Chapter 9
Torquato Lozano was Bruno. She gripped the windowpane as he was going on about how he wanted her to stay working for the company while her mind spun in a million different directions and all of them pulling back together into a whirlpool of blackness she wanted to disappear into.
“No. No. No.” she whispered as she inched her way to the door.
“Anyway,” he cleared his throat as she reached for the handle of the door. “Where are you going? We’re not done.”
She kept her spine straight and didn’t turn around, praying he hadn’t seen her face yet. “Look, it isn’t in my best interests to remain. Genevra was still spouting shit when I was on my way here, despite Kylen and Bastiano telling her to back off. Also, it was one thing to work for this company when it was simply one of your umbrella companies but it’s clear you’re relocating businesses back to New York. I can’t work for the Lozano family after I so blatantly disrespected you. My father will know, and he’ll be in my business. I can’t.”
“Look, Kylen said you’re a damn valuable asset and I trust his judgement. He clearly knew you were Mariani, or he wouldn’t have his job. He’s good at what he does. If he trusts you, I do too. Think about it and give us your answer in the morning. I’ll deal with your father if he starts up.”
“Sounds good.”
J“Alcee, for what it’s worth, I am sorry for what happened to you when the engagement was called off. I make my own rules and my own way in
life, and I forgot sometimes innocent people can get caught in the crossfire.”
“As I said, I disrespected you first. I lost my virginity before you even made the call. The engagement would have been called off regardless.” She didn’t add she’d given it to him but instead rolled out her shoulders.
“Fair enough.”
She hated those two words. They were the equivalent of “whatever” and “if you say so” and they always grated on her nerves because it was one of her father’s favorite phrases to dismiss her. She took it as the dismissal she knew it was and walked out.
Making her way to the elevator, Tank waved at her to hold on and he raced towards her. “Please tell me you didn’t quit?”
“He gave me until morning to think it over.”
“Look, you’ll rarely need to be on this floor. The ice princess will need to go through us to put orders in and so we can keep you on the ten floors beneath this one. You never need to come up here.”
“I’ll think about it but right now, I just need to get home.”
She stepped into the elevator and exhaled shakily. She needed to get home to her son. The child she’d created accidentally with the office she’d just left.
man whose
She’d never missed a birth control pill in all the years she’d taken them from the time she was fifteen until she was twenty–one and her father locked her in the holding cell. For seven days after the night she’d lost her virginity, her family withheld everything other than day old bread and water in the hopes of making her crack to reveal her lover’s name. The things they withheld included her birth control. Finding out semen could last a full seven days, floating around in her womb just waiting for the egg to drop had been shocking.
Should she turn around and confront him? Why the fuck did the heir to the Lozano family pay for a virgin? He could simply ask his guys to wrangle one up for him. She grimaced as she thought of the story. Someone gave him an STI.
One of the first things she’d done when she went to the clinic upon her release from her father’s jail cell hell, was to request a full panel of tests to make sure the Bruno guy who divulged late he’d once suffered an infection didn’t pass something onto her. While she was getting IV fluids to replenish her from seven days of torture, another nurse drew blood to check for diseases. When the results came back ten days later, she was clean, it was a bittersweet feeling because the same day she’d gotten the information was the same day she’d taken a home pregnancy test and saw two striped lines.
She was lost in her thoughts as she collected her belongings from her locker, making sure to leave nothing behind. She paused at her workstation and also grabbed anything personal there as well. Despite telling the man upstairs she’d think on it, she knew she was never coming back to work here and more importantly she was going to find a way to get the hell out of Dodge.
Her son was the child of Don Torquato “Grizzly” Lozano and if the man knew there was an heir running loose in New York, it was entirely possible he’d steal her son from her. She’d heard his nickname in the past because everyone knew he was a huge motherfucker, but she also knew there was a lot to do with how vicious and violent he could be. The term “grizzly murders” a play on the word “grisly” was often applied to crime scenes where he was rumored to participated all over the world.
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Chapter 9
In a daze, she took the elevator back down to the lobby and stepping out while slinging her backpack over her shoulder she slammed hard into a solid wall of muscle. The man was almost as large as Torquato and when she met his gaze, she was instantly catapulted back to the day in the hotel. This was the man who’d been wearing the gun holster over his white dress shirt and took Bruno, or Torquato as she now knew him, into the next room to discuss something.
He narrowed his gaze at her as if trying to place her face. “Where are you off to in
uch a hurry?”
“Home. I just finished putting together Mr. Lozano’s computer system upstairs.” She rushed the words out.
“Oh, you’re the Mariani princess.” He was still studying her. “I’m Tito Arace. I know your face from somewhere.”
“My personnel file perhaps. I’m sure you looked at it when the company was taken over right?”
“Nope.” He was really staring hard at her and when she tried to dart past him, he grabbed her arm. “What’s the rush?”
“I need to get home. I stayed longer than I was supposed to as it was.”
“Did your family send a car here for you?”
“No. I take the subway. My family and I aren’t um,” she shook her head. “There is no car coming. I do need to go though.”
“We’re allied with your family. I can’t let their Principessa take the subway. Your father could start a war over it.” He laughed at his joke.
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Why would she take a pregnancy test after only 17 days?
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