‘Not at all.’ Luca brushed Dan’s thanks aside.
The couple moved on and Luca remained standing.
Bronte was looking down at her place setting, her slim shoulders rolled forward, with her teeth gnawing at her bottom lip.
‘We’re leaving,’ he clipped out, throwing some money down on the table to cover their ordered meal.
She looked up at him with a pinched look. ‘But…but people will wonder what’s—’
Luca snatched at her hand and pulled her to her feet. ‘I don’t give a flying you-know-what for what people think,’ he bit out savagely. ‘I am not going to discuss this in a public restaurant.’
Bronte stumbled out of the restaurant with him, desperately hoping Judy and Dan wouldn’t notice from their seats towards the back of the room. The tension in Luca’s hand as he held hers was almost brutal. His fingers were like savage teeth biting into hers as he pulled her along beside him, his mouth set in a hard flat line. His dark eyes were dangerously brooding, his frown equally so. Once they were outside, every step he took pounded the pavement with his fury. The storm that had been brewing earlier was now in full force, as if it had sided with Luca. The flashing lightning and booming thunder mimicked the expression on his face, the electrifying hatred in his gaze zapping her like lightning each time he looked at her.
Bronte ran her tongue over her dry lips. ‘Luca…I was trying to tell you when Dan and Judy arrived…’
His hand tightened like a vice as he swung her to face him. ‘You were trying to tell me what?’ he asked. ‘That you deliberately lied to me from the moment you saw me yesterday? You told me the child was one year old. I did the calculations and you knew I would, didn’t you? That’s why you cut a couple of months off so I wouldn’t suspect she was mine.’
Bronte hung her head. ‘I’m sorry…’
He wrenched her back along the pavement. ‘It’s a bit late for an apology, damn it. You have a hell of a lot of explaining to do. I am so angry at this moment you should be thanking God we are in a public place. But you just wait until we get back to my hotel. You had better have your excuses handy.’
Each of his words was like a blow to Bronte’s chest. She had known he wouldn’t take the news well, but to have heard it the way he did had made it so much worse. He was shocked and angry and rightly so. He had missed out on the most precious first months of his child’s life. Even though he had refused to see her after he ended their relationship, Bronte knew she’d had a responsibility to tell him, even if it had to have been in a letter addressed to his villa or house in London. He would have got it eventually. But her hurt at his rejection had made her act in a passive aggressive way. She could see it now. How she had secretly relished the fact he didn’t know about Ella. It was her little payback for the heartbreak he had caused her. It was an appalling thing to do and she was deeply ashamed.
She couldn’t give back what she had stolen from him. Each day of the fourteen months of Ella’s life was irreplaceable. Sure, she had photos documenting every little milestone, but how could that compensate for the real thing? Even if he had not wanted a part in his child’s life, he should at least have had the right to choose. She had denied him that right and now he was after revenge. She just knew it. Luca Sabbatini was not the sort of man to walk away from something like this with a shrug of his shoulders. He would want her to pay for what she had done and pay dearly.
The lift journey up to Luca’s penthouse felt to Bronte as if she was being led to the gallows. As each floor number flashed past, her heartbeat escalated. She felt sick with anguish, guilt and nerves. Her stomach was curdled with the fear he would take Ella away from her. He’d already said how much his mother longed for a grandchild. And what could be more perfect than a little girl to replace the one she had lost in babyhood? The odds were stacked against Bronte keeping custody. How could she afford to contest such a case? She earned too much to qualify for legal aid and too little to take on the Sabbatini dynasty. But she was not going to give up without a fight. She would do anything to stop him from taking her little girl away from her.
Absolutely anything.
Luca activated the swipe card and practically frogmarched Bronte into the suite. He shut the door with a bang that reverberated like a cannon boom. ‘Why the hell didn’t you tell me you were pregnant?’ he asked.
She looked at him with stricken features. ‘I tried to contact you time and time again but you refused to meet me face to face.’
Luca felt a knife jab of guilt but he pushed it aside to make room for his burgeoning anger. ‘How did it happen? You told me you were on the Pill and, in any case, I always used protection.’
‘I don’t know how it happened,’ she said. ‘I must have missed a dose or something. And then there was that time when the condom broke.’
Luca remembered that time as if it had happened yesterday. He had been so eager to see her after being away on a business trip. He had barely got the condom on in time and then it had broken. ‘When did you find out you were pregnant?’
‘A week after you told me our relationship was over.’ She bit into her lip again and another flick knife of guilt caught him off guard.
Luca took a breath but it felt as if he was breathing through barbed wire. His throat felt raw and his chest so tight it ached unbearably. He scored his hair with his fingers, not surprised to see how unsteady his hand was. He could feel the tremors of rage rolling through him. Rage and remorse, a juxtaposition of emotions that made it hard for him to think clearly.
He had a child.
A little girl.
Fourteen months old and he had not shared a second of it. He had not seen her growing in Bronte’s womb; he had not been at the birth. He knew nothing about the birth, how long the labour was, whether she had given birth naturally or by Caesarean. He didn’t know whether she had fed the child herself or given her a bottle. He knew nothing about his daughter: the sound of her voice, the feel of her baby skin, the softness of her hair or the touch of her little hands. How could he ever get that time back? How could he forgive Bronte for stealing it from him? It had already poisoned what he felt for her. He had come back with such hope at resuming their relationship. But now he felt as if he didn’t know Bronte at all. She had changed. She was a scheming little thief, and his loathing of what she had done made him want to cut her from his life all over again. But he couldn’t because of his little daughter. His heart tightened again at the thought of that little girl in the photos he had seen.
His daughter.
‘I wanted to tell you in person,’ Bronte said in a small voice. ‘But you didn’t return my calls or emails. I went to your villa in Milan but I was turned away at the door. Your housekeeper said you were with your mistress in the US.’
Luca felt an avalanche of guilt come down on him. He had made it impossible for her to contact him. He had covered his tracks so well, not even his family had been aware of where he was and what he had been doing. He had spun them the same tale: a whirlwind affair in the States. And it had worked, perhaps rather too well. ‘You could have sent a letter,’ he said, still not quite ready to take the whole blame.
‘Is that how you wanted to hear you had fathered a child?’ she asked.
‘It would be a damn better way than finding out in a restaurant in front of complete strangers,’ he shot back.
She lowered her gaze and did that thing with her bottom lip again. ‘I told you, I was about to tell you when they arrived…’
‘When?’ he asked. ‘Between the main course and dessert? How were you going to slip it into the conversation? “By the way, I had your child fourteen months ago; I thought you might like to know now that you’re here in Melbourne.” For God’s sake, Bronte, what the hell were you thinking?’
She looked at up at him with tears shining in her eyes. ‘I didn’t expect to ever see you again. You made it so clear our relationship was over.’
‘So you punished me by keeping my child a secret,’ he said. ‘I
s that it? Is that why you didn’t try harder to get the message to me?’
Guilt flooded her cheeks a cherry-red. ‘I didn’t want any of this to happen…’
‘Meaning you never intended for me to find out,’ he said heavily. ‘Well, I’ve got news for you, Bronte Bennett. I want my child. You have got one hell of a fight on your hands if you think you’re going to keep me away from her.’
Bronte felt a rod of anger straighten her spine. ‘You can’t take her from me, Luca. I won’t allow it. She’s my child. I’ll fight you until my dying breath.’
‘You and whose legal team?’ he asked with a malevolent look. ‘You do realise who you are up against here, don’t you? You haven’t got a hope of winning this, Bronte. Not a hope.’
Bronte hated herself for doing it but right at that moment her temper got the better of her. ‘First you have to prove she is yours,’ she said with a jut of her chin. ‘Have you thought about that, Luca? How do you know she isn’t another man’s child? You only saw me two or three times a week when we were together, sometimes even less. I had plenty of time to play around behind your back.’
His expression went as dark as the thunderous sky outside. His hands went to tight fists, his breath hissing out from between clenched teeth. ‘A paternity test will soon sort out that. I will apply for one in the morning. If you don’t agree, expect to hear from my lawyer.’
Instead of feeling she had won that round, Bronte felt as if she had lost much more than a few verbal points. She had lost his respect. She could see it in his eyes, the way they had stripped her bare. It was one thing for him to have the freedom to see who he liked when he liked but quite another for her to do the same. She had been his possession, his little plaything on the side, and it would infuriate him to think she had given herself to someone else while involved with him.
‘Who was it?’ he asked through tight lips. ‘Anyone I knew at the time?’
Bronte turned away. ‘I don’t have to explain myself to you. You certainly gave me no explanation for what you got up to when you weren’t with me.’
He grabbed her arm and spun her around to face him, his expression still as menacing as the storm raging outside. ‘Who the hell were you seeing?’ he asked.
Bronte tugged at his hold, squirming at the bite of his fingers. ‘Stop it, Luca. You’re hurting me.’
His hold loosened, but not by much. ‘Tell me who you were seeing, damn it.’
She felt tears approaching and fought them back valiantly. ‘Tell me who you were with in LA,’ she said. ‘What was her name? Was it someone famous or someone married so you had to keep it a big secret?’
His eyes flickered for a moment, his mouth pulled so tight it was white-tipped at the corners.
‘Was she very beautiful?’ Bronte asked, struggling now to keep her voice from cracking. ‘Did she love you? Did you love her?’
He dropped his hand from her arm and stepped away. He rubbed the back of his neck as if trying to soothe a knot of tension there. He didn’t speak. He just stood in front of the bank of windows and looked at the last of the storm’s activity outside. His back was like a fortress, a thick impenetrable wall she had no hope of scaling. In spite of his hostility, she wanted to go to him, to put her arms around his waist, to hold him, to breathe in the aching familiarity of his scent.
‘Luca?’
He turned to face her, his expression rigid with determination. ‘I want to see her,’ he said. ‘I want to see my child.’
Bronte took a little step backwards. ‘You mean…now?’
‘Of course I mean now,’ he said, scooping up his car keys from the coffee table.
‘But she’s asleep,’ Bronte said. ‘And…and my mother’s there and—’
‘Then it’s time your mother met the father of her grandchild,’ he said. ‘She’s going to have to get used to me being a part of the child’s life.’
‘“The child”,’ Bronte said, throwing her hands out wide. ‘Can you please use her name? It’s Ella.’
‘Does she have a middle name?’ he asked, his eyes hard and black with contempt as they pinned hers.
Bronte compressed her lips. ‘Her full name is Ella Lucia Bennett.’
He blinked and the strong column of his throat moved up and down over a swallow. ‘You named her…for me?’
She let out a small sigh. ‘I wanted her to have something of you, even if it turned out she never met you. I felt I owed you that. I felt I owed her that.’
A little muscle in his jaw worked for a long moment. ‘I want my name on her birth certificate,’ he said. ‘I don’t suppose it’s there?’
She shook her head. ‘No, I didn’t see the point at the time.’
‘Did you tell anyone I was the father?’
‘Not until recently,’ she answered. ‘My mother eventually pried it out of me. Rachel figured it out when you came to the studio yesterday.’
There was a small tense silence.
‘I’m starting to think a paternity test is going to be a waste of time,’ he said. ‘You didn’t cheat on me, did you, Bronte?’
She shook her head. ‘No. There’s been no one but you.’
Luca curled his fingers around his keys until the cold hard metal cut into his palm. He needed time to process everything. His head was still reeling with the knowledge he was a father. He felt as if he had been pummelled all over. He ached with a pain he couldn’t describe. It was worse than anything he had ever experienced. He couldn’t imagine how he was going to sort out the mess his life had suddenly become. Things were going to get a whole lot more complicated when it came down to the practicalities. He lived between Milan and London. Bronte lived in Melbourne. Thousands of kilometres separated him from his daughter. That was one of the first things that had to change. ‘Let’s get going,’ he said, moving across to hold the door open for her.
‘Luca…wouldn’t it be better to do this tomorrow when we’ve both had some time to think about things?’ she asked. ‘To cool down a bit, think things through in a more rational state of mind?’
‘What is there to think about?’ he asked. ‘I want to see my daughter. I haven’t seen her once and she’s fourteen months old. I am not prepared to wait another hour, let alone another day.’
She moved past him with her head down, her expression shadowed with worry. Luca wanted her to be worried. He wanted her to be aware of what she had done. He wanted her to feel something of what he was feeling, how cheated he felt, how completely devastating it felt to have your world turned upside down without warning.
After asking for directions to her home, Luca retreated into a brooding silence. He couldn’t hope to keep something as big as this silent for long. The press would very likely get in on the news. He had to call his mother and brothers and his grandfather. He didn’t want them to read it in the press rather than hear it from him. And then there were legal things to see to, such as changing his will to make sure Ella was well provided for in the event of his death.
And then, of course, there was the issue of where to go from here with Bronte. He glanced at her, sitting with her head bowed, her eyes on her knotted hands in her lap. A sharp little pang caught him off guard when he thought of her trying to contact him with the news of her pregnancy. He wondered what she must have been feeling, alone and abandoned, far away from her family and friends. He thought too of the audition she’d had her heart set on. A once in a lifetime opportunity she had relinquished in order to have his baby. So many women would have chosen another option but she hadn’t. She had soldiered on, giving up her dream to give life to his daughter.
‘Tell me about the pregnancy,’ he said. ‘Were you well throughout?’
She lifted her head to glance at him. ‘I was sick a lot in the beginning,’ she said softly. ‘I lost a lot of weight in the first three months but after that things settled down a bit.’
Luca felt another jab of guilt. ‘What about the birth? Did you have someone with you?’
‘My mother
was with me.’
He gripped the steering wheel tighter, thinking of what he had missed out on. That first glimpse of new life, hearing the miracle of that first spluttering cry. ‘Was it a natural birth?’ he asked once he got his voice into working order.
‘Yes. I think the fact that I was fit and well helped a lot. I had a relatively short labour. It was painful but I wanted to do things as naturally as possible.’
‘Were you able to breastfeed her?’
‘Yes, but it took a while to get things established,’ she said. ‘For something so natural it’s harder than you think to get things right. I weaned her a couple of months ago, just before her first birthday.’
Luca let silence build a wall between them. He wasn’t quite ready to let her off the hook. He knew he hadn’t made things easy for her by being so adamant about ending their relationship, but he still felt she could have tried harder, should have tried harder.
The closer he got to Bronte’s mother’s house, the more nervous he felt. His stomach was a hive of restless activity. It seemed like a flock of sharp-winged insects was inside him trying desperately to find a way out.
He was about to see his baby daughter for the first time. He would be able to touch her, to hold her in his arms, to feel her petite little body nestled up against him.
He already loved her.
That had surprised him. He thought he would have to meet her first, but no, as soon as he knew she was alive he felt something switch on inside him. The urge to protect and provide for her was so strong he couldn’t think about anything else. He was determined to give her everything money could buy, to give her the sort of childhood that would give her every opportunity to blossom and grow into a beautiful young lady, well educated, compassionate and ready to take on the world.
‘It’s the third house on the left,’ Bronte said. ‘The one without a fence.’
Luca parked in front of the small weatherboard house. As far as he could see, it was neat but in no way luxurious. Humble was probably a more appropriate word. There wasn’t much of a garden, just a lawn and a few azaleas and camellias that lined the boundary of the block. The contrast with his family’s villa, his childhood homes in Milan and Rome and the holiday villa at Bellagio couldn’t be more apparent. He knew for certain there wouldn’t be any household staff opening the door as they approached, nor would there be a team of gardeners to tend the block, nor a driver at the ready to run errands.
Scandal: Unclaimed Love-Child Page 8
