Chapter Eight
Luciano was slightly shocked when Pearl confessed that she didn't have a car, and he adamantly refused to drop her off at the bus stop. They drove to her apartment in silence, and Luciano finally had a few moments to think about the whirl of events.
He couldn't believe he had found his mermaid again, and the fact that she was pregnant with his baby seemed beyond comprehension. He could hear his dead father and uncles laughing at him for believing immediately that a strange woman's baby might be his, but deep in his heart, he knew it was true.
There's a strange connection between Pearl and I, he thought. She feels it too. Fate has placed us on a very strange road, but perhaps it is the right one after all.
When she had run, Luciano had felt as if his heart was being tugged out of his chest. His mind had suddenly flashed with pictures of her slipping and falling, being burned in the kitchen or cut by a surprised chef. He had skydived and scuba dived and raced some of the fastest cars on the planet on a flat track. Somehow, despite all of that, he wasn't sure that he had ever been more afraid than he was when he saw Pearl running into danger.
He thought she understood now. As distasteful as it might have been, he had spoken nothing but the truth at dinner. He had always been taught to protect his family, protect its interests, and that included the child he had just found out about.
He risked a glance at Pearl herself, pushed against the passenger door and gazing out at the passing lights. When he looked at her, his heart squeezed tight. Some of it was because of the idea that she was carrying his baby, but he was too wise to think that was all there was to it. She had a face of surprisingly delicate beauty. Her profile, slightly snub nose and all belonged on a cameo. The pleasure he had found in her arms still echoed through him, and the idea of that wild mermaid carrying his baby struck him straight in the heart.
She directed him to a small apartment building on a plain street. It didn't look rough, but it wasn't pretty, either, and Luciano felt a momentary pang at letting her out alone, even at her own doorstep.
"Tomorrow I will send someone for your things," he told her. "Just pack what you need to get by for a few days, you can buy new things when you settle."
"Of course, my lord," she said, her lip curling a little. "Do you have any other instructions?"
"Just one question," he said honestly, and she looked at him warily. "Can I kiss you?"
Pearl hesitated, and there was a wild and cautious look in her lovely eyes that cut him to the heart. Luciano didn't miss the way her hand stole up to her belly, covering the curve of it protectively.
"I want to," she said finally. "But is that a good idea? I mean, there's so much about you and me that's up in the air. We've...we've gone through a lot, and there's a lot ahead of us..."
She was still talking when Luciano leaned in, cupping the back of her blonde head with his palm. The kiss started out slow and exploratory. They were two people who were getting to know each other all over again after a long absence. The sweetness of her filled him with a need that he hadn’t been able to recapture after they had parted. He could feel her lean into him, and his body was full of a kind of longing that had no name.
Pearl was only quiet under his touch for a few moments. Instead of pushing him away, she reached up and grabbed two enormous fistfuls of his shirt, holding him in place. He could have told her that there was no need to hang on so tight, that he wasn't going anywhere, but that didn't seem to matter to her.
In the space between one moment and the next, the kiss went from sweet and soft to something much more needy and desperate. She kissed him as if she would drown otherwise, and in a flash of insight, Luciano knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that there had been no one since their fateful night on the beach. It might not have been intentional, but there was a kind of loyalty to it. He knew in that moment that she had needed him as much as he had needed her.
His arms came up around her, dragging her close. Pearl melted into him with a sweetness that took his breath away, and the soft moan she uttered against his lips made him shudder.
No, I can't let her go again, I never should have let her go before...
Just as abruptly as their kiss had started, it ended again. Pearl let go of his shirt and pushed hard, pressing her back against the car door. Her vivid green eyes darted back and forth, and she looked so much like a beautiful animal brought to bay that his heart ached.
"Pearl..."
"We can't do that," she said, her voice high and slightly panicked. "God, the last time we did that... You can't kiss me like that again!"
A protest rose up in Luciano's throat, but after a moment, he nodded with chagrin. He would have to bear the fault for this one, even if it was unfair. It would do no good to talk to Pearl about their chemistry, the longing he was certain resided in her heart just like it did in his own.
"All right. I'm sorry."
She scanned his face desperately as if she wasn't sure he was telling the truth, but finally, she nodded, satisfied.
"I should get going," she said stiffly, but she looked to him as if for permission.
Luciano nodded silently and walked her to the apartment door. She raised an eyebrow, but he gave her a fierce look.
"I want to see you safe," he growled. "That's not one that you can talk me out of."
"This area's not bad," she said with a heedless shrug. “More car crime than anything else. No real problems with robbery or muggings, anything like that."
Luciano scowled at that, but nothing was getting fixed that night. He had to plan, and things were already taking shape in his mind.
He thought she would simply bid him goodnight and disappear into the building, but she paused.
"I...I have missed you," she said, the words sounding as if they had been torn from her. "Tonight was... I was happy to see you tonight."
Luciano smiled with half his mouth, raising an eyebrow in surprise.
"You don't have to lie to me, mermaid," he started, but then to his shock, she leaned up, hands braced on his chest so she could brush a soft kiss over his jaw. Then, probably before she had to explain herself or even think about what she did, she darted back into the building, the door shutting behind her.
Luciano stood on her doorstep for another few moments, his fingers coming up to brush the place her mouth had touched. He wondered if it was really tingling a little, as if such a simple touch could make so much of an impression.
He thought of her words, and about the feel of the kiss against his face, and he grinned. She hadn't been lying after all.
***
Back in her dim little apartment, Pearl locked her door and shot the bolt before slumping into the single overstuffed chair that was, besides her bed and a small nightstand, the only piece of furniture in the small apartment. Her face felt hot, as if she had spent a great deal of time in the sun, but she knew it wasn't the sun that had made her feel this way.
Pearl realized that deep in her heart, she had never expected to see Luciano again. Even if she had, she had never thought the insane chemistry between them was something that would reappear.
Now, it seemed as if she was wrong on both counts, so what was she going to do with that?
"He can't have you, you're not his alone," she murmured to her belly, and she felt that surge of maternal protectiveness again.
Pearl knew above and beyond anything else that her duty was to her child. Her child's needs came first, even if it wasn't a child yet. She told herself that she knew little about Luciano besides the strong attraction she had felt for him and how good and right he felt to her foolish heart. Despite all of that logical sense, however, there was a part of her that softened at the idea of him holding a little baby in his hands, a baby that had his dark hair, perhaps her green eyes.
God, I know I could do this alone, but what does Luciano mean in all of this?
She wanted what was best for her child. Luciano was an actual prince, a man who could probably buy and sell her city block a few times over. How in the world could she fight him if she thought he meant her harm?
She buried her face in her hands. Just six months ago, life had been so simple. She wanted to swim, she wanted to see the world, and the idea of a child was a distant dream, something for someday, perhaps, when she was ready to settle down.
Now, with her belly growing rounder by the day, the last thing she felt was settled, and here Luciano had showed up to muddy the waters further.
She knew every part of her body craved him, but was that enough?
Pearl also knew from long experience that she could go over and over the different alternatives and paths in her mind until she drove herself crazy. That was why swimming and playing a mermaid were so good for her. They allowed her to focus only on the task at hand rather than chasing a thousand different rabbits down a thousand different holes.
She forced herself to calm down, taking several long breaths, and rose up to shower and dress for bed. It was still ridiculously early, but she had been feeling so tired lately. Ruefully, she passed her hand over her belly.
"It sounds like things are going to get a bit hectic for a while, huh, baby? Let's try to take it easy on each other."
Lying curled on her side in her small bed that night, she wasn't thinking of her baby, however. Instead, she was thinking of the warmth and comfort of Luciano's body curled up against her back, his arm heavy over her hip and his lips next to her ear, whispering soft, sweet things to her as she drifted off...