by Jackie Braun
“Do you realize the insult of your actions?” This from Scarlett, who had risen to her feet and was coming around the desk. Her dark hair and chocolate eyes spoke of her Italian ancestry, but her English carried an Australian accent.
“Did he?” Angelo challenged.
“I can’t believe your nerve—”
“It is all right, Scarlett.” Luca held up a hand. “Angelo is entitled to his anger.”
She huffed out a breath. “Is he also entitled to act boorish and ungrateful?”
“No.” Angelo answered before his father could. His blinding anger had begun to dissipate. All too clearly he could see this exchange from his cousin’s viewpoint. He was being boorish. He did seem ungrateful. “I apologize for barging in here. At the very least I should have knocked. The cook—”
“Chef,” she inserted icily.
“Lorenzo, yes. We met in his kitchen. He’s your fiancé, I believe.” Scarlett’s expression softened slightly. Angelo went on. “He advised me to knock first before coming in here, but I had already worked up a full head of steam.”
“Over what? Your father wishing to welcome you home by paying for your meal at my mother’s restaurant? Yes,” she drawled. “I can see how that would offend you.”
“He has more reason than that,” Luca inserted quietly.
“No, Uncle, he doesn’t understand—”
Luca took her hand, kissed it in a doting fashion. “Can you leave Angelo and me alone for a moment, per favore?”
She looked torn, but finally nodded.
“I saw you and Atlanta through the window. I meant no offense in buying your meal,” Luca began when they were alone. “It was intended as a gesture of goodwill.”
Move on. Atlanta had told him that. Angelo swallowed. Some of his pride went down in the process.
“Thank you.”
Luca’s face brightened. “You’re welcome. Did you enjoy your meal?”
“I did.”
“Especially the company, I would imagine. She is a very beautiful woman.”
“She’s a hell of a lot more than beautiful.”
“I felt that way about my Violetta,” Luca mused before flushing.
“And my mother? How did you feel about her?”
Luca’s expression turned thoughtful. “Your mother was lovely. She had an infectious laugh and a great love for adventure.”
“She was the life of the party, all right,” he replied dryly. “So, did you love her?”
“It happened so quickly.”
“Did you love her?” Angelo bit out the words.
“I thought so at that time. She was an incredible woman. But life here was not what she expected. By the time she decided to go back to America, we both knew we weren’t what the other needed.”
“She left Alex and me here with you.”
“She had a demanding career and lived in a big city. We both felt it would be for the best for you to stay here.”
Twice abandoned, which made his tone all the more bitter when he said, “That was short-lived.”
Luca closed his eyes on a sigh. “Of all the mistakes I’ve made in my life, sending your brother and you to live with Cindy is the one I regret most.”
“Then why did you do it?”
“I was selling food from a roadside stall at the time,” Luca began. “Money was tight. I…I had no means to keep you, no way to care for you.”
He’d heard it all before from others. He still didn’t understand. “So you sent us away. Even though you and Cindy had already decided we should stay here, you shipped us to Boston.”
Luca nodded slowly. “I wanted you to have a stable home.”
“Cindy was an alcoholic. I’m sure the stress of single parenthood didn’t help. She drank her way to an early grave.”
“I…I…”
Angelo didn’t wait for him to finish. “A lot of nights, she didn’t come home at all. Or she passed out on the floor before making it to her bed. Is that the stable home life you had in mind?”
Luca shook his head, looking like a doomed man. Even so, Angelo pulled forth another sharp-edged memory to hurl.
“Alex and I ate out of a Dumpster once. It was right after we ran away from the first foster home after Cindy died. We didn’t like it there much.”
“Alessandro mentioned that the father was not a kind man,” Luca said quietly.
“Kind?” Angelo’s laughter rang out bitter and harsh. “The guy would have beaten us senseless for the slightest transgression. That is, if he could have caught us. Luckily, Alex and I were fast on our feet.”
Luca extended his hands palm up. “I am so sorry.”
“Yeah. I’m sorry, too. Sorry that I let Alex and Atlanta talk me into coming here tonight and giving you a second chance to explain.”
“Your brother found it in his heart to forgive me.”
“Yeah, well, we may look alike, but Alex and I are very different people.”
Luca wasn’t put off. “So I can see. You play professional baseball for a living. Alessandro, he tells me you are very good at this game.”
“It’s more than a game. It’s America’s national pastime, as big as what soccer is here.”
“And you are good at it.” His father smiled.
Angelo let out a derisive snort. The lost young boy he’d been couldn’t stop himself from bragging, “I’m better than good. I’m one of the best. I’ve got three World Series rings and I’ve been voted Most Valuable Player more than once. I’ll be in the Hall of Fame someday. In the meantime, the Rogues pay me millions of dollars each season, and I make twice that amount a year endorsing everything from breakfast cereal to luxury automobiles.”
“You have done well for yourself.” Luca nodded. “I am pleased for you and very proud.”
The words warmed him. He’d waited a lifetime to hear his father say them, which, in the end, was why he bristled. It was too late. Too damned late.
“Go to hell, Luca.”
Atlanta was waiting for him just outside the courtyard the two restaurants shared. It bustled with people. Music played, laughter rang out over the din of conversation. When he reached her, Angelo opened his mouth to speak. No words came. She stepped forward and wrapped her arms around him. It turned out no words were necessary. He buried his face in her hair and for the first time since he was a boy, he cried.
CHAPTER TWELVE
“URGENT!” read the subject line of the e-mail sent from her stylist. Atlanta opened it and immediately wished she hadn’t.
“Make sure you’re sitting down when you click on this link. I’m so sorry, sweetie.”
Atlanta did as instructed. She sat first. Not that it mattered. Nothing could stop her from slumping to the floor once she’d read the story’s headline.
“My daughter seduced my husband: Atlanta Jackson’s mother’s firsthand account of the star’s dark side.”
The accompanying photo was a grainy one of her and Duke. He had his hand on her backside and, though she recalled wanting to retch at the time, she’d smiled because her mother had told her to before taking the picture.
“Oh, God.” It came out part moan and part plea. Not for the first time, her prayer went unheard.
Her first instinct was to stay curled up in a heap on the room’s cotto floor. Her second one was the one she obeyed. Rising, she squared her shoulders. This time, she was going to fight.
Angelo arrived to find Atlanta’s bags stacked in the entryway of her villa.
“What’s going on?”
“Angelo. Thank God. I’ve been trying to reach you.”
“My cell has been off. What’s wrong?”
“I have to cut my vacation short.”
“So I see.” He motioned toward the bags and tried to give name to the flurry of foreign emotions hammering inside of him. The one beating most furiously was one he’d experienced before. He knew what it felt like to be left by someone he trusted.
By someone he loved.
“I�
�ve scheduled a press conference in Los Angeles for tomorrow afternoon.” Her chin jutted up. “I’m not going to run away any more and let the lies go unchecked.”
It made sense. He was proud of her for doing so, in fact. Though he still couldn’t help feeling abandoned. So he asked, “Why now? What’s being said now that you need to rush off?”
“Zeke somehow managed to contact my mother. Or maybe she sought him out.” She rubbed her eyes. “I don’t know. It really doesn’t matter anyway. The bottom line is she’s gone on the record claiming I seduced my stepfather.”
“I can’t believe she would accuse you of having sex with the guy.”
Her throat worked convulsively. “But I did, Angelo.”
“Atlanta.”
He reached for her, but she shrank back. “Duke came to my bed every other night like clockwork from the day I turned eleven until I’d saved enough cash to leave for good.”
It was exactly what Angelo had feared.
“Even before then, he’d started touching me inappropriately.” Atlanta closed her eyes. “How could my mother not know what he was doing? She knew, damn her. Yet now she’s pretending it was all my idea.”
“I don’t know what to say.” Sorry seemed so trite in light of her revelation.
“You…you…don’t need to say anything.” She offered her fake Hollywood smile. He’d botched it, he knew. She needed reassurance. She needed his support. Before he could remedy his mistake, though, a car pulled up out front and a horn honked.
“Franca’s husband is taking me to the airport. The sooner I confront this mess, the better. No more running. No more pretending. No more sweeping all of that ugliness under the rug. I don’t give a damn about my career. If I never act again, it won’t matter as long as I can look in the mirror and know I did all that I could to stand up for myself and set the record straight.”
Despite her strong words, a tear leaked down her cheek.
“Atlanta.” Just as she had for him the other day, he wiped it away. Before he could say anything else, she stepped away.
“I’m sorry about your family party. I wish I could be there for you tomorrow evening.”
“Same goes.”
“I’m going to echo what your brother said. Keep an open mind. Family, the real kind, is a rare gift. You’d be a fool to let it slip away. Your baseball career will leave you. Careers do. They’re fickle, Angelo. Especially careers such as ours. Family—not my kind, but the real kind—it sticks around. So does love.”
The driver honked a second time. “I’ve got to go.”
“I’ll help you carry these out.” He pointed to the stack of bags.
“No. Your shoulder. Franca’s husband will help me get them.” She opened the door and waved for the man to come inside. Here she was facing her problems head-on and Angelo was still trying to avoid reality.
Everything happened quickly after that. Atlanta’s bags were stowed in the car’s trunk. Afterward, she and Angelo stood together next to the idling vehicle.
“Have a safe trip.”
“I will. Thanks.”
“I’ll call you.”
“Please. I…I’d love to hear from you.”
He brushed his lips against hers.
He stood in the driveway long after the car was gone. He didn’t feel lonely, he felt empty. Atlanta wasn’t merely a part of his life, he realized. She was his life.
“I can’t make the party.”
Isabella said something in Italian that sounded suspiciously like swearing, given her tone. “What do you mean?” she asked once she’d switched back to English.
“Something’s come up. I’m booked on the evening flight to Los Angeles.”
She cocked her head to one side and her expression turned less menacing. “Something? If you are going to Los Angeles, my guess is it’s more like someone.”
“Atlanta,” he admitted. “She needs me.”
His sister’s eyes widened at that. “Is she all right?”
“No. Not yet. But she will be.” His lips curved. “We’re both going to be.”
“I’ll drive you to the airport.”
Stunned, he asked, “Just like that? I’m ditching the family reunion party you planned for a woman you don’t even know.”
“You know her.” Isabella smiled then. “And you love her.”
“I…I don’t…” Angelo started to deny it, but realized he would be lying. He loved Atlanta Jackson. What was more telling, though, was that he loved the woman who had once been Jane Marie Lutz. “I do.”
Isabella’s grin widened. “That makes her family.”
Family. For so long, Angelo had found the word his foe. He embraced it now. He reveled in it.
“If I have anything to say about it, she will be,” he promised.
Atlanta paced in the makeshift green room. The press was lining up in the hotel’s largest conference room. Even so, some had been denied access in order to comply with the fire code. Her statement was going to be winging around the world via cyberspace and other electronic media before midnight. Everyone would know she’d been sexually abused by her stepfather and then had allowed herself to be manipulated by Zeke. The only person whose reaction she worried about was Angelo.
“We’re ready for you, Miss Jackson.”
She smiled at the young intern who’d come back to make the announcement.
As she had in New York, she murmured, “Show time,” as she walked out the door.
Her purposeful stride and confident smile faltered when she spied Angelo standing at the bank of microphones.
“What are you doing here?” she snapped around her high-wattage smile.
“I’m being there. You know, like you’ve been there for me.”
“Angelo, you don’t need—”
He pressed a finger to her lips. “That’s where you’re wrong, sweetheart. I do. In fact, I can’t imagine being anywhere else right now. You’re too important to me.”
The assembled media representatives had had enough of their whispered comments.
“Hey, Angelo. What’s going on between you two?” one hollered boldly.
“This is Miss Jackson’s press conference. I’m just here to lend support. Direct your questions to her, please.”
They weren’t put off, but they did ask the expected questions about her relationship with her stepfather. He stood beside her, proud of her courage as she offered up the ugly and unvarnished truth.
She glanced sideways at him as she finished.
“How do you feel about that, Mr. Casali?”
“I’m proud of her. She was a victim when she was a helpless kid. She’s not a kid any more, nor is she a victim. As you can see, she’s anything but helpless.”
“Rumor has it the two of you are pretty tight these days,” another reporter shouted. “What’s the real story?”
“The real story? She didn’t seduce me like some of the tabloid headlines claim.” Some of the reporters chuckled. “But I have fallen in love with her.”
Her mouth fell open and she gaped at him. “Angelo?”
“I didn’t think I could fall in love. You proved me wrong, Atlanta. I love you.” When she continued to stare at him, he added, “I hope to God you love me back or I’m making an incredible fool of myself.”
At that she launched herself into his arms. “I love you, too.”
One question made it over the din of voices. “What about your careers?”
With Atlanta in his arms, Angelo boldly asked, “What about them?”
“Some people are saying you’re both washed up,” the reporter went on.
“Not washed up. I’m retiring.” The word was oddly much easier to say than he’d thought. “I’ve had an incredible career and I am very grateful to the Rogues organization, but I think it’s time to move on.”
“Unconfirmed reports say your shoulder—”
“I need surgery,” he cut in. Atlanta had taught him how to face his worst fears. “I have a torn rotato
r cuff and some arthritis. I’ll never be able to play at the level I used to. It’s time to give some of the younger guys on the roster a chance to shine.”
“What about Miss Jackson?” the same reporter asked. “Where does she fit in to your plans?”
She was watching him intently. Suddenly, he saw his future clearly.
“She doesn’t fit in,” Angelo said. “She’s at the center of them. The heart. If she’ll have me, I want to marry her. I want to make a family with her.”
Family. There was that word again. This time, he understood it, embraced it.
“Miss Jackson?” The reporter was grinning now. “Can we get a comment from you regarding Mr. Casali’s proposal?”
“There’s only one thing to say to a proposal like that.” But the reporters never heard her say the word yes. It was muffled against Angelo’s lips during their kiss.
EPILOGUE
THE party with Angelo’s family was rescheduled. Isabella had seen to all of the details. He expected it to be awkward. He expected to want to leave early. Neither was the case. With Atlanta by his side, he met just about every Casali and Firenzi and faced down the past that had been his nemesis for so long.
“I am glad you are here,” Luca said toward the end of the evening. After his initial welcome, he’d kept to the sidelines. Now, with the party winding down, he returned to the fore.
“I’m glad I am, too.”
“I know you haven’t forgiven me, but—”
Angelo stopped him. “I’ve moved on. The past is…well, past. I’m concentrating on the future these days.”
“Thank you.”
“Thank Atlanta. She taught me that.” But his expression softened. “You did what you thought was right at the time.”
“Let’s have a toast,” Isabella called.
She began with Cristiano, who was being released from the hospital as well as being awarded a medal for his bravery in the line of duty.
All those assembled raised their glasses.
She smiled at Angelo when she said, “To family.”