‘Oh, for crying out loud,’ she snapped. ‘I don’t have time to get my emotional well filled. I’m busy. I’m the sole parent to a high-needs child juggling a million things including working foryou. I certainly don’t have time for another baby when I’m full up with the one I have.’
‘You don’t think McKenzie would like a little brother or a sister?’
She stopped then for long moments as if shocked by his question, her fingers rubbing at her temple.
Had she never even considered that?
‘I’m sure she would,’ Peyton said, recovering from her silence. ‘I’m also pretty sure she’d like a unicorn. Unfortunately,she doesn’t get a say.’
Valentino chuckled even though he doubted she was trying to be funny. Which was his entire point. She should expect more from her life than merely surviving it.
Turning beseeching eyes on him, she said, ‘I’m tired, Valentino.’
Her exhaustion sucker-punched him, but it didn’t defeat him. Because she didn’t have to do this alone any more. ‘I know but… I’ll be here. I’ll help.’
Peyton almost laughed out loud.I’ll be there. I’ll help. Where had she heardthatbefore? Along withyou won’t have to do this alone.
How long would it take an Italian playboy surgeon with an international career to grow tired of playing house in little old Brisbane? She hardened her heart to pretty words that sang like sirens from the rocks.
Arnie had also promised he’d help. Promised he’d be here until death parted them.
Obviously, he’d taken Daisy’s death as a literal translation. Their daughter hadn’t even been in the ground a week when he’d left for good.
Sure, he’d been mourning too and she’d tried over the past few years to make allowances for Arnie’s grief amidst her anger, but empathy was difficult when she was coping with everything else as well. Peyton couldn’t go through that kind of desertion and heartbreak again. She just couldn’t.
‘And when Harry gets back? When London calls?’
He scooped up her hands and held them cocooned in his. ‘Then you come with me.’
The broken edges of Peyton’s heart rubbed painfully at his simplistic, egocentric response. ‘No, Valentino. I can’t. I won’t. This is myhome. It’s McKenzie’s home. I’m not going to uproot her when she has years of therapy left.’
‘They have speech pathologists in other parts of the world.’
Of course they did but Peyton had vowed never to blindly follow a man again, like she had Arnie. ‘She trusts the St Auburn’s team. Has built relationships with them.’
He squeezed her hands. ‘Children adapt.’
Peyton shook her head. Spoken like a true egotist, used only to looking after himself. Not a responsible father who put the needs of a child first.
Could he hear himself?
‘So, let me get this straight. You want me and McKenzie to up sticks and follow you around the world withyourchild like some puppy, hoping you can squeeze in some time for us all between your work and dating catwalk models?’
Valentino’s brow furrowed deep, his look of affront almost comical. ‘Dio!No,’ he rejected. ‘I have more respect for you than that. We would marry, of course.’
Marry?
Peyton almost choked. Firstly, if that was a proposal, itsucked.Secondly,what the what? Unsure that her legs would actually support her through such a bizarre conversation, she sank into the nearby armchair. ‘I beg your pardon?’
Was this really happening? Had she misheard? Or was it a lost in translation thing?
He shrugged like his suggestion wasn’t completely out of left field. ‘We’ll get married,’ he reiterated.
Okay, shehadheard him correctly. About a million questions crowded her brain, but only one floated to the surface. ‘And what about love?’
Try as she may, Peyton couldn’t rid her voice of its helium-like squeak. She’d vowed never to marry again but if she was ever dumb enough to do so a second time, it would only ever be for love.
Far from backing down, Valentino shoved his hands on his hips. ‘Did you love your husband?’
