own worth?’ she put in. ‘Or how much you are worth signor?’ She took delight in watching him stiffen. ‘Well, let me put that question straight before there is any more confusion here. You are worth precisely nothing to me—capisce?’ She even used Marco’s way of saying it. ‘So you may write on your cheque “I give my illegitimate daughter Antonia Carson exactly nothing!”’ Her eyes flashed with disgust. ‘Now excuse me,’ she said, and turned and left the room.
If Marco had been there to watch her do it, he would have recognised the move as Antonia showing her contempt.
But Marco wasn’t here. And neither did she intend to be by the time he arrived home. If her own father could view her like that, what hope did she ever have of gaining the respect of anyone while she continued to stay with Marco?
She had to go—and right now, she decided. Before Marco had any chance of convincing her otherwise! And the saddest thing was she knew he could do it. One word, one touch, and she was as weak as a kitten where it involved him.
Carlotta was hovering in the hallway. Her face looked concerned, which made Antonia wonder if the housekeeper had overheard what had been said in the sitting room.
But, ‘Will you see Signor Gabrielli out for me, please?’ was all Antonia said to her. Then walked past her and into the bedroom…
At about the same time that she was confronting her father, Marco was confronting his own across the desk in the family library. All around them stood the results of centuries of time-honoured collecting. The house itself was a national treasure. And out beyond the window spread a whole valley strung with the vines which made the wine the Bellini name was as famous for as its centuries-old corporate leadership.
‘I need your support,’ Marco was saying grimly. ‘I have no wish to feud with my own parents, but push me and I will.’ It was both a threat and a warning.
‘You are expecting me to dictate to your mother?’ the older man asked, then released a laugh of fond derision. ‘Sorry, Marco. But I am too sick and too wise to accept the task.’
But he wasn’t as sick as Marco had expected to find him. ‘You’re looking better,’ he remarked—perhaps belatedly.
‘Thank you for noticing.’ His father thought it belated too. In height, in looks, in every way there could be, Marco was his father’s son. But a few months ago a virus had sucked the life out of Federico Bellini. By the time the doctors had managed to stabilise him he had halved his body weight, lost the use of one lung and damaged his heart, liver and kidneys.
‘New drugs,’ the older man dismissed with the same contempt with which he had always treated the medication which kept him living. ‘Who is this woman your mother sees as such a threat that she publicly offends her?’
Subject of his health over, Marco noted. It was his father’s way. It would be Marco’s way, given the same circumstances. ‘You know who she is,’ he sighed. ‘She’s been living with me for the last year.’
‘You mean you’re still with the same one?’ Federico pretended to be shocked, but Marco wasn’t taken in by it. Though he did allow himself a wry little smile of appreciation for the thrust. ‘No wonder your mother is in a panic.’
‘It isn’t her place to panic.’
‘Then I repeat,’ his father incised, ‘who is she?’ And the accent was most definitely on the who.
Dipping his hand into his inside pocket, it was not a chequebook that Marco retrieved, but a photograph, taken at his best friend’s wedding. He dropped it on the desk in front of his father. Federico picked it up, studied it.
‘Your good taste has never been in question,’ he drawled.
‘But—?’ Marco prompted.
‘I might have been out of circulation for the last year, but I have seen the painting,’ Federico said. ‘She has an exquisite body and sad eyes.’ The photograph came back across the desk.
Odd, Marco noted, that when he could have challenged that comment with the truth he did nothing of the kind.
Because Antonia was right, he realised. Look at the naked mother and you see the naked daughter. So it didn’t really matter what people were told.
And anyway, there was a point of honour here he was determined to hold on to. He had a right to choose his own future, and Antonia had a right to be accepted for that choice. If his parents could not bring themselves to do that, then…
Then what? he asked himself.
‘Nice to own. Nice to sip,’ his father murmured. ‘But that’s about all, Marco…’
It was a refusal of support. Marco picked up the photograph and placed it back in his pocket. ‘Is that your final word?’
His father sent him a grim look as he stood up to leave. ‘Is she pregnant?’ he asked.
Now there was an interesting concept, Marco mused cynically. A Bellini child, born out of wedlock. A wry smile touched his mouth ‘No,’ he replied. ‘But I could easily make it so.’
Ah—now he was actually being taken seriously, he saw with grim satisfaction as his father’s expression sharpened dramatically. ‘Sit down,’ Federico commanded.
Marco complied, but only because it was what he had expected to be told when he’d stood up in the first place.
‘Now, explain to me why this woman, when you could have any woman you wanted?’
Arrogance abounded. Antonia would have just loved to hear his father say those words. ‘She’s what I want.’ He stated it simply. Then he sat forward and looked his father directly in the eye. ‘She is what I intend to have,’ he extended with deadly seriousness. ‘Comprende…?’
The silence lasted for all of thirty seconds, the sabre fight with their eyes an evenly matched thing. Then Federico Bellini sat back in his thick brown leather chair, huffed out a short laugh, gave a shake of his head and said, ‘Next weekend. Here, I think. We will keep this official, above-board and on the right side of the sheets, if you don’t mind.’
‘Grazie,’ Marco thanked him, and not by a flicker did he wallow in his triumph.
But his father hadn’t finished. His eyes suddenly took on a devilish gleam. ‘Now all you have to do is get your mother to see things your way…’
Carlotta had already been in and returned the bedroom to its usual pristine smoothness, Antonia found. Nothing out of place, nothing to show that the room had been used at all. Walking over to a built-in closet, she took out the small leather suitcase again. She wasn’t really surprised to find that Marco had neatly returned her clothes to their appropriate places in the room. It was the way of the man. The way of his housekeeper. Everything neat and in its place. This bedroom was Antonia’s place. Last night should have reminded her of that.
This time no angry male strode in to halt the process of packing. The suitcase closed with a snap. But as she set the case down on the floor a knock sounded on the door and Carlotta stepped inside.
Of course, she had to see the suitcase. Her eyes
