New Arrivals: His Expectant Mistress: Accidentally Pregnant! / One-Night Pregnancy / One Tiny Miracle.... Rebecca WintersЧитать онлайн книгу.
seats with her eyes closed. Even after the long flight she still looked fresh in her two-piece yellow linen suit. She had marvelous dress sense and a glow about her from being in the Californian sun, but some of it could be attributed to the fact that she was pregnant.
He’d had two weeks to think about the possibility that the baby wasn’t his. He still found it difficult to accept and knew he would find it hard to let the baby go to its biological parent, especially after Vincenzo had been forced to go through the same experience with Dino all these years. But at this point in time he was much more concerned for Irena’s health and the baby’s.
Sometimes when he allowed himself to believe the baby was his, the joy that filled him was almost too intense. He let out a ragged breath. Two weeks from now they’d know the truth and they would deal with it. Though she’d pretended everything was fine in front of Dino, Vincenzo sensed Irena’s anxiety was growing more acute.
Unable to help himself, he walked over and kissed her exposed throat, one of her many delicious parts.
“Vincenzo—” Her eyes flew open in surprise.
“We’re about to take off. Let me help you.” He fastened the seat belt for her, then took the seat opposite her and strapped himself in.
“How did it go? Was Dino happy to be home?”
“I’m sure he was glad to see his mother, but Leo was there and it made things less natural for him.”
“After these weeks of being together, I know it will be hard on both of you to be apart. Thank goodness you only have to wait until Wednesday.”
He gave her another prolonged kiss, loving Irena for loving his son, for understanding.
They’d already taxied out to the runway and were airborne. He waited until they’d attained cruising speed before undoing his seat belt. “Can I get you anything from the galley?”
“No, thank you. I had a soda while I was waiting for you.”
He went in search of a cup of coffee. When he returned, she looked worried and gave him a searching glance. “How did Mila treat you?”
“Now that the tables have turned, she was unusually quiet.”
Irena shook her head. “Surely she knows I could never replace her in Dino’s eyes. She’s his mother! If I can be his friend, that’s all I’ll ever be.”
“There’s more to it than that, Irena.”
“What do you mean?”
“As long as Dino was our only child, Mila never worried that he wouldn’t inherit the title from my father one day.”
“You said it was defunct,” she reminded him.
“It is, but it’s still of symbolic importance to her and her family. I could see it in her eyes tonight. She’s almost apoplectic that there’s the possibility you and I will have a baby in the future. That will mean Dino won’t be the only one in line for the title and the money.”
Irena left out a hysterical sound between a laugh and cry before eyeing him steadily. “Is it an extensive fortune?”
His lips tightened. “Yes.”
“What does the Valsecchi family do?”
“Many things—investment banking, shipping, exports and manufacturing throughout eastern and western Europe. Now that my grandfather is deceased, my father, Guilio, is the CEO and oldest living member of the family.”
“Is it a big family?”
“Average. The board consists of his two brothers, my uncle Carlo and my uncle Tullio. Reporting to them are their five sons, my ex-wife’s brother and my stepbrother whom you’ve already met. Each one of them holds the position of vice president for the various departments within the business.”
“Where do you fit in?” she asked quietly.
“That’s a long story. I was twenty-six when my mother died. You already know her feelings about wanting me married to Mila, so I became engaged, but I didn’t set a date for our wedding because I needed more time. Except for a war separating you, I don’t understand putting off marriage if you sense it’s right in your gut.”
He put his empty coffee mug on the side table. “Within six months my father remarried a widowed aristocrat from Genoa. She had a son, Fabbio, who was twenty-seven and a bachelor. He fell for Mila. If her ambition hadn’t been so great, she would probably have been happy with him.
“Father saw what was happening. About that time he announced he’d been diagnosed with cancer. I believed he might have been making it up to manipulate me. I’m sorry to say it worked. I acceded to pressure and married Mila. After she became pregnant, father ended up in the hospital with prostate cancer. At that point I felt guilty that I had doubted him.
“He thought he was going to die and appointed me acting CEO. Up until then I’d been his assistant. At that point he transferred the title to me. Naturally these moves infuriated the rest of the family and the lawsuits started flying. It was brother against brother, cousin against cousin.
“To defuse the maelstrom, I refused the title. That not only upset my father, it infuriated Mila and her family. They treated me like a pariah. In time my father recovered, but wasn’t speaking to me.”
Irena made another sound in her throat. “How ghastly for you.”
“With our baby on the way, I won’t pretend it wasn’t a hellish period. I was away on business for a lot of the time. By the time Dino was born, we were at war. As I told you earlier, she wouldn’t let me have anything to do with him, so I divorced her. You know the rest. The cruel part began with the visitation order that pretty well stripped me of my rights.”
She stared at him in a daze. “Where were you living until then?”
“In one of the smaller family palazzos overlooking the water in La Spezia. After the divorce, Mila continued to live there.”
“And your father?”
“In the former ducal palazzo with his second wife where I was raised. It’s higher up the hillside.”
“I thought Mila went back to Florence?”
“She spent time in both places, but when it was my visitation, she managed to be in Florence. Anything to make it more difficult for me. These days she splits her time between Florence, La Spezia and Milan. Again, when it’s my time to be with my son, I have to travel, but naturally I don’t mind.”
“How did you come to live in Riomaggiore?”
“The Valsecchi company owns several hundred houses and apartments in Cinque Terre that are rented out. I decided to take the one I’m in because I favor it, and it’s near the plant in La Spezia where I work. Antonello’s was part of my mother’s dowry when she married my father.”
The fasten seat belt light flashed on. They were coming into Genoa.
“You’re right,” Irena murmured, fastening hers. “Your family life has been much more complicated than anything that has happened to me.” She smoothed the hair away from her face. “Vincenzo? Why has marrying me allowed you to gain joint physical custody?”
He’d known that question was coming and had hoped he could put off answering it for a while longer. “I’ll tell you when we’re in the car. From the looks of it, jet lag is already catching up to you. Your beautiful eyes are doing that little flutter thing.” His comment caused color to seep into her cheeks.
But Vincenzo knew that his wife, who still had yet to sleep in his bed, deserved to know what was happening. Their marriage might have been for convenience’s sake, but he longed to make their marriage real. The truth was, he didn’t dare make love to her until he’d cleared it with her doctor tomorrow. If being intimate could put the baby’s life in any danger with the test looming, he would wait as long as