The Marciano Love-Child

by MELANIE MILBURNE

  ‘But of course,’ Alessandro said, smiling politely.

  Scarlett listened as a volley of questions and short, impersonal answers flew back and forth until an older rather, forceful-looking female journalist jostled forward with her microphone.

  ‘Is it true, Mr Marciano, that Scarlett Fitzpatrick is the mother of your three-year-old son?’ she asked. ‘A son you had not even known existed until a week ago?’

  Scarlett felt the tension in Alessandro’s body as he stood beside her with his arm encircling her waist. ‘Yes, she is,’ he said in a clipped tone. ‘Now, if you will excuse us, we have to—’

  ‘Do you have any comment to make on the current medical condition of your son, Mr Marciano?’ the journalist persisted.

  Scarlett glanced up at Alessandro in confusion but his expression was inscrutably tight. ‘No, I do not have any comment to make, other than he is a very healthy little boy,’ he said. ‘Now, if you will please make way—’

  ‘Miss Fitzpatrick.’ The journalist shifted targets with consummate ease. ‘You must be very relieved to have your little son declared healthy. Were you worried he might also be a carrier?’

  Scarlett felt the colour drain out of her face, and her chest suddenly felt as if someone very heavy had just sat upon it, crushing her lungs so she couldn’t draw in a breath. ‘Umm…a c-carrier?’ she stammered, glancing up at Alessandro for help but his features were stonier than a statue.

  She turned back to the journalist, her heart beginning to hit and miss a few beats. ‘A carrier of…of what?’

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  ‘I WAS going to tell you,’ Alessandro said as he bundled her into his car a few tense minutes later, his expression still looking as if it had been carved from granite.

  Scarlett was opening and closing her mouth, as she had been doing ever since he had dragged her away from the press, her chest still so tight she could barely breathe, let alone get a word out.

  The journalist hadn’t minced any words. It seemed the older woman had found out a whole lot more about Alessandro Marciano’s background than the young woman who had loved him and given birth to his son.

  Still loved him, Scarlett corrected herself. She had been fooling herself into believing otherwise, but there was no point denying it now.

  ‘I just did not want to dump it on you like that bitch of a journalist just did,’ he said through gritted teeth as he started the car with a roar. ‘I wanted to prepare you for the possibility that Matthew might have cystic fibrosis like my brother Marco, or if not he could—like me—be a carrier.’

  Scarlett looked down at her still-shaking hands. The news had totally stunned her. She had not expected anything like this. She had believed Alessandro to be a playboy by choice, a man who actively sought no strings in his relationships for selfish reasons. She had never once thought there could be some other explanation. She couldn’t begin to imagine how he had suffered and agonised over his decision to become sterilised, especially at so young an age.

  The loss of his younger brother had clearly devastated him. In the whole time she had known him he had not once uttered a word about having a sibling, let alone having lost him to the debilitating and all-too-often ultimately fatal respiratory illness.

  ‘My brother was three and a half years old when he was diagnosed,’ Alessandro said into the silence. ‘He had been more or less healthy until that point. He had the occasional chest infection, but things went downhill from there. He spent most of his childhood in hospital, and when he was not in hospital he was being pummelled by physiotherapists at home trying to clear his lungs.’

  ‘I’m so sorry…’ Her voice came out as a broken whisper. ‘I am so sorry…’

  ‘You have nothing to be sorry for,’ he said. ‘I should have told you earlier. I have not spoken of Marco’s death for many years to anyone, not even my parents. It still upsets them both so much. Marco lost his childhood due to his illness and his future due to his death. He spent every day suffering while I looked on helplessly.’

  Scarlett wanted to reach out to him and hold him close but he was concentrating on negotiating his way through the thick city traffic.

  ‘I would have gladly changed places with him,’ he continued in the same ragged tone. ‘I felt so damned guilty for being the healthy one. When the doctors suggested genetic testing, I felt marginally better to find out that I had not exactly escaped. I was a carrier.’

  ‘Is that why you…?’

  He didn’t wait for her to even frame the rest of her question. ‘Yes. I decided I was not going to take any chances. Although both parents need to be a carrier to produce a child with cystic fibrosis, I was not prepared to risk it. I had seen enough. Neither of my parents knew they were carriers until Marco was diagnosed. Their marriage which had been steady enough to that point fell apart. They each wanted to blame the other. They still blame each other.’

  ‘But it’s no one’s fault,’ she said. ‘How can it be anyone’s fault? It’s just the way the dice fall.’

  He let out a long, uneven sigh. ‘I know, but I can also understand how each of them feels. It is hard when you carry the genetic blueprint for a disease. You just want to get rid of it from your life, to pretend it is not there.’

  ‘And the only way you could do that was to remove any chance of becoming a father,’ she said, beginning to chew at her lip.

  ‘Yes,’ he said, flicking a quick, shadowed glance her way. ‘But now I am a father.’

  Scarlett prayed fervently that her gut feeling was right on this, even though the hammer of doubt began to pound inside her brain with deafening force. ‘I don’t think Matthew has it, Alessandro. He’s fine. He’s a healthy little boy.’

  His hands tightened on the steering wheel. ‘How can you be sure?’ he asked. ‘He will have to be tested. Even if he does not develop the disease, he could be a carrier. Either way we have to have the test done so we will know what we are dealing with.’

  ‘Is that why you are insisting on marrying me?’ she asked after a short pause.

  He didn’t answer immediately, but Scarlett couldn’t tell if that was because the car in front had just done an illegal manoeuvre which Alessandro had to quickly counteract, or whether he was still thinking about how to respond. ‘Marriage is our only option,’ he finally said. ‘It will give Matthew my name, which is important to me for legal reasons. He is and will remain my only heir.’

  Scarlett surreptitiously pressed her hands against her flat stomach. They had made love without protection. He had assumed as he had four years ago that he wouldn’t need it—however she…

  ‘I am sorry you had to hear it the way you did,’ he said. ‘I would have given anything to spare you that.’

  She reached out a hand, laid it on his thigh and gently squeezed. ‘It’s all right, Alessandro,’ she said softly. ‘I understand your reluctance to tell me sooner, I really do.’

  He picked up her hand, brought it up to his mouth and held it tightly against his lips so she felt the movement of each agonised word against her skin as he spoke. ‘I do not want to lose him, Scarlett. I have only just realised he is mine. I have already missed three years of his life. I could not bear to lose him again now.’

  She fought back tears as he released her hand. ‘I won’t let that happen,’ she said, gripping both hands tightly in her lap. ‘Nothing and no one is going to take my son off me. Nothing.’

  He gave her a bleak look as he turned into his driveway. ‘You sound exactly like my mother,’ he said as he activated the remote control on the gates. ‘But, when she should have been celebrating Marco’s coming of age, she was preparing for his funeral instead. He died the day before his eighteenth birthday. She has never quite recovered from it, nor has my father.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said again.

  ‘We will have lunch together, and then I want to collect Matthew and spend the afternoon and evening with him. I have organised for the doctor to come to your flat to take some blood for testing.
I thought it would be less stressful for Matthew than taking him to the surgery. Is that all right with you?’

  ‘Of course,’ she said, moistening her dry lips, her heart beginning to thud again with dread. ‘Yes, of course it is.’

  He came around to open her door and as she got out he kept her hand in his and brought her up close. ‘We will marry at the end of the week. I know it is short notice, but I do not want to waste any more time.’

  She tried to get her hand back but he held it firm. ‘Surely we don’t have to rush things?’

  ‘I know how you feel, but I do not want the press to go on and on with this. Believe me, they will hound us relentlessly. It is a matter of personal privacy. Also, I do not want to miss another moment of my son’s life. I want him under my roof and under my protection. My parents will want to fly out to meet Matthew, but I will not have them come here until the media attention dies down. It will be best if we marry quickly and get on with our lives so that we are left alone.’

  Scarlett could understand his position, but she felt as if things had escalated out of her control. Just a couple of hours ago she had been adamant that she was not going to be railroaded into marriage with him, but now…

  She looked at him covertly as he led the way into his house, his face now devoid of the heart-wrenching emotion she knew was lying just under the surface. He was a deep and complex man, nothing like the arrogant self-serving playboy she had made him out to be. He was responsible and caring, and deeply hurt by the cruel hand of fate.

  He turned to look at her as he pushed open the door for her to precede him. ‘He looks like him,’ he said, his voice sounding rough and uneven.

  She felt her stomach clench. ‘Matthew looks like Marco?’

  ‘Yes.’ His broad shoulders went down in a sigh as he closed the door and leaned back against it. ‘If I hadn’t seen your computer screen-saver the other day I would still be insisting he could not possibly be my son.’

  She went to him then, hugging him around the waist, her head buried against his chest. ‘At least you know now,’ she said huskily. ‘That’s all that matters.’

  Alessandro bent his chin to the top of her head and breathed in the summer-jasmine fragrance of her hair. ‘Yes,’ he said, his heart feeling like a lead weight in his chest. ‘I know now.’

  ‘Mummy!’ Matthew said gleefully, and then when he saw the tall figure two steps behind added with even more excitement, ‘Papa!’

  Alessandro scooped up his son and held him close. The tiny but strong limbs clutching at him reassured him just as much as they tortured him with guilt. ‘How was your day?’ he asked.

  ‘Good. I made a special thing for you.’

  ‘Oh really?’ Alessandro asked, looking a little bewildered.

  ‘Box work,’ Scarlett said in an undertone, pointing to the cardboard boxes and other craft materials on the small tables scattered about the room. ‘He made a jewellery box for me the other day. It’s bright green, with pipe cleaners for handles.’

  ‘Oh.’

  Matthew came over with a proud smile and handed his father a teetering assortment of small cardboard-cartons and yogurt containers pasted together rather haphazardly.

  ‘Wow,’ Alessandro said, holding it a little gingerly. ‘What is it?’

  ‘It’s a hotel,’ Matthew announced. ‘Like the one you and Mummy are building together.’

  Scarlett looked at her son in surprise. ‘How did you know about that?’ she asked.

  ‘Roxanne told me,’ he said. ‘She said it was the biggest con…con-something you had ever done.’

  ‘Contract,’ she said. ‘It’s like an agreement or a promise, but it’s written on paper and both people sign it.’

  ‘When I grow up I want to have lots of hotels too,’ Matthew said. ‘And lots of cars, just like Papa does.’

  Alessandro felt a knife-like pain rise in his chest. What if his son didn’t get the chance to grow up? Like Marco, he might not even get to see the day he came of age. He couldn’t believe how much it hurt him to even think about the possibility of losing his little son. He had only known him a few days, and yet the love he felt for him was as strong as any devoted father’s, he was sure. It filled him, it consumed every waking moment—the need to protect his flesh and blood in every way possible.

  He forced a smile to his face and bent down to be on a level with Matthew. ‘We have come early because we have something special to tell you.’

  Matthew’s eyes became bug-like with excitement. ‘Am I getting a puppy?’ He started to jump up and down. ‘Am I? Am I?’

  ‘No, darling,’ Scarlett said. ‘It’s not a puppy.’

  Alessandro watched as his son’s little shoulders slumped, Matthew’s bottom lip trying not to pout in disappointment but failing. ‘We will think about a puppy,’ he found himself saying as he laid a hand on Matthew’s little bony shoulder.

  ‘Really?’ Matthew asked, eyes wide with anticipation.

  Alessandro gave the little shoulder under his large hand a gentle squeeze. ‘Of course we will. You can even choose its name.’

  Scarlett sent Alessandro a cautionary glance but he ignored it as he continued, ‘Matthew, your mother and I are getting married in a few days. That means basically that you will not be living in the flat alone with your mother but with me at my house.’

  Matthew’s little face fell, his hazel eyes wide with worry. ‘Is…is Mummy going to be there too?’ he asked.

  Alessandro frowned. ‘Of course she is. That is what being married means. Two people living together.’

  Matthew worked at his bottom lip for a moment before releasing it. ‘But Ben’s parents are married, but his mummy lives with someone else now.’

  Alessandro looked at Scarlett for help. ‘Can you explain this? I do not seem to be doing such a great job of it,’ he said with a rueful grimace.

  Scarlett ruffled her son’s hair and smiled at him tenderly. ‘Ben’s mum and dad are going through a divorce, which means they don’t want to live together any more. Your father and I, er, do want to live together so we can both be with you all the time.’

  ‘So I will always have a live daddy now?’ Matthew asked.

  ‘Yes,’ Alessandro said, his throat feeling tight. ‘I will always be there for you. Now, run along and get your things as we are going out tonight to celebrate becoming a family.’

  Scarlett had to wait until Matthew was out of earshot. ‘I don’t think you should have said you were going to be with him indefinitely.’

  He looked down at her. ‘Why not?’

  She hoisted the strap of her bag back over her shoulder and checked to see where Matthew was before she answered. ‘You intimated to me that our marriage was going to be temporary.’

  ‘It will last as long as it needs to last to provide for my son. I want him to visit my country. I want him to learn my language.’

  She threw him another reproachful look. ‘Promising him a puppy was totally out of line. Dogs need a lot of care and attention, and unless they spend inordinately long periods of time in quarantine they cannot travel overseas.’

  ‘I want to give him what he wants—surely that is my privilege as his father?’

  ‘You’re trying too hard,’ she said, conscious of Matthew scampering over towards them with his little backpack slung over one shoulder.

  ‘Do not tell me how to be a father to him,’ Alessandro said in a harsh undertone. ‘You are his mother, you know nothing of what being a father involves.’

  Scarlett gave him a stringent look. ‘I have been both mother and father to him for the last three years, so don’t tell me what I do and do not know.’

  Grey-blue eyes warred with hazel, but in the end it was Matthew who broke the gridlock. ‘Where are we going to celebrate being a family?’ he asked.

  Alessandro took his son’s little hand in his. ‘Where would you like to go?’ he asked.

  ‘I just want to be where you and Mummy are,’ he said with an engaging smile. ‘But s
omewhere where there is chips would be good. I love them, but Mummy won’t always let me have them.’

  ‘That’s because I want you to be as healthy as you can possibly be, darling,’ Scarlett said. ‘I want you to grow up big and strong.’

  ‘Just like Papa?’ Matthew asked, doing a little skip as he held tightly to his father’s hand.

  Scarlett saw the up-and-down movement of Alessandro’s throat and the shadow of grief come and go in his eyes as they briefly met hers. ‘Yes,’ she said softly. ‘Just like Papa.’

  ‘Is he asleep?’ Scarlett asked, peering around Matthew’s bedroom door later that evening after she had seen the doctor out.

  Alessandro stood up, his sudden increase in height making the room seem even smaller than it was. ‘Yes,’ he said, closing the book he had been reading. ‘He fell asleep on the first page, but I kept reading.’

  Scarlett looked at the title and inwardly frowned. ‘That’s probably a bit advanced for him,’ she said, indicating the copy of C. S. Lewis’s The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe in his hand.

  He turned away from her to place it back on the small shelf amongst the picture books and children’s Bible. ‘I know, but my brother really loved it when he was a child. I used to read it to him when he was in hospital for long periods. I just thought…’

  She took a step towards him even before she realised she’d moved. ‘Alessandro…’

  He turned back to face her, his expression frighteningly grave. ‘We need to talk.’

  ‘Yes—yes, I know.’

  He led her out of the room, reaching for the light switch at the same time she did, his hand coming over hers.

  Scarlett met his gaze in the semi-darkness, her heart feeling as if it was going to burst from her chest as his long warm fingers curled around hers.

  She didn’t pull away when he took her hand in his and led her through to the small sitting-room, where he took the sofa opposite once she was seated.