‘I did’
Elisa’s mouth dropped open and then it snapped shut and her eyes shot messages of murder and mayhem at him.
‘guess her father never told you she was a tramp.”
‘your father did not call you such a name.” He deeply regretted telling Elisa what her father had said at all. It had hurt her and that only added more weight to the guilt he carried regarding her.
‘Whatever. You were telling me about this panning person.”
‘Not panning , Pennini .” He felt his lips curve at her sarcastic wit.
‘she is not a loaf of bread, carA”
‘she’s not your ex-wife either. You’ve never been married.”
Remembered humiliation made him frown. ‘No. She is not my ex-wife. I planned to marry her though.”
‘lucky her ”
He shrugged, feeling uncomfortable all of a sudden.
‘she thought so. My family is rich. I am my father’s only heir. Already I was being groomed to take over the business.”
‘What are you saying, that she tricked you?” Again Elisa sounded disbelieving. ‘I suppose that baby wasn’t yours either.”
‘Exactly ” Suspicion narrowed her eyes. ‘Are you sure?” ‘ ‘Si Very sure. My father, he was furious when I told him I intended to marry this girl. He threatened to cut me off, but I did not care.”
‘He didn’t want you to marry the mother of your baby? That doesn’t sound very Sicilian.”
‘He did not believe the baby was mine.”
‘so it’s hereditary.”
He wanted to touch her so badly, to once again kiss her and wipe that look of distrust and antipathy off her face, but he knew she would not accept it.
‘My father was right.”
Elisa’s arms crossed under her very lovely breasts.
‘sure he was.”
‘He investigated her and discovered she had been sleeping with another man who happened to be ten years her senior and married only a week before she and I became lovers.”
‘That doesn’t mean the baby wasn’t yours.”
Too tense to remain motionless, he paced to the other side of the vault.
‘No, it does not, but the blood tests done during her pregnancy did.”
‘Blood tests?” Her voice sounded close and he turned.
She was standing right behind him, having followed him the few feet across the vault.
’she had to have an amniocentesis. I do not even know why, but my father got hold of the results.
The baby’s blood type was neither hers nor mine.”
‘And he told you.”