Or kidnapping.
Yeah, that last one still made her blood run cold. Seven months she’d been stuck in this place—first as a scared, pregnant hostage who’d feared for her life every day despite her luxurious surroundings, and now as a scared, single mother with an infant, still living in constant fear that today might be the day her life came to an end.
The baby sighed contentedly and sucked harder, making Serena bite back a wince. Gracie had Serena’s thick dark hair but had inherited her father’s eyes. She leaned back and sighed, adjusting Gracie on her chest. Figured her only one-night stand had ended with a lifetime of consequences, but there you go. Not that she regretted having her daughter. Not at all.
She just wished the circumstances were different.
In her mind, an image of her avenging angel rose once more, wearing the face of the man who’d changed her life forever. Serena started, earning a squeak from Gracie. Serena didn’t even know the guy’s last name. Only his first—Noah. The Navy SEAL. That was all she knew. Oh, and that he had the kindest blue eyes she’d ever seen. The same as the angel in her dreams. The same as their daughter.
God, her hormones must still be out of whack. She wasn’t usually so sappy.
And she knew exactly why she kept dreaming about an angel with Noah’s face. Because of his tattoo. They’d met because of their ink, at the art gallery. He’d been checking out her ass from across the room while she’d gotten the crusader artwork across her hip. In truth, maybe she’d been checking him out too, even before he’d worked up the resolve to walk over and start making conversation. She’d spotted him clear on the other side of the gallery and hadn’t been able to look away.
Hard to ignore six-feet plus of solid, sculpted muscle and pure alpha-male swagger.
Wind made the shuttered windows creak and Serena slowly turned to stare at the slatted early-morning sunshine glowing across the hardwood floors of the grand villa where she was being kept. The villa was beautiful, she had to admit.
But even if it was in the lap of luxury, being a kidnap victim sucked.
Gracie finally fell asleep, mid-suckle, and Serena carefully dislodged the baby from her breast before smoothing her nightshirt down and carrying her daughter back to the crib for a nap. While the baby slept, she showered and changed, then returned to the bedroom to start her usual morning ritual of scribbling in her journal, then staring out the window until a maid arrived with her food. Then it was another long day of knitting and playing with Gracie and hoping to hell she found a way out of this place before those two thugs who were guarding her decided to come up here and finish her off for good. She tried not to think about their death threats often because they only made her anxiety worse, but sometimes there wasn’t anything else to think about.
Those days were the worst.
Even months after the kidnapping, Serena still berated herself on a daily basis for not being more careful, for not being able to fight off her attackers, for making the idiotic decision to come to her family’s estate here in St. Dourdane on the South American coast in the first place, instead of staying at home like pretty much everyone had advised her to do once she’d found out about the pregnancy, including her OB/GYN. But no, Serena hadn’t listened to them. Had only wanted to get away, to try and get some space and time alone to regain her equilibrium after news of the impending baby had rocked her world. Little did she know that soon-to-be little Gracie’s surprise appearance in her womb would only be the start of her troubles.
She’d planned on working while she was here too, of course. The charity foundation she’d taken over after her parents’ death in a plane crash was doing great work in the poorer villages of St. Dourdane, making sure children had the education and literacy skills they needed to escape a life of poverty. She’d planned to check out their efforts first-hand, maybe do a bit of social media promotion for the cause, drum up more donations. And sure, her trip here had been rushed, without the usual security precautions, but she’d figured she’d be safe enough. She’d intended to be in and out so quickly that no one would have the chance to plan an attack, since only a few key people within her family’s candy company knew about her travel plans. Besides, she’d always loved coming here. She still had fond memories of her parents and brother spending time on the estate when they’d been kids. Swimming, hiking, playing on the beach. Postcard perfect stuff.
Then she’d been kidnapped, taken in the dead of night by the thugs, who’d tied her up and blindfolded her, threatening to kill her if she made so much as a sound. She’d gotten a brief glimpse of their faces before they’d put the blindfold on, their hard features and lethal expressions seared into her mind forever. She’d seen the same men around the villa a few times, enough to make her put off any plans for escape until she knew she was strong enough, post-delivery, that she could make it. Or until things got so desperate that staying became more impossible than risking her life and the life of her baby for a chance at freedom.
A familiar panic tightened her throat before she swallowed it down. She was fine. Gracie was fine.
For now.
On paper, getting stuck in some luxury villa for months on end sounded great. Until you realized you were in complete lockdown. No phone. No internet. No TV. No access to the outside world at all. The only
