Page 7 of Reckless Love

“Your son,” he says, ignoring me. “Is five? And his father is…” He glances up at me, and there’s a challenge in his eyes.

Fuck him.

“Fifty-five, but I’m sure that’s in your notes.”

“Yes. Is the boy biologically his?”

“Of course he is,” I grit out.

“Looking at the boy’s birthday—”

“You know what I was like,” I say, cutting him off. If he’d stuck around, we could have had this conversation then, but he didn’t. He doesn’t get to show up and grill me like he has any interest in my life.

“Those Tucker genes are strong,” he says, forearms braced on his knees. “He looks a lot like you. Like Nathaniel. Tall for his age, though.”

“His father is tall,” I say. “What does this have to do with our protection?”

“If I’m going to protect you, I need to understand who I’m protecting.”

“The wife and son of Raul Santos,” I say, as though that’s some kind of accomplishment. It’s not, and I know it.

“Hmm,” he says, and he checks off something on his sheet.

“If you don’t believe me, there’s a DNA test.” At the time, the results shattered me.

This hard exterior he’s giving me is causing my palms to sweat. Whenever we’d argue, he’d close off like this, but I always knew he’d give in. That at some point, he’d look at me and decide whatever we were fighting about wasn’t worth losing me or not having me. Maybe one hour or a few hours or two days, but not six fucking years.

I scan his fingers for a wedding ring, and the knot inside me loosens slightly when I see that his hands are bare.

“I don’t think you should be in charge of my safety,” I say.

“Why’s that?” he asks. “You don’t think I’d protect you with my life?”

My stomach plummets to my feet, and I avert my gaze, hoping he hasn’t seen how hard that question hit. There was a time when he would have done anything to protect me. Broken any rules or laws. Carried me through hell. Suffered any consequence if it meant I was okay. It wasn’t something we talked about, nothing we said, but I knew.

Right now, he doesn’t resemble the guy I left in his apartment six years ago. He looks like Stephen, but he doesn’t feel like him. The impenetrable shell, the one I cracked open years ago, has been sealed up.

“I have no idea if you’d protect me to that extreme,” I say.

“Your husband is paying Owen very well,” Stephen says, “which means I’m being paid very well. Just like everything else on this island, if you spend enough, someone with less will be willing to sacrifice their life for more.”

A sheen comes across my vision, and I turn away, surprised by the urge to cry. I stride toward the kitchen to hide the rush of feeling. So what if it seems like he’s spent the last six years putting his life on the line like it’s nothing to anyone? I shouldn’t care. I can’t care. He left me.

At the kitchen counter with my back to him, I press the heel of my hand into my chest, and I will whatever this feeling is to go away.

Stephen Foster is my past, so distant I barely recall a single detail. I have my company, my son, and my shitty husband. And I’m fine. I’m so fine.

“I’ll need a copy of your schedule,” Stephen says, and his deep voice, detached from his physicality, is no less impactful. I hate the way the sound vibrates through my body, and I want to soak in the sensation, relish that he’s in my world again.

In some ways, it’s worse not to be looking at him when he talks because if I close my eyes, what it was like to have that voice in my ear, urging me to come again for him is right there on the edges of my consciousness.

Oh, god.

My chest heaves at the memory.

“Mrs. Santos?”

But he never called me that. And the reminder of who I’ve become is a bucket of ice-cold water poured over my head. I shiver and turn to face him, crossing my arms. At least there’s more distance between us now that I’m in the kitchen and he’s still in the main living room area, which is better.