Page 41 of Good Girl's Bad Lessons

“I believe a part of your mother really wanted to be happy. She loved the idea of being a wife, and having a family, and wanted to cling to those dreams.”

Nico snarled. “But she still saw you?”

“We met only a few times after her marriage. A couple of them by accident.”

Nico rose to his feet, tension oozing from his body. He curled his fingers into a ball. “You knew she had a family. Why didn’t you walk away?”

Desmorais placed the crystal back on the table and peered at Nico. “I’m a man who paid the cost of his freedom. Funny thing is, I didn’t marry her, yet for years couldn’t be with anyone else. I felt more loyal to her than if I’d been married,” he said, sadness lacing his voice.

“I can’t believe this. Is that why you bought the house? Did my father—”

Desmorais stepped toward Nico. “I don’t think he knew about me. I mean, before the marriage yes, but after… She never told me anything.”

Nico shook his head, more to himself than anyone else in the room. “He knew. I heard him once talking to a lawyer about his life insurance and how he wanted to keep confidential the fact that one of his sons wasn’t his.”

Her blood froze. She’d give anything to take the bitterness from Nico’s expression.

Nico squared his shoulders. “Does this mean you’re Marco’s father?”

The muscle in Desmorais’s jaw twitched, and he looked at Nico square in the eye. “No, Nico. I am your father.”

…

Nico’s body trembled. His father. There had to be a mistake. His entire body paused for one long minute then pulsed again. “Can’t be.”

He studied Desmorais’s features, his strong jaw, the greenish eyes…maybe the eyes had the same roundness as his. No. He ran his hand down his face.

“Why do you believe such a thing?”

His lips curled into a small, modest smile. “Your mother told me.”

Nico pushed air through his clenched teeth. “Why?”

“Because she asked me to stay away. She wanted to work things out with your father.”

Emma touched the side of his chest. “I’ll leave you two alone,” she whispered, then nudged him again. “Call if you need me.”

He’d asked her to stay because he trusted her—and he appreciated now how she decided he should handle this part of the conversation by himself and offered to leave.

His temples throbbed, and he rubbed them with his index finger, trying too hard to focus on the present. On the man in front of him, with tears brimming in his eyes. What if he told him the truth? “I can’t believe it without a DNA test,” he said, throwing it out there to see if Desmorais would bite.

“It may be a bit complicated, given that your mom’s dead, but I’m in if you are. Or, I can show you these—”

He headed for the shelf and grabbed a folder. Clearing his throat, Desmorais took a stash of letters bound by a rubber band, and gave them to him. “The one on the top was from your mother to me. Before she had you, she disappeared for months and didn’t answer my letters or phone calls. I let her be, as I always had. But I heard she had a baby, and I wrote her asking if you were mine.”

Nico leaned against a column and silently read the letter on top. He touched the paper, damaged on the edges. When he recognized the bold strokes of his mother’s handwriting, his heart leaped up his throat. She wrote in Italian and not French.

Dear Angele,

I’m sorry I’ve disappeared. I’m trying to focus on raising my baby boy and hope you understand. What you asked me in the last letter…it’s true. He’s yours. But my baby needs a father, someone reliable who’ll be there and help me. I know you like to travel, explore the world, investigate, and write, and I’d never ask you to give it up for me. Please don’t try to contact me anymore. If you love me and if you love this child, let me raise him the best way I can.

Always,

Luciana

Nico’s fingers trembled, the paper in his hand shaking. Frustration clogged his throat, and when he finally spoke, he groaned. He’d chastised himself all those years because he’d thought he hadn’t told Marco about finding out Marco wasn’t Calogero’s son, when it’d been him all along.

“I understand you’re upset.”

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