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“At this point, I like anywhere I’ll feel safe.”
For the moment, they felt united.
For the moment.
Dante busied himself with work during the journey, and Minerva slept when Isabella did, and woke when she was fitful. She marked the hours in feedings and diaper changings.
Until finally, the plane began to descend.
There was a small runway on the island, clearly.
“Your pilot knows where we are,” she said.
Dante acknowledged this with a nod of his head. “I do trust him.”
“How much do you trust him?” she pressed.
He lifted a dark brow. “Enough to allow him to fly me fifty thousand feet over the ocean?”
“Yes, but in that case his fate is tied to yours.”
“Oh, believe me, Minerva, his fate will always be tied to mine. Because should anyone betray us—and in this case, the only option would be him as he is the only person on earth who knows we are here—his fate would be in a precarious position indeed.”
“You’re filled with death threats of late.”
“Well, as is your life. Therefore, I find the situation merits more of them than I would typically be meting out.”
Minerva pondered this as they got their things together and disembarked. She suddenly found him to be something of a stranger.
She had always known that he was hard, but she had also felt safe goading him. Now he had kissed her, and that made him feel unpredictable. And wholly different from what she had imagined he was.
Then there was his willingness to threaten someone’s personal safety.
He did so with ease and without compunction. And it made her wonder what kind of man he was on a day-to-day basis.
She knew whom he was when he was interacting with her family, but she was beginning to think that wasn’t the measure of him.
And given that he had actually robbed her father at gunpoint, she did wonder if Robert and Maximus had a better idea of who he was than she did.
Or Violet. Or Elizabeth.
She wondered if the women in the family were entirely ignorant of that side of him.
“You’re thinking so hard I can see smoke coming out of your ears, Min,” he said.
She tapped her chin. “I’m just thinking about your ruthlessness.”
He lifted a shoulder. “People often do.”
“Well, I didn’t know that. You always seemed like somewhat of a stern older brother to me.” She wrinkled her nose. “Stern. Not dangerous.”
“Ah,” he said. “An easy mistake to make, I suppose. Though, I don’t think anyone else in the world has ever made it.”
“Well, they don’t know you like I do.” She frowned. “Like I did.”
They got off the plane and there was a car parked just there, waiting for them. It was fitted with a base for Isabella’s car seat, and as soon as she was safely secured they were on their way.
The landscape was beautiful, and desolate as he had said. Dense forestation on one side, and brilliant white sand on the other. And there, built into the craggy hillside overlooking the sea, was an intensely modern, modular home, white squares to match the sand with glass all around.
