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“Yes, but they should have been honest with me. I was not born to them. I’m not biologically related.”
Skye sighed, stroking his back, wishing she could take away this hurt.
“And if I hadn’t been sent those papers, I doubt they would ever have told me the truth.”
Skye’s eyes shuttered. “Oh, Leo,” she murmured, then pulled back just enough to place a kiss on his lips, gentle, soft, reassuring.
“I have no idea who I am,” he said with a shake of his head.
“You’re the same person you’ve always been.”
“No, I’m not. So much of my identity came from being a Valentino?—,”
“You are a Valentino.”
“I am not. It’s all a lie.”
“But they raised you. They chose to love you.”
“I’m not saying that’s not true. But they should have been honest with me. This did not need to be a secret. I feel as though every touchstone I considered stable has been shifted away from me. I don’t know who I am anymore,” he repeated, and she heard it this time. She really heard it. The desperation that a man like Leandro must feel. His pride, his sense of identity. She hugged him hard, trying to find words that might help him.
“I know who you are,” she said, simply, after several moments of silence. “You are good and kind, decent and moralistic. You are all the things you always were, and when the shock of this has worn off, you’ll see that.”
“But they are not my family. I have no family.”
“Of course they’re your family,” she contradicted. “That’s never going to change.”
“It already has changed.”
“You’re in shock,” she reminded him. “You’re still trying to make sense of all this. You’re hurting and angry. In time, you will be able to see that the choice your parents made to love you almost makes them more your parents than anything else. They chose you, Leo. You didn’t know that, but they did, and they loved you every single day, in a way that never once made you wonder if you were somehow different. They never treated you as less of their child than your siblings. They never made you feel like you didn’t belong. What greater proof of their genuine love for you is there than that?”
She felt his Adam’s apple shift as he swallowed, and she lifted up onto the tips of her toes so she could place a kiss on top of his head.
“They still should have told me. People have a right to know their own past.”
“I don’t disagree,” she said gently. “But it sounds to me like you have two parents who love you more than anything. I’m sorry for the pain you’re going through right now, but I can’t pity you that situation. You are loved, Leo. You are part of a family, whether you were born to them or not.”
He glanced away, his features taut, but he didn’t reject her words and he didn’t disagree with her.
Skye cupped his cheeks with her palms and brought his face back to hers. “You are loved, and you will always belong with the people who love you,” she repeated, and as she said the words, she felt something lock into place in the centre of her chest, something that spread warmth through her body and made her pulse tremble. Because he was loved—by his family but, she was starting to realise, also by her.
CHAPTER TWELVE
“YOU’RE LEAVING?”
She didn’t want to. Not yet; not after the revelation he’d shared with her only a little while earlier. But having spent the night last night, she knew she needed to be home with her parents and daughter. With the people who loved her, with the people to whom she belonged. Even when the thought of walking away from Leandro like this was almost impossible.
But it was one of the few times she’d gotten off work in time to make it home for dinner; she couldn’t miss the chance to see Harper. Time was so fleeting, after all.
“I have to,” she apologized. And then, almost shyly, “But you could come with me?”
He arched a brow.
“Come have dinner with us.”
“Like this?”
She half-smiled. “You look devilishly handsome.”
