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‘I’m as well as a man can be when he sees his granddaughter working herself to the bone.’ He scowled down at the bottle in her hand. ‘A man doesn’t like to see a woman drinking beer.’
‘Then it’s a good job I don’t have a man I need to worry about.’ She teased him lightly, relieved that he had the energy to spar with her. This was their relationship. This was Baracchi love. She told herself that just because he didn’t express it didn’t mean he didn’t feel it. On some days she actually believed that. ‘What are you doing up? You should be asleep in bed.’
‘Luca was crying.’
‘He had a dream. He just wanted a cuddle.’
‘You should leave him to cry.’ Her grandfather gave a grunt of disapproval. ‘He’ll never grow up to be a man the way you coddle him.’
‘He’s going to be a fine man. The best.’
‘The boy is spoiled. Every time I see him, someone is hugging him or kissing him.’
‘You can’t give a child too much love.’
‘Did I fuss over my son the way you fuss over yours?’
No, and look at how that turned out. ‘I think you should go to bed, Nonno.’
‘Can I cook for a few people? That’s what you said to me—’ he winced as he walked stiffly towards the waterfront ‘—and before I know it my home is full of strangers and you are serving good Sicilian food on fancy plates and lighting candles for people who wouldn’t know the difference between fresh food and fast food.’
‘People travel a long way to taste my cooking. I’m running a successful business.’
‘You shouldn’t be running a business.’ Her grandfather settled himself in his favourite chair at the water’s edge. The chair he’d sat on when she was a child.
‘I’m building a life for myself and a future for my child.’ A life that was now overturned. A future that was threatened. Suddenly she didn’t trust herself not to betray what she was feeling. ‘I’ll fetch you a drink. Grappa?’
She had to tell her grandfather about Santo, but first she had to work out how. How did you tell someone that the father of his precious great-grandchild was a man he hated above all others?
Fia walked back to the kitchen and grabbed the bottle and a glass. It was a long time since he’d mentioned the Ferraras. And that was because of her, of course. Concerned for Luca, she’d insisted that if he couldn’t speak the name positively then he wasn’t to speak the name at all.
At first she was just grateful that he’d taken her threat seriously, but now she was wondering whether it meant he’d actually softened over time.
Please. Please let him have softened—
Fia put the glass on the table in front of her grandfather and poured. ‘So what’s wrong?’
‘You mean apart from the fact that you are here every night slaving in that kitchen while someone else looks after your child?’
‘It’s good for Luca to be with other people. Gina loves him.’ She didn’t have the family she wanted for her son, so she’d created it. Her son was never going to be lonely in the way she’d been lonely. He had people he could turn to. People who would hug him when life threw rocks.
‘Love.’ Her grandfather grunted with contempt. ‘You are turning him into a girl. That’s what happens when there is no father to teach a boy to be a man.’
It was the perfect opening for her to tell him what she needed to tell him. But Fia couldn’t push the words past her dry throat. She needed time. Time to discover what Santo intended to do. ‘Luca has male influences in his life.’
‘If you’re talking about that boy you employ in the restaurant, there’s more testosterone in my finger than he has in his whole body. Luca needs a real man around.’
‘You and I have very different ideas about what makes a real man.’
His bony shoulders slumped and the lines on his forehead were deep. In the past month he appeared to have aged a decade. ‘This isn’t what I wanted for you.’
‘Life doesn’t always turn out the way we plan it, Nonno. When life gives you olives, you make olive oil.’
‘But you don’t make olive oil!’ He waved a hand in frustration. ‘You send our olives to our neighbours and they make our oil.’
‘Which I use in my restaurant. The restaurant that everyone in Sicily is talking about. I was in the paper last week.’ But somehow the buzz that she’d got from that fleeting moment of success had gone. Recent events had diminished it to nothing. ‘The week before I was mentioned in an important travel blog. The article was called “Sicilian Secrets”. I’m doing well. I’m good at my work.’
‘Work is what a woman does before she finds a husband.’
Fia put the bottle down on the table. ‘Don’t say that. Soon, Luca will be old enough to understand you and I don’t want him growing up with that opinion.’
‘Men ask you out! But do you say yes? No, you don’t. Dark, blond, tall, short—it’s always “no”. You shut everyone out and you have done since Luca’s father.’ He looked at her intently and Fia’s fingers tightened on the bottle.
‘When I meet a man I’m interested in, I’ll say yes.’ But she knew that wasn’t going to happen. There had only ever been one man in her life and right now he despised her. And worse, he thought she was an unfit mother.
Barely able to think about that, she focused on her grandfather and felt a flicker of worry as she saw him absently rub his fingers across his chest. Impulsively, she reached across the table and touched his hand. When he immediately withdrew, she tried not to mind. Her grandfather wasn’t tactile, was he? It was silly of her to even try. He didn’t hug her and he didn’t hug Luca. ‘What’s wrong? More pain?’
‘Don’t fuss.’ There was a long silence while he glared at her and something in his gaze made her stomach clench.
Was it just her guilty conscience or did he—?
‘You weren’t going to tell me, were you?’ The harshness of his voice shocked her and she felt as if the earth had shaken beneath her feet.
‘Tell you what?’ Her heart was suddenly pounding like a drum in a rock band.
‘He was here tonight. Santo Ferrara.’ He said it as if the name tasted bad on his tongue and Fia put the bottle down before it slipped from her hand.
‘Nonno—’
‘I know you banned me from mentioning his name but when a Ferrara walks onto my property, that gives me the right to talk about him. You should have told me he was here.’
How much did he know? How much had he heard?
‘I didn’t tell you because I knew this would be your reaction.’
He thumped his fist on the table. ‘I warned that boy not to step onto my land again.’
Fia thought about the width and power of those shoulders. The haze of dark stubble accentuating that hard jaw. ‘He’s not a boy. He’s a man.’ A wealthy man who now ran a global corporation. A man with the power to shake up everything she loved about her life. A man who had gone off to talk to lawyers and think about the future of her son.
Their son.
Oh, God—
Her grandfather’s eyes glowed bright with rage. ‘That man walked into my home—my home—’ he stabbed the air with his finger ‘—with no respect for my feelings.’
‘Nonno—’
‘Did he have the courage to face me?’
‘Calma! Calm down.’ Fia was on her feet; the emotion was a burning ball at the base of her ribs. If her grandfather was this upset now, how much worse was it going to be when he found out the truth? It was starting again, only this time Luca would be in the middle of it. ‘I didn’t want him to see you and this is why! You’re getting upset.’
‘Of course I am upset. How could I not be upset after what he has done?’ His face was white in the flickering light from the candle and Fia was sure that hers was equally pale.
‘You promised me when Luca was born that you would let the past go.’
He gave her a long, long look. ‘Why are you defending him? Why is it that I’m not allowed to say a bad word about a Ferrara?’
Fia felt the heat pour into her cheeks. ‘Because I don’t want Luca growing up with that animosity. It’s horrible.’
‘I hate them.’
Fia breathed deeply. ‘I know.’ Oh, yes, she knew. And she’d thought about that every day since she’d felt the first fluttering low in her abdomen. She’d thought about it as she’d pushed her son from her body, when she’d first looked into his eyes and every time she kissed him goodnight. There were days when she felt as if she couldn’t carry the weight of it any more.
Her grandfather’s eyes were fierce. ‘Because of Ferrara, you will be alone in the world when I’m gone. Who will look after you?’
‘I will look after us.’ She knew he blamed Santo for her brother’s death. She also knew it was pointless to remind him that her brother had barely been able to look after himself, let alone another. It had been his own reckless irresponsibility that had killed him, not Santo Ferrara.
Her grandfather rose unsteadily to his feet. ‘If Ferrara dares to come back here again and I’m not around you can give him a message from me—’
‘Nonno—’
‘—you can tell him I’m still waiting for him to act like a man and take responsibility for his actions. And if he dares set foot on my property again I’ll make him pay.’
CHAPTER THREE
SANTO sat and waited in his office at the Ferrara Beach Club—an office hastily vacated in his honour by the manager of the hotel. If he needed an indication as to why this hotel was less successful than the others in the group it was right there on the desk. Lack of discipline and organisation was visible everywhere, from the scattered papers to the dying plant that drooped sadly in the corner of the office. Later, he’d deal with it. Right now he had other things on his mind. Mocking him from the wall was an enlarged photograph of the hotel manager, posing with his wife and two smiling children.
A typical Sicilian family.
Santo stared moodily at that picture. Right now he felt like tearing it down. He’d never considered himself idealistic, but was it idealistic to assume that one day his family would look much like the one in the picture?
Apparently it was.
He glanced at his watch.
Not for one moment did he doubt that she would come. Not because he had faith in her sense of justice but because she knew that if she didn’t, he’d come and get her.
His face expressionless, he waited as darkness gave way to the first fingers of dawn; as the sun rose over the sea, showering light across the smooth glassy surface.
He’d sent the text in the early hours, at a time when most people would have been asleep. It hadn’t occurred to him to try and sleep. There had been no rest for him and he knew there would have been none for her, either.
Exhaustion fogged his mind and yet his thoughts were clear. As far as he was concerned the decision was clear. If only the emotions were as simple to deal with.
He checked his phone again and found a message from his brother, another person who had been frequenting the early hours. Just four words—
What do you need?
Unconditional support. Unquestioning loyalty. All those things that a family should offer, and which his did. He’d been raised with that support, surrounded by love. Unlike his son, who had spent his early years in the equivalent of a pit of vipers.
Sweat beaded on his brow. He could barely allow himself to think about what his son’s life must have been like. What was the long-term impact of being raised in an emotional desert? And what if the abuse hadn’t just been emotional? Although he’d been young, he still remembered the mutterings and the rumours about the Baracchi family. Remembered seeing Fia sporting bruises almost all the time.
The knock on the door was the most reluctant sound he’d ever heard.
His eyes narrowed and he felt a rush of adrenaline, but it was only a young chef from the kitchen, bringing him more coffee.
‘Grazie—’
The rattle of the cup on the saucer and her nervous glance told him that his black mood was visible on his face although they’d probably all misinterpreted the cause. Everyone in the hotel from the top down was jumpy about his visit. Normally they’d have reason. They had no way of knowing that his current mood was caused by something different. That a reorganization of the hotel was the last thing on his mind right now.
She melted away but moments later there was another tap on the door and he knew instantly that this time it was her.
The door opened and Fia stood there, those fierce green eyes glittering like jewels in a face as pale as morning mist. One look at her white face told him that she hadn’t had any more rest than he had.
She looked washed out and stressed. And ready for a fight.
Across the room their eyes clashed.
They’d been lovers.
They’d shared the ultimate intimacy, but that wasn’t going to help them navigate the treacherous waters they now found themselves in because they’d shared nothing else. They had no relationship. Essentially they were strangers. All they’d had were a few chance encounters and one stolen night, one delicious taste of the forbidden. None of that was going to help them through this desperate situation. And it was desperate; even he could see that.
‘Where is my son?’ He snapped out the words and she leaned her back against the door and looked at him.
‘Asleep in his bed. In his home. And if he wakes, Gina is there, and my grandfather.’
The anger rushed at him like a ravenous beast ready to snap through the last threads of his fragile self-control. ‘And that is supposed to provide me with comfort?’
‘He loves Luca.’
‘I think we have a very different idea of what that word means.’
‘No.’ Her eyes were fierce. ‘No, we don’t.’
Santo’s mouth tightened. ‘And will he still “love” him when he discovers the identity of his father? I think we both know the answer to that.’ He rose from his chair and saw her hand shoot towards the door handle. His mouth tightened and his eyes narrowed in a warning. ‘If you leave this room then we will be having this conversation in public. Is that what you want?’
‘What I want is for you to calm down and be rational.’
‘Oh, I’m rational, tesoro. I have been thinking clearly from the moment I saw my child.’
The atmosphere thickened. The air grew overly warm.
‘What do you want me to say? That I’m sorry? That I did the wrong thing?’ Her voice was smoky-soft and that voice drew his eyes to the smooth column of her throat and then to her mouth. It had been just one night but the memory of it had left deep scars in his senses. He knew how she’d taste because he remembered it vividly. He knew how she’d feel because he remembered that too. Not just the smooth texture of her skin, but the softness of her gorgeous hair. Now released from the clips that had restrained it during cooking, it fell down her back like a dark flame, reflecting the sunrise back at him. He remembered the day her father had cut it short in a blaze of Baracchi temper, hacking with kitchen scissors until she’d been left with a jagged crop. A horrified Santo had witnessed the incident and had tried to intervene but the sight of him had simply inflamed the situation.
She’d sat still, he remembered, saying nothing as hunks of long hair had landed in her lap. Afterwards she’d hidden in the boathouse, her fierce glare challenging him to say one word about it and of course he hadn’t because their relationship didn’t encompass verbal exchanges.
And it had been in the boathouse, on that one night that had ended so tragically, that their relationship had shifted from nothing to everything.
Santo hauled in a deep breath, resisting that savage, elemental instinct that had him wanting to flatten her to the wall and drag the answers from her. ‘When did you find out you were pregnant?’
‘Why does that matter?’
‘I’m the one asking the questions and right now you’ll answer any question I choose to ask you.’
She closed her eyes and leaned her head back against the door. ‘Not for ages. Afterwards … I can’t really remember. It’s all a blur. First there was the hospital. Then the funeral. And my grandfather …’ Her sudden silence said more than words. Her breathing was fractured. ‘It was chaos. The last thing I was thinking about was me.’
Yes, it had been chaos. Pandemonium. A huge tangled mess of blame, guilt, regret and raw emotion. The frantic rush to save a life that was already lost. A moment of intimacy lost in a sea of negative publicity and cruel gossip. Remembering it sent the tension flowing through his muscles and he knew she was feeling the same. In fact he was fairly sure that the only thing holding her upright was willpower.
‘So when did you find out?’
‘I don’t know. I suppose it must have been a couple of months. Longer—’ she rubbed her fingers over her forehead ‘—it was a very difficult time. I probably should have realised sooner but at the time I just thought that everything I was feeling was part of the shock. I felt sick the whole time but I thought that was grief. And when I did finally work it out it seemed like—’
‘—one more problem?’ His hands were clenched by his sides but her eyes flew to his, appalled.
‘No!’ She shook her head violently. ‘I was going to say that it seemed like a miracle.’ Her words dropped to a whisper. ‘The best thing in my life came from the worst night of my life.’
It wasn’t the response he’d expected and for a moment it threw him. ‘When you realised, you should have contacted me.’
‘For what purpose?’ There was despair in her tone. ‘So that you and my grandfather could rip each other to pieces? Do you think I wanted Luca exposed to that? I made the decision that was best for my baby.’
‘Our baby,’ Santo corrected her with lethal emphasis. ‘And from now on we’ll be making those decisions together.’ He saw the panic flicker across her face and knew that anxiety was responsible for those dark shadows under her eyes.
‘Luca is happy. I can understand how you’re feeling, but—’
‘You do not understand how I’m feeling.’ His voice was raw. Savage. He didn’t know himself and he certainly didn’t trust himself. ‘This is my son we’re talking about. Did you honestly believe I would want him to grow up a Baracchi?’ He braced himself to ask the question that had robbed him of sleep. ‘Has he ever hit him?’
‘No!’ Her denial was immediate and sincere. ‘I would never, ever allow anyone to touch Luca.’
‘And how do you defend him? You never defended yourself.’ Perhaps it was low of him, but he told himself that his son’s welfare was more important than her feelings. ‘You just endured it.’
‘I was eight years old!’ Hurt and reproach flickered in her eyes and suddenly he felt like an animal for ripping into her. That was what people had done all their lives, wasn’t it?
‘I apologise for that remark,’ he breathed and she shook her head.
‘You don’t need to. I don’t blame you for being protective of your child.’ She spoke quietly, as if she had long since resigned herself to the fact that no one had any concern for her. ‘And yes, I was brought up in a violent family but that violence came from my father, not my grandfather. I assure you that Luca has never been at risk. He has had a warm, loving childhood.’
‘Without a father in his life.’
She flinched as if he’d slapped her. ‘Yes.’
‘Naturally I am relieved that he has been safe, but that doesn’t change the fundamental issue here. Family is the most important thing to me. I am a Ferrara and we look after our own. There are no circumstances—none—that would induce me to walk away from my own child.’ His words struck another blow because of course her mother had done exactly that. She’d walked away when Fia was only eight years old.
Her face lost the last hint of colour and he wondered briefly how it must feel to watch a parent walk away, leaving you to cope with danger alone.
He knew the story, as did everyone else. Her mother had been an English tourist who had fallen for the charms of the smooth, good-looking Pietro Baracchi, only to discover after the wedding that he was an incurable womanizer with a dangerous temper. After one beating too many, she’d turned her back on Sicily and her two children and soon after that Fia’s father had been killed in a drunken boating accident.
She watched him steadily. ‘You are very quick to judge me, but did you bother to come back and find out if there were consequences to our night together?’
Her unexpected attack shook him. ‘I used contraception.’
‘And that worked out well, didn’t it?’ She tilted her head. ‘Did you, at any point, wonder how I was doing after that night? How I was coping after the accident that killed my brother? Did you bother to come and find me?’
‘I did not wish to inflame the situation.’ But her words had kindled a nagging guilt. He should have contacted her. The thought was uncomfortable, like walking with a sharp stone in your shoe.
‘So you’re admitting your concern that having contact with me would escalate our problems.’ Her voice was remarkably calm. ‘How much more inflammatory would it have been if I’d told you there was a child?’
‘The child changes everything.’
‘It changes nothing. It just makes everything harder.’ She pushed her hands into the pockets of her jeans. With a face free of make-up and her hair loose, she looked impossibly young. More like a teenager than a successful businesswoman. ‘It’s a waste of time dwelling on what is already done so let’s talk about the future. Of course you want to see him. I understand that. We can arrange something.’
Distracted by the length of her legs in those jeans, Santo frowned. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘I’m saying that you can see Luca. We’ll work something out, providing you agree to certain rules.’
She was giving him rules? Stunned, he could barely respond. ‘What rules?’
‘I will not at any time tolerate you speaking ill of my grandfather in front of Luca. Nor will you denigrate anyone else in my family, and that includes me. No matter how angry you are with me, you will not show it in front of Luca. As far as he is concerned, we are united. We might not be together, but I want him to believe we are on friendly terms. Providing you agree to that then I’ll let you have full access.’
Genuinely shocked at the depth of her misunderstanding, Santo felt exasperation surge through him. ‘Access? You think I am talking about visiting rights? You think this is about making polite arrangements to take my child on the occasional outing?’
‘Don’t you want that?’
‘Sí, I want access. Full access.’ His tone was a perfect reflection of his mood. Grim. ‘The sort of access that comes from being a full-time father. Access to tuck him in at night and get him up in the morning. Access to spend all the time I want to spend with him. Access to teach him what family is truly about. And that is what is going to happen. I have had lawyers working through the night drawing up the necessary paperwork to acknowledge him as my son. My son.’
There was a hideous silence.
For a moment she said nothing and then she exploded across the room like a wild thing and pounded his chest with her fists.
‘You will not take him from me! I won’t let you.’ She was so furious and he was so shocked by the unexpected explosion of emotion it took him a few seconds to grasp those slender wrists, a few more seconds to free himself from a lock of that vivid hair that had wrapped itself around him.
‘And yet you took him from me—’ He enunciated every syllable, threw those words right into her shocked face and saw the exact moment reality sank home.
‘I’m his mother—’ her voice was hoarse ‘—I will not let you take him. I will find a way of stopping you. He needs me.’
Santo paused long enough to make her suffer a fraction of what he had suffered since he’d discovered the truth. Then he released her hands and stepped away from her. ‘If you’re trying to impress me with your maternal dedication then don’t waste your time. Even if everything else you say is true, the fact is that you have employed a nanny.’
She stepped back from him, confusion on her face. ‘What does Gina have to do with this?’
‘You don’t look after him yourself.’
‘I do look after him—’ her eyes were stricken ‘—and there are reasons I choose to have a nanny. I can—’
‘You don’t have to explain. Caring for a child full-time is a demanding experience. A young child is very restricting, as your mother discovered. She chose to walk away from it. I’m willing to give you the opportunity to do the same.’
Her eyes were huge. ‘I don’t understand what you’re saying.’
‘I’m saying that I will take full responsibility for him.’
‘You’re … threatening to take my son from me?’
‘Offering,’ Santo interjected smoothly, watching her face closely. ‘Offering, not threatening. And if you want to see him then of course that can be arranged.’
Her breathing was shallow. ‘You think I want to give him away?’
‘You can have your life back. And given that I’m prepared to sweeten the deal with a significant financial incentive, it could be a very comfortable life. It’s a generous offer. Take it. You’d never have to work again.’
She lifted her hands to her cheeks and gave a choked laugh. ‘You really don’t know anything about me, do you? I love my son, and if you truly believe for a moment that I’d give him to you on any terms then you have no idea who you’re dealing with.’ Her hands dropped to her sides. Clenched into fists. ‘There’s nothing I wouldn’t do to protect my child.’
Unmoved by the anger in her eyes, Santo nodded. ‘Your mother would have taken the money and run. It’s to your credit that you didn’t do the same.’
‘So this was some sort of test?’ She gave a moan of disgust. ‘You’re sick, do you know that?’
‘Our child’s future is at stake. There is nothing I wouldn’t do to protect him. If protecting him means offending you, I’ll do that too.’ He threw her own words back at her and she wrapped her arms around herself.
‘I am not my mother. I will never leave Luca.’
‘In that case we will find another solution.’ And there was only one that he could see. He consoled himself with the fact that at least she was making an effort to fight for her child.
‘Do you think I haven’t searched for one?’ Her raw tone exposed layers of despair. ‘There is no solution. I don’t want him shuttled between us. I don’t want him absorbing all the bad feeling that runs between our families. He’s been brought up in an atmosphere of happiness and calm.’
‘Knowing your grandfather, I find that impossible to believe.’
‘My grandfather has stuck to my rules.’
Santo frowned. ‘More rules?’
‘Yes. From the moment Luca was born, I insisted that any mention of the name Ferrara in our house had to be positive. I didn’t want my son growing up in the same poisonous atmosphere I experienced.’
Genuinely surprised, Santo lifted his eyebrows. ‘And how did you achieve this miracle of good behaviour?’
‘I threatened to take his grandson away unless he agreed to my terms.’
If he’d been surprised before, he was shocked now. So she was stronger than she looked, then. ‘Ingenious.’
‘You will abide by the same rule. You will not speak badly about my family in front of Luca. If you can’t say anything nice, then you don’t mention us. When he spends time with you I want to be confident that you are not denigrating my family and I will know because right now Luca is like a recording device. He repeats everything he hears.’
Fascinated that so much passion could be trapped in such a small package and reluctantly impressed at her steadfast refusal to involve herself in the Baracchi/Ferrara hostilities, Santo took his time to respond.
‘Firstly,’ he said softly, ‘the bad feeling was all on your side. We made several overtures, all of which were rejected. Secondly, you will know what I am saying to Luca because you will be there to hear it in person. Thirdly, our families will be merged, so all this ceases to be relevant.’
‘Merged?’ Nervous, she pushed her hair back from her face. ‘You mean because Luca belongs to both of us?’
‘I mean because I intend to marry you.’
Silence spread across the room.
For a moment he wondered if she’d actually heard him.
Then she made a strange sound in her throat and took a step backwards.
‘Marry you?’ Her voice was barely audible. ‘You have to be joking.’
‘Relish the moment, tesoro. Up until now, women have waited in vain for a proposal of marriage from me.’
She looked as if she’d suffered a major shock. ‘You’re proposing.’
‘In a practical sense, yes. In a romantic sense, no,’ he drawled, ‘so if you’re expecting me to get down on one knee you can forget it.’
This, he thought, would be a real test of her devotion to their son.
She lifted her hand to her throat and looked at him as if he was mad. ‘Apart from the fact that we haven’t laid eyes on each other for three years and barely know each other, there is no way our families would accept this.’
‘I presume you are talking about your side of the family, because my side will support me in whatever decision I make. That’s what families do. The reaction of yours is of no interest to me.’ He gave an indifferent shrug. ‘And as for the fact that we barely know each other, that will be rectified quickly enough. You will get to know me fast enough because I don’t intend to let you out of my sight.’
She sleepwalked to the window. ‘I saw a picture of you just last week strolling along a red carpet with a woman on your arm—you have a million women chasing after you.’
‘Then it’s fortunate for you that I was waiting for that one special person and hadn’t yet made that commitment.’ His expectations mocked him. His brother and his sister both had strong, happy marriages. He’d had no reason to believe that his wouldn’t be the same. His hopes for the future were undergoing a transformation so rapid that it left him reeling.
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