The Marriage He Must Keep(34)

“He’s ours,” Alessandro confirmed, low and sure, practically daring anyone to contradict him.

“Bring him to me,” Ermanno Ferrante said with an imperious wave of his hand.

He wasn’t a tall man. His children and grandchildren towered over him, but he was still spry and sharp-eyed despite his weathered skin and steel-gray hair. He sat with the arrogantly regal posture that Alessandro must have learned from him, because they both had the ability to command a room with a look.

Alessandro tugged Octavia with him as he carried Lorenzo across. She could feel Ermanno’s gaze drilling into her as she approached. He was capable of the same force and power that Alessandro possessed, but what was he looking for? Artifice? Proof? Guilt?

“Nonno, your great-grandson Lorenzo,” Alessandro said, leaning down to kiss his grandfather and set the baby in the old man’s arms.

Octavia would have kissed him in greeting, too, but the old man bent his head to give the baby a long, thorough study.

Behind her, she heard a few feet shuffle as everyone awaited his judgment.

“He looks like your father,” he said with a glance up to Alessandro. Then he nodded his head toward the side table. “Bring the photo.”

Octavia’s knees nearly gave in as she moved to fetch the black-and-white of Alessandro’s grandmother holding her firstborn and she had to agree, there was a strong similarity in the babies’ sleeping features. It was bittersweet to see the resemblance, making her see her son’s place in this family while reinforcing that she couldn’t take him away from it.

“You’ll understand if we’re not happy,” Viviana, Primo’s youngest sister, said.

“Babies make everyone happy.” Alessandro pivoted, voice light with contradiction, but his tone held an edge that put a knot in Octavia’s stomach.

“We’re not happy with the things you’ve done, Sandro,” Viviana clarified, chin coming up in belligerence.

“I’ve done exactly what I’m supposed to do—react to threats and limit damage,” he said without apology. “Nonno, Octavia and the baby need to rest. I’ll settle them in our apartment, then we can talk in the office. Zio, you may join us if you like. I imagine you have a few questions.”

Primo’s father, Giacomo, made a noise as if he had a lot more than a few questions about his son being arrested and fired and expelled from the family residences. Octavia felt the blister of hostility off everyone in the room, much of it aimed at her.

So she bit back saying that she wasn’t that tired. The past few nights had been rough ones sleepwise, but her incision was itchy rather than tender and physically she was starting to feel like her old self.

But this was too awful to endure. She let Alessandro take her up to the suite they always used. He went through to the sitting room where a temporary nursery had been arranged. Bree took Lorenzo and Alessandro came back to their bedroom, closing the door behind him.

“I want to go to the town house,” Octavia said firmly. There was no way she could sleep here. The verdant estate was beautiful and the view gave way to a distant scape of the city against the smudged blue of the bay, but antagonistic waves penetrated the walls and floors.

“Putting off this confrontation will only make it worse.” He unbent her folded arms and stole her light coat, tossing it to a chair and nudging her toward the bed. “But can you see that if I had left you in London, they would have held you in suspicion? By bringing you back to face them, you’re showing them you’re blameless.” He pressed her shoulder to sit on the edge of the bed, then he bent to pick up her feet, tipping her onto her side while he removed her shoes. “Once I make it clear that I fired Primo and the hospital is pressing charges, as well, they won’t hold you accountable.”

“I’ve never known you to be delusional, Sandro,” she said on a dry laugh. “If they didn’t warm up to me in the past, they certainly won’t now.”

He paused in reaching for the blanket folded on the foot of the bed.

“What did you say?”

“That you’re being optimistic. If it was just me, I could take their dislike, but I’m scared for Lorenzo. I realize he doesn’t even know what he’s in the middle of, but—”

“This is for Lorenzo, but no. What did you call me?” He dropped the blanket and sat his hip next to hers on the mattress.

His weight rolled her into him and a funny self-consciousness washed over her. “They all call you Sandro. I didn’t think you minded if I did.”

“You haven’t called me that in months.” His hand went to the outside of her thigh, light but familiar, making tingles fan out from the spot across her abdomen and down to her knee and inward to her loins.