Bound by Their Christmas Baby

by Clare Connelly

  ‘I’m fine.’ He didn’t mention Noah. It was early days there and he was keeping a close eye on the situation.

  ‘Good.’ She stepped away from him, towards the kitchen. ‘Would you like anything? Coffee?’

  He shook his head but followed her, watching as she poured herself water and took a small sip.

  ‘How are you?’

  ‘Fine,’ she said, but her eyes shifted away from him and he ached for her, for the obvious hurt he’d inflicted.

  ‘I thought that if I married you I’d be a better man than my father. But it turns out I’m every bit as bad. Worse, actually.’

  Her eyes lifted to his face and she said nothing, waiting for him to continue.

  ‘I told myself it was right for all of us; the best thing we could do for our son. But I ignored your feelings and needs. I should have helped you to live a better life here, in New York, but I was selfish. I wanted you in Italy and so I bullied you into coming there with me. I treated you so much worse than I accused your father of doing. How you didn’t scratch my eyes out is beyond me.’

  She shook her head but he couldn’t let her interrupt. What if she told him to leave? He needed to at least say what he’d come to tell her, and then let her decide what she wanted. And he would need to respect that decision.

  ‘When I got back to Italy, after Christmas, I just knew I couldn’t be responsible for making you miserable. All I could think about was the way you looked when we argued. The things I said. The way you stared at me as though I was…’ He shook his head angrily, dragging his fingers through his hair. ‘You were falling apart. You hated living with me; you hated Italy. I had to send you here because I wanted you to be happy. Are you happy, tempesta?’

  Her eyes locked onto his for several long seconds and then she blinked, looking away hurriedly. ‘I’m getting there.’

  ‘I don’t believe you.’

  Her smile was miserable. ‘That seems to be our problem. You never have believed me.’

  His gut twisted sharply. ‘No.’ Regret made the word heavy. He ran his palm along the back of his neck, feeling the coarse hairs there.

  ‘On Christmas Day you asked me if I loved you and I said no. I’ve never been in love. I’ve never been loved. But I’ve been lonely and I’ve been alone. I’ve been miserable. Most of my life was that. And then I met you.’

  Abby was very still, waiting, her breath held, needing to hear something that would lift the weight that had lodged permanently on her chest.

  ‘That night, last Christmas, my God, if you knew how I felt. How I wanted you. How I fell for you.’ He swore softly under his breath. ‘It was my fault that the Calypso debacle cut me to the quick. For the first time in my life, I let my guard down. I let you in. I wanted every single piece of you. Not just your body—all of you. I’ve never felt that way before.’

  ‘And I lied to you,’ she muttered.

  ‘You lied to me,’ he confirmed grimly. ‘And I couldn’t forgive you for that. But nor could I forget you.’

  Only the sound of Abby’s laboured breath filled the room.

  ‘I spent a year proving to myself that I was over you and then, the whole time I was in New York, I looked for you.’ He grimaced. ‘I don’t mean I actually tried to find you. Just that my eyes were always scanning, hoping to catch a glimpse of you. Seeing you at the restaurant was an accident, but I don’t think I would have left the city without you. One way or another.’

  ‘Don’t say that,’ she said with a shake of her head. ‘You don’t need to pretend.’

  ‘I spent a year waiting for you. I told myself I was busy, that I was angry, but I didn’t so much as look at another woman.’

  Abby’s stomach swirled. Disbelief warred with pleasure at his admission.

  ‘I’ve spent a long time pushing people away, tempesta. All my life. And then you came to Italy and I relaxed, because I had everything I needed. You were living with me. You were my lover, and we had a child. I had a family. But I didn’t realise how much that would hurt you. How much I was hurting you.’

  ‘And so you let me go,’ she said with a soft nod. ‘I’ve worked that much out, Gabe. I know why you ended it. Why you sent me home. It was very kind of you.’

  ‘No,’ he said with a shake of his head. ‘You don’t understand. It wasn’t because I didn’t want you to stay.’

  ‘You didn’t want to hurt me,’ she said, her smile one of sadness. ‘You’re a good person. Too good to lie to me, too good to use me.’

  ‘I didn’t want to hurt you so I sent you here, as though I could click my fingers and take us back in time. As though by sending you home I wouldn’t feel like I had been hollowed out, like all of me had been dug from my body at the same time you left. I didn’t want to hurt you but I didn’t have any idea how much it would hurt to see you go. I’ve pushed people away all my life, and it comes easier to me than anything else. Even more so than admitting how I feel.’

  Abby squeezed her fingernails into her palm and forced herself to face him. ‘And?’ she asked, the word a thin breath. ‘How do you feel?’

  ‘I feel like I have stepped into a strange world with only sharp edges and darkness. I feel like I am sinking all the time, my lungs filling with water rather than air and with no way to breathe. I wake each morning and reach for you, craving you, and then I remember. You’re gone. You’re here.’

  ‘Are you saying…are you trying to say that you love me?’ she demanded, hope an uncontainable beast in her breast.

  ‘I know nothing of love,’ he admitted, the words gravelly. ‘What I am saying is that you are the beginning and end of my life. That without you everything is unbearable. I want to wake up and see you every morning, and hold you tight every night. I am saying that even if there were no Raf I would want you. I’ve spent my whole life pushing people away and I won’t do it now—I can’t. I want to do the opposite. I want to pull you close, to hold you near, to make you mine for the rest of my life, even when knowing how much I need you, how much power you have over me, terrifies me. Tempesta, you have run like a cyclone through all of me so that I’m not the same man I was the night we met. That man thought people—thought you—were disposable. I was so wrong. So very, very wrong. If you’ll forgive me for being so stupid, I will make you love me too.’

  And it was so ferociously determined that she laughed, a little unsteadily given that her chest was squeezing painfully.

  ‘You’re telling me you love me and still somehow doing it in a way that would control a room full of executives.’

  ‘Apparently, I can’t help doing that,’ he said with a shake of his head. ‘It makes what I say no less true.’

  ‘Gabe—’ she kept her distance ‘—I know enough of your upbringing to know how much loyalty means to you. Trust too. How will you ever trust me after what you found me doing?’ Her cheeks flamed. ‘You’ve told me again and again that you don’t believe me. That you think I was unequivocally going to give those images to my father. There’s no hope for us when you feel as you do. I’ve spent a long time coming to terms with that.’

  ‘And so have I. I cannot live without you, and I unequivocally believe what you said.’ He shook his head angrily. ‘I do believe you. I cannot explain it. The rational part of my brain demands proof and explanations, but the part of me that knows you, that understands you, simply believes.’ He took a step towards her and when she didn’t step backwards he lifted his hands and cupped her face. ‘You know almost as much about rejection and loneliness as I do.’ His gaze bored into hers, seeing all the secrets of her soul. ‘Your mother died and you were abandoned. Your father shut you out at every opportunity. Is it any wonder you were prepared to do anything he asked of you? In the hopes that maybe, just maybe, that might be the thing that would make him love you?’

  She sobbed and shut her eyes, his interrogation, his understanding, all too much to co
pe with.

  ‘He was wrong not to see your true value. But I was more so. You gave me everything—you made me feel alive and real for the first time in years. You gave me your beautiful, kind heart and I shouted at you. I practically threatened to take your son from you.’ The words were loaded with anger, all directed at himself. ‘Believe me, if I could take that day back, I would. With all that I am, I wish I hadn’t said those things to you. I wish I hadn’t given you any reason to feel pain.’

  ‘This is about Raf,’ she whispered. ‘It has to be.’ For she couldn’t make sense of what was happening. All her dreams were coming true before her and she wasn’t sure they were strong enough to hold her weight. ‘You miss him.’

  ‘Sì. I do miss Raf, but I’m as prepared now as I was a week ago to leave him with you, if that’s what you want,’ he insisted gently. ‘This, right now, is about you. It’s about the woman I fell in love with last Christmas, and somehow found my way to again. It’s about the woman who gave me her innocence, who’d been waiting for me all her life, just as I had been waiting for her. It’s about the woman who took a broken, angry man and made him smile once more. It’s about the woman who has come to mean everything to me, who I do not wish to live without.’ He ran his thumb over her lower lip and she juddered, her breath escaping her slowly, brushing over his inner wrist.

  ‘I’ve trained myself not to want love. It’s never been offered to me anyway.’ He dropped his head so that their foreheads were touching and Abby breathed in deeply, letting his proximity chase the grief from her veins.

  ‘I offered you love,’ she whispered. ‘I loved you every day we were in Italy. Even when I was so mad I could burst, I loved you… I wanted our marriage to be a real one,’ she said. ‘I felt so close to having everything I’d ever dreamed of. It was so magical—such a magical Christmas—with the snow, and the tree, and you and then the wedding dress…’

  ‘From the moment we met, you have been all I’ve wanted. I’ve been stupid enough to run from that, but now I’m running right towards you. I want you, all of you, and if there were no Raf I would still be here, begging you, as a man who loves a woman more than any ever has, to marry me. To spend the rest of your life with me, letting me love you…’

  Abby sobbed, a sound of pure, exquisite joy.

  ‘You’re going to marry me,’ he said into her mouth and she nodded, laughing, before kissing him again.

  ‘Can we go home now?’

  He pulled away so he could study her face, see the earnestness there. ‘Home? Where is our home to be?’

  ‘The castle, obviously.’

  His smile was the most beautiful thing she’d ever seen. ‘Ah. And so it is, mi amore.’

  EPILOGUE

  ‘RAF!’ A LITTLE girl’s voice squealed with delight and when Abby turned around she saw Ivy, Noah’s adopted daughter, giggling in response to Raf’s attempts to grab her hair. As a two-year-old, he was charming and spirited. Abby was grateful they’d retained Monique to help chase after him!

  Abby walked towards the pair of children and crouched down, lifting a manicured nail to her son’s nose. ‘Stop that, Rafael.’ She suppressed a smile when his chubby face turned towards her. ‘Ivy’s mommy has spent far too long braiding her hair to have it undone by the likes of you. Now, where’s your bouquet, Ivy?’

  ‘I’ve got it!’ Holly called from the doorway, carrying three bunches of flowers and wearing a broad smile on her beautiful face. She was glowing, but Abby had known Holly almost a year and knew it had little to do with her pregnancy. Holly was one of those women who always glowed. She was warm and kind and, from the moment they’d met—the Christmas after they’d become engaged—Abby had known they would be friends.

  It had proved to be so, and the proximity of Italy and England had meant that both families met quite often.

  Families.

  Abby turned to her reflection in the mirror, studying the bridal gown. It was the same one Gabe had chosen and given her two years earlier, a Christmas morning that was snowy and magical, just like this one. Except not like this one because she’d been so insecure then, so uncertain of her future and what her marriage would look like. Now, every day was a gift, boxed in so much security and love that she felt as though she were floating through life.

  Families.

  She’d been alone for so long and now she had Raf and Gabe, and Noah, Holly and Ivy, and Holly’s big, chaotic extended family too.

  ‘Your father’s outside,’ Holly said softly, handing a small box to Abby. ‘And the groom asked me to give you this.’

  Abby took the box and opened it, her fingers shaking a little at the mention of her father.

  It was a big step for him to have come to Italy—and that was all down to Gabe’s persistence. It was the reason they’d waited two years to marry. He’d understood, without needing to be told, how much it would mean to Abby to have her father walk her down the aisle at her wedding.

  Irrespective of Lionel Howard’s sins, he was the only family from her old life that she had left and she wasn’t ready to shut the door on that completely. So Gabe had made it his mission to smooth the fractures of their relationship. It had been disastrous at first, but Gabe was not a man to take no for an answer, and by the following Christmas a fragile truce had been formed.

  Now, a year later, it was still fragile, still young, but Abby was glad that there was the prospect of a future that included her father. If he chose not to make the most of it, then she’d accept that. She’d let him go, knowing that what she and Gabe had was special, that he could be a part of it if he wanted, but that you couldn’t force love. You couldn’t force someone to want you.

  ‘What’s in the box, Abby?’ Ivy asked, coming to stand beside her.

  ‘Let’s find out, shall we?’ She unwrapped it and lifted the lid, tears moistening her eyes when she saw the decoration inside.

  ‘What is it?’ Ivy asked again.

  ‘It’s a tradition,’ Abby whispered, then smiled brightly, lifting the decoration so Ivy and Holly could see the delicate etchings on each side. It was of the castle, she realised, a single tear running down her cheek.

  ‘Stop that!’ Holly said with a laugh, dabbing at it with a tissue. ‘You’ll ruin your make-up.’

  ‘Why do we cry when we’re happy?’ Abby asked with a laugh. ‘Because I am. Happier than I ever thought I’d be.’

  ‘Just about as happy as you deserve, I’d say,’ Holly said kindly, running a palm over her rounded tummy. ‘Shall I get your father?’

  Abby sucked in a deep breath and nodded. ‘Yes. I’m ready.’

  ‘Come on, you two.’ Holly held her hands out to the children and guided them from the room. Abby wasn’t alone for long. A moment later, Lionel walked in, his expression guarded until he looked at his daughter, properly looked at her, and then was arrested where he stood, unable to keep walking.

  ‘You look…’ He shook his head. ‘You are so like her,’ he said slowly.

  Abby ignored the twisting of her heart, the pain that came from knowing she would always be just a reflection of her mother to him. It was enough that he was there—not because she wouldn’t have been happy to marry without her father’s presence, but because it was yet another proof of the myriad ways in which Gabe loved her. There had been many testaments to that fact over the two years since they’d become engaged, and each reminder of how special she was to him filled her with a rush of pleasure.

  ‘Shall we?’

  Lionel nodded, holding his arm out for Abby. She put her hand in the crook of his arm, took one last look at herself and smiled. ‘Let’s go then.’

  They walked towards the stairs of the castle, but at the top, before they came into view of the wedding guests, he paused, turning to face his daughter, a frown on his face.

  It was natural for Abby to experience a jolt of anxiety. She didn’t want he
r father to be there to only ruin the day. She waited, her breath held, for what he would say.

  ‘I do love you, Abby. I know I’m not a good father. After your mother died I just couldn’t be anything to anyone.’ He shook his head. ‘My business was everything. I look at you now and I realise I don’t know anything about the young woman you’ve become.’

  Abby expelled a sigh of relief. ‘There’s time to get to know me, Dad. Our door is open to you.’

  And tears sparkled in his eyes as he shook his head. ‘That’s better than I deserve.’

  Abby tilted her head. ‘Yes,’ she agreed with a teasing smile—the smile of a woman so completely in love and content that nothing could bring her down for long.

  They began to walk once more, and halfway down the stairs the makeshift wedding venue came into sight. The foyer had been decorated with another huge tree—their third in the castle—and seats had been set to view it. She couldn’t see her groom yet, though. That moment was reserved for when she and Lionel reached the ground floor and moved forward.

  Then Abby’s heart jolted in recognition of her mate, her partner, her purpose.

  He stood, tall and handsome, in front of the tree, dressed in a jet-black tuxedo with a crisp white shirt, but it was his eyes that almost felled her. They were boring into her with the intensity that was part and parcel of his love for her.

  She smiled at him, a smile of love, of understanding. As the music began to play she walked down the aisle with her father.

  Noah stood beside Gabe and, as they got close, Gabe turned to his best friend and nodded at something Noah said. Noah turned to look at his own wife before patting Gabe on the back.

  Later, after the ceremony, when they were dancing at the reception, their guests surrounding them with happiness and love, Abby asked her husband what Noah had said.