soon.

It murmured beautiful things.

It promised, too.

Hope, Valeria realized.

That’s what she was feeling in those moments—hope. As traitorous as it was, and as destructive as it might be. Because what might happen, she wondered, if she did get that freedom Chris promised her.

What would happen with him?

With her?

For her child?

She had never dared to hope before.

Now, it was all she felt.

Because of him.

“But have you explained to Papá what you’re planning yet?”

“Why, so he can ruin the Canadian deal?”

“Jorge—”

“Samuel, I told you how this will work. Didn’t I?”

The Spanish between the Lòpez brothers flowed fast, and while Valeria was fluent, her years away from Mexico and not needing to speak her mother tongue sometimes made it difficult for her to follow along when two or more people spoke quickly. Her steps slowed coming down the stairs of their ranch home, so she could focus on just the conversation happening between Jorge and his brother in the kitchen.

“He’s already planned Abril’s wedding to Roberto García,” Samuel said, a sigh following his words. “If you think by ruining this arrangement, he’s made with our rivals will only piss them off, then you are mistaken, brother.”

“Have you considered that’s what I want?”

“Excuse me?”

Jorge let out a bitter laugh. Valeria shivered. Her husband was a lot of things, and a bastard was at the top of the list. He didn’t care who he had to hurt on his way to the top as long as that’s where he landed at the end of it all.

His family?

People he should care for?

Those he proclaimed to love?

Fodder.