‘What are you doing?’ she asked, hooking her foot behind the ankle of her standing leg. She’d used to do that when she was younger, he remembered. When she was nervous. He dismissed the sight of it and went back to his emails.
‘I’m cancelling all my meetings.’
‘What about Peterson?’ she asked, causing his head to snap up.
He blinked. Once. Twice.
Then he huffed out a bitter laugh, his eyes roaming the room, before coming back to her, in disbelief.
‘Really? That’s what you’re worried about right now?’ he demanded. Of course she would care more about Gallo Group than, oh, just a little something like telling him he was the father of an unborn child.
‘Well, that’s what brought you here,’ she pressed. ‘You said you needed me to handle the contract renewal.’
‘It doesn’t matter. I’ll deal with it later,’ he dismissed.
‘You can’t. He’s GG’s biggest client. If he goes, then the whole company will fall apart!’ she exclaimed.
And he knew he shouldn’t be surprised. He knew he shouldn’t be angry that at this very moment in time, just when he was struggling with the fact that he was going to be a father,shewas worrying about her family’s damn company.
‘This is very true,’ he agreed. ‘It’s also something you didn’t care one single iota about less than twenty minutes ago. And as you so rightly pointed out, Gallo Group is mine and I’ll handle it in the way I see fit.’
She let out a growl of frustration that matched precisely how he felt. He locked his phone screen, slipping it back into his pocket, and watched as Maria did a very good impression of someone about to throw a tantrum. He imagined there would be only three seconds before she started tapping her foot on the floor in annoyance. That she did it in four seconds showed a surprising amount of restraint on her behalf. She huffed a long wave of thick black curls over her shoulder and his hand fisted from the memory of how it had once felt to hold those in his palm.
How she was still the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen was beyond him. He had spentyearsliving in Paris, and had counted models as some of his companions. Was it because now he knew she was pregnant? Was he imagining the glow about her, or was that simply the heat of her anger? Did it really matter?
Certainly not now that she was carrying his child. Which brought him right back to the matter at hand. He’d checked his diary before messaging his assistant. And even if it hadn’t been clear, he would have made it so.
‘Will this weekend suffice?’ he asked her, knowing that it would throw her. Knowing that it would confuse her. A small, mean part of him relished the fact that she might feel just a little of what he was currently struggling with.
‘For what?’
‘Our wedding.’
‘Wedding? I can’t marry you!’ she cried, throwing her hands up in the air. ‘What on earth would the family think? That I’m so desperate to get my hands on Gallo Group that I’d sell myself by marrying—’
Her words halted dramatically mid-sentence and mid-air, the temperature in the room dropping to freezing from his anger.
‘What were you going to say,cara?’ he demanded. ‘That you were prostituting yourself? To someone like me? The illegitimate bastard son of a whore who inherited everything they’d always wanted?’
‘Micha, I—’
But he didn’t want to hear it. Didn’t want her to take back her unthinking words. Because he needed to know, needed to remember what she thought about him. He couldn’t go into this blindly and naively like he had before.
‘I’ve been called worse. I don’t care what they think,’ he dismissed.
‘ButIdo,’ she said, her eyes bright with indignation.
‘And that’s always been your problem, Maria. One that I’m more than happy to exploit to my advantage.’
‘What do you mean?’ she asked.
‘All I have to do is wait, Maria. Because it won’t be long until you start to show. And what do you think will happen when news of an unwed Gallo heir gets out? No, I know you better than that. So I know you’d rather marry me than drag Gallo Group through the mud by such a scandal. You might not work there any more, but you’re a Gallo. You wouldn’t do anything to harm the company.’
‘You bastard,’ she bit out.
‘Yes. That is quite literally true,’ he admitted. ‘Which is why when I say that we will be marrying this weekend, I mean it. So let me be very clear,bella. There is literallynothingI won’t do in order to ensure that my child grows up legitimate. Nothing.’
She saw it. The absolute, uncompromising truth in his gaze. When he got like this, he was a force to be reckoned with, undeniable and unstoppable. It was both absolutely pig-headed and infuriating, but once it had also been incredible.
