She squeezed Lauren’s forearm as she moved past her to the stove.
Lauren dropped her hand from her bellybutton, cringing as she feared how much she had revealed with her hand on her middle and the yearning in her eyes.
She knows.
* * *
Paolo glanced across to Lauren as they rose in the elevator to his penthouse, half expecting she was asleep on her feet, she was so quiet. Her head was pressed into the wall behind her and her lashes were heavy, but she blinked so her eyes were still open.
“Was the day too long for you?” he asked, realizing how late it was.
“I’m a bit talked out,” she admitted, rolling her head toward him. A soft smile gave her a dreamy look that pulsed a measure of unexpected tenderness through him. “But your family is so fun. Maria apologized to me. Did you tell her to?”
“No, but I’m pleased that she did.”
“It wasn’t necessary. You might think she was meddling, but she only wants to protect you. I like her. I liked everyone.”
“They liked you.” He had enjoyed watching her charm his gregarious family with her quiet, genuine interest. She didn’t always get the joke right away, but her Italian was good enough she got there eventually. The children had been fascinated by her stories of tapping maple syrup from the trees of her grandmother’s estate and the old folks had speculated on which notorious rake could be her grandfather. She had fit in beautifully, filling him with pride at having her as his companion.#p#????#e#
“You’re lucky to have so many people care about you. You know that, don’t you?” Her earnest eyes chided him against feeling any other way.
He nod-shrugged and braced the door for her as they arrived, keeping to himself that there were times when he questioned his luck. His biting conversation with Maria when he’d carried her sleeping toddler upstairs still grated.
I’m putting one and one together and coming up with three, she had leveled at him in an undertone, too sharp for anyone’s good.
I’ve asked Lauren to marry me. I tell you that in confidence so you’ll give her the respect she deserves, Paolo had returned implacably while his urgency to marry Lauren had increased. Pretending she was a friend visiting from Canada was annoying when his intentions were not only honorable, but something he was completely committed to.
Maria’s head had snapped around with a searching expression. Are you this time, caro? Confident?
Paolo’s guts had turned to water. He hadn’t answered as indecision sat like a knot in his belly. He was aware of a growing desire that the baby be his. It scared him how badly he wanted that. Watching Lauren play board games with the children and take every opportunity to hold his cousin’s new baby had impressed on him that she was not only a woman who wanted to be a mother, but would take to the role naturally. The baby she carried was lucky and if the baby was his, he was lucky to have such a woman as mother to his offspring. Fear ate at him that he’d wind up devastated again while something deeper and fiercer demanded he claim her as his regardless.
Maria’s watchfulness as he had processed all his emotions had been unbearable, reminding him she’d seen not just his humiliation of being cheated on in the past, but his heartache at losing out on being a father. He loathed bearing pity from his family. He was their rock, not the other way around.
It doesn’t matter whose it is, he’d claimed to her. She’s the wife of my friend and needs a husband. It had sounded a little too chivalrous even to him.
Maria had cautioned him not to act too hastily and he’d walked out on her accusing him of behaving impetuously out of grief.
That’s not what this was. His feelings toward Ryan had become very contradictory. He harbored a lot of anger toward Ryan for the way he’d treated Lauren and, yes, Paolo couldn’t help turning some of that responsibility on himself, but there was more to it. Ancient instincts of familial protectiveness were clamoring in him. He wanted Lauren in his cave, well buffered from predators or falls or starvation. He wanted her cub under his guardianship. It truly didn’t matter to him whether the baby’s DNA contained his so long as he could keep both of them.
He took a moment to absorb how comfortable he was with the notion of accepting another man’s child. Because he knew it was unlikely he’d do so?
He worked his hands to dissipate the sweat that rose on his palms, disturbed by the path his mind was taking without any hard evidence. But it was tough to doubt Lauren when she was so lousy at subterfuge. More than a few lips had curled with conjecture when Lauren had declined wine, claiming, Paolo said I could drive the Lambo if I stayed sober.