Page 278 of Cara & Gian: The Guzzi Duet

“Marcus!” Gian whispered loudly down the hall.

Nothing answered him back.

“Marcus, you better not be waking up your brothers, you little monster.”

Or his mother …

Marcus could be a handful for a nearly two-year-old child. Gian turned his back on his oldest son for two seconds, and the kid was gone. Like fucking lightning.

The further down the hall Gian got, the quieter he whispered for his son to come out of his hiding spot. “Marcus, Daddy has one of your cookies.”

Muffled behind the twins’ nursery door, Gian heard the sounds of Marcus making car noises. He quickly opened the door to find his boy playing on the floor between the two bassinets, his favorite toy car in hand. Marcus didn’t even look up at his father, instead continuing to play as though he hadn’t done anything wrong. Thankfully, it seemed the plush carpet was mostly muting the noise of the toy car.

“Marcus,” Gian murmured, carefully sidestepping a particular spot on the floor that creaked loud enough to wake the devil. “You know not to come into your baby brothers’ room when they’re napping. Come to Daddy, please.”

The boy rolled over to his back, and smiled up at Gian.

“Hi, Daddy,” Marcus said, barely above a whisper.

Serene.

Innocent.

Sweet as could be.

Terrible.

Good God, the boy was terrible. He knew exactly how to wrap his mother or father right around his tiny little finger with nothing more than a smile and twinkling brown eyes. Gian fully expected that out of his three children—whether or not more kids came in the future was up to Cara—Marcus was going to be the one Gian had to watch out for.

“Let me check on your brothers, and then we’re going,” Gian told the still-smiling toddler.

Gian leaned over the wicker bassinets, his gaze drifting over the swaddled, sleeping twin two-month old boys. Even small, brand new, and beautiful, he could see his features reflected in the babies. The shape of their noses, their dark hair, and the curve of their lips. Marcus had been perfect, too, but Gian had forgotten how strange and wonderful it felt to simply stare at his children and feel.

When they slept, when they were quiet, and when they couldn’t possibly know he was watching them … it was amazing. They were amazing.

And they had come from him.

Corrado preferred his thumb to a soother.

Christopher could only be soothed on the breast.

Gian vividly recalled the moment Cara had slid a positive pregnancy test into his hand with one of her sly smiles. He had never guessed that one baby would actually be two. Identical twins—boys, again.

Suddenly, their little family had become very big in a short amount of time.

He barely blinked, and he had three children. Three boys to raise. Three pieces of him to love. Others might have been scared at the changes in their life, but Gian was not one of those people. He had wanted a family of his own for longer than he cared to remember, but he had settled on the idea that he might not see those wishes through.

Yet, there he was, a father.

And there his babies were, all his.

“Daddy.”

Little Marcus pushed up from the floor and tugged on his father’s pant legs. Quickly, to keep him quiet and prevent him from waking up his baby brothers and mother, Gian scooped Marcus into his arms. The toddler peered into the wicker bassinets, curiosity lighting up his gaze.

For the most part, Marcus had no interest in his brothers. They were still too new, Gian thought. They didn’t play like he did, they cried when Marcus wanted quiet time, and they took up a lot of his mother and father’s attention.

He was a good big brother, though.