LITMIR.BIZ

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learned to be a father to Zac. Not just a father, but a dad.

      * * *

      The silver-gray Audi purred along the mountain road, gearing down on the hairpin curves. The narrow highway from Cusco to Urubamba could be dangerous after dark, and Emilio had warned his driver to take extra care. Tonight there was precious cargo on board.

      On the far side of the backseat, Grace had fallen asleep, her tousled blonde head pillowed in the corner between the seat and the window. Feeling an unaccustomed tenderness, Emilio had tucked a blanket around her as she slept. She’d had her whole life uprooted, but she’d kept her complaints to herself. All she’d asked of him was to let her be with the child she loved—a child who wasn’t even hers. He couldn’t help but admire that kind of devotion. For all her stubborn independence, Grace Chandler was a genuinely good woman. Arturo’s son was lucky to have her.

      The baby slumbered between them, securely buckled into his car seat. In the semidarkness, Emilio studied the chubby features—the pert nose and dimpled chin, the straight brows and feathery black eyelashes. He saw more of Cassidy than his brother in the child. But that would change. Like all Santana males, young Zac would grow to be a tall, handsome man. By the time he came of age, he would already be learning to run the estate and the Santana business empire.

      Such big responsibilities for a little boy. Little Zac should have his father here to teach him. Tio Emilio would have to fill the void. Heart skipping, Emilio brushed a fingertip across the soft ridge of knuckles. Zac stirred and whimpered, causing Emilio to pull away. Had he done something wrong? Por diós, he didn’t know the first thing about babies.

      With Arturo gone, duty demanded that he be a father to this niño precioso. But how could he even begin?

      Emilio remembered his own father as a busy, distant man who’d suffered a fatal heart attack at fifty, leaving a mistress in Callao and a twenty-year-old son as the head of the family. Arturo had been yanked out of Harvard and forced to grow up fast. Emilio, barely seventeen, had been left to drift.

      Their mother, a pampered society beauty, had been little help. She’d taken to her bed for the first few months, then flung herself into a series of sad affairs that ended one night in a fatal mix of pills and alcohol.

      In short, Emilio had barely ever known what it was like even to have a parent—he’d certainly never learned to be a parent. To him, this small lump of humanity was more intimidating than a boardroom full of corporate rivals bent on eating him alive.

      “A penny for your thoughts.” Grace’s husky voice startled him. She’d awakened and was studying him with her extraordinary hazel eyes. Tangled hair framed her sleepy face. She looked surprisingly sexy, he thought. He was struck by the intimate feel of the moment—the dark, close atmosphere of the car’s backseat; her presence beside him, warm, drowsy and more relaxed than he’d ever seen her, speaking to him in a soft, languorous voice.

      “I asked you what you were thinking.” She spoke as if explaining her previous question. Knowing she might not be pleased by the truth, Emilio scrambled for a diversion.

      “Tell me about Cassidy,” he said.

      “Didn’t you know her when she was here?”

      “We had a few conversations. But she didn’t mention her family or her illness.”

      “There wasn’t much family to tell you about. We were teenagers when her father married my mother. At first we had nothing in common. She was the beautiful, wild one. I was the older, serious one. We alternated between fighting and ignoring each other. But after our parents died in a plane crash we became close. I took care of her until she was old enough to leave home and get modeling work. Wherever she went, we kept in touch.”

      “What about the brain tumor?” he asked. “Cassidy had headaches in Peru, but she never mentioned...” He shook his head. “I keep wondering if she knew, even then.”

      “Cassidy had surgery and radiation for the tumor six years ago, when she was twenty-two. The doctors said it might come back. When she started having headaches again, yes, she knew what it was.”

      “And the baby?”

      “Soon after she got home, she discovered she was pregnant. The doctors advised an abortion. Cassidy wouldn’t hear of it. She even made us promise that if we had to, we’d keep her body on life support long enough to safely deliver the baby. But that turned out not to be necessary. She lived to hold her son and name him...and to give him to me.” Grace gulped back a surge of tears. “She sacrificed so much to bring him into the world.”

      Emilio pondered what she’d told him. “She’s not the only one. It’s a big sacrifice you’ve made, too, uprooting your life to bring him here, to a strange country—”

      Her eyes flashed in the darkness. “Zac is my life. There’s nothing I’ve left behind that matters as much to me as him.”

      “But your house, your work—”

      “My house will be there. And once my art supplies are unpacked, I can work almost anywhere. All I need is a little space.”

      “If you wish to work, of course, there’ll be room for you to set up a studio.” Emilio said. “Not that you’ll need the income. If you decide to stay, you’ll receive pay and lodging for being in charge of my brother’s son.”

      Her body went rigid, jerking her bolt upright in the seat. Emilio knew at once he’d said the wrong thing. But he didn’t know how make it right.

      He spoke against the icy wall of her silence. “You’ll also have a car and driver at your disposal. A pretty woman driving alone in this country is asking for trouble.”

      Of course he would see to it that she had everything she required while she was here and taking care of the boy. It was only fair. No matter what she said, he knew she’d given up a great deal. Room and board, plus an income for whatever else she needed, were little enough for him to provide.

      Her full lower lip quivered. “Is that all you think I am to Zac? Just his hired caretaker?”

      So that was what he’d said wrong. Emilio exhaled, easing the frustration that had surged like heat in a volcano. “Of course not. I’m just trying to do the right thing—for you, for Zac and for my family’s future.”

      She was silent for a moment, studying him with those arresting eyes. They still danced with anger, but she seemed to be holding it in. “Tell me about your family,” she said, surprising him.

      “As you said about your own family, there’s not much to tell. I lost my parents fifteen years ago. My firstborn brother died when he was four. Then there was Arturo...and me. That’s all.”

      “What about Arturo’s wife? He told me he was getting married.”

      “The wedding never happened. Arturo kept finding excuses to put it off. He said he was busy with work. But I think the truth was he never got over Cassidy.”

      Her gaze deepened in the shadows. “So you’re the last of the Santanas.”

      Emilio glanced at the sleeping baby. “Not anymore.”

      * * *

      By the time the car reached the outskirts of Urubamba, Zac was awake and fussing. Grace found the formula stored in the portable cooler. Soon he was chugging it down, clasping the bottle like a pro. Before long he’d be old enough to wean to a sippy cup, and after that there’d be walking, talking, potty training—so many ways a little boy would need a mother’s help. How could she ever think of going back to Arizona and leaving him to the care of hired nursemaids?

      Emilio sniffed and frowned. “I think somebody might need changing.”

      Grace nodded, recognizing the familiar stink. “That’s no surprise. But I was hoping I wouldn’t have to change him in the car.”

      “I was hoping the same thing. If it can wait a few more minutes, we’ll be home.”

      Home

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