f her home, new life had just begun. It would grow back, even better and brighter than she’d ever dreamed.
The secret of life, as in making omelets, was love.
Spring had come to Venice at last.
Alex looked out the window of the palazzo. After a cold, dark, wet winter, the city had burst into the flowers of May. In the courtyard below, the leaves were green, and the canal sparkled blue against the sky.
His palazzo, too, had changed.
Looking around the salon where he’d first met Rosalie, when she’d been a panicked, pregnant stranger, Alex smiled. The floor was covered with his son’s toys. Oliver was almost nine months old now, and a very fast crawler. He was already learning to walk.
Their family had only arrived a few weeks ago. They’d spent most of the winter planning their new vineyard in Sonoma, where they were rebuilding Rosalie’s childhood home, and had passed the early spring at his vineyard in La Tesora. They looked forward to splitting their time between California and northern Italy, and had excellent employees to help manage both.
But Rosalie was his true partner. He’d never felt so alive as he did now. Their marriage had lots of laughter and joy by day—and by night, they set the world on fire. Alex shivered. Saying he loved his wife was insufficient. She was his life.
Everywhere he looked now, he could see her influence. She made everything joyful. The palazzo that had once been so empty and barren had become a comfortable, warm home.
Even Alex’s work had changed. She’d convinced him to stop trying to be an anonymous wine genius, losing money every month, and start trying to market Falconeri wines, and turn it into a viable business.
“I know you’re a billionaire and don’t actually need the money,” she’d said, rolling her eyes, “but if we’re going to all the trouble of making it, why don’t we also try to actually make people want to buy it? Just for fun?”
So they’d returned to Venice to open a tasting room for tourists. Just yesterday, they’d met with an architect to discuss plans for a tasting room and retail store at La Tesora. They might even sponsor next year’s Venice Film Festival, to build the Falconeri brand. It made him nervous, but as his wife had said, the paparazzi were following them anyway—why not take that publicity and turn it into something positive? They were making wines. Instead of keeping it a closely held secret, why not go big, and see if the rest of the world liked their wines too?
It was risky. It involved putting his heart, and his wine, on the line. But in spite of that—or maybe because of it—Alex had never been happier.
In the palazzo’s salon, above the marble fireplace, the painting of his haughty ancestor had been replaced by a beautiful new oil painting of his wife, holding their baby in her arms. After he’d begged, Rosalie had arranged it as a gift for his thirty-sixth birthday. Alex looked up at the painting, at her dark, spectacular beauty, at the glowing warmth of her deep brown eyes.
Then he heard her voice behind him. “There you are.”
Turning, Alex saw his wife, even more beautiful in person. Coming forward, he kissed her. “Is everything ready?”
“Yes. Just in time too.” She gave him a sideways glance. “Are you sure you’re ready for this? There are four now, you know. Four.”
He paused. He’d invited Cesare and Emma and their children to stay not just for dinner, but for an entire weekend. If it went well, Alex and Rosalie and Oliver would go stay for a whole week with them in Lake Como later this summer. “If this works, our children will grow up as best friends.”
“But there will be five children in our house at once,” she pointed out. “All under the age of nine. Are you ready for that?”
“Absolutely,” Alex said.
She hesitated, then watched his face. “And six?” she said slowly. “Could you handle six?”
Alex frowned. “What do you—” Then his expression changed. He breathed, “Are you saying...”
Rosalie nodded shyly. “Around Christmas.”
“A baby!” With a shout, he pulled her into his arms, then kissed her cheeks and eyelids and forehead until she pulled away with a laugh.
“You’re squashing me!” Her eyes grew wistful. “Are you truly happy, Alex?”
“So happy, cara,” he whispered, holding her tenderly. “So very, very happy.” He gave a low laugh. “And I’m happy that this time, we did it the old-fashioned way.”
“This time,” she said huskily, her dark eyes warm. “And all the times to come.”
And as Alex lowered his head to kiss her, he was thinking that six children wasn’t such a bad idea. Because there was only one thing in the world more important than making wine, more important than promises, more important even than land that had been in the family for a hundred years. Only one thing would last forever, until all the stars went dim in the sky.
Love.