“When did you find out you were pregnant?”

She closed her eyes, remembering all too vividly the fear and the joy. The panic that she wouldn’t be able to keep herself or her child safe as her pregnancy progressed.

“It hasn’t been long,” she said huskily. “Maybe if I hadn’t been so busy slipping from place to place, keeping one step ahead of my father’s men, I would have realized that the fatigue and sickness wasn’t due to stress and fear. When I noticed my pants were snug and I hadn’t been eating well, I tried to remember the last time I’d had a period. Then I knew.”

“That time in the shower,” Sam murmured.

She smiled faintly. “Yeah.”

“Why didn’t you come to me immediately? If you were in trouble and you knew where to find me, why didn’t you come before now?”

If only it had been that easy.

“As I said, I didn’t know I was pregnant until six weeks ago—”

“Is that the only reason you came? Because you’re pregnant?”

He sounded accusing, and she just stared at him. What had he expected?

“It’s a big part, yeah,” she said, her chin going up.

She could be as belligerent as him any day of the week. Damn it, but she was tired of having to defend herself.

“This is the first place they would have looked for me. They’ve probably been watching you for months, waiting for me to show up. It’s the only reason you’re still alive. My father had information on KGI. While he may not have had the balls to launch an all-out attack on you here, he would have done whatever was necessary to take you out. He’s a patient man when it comes to vengeance.”

Sam’s frown deepened. “What changed then? Why now?” The overt suspicion in his voice hit her like a poisoned dart. Yeah, she knew he had a right, but it was starting to seriously piss her off.

“What changed is that bastard caught up to me. What changed is that I’m not as fast or as agile as I used to be. Being five months pregnant with your child changes a lot, including my ability to take care of myself and protect us both from assholes that my uncle sends.”

“Uncle?”

Sam latched onto her slip, his eyes sharpening.

“Uncle, father, whatever. They’re partners. Either way I betrayed them both. They won’t forgive that.”

“We were led to believe that Tomas Mouton was a patsy of your father’s and nothing more. He had no power. Alex pulled all the strings and Tomas just took up space in Mouton’s organization.”

“I’m sure that’s true.” Indeed it was. But with her father dead, Tomas would have seized his opportunity to take over the network. And his first order of business would have been to recover the key Sophie had stolen and execute her for her betrayal of the Mouton family.

She kept that information buried, unsure of how much if anything she should tell Sam about the key or the fact that she’d killed her father. There was such a thing as too much information all at once. She wanted Sam to be willing to offer her and their child his protection, not toss her out on her ass at the first opportunity.

“Sam, look at me,” she begged softly.

His gaze lifted and he met her eyes. She flinched at the lack of emotion, but she swallowed her pride.

“I know what it looks like. I know you have a right to be suspicious. You think I’m here even now on some fact-finding mission for my father, or maybe I’ll take you down while you sleep because who would suspect a banged-up pregnant woman, right?”

His lips thinned. He wasn’t amused by her statement at all. She wanted to reach out to him, to touch him, but she was too afraid of his rejection, and if it came now, it would crush her.

“I took a risk by spending so much time with you in that hotel. I lied to my father and said whatever I had to say not to raise his suspicions, because I wanted to be able to return to you each night. I knew you weren’t offering me forever. I knew I was a fling. You don’t have to beat me over the head with that. But I’m not the only one who lied here. You did too.”

She sucked several steadying breaths through her nose and regained control of her emotions.

“I also knew that when I gave you the information on the arms deal that you’d leave without once looking back and that it would be up to me to escape my father’s grasp. So yes, if you want to look at it like that, I used you. I used you to get away from my father, but I never gave him a damn thing about you. I didn’t sell you out. He never even knew I’d leaked the information. No, I didn’t sell you out, Sam. I sold my father out. For you. And for a hell of a lot of other people he would have hurt.”

“And now he’s after you. For what, revenge?”

She swallowed and turned her head away. Revenge? Revenge sounded personal. Tomas would make an example of her. A rite of passage in his new role of leadership. He’d want to deal effectively with her. She’d be an example to others how traitors were dispatched. The fact that she was his flesh and blood would only raise his stock among his followers. Like her father, he’d be viewed as a man not to cross. But most importantly, she held the success of that empire in her hands. And for that, he’d be willing to risk everything.

“He’ll kill me and our child as soon as he gets what he wants,” she said softly. “It’s why I had to finally come to you and hope you would offer me your protection no matter what your feelings might be for me. I can’t do it myself any longer. I almost died. Our child almost died. I’m no longer willing to take the chance of going it alone, even if it means bringing trouble to your front door.”

His eyes grew hard and determined. His jaw tightened in anger, but when he reached out to grasp her arm, his touch was gentle and soothing.

“There never should have been any doubt you could come to me. I may be mad as hell. I may feel like a dumbass, but that’s nothing next to your and our child’s safety. Did you honestly think I’d turn you away once you’d explained everything?”

He sounded incredulous, and once again she was struck by how unfair it all was. She was expected to trust him, but he wasn’t required to believe squat about her or her intentions.

“If I’d thought you’d turn me away, I wouldn’t be here,” she said evenly. “No, I didn’t immediately come here. For one, I had no way of knowing how long you’d be tied up in Mexico. Two, I had no way of knowing if anything would happen to you. Three, once you no longer served the purpose of luring me into the open for my father’s men to snatch, you’d be expendable. Now the clock is ticking because as of the minute I came to you, you’re expendable.”

“You really believe all that, don’t you?”

She turned away from him, her shoulders heaving with anger.

“I’m not an idiot, Sam. You may not think what I’ve done has been smart or that I’ve had the best plan, but you know what? It’s kept me alive so far. And you know what else? It’s kept you alive too.”

An impatient hiss escaped his lips, and then he gripped her shoulder and turned her back around to face him.

“Let’s get a few things straight here, okay? Just so there’s no further misunderstanding in the future. You will not make decisions in regard to your or the baby’s safety at my expense or in an effort to save me. That’s horse shit. My job—what I do—is protect people. From now on that’s you and our baby, Sophie. I’m protecting you both, and the best way you can help me do that is to listen to everything I tell you. Don’t make rash, emotional decisions. And be honest with me. Completely. From now on. Got it?”

She wanted to deck him for being a condescending jerk, but she could see he truly wasn’t attempting to talk down to her. He was in total command mode, and he was talking to her like he’d talk to one of his men. No nonsense and he expected compliance. She was sorely tempted to snap him a salute and rattle off a snarky “yes sir!”

“Now come here,” he said in a low voice.

The deep timbre sent a shiver down her skin. He sounded gruff and a little unsure, but there was also a compelling plea for her to come to him.

She went and he caught her in his arms, pulling her against his chest. Warm. He was so warm that his heat soaked into her pores and invaded her stiff muscles.

He felt so good, so absolutely right, that she could do nothing more than stand in the circle of his arms and bury her face in his neck.

“I’ll protect you, Sophie. We have a lot to work out, and we’ll get there. But first I’m going to do everything in my power to make sure no one ever touches you or our child. If you believe nothing else, believe this.”

“I do believe you,” she whispered. “It’s why I came.”

“I just wish you’d come sooner,” he said in a quiet voice.

“I’m here now.”

He nodded. “And you’re staying.”

He turned her toward the couch and urged her down once more. After making sure she was propped in a comfortable position, he carefully arranged the blankets around her.

“You need to rest and I’ve got to plan our way out of here. Donovan is doing some checking on our assassin. So if you’ll sit tight and let us do our thing, we’ll have you out of here as soon as possible.”

She tried to cover the yawn that threatened to crack her jaw, but gave up and surrendered halfway through.

He leaned in, kissed her forehead and then smoothed his hand down her face.

“Rest, Sophie, and trust me to protect you and our baby.”

She stared back up at him. “I do, Sam. I do.”

Nodding his satisfaction, he turned on his heel and headed out of the living room to find his brothers, and she was left alone, huddled under the blankets on the couch to ponder the mess she’d gotten the entire Kelly family in.

CHAPTER 10

“WHAT did you find out?” Sam demanded as soon as he returned to Donovan and Garrett.

Donovan looked up as Sam approached. “I ran the guy’s photo and prints through the CIA database.”

“And?”

“Interesting. He’s one of Mouton’s all right, but he was assigned to his brother’s security detail.”

“What’s so interesting about that?” Garrett asked.

“Well, the info I gathered suggested that Tomas is a token part of Alex’s network. He has no say, no power, and Alex ignores him as long as Tomas plays by the rules. Which are basically that he keeps his mouth shut and does whatever Alex tells him.

“Now, yeah this guy would have been chosen and hired and trained for that matter by Alex or his trusted head of security, but he wouldn’t have had any real power or responsibility other than to stick close to Tomas, and if I know Alex, the assassin probably reported to Alex, not Tomas.”

Sam frowned. “So why send this guy after Sophie? If her father’s so pissed, or he wants revenge or he wants to send a message, why send this joker? He wasn’t completely inept, but he wasn’t hard to take down. Why not send one of his best?”

“Why send anyone at all?” Garrett demanded. “I feel like we’re missing something here. Yeah, so Sophie’s his daughter and she bailed. Mouton doesn’t strike me as the sentimental type. Why would he give a shit about a woman? The guy’s a first-class asshole. He’s trafficked in women and children. I doubt he understands the first thing about familial sentiment.”

“She sold him out,” Sam said in a low voice.

He still wasn’t sure what to make of Sophie’s declaration. His gut told him she was telling the truth. Sometimes it paid to go with your gut. Other times it got you killed. Damn if he knew which was the case this time.

“Sold him out?” Donovan gave Sam a searching look that was threaded with disbelief. “Back up a second. What haven’t you told us?”

Garrett leaned forward, his ever-present scowl deepening.

“She was our informant,” Sam said to Garrett. “The one who tipped us off about when the arms shipment was going down.”

Donavan and Garrett exchanged what-the-fuck looks. The words to defend her rushed to Sam’s mouth, but he swallowed them back. He couldn’t defend her. Not yet.

“She did all that because you were fucking her?” Garrett asked incredulously.

Sam turned and slammed into Garrett’s chest, twisting Garrett’s shirt in his hands.

“I’ve had enough of your mouth,” Sam snarled. “You will have some goddamn respect when talking about the mother of my child, you got me?”

Garrett’s eyes narrowed, then widened when Sam didn’t back down. He put his hands up. “Okay, okay, my bad.”

When Sam released his shirt, and Garrett took a step back, swearing the entire way.

“Will you at least try to look at this objectively?” Garrett asked. “What if it were me or Van? One of us hooks up with a chick while we’re on a mission. He gets distracted. Chick shows up months later, after we failed to take down the target, and she’s making all sorts of wild claims, not the least of which is she’s pregnant with Van’s child or my child. Then she says she sold out her flesh and blood for a guy she was with a matter of a few days. Tell me, Sam, would you be saying okay, yeah, whatever?”

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