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Adriano knew his friend had heard. He had instructed Tony to contact a few of the people closest to him and let them know. In addition to Santino, messages had been sent to the vice-president of his company and his estranged cousin.
It was funny what passed forclosenessin his life.
“Thank you,” he told Santino. “I might be on the verge of a medical breakthrough, actually.”
“Yes, I heard about the American doctor you brought over to do research on the subject.”
“You heard about that? How?”
“It’s not a secret,” Santino said. “My mother knows she’s been working at the free clinic. She doesn’t go there herself, but she knows people who do, and apparently all the nurses are talking about the pretty American doctor who came overseas to work with Adriano Canali—and is staying at his house.”
“That’s a lot of gossip,” Adriano said.
“So it isn’t the truth?”
“I’m not saying it’s not true. I’m just saying it’s gossip.”
Santino laughed. “How pretty is she?”
“She’s gorgeous, if you really want to know.” He wished he had a picture of Amy on his phone so that he could have showed Santino, but of course there had never been any way to take a photo of her that wouldn’t have looked creepy.
And he was surprised at his impulse to show her off, too—as if she belonged to him in some way, as if he wanted to let his friend know just how attractive she was. He felt as if it would reflect well on him if Santino were to see that, even though a part of him knew that was the wrong way to think about it.
He settled for a description of her. “She’s smart as a whip, obviously,” he said. “But there’s more to her than that.”
“More in what way?”
He struggled for a moment to articulate it. “She doesn’t let me push her around,” he said at last.
Santino burst out laughing. “It’s about time somebody didn’t!”
“It’s maddening sometimes, trying to be around her, knowing that she won’t take orders. Knowing that I’ll never be able to get her to do anything unless she decides for herself that it’s the right thing to do.”
“You finally found someone who isn’t afraid of you. I say you keep her around.” Santino sipped his coffee. “I wonder if you’re interested in her as more than just a doctor.”
“You try to set me up with every woman whose name I mention to you,” Adriano pointed out. “You tried to set me up with Claudia when I hired her to be my chef, and she’s ten years older than I am.”
“I don’t see what the point of having a beautiful woman staying in your guest cottage is if you’re not going to try to makesomethinghappen.”
“The point is that she’s there to save my life, Santino. She’s my doctor.”
“There’s no law that says she can’t do both things.”
“There’s a professional code of ethics that says it, though. And anyway…” Adriano hesitated, wondering if he was making the right choice—but he had to come clean to someone eventually. “I already slept with her.”
“You didwhat? Ha! And you wanted to act like I was crazy for suggesting it!”
“You are crazy,” Adriano said firmly. “I was crazy to let it happen. It’s been nothing but a problem, because we’re awkward around each other now. You should have seen us when we were trying to discuss my list of surrogates the other night.”
“Back up. What’s this about a list of surrogates?”
“The medication she wants me to try can cause infertility, and I don’t want to miss my chance to have a child,” Adriano explained. “I’m looking into surrogacy options before I start my treatment. That way, if things go well, I’ll be able to have the family I want to and still treat my disease.”
“Wow,” Santino said in a low voice. “I had no idea children were even something you were thinking about, Adriano. You always surprise me.”
“I don’t think I knew how important it was to me either, until I thought I might be losing the chance to do it,” Adriano said. “Ever since my diagnosis, I’ve had to think a lot more about what I want out of life, because I don’t know how much time I’m going to have. And one of the things I’ve figured out is that I want a child.”
Santino nodded. “Well, good luck to you,” he said. “I’m sure you’ll be able to make that happen pretty quickly. Have you started?”
