With These Four Rings - Book Five: Wedding Bonus (Billionaire Brides of Granite Falls 5) (11 page)

“Stay back, Shaina. This is between me and my brother. It’s about time I taught this little bastard that he can’t just walk into my house and take it over.”

At least he’d called him his brother—bastard or not. There was hope yet. Shaina tugged harder as Galen struggled to free himself from Mass’s chokehold. “Stop, Massimo! You’ll kill him,” she screamed as Galen began to gag and his face turned white. “Is that what you want? Let him go.”

Mass let go, but not before he’d delivered another punch to Galen’s jaw.

As she watched Galen panting on the floor with blood trickling from his mouth, Shaina blinked away the image of Mass curled up on the floor in the New York City penthouse suite after Cameron had taken out his six years of anger on him. What was it with men, always believing they could solve their problems with cockfights?

“You had no business in there!” Massimo trotted around Galen, clenching and unclenching his fists as he glared at him like a lion glared at a beaten challenger who’d tried to usurp him. “After what your mother did to mine, you have no business here! You don’t belong here. Not today of all days.”

“What my mother did to yours? What about what yours did to mine, and me?” Galen declared, once he could talk again. He dabbed at the blood that had dripped on to his white Polo shirt. “Because of your mother, I never knew my father. My parents were denied a life together because of her jealousy. She—”

“You son-of-a—”

CHAPTER SEVEN

“Massimo, no!” Shaina planted herself in front of Mass to keep him from going after Galen. He would definitely choke the life out of him this time. She didn’t want her husband to end up in prison for murder. She glared at her brother-in-law. “What are you talking about, Galen? His mother was married to his father. Your mother got in between them.”

“Why are you defending him, Shaina? He only married you to get all this.” He waved his hand around indicating the entire estate. “It probably would have fallen to me if he hadn’t tricked you. Now I understand why he didn’t contact me for six years.”

So he’d read the article in
Granite Falls People News
, and like everyone else, he only had half the story. That’s why he’d shown up without calling first. He thought he had a right to the Andretti fortune.

“Excuse me, Mr. Andretti. Would you like some assistance?”

Shaina turned to see two security guards from the gatehouse coming toward them. Somebody must have called them when the fight started. Shaina laced her arm around her husband’s waist and walked him away from Galen. He was rigid with rage, his heart beating a mile a second and his chest heaving like he’d just run a marathon. “Escort Mr. Carmichael out of here. And don’t let him back on to the property until Mr. Andretti gives the okay.”

“Yes, Mrs. Andretti. Right away. Come on, buddy.” The one named Kurt pulled Galen to his feet.

“This isn’t over, brother,” Galen barked at Mass. “I have every right to be here. Andretti blood flows in my veins, too.”

Shaina tightened her hold on her husband and watched with mixed emotions as Galen limped away between the two men. He was so freaking clueless, just like Cameron had been when he’d attacked Massimo. For that reason, Shaina felt pity for him.

“The show is over. You can all get back to work now,” she said to the servants who’d wandered into the hallway and on to the balconies above to watch the fight. “This blood needs to be cleaned from the floor.” She turned to the maid standing nearby and wringing her hands in front of her. “Trudy, the music room must be tidied and ready for our guests.”

Trudy snapped out of her daze. “Yes, Mrs. Andretti.”

Shaina led Mass to the elevator. On the third floor, she headed into the direction of
Il Nido d’Amore
, one of the two places on the estate Mass felt closest to his mother, since the music room was out at the moment.

She was grateful that Azi had kept Aria away from the cataclysmic mêlée. She never wanted her daughter to see her father in this state.
She
never wanted to see him like this again, and as soon as she returned from her honeymoon, she was going after the Carmichael clan. Edith Carmichael had evidently fed her family a boatload of lies about Massimo’s mother, and she was going to set them straight.

They’d all been expecting this showdown. She’d heard the servants whispering among themselves. Those who’d been on staff when Massimo’s mother was alive, and had been reinstated after Shaina and Massimo set up house, couldn’t understand why he would want his father’s bastard son in his life, and most alarmingly in his mother’s home. Yet, despite their feelings, like devoted servants, they’d treated Galen like an Andretti while he’d been living under Massimo’s roof.

Shaina felt responsible for the trouble Galen’s presence was causing Massimo. She was the one who’d encouraged him to invite his brother to the U.S and to the Andretti estate in the first place. Even after their first fight, she’d encouraged Mass to ask Galen to be his Best Man at their wedding. He’d grudgingly done so, just to please her. Maybe she was trying too hard to get the brothers back to the amicable place they were when they first met. Maybe some sleeping dogs were better left undisturbed. She had no idea if they would ever be able to bridge this widening gap between them.

Inside
Il Nido d’Amore,
she eased Mass down onto a red silk sofa in front of a triple row of French doors that overlooked a courtyard surrounded by trimmed shrubs and overhanging trellises. A steep stone staircase with lampposts descended to a green lawn bordered by beds of summer flowers, and a three-tier fountain with bronze statues of angels spewing streams of water from their mouths. A path led to a garden house a short distance away.

Something pleasant for him to look at, she thought as she helped him out of his jacket, took off his tie, and pulled off his shoes. When she stood in front of him, he circled her waist with his hands and gazed up at her, his blue eyes flashing pain and his hands still trembling with rage. “I’m sorry.”

“For what?” She smoothed an errant curl from his forehead and pulled his head against her stomach.

“For embarrassing you. I should have kept my emotions in check. One thing my father drilled into my head when I was growing up was never to lose control in front of the household staff, or the employees at A.I. Never show my weakness.”

“You’re not weak, Mass.” She caressed the smooth strong jawline of the man she loved with all her heart and soul. Two years ago, he probably wouldn’t have lost control like that. He most certainly would have tossed Galen out of the mansion, but he would have continued with his day without anyone knowing he was bleeding inside. She’d humanized him, taught him that it was okay to show his emotions. “You’re the strongest man I know. I love your strength, your passion.”

“He had no business in my mother’s music room. He sullied my last memories of her. From now on, every time I think of her last moments in this house, I’ll see him sitting at her piano, playing her favorite tune. It’s just wrong.”

“Shh.” Shaina hugged him tighter and tried to caress away his fury and his hurt.

When he relaxed against her, she lifted his head from her stomach and sat down beside him. She held his hands. His knuckles were red but not swollen. She kissed each one ever so gently before meeting his gaze. “I shouldn’t have pushed you to reach out to Galen before you were ready. Cameron and I are so close. I can’t imagine not having a relationship with him. I just wanted you and Galen to have that kind of connection, you know. But maybe that’s not possible. You didn’t grow up together. You didn’t even know he existed until eight years ago, and the fact that he’s a product of your father’s infidelity is a lot for you to deal with.” She laid her palm against his chest. “It’s my fault. I’m the one who should be sorry.”

He pulled her close to his side and kissed the top of her head. “It’s nobody’s fault. It’s just a bad situation.”

“Do you hate him for what he said about your mother?”

“I don’t hate him. He’s obviously misinformed and angry. I hate what he represents. I can’t get past the fact that his mother is the reason mine isn’t here, that I don’t have my sister, that every year I’m throwing a Thanksgiving dinner in July.” He paused on a deep sigh and his fingers tightened around her arm. “Except for Aunt Bella, my entire family is gone, everyone and everything from my past. All I have are my memories, and I don’t want to share them with him,” he ground out between clenched teeth.

Shaina lifted her head and stared at him. She’d been so focused on keeping him from killing his brother that she hadn’t noticed the deep sadness in the blue of his eyes, the hints of redness in the white. Something else was tearing him apart. “Why are you home so early, Mass?”

Expelling a long breath, he sat forward, planted his elbows on his knees, and stared out the door where the sun was barely visible above the tree line.

She rubbed at the tension in his shoulders and back. “Mass, what’s wrong?”

“It’s Jabari.” He pressed his palm into the scar on his right side—the eternal reminder of Jabari’s strength, his wisdom, devotion, and love for him.

“Did he take a turn for the worse? He seemed fine this morning when we watched him by satellite. He seemed stronger. He was actually running about.”

When he just shook his head and sniffled, Shaina knew the inevitable had happened. “Oh, Mass,” she said in a broken whisper. She wrapped her arms around him, stretched out on her back and pulled him down on top of her.

He cried, his hot tears soaking into her blouse. He cried so hard that the sofa vibrated. Shaina cuddled her husband as if he were a helpless child in her arms. This hurting little boy, the vulnerable side of Massimo Luciano Andretti, was something the world would never see. This was hers. All hers, and she cherished it with every beat of her heart.

“He was my best friend for almost twenty-six years. I loved him so much, so much. I’m going to miss him terribly.”

“I know. I know, baby.” The juxtaposition of Jabari’s and his mother’s exit from this world couldn’t be weirder. No wonder he’d lost it with Galen. Weirdness was not an anomaly in this family. Like Aria, both Shaina and Massimo’s mothers were born in December, and they both died in July. She and Cameron were heading to Maine at the end of the month to visit their mother’s grave, and their father’s, who lay right next to her. July wasn’t a good month for the Andretti/Norwood blended family. December, they loved.

“I came home to share the news with you and Azi because you were both close to him. But then I walked in to that. Him!”

“You shouldn’t have had to deal with Galen. Not on the day before the anniversary of your mother’s death, and now Jabari’s.” She had some news to tell him, too. News that would make him happy, but she didn’t want to lessen the impact of Jabari’s death. He needed to grieve for his beloved cat. “I’m going to miss him, too. I fell in love with him from the day I met him. Jabari was a beautiful cat, and Aria loved him. We were just watching the video of the two of you on the blanket with him at the camp.”

“You were?”

“Yes. Aria got real excited when she saw him, and she started yelling, ‘Bari, Bari. Nice
puttyca
t.’” She told me that she loves him, and that you were crying because Bari was hurt. She understood, Mass.”

“It must have been around the same time I was watching him take his last breath.”

“You watched it happen?”

He lifted his head and rested his chin in the valley of her breasts. “Servio called to tell me that he was struggling to breathe. I cut a meeting short to watch him. It was just old age. He died peacefully.” Tears glittered in his eyes. “I’m glad we went to see him last week. “I just wish I was there with him at the end, though.” He paused. “I should have gone back after Aria was feeling better. I should have been there with him. I should—”

“No, Massimo.” Shaina clasped her hands on his cheeks. “I will not let you do that to yourself. You did all you could for him. Jabari knows you were watching him. He did what he was born to do. He saved your life, and I’ll be eternally grateful to him. Now he can rest in peace in leopard heaven.” She paused, hesitant to asked, but knowing that the issue needed to be addressed, and quickly. “What are you going to do about his remains?”

He waited a long time before responding. “I’ll have him cremated and scatter him in the Serengeti, so he will always be part of the jungle.”

“That’s nice. His spirit will be free to roam the plains of his homeland forever. Maybe he’ll run into your mom.” To avoid evoking memories of his father’s infidelity, and the events associated with the day he almost died in the jungle, she refrained from mentioning his dad, whose remains were also scattered in the Mara Lands.

“I love you, Shaina. I hope you don’t think I married you just for the money like Galen said. I loved you long before I knew I had to marry to secure my inheritance.”

“We’ve been through that, Massimo. I know what we have, and that’s all that matters. What you wrote in that article was beautiful. It made me proud to be your wife.” She leaned forward and kissed his eyes, his nose, the salty tears from his cheeks, and then she placed her lips on his and kissed him deeply, their tongues dancing around each other as passion gave way to sadness.

He groaned, circling her body and pulling her closer, taking the reins of the kiss, delving deeper, seeking the comfort he needed from her.

Shaina moaned when his hands crawled under her blouse and his fingers grazed her hot flesh on their way to the mounds of her swelling breasts. She felt moisture collect in her panties as he shifted his weight and nestled his pulsing hard-on at the apex of her thighs. Fire sped through her veins. They hadn’t made love in five days, not since they returned from Africa.