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I took various phone calls and had difficult schematics shipped. I had to make full sketches and send those images to the engineers in my lab. Even though I had some of the brightest minds working for me, I still had to delegate everything personally. That was the only way things ran smoothly.
Hours passed, and before I knew it, it was lunchtime. Mia approached me at the table where I’d been sitting all morning. “Let me know when you want lunch, Carter.”
I looked at the time on my computer, realizing it was past one. “I’ll take it now. And I want you to eat with me, sweetheart.”
“Alright.” She returned twenty minutes later with salads and sandwiches for us both, along with freshly brewed iced tea. When she took the seat perpendicular to me, I shut my laptop and put my phone aside. “You don’t have to stop working because of me.”
“I’m aware.” I drank my iced tea as I looked at her, seeing the beautiful woman who never wore a drop of makeup. With soft brown hair that framed her face and coffee-colored her eyes, she was a sight to behold. “Lunch is good. Thank you.”
A slight smile formed on her lips. “Thanks.”
I turned my gaze back out the window, seeing the perfectly manicured gardens that hid the gates from view. With a state-of-the-art security system on the grounds, it would be difficult to cross my path without me knowing about it.
“So…any news on Luca?”
“Still working on it, sweetheart. They’re running the background report on my guy. When they’re done, they should release Luca. We’ll make the exchange right away.”
“Alright.” She looked into her iced tea, her eyes downcast. “I’m just anxious. I’m happy to be here. I’m happy that I’m free from Egor. I just—”
“I understand, sweetheart.”
She turned back to me, sighing quietly. “What if he doesn’t remember me…?”
“That’s crazy. Of course, he will.”
“He was only five when I didn’t come home…living in that orphanage for three years must have been a nightmare for him. He had no idea what was going on. He didn’t know what happened to me. It’s just… I hate Egor for what he did. Rape and torture are nothing compared to taking my son away from me.”
It broke my heart to listen to this. It made me want to kill Egor.
“And now, I can’t have any more children…which is just as hard. I’ve always wanted three kids.”
“It’s not impossible, sweetheart.”
“But unlikely,” she whispered. “I should be grateful I have at least one—”
“No. What Egor did was unacceptable. He should die for what he did to you.”
Her eyes shone with gentleness. “I hate him…never hated someone so much in my life.”
“And you should.”
“I always promised myself I would kill him someday…but now that I’m getting Luca back, I should just let it go.”
I wanted to take care of it for her, but I knew vengeance wouldn’t be smart. We should just be thankful we were both able to get away without inciting his wrath. “Yes. You should concentrate on your son.”
“I will,” she whispered.
I had a few questions for her, but they were all personal. She was my property now, but I didn’t have the right to ask her about her past. Anything that happened before me was none of my business. That didn’t stop my curiosity. “Can I ask about Luca’s father?”
“Sure.” She looked me in the eye. “There’s not much to tell.”
“Were you married?” I shouldn’t feel jealousy over someone I didn’t care about. If I did care about her, I would just let her go for good. She was a slave to me now. In some ways, I wasn’t better than Egor. But the idea of her loving a man made the veins in my body burn. The idea of her making love to someone every night while looking him in the eye made my blood boil. Professing to love him for the rest of her life just made it worse.
Shit, what if she was married now?
I was standing between her and her husband.
Fuck.
After she finished drinking her iced tea, she answered my question. “No. Never been married.”
Thank fucking god. “Can I ask what happened?” The father obviously wasn’t in the picture at all. Otherwise, Luca wouldn’t be in an orphanage.
“I got pregnant with Luca very young. I had him when I was eighteen.”
If he was eight, that meant she was twenty-six now. So she was a bit younger than I was.
“The father said he was too young to be a dad and didn’t want the responsibility. Told me to get an abortion. I had no interest in that, so I kept the baby. It was really hard to raise a son at that age. I didn’t have any support and I was broke, but I worked two jobs and put myself through college. When I graduated with a clinical lab science degree, I moved to Italy for my first job. I was the lead scientist for a large winery, overseeing the fermentation process. I was making decent money and giving Luca a good life. Mastering two languages at once, he was a bilingual kid. Then I made the mistake of going to a bar with some friends…a decision that ruined my life. That’s how I ended up here…”
