Page 60 of Redemption
“Did you tell him we are rich? Is that why he came?” Suspicion snakes back into his tone.
“He is very rich as well, Father. It was not money that motivated his visit. It was love for his family. To protect them. He is … a different sort of man from you and me, Father. He …” I trail off, not knowing how to describe my brother without prejudicing my father against him.
“He is what?” my father asks impatiently, his gaze riveted back on the screen.
“He is American. Through and through, despite his Italian blood. You will have to meet him for yourself to learn more. Mother has invited you personally to her island. She is having a welcome party for them as we speak. Your presence is requested so that it can be a true family gathering.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Lachlan
“The Giordanos were Italian nobility, but not the useless kind. They were not much for being courtiers, but preferred instead to build a legacy for the future. And when the nobility was abolished, the Giordanos became rebels of a sort. Your great-great-grandfather started a newspaper anonymously and began to print the truth, even when it was not popular with the government. The people, however, ate it up like sweets. Italy has not always been an easy place to live. We have been through much hardship and change over the years. But the Giordanos have adapted and thrived.”
In the family portrait gallery, my mother explains some of the Giordano family history and the men and women whose likenesses are captured in oil on canvas.
I, however, can barely concentrate.
Right now, my brother is telling my father that I am alive. That I have returned to the family.
If I could be anywhere right now, it would be a fly on the wall of that conversation. I wish more than anything that I could see and hear his reactions firsthand.
Is he happy? Is he handling it well? Does he wish to come and meet me immediately? Or does he think I’m an imposter, even with the photo?
“I should have gone with him,” I can’t help but say as my mother moves down to another portrait.
“Oh, no, you should not have. Such a shock from seeing both of you in the flesh, without knowing in advance, would have likely killed him. From what I have been told by his very unkind secretary, he is not in good health. She lives in fear of finding him fallen over dead on his desk one day. Which is probably fair. The man has tried to work himself into a grave for more years than I can remember.”
None of the comments about my father, despite his obvious success in business, have been flattering.
In that moment, I picture myself in my library in New Orleans before I became fascinated with Keira. Would I have worked myself into an early grave because I had nothing else to live for? Undoubtedly. Mistresses didn’t keep my attention for long. And the grind of my business dealings was my only other focus for many years.
I hadn’t felt joy … maybe ever.
I didn’t know happiness beyond the next conquest.
I knew death.
I knew dominance.
I knew darkness.
Keira will never understand the fate worse than death from which her very existence saved me. A spark of light in the darkness. A flash of hope in a world of death and despair. She was the life ring, tossed into the depths of hell, that I used to find my way back into the world of the living.
I am not the same man I was before her. She changed everything. I don’t even think the same way anymore. Love altered me at the very deepest levels of my soul.
Even if my father is a terrible, miserable old man, I know there is hope for him. Because I am his son, and there was hope for me, even when I didn’t realize I needed it.
If I can change, anyone can change.
I look down at the perfect face of my daughter in my arms and the sparkle of innocence in her dark brown eyes. I know she can melt even the hardest of hearts.
Silently, I tell her, Your grandfather will not be able to resist you, princess. Your very presence can convert a man instantly.
Chapter Thirty
Marco
He fidgeted the entire flight. My father, the son of Comte Alessandro Marconi Giordano, fidgeted the entire flight back to Lago Maggiore.
