CHAPTER TWELVE – CAMILLO

I’d left my nephew with the nanny I had my private detective check out. I kept her on speed dial and monetarily comfortable, so I could have her at the drop of a hat. I knew this would be the night I’d go to see Rose. The night I would take in her luscious body with my eyes again and devour her essence with my lips. I called the nanny up and told her to come over before I kissed my nephew goodbye and told him he could play games until he fell asleep if it helped him to sleep better.

From the moment I walked into the diner, I was speechless. It was as if the past three years hadn’t aged her at all. The halo of innocence that surrounded her didn’t seem tainted at all by her circumstances. The way she continued to glide around the floor, cleaning up after people who probably had no respect for her, was astounding to me.

It stunned me into a silence as I made my way to the counter and sat down.

The fact that this woman was my daughter’s mother made my heart pound hard within my chest. I’d been able to keep part of the vow I made to myself that night. I followed it so fervently, in fact, that I couldn’t fuck any other subs after her. I was disgusted by their inferiority to the perfect submissive I’d found in her that night. They were all just pathetic copies of the one true princess I’d found in her that evening.

That perfect evening three whole years ago.

When I saw that first picture of my daughter, I’d almost lost my mind right there in the cabin. After losing both of my parents to such senseless violence, I couldn’t live without my family, now that I knew they existed. I couldn't allow my daughter to grow up thinking her father didn’t want her. Didn’t love her. Didn’t care for her or her mother.

But I was also eager to see Rose. To see this beautiful princess again for the first time since that night. I was ready to be in her presence again and feel the tension that naturally thrummed between us. As I sat down at the counter and watched her pour me a cup of coffee, I couldn’t help but hide a smirk at how the words burst forth from her lips.

She wanted to know what I was doing here but pretty soon, I would show her.

I watched her drift around the diner, cleaning up and tending to her own business. I could see the slight sheen of sweat on her brow, denoting the long day she must’ve had. A twinge of guilt slithered through my body as I watched her hunch her back over that damn broom.

The mother of my child shouldn’t have to work nearly as hard as she was in order to provide for our child.

I knew she recognized me from the moment she looked into my eyes. When she asked me what I was doing here, I no longer wanted to tell her. Anger bubbled up in my throat as she defied me and bucked up against me with the strength I knew she possessed. She’d kept my child from me. She’d kept our beautiful daughter a secret. I’d missed precious years of her development because of her unwillingness to reach out to me.

She needed to be punished like the bad little princess she’d been.

Now, I had her in my grasp. I could see the fear behind her eyes, but she made no move to get away. There was still an innate trust vibrating throughout her entire body, pressing her into me in a movement I don’t even think she registered. I bent my lips down to her ear and heard her gasp, kissing the shell of her ear before she continued to writhe in my lap.

“My truck’s out back,” I said. “You’ve got twenty minutes to close down and get out there.”

Then, I released her and made my leave. I threw a few bills onto the counter to pay for the coffee, striding out back as I made my way to my truck. I watched her while she flew around and cleaned, making haste in everything she did as I sat back and smiled. She was trying her best to prove to me she could still listen, even after committing the ultimate betrayal.

It was that innocence in her rising to the top and I felt my cock pressing hard against my pants.

Twenty minutes later, she cut off all the lights and locked up the building. She came outside and spotted my car, and she approached it without hesitation. I kept the motor running so she could climb into its warmth, and the moment she sat down in the seat next to me, I could hear her teeth chattering.

“What do you want?” she asked as her gaze whipped over to me.

“Why didn’t you contact me?” I asked.

Her eyes widened in surprise and her lips parted in shock. I watched her eyes narrow as that fierce spirit of hers flooded back to the surface and I prepared myself for a fight.

“Why in the world should I have tried to contact you?” she asked.

“You’re really not going to tell me on your own, are you?” I asked.

I watched her swallow hard, but her gaze stayed intense. I had to applaud her for her strength. I was finally getting the full understanding of how the note I’d left her had affected her. She straightened up her back, with one hand on the door handle of the truck, ready to escape should the slightest thing go wrong.

I decided to keep the door unlocked, just to let her know I wasn’t going to cage her.

Not without her permission. “I guess I’m just going to have to drag it out of you,” I said, grinning.

My cock was hardening against my pants as I thought about all the ways I could torture the information out of her. I could spank her until she cried out for mercy.

All the while, she sat there, sturdy and strong, but still with that little glimmer of innocence in her eyes.

“Drag out what?” she asked.

She wasn’t going to tell me, but I couldn’t punish her in the car like I needed to. Like I’d intended to the moment I stepped out of my cabin to venture into town. My eyes scanned her body, taking in every dip and valley that was still so beautiful, yet just a bit different from the last time I’d taken her. I wondered if any other man had touched her body since, defiling her while she was pregnant with my child. The thought awoke anger inside me and as my eyes bored into hers, I saw her scoot back just a bit from me.

Her fear was beginning to take over, but all I wanted to do was taste her coming on my tongue. All I could think about was her legs clamping down around my head. I thought about her hands tugging at the tendrils of my hair. I thought about her juices getting trapped in my beard while my hands pinned her arms, rendering her silent and immovable while her tits arched into the air for me.

I scooted closer to her and, in an instant, the door was open and she was out in the cold once again.

I took a deep breath as she stood there, staring at me. She was different now. She was special. She was the mother of my child and we had to find a way to forge our family together. We had to find a way to navigate these new and uncharted waters side by side. I had to find a way to learn softness. My hardness and my cruelty were no longer appropriate. No longer necessary.

No longer what she needed.

I realized, then, why she was keeping her secret. Why she wasn’t telling me about our daughter. I settled back down into my seat and drew in a deep breath, trying to settle my cock while she trembled out in the cold. I clenched my hands onto the steering wheel of my truck, feeling the animal she brought out in me quiet down as a sigh ripped from between my lips.

Slowly, she got back up into the truck and I decided to simply tell her.

“I know about our daughter, Rose.”

I looked over at her and her eyes widened. I watched her pale skin, that was once flushed with the pleasure I could bring her, grow paler than the snow falling outside. I felt a twinge of regret, exposing myself to her like this, but I had to press on.

My daughter was at stake.

“When I moved to the area a few months ago, I hired a private detective just to check up on you. To make sure you were all right after our encounter all those years ago. That’s how I know about our daughter.”

Her jaw unhinged in shock, her chest panting as my words rendered her speechless.

“You… live here?” she asked.

“I do a lot of skiing here. It only made sense to have some sort of home here I could come to, instead of paying for those luxury spa resorts.”

I wasn’t ready to tell her yet about the fact that I’d moved here to be close to her and that I was running from my past with the mob. I wasn’t ready to tell her about my nephew.

I wasn’t ready to tell her any of that, just like she wasn’t ready to tell me anything about her, either.

“I know she’s my daughter,” I said.

I waited to see if she would contradict me and, when she didn’t, I breathed a sigh of relief. I turned my gaze back out through the window as the snow continued to pour harder and harder onto my truck. I knew if I didn’t let her go soon, we’d both be trapped here at least overnight.

And while the idea of being trapped with her throbbed my cock to life again, I knew it would only frighten her more.

My perfect little songbird, scared to sing her song for me.

“She is,” she said. “But I didn’t contact you because of the note you left me. It was a very telling warning. That, coupled with the rumors of your background and your connections to organized crime, I thought it better to simply leave you be.”

I kept my gaze hard out the window as I relaxed back into the seat of my truck.

“I understand. But I do wish I would’ve had that time with her. Would it be possible for me to see her?”

“I… honestly, I don’t know,” she said. “I’m a bit nervous about that. I don’t know what your intentions are, or where you are in your life, or what types of trouble you might bring into ours.”

I nodded slowly, her words piercing me like one of the knives I had hanging on the walls of that room I’d led her into that night.

That night that changed everything for me. For us. For my future.

“You know, you didn’t exactly reach out to me either. I haven't heard from you all this time and, now, you just show up out of nowhere and want to see your daughter? What changed?”

I’d almost forgotten how intelligent she was. How she could put pieces together, even if she didn’t understand she was piecing.

“I won’t rest, knowing my blood is out there, and I have no ties to it. Family is the most important thing to me, more than anything else on this planet. And I look forward to proving that to you.”

I turned my gaze toward her and I could see the doubts running through her mind. Her hands were squeezed in between her thighs, her body desperately trying to keep a grip on her nerves. But there was a strength about her, even as she trembled in my presence. There was a fire behind her eyes that wasn’t present the first time I’d ever gazed into them. She had a strong moral streak, I could tell, and I knew she would eventually relent.

I knew she wouldn’t keep me from my daughter for long.

“Okay,” she said. “I’ll let you see her, but only because it’s the right thing to do. Because she’s your daughter. Not because of… whatever just happened back there.”

I let out a breath I didn’t realize I was holding and relief coursed through my system. We could talk about what happened in the diner at a later time. For now, I was simply reveling in a truth I didn’t realize I needed so desperately.

My beautiful Rose would let me see my daughter and my heart thundered with joy while the snow slowly let up its furious downpour.