Page 160 of Pretender

Then I burst out laughing, and they share a hesitant chuckle before they give in to their laughs too. Linnea tilts her head at me, her brow wrinkling with a questioning look. I shake my head.

Where would I even start?

“Let me explain this to her,” I say in Italian to my grandparents and turn to Linnea, giving her the short version of this ridiculous miscommunication of the century. She presses her lips together, stifling a smile.

Edoardo lets out a sigh. “We don’t have many years left, and seeing you with your cousins would mean everything to us.”

“As long as you make it clear to them I’m not here for the Aurato inheritance, I’d be very happy to meet the rest of the family.”

“You don’t want it?” they ask at the same time, Edoardo grasping Nonna’s hand on her knee.

“I don’t need money,” I say. “I don’t want to take anything from the family. You must have someone in mind already? To run your business?”

“Yes, your cousin Raphael has been a good CEO.”

“So let him keep doing that. Running a company is not my greatest strength, despite having succeeded at it. I’m more of an investment person.”

“What about the name? The bloodline?” Nonna asks. “Will you give your children our name?”

I look at Linnea and she cocks her head at me, not understanding what they’re asking.

“We haven’t talked about children, but if we do have them, we’ll probably name them Fredriksen after their mum.”

Nonna gapes at me.

“This is a strange conversation for me,” I say. “If we bond as a family, I will consider it. If it means this much to you. But no talk about inheritance, please.”

Nonna glances up at Edoardo and he nods once. “Let’s go meet the rest of the family,” he says. “I hope you’re hungry, because we prayed you would stay and we’ve had every Florentine dish we adore prepared for you to celebrate.” Edoardo pauses, and his steel-blue eyes meet mine. “Will you please call me Nonno?”

“Nonno,” I respond, grinning at them both, letting my widest smile break free, and when Nonna bursts into tears, smiling back at me, I can guess what she sees.

I resemble her son.

She stands up and stretches her arms out, and I meet her in the middle of the room, wrapping my arms around her frail little body.

“Nonna,” I whisper, feeling the weight I’ve carried for thirteen years fall away as I hug my father’s mother, finally knowing Dad was the man I hoped he was.

I tilt my head up, the chandelier above us blurry through my tears, and I blink hard. I can finally do what Linnea’s friends said. Let my dad live on in the stories I tell about him, the stories I can allow myself to remember again.

LINNEA

We lay like starfish on the massive hotel-room bed, still clothed—stomachs full of every Florentine dish we could humanly fit after two rounds of Negroni, feet aching from standing and dancing, and throats sore from talking loudly and a lot. The oldest of the Aurato family only spoke Italian but the cousins our age and younger all knew English, and wanted to learn everything about us all in one evening.

“This is surreal,” Aiden says.

“Yeah.” I glance at him to catch the smile I can hear in his voice, and he rolls towards me, tucking his arm under his head. He’s smiling, but there’s something else in his expression. Those thick eyebrows push together, forming a small crease between them.

“What’s on your mind, Aiden?” I ask, mirroring his position to face him.

“Nonna. She asked me something we’ve not talked about.” He clears his throat. “I want to say this the right way. No matter what your stance is on this, I’m okay with it. All I want and all I need is you.” He shuffles closer to me, tangling his legs with mine.

“Okay?”

“She asked about children. Is that something you see in your future? In our future?”

The question stirs something in me, and I consider it.

I didn’t want children with Henry, never got that ‘itch’ that some of my friends talked about. The biological need kicking in. And what about my work? I don’t want to be the kind of parent mine were to me but I also have all these design dreams I want to fulfil.