*DANTE’S POV*
I stood at the office window, staring out into the teeming city below me.
My mind, however, was miles away.
It appeared to me in the form of Camilla, her words, the DNA test, all hanging over my head like a cloud that refused to go away.
Two weeks had passed since I had mailed those hair samples to get the test.
Long, agonizing weeks in which patience was something with which I had no choice.
I had just reached for my coat, ready to call it a day and head home, when the creaking sound cut into my musings.
“Boss,” Alex said, coming into the room with a brown envelope in his hand, while his face was a mask of unreadability.
I turned slowly, knowing full well what he had in his hand.
It felt heavier than it should like my whole future was weightily enclosed inside.
“Is that it?” I asked in a low voice.
Alex nodded, reaching inside his jacket and laying the envelope on my desk.
“The report from the hospital. The DNA test results.”
I stared at it a second, my stomach beginning to twist up into knots.
It was it.
That envelope had the power to change everything.
If the child was mine, if Jasper was my son, there was no going back.
“Thanks, Alex. I’ll take it from here,” I said shortly.
He hesitated for a second, a flicker of concern crossing his eyes.
He nodded and turned to go; another word unspoken.
The door closed softly behind him, leaving me to the thing I’d been fearing, and needing for weeks.
I picked up the envelope and stared at it.
My mind racing.
The words my father said to me a little time ago rang inside my ears: “You need someone to carry on the Draven name.” How little did he know just how close to the truth he was.
Holding tightly the envelope in the palm of my hand, I went back home from the office in absolute silence.
Finally, I reached the mansion.
All was silent: the staff going around their duties, oblivious to the war going on inside me.
I went straight up into my study, banged the door shut behind me, and sat at my desk with the envelope still unopened.
That means hours on end, just staring at it and trying to make some sense of it.
My head replayed every single interaction I’d had with Camilla: the night together, her confession, the way she looked at me when telling me about Jasper.
Was this, finally, the truth?
If she was, then it all changed.
Not just for me, but for her, too.
But if Jasper was indeed my son, there was no more distance I could put between them and this life.
I had finally taken one deep breath and opened the envelope, ripping it open.
Inside were some clinical pages with numbers and terms that mostly meant nothing to me.
Further down the document, my eyes scanned down the page until they landed on that one sentence that mattered.
“The DNA matches. Probability of paternity: 99.99%.”
My eyes stared at words, my heart pounding against my chest.
The earth had shifted in its place under my feet.
Everything I’d ever thought I knew was turned upside down at that moment.
Camilla hadn’t lied.
Jasper was mine.
My son.
Reality finally set in, and I slumped backward into my chair.
Jasper was my son.
Impossible to deny, a truth that would come with the weight of a responsibility not quite sure I was ready for.
Finally, my father would get what he had wanted this whole time: a grandchild, an heir to carry on with the name of Draven.
What he didn’t fathom, though, was the price coming with it.
The mafia wasn’t dangerous, it was deadly.
If Camilla and Jasper ever came into my real world, they would be exposed to all manner of things.
Now they were in danger.
I ran a hand through my hair; a decision weighed in my mind.
Now or never, I thought.
Jasper was mine, and with that came Camilla, too bloody well tied to me whether either of us liked it or not.
I could not leave them unguarded against those foes who would have no scruple in using them against me, taking advantage of any weakness they might detect.
A son, a child, that would be my greatest weakness.
Slowly I let my breath out, these various fancies chasing one another around my brain.
I must rescue them from whatever muddle was on, whatever peril Camilla had hinted at when first she came to me about Jasper.
She wouldn’t have come to me unless she were in dire straits.
Unless she had no other recourse.
The more I thought about it, the more crystal clear it became: there was no decision to be made here.
I couldn’t turn my back, not on my son.
And if that meant bringing Camilla and Jasper into my world, well then, so bloody well be it.
That humming of my phone lying on the desk had just dissolved the silence in that split second.
I looked down to see a message from Alex: “Shipment details finalized. Awaiting further instructions.”
I dismissed all this for now; after all, the need was to focus on whatever was taking place around me.
Business could wait.
Right now, my family came first.
I stood, my long legs devouring the space across the room as the weight of what I contemplated settled over me.
My father would be in a state of thrall: he’d be getting the grandchild he’d always wanted, and our legacy would be secured.
But I wasn’t doing this for him.
I was doing it for Jasper.
And for Camilla, too, whether I liked it or not.
I stopped in front of a window that stretched from wall to wall looking out onto the estate.
It stared back at me in the glass, my reflection cold and sure.
I have to get them out.
It was a question of life and death for Camilla and Jasper, and whether I wanted them in my life or not ceased to matter anymore.
They were now in my life, and it was my duty to keep them safe.
Dark, twisted, and utterly merciless, that’s the only way to describe the Mafia world.
But I wasn’t going to let that darkness swallow my son or the woman who’d brought him into this world.
I firmed my fists into an iron-clad clench while my jaw set as the resolve merely froze into the marrow of my bones.
There was no going back now.
Whatever that would take.
I came back to the report once more, words jammed inside my brain-heating it up, burning it, scorching it.
Jasper was my son.
“I have to save them,” I muttered low but conviction from a thousand voices.
“I’ll protect them, no matter the cost.
And with that, I knew my life had just taken a sharp turn.
The very world I’d struggled so diligently to keep Camilla from had just become the very thing I was to protect her and Jasper from.
One thing was for certain, I wasn’t about to let them get taken from me.
Not now.
Not ever.
Whatever it takes, I’ll protect them, even if embracing the darkness I worked so hard to keep them from is the only way to do it.