With These Four Rings - Book Five: Wedding Bonus (Billionaire Brides of Granite Falls 5) (28 page)

She tilted her head to one side and her brows furrowed. “You don’t want to listen to it?”

“No. Tell me what she said and how and why you came to record her.” He sat back and folded his arms across his constricting chest.

Mrs. Marshall shifted uneasily. “See, this is the part that always scared me. The reason I never told anyone. Because if your father knew I was eavesdropping on his private conversations—but only with her,” she added hastily. “He would have fired me, or worse, and like I said, I had a child to support.”

Massimo nodded.

“When she first moved here from England, Judith lived in my apartment complex in Evergreen with an American student who’d done a semester abroad in London. She’d followed him back here, and after they broke up, she stayed. She didn’t have any money or friends, and she asked me where she could find work. She seemed nice, so I spoke to my cousin who owned a cleaning company. She didn’t have any papers so he paid her under the table. Soon she asked to be on my crew at A.I. My cousin refused because anyone who worked at A.I had to be fully investigated with background checks. She slept with him to get her way.” She swung her head from side to side. “I should have known she was up to something. Anyway, the next thing I know, your father’s personal assistant retired and Judith took her place. I later found out that she’d slept with somebody else to falsify working papers for her.”

“So she had her eyes on my father all along.”

“She wanted to live in one of the three biggest mansions on Mount Reservoir. Mr. LaCrosse and Mr. Andreas were faithful to their wives, so she went after your father.”

The notorious man-whore
.

“I wanted to rat her out, but I was afraid my cousin would get in trouble for allowing her in the building in the first place. I could have lost my job, too. Judith held that over my head. Like I said, I’d seen how your father handled people who crossed him. I had to find some other way to get rid of her. So I started bugging her office. She was so stupid, thinking she was better than me because she was the personal assistant to the CEO of one of the biggest companies in the world, while I was still cleaning toilets—her toilet.”

“That’s how you found out about the false papers.”

She nodded. “Among other things. She told your father she was on the pill all the while she was trying to get pregnant. The day she told him she was carrying his child, your father told her that he loved his wife and son and would never leave them, that her child was a bastard he would never acknowledge. He told her that you and his wife’s unborn child were his true heirs and he would never force them to share their inheritance. He demanded a paternity test and if it was his child, he would arrange for a flat in London for her, a car and a sizable income. He would have his attorney draw up a contract that she would never tell the child about his paternity, ever, and she would never return to the U.S. or he would stop all financial support and put her child into foster care in a foreign country and she would never see it again. He told her that he was going home to spend some time with his family and see his attorney about the contract. He would return later that day and she would sign it, pack her things, and leave.”

Massimo groaned as he remembered his father coming home unexpectedly, playing a Star Wars game with him on his Nintendo, before joining his mother in
Il Nido d’Amore
where they’d stayed for hours. His father must have been making up for hurting his mother.
Why couldn’t he have come to his senses much sooner?

Mrs. Marshall finished her water and eyed Mass’ that he still hadn’t touched. “Go ahead.” Anything he put into his stomach would come right back up.

She drank half of it. “After your father left. Judith went crazy, ranting and raging and tossing things around.”

“Is all that on this tape?” he asked, pointing to the menacing black box.

“Well, not on this one. I have others. This one just has the call to your mother. You want me to go on or you want to listen for yourself?”

He shook his head negatively.

“I’ll leave out the expletives. They’re even too repulsive for me to repeat.” She inhaled deeply. “Judith decided that since your father wouldn’t leave your mother, she would make her want to leave him, so she called her. She told her that her husband didn’t love her, that he’d only married her to secure an heir for his estate. He had his heir and now had found true love with her, Judith. She told him that she was pregnant with his child, and that he was only waiting until your mother’s baby was born before he divorced her and put her out of the mansion. She said that she and your father would raise you and your sister alongside the one she was carrying. She told her to save herself embarrassment and leave quietly, because whatever she just shared with him was a goodbye—” She paused and averted her gaze. “I’m sure you know what four-letter-word she used.”

Massimo dropped his elbows on the table and his head in his hands as tears stung his eyes.
His poor, darling mother
. It was easy for her to believe those lies since Luciano was such a dog to her, and according to Aunt Bella, had only told her that he loved her three times: when he proposed to her, when he married her, and when Massimo was born. She was insecure, unsure of her place in his life. She should not have died with those lies in her head.

He pounded his fist on the table
. Damn his father! Damn Judith Carmichael! Damn them both to hell!

“I’m sorry you had to hear the truth, Mr. Andretti.”

He wished he hadn’t. He lifted his head and stared at her. He was aware that his cheeks were wet with his tears but he didn’t care. “Why after all these years are you telling me now? You said you didn’t speak up before because you were afraid of my father. He’s been dead for eight years. Why even bother telling me now?”

“Just in case you’d happened upon this information some other way, I don’t want my daughter, Mindy, to get caught in the middle of this feud with you and your—with Judith’s son.”

Massimo frowned. “How is your daughter involved?
Please don’t tell me that old bastard fathered your daughter as well.

“Mindy is friends with your cousin’s wife, Tashi. They used to be neighbors on Temple Street. Mr. Andreas gave Mindy a job working in a boutique at Hotel Andreas. That’s where she met your—Galen. She told me you and Galen had a fight about his share of your father’s company or something like that. The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.”

No they don’t, but once some apples fall to the ground, they roll for yards to get away from the tree that had borne them
. Massimo stared out the window. The storm had passed. The sun was trying to peek out from behind gray clouds.

“I don’t want that boy anywhere near my daughter,” Mrs. Marshall said. “I figured if you knew the truth you’d do something about it.”

Massimo shifted his gaze to her. His lips twisted into a cynical smile. Everybody wanted something.
Always
. She’d just given him the answer to a question that had been burning a hole in his heart and mind for the past twenty-five years—an answer he now wished he didn’t have. All because she wanted him to do something to keep Galen away from her daughter.

Mass curled his fingers around the tape recorder. “Thank you for telling me, Mrs. Marshall. Is there any way I can get my hands on the other tapes you spoke about?”

“Sure. Sure. I can bring them by your office tomorrow.”

That would work. He’d have time to listen to them before he took his family to Como for the week. “Say around nine in the morning?”

She nodded. “Nine.”

“Does anyone else know you have them, or about what you just told me?”

“No, sir. You’re the only person I’ve ever told. And they are the only copies I have.”

There was no need not to believe her. “I’d like this to stay between us,” he said in a quiet voice, yet edged with an ominous quality.

Her eyes widening with fear as she stared into his.

Satisfied that Mrs. Pamela Marshall would take her dirt on Judith Carmichael to her grave, Massimo glanced at his watch. “I have another appointment, so if you don’t mind, we can bring this meeting to a close.” He stood and walked around to her chair and helped her to her feet. “Now that you’ve gotten this burden off your chest, you can sleep in peace.”

He, on the other hand, would probably lie awake for many nights with the vision of his mother standing in the music room with Judith Carmichael’s obnoxious voice and ugly words in her ears.

Mass swept into the foyer when Galen opened the door. He’d called when he left Big Boy’s to let him know he was paying him a visit. He stood near the door and swept his gaze around. The villa was just the way he’d left it when he’d given it up for Shaina—taupe leather sofas and chairs, marble tables, Persian rugs, crystal chandeliers, and expensive paintings on the walls.

“It’s good to see you, Massimo,” Galen said, holding out his hand for a shake.

Ignoring it, Mass took in the black and blue areas around his eyes and the scab on his lower lip. At least Galen was healing, physically, while the scars on the wounds of Mass’ heart had just been ripped wide open. Mass wanted to crack Galen’s lip open again and watch him bleed.

Mass, you can’t blame Galen if it was his mother who’d called your mother. Promise me you won’t take your anger out on him.
Shaina’s warning rang in his ears. And his devious wife had made him promise while they’d made love to Beyonce’s “Drunk in Love” last night, and then this morning in the shower to Case’s “Shook Up.” Both times her voluptuous body had bounced and undulated on his shaft like he’d never seen it done before. It was mind-blowing. He was still shook up. For her sake and in anticipation of being shaken up again soon, Massimo kept the promise he’d made to his wife and unclenched his fists.

“Would you care for some coffee?” Galen’s voice broke into his reverie. “I just made a fresh pot.”

“In your text, five days ago, you said you wanted to talk. What do you want to talk about?”

Galen ran his fingers through his dark curly hair and leaned against one of the columns that separated the small foyer from the open concept spaces of the kitchen, dining and living rooms. “I just want to say I’m sorry, in person. I’m sorry, Mass.”

Massimo looked him up and down. He was a handsome young man, which was no surprise since he was an Andretti. He had their father’s chin—the same chin Mass had inherited. “What are you sorry about?”

“For saying those things about your mother. I shouldn’t have. I didn’t know that room was special to you and I didn’t realize that it was the anniversary of her death, and that Jabari had just died. If I’d known, I would have been more sensitive.”

Meaning, you would have waited to ask for half of Andretti Industries. Caught me when I was in a better mood, and much more receptive
. “You don’t know a lot of things, Galen. You also insulted my wife by telling her that I forced her into marriage for money, the money you would have gotten if she hadn’t married me. So I’ll ask you again. What do you want?” Massimo just wanted to hear him say it out loud, so he, Galen, could hear how absurd it was.

Galen crossed his arms and looked Massimo straight in the face. “I deserve half of Andretti Industries. I’m Luciano’s son, too. I was neglected and denied my birthright through no fault of my own. I deserve half of his estate, and I deserve a seat on the board.”

Massimo laughed so hard, he had to brace his hand against the wall to keep from falling to the floor.

“So this is a joke to you?” Galen demanded in a vociferous voice. “You think it’s funny?”

Mass sobered up and cleared the frog from his throat. “I’m not giving you half of A.I., Galen, nor will you ever sit on the board. Andretti Industries belongs to me as the rightful legitimate heir of the Andretti bloodline. It’s the heritage of my children, and
their
children, for generations to come. My kids won’t be fighting yours for power, decades from now. I won’t leave them such an unstable legacy.” And just in case Andretti Industries went under for some unfortunate reason, there was
La Banca di Bianchi,
the second largest bank in Europe. In a few years, it would be the largest. Massimo couldn’t wait to groom Aria and her future siblings to take over the two empires he was safeguarding for them.

“You expect me to just walk away empty-handed like I came?” Galen asked.

“You can go out and start your own company. Carve out your own place in the world. I started
La Banca di Bianchi
all on my own.”

“You had Andretti money for a startup.”

“Wrong. I borrowed every penny of that startup, and paid it back with interest. You can do the same. Make your company whatever you want and wherever you want. You can stay here in the States, here in Granite Falls, or you can return to Europe. I don’t care. Once you figure it out, I will give you the initial financial backing. Just tell me how much you need and I will write you a check up to a certain amount.”

Galen’s hazel eyes glowed with anger. “That’s not fair, Massimo. You know it.”

“Life’s not fair, Galen.”

“I didn’t have my father in my life to groom me, to make me into the kind of man you’ve become.”

Massimo chuckled softly. The man he’d become had nothing to do with his father, but everything to do with the sweet love of the remarkable woman he’d been lucky enough to find. She’d changed him from the bitter man-whore his father had turned him into. “You received an education equal to mine. It’s much more than most bastards get. Use it. And if it’s grooming you need, when you’re ready, I’ll groom you like our father groomed me. We make the most of what we get and play the hand we’ve been dealt. This is your hand. Play it. It’s the best offer you’ll ever get in your lifetime, so I suggest you take it. If you decide to accept my offer, you will sign an irrefutable contract that neither you nor your progeny will ever interfere in Andretti Industries business from here to eternity, and beyond.”