Across from him, Octavia paused with her spoon halfway to her mouth.
“I had some notarized copies made,” Sandro said smoothly. “But we can discuss all of that at the office sometime next week. I’ll have my PA call yours to set it up.”
“That’s not why you’re here tonight?” Mario said with a degree of incredulity.
“No, this is a social call,” Sandro said. He looked across at Octavia, unsure why that wouldn’t be clear. “Octavia wanted to visit and introduce you to your grandson.”
Which wasn’t quite true. He had suggested it and she had made the arrangements with a mutter about inevitability and her mother not being happy. Now her dark gaze met his, black-coffee eyes turbulent in her otherwise expressionless face. In the past few days, she’d been quick to smile and reach out to him, but tonight she was the pretty mannequin again.
Mario snorted. “There was no need to rush that. Boy won’t speak for years.”
Octavia’s fingers tightened around her spoon.
Sandro was offended on their son’s behalf, too. And Octavia’s. This was a stark glimpse at the sort of disconnected childhood she had hinted at. He had to catch himself from turning on Mario with a few home truths.
As it turned out, he didn’t have to react. Octavia blurted, “Even longer before he’s allowed to.”
A moment of stunned silence, then Mario said, “What did you say?” in a tone infused with ominous warning.
“Octavia,” her mother scolded in a murmur.
“No, I’m going to say it,” Octavia said on a burst of suppressed wrath. “He put you through all those miscarriages, insisted he wanted a boy, I finally deliver one and he can’t even be bothered to hold him. I don’t understand you.” Her voice rose as she leveled the last at her father.
“Cara,” Sandro said gently, trying to keep this from becoming a scene.
“An heir and a spare, Octavia. That’s what I need.” Mario turned his red face to Sandro. “And so do you if you want to finalize the merger. Control your wife.”
Sandro took issue. Very strong issue, but Octavia went off enough for both of them.
“Really?” she cried, rising to toss her napkin over her dessert. “All this time and you still don’t understand how biology works? What if I don’t have another boy? What if I don’t want to go through another pregnancy? What happens to the merger then?”
“The inheritance moves through regular channels,” Sandro interjected, taking satisfaction from throwing the reminder in his father-in-law’s face. “It will go to your mother, you, then any children we have. Stopping with Lorenzo would only delay my takeover, not prevent it. And we should get him home to bed,” he added, rising to move to the door of the dining room where he requested their car be brought around and that Bree put the baby into it.
“Yes. Leave. Come back when you’ve found your manners,” Mario said patronizingly.
“Why on earth would I ever come back?” Octavia cried. “I married the man you chose for me— No! I married a man better than the one you chose for me, and you’ve never so much as said, ‘Thank you.’ Now I deliver an heir and you turn your nose up. Do you think I want my son near a man incapable of showing either of us a shred of affection or respect? No. I don’t. Mamma may come and see Lorenzo anytime she likes, but you will never see me or my son again. You have nothing I want, especially your precious money. Give it to Sandro, spend it, throw it in the bay. Do whatever will make you happy with it because it’s obviously the only thing that ever will.”
“Buonanotte,” Sandro said, gathering his wife and shuffling her out of the room.
“Don’t act like I’m the one behaving badly. He deserves to hear this. Or are you worried I’m ruining your secret backdoor deals?” She pulled away from him as they reached the front door.
“There is nothing secret about any of it,” he stated, not liking her accusation. “You never asked.” He dropped her coat on her shoulders and pressed her outside.
She shoved her hands into the sleeves and folded the edges over herself before throwing herself into the back of the car.
He went around the other side and climbed in, regretting they didn’t have a privacy window. “We talked about having three or four children before we married,” he reminded.
“Pregnancies,” she snapped.
“Si. You’re right. I take the hopeful view that all of your pregnancies will be successful. Sue me for being an optimist. And the gender doesn’t matter. Your father wanted to make it a condition they be boys, but I struck that. I begin the takeover with the birth of our first child and assume majority control with our second. We needed a trigger of some kind for these things. In the unlikely event we had no children, he very rightly made provisions to maintain control and leave his fortune to his family through his estate.”