A Promise of Forever

by M. E. Brady

  “If I do reach her, what do you want me to say? Do you want her to know you’re going to see her?” Jake queried.

  “No, don’t call. I want to talk to her but this time we play by my rules. She gets no time to prepare for me. I don’t want to give her any length of time to think up anymore lies. I’ll call my driver and I’ll have him drop you off on the way.” The driver was waiting outside for them when they finished. Gianfranco had the driver drop Jake off along the way. He said good bye to Jake and gave the driver directions to Katelyn’s apartment.

  Belle Harbor was a small beach town not far from Manhattan. It had been a great place to hang out during their college days, when school let out for the summer. When most of their friends were heading to the Hamptons, they headed to Belle Harbor. Kevin and Katelyn were born and raised in Belle Harbor. Their family owned a cute house that overlooked the beach and if you went up to the second floor, you could see the ocean from any room. They were happy there, until the death of their parents. It happened a year after Kevin’s graduation from law school. Kevin did what was expected of him and stood by Katelyn. He stayed in New York until she finished high school, in spite of the great offer he had to join a large law firm in Montana. He hadn’t accepted their earlier offer because, after the loss of their parents, he didn’t want Katelyn uprooted and he wasn’t going to leave her behind. He must have impressed the partners because, once Katelyn graduated high school, they came back with a second offer.

  Gianfranco glanced out the window during the ride to Katelyn’s apartment and thought about all the good times they had here at the beach. He remembered all the bars they frequented and all the trouble they got into. It was a nice place but Jenny could have had so much more. His child could have lived on an estate with horses. He knew from Kevin how much his little girl loved horses. If Katelyn wanted, he would have provided the house on the beach too, for the summer.

  Katelyn lived in one of the few high-rise buildings, overlooking the ocean. He liked her apartment, it was quaint. Luck was on his side as the driver pulled up to the entrance of her building. There was usually a guard at the door but there was a woman just leaving the building to walk her dog. Gianfranco dismissed his driver for the night and shouted for the woman to hold the door for him. “I forgot my key,” he explained as he reached behind the woman and held the door behind her.

  “That’s a fancy car you have there. Second one this week I saw here. Do we have someone famous living in this building that I don’t know about?” she asked.

  “I don’t know personally. I had to work late tonight; company policy to send me home in a car.” He knew that this was his company’s policy so he blurted it out rather than tell the woman too much. He didn’t need to alert Katelyn with the buzzer or security because he was already in the building and he knew exactly where Katelyn’s apartment was. When he reached her apartment on the 8th floor, he rang her doorbell. The element of surprise was a great weapon. He knew that Jenny had to be asleep by now and he wouldn’t be disturbing her.

  Katelyn’s door stood slightly ajar, with the chain still attached so she could see who might be trying to gain access. After the incident with Adam, she didn’t want to take any chances. She wasn’t surprised to see Gianfranco as she opened the door a little further. “I thought you were going to be otherwise occupied tonight. Did she turn you down?” she asked curtly.

  “I came to talk. Is Jenny asleep; I don’t want her to hear what I have to say?” he asked before she allowed him to walk by her and into the apartment.

  “He must be under a lot of stress.” The shadows under his eyes gave it away. She could tell that whatever it was that he needed to say seemed important enough that it couldn’t wait. He had a determined look in his eyes. She was puzzled at first because he led her to believe that what he had to say would lead to a scene of some kind.

  “Jenny is staying with a friend tonight. I wasn’t sure what time I would get home so my friend kept her overnight. I had some business to take care of,” she added as an afterthought.

  He raised his brow and she could see his jaw tighten as he turned away from her. “I forgot about Prince Charming, for a second. Do you always dress like that and then go bed-hopping? Or is this a habit, you recently acquired?” He was angry but he couldn’t help what she was doing to him. She still had on that dress and it was slowly driving him crazy; now she had no shoes on and her legs and feet were bare. He was sure she was naked under that dress and he wanted to find out if it were true; his thoughts were rampant.

  She shook with anger. How dare he think that he could tell her how to dress and think that he could make assumptions, about her sex life? She was seething as she lifted her hand to slap his face in retaliation but she was stopped in mid air. Even with a few drinks in him, he had her at a disadvantage. His strong hands were now around her wrists, as she fought to loosen his grip. He pulled her closer to him and noted, with fascination, as her body tingled from his proximity, her body touching his.

  “Why are you doing this to me?” she murmured in barely a whisper as she fought to control what her body betrayed. She was lost in his arms as she felt his athletic body so close to her own. “You made it perfectly clear at the tavern, what I meant to you,” she scowled.

  “I made nothing clear to you, Katelyn. That woman meant nothing to me and you would have found that out yourself had you stuck around a little longer. The reason I’m here though has nothing to do with what you saw tonight. Why didn’t you tell me, Katelyn?” he asked as drew in a breath. He still couldn’t believe that the Katelyn he knew would do this to him. “Why didn’t you tell me that we had a child together?” he added, as he drank in the scent of her skin next to his face.

  There was no use denying it and she would have told him the truth herself soon enough. How does he know? She had kept that secret from everyone, even Kevin. “My pregnancy was not your concern,” she lashed out. “I found myself pregnant through my own inexperience. I didn’t blame you. I should have protected myself,” she added, pulling her wrists from his hold. She pushed her hair behind her ear like she did when she was scared.

  He noticed her nervous habit and thought perhaps now that she was through running scared; she would begin to settle down and tell the truth. “Your pregnancy had everything to do with me. Jenny is my child too. I should have had some say in her life. Regardless of how you felt about me, I had a right to know my daughter. You had no right to keep her birth a secret from me.”

  Katelyn couldn’t think of any rebuttal because she agreed with him. She had no logical excuse. He still stood close enough to her so that she could feel his breath on her face and, once again, her body was betraying her. Damn this dress, it was a bad idea. The material was so thin; her body was on fire as though he were touching the skin beneath it. From head to toe, her body and mind were not acting cohesively. Her brain was trying to concentrate on the conversation but her body wanted nothing to do with it. His eyes softened as he acknowledged the painful lust she was experiencing.

  “I could kill you for keeping Jenny from me. I would have been there for you, you know that, Katelyn,” he said pulling her into an embrace that only caused more uncertainty between them. The sexual tension between them only added to the stinging grief of what could have been.

  She knew he would have been there but his heart would not have been hers and that was where the lie began to take on a life of its own. Where will we go from here?

  “Tell me, Irish, why is it that when I want you to talk, you say nothing. I find it hard to fathom that my little argumentative vixen has nothing to say. It’s not like you to be at a loss for words. You’re not going to say anything?” He let one hand move suggestively down the side of her face and, as he did, he saw her breasts rise as if commanded, begging to be touched. He watched her as she struggled to catch her breath. She was his and he wanted her to admit it. His body wanted hers as badly as she needed his. They were each other’s weakness as much as each other’s strength. />
  His gaze lingered on her lips; they both knew he was going to kiss her, he had little choice. He did, and, as his tongue moved longingly, tracing her lips, her legs weakened. He tasted all the secret places of her mouth that only he had known. “I’ve been cursed by the memory of you for far too long,” he drawled as he took her into his abyss.

  He nipped and teased and suckled until she surrendered to him completely. He could bring her to the point of submission each and every time they were together and he reveled in that knowledge. Most men dreamt of having that kind of power over their lover but not him. This knowledge only proved their weakness for each other.

  “Gianfranco,” she whimpered. “Please stop, I can’t let you do this to me again,” she quivered. “You can’t barge into my life and take over. Whenever you’re around me, it’s like, I can’t think for myself anymore.” Katelyn could barely speak as she put some distance between them.

  “That’s the first logical thing you’ve said today. I’m making the decisions about us from now on. You are no longer in a position to call the shots. I’m not marrying you for the sake of some hidden undying love and devotion. No Katelyn, you and I are getting married as soon as possible because we are forever bound to each other by our child. I will not be separated from her for one minute more. I do realize that you are part of the package and I’ll live with that but, be warned, I will not tolerate any more lies.” He was still angry as he reached for something, anything to lash out at. He would never physically hurt her but he did find a crystal vase to take his anger out on.

  Katelyn stood horrified as he flung the vase across the room. It shattered into hundreds of little pieces. She was glad Jenny wasn’t here to witness him lose it. Somehow she knew by the look on his face that he had regretted his lapse of control and was finding it difficult to apologize for it.

  He had spent the better part of the evening keeping his anger in check. He glanced down at her coffee table and saw the face of his daughter, Jennifer Elizabeth Donavan, who was, in fact, Jennifer Elizabeth Broccolini, staring back at him. He looked at Katelyn differently than he had before. She was no longer the innocent who found herself in a tough situation; she was now the conniving selfish woman who had kept his child from him on purpose. And yet, he didn’t want to hurt her, he wanted what he’d always wanted, to love and protect her and have her in his life and in his bed.

  As his eyes swept over her body, once again, his pupils flared with need for her. “Why?” he asked. He leaned against the wall for support and tilted his head toward the ceiling. It was then that he noticed all the pictures that held the memories of his daughter’s life.

  He clenched his fists as he took in each shot of her. There were dozens of photos of her through the years; years that were lost to him. He moved from the beginning to the end, taking in each snapshot of another time lost. Katelyn watched in horror as the tears fell from his eyes. There were pictures of her first bath, her first step, even one of her after saying her first word. Katelyn had added a blurb on one picture in a cloud, Jenny said ‘dada’. He hoped that each time Jenny said the word ‘daddy’, that Katelyn felt the pain, as he did at this very second.

  Katelyn was remembering and she wanted to tell him that her heart broke every time their daughter called out to a man she had never met. With tears still streaming down his face, he turned to her and drew in a deep, needed breath before speaking. “My attorney will be in touch with you in the morning. He’ll have all the papers drawn up for you to sign, naming me as Jenny’s father. The papers are necessary if I’m to be named on the birth certificate legally. He’ll also let you know when and where the wedding will take place.” He sniffled and Katelyn could tell he was slowly regaining control.

  “Don’t push me on this, Katelyn. I’ll make sure the attorney is here before my car arrives to take you both to the airport,” he informed her, in no uncertain terms.

  “I’m not marrying you. This is ludicrous.” She saw his body stiffen. “We don’t have to get married; I won’t keep her from you.”

  “How magnanimous you are, not to keep my daughter from me any longer. But, as I’ve warned you, you don’t get to call the shots any longer. All the arrangements will be made; all you have to do is show up. Katelyn, do let me warn you though, we play by my rules this time and if you give me any trouble at all, I’ll take her from you. Don’t think for a second that I won’t or that I can’t,” he added abruptly.

  “That’s just insane. What judge would let you take her from me and the only home she has ever known?” she sputtered nervously. If Gianfranco lived up to his reputation, she knew he was capable of just what he threatened.

  “Don’t underestimate me or the power I have. I have plenty of money and a lot of friends; don’t make me use either of them. Don’t you think that a judge would have a hard time justifying your reasons for keeping her from me? I would have given anything to be in her life and you would have been my best witness on the stand. Even you wouldn’t deny that I would be a good father.” The venom in his voice only added to her fear of him and all he threatened to do to her.

  “Why are you doing this to me?” she asked meekly, as if all the life were drained out of her.

  “I’m not the one who should be answering that question. Why did you do this to me?” he asked in a voice that didn’t hide the sorrow he felt in his heart. “Are we in agreement?” he added staring down into her eyes.

  She saw that she had less than zero options and tentatively agreed to his terms with a slight nod. “Was that so hard?” “Anyone watching this would think that you were just sentenced to a life of poverty and pain. Instead, what I offer is a life of luxury for both you and our child, a life most women would love to have; you act as if I’ve just stolen your life from you.”

  Her stomach was still churning as he issued his ultimatums about her future. The irony was that there was nothing she wanted more than to become his wife but she knew she would pay a price. Was having him in her life permanently this way worth the sacrifices it would cost? Their union would bring his child into his life but he’d be stuck in a marriage that meant little or nothing to him, or so she thought.

  “I’m not going to be joining you and Jenny in the morning but your plans to visit Kevin were confirmed. I’ll try to join you both later in the week, if I can. My assistant will handle all the announcements for the newspapers.” He stared at her for what seemed like forever, waiting for some sort of rebuttal, but there was none. Instead, all he saw was her expression of rampant fear and rejection. “People will expect an announcement if we get married and I want everything to be above board. It would raise eyebrows if we didn’t do this,” he added, explaining his reasons for a public announcement.

  She was overwhelmed at the extent to which he was making plans. “You’re not planning on announcing that Jenny is your child, are you?”

  The room was full of emotions that ran from hostility, to regret and she could see he was trying very hard to keep his emotions in check. He took a couple of steps closer to her, thinking that, if he moved forward, she would somehow stop defying him. “I’m going to recognize Jenny as my own no matter how you feel about it. I want everyone to know that I’m her father. I’d love to shout it from the rooftops but I won’t do that until we explain to her where I’ve been all this time.”

  There was awkward tension in the air. She was afraid to say anything to him. If he went back on his word and made the announcement before giving her time to explain it to Jenny, she would never forgive him. It was as if he could read her mind because he walked over to her and gently lifted her chin so she could see into his eyes. “I promise you that until we have both sat her down and explained everything to her, nothing will be made public. Besides, I still have to deal with Kevin. He’s never going to forgive me for this. You know that, don’t you,” he added disappointingly.

  The note of his concern for Kevin’s feelings didn’t surprise her. Gianfranco could care less about her feelings but he couldn�
�t fathom the idea of hurting Kevin. She wondered what Kevin would say. He would probably feel let down by them both but she knew her brother well enough to know he’d forgive his friend. Gianfranco circled once again and then, as if he could take no more of her, he strode out to the hallway that led outside and dialed a number on his phone before leaving.

  Katelyn was left in the apartment alone with plenty of sleepless hours to think about all that had transpired between them. She was glad that the truth had finally come out and maybe now she could give her daughter what she wanted most in the world, a father. She never did find out from Gianfranco how he figured it out but she was sure that no one else had yet. Her cell phone began to ring and Katelyn wondered who it could be and whether or not they knew the identity of Jenny’s father. She saw that she had multiple missed calls from Jake. Her caller identification told her that it was Jake, calling again. “Hi Jake, why are you calling so late?” she asked, knowing it had something to do with her exit from the tavern.

  “Are you alright, Katelyn? Did Gianfranco make it there?” he asked.

  “Yes, I guess, I have a lot of explaining to do, don’t I? Does Kevin know anything yet?” she asked. Jake wanted her to know that he wasn’t calling for any reason other than to check in on her and make sure she was alright.

  Chapter Seven

  Katelyn and Jenny arrived at Kennedy Airport precisely at six p.m. and because they were flying in Gianfranco’s personal plane, they didn’t have the hassle of security. They were escorted to an awaiting Boeing 727, sitting on the tarmac. Katelyn felt like a celebrity with all the fuss being made over them. The surprises kept coming; the pilot and co-pilot were on hand to greet them, as well as their private steward and stewardess. It seemed a bit over the top but who was she to complain. Jenny was really excited about all the attention she was getting and didn’t want the day to end. Neither of them had ever been on a private plane before and both were looking forward to the tour promised them by the stewardess when they boarded.