Thin Lives (Donati Bloodlines #3) (20 page)

Ray didn’t respond.

Affonso chuckled darkly.

“Maybe you should go underground, too,” Ray suggested. “Get away for a bit—take your wife and son until this is all settled.”

“Your intentions are showing.”

“No, you’re just paranoid.”

“Don’t bite the hand that feeds you, Ray,” Affonso said after a long while. “That hand can kill you just as quickly, and just as easily.”

Behind her, Emma heard the soft wails of Cross starting up again.

She couldn’t get back to her son fast enough.

Emma couldn’t remember a time when she had felt as nervous and unsettled as she did walking into the large, three-level mall alone.

Well, she wasn’t exactly alone.

Glancing over her shoulder, she found her enforcer trailing behind a few steps. But even with him there, it didn’t help the sinking feeling in her chest. At Affonso’s demand that morning, he’d informed Emma that she needed to get out and update her wardrobe with a few things for some events they had coming up.

Dinners, charities, and that sort of thing.

Apparently the walk-in closet full of designer dresses wasn’t good enough, because she had worn them all at least once in their marriage. He wanted her to have new things.

Emma tried to refuse, saying she would order stuff in, but Affonso wasn’t having that. Her stomach had dropped a little more when she asked if she could take Cross along, and was quickly refused that request, too.

She hadn’t left Cross alone once since his birth two and a half months earlier. Certainly not for long enough that she couldn’t be there if he needed her.

As she walked to the first escalator and stepped on the moving stairs, Emma reminded herself that Sherry—their cook—was there to handle the baby. Affonso would likely leave Cross with her, knowing he was out of his element for most things the baby needed.

Heaven forbid he had to see a dirty diaper.

It wasn’t long before Emma found a department store she recognized. The dresses might not have the label Affonso would approve of, but she had no desire to drive further across New York just to go to those specialty boutiques. Her husband would have to settle for what she could get close to home.

While Emma searched through racks, and tossed dress after dress over her arm to try on, her mind was somewhere else entirely. Between worrying over her son, and obsessing over Calisto’s still missing status, she rarely had any room left in her mind for much else.

She felt so … out of it lately.

There wasn’t a better word to describe it.

The rest of the world and people around her were still moving, doing their thing and going on like nothing was wrong or amiss. In Emma’s world, everything was off-centered.

She wasn’t sure how long she wandered around the store, pawing through clothes and letting her mind wander, but when she peeked her head up to look at her surroundings, she realized the store had quite a few people in it. It took her a minute to zone in on her enforcer across the floor, checking his watch, and looking like he was in the very last place he wanted to be.

Thankfully, the man didn’t bother her much.

He rarely spoke.

She couldn’t complain.

Emma figured the enforcer would notice her making a beeline for the changing rooms in the back, and follow behind as he usually did, so she didn’t bother trying to get his attention as she headed that way. Despite the amount of people in the store, the line of dressing rooms were mostly quiet but for one or two women handing clothes back and forth to one another over the top of one door to try on.

She disappeared behind one dressing room door, locked it, and hung the six dresses she had picked up on the hook. For a long moment, Emma just stared at herself in the mirror. She had long become accustomed to the mask staring back at her—it had been a part of her daily ritual from the moment she woke up as Affonso Donati’s wife.

The flawless makeup.

Perfect hair.

Clothes without a wrinkle.

Smile in place.

Unhappiness tucked safely away.

Complaints invisible.

Emma didn’t like being alone with this person staring at her in the mirror. It felt like someone else—someone who wasn’t her—was watching her, judging her. Her reflection was simply a distraction for everyone else around her, to keep them from looking too deeply, where they would find her sadness sat upon a throne of disappointment.

People saw her as a queen.

Emma felt more like a prisoner.

And that … that was an awful way to live.

Needing to get the hell away from those thoughts as fast as she possibly could, Emma reached for the first dress hanging off the hook, and pulled it from the hanger. She wasted no time taking her clothes off, and slipping on the silk blue dress that hugged her curves. Despite not being able to do a lot while pregnant, she hadn’t gained a great deal of weight, which meant she didn’t have a lot to lose after Cross was born.

Her hips were slightly wider, and her waist wasn’t as tiny as it had been, but she wore those changes proudly. She did put the small gym room in the basement of the Donati home to good use at least once a day when Cross was feeling up to sitting in his bouncy chair and watching his mother run on a treadmill.

That, more than anything else, had helped to flatten her stomach back down.

Emma found she loved running. It was freeing, even if she was running to nowhere. She could push her limits, run until her legs ached and her lungs burned. She didn’t have to stop until sweat covered her clothes and she just couldn’t move anymore.

It was a sort of relief that she hadn’t known existed before.

She was grateful for it, now.

Emma tried on another two dresses before a soft voice called out, “Is there an Emma Donati back here?”

A brief flicker of fear passed through Emma.

Still, she called out, “Dressing room number four.”

She heard the soft click of heels just outside the door before the woman tossed a red garment into the room, and it landed in Emma’s arms. Then, one of the store’s bags with their logo was also thrown over the door. She stared at the red dress, unsure and wary in her heart.

“Your husband asked me to bring this one back, Mrs. Donati,” the woman explained. “He said you would understand why. He has paid for this dress, and asked that you put your clothes in the bag, and come out with the red dress on. He’s ready to leave when you are.”

Emma blinked, feeling tears prickle at her eyes.

Affonso hated red.

Calisto loved it on her.

But how would he have gotten past the enforcer?

Where had he even
been
for two and half months?

Emma stopped thinking, she just pulled the red dress on, surprised that it fit her well. She then quickly tossed her purse and clothes into the bag with the store logo on the front, grabbed the door and flung it open.

Calisto

Calisto glanced up from the confirmatory text message he had gotten, explaining that the enforcer who had been watching Emma was thoroughly distracted and out of the store. He’d been waiting for this morning for a long while—two and a half months, actually.

Careful preparations.

Quick escape routes.

Plan Bs, and Cs, if needed.

Backtracking and self-doubt until he was satisfied with his choices.

Today should have been perfect. Had everything gone according to plan, it should have went off without a single bump in the road.

And yet, something was wrong.

Something was missing.

His son wasn’t in Emma’s arms when she flung open that dressing room door.

Calisto thought for sure that she would have baby Cross with her, as he was still young, and whenever he had been watching her over these last couple of months, she always had his son with her. When he had gotten word from Wolf—the one and only person he truly trusted in the Donati family—that Emma was out with her enforcer, the man forgot to mention the baby wasn’t with her.

This had been his one shot.

The one chance he had to get Emma and his son away from Affonso before Calisto rained hell down on him. He’d hoped to take them without issue, keep them safely hidden away, and then bring them back out when the threats were finally gone.

“Cal?” Emma whispered.

Calisto lifted his gaze to meet hers, and a look of pure astonishment colored up her beautiful features. Just like he thought, that red dress he’d picked off the rack as he came into the store fit her like a glove. She was still so beautiful to him. As he stared at her, feeling the waves of her surprise practically wafting from her, there were a lot of things running through his mind. All of the things he had wanted to say.

That he loved her.

He wanted to thank her for his son.

She should know he was sorry for forgetting her.

And maybe he wanted her to know that he was fixing it—all of it.

Or trying to.

Instead, Calisto smiled. “Emma.”

Whatever hesitation she must have felt was gone as she opened the dressing room door the rest of the way and flew into his embrace. Calisto’s back was to the wall, but he still wasn’t ready for the impact of her body slamming against his. Her hands found his face, grabbing tight and forcing him to look at her.

Emma didn’t move.

She just … watched him.

“You remember, don’t you?” she asked.

The obvious answer was “yes”.

Calisto went with something different. “I’m sorry I ever forgot you at all, Emmy.”

He swore he watched months of heartache, silence, and pain fall off her shoulders with his words. Her gaze, once a fiery green, had been dulled the past few months, but brightened instantly. Her smile grew wide, matching his.

Calisto felt better than he had in a long while, and all it took, was this woman in his arms. From the very second he’d remembered all of the things that he had forgotten, his mind focused in on one thing above the rest—Emma. He could only imagine how lonely she must have felt.

Scared.

Desolate.

Caged.

There had been a brief period where he fought with his anger where she was concerned. He thought if only she had told him the truth—taken him aside during the many times he asked her if there was something he was missing.

But then he quickly thought of the bullets that nearly killed him.

And the man who probably tried to do it.

Affonso
.

Calisto wasn’t angry at all.

Not with Emma.

He suspected she had done what she needed to.

How could he blame her for that?

“I missed you,” Emma said softly.

Calisto caught the one tear that fell from the corner of her eye with the pad of his thumb. “I never really went anywhere. I was always around.”

“But you weren’t at the same time.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Me too,” she replied. “Where have you been?”

Calisto tilted his head to the side, smiling slyly. “Around. Watching. Planning.”

“Planning?”

He lifted one hand, gesturing at them. “Planning, Emma.”

“I don’t understand.”

“I know.”

He didn’t really need her to, not right then.

Calisto tipped Emma’s head up and quickly dropped his head to press a soft kiss to her mouth. He’d thought about kissing her, touching her, holding and having her every single day. Nothing really prepared him for the shock of love that flooded his system when her lips parted for his without question, and her tongue struck against his hard, letting him deepen the kiss until his lungs burned with the need for air.

Even then, he didn’t stop.

He didn’t think about the customers that were walking in and out of the dressing room as he tangled his hand into the strands of her hair. All he could feel were her soft lips and the heat of her mouth pressed to his.

No, he just kissed her until the streaks of her tears hit the corner of his mouth, and he was forced to pull away so he could wipe them away again.

“
Ti amo, Emma
—I always loved you, even when I couldn’t remember you,” he told her.

Emma blinked away the tears coating her lashes. “I knew you did. I was just waiting for you to remember, too.”

Calisto glanced to the side, knowing they didn’t have much time. “We have to go—at least get out of the store. After that, we’ll be clear.”

“The red dress?”

“He’s not going to be looking for red, you know.”

Emma shook her head, smiling slightly. “Why today?”

“It was the right time.”

Except it wasn’t.

Something was still missing.

“Where is my son?” Calisto asked.

Emma stilled, almost like she hadn’t expected him to say that. She didn’t answer, either.

“I was starting to figure it out before I got my memories back,” he explained when she stayed silent, “but I knew for sure after. The math wasn’t all that hard to do, for one thing.”

“I was scared,” she whispered. “Affonso knew—he would have killed me had it been any other man’s child. He almost did the night he found out.”

Rage skipped over Calisto’s body.

He pushed it back down.

Not yet
, he told himself.
That will come.

“Where is Cross?” he asked again.

Though, he was pretty sure he knew.

“At home with Affonso and Sherry. He wanted me to go out and get some new clothes, but he wouldn’t let me take the baby today. He uses him to scare me sometimes—manipulate me—that’s all it is.”

Calisto was going to ask her to explain that a little more, but his phone dinged with an incoming message. Checking the device, he decided his questions would have to wait.

“Come on,” he said, twining their fingers together.

Emma didn’t hesitate to follow as he led her from the dressing rooms, and out of the store. He was careful not to look back at the enforcer he knew was coming their way, but would probably pass the woman in the red dress by without so much as a second glance.

“Where are we going?” Emma asked.

Earlier, he’d had a clear answer to that.

Now, he wasn’t so sure.

“Somewhere to talk,” he decided on saying.

Somewhere he could think …

The hotel Calisto had been using as a safe-house of sorts wasn’t actually all that far away from the mall he had tracked Emma to. It was only a few blocks away, which at first, he thought would make things easier.

Once he had Emma safely inside the confines of the room, Calisto paced the length of the floor, needing to get his thoughts in order.

Things should have been perfect.

One of two isn’t bad
.

Except the second person he should have had with him was his son.

Fuck.

Calisto froze on the spot when he noticed Emma standing in the middle of the hotel room, staring at the tiny bassinet in front of the large windows overlooking the busy street. She looked over the other items resting on the table—anything his child might have needed for a week or two stay with his mother in this very room.

“You thought I would have Cross,” she said quietly.

He didn’t want her to worry. That was the last thing either of them needed. He could worry enough for the both of them without her adding to it.

“I’ll have him soon enough,” Calisto said. “It was just a minor bump in the plans.”

Emma spun on her heel. “But you thought I would have him today, didn’t you? That’s why you asked me where he was.”

Calisto swallowed hard, knowing Emma wasn’t going to let up unless he gave her the truth. “Yes, I did. I wanted to have you both safely hidden away for however long I needed until this was over.”

“And what is
this
exactly?”

No, he wasn’t going to lie.

“Affonso, that’s what.”

Emma didn’t even bat a lash. “I didn’t want to leave him—I haven’t left Cross alone at all since he was born.”

“I know, and what I don’t know, I’ve been informed.”

“By … Wolf,” Emma said.

Calisto nodded, offering nothing more. The less she was involved in his plans, the better. For now, anyway. Wolf, however, was just one of the allies Calisto was using to get what he wanted, and to do what needed to be done.

“But you’re here, and I’ll rest a bit easier knowing that you’re safe at least,” Calisto explained. “I hoped to have Cross here as well. It would have made it a lot quicker to finish this all out, but I’ll handle it.”

Emma’s brow furrowed before she said, “No.”

“What?”

“You can’t … You think I’m going to stay here without our son?” she asked.

Tension climbed over Calisto’s shoulders at the heat in her tone. “I know you’ll be a hell of a lot safer here than you would be—”

“Absolutely not,” Emma interrupted quickly, a fire in her eyes. “He’ll take him from me if I don’t go back home tonight with a damn good excuse about where I was today—do you understand that, Calisto? He will take Cross from me like he’s promised to do from the very beginning.”

“Emma—”

“Or worse, he’ll kill him. A dead son is better than no son at all, right? That’s what he would tell
your
mother. And that’s exactly what he’s been telling me. Do not ask me to leave our son with him knowing what he might do to him.”

Calisto let out a slow breath, willing his emotions to calm. He’d waited months to approach Emma at a time when he knew was safe for them both, and he didn’t want to fight with her.

Love her.

Touch her.

Taste her.

Hold her.

Anything but fight with her.