Sicilian's Baby of Shame
Page 16
‘She chose appropriately,’ Sophie said, for Bastiano was very respected in Casta now.
‘Apparently, she had a heart attack, her blood pressure kept going up. During the birth she kept calling out for my father...’ He was the closest in his life he had ever been to tears, but he fought them, and then he told her the truth he had just learnt. ‘He couldn’t come, of course, as he had a wife and son. I’ve just found out that Raul is my brother.’
She peeled herself from his arms and during a conversation where there were no smiles to be had, Sophie found one.
‘Half-brother,’ she said. ‘There is a very important half, for Maria was not your mother.’
‘No.’ He smiled. ‘Certainly not.’
And he told her what he had gleaned, for his mother had cried through the long delivery with the young student midwife.
‘She and Gino were dating a little but she wanted to save herself for marriage. Maria decided she wanted Gino and gave him what my mother refused to. Maria got pregnant so he married her, but it would seem he had loved my mother all along. She gave in and slept with him and an affair commenced, but by then he had a wife and a son. He loved her, I think, he gave her this ring...’
‘What about you?’ Sophie asked. ‘Did he love you?’
He let out a long breath. ‘He blamed me for her death, and apparently he took one look at me and walked out.’
‘Do you think Maria knew?’
‘I think she seduced me the same way she seduced my father,’ Bastiano said. ‘I think I reminded her of him and to get back at her husband for not loving her, she left her money to his son...’
‘And look what you did with it,’ Sophie said.
For he had fought his way back to respect, and turned ruins into beauty.
They shared a kiss, and there was peace when he lay on the bed beside her. They stayed up to watch the night disappear and light fill the sky.
‘Call Raul,’ she told him.
‘It’s too early.’
‘I would think this news is thirty-two years late.’
So she lay there and listened to Bastiano as he told Raul the news. That they were more than friends, and even as enemies they had been tied to each other and unable to walk away, for they were brothers.
Which meant there were more questions as they worked their way back into each other’s lives.
‘Yes,’ Bastiano said, ‘we have a name.’ And he looked over at Sophie as he said his son’s name out loud. ‘Rafael.’
They had chosen appropriately for it meant God has healed.
He had.
EPILOGUE
THERE WAS NO place nicer for afternoon tea than at the Grande Lucia and Sophie did not have to be asked twice before she said yes.
Lydia and Raul were coming in from Venice and Gabi and Alim were in residence, so what better excuse than to fly to Rome and catch up with friends?
Ronaldo greeted them warmly and Anya waved. What bliss to sink into a leather chair and eat the pretty cakes and to laugh and catch up.
Raul and Lydia had a daughter, Serena, just a few days younger than her cousin Rafael, and little Lucia was a delight, the boss of the babies, they all agreed.
Oh, Sophie loved being back here.
There was a soothing familiarity to the place and she was thrilled that Gabi had persuaded Alim not to sell it.
It was almost a second home.
She looked over at Bastiano, who was holding their son, and to see him laugh at something Raul said made her heart swell.
Yes, Sophie was a thief for she had stolen his heart and she treated it with such tender care, as he did the same for hers in return.
Familia.
Absolutely.
They had been born to love each other, she was certain of that.
‘Are you staying?’ Gabi asked.
‘Of course.’ Sophie smiled. ‘I just wish they hadn’t fired Inga and she could serve me breakfast in bed.’
Oh, that would be perfect, but she could more than live without it.
It was a wonderful catch-up and afternoon tea stretched into dinner, so it was late in the night when Bastiano took Rafael through to the nursery and placed him in his crib while Sophie got ready for bed.
‘Sophie,’ Bastiano called to her, for she was taking ages and now that the baby was asleep it was time to crack open champagne.
‘One moment.’
He poured two glasses and placed hers by the bed. The turndown service had been in and he was just about to get up from bed and open the drapes and shutters for the view when Sophie emerged from the bathroom.
She was wearing her old uniform and her hair was up in a messy bun. She always made him smile.
First she opened the drapes and the shutters and stood a moment to take in the view, and to take in her life, for it was everything she had hoped for and more.
‘Get over here,’ he told her.
‘I’m just preparing the view for you, Signor Conti,’ she told him, and turned around and smiled. ‘Then I am going to make the bed...with you in it.’
Yes, the words were out, and she had let them out, and they were how she felt.
They loved each other so.
* * * * *
EXCLUSIVE EXTRACT
Being forced to spurn Nikos Kyriazis devastated Marnie Kenington. Years later, he offers to absolve her family’s bankruptcy—if she marries him! Nikos wants revenge – and he knows that in the bedroom he can take Marnie apart... piece by sensual piece…
Read on for a sneak preview of debut author Clare Connelly’s book
BOUGHT FOR THE BILLIONAIRE’S REVENGE
‘Now you will marry me, and he will have to spend the rest of his life knowing it was me—the man he wouldn’t have in his house—who was his salvation.’
The sheer fury of his words whipped Marnie like a rope. ‘Nikos,’ she said, surprised at how calm she could sound in the midst of his stormy declaration. ‘He should never have made you feel like that.’
‘Your father could have called me every name under the sun for all I cared, agape. It was you I expected more of.’
She swallowed. Expectations were not new to Marnie. Her parents’. Her sister’s. Her own.
‘And now you will marry me.’
Anticipation formed a cliff’s edge and she was tumbling over it, free-falling from a great height. She shook her head, but they both knew it was denial for the sake of it.
‘No more waiting,’ he intoned darkly, crushing his mouth to hers in a kiss that stole her breath and coloured her soul.
His tongue clashed with hers. It was a kiss of slavish possession, a kiss designed to challenge and disarm. He blew away every defence she had, reminding her that his body had always been able to manipulate hers. A single look had always been enough to make her break out in a cold sweat of need.
‘No more waiting.’
‘You can’t still want me,’ she said into his mouth, wrapping her hands around his back. ‘You’ve hardly lived the life of a monk. I would have thought I’d lost all appeal by now.’
‘Call it unfinished business,’ he responded, breaking the kiss to scrape his lips down her neck, nipping at her shoulder.
She pushed her hips forward, instinctively wanting more. Wanting everything.
Her brain was wrapped in cotton wool, foggy and filled with questions softened by confusion. ‘It was six years ago.’
‘Yes. And still you’re the only woman I have ever believed myself in love with. The only woman I have ever wanted a future with. Once upon a time for love.’
‘And now?’
‘For…less noble reasons.’
Don’t miss
BOUGHT FOR THE BILLIONAIRE’S REVENGE
by Clare Connelly
Available August 2017
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Copyright ©2017 Clare Connelly
ISBN: 978-1-474-05262-7
SICILIAN’S BABY OF SHAME
© 2017 by Carol Marinelli
Published in Great Britain 2017
by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF
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