scrubbed a hand over his face.
Why didn’t she tell me? Was he really the father? Olivia had led him to believe that she carried his baby, only then he’d found out she’d tricked him. She’d already been pregnant when they’d slept together. Olivia had viewed Dante as perfect daddy material for another man’s child...
He was angry. Angry at himself for thinking Shay might be different, but apparently not. He should’ve known better—a week and a one-night stand were no time to get to know someone. To trust someone.
A pink blush tinged her creamy cheeks. “I took this job so that I could tell you in person.”
“Why didn’t you tell me sooner?” he demanded. “Why didn’t you contact me before you showed up here? As soon as you found out? It’s been months, Shay. You can understand my trepidation. My anger, surely?”
She winced. “I know. But I’ve only very recently found out myself, Dante. I’m sixteen weeks.”
“Four months in and you expect me to believe that you just found out?” Dante scoffed.
“Yes. I was working in a war-torn area. My periods have always been irregular and I put their absence down to stress and travel. I wasn’t keeping that close an eye on dates, but something told me that it had been too long. I took a test, which came out positive, but then there was no way to contact you. Communication was spotty.”
Dante saw red. “You were pregnant in a war zone?”
Her eyes narrowed. “There are lots of pregnant women in war zones.”
Dante cursed under his breath and scrubbed a hand over his face. “That’s not what I meant.”
“Sure sounded like it.” She crossed her arms and he noticed her breasts were fuller and he recalled at that moment the way his hands fit so nicely around them.
Get control of yourself.
“Fine. So you couldn’t get word to me.”
“No, I thought it would be news better delivered in person.”
“I want a paternity test,” he demanded.
Shocked and hurt, Shay glared at him. “It’s your baby, Dante. I haven’t been with anyone else.”
“You didn’t even know you were pregnant right away, so you understand my hesitancy. We used protection,” he said.
“A faulty condom. They’re not infallible.” Shay sighed. “And I don’t sleep around. I don’t sleep with strangers.”
“Wasn’t I a stranger, cara?”
She shot him daggers. “I didn’t come here to make you a father, Dante. I actually took the job because it paid well, so that I could take a longer maternity leave when I return to the States.”
“So you considered not telling me?”
“Of course not. You have the right to know about your child, Dante. What I’m saying is that I don’t expect anything from you.”
Everything was sinking in and he was having a hard time processing for a moment. He wanted to believe that she was telling him the truth, but he’d been burned before. And thanks to his father’s indiscretions the entire world seemed to know that he was a prince, poised to inherit a vast estate of land and money. Wasn’t that what had drawn Olivia to him?
Of course, if Shay was pregnant with his child, it solved all of his problems.
He had to be married and have an heir by the time he was thirty-five. There was nothing in the will that stated he had to stay married. And while Olivia had made him very wary of marriage, he had wanted to be a father for as long as he could remember. He wanted the happy family he’d never had growing up. Plus, he knew that Shay was passionate about her job. She wouldn’t want to settle down in Italy with him—hadn’t she told him that she feared staying in one place for too long? What if he could get full custody of the baby? Have the child he’d always wanted without risking his heart.
“Dante, say something. Anything,” Shay said. “I know this must be a terrible shock.”
Before he could say anything there was a knock on his door. His assistant poked her head round it. “Dr. Affini? The trainees are gathered in the lecture theatre and are waiting for you.”
Dante acknowledged the woman before he turned back to Shay. “We’ll talk later. We have a job to do.”
Shay smiled, relieved. “Yes. We have a job to do.”
He’d let her have relief for now, but this was far from over.
* * *
Shay had wanted to tell Dante that she was pregnant from the moment she’d found out. She was frustrated when she realized she’d put their child in danger, and then when he’d insinuated that, she’d felt even guiltier. She wasn’t irresponsible. Once she’d known she was expecting, she’d been flown out, leaving her free to take over this assignment from her colleague Daniel, who’d sadly just been diagnosed with stage two colon cancer. She’d dreaded telling Dante here, at work, but she respected him and he deserved to know about their child. She also wanted him to know that she didn’t expect anything.
She wasn’t looking for a marriage or even for him to be part of the child’s life if he didn’t want to be.
She knew firsthand what it was like when a man was forced into staying.
Her own father had made that painfully clear to her until the day he’d left her and her mother.
So she knew what it was like to be rejected by her father and she didn’t want that for her child. And that was why she’d been terrified of telling Dante. Terrified he’d reject her and the baby, which would make the next twelve weeks working with him miserable.
Glad to be able to focus for the moment on the job at hand, Shay took the time it took them to make their way to the lecture theatre to chat about the assignment with Dante.
“I think I’m pretty much up-to-date on what Daniel was planning to do and how he was going to implement the simulation and training program,” Shay said as she skimmed through the binder that she’d been given as she’d boarded the plane.
“So, what happened to Daniel?” Dante asked.
“Cancer,” Shay said sadly.
“That’s too bad. I wish him a speedy recovery, but I wish they had told me he wasn’t coming.” Dante rubbed his dimpled chin, and those butterflies that liked to dance around in the pit of her stomach months ago were starting up again. She’d forgotten how he affected her. He was still so handsome, the stubble on his chin suited him and she resisted the urge to tuck back the errant strand of his thick black hair.
“I thought you had been informed that Daniel was no longer coming,” she said.
“Clearly not,” he snapped.
“Dante, you’re clearly not okay with this.”
“I’m
