The Marriage He Must Keep

by Dani Collins

  “Primo’s father was in charge for a decade, about as long as my own father was. He’s always believed he has as much right to take over as I do. We fought about it more than once in our teens. Quite honestly, if my grandfather had seen Primo as the better leader, he would have named him the successor, but Primo was always driven by passion and not in the right way. I thought we had put it to rest when I gave him this position in London. He had the freedom to grow the branch under his own terms. I believed his loyalty was unshakeable.”

  The disillusioned note in his voice almost made her sympathize, but she resented his blind belief at the same time.

  “That’s why I trusted him,” she said. His misjudgment had shaken her belief in him and thus her belief in herself. She’d never had much faith in her parents beyond the expectation that they would keep her fed and physically safe, but Alessandro had seemed to offer more than that. Then he had delivered...this.

  She never should have counted on him. But she had.

  “Did you trust him? Because you told the paramedics you didn’t want him near you or the baby,” he said pointedly.

  “It seemed paranoid when I said it.” She was reluctant even now to admit how much a victim she’d come to feel around Primo. He’d been downright sinister catching her in those first contractions and saying with such concern, “Go lie down. I’ll call the hospital.” Who imagined anyone would lie about something like that? It was only as things had progressed, as fear for her life and her baby’s had gripped her, that she’d started to suspect he was deliberately delaying things.

  “What could he possibly have thought to gain by doing something like this?” The magnitude of the crime kept striking like aftershocks from a quake.

  “It wasn’t something he planned,” he said with grim cast to his hard features. “The opportunity presented and he acted. He admitted that much. A paternity question down the road would have caused us a great deal of suffering and could have opened doors to his own heir taking control over my false one. That’s as far as he got with thinking it through.”

  “Mio Dio,” she breathed, sliding her arm up over her eyes, hiding from the thought of Alessandro questioning her faithfulness a year from now, when they might have discovered the baby wasn’t his.

  Suddenly Alessandro’s voice was right beside her. “He was behind some death threats I received earlier this year.”

  “What?” she gasped, dropping her arm.

  “I didn’t tell you because you were already anxious about the pregnancy. I wanted you near the specialists here in London anyway, but it seemed safer for you to be out of Naples. That’s why I haven’t brought you home, even to visit.” His jaw looked carved from marble.

  “All this because he’s jealous? No, he was punishing me,” she said with an appalled crack in her voice.

  “He wasn’t happy about our marriage, that’s true. Had he married you and been given control of your father’s fortune, he would have been in a better position to challenge me over controlling the family company. When I married you, I became untouchable. There really was no other way for him to bring me down except to attack my personal life.”

  “That’s sick,” she said, recoiling. “Did you know that? That his reasons for talking with my father were more about making a strategic move against you than wanting a wife?”

  A very brief pause, then, “I was aware there could be certain challenges if he bettered his position,” he said carefully. Too carefully.

  “You married me to prevent him from gaining an advantage,” she breathed. She hadn’t thought she could be any more shocked, but she was. All those tiny details she’d recalled from that first evening took on new meaning. His initial air of disapproval— “You were planning to stop it, one way or another.” His question about whether she wanted a love match... “You wanted to talk me out of it, but you proposed instead. It was a calculated move to keep him in his place.”

  “It was a precaution,” he said. “I wanted to marry eventually, and you and I were well suited.”

  “No, we weren’t! Not if this was the real reason you proposed!”

  “Don’t get upset—”

  “I am upset!” she said in such a burst, her stomach hurt.

  “Octavia, calm down.” He sounded so patronizing she wanted to smack him. “Today was very stressful and you’ve just had surgery. Let it all sink in and tomorrow you’ll have a clearer view.”

  “He tried to take our baby because you took the wife he wanted,” she stressed. “Why aren’t you upset?”

  “I am.” The words snapped like a flag in a stiff breeze, but he didn’t look or sound upset. But then, this was a man who had approached marriage so cold-bloodedly, she couldn’t even let herself think of it yet. “But you don’t have to worry about him ever again. The police have taken him for further questioning. The hospital is pressing charges for interfering with the baby tags and I will make a formal complaint when we get back to Naples for the death threats. He will be too tied up in legal proceedings to bother us and certainly won’t have a place in our lives or any sort of position in the corporation. We’ll put all of this behind us very quickly.”

  She stared at him, stupefied at how easily he thought this could be shaken off like dirt from a rug. It was something her parents would have done. The puppy was a nuisance, Octavia. Those old books were in the way. That friend of yours needn’t visit again once school finishes.

  You’re just a marble I won from my cousin, Octavia.

  Discussion over. Move on.

  She wanted to curl up into a ball and cry, but she had a son to think of. Failing to fight for a better situation had nearly cost her the chance to raise him herself. She couldn’t afford to be acquiescent. Not anymore.

  “I’m not going back to Naples with you,” she said firmly.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  “BUT THAT’S WHERE our son will be. Surely you’d prefer to be with him?”

  He shouldn’t have said it. He’d been down to his last vibrating nerve, already feeling so guilty his self-respect had been consigned to the London sewer. Her refusal to come home with him had snapped his leash. He’d seen himself losing what Primo had tried to cost him and he’d reacted with the sort of ruthless aggression he’d been suppressing all day.

  He would not let his cousin win.

  Octavia had stared at him in stunned, hurt silence, her face the furthest thing from the amenable expression he was used to seeing there. Beneath her crushed anguish, her eyes had blazed with singular fury. Raw emotion that had sparked off his own.

  For a moment he’d scented the fight he was itching for.

  Then a cool contempt had flickered in her face before she’d rolled onto her side and closed her eyes.

  It had taken everything in him not to wrench the rail from her bed and drag her around to continue hashing things out, but the nurse had come in. Lorenzo was hungry.

  Octavia left without a backward glance and didn’t return.

  Why the hell had he allowed himself to lash out like that?

  He’d managed to hold his temper for hours in his mother’s sitting room, as the police had pulled one vile act of insurgence after another from Primo. His cousin’s resentment had festered here in London, to the point where he’d taken pleasure in torturing Alessandro by recounting the way Octavia had begged for her husband while she writhed in labor, sweating and scared.

  “Does that bother you, Sandro? I’m surprised. You only married her to stop me from doing it.”

  Not entirely true. He had had a clear view of the board when a chance remark from their accounting VP had tipped Alessandro off to Primo’s contemplation of marriage. Alessandro had gone to that charity gala in search of ammunition to protest the union and circumvent any power plays Primo might have made.

  Perhaps he should have acknowledged the s
eeds of his own mistrust then, but he hadn’t seen Primo’s actions as overtly aggressive, merely that if his cousin married well there was potential for trouble. It was Alessandro’s habit to look for such signs and nip them in the bud. In all sides of his life, he forestalled the potential for damage wherever he could.

  The idea of proposing to Octavia hadn’t struck him until he’d talked with her on the terrace. He had gone out there to discover how determined she was to marry Primo, but marriage hadn’t been on his mind. He’d always had a distant awareness that he had a duty to produce an heir at some point, but that was a future thing that he would get to when he was ready. And it wasn’t as if he was waiting for a woman to steal his heart. Quite the contrary. He’d already decided to arrange a marriage when the time came.

  So he hadn’t felt quite ready to settle down that night. Primo had essentially forced the issue, but as it had turned out, once the idea of taking Octavia for himself had struck, it had stuck.

  She had been pretty in an understated way with potential for genuine beauty. She’d also been collected and traditional and more than willing to accept the simple attachment of an arranged marriage over the more volatile love match his parents had had. She wanted children and wanted to devote herself to them. Given the demands of his work, he saw that as yet another way they were an immediate fit.

  Best of all, the family wouldn’t lose a lucrative partner and he had the perfect excuse for Primo. Lady’s choice. He couldn’t help that Octavia had fallen for him. Women did. If he was taking advantage of her inexperience and surface infatuation, well, it was for the greater good.

  His only moment of doubt had come when he’d taken her to the dance floor. He’d wanted to lend an air of romance to his proposal, but also foreshadow his move to his cousin. As he had pulled Octavia into his front, however, and smelled the sweet, nutmeg scent of her hair, desire had rung through him with unexpected force.

  She had reacted, too. The sparkle of her attraction toward him had been beautiful. Incendiary. Fuel to his fire and bordering on dangerous. He hadn’t experienced such a rush of unbridled hunger in his life.

  Given that he never allowed feelings to rule him, he’d thought for one brief moment of abandoning his plan—but no. Suddenly the idea of her marrying Primo, sleeping in his cousin’s bed, had been unthinkable.

  He had proceeded with his proposal, convinced he could handle the attraction. He had taken Primo aside to explain that he and Octavia had a connection that had to be elevated above dispassionate business transactions. Alessandro knew for a fact that her father had asked her which man she preferred. She’d chosen Sandro and, since he was the better prospect, so had Mario.

  Arranged marriages were strategic by definition, damn it. He didn’t understand why she was upset to learn his reasons now.

  Because it came on the heels of Primo’s vindictive betrayal, he supposed. Her trust was shaken. She was looking for reassurance and not finding it in her husband. That bothered him. He prided himself on being completely reliable.

  Tomorrow, he silently promised her. They would both be calmer and capable of talking rationally. She would come to Naples with him.

  * * *

  Lorenzo was over a week old when they released her. Despite cabin fever, Octavia was a little bit sorry to be discharged. The hospital had been a nice delay against worrying over how she and Alessandro would proceed. She hadn’t seen him much. He’d had meetings with police and conference calls with his grandfather and appointments with executives in the various offices. He called and texted often, but his absence had left her to explain to Sorcha and her Spaniard how the mix-up had occurred.

  Cesar Montero did have a similar air of dynamic power to Alessandro’s. He had been quite intimidating, arriving on a high tide of energy, sweeping into the nursery with an unequivocal demand to see his son. He was perfectly polite to Octavia—barely noticed her really, which was fine by her—but the thick tension between him and Sorcha had been like a suffocating fog.

  Octavia had apologized to Sorcha when they had a moment alone, saying, “I’m so sorry this awful situation happened, Sorcha. I feel terrible—”

  “Oh, I don’t hold you responsible!” Sorcha reassured her, but admitted on a quivering whisper, “But Cesar didn’t know about Enrique. At all.” The stress of dealing with his discovery was visible in her pinched nostrils and white cheeks.

  Octavia didn’t judge. She was far too preoccupied with her own problems and the sordid reason her husband had married her. Part of her wanted to spill it all to her new friend, but it was so personal, so lowering.

  Before she left, Sorcha made a point of exchanging contact details so they could stay in touch. “I’ll be going to Spain,” Sorcha had said, a conflicted expression torturing her beautiful face. “I don’t expect it’ll be a warm welcome from his family. I’d appreciate having a friend, even if you’re in London.”

  “I’ve been in London for medical care. I live in Naples,” Octavia had said, not bringing up her reservations about going back there. Alessandro hadn’t said another word about their plans, but she hadn’t stopped thinking about how ruthless and arrogant he’d been the other night. It hurt. She felt as if she was back in her childhood, expected to do as she was told.

  And why not? She virtually always had.

  “I’d like a friend, too,” Octavia said with a touch more vehemence than she meant to reveal. “I’m very attached to Enrique,” she added, reaching out to stroke Sorcha’s son’s tiny closed fist. “I’ll need regular updates. I’m going to miss him. He was almost mine.” It was true. She felt a strange connection to the boy.

  “I feel the same,” Sorcha said, eyes shining with emotion. “I’ll feel so cheated, not seeing Lorenzo every day.”

  They hugged it out and Sorcha was gone when Alessandro settled Octavia in the back of his town car. Loneliness gripped her, keeping her silent on the short drive to his mother’s mansion.

  “Mother is home. She’s anxious for time with Lorenzo before—” He cut himself off.

  Before we leave? Was that what he had almost said?

  Octavia’s tender stomach muscles tightened.

  His mother’s mansion was a few hundred years old, its facade elegant and weathered. Inside, Ysabelle had decorated with the colorful overindulgence that matched her personality and expressive Italian roots.

  As they entered, she swooped on her grandson like a gull spotting a sandwich crust, silk sleeves flowing out like wings from her bright blue dress.

  Praise and endearments in rapid Italian flowed over all of them along with several embraces into clouds of an ethereal perfume, warm kisses that left lipstick stains on their cheeks and pets of the hair that made Octavia couch a smile. Alessandro was not five and didn’t care to be fussed over like he was.

  She didn’t mind the attention. Her own mother wouldn’t greet her like this, drawing her into the lounge where dozens of gifts were arranged with care on every surface, all wrapped in pastel stripes and extravagant bows.

  “When did this happen?” Alessandro asked, folding his arms as he took in the grand gesture with an exasperated shake of his head.

  “Surprises are fine when they’re nice ones,” his mother assured him, patting his arm on her way by. “Your nanny helped me,” she told Octavia as she directed her into the chair with the balloons tied to the armrest.

  “We have a nanny?” Octavia murmured, casting a wary glance at her husband. She didn’t like surprises any more than he did.

  Brianna—call me Bree—was young and eager and melted with adoration the moment she saw Lorenzo, but Octavia was reluctant to hand over her son to a stranger when Alessandro’s threats of stealing him back to Italy were still fresh in her mind.

  “You’re still recovering,” Alessandro said. “You need the help. I’ll pitch in as much as I can, but work is completely upended r
ight now. I have a lot of demands on my time.”

  Octavia hadn’t considered how losing Primo would affect things at the family company. Alessandro must be putting out a lot of raging fires. The Ferrante holdings were a far-reaching and very demanding enterprise.

  As she took her son from his car seat and handed the baby to his grandmother, she asked, “You really fired him?” She half expected Primo was still here and couldn’t shake the tension of having to face him.

  Alessandro was taken aback. “I told you he was out of our lives. Did you not believe me?”

  She blinked. Not really. The men had been so close.

  A hint of the torment he’d revealed that first night flickered across his expression, telling her he was still coming to terms with it all. Her heart lurched at seeing him struggle. If she’d been the type who knew how to reach out, if things hadn’t been so strained between them, she might have tried to comfort him.

  But she didn’t know how so she only said, “Thank you,” because Primo’s absence lifted a giant weight off her.

  “I needed my fainting couch when he told me,” Ysabelle said, lowering to sit on the sofa opposite, Lorenzo in her lap. “It was such a shock.”

  The twist of Alessandro’s mouth told Octavia that Ysabelle wasn’t overstating her reaction, not that she wasn’t entitled to some histrionics. Octavia was still reeling.

  “Are you up to this?” Alessandro asked Octavia, jerking his head at the multitude of presents. “Or would you rather rest and open these later?”

  “I can do it now. This is very nice,” she told her mother-in-law. “Thank you.”

  “I’ve ordered lunch. We’ll fetch you when it’s ready. You can go work,” Ysabelle told her son with a clasp of his hand and a kiss on the back of it. “I know that’s where you’d rather be,” she added with a vague scold in her tone. “Since you’ve already heard about my count. We’re in love,” she leaned forward to confide to Octavia. “I thought I’d never make love again and now... It’s like we’re nineteen!”