LITMIR.BIZ

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Eight

      DANTE stood on the wraparound terrace of his two-story Central Park West penthouse, a cup of rapidly cooling coffee in his hand.

      Was it possible he’d been away from New York for only two days?

      It felt more like weeks.

      Either autumn had suddenly overtaken the park or he simply hadn’t noticed it, now that the leaves of the maples, oaks and sycamores far below were turning rich shades of crimson, brown and gold. Up here the mums and asters and who-knew-what-else his sister Isabella had planted in big redwood tubs had burst into vivid bloom.

      Izzy would be thrilled.

      She’d planted them last spring. Even when she was a kid, she’d loved to dig around in the dirt. Cesare would spend hours in the fenced-in yard behind the house in the Village, planting, then feeding and watering his annual crop of tomatoes. Izzy would accompany him, down on all fours tending the scraggly daisies that seemed the only flowers hardy enough to survive the Manhattan air. Now, all grown up, she’d taken one look at Dante’s terrace after he’d bought the penthouse, gotten a dreamy look and said she could just imagine how perfect some plantings would be here, and here, and here….

      So he’d let her poke and plant, he’d teased her like crazy and the result had been a summer of roses and daffs and other stuff, and now here came autumn.

      His first reaction, seeing the blaze of color this morning, was to grab the phone, call her and say, “Hey, Iz, so maybe playing in the dirt isn’t such a bad thing.”

      “It’s called gardening, you idiot,” Iz would say, and laugh.

      Except, he couldn’t tell her.

      She’d want to come by, and how could he let that happen because if she did stop over, if any of his family did, how in hell would he explain the woman and baby living in the guest suite? Would he say, “Hi, good to see you and by the way, this is Gabriella—no, I don’t think I ever introduced you to her before, Mama, and oh, by the way, this is her baby who might, emphasis on the ‘might,’ also be mine and yeah, that ‘might’ is important because somehow or other, I blew straight past the whole DNA/blood-test/paternity-test thing…”

      Right. That would work out just fine. His mother would pass out, his sisters would shriek, his brothers would tell him he was an idiot, and his father would laugh and say that obviously, the trip to Brazil had not taught him anything about negotiating.

      Dante took a long breath.

      Maybe the problem was he’d come up against someone who was a hell of a lot better at negotiating than he’d ever been.

      He raised the coffee cup and drank. Maybe caffeine would help. God knew, something had to. What in hell had he been thinking yesterday? Better still, had he really convinced Gabriella to come north…or had she played her role so well that she’d convinced him to ask her to do it?

      At this point he honestly didn’t know.

      The only certainty was that yesterday’s brilliant plan was clearly today’s potential disaster. Either he’d been manipulated big-time or he’d lost his sanity. However he looked at it, the truth was that he didn’t have any idea how he could have thought bringing her and the kid home with him would be a good idea.

      How could it be?

      The only positive thing was that nobody knew about this mess. And he had to keep it that way until it was resolved. Not easy, considering the presence of the woman and child sleeping in the guest suite, but if he moved fast, he could do it. Nobody even knew he was back. His office didn’t expect him for a couple more days. Neither did his brothers. He’d given his housekeeper a few days off because he hadn’t known exactly how long he’d be gone; he’d told his driver the same thing. The night doorman had been on duty, ditto the concierge, but why would anybody question them?

      At least he had some breathing room.

      As for why he’d acted so foolishly…he had no ready answer. Maybe he’d been punchy from lack of sleep. From all the flying back and forth. From the shock of seeing Gabriella again. From looking at a baby and being told it was his.

      Dante slugged down more of the coffee and shuddered. It was cold, oily and acrid but he drank it with grim determination. He’d brewed the pot hours ago, knowing he needed the jolt, trying to come up with a plan. Gabriella, thanks for small favors, was still sleeping. She and the baby. At least, he assumed they were because there hadn’t been a sound from the guest suite. He’d taken her there as soon as they’d stepped from his private elevator and there hadn’t been a whisper from it since.

      Not that they’d exchanged so much as a word during the flight home.

      “There’s a small room in the rear of the plane, senhor,” the attendant had told him in hushed terms when she saw Gabriella board with a swaddled infant in her arms. “The lady might find it more comfortable.”

      That was where Gabriella had spent the entire flight, curled up on a sofa in that room, the kid asleep in a contraption that looked more like the kind of pack frame he’d used hiking in Alaska than a thing meant for carrying a kid but, hey, what did he know about babies?

      Nada, he thought grimly, niente, zip. He didn’t have one fact in his head about babies beyond that they were small. And that was how he’d always liked it. He’d never been one of those guys who got off thinking about someday having children. Truth was, he always had to fake it when somebody showed him baby pictures. You had to say something, he understood that, and his standard response was “Cute,” accompanied by a big smile, the same as he’d done that day in the lobby.

      Was it his fault children, especially babies, looked pretty much alike? Or that they didn’t much interest him at this point in his life? Someday, maybe, but surely not yet.

      Which led to the distinct possibility that he might have moved too quickly in this entire situation, and yes, that was absolutely the word for it even though he knew better than to use it again with Gabriella.

      Simply put, he’d made an enormous mistake.

      The plan he’d started with—sitting down with Sam Cohen, arranging for paternity tests and, if they panned out, establishing the necessary trust funds—had been the right one. So what if the bank had sold Viera y Filho to Ferrantes? A ranch, as Sam had so reasonably pointed out, was just a ranch. He could have found another place for Gabriella, left her there while he flew home and arranged all the rest. She’d have been safe from Ferrantes, safe from poverty…

      And five thousand miles from him.

      A muscle knotted in his jaw.

      A little distance between them would have had nothing to do with his Doing The Right Thing. There was no reason for her to be here where he could see her face. Smell the unique delicacy of her perfume. Know that she’d spent the night just down the hall from his bedroom…

      “Dammit,” he muttered, and strode from the terrace into the living room.

      That was precisely the kind of crap that had brought him to this point. How could a man cling to reason when a woman who had once shared his bed sighed as he kissed her? How could he think straight when she returned his kisses as if she’d been aching for them? That had always been one of the things that had gotten to him about her, the way she’d made him feel as if he was the only man who’d ever mattered. That he was important to her.

      That she’d been becoming important to him.

      Dante snorted as he dumped the rest of the coffee into the kitchen sink.

      Why think about all this stuff again, especially since it was ridiculous? She was beautiful and bright; they’d had fun together and she was amazing in bed. End of story.

      That she could still affect him, still push the right buttons, was not good. Dante narrowed his eyes.

      Responding to his kisses even as she faced him with apparent defiance, holding herself aloof

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