Claiming His One-Night Baby. Michelle Smart

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       CHAPTER ONE

      JAW CLENCHED, HIS heart pounding an irregular beat in his chest, Matteo Manaserro watched the coffin being lowered into the consecrated ground of Castello Miniato’s private cemetery.

      Surrounding the open earth stood hundreds of Pieta Pellegrini’s loved ones, friends, family, colleagues, even some heads of state, with their security details standing back at a discreet distance, all there to say a final goodbye to a man who had been respected the world over for his philanthropic endeavours.

      Vanessa Pellegrini, Pieta’s mother, who had buried her husband, Fabio, in the adjoining plot only a year ago, stepped forward, supported by her daughter Francesca. Both women clutched red roses. Francesca turned around to extend a hand to Natasha, Pieta’s widow, who was staring blankly at the wooden box like an ashen-faced statue. The breeze that had filled the early-autumn air had dropped, magnifying the statue effect. Not a single strand of her tumbling honey-blonde hair moved.

      She lifted her dry eyes and blinked, the motion seeming to clear her thoughts as she grabbed Francesca’s hand and joined the sobbing women.

      Together, the three Pellegrini women threw their roses onto the coffin.

      Matteo forced stale air from his lungs and focused his attention anywhere but on the widow.

      This was a day to say goodbye, to mourn and then celebrate a man who deserved to be mourned and celebrated. This was not a day to stare at the widow and think how beautiful she looked even in grief. Or think how badly he wanted to take hold of her shoulders and...

      Daniele, Pieta’s brother, shifted beside him. It was their turn.

      Goodbye, Pieta, my cousin, my friend. Thank you for everything. I will miss you.

      Once the immediate family—in which Matteo was included—had thrown their roses on the coffin, it was time for the other mourners to follow suit.

      Striving to keep his features neutral, he watched his parents step forward to pay their last respects to their nephew. They didn’t look at him, their son, but he knew his father sensed him watching.

      Matteo hadn’t exchanged a word with them since he’d legally changed his surname five years ago in the weeks that had followed the death of his own brother.

      So much death.

      So many funerals.

      So much grief.

      Too much pain.

      When the burial was over and the priest led the mourners into the castello for the wake, Matteo hung back to visit a grave on the next row.

      The marble headstone had a simple etching.

      Roberto Pellegrini

      Beloved son

      No mention of him being a beloved brother.

      Generations of Pellegrinis and their descendants were buried here, going back six centuries. At twenty-eight, Roberto was the youngest to have been buried in fifty years.

      Matteo crouched down and touched the headstone. ‘Hello, Roberto. Sorry I haven’t visited you in a while. I’ve been busy.’ He laughed harshly. In the five years since his brother’s death he’d visited the grave only a handful of times. Not a day passed when he didn’t think of him. Not an hour passed when he didn’t feel the loss.

      ‘Listen to me justifying myself. Again. You know I hate to see you here. I love you and I miss you. I just wanted you to know that.’

      Blinking back moistness from his eyes, his СКАЧАТЬ