Page 48 of Wicked Mafia Sinner

I force myself to step back and head for my office. The heat of her gaze shoots daggers at the spot between my shoulder blades.

I’m back to hating the blood in my veins.

I step into my office and pull up security feed of the entire underground compound. Cora stays in the kitchen and I watch her wipe at a tear.

Fuck. Anger floods my veins and I am tempted to push aside Luca’s message. It’s only an update. But I can't ignore it, not when Cora's safety hinges on me wrapping this up.

I tap Luca’s message which reads:

Still working on getting proof your son is behind this. With that we can pull in help from Harlon.

I respond: Agreed. Anything to get this done and over with.

The selfish bastard in me wants to keep Cora locked up down here forever.

She’s mine, my inner demons growl.

But I know I can't keep the light from seeking the sunshine for long.

And she’s not mine, I correct myself. Not really.

The next hours are pure fucking torture.

She wanders through my home, room by room. Her fingers brush over the spines of my books, she dips her toes into the cool water of my underground pool before turning to the bedroom around noon for a nap.

Instead of making calls and getting information from my informants, I watch her sleep on the security monitors on the back wall of my office. If she knew the inner me, she wouldn’t sleep so soundly.

Ash white spills over black silk. I didn’t notice the contrast the last time I watched her sleep. I was too mesmerized by her body.

I shut the feed off before I do the one thing I can’t and that is go to her.

My restraint lasts about two hours while I make a handful of calls and let everyone know to watch their backs. A few of my informants have seen my son and they’ve promised to feed exact locations if they come across him again. For money of course.

It’s five in the evening when my control breaks and I turn my security feed back on.

My sunshine walks the halls. When she finds my office, I go still. She stands outside the door and raises her hand to knock but steps back instead.

She raises her hand again but backs off, this time heading toward the kitchen.

It takes me a second to register that my heart locked up.

I return to my desk and fall back in my chair cursing myself for not jerking the door open and pulling her inside. I watch her open cabinets and mumble to herself. She finds the spices and organizes each item in alphabetical order.

What a curious little creature.

"Fourteen jars," she murmurs to the empty kitchen. “Fourteen and not a single one of them is paprika.”

I make a mental note to pick up more spices as I watch her prepare spaghetti and meatballs.

At six that evening, she sets two plates on the table and thirty seconds later she's at my door. This time she does knock.

I open it to find a set of violet eyes raised to meet mine.

“Would you like to join me for dinner?” She looks up at me like she’s going to say something else.

I swear to all that is holy if she says Daddy one more time I’ll fuck her on the table. She slips her hand into mine and I follow her to the dining table set off in an alcove off the side of the kitchen.

I pull out a chair for her and then find mine once she is seated. “This looks delicious. Thank you. I didn’t realize how hungry I was.”