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No one answered. They were all busy working, checking her vital signs, rolling her onto her side and inspecting her head, checking for the damage that was causing the bleeding. A nurse drew several vials of blood and raced them from the room.
And then he was waiting, standing beside her bed, wondering what had happened, wondering if she’d be okay.
After an interminable time, a woman in a white coat entered the room and moved towards Matteo, her smile reassuring. ‘She is your wife?’
He nodded. ‘Yes.’ The word was hardened by years of being in command. Of calling the shots and asking the questions. ‘How is she?’
‘She’s had a bump to the head, but it doesn’t look too serious. Unfortunately, the tests we’d usually run to be sure are obviously impossible at the moment. She may be a little groggy when she wakes, possibly for a day or so. I don’t anticipate any other complications, though.’
None of her words eased Matteo’s concern. ‘What happened to her?’
‘My guess would be that she passed out. It’s not unusual, in her condition. The heat of the day wouldn’t have helped—’
‘Wait a moment,’ he said, lifting a hand to stop her. ‘What condition?’
The doctor pulled a face. ‘You don’t know?’
‘Know what, dottore?’
‘About the baby?’
The world stopped spinning. No. It lurched catastrophically off its axis, sucking Matteo with it. He was in freefall as the doctor’s words filtered through his mind. ‘What baby?’ he asked, the question gravelled.
‘Your wife is pregnant. It’s very early stages—it’s quite by accident that the nurse even tested for it. Does she know?’
Hell.
Matteo’s eyes were dragged to Skye, still so peaceful-looking. Despite the fact her dark hair was matted around her, her eyes were shut and she looked serene. Had she known?
I never want to see you, ever again.
A muscle clenched in his jaw. Had she really been planning to divorce him and keep their child from him?
An ache spread through him, an ache of misery and disbelief. Of anger and rage. Skye wasn’t capable of that deception, surely?
She couldn’t have known.
‘She hadn’t mentioned it,’ he said with a hint of the ruthless determination that had seen him rebuild a once-great empire from its ashes and ruins. But his mind was reeling. Shock was seeping through him.
Skye was pregnant? And she’d come to him, seeking a divorce? A divorce he’d agreed to because he’d known he owed her that much; because he’d wanted her to be happy. And he’d thought he was done making stupid, emotion-driven decisions!
Would Skye have insisted on a divorce if she’d known about the baby? He couldn’t believe it of his wife. And yet, she was the daughter of that bastard Johnson. Did he really have any idea what she was capable of?
His brow was fevered as he replayed every detail of their meeting, looking for signs that she knew her condition. Had she touched her stomach at all? What else would a pregnant woman do? He had no clue.
Hell.
The idea of a baby had never even really occurred to him; foolish, given how often they’d come together.
‘Perhaps she has not been symptomatic.’ The doctor shrugged, as though it didn’t matter. As though it weren’t the most important news Matteo had received in his life. As though Skye’s knowledge or lack thereof wouldn’t change everything.
How could he forgive her if she’d planned to keep it from him?
His nod was distracted. ‘Is the baby okay?’
‘So far as I can tell.’ The doctor smiled reassuringly.
They’d only ever talked about children briefly. Skye was too young to have been thinking of having babies and Matteo hadn’t entered into the marriage with procreation on his mind. But still! She must have known how much this child would mean to him.
And she’d been intending to take the Vin Santo heir away from him. To raise his child as a Johnson!
Fury whipped at the soles of his feet, spurring him forward. ‘Did my wife’s handbag...?’
‘Yes, I believe it was dropped off separately.’ The doctor nodded curtly. ‘Someone found it on the pavement.’
His expression was grim.
‘I’ll have it brought in.’
‘Thank you.’
He waited impatiently, staring at Skye, trying to make sense of this, trying to hold his temper together. But, the more time that passed, the more he came to suspect the worst.
She’d been so adamant about the divorce—that it had to be right now. She had no time to wait.
And she’d held out the perfect carrot to get him to fit in with her plans! The hotel! The damned hotel. He would have done anything to get it back, even marrying her. And, yes, even divorcing her.
He’d wanted the matter of their marriage and the hotel resolved and she’d given him that on a platter. What a fool he was! He’d almost let go of the most valuable thing in his life.
His child.
How could he have been so stupid? Hadn’t he learned his lesson with the whole Maria debacle? He’d just been a boy then. A young, foolish boy. He’d fallen for her lies hook, line and sinker. He’d fallen in love with her too. And learned how stupid a notion love was. He’d sworn he’d never trust a woman again, and here he’d been about to take Skye’s request at face value. Damn it! She was a Johnson, first and foremost. When had he forgotten that?
A hospital staffer arrived minutes later, handing the handbag to him in a large plastic bag.
He took it without speaking, reaching for her bag and ripping it open. There were the damned divorce documents, alongside his purchase contract on the hotel. He removed both angrily and stuffed them in the still-damp pocket of his suit.
He was about to drop the bag to the floor when something else caught his eye.
Curiously, he reached for it, and his anger only darkened when he saw that the object was her passport with a ticket folded neatly inside. A quick inspection showed that it was to take her to Sydney, Australia, later that night.
The evidence was truly damning. All doubt evaporated and left inside him a seed of anger so powerful that it ripped his soul in half.
She had been going to take this child from him. His flesh and blood.
Nausea rolled through him, rising in his chest. He gripped his hands together, his eyes resting on his wife’s face—so beautiful, even like this.
Had she truly wanted to raise a child away from him? Without him ever even knowing?
The pain at the very idea was sharp.
‘Signor Vin Santo? We have spare clothes if you would like to get changed.’ A nurse was smiling at him kindly.
He didn’t return it. He couldn’t. ‘I’ll stay with my wife, thank you.’ The words rang with derision, yet the nurse didn’t seem to detect the undercurrent of Matteo’s tension.
Fury was at war with disbelief.
A machine was rolled through the door, its wheels making a soft squeaking noise as it was brought to rest beside Skye. The doctor he’d been speaking to earlier bustled in and sent him a look of reassurance.
‘Try not to be so worried,’ she said, pushing Skye’s dress up and arranging the blankets around her hips, exposing only her stomach. It was so flat. Was it possible that the doctor had got it wrong? How could a baby be developing inside her tiny frame?
His eyes devoured her body once more, purposefully looking for changes now. Her neat breasts were still small and round, just enough to fill his palms. But perhaps there was a new roundness to them he hadn’t appreciated before...
He swallowed past the bitterness. He would process her betrayal later. Once he knew his baby was okay.
The doctor lifted a part of the machine and pressed it to Skye’s belly, and Skye made a soft moaning noise.
‘Is it painful?’ Matteo asked instinctively.
‘No, not at all.’ The doctor spun the cart around so that Matteo could see the screen. He lifted his eyes to it and frowned.
‘What am I looking at?’
‘It’s too early to see anything clearly. I would say she is perhaps six weeks.’ The doctor smiled at him kindly. ‘Your baby is around the size of a lentil.’
‘A lentil?’
‘A legume,’ she clarified. ‘But I can see good blood-flow generally. There’s nothing here that worries me.’ She went to lift the wand but Matteo spoke, arresting her movement.
‘What is that?’ He pointed to a line at the bottom of the screen.
‘Ah. That is the heartbeat.’
‘The heartbeat?’ He closed his eyes as the reality began to thunder through him.
Emotions gripped him, so strong, so raw, and suddenly he wasn’t capable of speech. He stepped away from the bed, from his wife, from the doctor, and sucked in a deep breath of air.
‘Why don’t you get changed, Signor Vin Santo? You’ll be no help to her if you’ve come down with a flu.’
He didn’t answer. He was busy analysing the situation, trying to make sense of it.
Skye was pregnant with his child. With the Vin Santo heir. And she’d wanted to keep the information from him.
Unless... He turned slowly, his eyes locked to the doctor’s. Hope briefly flared in his chest. ‘You asked if she knew. Is there any way she wouldn’t have known?’
The doctor’s empathy was palpable. ‘Of course. It is still very early. If she hasn’t mentioned it to you, I think it is highly likely that she didn’t yet realise. It really depends on whether she had any other symptoms, and if she had a reason to do a pregnancy test. Were you trying to conceive?’
‘No.’ Their marriage was about one thing, and one thing only. The hotel. A child would just have complicated matters further.
How the hell had this even happened? She’d been on the pill, hadn’t she?
‘Your wife will be awake soon.’ The doctor leaned over and lifted one of Skye’s eyelids, then nodded confidently. ‘You will be able to ask her.’
It was suddenly imperative for Matteo to know the truth. No, it was imperative for him to know that she hadn’t known. He couldn’t believe that Skye would have planned to keep this information from him. Despite the evidence against her, he still had hope. A part of him believed she would never do something as calculated as taking a baby from its father.
No matter what he’d done, no matter what she believed, this was different. Their baby was not a pawn; it deserved better than to be used by either of them as a bargaining chip.
But worse was the belief she hadn’t intended to use it as a bargaining chip at all. Worse was the realisation that she had simply meant to disappear. To get on a plane and fly out of his life, taking his son or daughter with her.
He ground his teeth together and turned back to the bed.
His heart rolled.
It wasn’t possible.
‘Matteo? Where am I?’
Her thin, raspy voice drew his attention. He stared at her long and hard before speaking. ‘You’re in the hospital. In Venice.’ His expression was guarded, but he felt anger in his every expression, beneath the mask of civility he had donned with effort.
‘Hospital?’ Her eyes swept shut. ‘I fell. No, I fainted. That happens sometimes.’
‘Since when?’ he demanded icily, moving closer.
Her hands dropped to her stomach and he could see that she was in turmoil, that she was agonising over what to say. But apparently a need for reassurance eclipsed all other concerns. ‘Is he okay? Is my baby okay?’
CHAPTER THREE (#uba146e10-8157-59cf-87da-14d7fdc93c36)
EVERY SOUND IN the hospital was audible. The beeping of far-away machines monitoring the life signs of patients. The low-key chat of staff. The ringing of a phone. The whir of an overhead fan. Everything was audible in that way when things take on an almost supersonic quality in moments of shock and duress. The sounds had a brightness beyond their due.
Skye waited, her breath held, her worry lurching desperately.
‘Matteo?’ It was a whisper. A strangled, hoarse cry. ‘Please tell me...’
‘Our baby is fine,’ he said with a coldness that perforated her relief and doused it in ice.
Skye’s eyes fell closed. The whole point of coming to Italy and forcing his hand, of giving him the hotel, had been to ensure they were divorced before it was too late. Before her stomach became rounded, before she had given birth to their child, before he had any concept there even was a child. But she wasn’t sure she could summon the energy to care in that moment.
None of that mattered.
She felt only relief.
Tears stung her eyes. ‘Thank God. Oh, Matteo, I’m so relieved.’
‘They’re going to monitor you,’ he said, taking a step back from the bed and crossing his arms. ‘For a few more hours.’
‘I’m fine.’ Skye reached for the IV cable that was attached to her wrist and pulled it out. Matteo winced as the inch-long needle fell from her arm. ‘Fainting is one of the symptoms I’m learning to live with.’
She stood, but was so unsteady that Matteo couldn’t help but reach for her. His touch was clinical, but he didn’t want to see his wife—no, the mother of his child—splayed across the bed, unconscious again.
