Chapter Twenty
ALEXEI knew something was wrong almost as soon as he woke up. It wasn’t just that Eva wasn’t there in bed with him, it was also that the suite felt different. Like something was missing. Or someone.
He recognized the feeling immediately. It was the same one he’d had when he came home to an empty apartment eight years ago.
“Tell me you did not run again,” he said, getting out of bed and heading straight for Eva’s bedroom.
All the clothes he’d had bought for her were still hanging in the open closet. And in typical Eva fashion, the clothes she had worn last night before getting dressed for dinner were lying in a discarded pile on the floor. From what he’d seen, she’d only become slightly neater since the last time they’d lived together.
But the clothes that mattered, the ones she’d traveled in to get here, the ones that had still been sitting in a laundry bag on her dresser just a few days ago, were missing. The torn-into laundry bag the only evidence they’d ever been there.
Why had she run yet again?. Desperate anger and frustration gathered inside him like a storm cloud as he threw on a robe and headed out to the hallway. Was it because he had pressured her? Because he’d told her he loved her? Another more terrible thought occurred to him. Maybe this was her way of informing him she’d picked Aaron.
But then he saw the door to the conference room was open. He always met with Emilio in the younger man’s suite, and Emilio only came up to the penthouse to drop off a few things he requested and even then, he’d only gone into the conference room to use the fax machine, so why was the door opened?
He saw the scattered papers from the doorway, and his heart fell into his stomach when he spotted the Dallas Times article. He’d been planning to tell Gina to kill the article this morning, but now it was too late. The damage had already been done, and who knew what Eva was thinking. Probably that everything he’d told her last night had been a lie and that he was exactly what she’d accused him of being—a man who would do anything to win.
Anguish at the thought of losing Eva over this tore through him. No, he had to fix this. She’d most likely gone back to Drummond. He’d follow her there and he’d do whatever he’d have to do to make her see he really did love her, and that he was ready to start over fresh with her. No more lies, no more manipulation, just the two of them again like the last eight years had never happened.
His smart phone, which he’d stuffed in the pocket of his robe, started vibrating. It was Emillo. “I was just about to call you,” he said, after he pushed the Accept button. “I need for you to arrange for the plane to take me to Drummond. I want to be in the air within the hour.”
“Um, I think you’ll want to hear what I have to say first. The guy I hired to look into this Aaron fellow couldn’t find any Aarons over the age of twenty-one in Drummond, so he looked for documents linking Eva to an Aaron, and he found quite a few, including a birth certificate and school records.”
Alexei shook his head, his minding reeling under the onslaught of this new information. “So you are saying she and this Aaron have a school-aged child together?”
“No, I’m saying Aaron is her child. He was born about seven and a half years after Eva broke up with you, and my guy emailed me a picture of him, which I’m looking at right now. Of course, we’d have to get a DNA test, but if the eyes are any indication, this is your kid.”
Chapter Twenty-One
“MAMA, mama!” Aaron came running out of Steve’s five-story, yellow apartment building to meet her, with his Uncle Steve close behind. It seemed to Eva he must have grown at least a couple inches since the beginning of the summer, when she’d seen him last. If he kept going at this rate, he’d be up to her shoulder by his next birthday. That is, if he made it to his next birthday. She only hoped she could get them out of Italy before Alexei or his uncle managed to hunt them down.
She fell to her knees on the sidewalk to meet her son’s hug and he wrapped his long gangly arms around his neck. “Oh, sweetness, sweetness,” she said. “I missed you so much.”
“What are you doing here? I thought we were supposed to be flying back to Texas next weekend.”
“Yeah, that’s what I thought, too,” her brother said, appearing behind Aaron.
She threw her brother an apologetic look over Aaron’s shoulder. “Sorry, it was a last-minute decision to come to Italy. I would have called, but I only had time to look up your address in the airport before flying out here.”
Steve looked more than a little suspicious. “Well, you got here at the right time. We were just about to eat lunch. Aaron, please go inside and tell your aunt to put another plate on the table for your mother.”
“Okay, Uncle Steve.” Aaron quickly pulled out of the hug and ran back inside the apartment building to do Steven’s bidding, punching a code in at the door to gain entrance. Good, she thought, at least Steve’s building had some measure of security.
“Where’s your suitcase?” he asked when Aaron was out of earshot. “You didn’t leave it in the cab that dropped you off, did you?”
“No, I didn’t bring anything. Just myself. I was hoping Maria might loan me a few things to wear.”
Steven frowned. “You came all the way to Italy with nothing but the clothes on your back and a passport?”
“Yes,” Eva said. “Like I said. It was a last-minute decision.”
“Mmm-hmm, does Dad know about this last-minute trip?”
She gave him a tight smile. “Not yet.”
He shook his head. “Little sister, you seem to keep on finding new ways to keep him mad at you.”
“Yes, “ she snapped. “Because everything I do is designed to upset Daddy. Thank you for reminding me of that, once again, my perfect big brother.”
“I’m not trying to remind you of anything,” he snapped right back. “And don’t pull that routine with me. You’re the one who showed up here out of the blue, unannounced.”
She laid a placating hand on his arm before he could go any further. “You’re right. I was out of line. It was a long flight, and I’m just really tired and turned around and freaked out.”
“What’s going on, Eva? First Dad tells me something about how Aaron’s dad is back in the picture and apparently threatening to ruin the town. And now suddenly you’re in Italy, talking about you how ‘just decided’ to take a trip.”