LITMIR.BIZ

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      “Not as long as I don’t have to stay there. I’d miss Nonna and Nonno, and all my friends.”

      “Just as we’d miss you,” her grandfather said, his glance again settling on Callie with brief and telling intent. “Far too much to allow you to live so far away.”

      Allow? she fume dinwardly. Who did he think he was? God?

      She had to bite her lip to keep the lid on her annoyance. Why didn’t he just come out and say he didn’t trust her, and the whole idea of her marrying into his illustrious family turned his stomach? she thought, defiantly returning his stare.

      Most young wives, if they had any problems at all with their husbands’ parents, seemed more often to be at logger-heads with the mother-in-law. Clearly, in her case, Salvatore was going to be the difficult one.

      Hard-pressed to conceal the acid in her tone, she said, “In case you missed it the first time around, Signor Rainero, the whole purpose of our making a home for the children is to create as little disruption to their lives as possible. Relocating to San Francisco, or anywhere other than Rome, for that matter, would be counterproductive, don’t you think?”

      He inclined his head in regal assent, and the meal ended shortly after. And not a moment too soon, as far as Callie was concerned. She’d had about as much of Salvatore’s overbearing attitude as she could take for one day, and when Lidia asked if she’d like to help get the children settled for the night, she leaped at the chance.

      Perching on Clemente’sbed, with him leaning affectionately against her on one side, and Gina cuddled up next to her on the other, and watching the telltale expressions sweeping over their adorable little face as Lidia read, in English, another chapter from Sarah Plain and Tall, Callieknewadeepthankfulnessfor the changes that had come so unexpectedly into her life.

      This was what she’d missed with her children—the small, everyday rituals they’d cherish the rest of their lives—and to be given the chance to take part in them at last was nothing short of a miracle.

      “Sarah’s like you, Zia Caroline,” Gina decided, when Lidia finally closed the book.

      Callie laughed. “You mean, plain and tall?”

      “No,” Gina said, shocked. “You’re pretty. You look a lot like Mommy. But you’ve come to look after us because she can’t anymore, and that’s what Sarah did in the story, as well.”

      “Yes.” Stabbed by one of those sudden pangs of loss that crept up on her so frequently, Callie dropped a kiss on her daughter’s head. “And just like Sarah in the story, I’ll never leave you.”

      Clemente tugged on her sleeve. “Or me?”

      “Or you, sweetheart.”

      His father closed the library door, went directly to the antique carved butler table where coffee and liqueurs waited, and poured two glasses of grappa. “All right, there’s no one here now but the two of us,” he said, handing one glass to Paolo. “So tell me, my son, what’s really behind this preposterous idea of marrying Caroline Leighton?”

      “I already told you. I want to put the pieces of the twins’ lives back together, the best way I know how.”

      His father curled his lip scornfully. “And we both know you don’t need to marry that woman, to do it. Or, if you feel you must take a wife in order to provide a mother figure, that there are a dozen other women more suited—possibly a hundred!—who’d jump at the chance to take on the job.”

      “But none as dedicated as Caroline to your grandchildren’s welfare. Even you can’t deny that she loves Gina and Clemente.” His gaze clashed with his father’s. “I expect you to find that reason enough to give us your blessing, even if you disapprove of my choice.”

      For a long moment, their gazes remained locked in silent combat—two men used to getting their own way, Paolo thought grimly, the difference being that the elder had years more experience in winning.

      This time, however, his father was the first to break eye contact. “At least you don’t insult my intelligence by claiming to be in love with her,” he growled.

      To ward off the chill of evening, Paolo knelt and put a match to the fire laid in the marble hearth. “How I feel about Caroline is irrelevant to this discussion.”

      A clever, smooth answer, delivered with enough dispassion that even his own father couldn’t detect the lie. But there was no deceiving himself. His feelings for Caroline had undergone a huge change. He’d been falling more in love with her every day, and hadn’t hit bottom yet. Probably never would.

      Strange how things work out sometimes, he thought, poking at a log. Who’d have expected that what began with a funeral, would end with a wedding? That mutual sorrow would provide the breeding ground for love? Certainly not he!

      The day he’d met her in Paris, he’d viewed Caroline as his family’s self-declared enemy, one he was prepared to defeat by any means available. He’d been fooled by her aloof reserve, her icy control, seeing both as symptoms of a woman too self-involved to be touched by anyone’s tragedy but her own. There’d been nothing left of the sweet innocent he’d once seduced.

      Or so he’d believed at the time. Little by little, though, her brittle facade had cracked, beginning as early as that same afternoon when the twins’ nanny, Tullia, brought them back to his parents’ apartment from the park. At the sight of them, Caroline, who’d been taking tea with his mother in the salon, jumped up so abruptly from her chair that her cup overturned in its saucer.

      “Oh!” she’d whispered brokenly, flying across the room to where the children hovered in the doorway, and folding them in a fierce hug.

      He’d heard a world of love in that single syllable; a lifetime of something that, if he hadn’t known better, he’d have identified as a regret painful beyond bearing. The twins, though, still frozen with a grief too large for any child to comprehend, had remained unmoved, not caring about her enough either to reject or accept her.

      “Can you not say ciao to your aunt?” he’d asked them, surprised and not a little chagrined at how sorry he felt for her.

      “Ciao,” they’d recited obediently, and tried to wriggle free.

      After that, for him, it had been downhill all the way. The cracks in her composure had grown increasingly more noticeable, try as she might to hide them. At any other time, his mother would have noticed, and done her best to console their guest. But his mother was drowning in her own sorrow, and able to offer limited comfort at best.

      As for his father, so deeply ingrained was his antipathy for her that, if Caroline had collapsed in a broken heap at his feet, he’d have stepped over her without a second glance, and sent for the maid to clean up the mess.

      Paolo, though, grew more enamored by the hour,even if he’d been slow to realize it at the time. How else to explain why he couldn’t keep his hands off her, or stay away from her at night, or bear not being within touching distance during the day?

       Why else had he proposed to her?

      Oh, he might fool everyone else with his altruistic motives, and yes, his niece and nephew had figured hugely in his decision, but no use fooling himself. He wanted Caroline despite all the practical reasons for marrying her, not because of them. He was hooked, plain and simple. And loving every minute of it!

      Unable to keep the smile off his face, he dusted off his hands and picked up his glass again, aware that his father watched him closely.

      “You say your feelings for Caroline are irrelevant, Paolo?” he said scornfully. “Then I say, either you’re lying to me, or worse, you’re lying to yourself.”

      “You’re entitled to your opinion, Father.”

      His father responded with a derisive snort. “Opinion, nothing! Admit it, man: you’re besotted with her! She’s sbewitched

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