“I am sure, but we are facing a greater battle than I anticipated. Primo wasn’t the only one playing politics or resenting my position.”
“I never thought it significant before,” she murmured. “Until we arrived today and I saw that almost everyone who lives here... They’re all Giacomo’s children. There’s your aunt, but she travels so much this isn’t really where she lives, is it? And no one from your father’s or his sister’s side.”
They’d all had seemingly valid reasons for moving in and it was his grandfather’s house. Alessandro hadn’t considered it an appropriation, especially when his grandfather was in fine health and Alessandro preferred his town house because it was closer to work. Through Octavia’s eyes, however, he saw things much differently.
Especially after today’s conversation.
“My uncle is trying to convince my grandfather to let him have control again. So I may have an opportunity to put my house in order.” Disdain curled his lip as he recalled the suggestion. “I said he has some work to do in his own. I am in control, legally, so it’s not within my grandfather’s rights to remove me, but I didn’t want to insult him by reminding Giacomo of that in front of him. Things will get uglier before they settle into place.”
The wrinkle in her brow deepened. “When I went off to school, there was a girl in her last year there. Her father had a bone to pick with mine. To this day, I don’t even know what the problem was, but she turned me into persona non grata. I feel like that’s how it’s going to be here.”
She was pale and, despite the new mettle she was showing toward him, very sensitive. He saw it now, underneath the impassive expression she’d no doubt perfected against cold shoulders.
A weight settled on his heart, an apology on his lips.
“I’m asking a lot, I know.” He massaged her hand, still bare of his rings. Even though he knew she wasn’t leaving them off to hurt him, he disliked how her empty fingers suggested their marriage had been set on a windowsill to collect dust. He wanted the statement of their commitment back where it was prominent and visible.
But the rings were the least of his problems. He forced himself to maintain a light hold on her fingers, even though a subversive sense of urgency made him want to close his grip and hang on tight. Was he harming her—them—by insisting she face this with him? When she’d already been through so much and confrontation wasn’t her strong suit?
Was it even necessary for her to be here? After his uncle’s questioning of his loyalty, he had to wonder if these final weeks of restructuring might be easier if Octavia wasn’t under everyone’s noses.
Even as he considered sending her away, he rejected the idea. He wasn’t giving her up. Not when it was exactly the result Primo had hoped for.
Octavia had been a source of tension in the family from the moment he had married her, he saw now. His taking a wife and producing an heir was the assertion of his position as overseer of the Ferrante empire. Apparently Primo hadn’t been the only one to find that threatening. From his Uncle Giacomo through that branch of the family, there was disapproval and antagonism.
The opposition Sandro had only subconsciously acknowledged in his cousin last year was flagrant now. Leaving Octavia in London had given them all breathing space, but it had been a mistake. Sandro wouldn’t abandon her again and it was a decision that had less to do with defending his right to his heritage and more to do with how precarious his marriage was. If Giacomo and the rest of the family made these next few weeks difficult enough, he could lose Octavia and he simply refused to.
For the millionth time in the past four weeks, he wished he could sweep her into their bed, make love to her and reforge the connection they needed. Instead, he had to watch her fingers twitch nervously under his touch and her bottom lip catch between her teeth.
How did one earn a woman’s trust if not by demonstrating that even though he was strong enough to overpower her, he would only ever use his agility and strength to pleasure and protect her?
“What happened when your father died?” she asked, unexpectedly shaking him out of his rumination. “Did your uncle not challenge your right to command then?”
The memory of that dark time rose quick and fast to strike his heart like a rusted iron blade. He sat back, dropping her hand and trying to close the topic as swiftly and bluntly as he could.
“He didn’t have to. He was put in charge as a provision in the directorship. I was too young and too trapped in grief to properly take in the politics or legalities. Plus, I felt so guilty I refused to even train for the position, so he dismissed me as a threat. It was years before I considered it, even longer before I was ready to usurp him.”