Reunited by a Baby Secret (The Vineyards of Calanetti, Book 3)

by Michelle Douglas

That was why it looked familiar. He nodded. ‘Right.’

  ‘Colin should be along any minute. He promised to bring me a custard tart for afternoon tea.’

  What was it with women and cake?

  ‘Should I text and tell him to pick one up for you too?’

  He shook his head and then realised he had barely said a word since walking into her room. ‘No, thank you.’ Eating custard tarts with his mother and her husband didn’t fill him with a huge amount of enthusiasm. ‘I...uh...how are you feeling?’

  ‘Very well, thank you. The doctors are very happy with my progress.’

  ‘That’s good news.’

  ‘The man you called in—the specialist—is a real wizard apparently. The rest of the staff have been whispering what an honour it is to see him in action.’

  ‘Excellent.’

  They glanced at each other and then quickly away again. An awkward silence descended. Ryan moved to stare out of the window.

  ‘How is your Marianna doing?’

  It wasn’t so much the words as the tone that had an imaginary rope tightening around his neck and coiling down his body, binding him with suffocating tightness. He made an impatient movement to try and dispel the sense of constriction. ‘She’s not my Marianna.’ And he wasn’t her Ryan. The sooner everyone understood that, the better.

  ‘Oh.’

  He grimaced, wondering if he’d been too forceful.

  ‘She’s a lovely young woman.’

  ‘She is.’ But how on earth had he let her talk him into coming to see Stacey like this? ‘We walked around to Gran’s house this morning.’

  ‘Ah.’

  Ah? What the hell was that supposed to mean?

  ‘Marianna encouraged you to come and see me today, didn’t she?’

  He halted his pacing to glance around at her. ‘I don’t think it was such a good idea.’ He started for the door. ‘I don’t see the point in raking over the past.’

  ‘Sit down, Ryan.’

  His mother’s voice held a note of command that made him falter. He turned and folded his arms, the stupid Kitty Cat still dangling from his hand.

  ‘Please.’

  He stared at the stuffed toy. He thought about Marianna. He knew how disappointed she’d be if he left now. He didn’t want to disappoint her. At least, not on that head. He sat down.

  ‘I want to tell you what I told Marianna when I first met her.’

  He pulled in a breath. ‘Which was?’

  ‘That the biggest regret of my life was leaving you with your grandmother.’

  He couldn’t look at her, afraid his face would betray his disbelief and bitterness.

  From the corner of his eye he saw her lean towards him. ‘Will you listen? I mean really listen?’

  With an effort he unclenched his hands from around the stuffed toy. ‘Sure.’

  She didn’t speak for a long moment, but still he refused to look at her.

  ‘It’s hard to know where to start precisely, but we may as well start with the breakdown of my marriage to your father. You see, I thought it all my fault.’

  That made him glance up and he tried not to wince at her pallor or the way she pleated and unpleated the bed sheet. ‘Are you’re sure you’re up to this? Maybe we should wait until you’ve been sent home with a clean bill of health.’

  ‘No!’ She gave a short laugh. ‘I’m under no illusion that I’ll ever get another shot at this.’

  He could just walk out, but Marianna’s face rose in his mind. He cast another quick glance in his mother’s direction. Walking out now might cause her more distress. He forced himself to remain in his seat and nod. ‘Fine.’

  ‘Ryan, I only meant to leave you with your grandmother for a couple of weeks. I needed to find a new place to live.’

  ‘But Andrew—’ his father ‘—had gone. There was no need for you to move out of the house as well.’

  ‘I couldn’t afford the rent on my own.’

  ‘He would’ve had to pay you child maintenance. That would’ve helped.’

  ‘I... I refused it.’

  His head rocked back.

  ‘As I said, I blamed myself for our split and it didn’t seem right to me at the time to take his money.’

  ‘You thought that in my best interests?’

  ‘I thought that if I could just get a job...find a cheap place to rent, that I could make things perfect for us and...’ She lifted a hand and then let it drop again. ‘Getting a job proved harder than I expected. Eventually I managed to find one in the kitchen of a cruise ship, but it meant being away for months on end.’

  Ryan folded his arms. ‘You were gone for three years!’

  ‘I know,’ she whispered. ‘I’m sorry. I saved every dollar I could and came home to make a life with you and—’

  He leapt up to pace the room again. ‘Let’s not pretty it up. You met Colin on that cruise liner, got pregnant, and came back here to start a family with him.’ With Colin not with Ryan.

  ‘But you were part of our plans. We wanted you to live with us. It’s just...when I came back it was as if you hated me.’

  ‘I was seven years old. I barely knew you!’

  ‘I cried for a week.’

  ‘Poor you.’

  She flinched and he knew he should feel ashamed of himself, but all he felt was a deep, abiding anger. ‘From memory I don’t recall you expending a whole lot of energy in an effort to win me over.’

  ‘You brought all of my hidden insecurities to the surface,’ she whispered. ‘I told myself I deserved your anger and resentment. I didn’t want to wreck things with Colin...and I had a new baby. I had to consider them. You were happy with your grandmother. It seemed best to leave you with her for a bit longer.’

  A bit longer, though, had become forever.

  He spun around and glared. ‘Never once did you put my needs first.’

  She paled. ‘I didn’t mean it to happen that way. I was crippled by guilt, a lack of confidence and low self-esteem. I never realised, though, that you would be the one to pay the price for those things.’

  His lips twisted. In other words things had got tough and she hadn’t been able to deal with them. But something in her face caught at him, tugged at some part of him that still wanted to believe in her.

  Idiot!

  He tried to smother the confusion that converged on him with anger.

  ‘You’re never going to forgive me, are you?’

  ‘It’s not about forgiveness.’ His voice sounded cold even to his own ears. ‘It’s about trust. I don’t trust you to ever put me and mine first. I don’t trust you to ever have my back.’

  She pressed both hands to her chest, her eyes filling. ‘Heavens, your father and I really did a job on you, didn’t we?’

  ‘You taught me at a very young age how the world works. It’s a lesson I haven’t forgotten.’

  ‘Son, please...’

  He resented her use of the word.

  ‘Tell me that you at least trust Marianna, that you don’t keep her at arm’s length.’

  He gave a harsh bark of laughter. He wanted to trust Marianna. He couldn’t deny it, but nor could he trust the impulse. An ache rose up through him—an ache for all of those things he could never have, all of those things Marianna wanted from him that he was unable to give. Impossible! The best way to deal with such delusions, the smartest, most logical course of action, was to deliver them a swift mortal blow.

  He whirled back to Stacey. ‘Trust? What you taught me, Mother, was the frailties and weaknesses of women. I’m ready for that. When motherhood and the responsibility of raising a child become too much for Marianna, I’ll be there for my child. I won’t abandon it.’

  A gasp in the doorway had him spinning around. Marianna stood there pale and shaking, her eyes dark and bruised. Without another word, she turned on her heel and spun away.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  THE EXPRESSION IN Marianna’s eyes pushed all thought from Ryan’s mind. He surged forward an
d caught her wrist, bringing her to a halt. ‘Wait, Mari—’

  She swung back, her eyes savage. ‘Don’t call me that!’

  He swallowed back a howl. ‘You have to let me explain.’

  ‘Explain? No explanation is necessary! You made yourself perfectly clear, and I have to say it was most enlightening to find what you really think of me and our current situation.’

  It hit him then how badly he’d hurt her and it felt as if he’d thrust a knife deep into his own heart. He let her go and staggered back a step, wondering what on earth was happening to him, searching his mind for a way to make things right—to stop her from looking at him as if he were a monster.

  ‘To think I thought... And all this time you’ve been thinking I would abandon our child?’

  The jagged edges of her laugh sliced into him. Marianna might be impulsive, passionate and headstrong, but she was also full of love and loyalty. He need look no further than her relationships with her brothers for proof of that. The truth that had been growing inside him, the truth he’d been hiding from, slammed into him now, bowing his shoulders and making him fall back a step. She would never abandon her child. Never.

  What right did he have to thrust his worst-case scenario onto her? How could he have been so stupid? So...blind?

  His chest cramped. He’d held on to that mistaken belief as an excuse to justify remaining close to her. Because he’d wanted to be close to her.

  She reached out and stabbed a finger to his chest. ‘Stay away from me,’ she rasped, her eyes bright with unshed tears. ‘I will let you know when the baby is born, but you can’t ask anything else of me.’

  She wheeled away from him, making for the door. He couldn’t let her go! He started after her, not sure what he could say but unable to bear losing sight of her. Rebecca, holding Lulu, stepped in front of him, bringing him up short. He couldn’t thrust her aside, not when she was holding the baby. He made to go around her, but she laid a hand on his chest. ‘You can’t go after her when you look like that. You can’t go after her without a plan.’

  He lurched over to the chair and fell into it. A plan? He’d need a miracle!

  ‘So it’s true.’ His mother’s words broke into the darkness surrounding him. ‘You’re in love with her.’

  He lifted his head and looked at her. In love with Marianna? Yes. The knowledge should surprise him more than it did. ‘What do I do?’ The words broke from him.

  She didn’t flinch from his gaze. ‘We play to your strengths.’ He could hardly believe she was still talking to him after all he’d just flung at her.

  ‘You’re a logical man. What does Marianna want?’

  ‘Passion, an undying love, to never be bored.’ The words left him without hesitation.

  ‘Can you give her those things?’

  He recalled the way her brothers had taunted him with their stupid Paulo joke. The fact, though, was there was a thread of truth running beneath that. What if, a month down the track, Marianna dumped him?

  Darkness speared into him. For a moment it hurt to even breathe.

  No! He shoved his shoulders back. He wouldn’t give her the opportunity to get bored. He wouldn’t let their life and relationship become dull. He loved her—heart and soul—and if she’d just give him the chance he’d give her all the passion and intensity that her generous heart yearned for. He set his mouth—he’d make it his life’s work.

  He met his mother’s gaze. ‘I can give her those things.’

  ‘You’ll need to give a hundred per cent of yourself. Everything,’ she warned.

  Fine.

  ‘I’m talking about your time here, Ryan.’

  He frowned—what was she talking about?

  ‘You’re going to need to focus all your efforts on Marianna if you want to win her back.’

  It hit him then—the Conti contract! If he signed on the dotted line, they’d need him on board from the week after next. He’d be working sixty-hour weeks for at least a month.

  He swore. He scratched a hand through his hair. If he managed to smooth things over in the coming week with Marianna, maybe she’d let him off the hook for the following month and—

  Fat chance! She’d demand all of him. Damn it! Why did she have to be so demanding? Why so unreasonable?

  Suck it up, buddy. After the way you just acted, Marianna deserves to have any demand met, deserves proof of your sincerity.

  Acid burned his throat. Panic rolled through him. What if he didn’t succeed in smoothing things over?

  What if she never forgave him?

  He shot to his feet, paced the length of the room before flinging himself back into the chair. If she never forgave him he’d have lost both her and the Conti contract. Where was the sense in that?

  He couldn’t throw away all of that hard work. He couldn’t just dismiss months’ worth of nail-biting preparation. This was the contract that would set him up long term, would guarantee his livelihood for the rest of his working life and cement him as one of the business’s leading lights. The Conti contract would prove once and for all that his grandmother’s faith in him had been justified! He couldn’t walk away.

  Darkness descended over him, swallowing him whole. A moment later a single light pierced the darkness, making him lift his head. But what if he did win Marianna’s forgiveness? What if she did agree to marry him, build a family with him...to love him? A yearning stronger than anything he’d ever experienced gripped him now. Wasn’t winning Marianna’s love worth any risk?

  His heart pounded so hard he thought he’d crack a rib. No contract meant anything without Marianna and his child by his side. The knowledge filtered through him, scaring him senseless, but he refused to turn away from it. There’d be no point to any of his success—small or large—if he couldn’t share it with Marianna and their child. He lifted his head. ‘For Marianna, I’ll make the time.’

  * * *

  Marianna stumbled into her cottage, clicking on all the lights in an attempt to push back the darkness, but it didn’t work—not when the darkness was inside her. Forty hours of travel clung to her like a haze of grit. All she wanted to do was shower and fall into bed. The exhaustion, though, was worth not having had to clap eyes on Ryan again.

  She halted in the doorway to her bedroom—the bed unmade, the sheets dishevelled from her and Ryan’s lovemaking.

  She dropped her bags and with a growl she pulled the sheets from the bed, resisting the urge to bury her face in them to see if they still carried a trace of Ryan’s scent. She dumped them straight into the washing machine, set it going and then, leaving her clothes where they fell, she pushed herself under the stinging hot spray of the shower, doing what she could to rub the effects of travel and heartbreak from her body. She succeeded with the former, but it gave her little comfort.

  Like a robot she dressed, remade the bed and forced herself to eat scrambled eggs. She didn’t think she’d ever feel hungry again, but she had to keep eating for the baby’s sake.

  In the next moment she shot to her feet, the utter tidiness of the room setting her teeth on edge. With a growl, she pushed over the stack of magazines on the coffee table so they fell in an untidy sprawl. She messed up the cushions on the sofa, threw a dishtowel across the back of a dining chair—haphazardly. She didn’t push her chair in at the table, and she slammed her plate and cutlery on the sink, but didn’t wash them. She shoved the tea, coffee and sugar canisters on the kitchen bench out of perfect alignment.

  None of it made her feel any better.

  A tap on the door accompanied with a ‘Marianna?’ pulled her up short.

  Nico. She swallowed. ‘Come on through,’ she called out.

  He sauntered into the room. ‘I saw the lights on and thought you must be home. You should’ve let us know to expect you. I’d have collected you from the airport.’

  He pulled up short and took her in at a single glance. He’d always managed to do that, but she lifted her chin. She didn’t want to talk about it.

&
nbsp; ‘Alone?’ he finally ventured.

  She moved to fill the kettle. ‘Yes.’

  He was silent for a moment. ‘How’s Ryan’s mother?’

  ‘Out of danger and recovering beautifully.’ She’d ring Stacey tomorrow to double-check that the scene in her hospital room hadn’t had any detrimental effects on her recovery. And to assure her that she wouldn’t prevent any of them from seeing the baby once it was born.

  ‘That’s good news.’

  ‘It is.’

  He paused again. ‘How are you?’

  She met his gaze and his expression gentled. ‘Oh, Mari.’

  She couldn’t keep it together then. She walked into his arms and burst into tears, her heart shredding afresh with every sob. Why couldn’t Ryan love her?

  She refused to let the words fall from her lips, though, and she did what she could to pull herself together. She moved away, scrubbing the tears from her cheeks. ‘I’m sorry. I’m tired.’

  ‘You have nothing to apologise for.’

  Was that true?

  ‘I take it we shouldn’t expect Ryan any time soon?’

  Her brother deserved some form of explanation. ‘I told him I’d let him know when the baby was born.’

  Nico’s eyes darkened in concern.

  ‘It’s okay.’ She could see he didn’t believe her and she didn’t blame him. It wasn’t okay, but there was nothing she could do about it. She just had to get on with it the best she could. ‘We...we just messed up, that’s all. And I find that I can’t be...friends with him.’

  He swore softly in Italian.

  She managed a smile. ‘It’s okay, Nico. I’m a big girl. I will never denigrate him to my child. When we meet I will be polite and calm. That’s what will be best for my darling topolino.’

  He took her hand. ‘But what’s best for you?’

  She could never tell him and Angelo all that had passed between her and Ryan. They’d have to find a way to be polite to him too. She didn’t want to make that more difficult for them than it had to be. ‘The baby has to come first. That’s what matters to me.’

  He swore again and his grip on her hand tightened. ‘He’s broken your heart!’

  She moistened her lips and dredged up another smile. ‘Some would say it’s no less than I deserve for that trail of Paulos I’ve left in my wake.’