I study her face, noting how she won't meet my eyes.
A wild thought flashes through my mind.
Could they be mine?
The timing… if she got pregnant right before I left for Italy…
But that's impossible.
Elena would have told me.
She would have reached out, let me know I had children in the world.
Even if she hated me for her father's imprisonment, she wouldn't have kept something like that from me.
Would she?
I look at her more closely, trying to recall the children's faces. Do they look like me? Like my father or Gabriella?
No. I'm letting tonight's intimacy cloud my judgment, creating fantasies because I want a deeper connection to her, a reason to stay in her life.
"I'm sorry," I say, pushing the ridiculous thought away. "That must have been difficult, finding out you were pregnant after he was gone."
Elena nods, still not looking at me. "It was… complicated."
"And he never came back? Never tried to be part of their lives?"
"He couldn't.”
I pull her into my arms, suddenly protective of this woman who's had to be so strong on her own.
Whatever her past, whatever secrets she's keeping, right now, she needs comfort, not interrogation.
"His loss. They're beautiful children. You've done an amazing job with them."
I press my lips to Elena's, cutting off whatever else she might say.
Her response is immediate, a soft gasp followed by surrender as she melts against me.
This is easier than words, than questions with answers I don’t want to hear.
Our bodies still speak the same language even if everything else between us has become foreign.
"Let me have you again," I whisper against her mouth, my hands already sliding down her sides, memorizing the new curves motherhood has given her. "I've spent seven years dreaming about you."
Her fingers tangle in my hair as I trail kisses down her neck, across her collarbone.
I want to drown in her, to lose myself so completely that the doubts circling my mind dissolve into nothing.
"Luca.”
I move lower, my mouth finding her breast, my tongue circling the sensitive peak until she arches beneath me.
I push everything else away.
My father's failing mind.
The ghost of her children's father.
