Chapter 4

Draco

***

I wasn't into that sneaking around shit. At twenty-two I was a grown man who'd never had to do that shit even as a kid. But this was a delicate situation. Just because I felt something didn't mean I was about to jump in with both feet. There was too much at stake for that shit to happen.

In the end there was only one thing to do. "Come on." I took her through the kitchen and up the back stairs to my wing. Nobody dared come anywhere near here before noon. That was more than enough time for her to sneak back downstairs. "I won't sleep with you." She got stubborn right outside my door and dug her heels in.

"Didn't ask you to." I kept going with her hand in mine. "The bath's through there, go take a shower, I'll go find you something to eat." She looked at the bathroom door and back at me. "You can lock the door Red, I don't attack virgins." She lost all the color in her face.

I was across the room in a flash. "What is it?" She recoiled like I'd slapped her and her body begun to tremble. It doesn't take a genius to put that shit together.

"Somebody attacked you?" She pulled out of my arms and headed for the bathroom door. "I'll take that bath now and th-thank you." She went in and closed the door, leaving me standing there with more questions than answers.

I couldn't go after her, so I turned and headed for the kitchen and food. Just as I thought, there was a shitload of leftovers that were either gonna go to waste or for the staff's lunch tomorrow. I heated up a large bowl of stew and toasted some homemade bread with butter before grabbing a slice of cake and some juice to add to the tray.

Halfway back to my room it struck me that I hadn't done shit like this since I was a kid. I shook my head as I carried on. If only the boys could see me now. The heir supreme playing nursemaid!

I placed the tray on the little side table under the window as I listened to the water running in the other room. She'd been in there for a minute, and that got me to thinking. If she'd been sleeping in the stables all this time where was she catching a bath?

I knew there was a sink in the stables and a pipe where the men watered the animals, but the thought of her using either, which I was sure must be the case, left me cold. What if someone else had found her?

I rested my head back against the chair as I contemplated my strange behavior the last few weeks since I'd met her for the first time. For one, it wasn't like me, to give a fuck one-way or the other. Most of the time I was in my own little world.

I'd pretty much stopped caring about shit the day my grandfather was gunned down in the street right next to me. You get the brain matter and blood of one of your favorite people in the world splattered all over your designer shoes up close and personal, you get your shit together or you go soft.

Me I went fucking mental for like three years before pop reeled my ass back in. By then, at the ripe old age of seventeen I was a changed man, we both were come to think of it.

While gramps was alive pop had had more time to spend with me, and my little brother. He thought he had at least another thirty years before he had to take the reins, but it wasn't to be. If I hadn't known or guessed what we were into before that day I got a crash course.

I wasn't stupid, by the time I was seven or eight I knew who and what we were. If I was in anyway naïve to the fact, the little fuckers in elementary school with their Wall Street paper pushing asshole fathers were more than happy to enlighten me.

Until I started kicking asses and logging names for future reference. Yeah, even back then I was a hard ass.

Mom and dad had changed a lot since that day; they had to. They were now the king and queen of la familia and my brother and I suddenly had more fucking bodies on us than the pope. I couldn't even take a piss back then without someone on the door. Dad wasn't taking any chances since he'd declared all out war on friend and foe alike.

Yeah that's pretty much how we got our reputation. When in doubt we off every fuck. Say what you will, that shit works, why? Because if your friend knows what your enemy's up to, he'll be more apt to talk if he knows that he'd get fucked too if shit pops off. Most if not all, talk in the end.

After pop leveled their asses we didn't hear a peep out of anyone for quite some time. The only ones who'd fuck with us were upstarts who didn't know our history, or some greedy fuck with more guts than brains. They both usually ended up losing theirs.

Pop had started my training from then ‘til now, even when I was away at school I knew who I was and where I was going. Now here I am at twenty-two and my life was taking an unexpected turn in the form of some foreign chick that could hardly string two words together. But as my little brother Garret would say, she's a prime piece of ass. That boy needs help the scamp.

I smiled fondly at the thought of him as I heard the water finally turn off in the shower. I checked to make sure her food was still warm at least before walking over to the closet to find her a robe.

She must've either forgotten that I was there or she didn't realize that her body was still wet when she got dressed because the nightshirt was sticking to her. That's how I saw it, the unmistakable swelling of her stomach.

My eyes flew to hers accusingly as she looked at me like a trapped doe, about to take flight. "Who is he?" The words were angry and harsh and I barely restrained myself from grabbing her and shaking her for making me feel anything when she knew…

She recoiled from my anger and wrapped her arms Around her middle but that didn't sway me. "What kind of man let's his woman and child sleep in the damn stables? Where is he?"

She shook her head and backed away even farther. I didn't stop to question my fiery anger, or the fear that was so evident in her. I wanted to know just what the hell she was doing here in my room when some man had got her pregnant.

"Is he here? Does he live here in the states?" She made a strange sound in her throat two seconds before she hit the floor in a dead faint. It was only then I realized I'd been shaking her. Even with my anger at her my heart twisted at what I'd done.

"Shit Red, I didn't mean to hurt you." I dropped to my knees beside her and picked her up gently before taking her to my bed.

***

I almost panicked when she didn't wake up right away, but if I got mom that would just open up the floor for a shitload of questions I didn't feel like fielding right now.

My eyes were drawn to the telltale signs that another man had been there before me and I wasn't sure how to feel. Since these feelings in my gut were all new I hadn't the first fucking clue how to deal with jealousy.

I went into the bathroom and grabbed a wet cloth; I think I saw people doing this shit in the movies. It took about three minutes but she eventually came around.