Page 60 of A Treasure To Keep (Leone Legacy #2)

Marco

I received a call an hour ago informing me that the paperwork has been delivered.

I still can’t believe Alessandro convinced me to sign and send the paperwork.

Who the fuck even knows if it’s my baby?

People who struggle with infertility manage to have babies.

At least, that’s what stories on the internet say.

I’m sitting in my office when I receive a notification from our gate and click on our camera, noticing whose car is racing up the driveway. I should have guessed this would happen.

I race to the front door with enough time for the door to slam open, busting a hole through the newly fixed wall.

“We just fixed that wall!”

“Fuck your wall!” El’s heels come stomping toward me, blazing fire in her eyes.

She shoves me with enough force that I stumble back a few steps until I catch myself on a small table.

She’s more pissed than I thought she would be.

“Anything to fucking say now? You entitled son of a bitch! Who fucking said you had any right to interrupt my life? Also, who said I’m keeping the fucking baby? ”

“You and Andrea said I had that right the moment we started sleeping together, and I started regularly coming inside your pussy. You said it yourself, the shot isn’t 100 percent effective.

When it comes to your second question, if you didn’t plan on keeping it, you wouldn’t call it a baby.

” El screams out of frustration, slamming her fists against my chest until Alessandro bursts in.

“What the fuck is the problem? I’m on a call with Geno.” His footsteps halt when he notices El in the room, instantly knowing what’s happening. He should know. It was his fucking idea.

Her mouth drops open, realizing by Alessandro’s reaction whose idea it was in the first place to draw up everything.

“You! You’re behind this, aren’t you? Marco didn’t say a goddamn word for weeks.

All of a sudden, your name pops up on the paperwork handed to me when I’m sixteen weeks pregnant.

Just because you’re a dad doesn’t mean you have the right to interrupt my life. Does Luci know about this?”

A petite body holding a four-month-old smiling baby appears from the stairwell.

It suddenly clicks in my head. Four months.

Gia was born four months ago, and El is four months pregnant.

My baby could have been conceived the night Gia was born.

Also, the night I barged into Andrea and El’s apartment, distraught about Alessandro being shot.

Luci interrupts my thoughts as my mind pieces everything together.

“Do I know about what?” Three of the people she cares most about stand in front of her.

I can see from the worry in her eyes that she’s not prepared to take a side.

Also, knowing she’ll be forced to take a side, disappointing at least one person in the meantime.

Being the people pleaser she is, this is a massive worry of hers.

“Mio premio, this doesn’t involve you. Please take Gia upstairs.” El’s face says one thing. ‘The fucking audacity.’

“No. Stay here and see what a piece of shit your husband and his best friend are. Alessandro convinced Marco to serve me papers claiming partial custody of Andrea and my baby. A baby that’s not even born.

Can you honestly say you’re okay with that?

” Luci avoids eye contact with El, looking over to Alessandro, then at the floor while chewing on her lip.

There it is, the side Luci chose to take.

“I’m sorry, El, but I have to agree with them.

If Marco is the father, he has a right to help raise his baby.

The last thing I wanted was for Elio to raise Alessandro’s baby.

” Alessandro groans deep in his chest, his lip twitching at the mention of Luci’s ex-boyfriend, who had full intentions of raising a baby that wasn’t his.

El stands there in silence, dumbfounded by her best friend's reaction. After a minute, she turns toward me, the anger gone from her voice but still deeply ingrained into her eyes.

“If you think you’ll get away with this bullshit, you’re fucking crazy.

I’m going to tear up those fucking papers and I suggest you do the same.

Just because I let you fuck me doesn’t mean I want a future with you.

I want a future with my love, the real father of my baby.

Unless you want more holes in your wall, or even better, your body, you’ll drop this bullshit and let me live my life with my love. ”

El storms off, swinging open the door to accentuate the hole in the wall fixed from a few weeks ago. She turns her head back to me, continuing her fit by slamming the door into the wall several more times. When she finally decides there’s enough damage, she slams it shut.

I turn my head toward Luci and Alessandro, Luci still chewing nervously on her lip and Alessandro staring directly into my soul. I’ve known him long enough that we both know that means ‘what are you going to do?’.

Instead of answering him, I storm off into my office, picking up my copy of the paperwork. I flip through the pages, scanning through the bullshit terms that Alessandro and our lawyer recommended that I write down. Seriously? The kid has to have my last name? Bullshit. All of it is bullshit.

“Fuck!” I slam the paperwork on the desk and swipe everything off. Alessandro appears in the doorway when everything settles randomly throughout the room.

“Are you done?” Alessandro walks into my office, picking up what landed on the chair across from my desk before sitting down.

“Who the fuck knows? Also, who are you to fucking talk? Remember the big ass fits you threw after Aldo left with Luci?”

His face and tone flatten. “This isn’t about me.”

“Sure. Why the fuck are you in here? It was your dumbass idea to send the paperwork in the first place.” Internally, I know I’m poking at the bear.

“Don’t blame me. I didn’t force your hand.”

“You absolutely forced it! I was going to leave them to their own life until you butted in. Now I’ve caused even more of a mess.

El is angrier at me than she normally is, the closest thing to a relationship I’ve ever had is fucked, and now El and Luci are fighting.

And it’s all. Your. Fault!” I should have known the second I brought Luci into this, things would have gone south.

He stands face-to-face with me, even though I’m several inches taller than him.

“You sound like a child! You know, if you didn’t want to sign that shit, you wouldn’t have. Stop lying to yourself.”

“I signed that shit because you caught me during a weak time, and put that shit in front of me. El has a point. You can’t shove your parental opinions on everyone else because you’re a dad. I—”

Alessandro takes the opportunity to disrupt whatever I was about to say and slugs me.

Wow, that’s a flashback to our childhood.

Before we know it, we’re both in the middle of a fight, rolling on the floor until Luci comes running into the room.

At some point, I roll over something solid, taking note to scan my body for any holes where there shouldn’t be.

“Stop it! Stop it, you two! Fighting doesn’t solve anything.

This is a crap situation and now I’m being dragged into it.

We don’t need you two fighting over this.

Now don’t make me call Geno.” Alessandro has his fist back, and both of us stare, eyes wide, at Luci and her threat to call Geno.

I’ll say it again. Wow, that’s a flashback to our childhood.

“Finally! I don’t care what you do with the silly paperwork and who you sleep with.

I, on the other hand, hurt my best friend.

I’m taking Gia, and Enzo is going to take us to El’s apartment to apologize and for a girls’ day.

She’s done that for me, and I should have been a better friend to her.

” Alessandro stands, ready to tell her no when she interrupts him.

“No! Enzo will be with me and Gia. We will be safe. I’m going over there.

” I secretly love it when she puts him in his place.

She storms out of the room, Alessandro in tow, leaving me alone.

Finally. I rub my hands up my face, hissing when I hit the sore spot around where Alessandro threw that first punch.

When I open my eyes, the first thing I see is the paperwork.

The dumbass paperwork. I pick it up, intending to do what El asked of me, until my hands tense, unable to rip the packet even an inch.

I slam both my hands flat on the desk, closing my eyes while my head hangs low.

The first thing I see when I open my eyes is the tattoo of my papa’s name and the date he died on my forearm. He chooses now to send me a sign from beyond the grave? And one that says he agrees with Alessandro. Maybe they’re right. Maybe I should be involved in my child’s life.