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Rubbing a speck of dust off her brand new handbag, Cassie played safe. ‘Tell me again—how old is your niece?’
‘Allegra? She’s twelve.’
‘It’s a pretty name. It’s…strange to think of your brother being father to a girl who’s nearly a teenager.’ She shot him a shy glance. ‘Especially when you’ll soon have a tiny newborn.’
There was silence for a moment and Giancarlo felt the sudden lurch of his heart as he stared out into the Tuscan sky and the silver slither of the rising moon. A newborn. It sounded foreign. It felt foreign—because he still hadn’t got used to the idea—and most times he blotted it out because it seemed almost beyond his comprehension. He had not intended to become a father and knew nothing about babies—and somehow it had been easier to pretend it wasn’t happening. Safer too, since an online article he’d been reading had advised that early pregnancy was occasionally precarious and that babies could often be miscarried at this time.
And yet Cassandra’s tentative words made the idea flare into reality in his mind. A newborn. Was it really possible—this miracle which had come on him so unexpectedly? His flesh and blood growing inside her even now? He recalled the photo which had illustrated the article he’d read—of a little blob with a big head and curled little limbs. Something which had looked unrecognisable and yet had unmistakably been the form of a baby.
Suddenly, he reached across and laid his hand over her still-flat belly, unprepared for her little gasp of surprise. ‘Can you feel anything yet?’
She shook her head. ‘Not yet. You can feel a flutter at about fourteen weeks, apparently. So there’s still a little while to go.’ She felt her cheeks begin to glow because she liked the sensation of his hand there. It made her feel safe and protected—and if you weren’t loved, then surely those were pretty good substitutes. ‘Are we…are we going to mention the baby?’
He looked into the darkened violet of her eyes. ‘Not unless you want to make this even more difficult than it is.’
‘You think it’s going to be difficult?’
‘No, Cassandra—I think we’re all going to clasp hands and hug and laugh and joke together,’ he said sarcastically.
Plucking at a soft fold of her cashmere coat, she wondered if he was about to smash all her stupid fantasies with one careless admission that she would only ever be second best. But she already knew that, didn’t she?
Yet when she raised her face up to look at him she saw the unmistakable tension on his aristocratic features—and, despite her own feelings of worthlessness, she couldn’t help her heart from twisting. Is he hurting? she wondered as he helped her from the car. Was this meeting going to be unbearably difficult for him—and could she do anything to help alleviate his pain? Well, she could try by biting back questions which made his emotions feel raw and concentrate instead on getting through the evening and making him proud of her.
‘Just remind me,’ she said softly. ‘Your brother is Raul and your sister-in-law is called Gabriella—and Allegra doesn’t have any brothers or sisters?’
‘Sì, cara, esattamente,’ he said softly, and paused. ‘Ah, and here she is in all her glory to meet us.’
For a moment, Cassie thought he meant Allegra—because she remembered what she had been like at twelve. Could have easily imagined a young girl watching and waiting by the window, filled with excitement at the thought of seeing an uncle like Giancarlo. Yet it was not a coltish teenager who came towards the car, but a woman.
And what a woman.
Small and perfectly proportioned, her thick, glossy hair fell in a raven cascade over narrow shoulders. Her skin was olive, her restless eyes the colour of dark chocolate, and she wore an exquisitely cut dress in softest ivory—accessorised by brown crocodile-skin shoes. From her slender wrist dangled a narrow circlet of glittering diamonds and there were more diamonds at her ears—as well as a colossal solitaire beside her wedding band. On anyone else, that many diamonds might have looked showy—but the petite brunette exuded so much class and confidence that Cassie thought she could probably have worn a bin liner and convinced you it was haute couture.
So this, Cassie thought, was Gabriella.
Suddenly, she felt utterly insignificant in comparison—too pale and too wishy-washy with her fair skin and hair. Because this was the woman Giancarlo had loved, she reminded herself painfully. The woman he had wanted to marry—without anyone pointing a shotgun at him. The woman who had chosen his richer twin over him—and Cassie wondered whether a man like her new husband would ever recover from a blow so heavy to his pride and his heart.
