24. Contessa #2
Matteo’s hand finds my knee under the table, a gesture meant to be comforting, but only makes me more aware of the disaster we’re in. I want to slap it away. I want to grip it tighter. I want to scream.
“We were going to tell you,” I say, the lie tasting bitter on my tongue. “We just needed to find the right time.”
“The right time,” my father echoes, his voice deadly quiet now. “And when exactly would that have been? After the wedding? After my grandchild was born?”
The blood freezes in my veins. How does he know? My hand instinctively moves to my stomach; there’s no way he could see it with me sitting at the table.
My father’s eyes track the movement, and something shifts in his expression. Disappointment, and I want to curl up and cry.
“You’re pregnant,” he says, not a question but a statement of fact. “Matteo’s baby.”
I open my mouth to deny it, but nothing comes out. My eyes fill with tears that I blink back furiously.
“Six months,” Matteo says, his voice steady despite the tension crackling around us. “She’s six months pregnant with my child.”
My father stands so suddenly that his chair screeches against the floor. The entire restaurant goes silent.
“You,” he points at Matteo, his finger trembling with barely contained fury, “you absolute piece of shit. You knocked up my daughter. My little girl.”
“She’s not a little girl, Conrad.” Matteo stands too, matching my father’s height. “She’s a woman. My woman.”
The possessiveness in his voice sends a shiver down my spine, even as I want to strangle him for making this worse.
“Your woman,” my father repeats, his laugh hollow. “My daughter is your woman. And you expect me to be okay with that? After twenty-five years of friendship? After I trusted you with my family?”
“Conrad—” Matteo starts, but my father cuts him off.
“Don’t.” He grabs his jacket from the back of his chair, his movements sharp and violent. “Don’t you dare say my name like we’re still friends.” He turns to me, and the look on his face makes my heart shatter into a million pieces. “And you. My own daughter.”
“Dad, please—”
“I can’t do this right now.” His voice cracks, and that’s somehow worse than his anger. “I need to go before I say something I’ll regret.”
He turns on his heel and stalks toward the exit, not looking back. I watch him shove through the doors, his shoulders rigid, and disappear into the Sunday crowd.
The restaurant is dead silent. Every single person is staring at us—at me, at my swollen belly, at the man who just announced to the entire brunch crowd that he’s been fucking his best friend’s pregnant daughter.
I can’t move. Can’t breathe. Can’t think past the roaring in my ears and the acid churning in my stomach.
Matteo sits back down like nothing happened, reaching for his water glass with steady hands.
“You couldn’t just not do that,” I whisper, my voice shaking so hard I can barely form the words. “You couldn’t just let me handle it. You had to fucking announce it to the whole restaurant like it’s a goddamn press conference.”
He sets the glass down and turns to face me. There’s no smirk, no teasing glint in his eyes. Nothing but that intense, unwavering focus that makes my skin prickle.
“Contessa.” His voice is low, controlled. “You had ample time to tell him. Months. And the clock isn’t stopping.”
I open my mouth to argue, but he keeps going.
“Do you think it would have been better to wait until after the baby was born? To show up at his door with a newborn and say, ‘surprise, here’s your grandchild, oh and by the way, your best friend is the father’?
” He leans closer, his eyes boring into mine.
“Or were you just going to cut your father off entirely with no explanation? Ghost him until he figured it out on his own?”
The words hit like a slap. Because he’s right—that’s exactly what I was doing. I was avoiding the conversation, pushing it off, hoping some miracle would make it unnecessary.
“He hates me,” I say, and my voice breaks on the last word. The tears I’ve been fighting spill over, hot and shameful. “He’ll never forgive me.”
Matteo’s hands come up to cup my face, his thumbs sweeping across my cheeks, catching the tears before they can fall further. The gesture is so tender it makes me cry harder.
“Listen to me.” His voice is firm but gentle. “He doesn’t hate you. He could never hate you. You’re his daughter, Contessa. He’s angry at me—rightfully so—but that anger is not directed at you.”
I shake my head, more tears spilling. “You didn’t see his face. The way he looked at me—”
“I saw it.” His thumbs keep moving, wiping away each tear as it falls. “And I’m telling you, he’ll come around. It might take time, and yes, things are going to be different. But they were always going to be different. That’s what happens when your daughter grows up and builds her own life.”
“Different isn’t bad,” I whisper, echoing something he’s told me a dozen times before.
“Different isn’t bad,” he confirms, pressing his forehead against mine. “Your father loves you more than anything in this world. That doesn’t change because you’re pregnant with my child.”
I grip his wrists, holding his hands against my face. “What if he doesn’t? What if he never speaks to me again?”
“He will.” There’s absolute certainty in his voice, the kind that brooks no argument. “And until he does, I’ll handle it.”
I pull back to look at him. “Handle it how?”
“Conrad and I have been friends for twenty-five years. We’ve been through worse than this.” His mouth twitches. “Well, maybe not worse. But we’ll come to an agreement. That’s what men do.”
“An agreement,” I repeat, not sure if I should be relieved or terrified.
“He’s my best friend, Contessa. Was my best friend.” Something flickers across his face—regret, maybe, or grief for what’s been lost. “We’ll figure it out. And I don’t want you worrying about it.”
“Don’t want me worrying about it?” I let out a watery laugh. “My dad just found out his best friend knocked up his daughter in the middle of a crowded restaurant. How am I supposed to not worry?”
“Because that’s my job.” He presses a kiss to my forehead, then each cheek, then the tip of my nose. “Your job is to take care of yourself and our baby in ways that I cannot. Let me handle your father.”
I want to argue. Want to tell him he can’t just bulldoze through every problem in my life and expect me to fall in line. But the truth is, I’m exhausted. Emotionally, physically, completely drained. And the baby is kicking like crazy, reacting to my stress.
“Okay,” I whisper, because I don’t have the energy to fight. “Okay. You handle it.”
“Good girl.” He brushes his lips against mine, soft and reassuring. “Now, let’s get you home. You need to rest.”
He stands and helps me up, one hand on my elbow, the other resting protectively on the small of my back. The entire restaurant watches us leave, a hundred pairs of eyes tracking our every move. I keep my chin up, refusing to let them see how shattered I am.
As we step into the sunlight, I catch a glimpse of my reflection in the restaurant window. The girl staring back at me looks nothing like the independent, self-sufficient woman I thought I was.
But when Matteo’s hand slides from my back to rest on my belly, warm and possessive, I feel a strange sense of calm settle over me. Maybe I don’t have to look independent all the time. Maybe letting someone else handle the messy shit doesn’t make me weak—it makes me smart.
I’m still running my own company. Still making decisions that matter. Still the girl who built an empire from scratch. But now I have a man who tends to my every whim, who worships my body even as it changes, who handles the ugly parts so I don’t have to.
Maybe that’s not losing my independence—maybe it’s just evolving it.
I love how Matteo handles me. Love how he takes control when everything’s falling apart. Love how he knows exactly what I need before I do.
I love—
Nope. Not going there.
Absolutely not going there. It’s the baby hormones, thank you very much.