29. Chapter Twenty Nine #2
“And,” I continue, “I have two grown sons. I would like grandchildren eventually. Preferably before I am too old to enjoy them.”
Mario keeps watching me.
I sigh. “What?”
“I am being serious.”
“So am I. Edoardo is twenty-seven. Alessio is twenty-four. Grandchildren are hardly an outrageous possibility.”
“That is not what I am asking.”
I wait.
He says nothing.
I recognize the tactic because we have both used it countless times over the years.
Unfortunately for him, I am his brother.
I know exactly what he is doing.
Unfortunately for me, he also knows I know exactly what he is doing, which means we could be here until dinner tonight.
I finally shake my head. “You are irritating.”
“So I have been told.”
“Frequently, I imagine.”
“Lorenzo.”
I let out a breath. “What exactly are you asking me?”
Mario leans back in his chair.
“Have you ever thought about having more children?”
Even knowing what was coming, the question catches me entirely unprepared.
For several seconds, I simply look at him.
It has been so long since anyone asked me something like that that I cannot remember the last time I considered an answer.
My sons are grown men.
The years when my house was full of toys, small shoes, arguments over bedtime, half-eaten meals, and boys racing through rooms they had been told repeatedly not to run through feel both impossibly distant and strangely close when I allow myself to remember them.
I look down at my hands.
“When Gemma and I got married, we always imagined a house full of children.”
Mario says nothing.
He knew that, or at least part of it. We were all younger then, when the future seemed like something that would unfold more or less the way we expected if we worked hard enough and protected what mattered.
“We never had a number,” I continue. “We simply assumed there would be several. Edoardo came, then Alessio, and we thought there would be more after him.”
I can still remember how ordinary that expectation once felt.
There was no urgency to it. No reason to think we needed to make plans around a future that seemed obvious. My chest tightens with an old ache that has dulled over the years without ever disappearing entirely.
Then Gemma became sick.
Then she died.
Alessio was barely old enough to know her, and Edoardo was still little himself. Suddenly the future became something entirely different from what either of us had imagined.
“She died so soon after Alessio was born,” I say. “Afterward, I was raising two boys who had lost their mother. I had no interest in imagining another version of my life.”
Mario’s gaze softens, although he does not interrupt.
“It never became a conscious decision that I would not have more children. It simply stopped being something I thought about. The years passed, the boys grew up, and eventually that part of my life felt finished.”
I sit back.
“I let go of the idea.”
There is no bitterness in the admission.
That surprises me less than it might have once.
I loved Gemma. I loved the family we created together. I still do.
What we lost does not make what remained inadequate.
“I love my sons,” I say. “I have never resented having only them. I never looked at Edoardo and Alessio and thought I should have had something more.”
“I know,” Mario says.
“Then why ask?”
He looks toward the photograph on the corner of his desk.
Victoria is holding Leonardo in it, and Mario is standing beside her with one arm around both of them. I have seen the photograph dozens of times since he put it there, but I have never paid much attention to it.
“I always thought I would only have two children,” he says.
I look back at him.
“After Anna, I never imagined otherwise. Matteo and Tomasso were grown. I assumed that part of my life was over.”
“And then Victoria.”
“And then Victoria.”
There is a warmth in his voice that would once have earned him weeks of ridicule from the rest of us.
These days, none of us bother.
We have all seen what she means to him.
“Leonardo was never part of the life I thought I would have,” Mario continues. “Now I cannot imagine life without him.”
I study my brother.
“You are becoming sentimental in your old age.”
“So are you.”
“I am younger than you.”
“Barely.”
“Enough that it matters.”
Mario smiles faintly, but his attention does not leave me.
I know what he is doing now.
He is not trying to convince me to want another child.
He is asking whether I have allowed myself to consider that the life I assumed was finished might have changed again.
Donna enters my thoughts immediately.
She is in my kitchen more often than her own lately. Her things have appeared in my bathroom and bedroom. Mocha has toys scattered across the floor, and the snacks Donna likes to munch on when she's doing research have appeared in my kitchen.
Last night, after everything that happened, Donna stood in my bedroom wearing one of my shirts and argued with me about whether she really needed extra security on her office.
Then she climbed into my bed, curled against me, and fell asleep.
I woke before her this morning and spent several minutes simply looking at her.
That is still new enough to unsettle me.
So is loving her.
So is knowing she loves me.
Children are so far beyond anything I have allowed myself to consider that the thought feels almost ridiculous.
“I have not thought that far ahead,” I admit.
Mario nods once.
“Things with Donna are new.”
“You love her.”
“Yes.” There is no hesitation now.
Yesterday the words came out in the middle of an argument, which should not surprise me. It perfectly encompasses the relationship between Donna and me so far.
“I love her.”
“And she loves you.”
A smile pulls at my mouth before I can stop it.
“Yes.”
“You sound surprised.”
“I remain somewhat surprised.”
“Why?”
“Because she is very stubborn.”
Mario gives me a flat look. “That has never bothered you.”
“It bothers me constantly.”
“You would be bored otherwise.”
I laugh softly and look away. He is right.
The amusement fades as quickly as it came.
“I do not know how Donna feels about children,” I say. “We have never discussed it.”
It is an obvious statement, but saying it aloud makes the possibility feel more substantial than it did a moment ago.
Donna is twenty-five.
Her life is still taking form in ways mine stopped doing years ago. She has only recently started her own business after leaving the FBI under circumstances that forced her to rebuild everything she thought her career would be.
I have two adult sons.
I am apparently already thinking about grandchildren.
There is an entire conversation contained in that difference, and we have barely managed to admit we are in love without turning it into an argument.
“I can only imagine that conversation would terrify her,” I add.
Mario’s mouth curves. “You seem pleased by that.”
“I find the thought of terrorizing Donna quite enjoyable. However, this particular subject may be pushing my luck.”
“You could simply ask her what she wants.”
“That sounds suspiciously reasonable.”
“I have my moments.”
“Rarely.”
He ignores that.
I look down at my hands again.
“I do not even know what I want,” I admit. “Yesterday morning, I had not told the woman I loved her. This morning, you are asking me whether I have considered having children with her.”
For a moment, neither of us speaks.
The sounds of the office continue beyond the closed door: muted footsteps in the hallway, the distant ring of a phone, voices too low to make out the words.
Ordinary sounds.
Ordinary morning.
And I am sitting here thinking about a future I thought I had closed the door on more than twenty years ago.
Mario breaks the silence.
“And if she does not want children?”
I lift my head.
He watches me carefully, waiting.
The answer comes easier than anything else has.
“I love my sons,” I repeat.