He didn’t need her love. He had his business empire. His airline that allowed him to escape anywhere, anytime. He was a citizen of the world, beholden to no one and attached to nothing. He could replace Hana instantly. He...
Closing his eyes, Antonio leaned his hot cheek against the cool leather punching bag. He suddenly didn’t care about his empire.
Money—what did that matter without being able to spend it on her?
Power—what kind of power could he ever have, if he didn’t even have the power to be with her?
Sex—what appeal could meaningless hookups ever have, after the ecstasy of holding Hana in his arms?
His wife had tried to heal him. Ridiculous. Even she, with all her warmth and care, didn’t have that power. He still couldn’t believe Hana had tracked down the doctor and gone to speak with his mother.
There’s not much time left. Your mother’s sick. Dying...
A shudder went through him and he opened his eyes bleakly.
For the first time since he was a boy, he tried to picture his mother. Tried to imagine why she’d abandoned him. Was Antonio so awful as a newborn? Had he been colicky, crying for hours? Had she hated the man who’d impregnated her?
Had he been conceived, not in love, but out of some horrific act like rape?
It was his greatest fear.
Antonio thought of his childhood, of not even knowing who he was or why he’d been abandoned, of being sent back to the orphanage whenever he’d dared hope he’d found someone to love him, of getting beaten by the older kids for crying. He’d simply learned to stop feeling anything at all, just to avoid pain. He thought of the time he’d imagined himself in love with Isabella, giving his heart away so eagerly, only to have it thrown back in his face. Money is what matters. Money is what lasts. You’re young. You’ll learn.
But Hana hadn’t cared about money. She’d only cared about him. Helping him. Healing him.
Loving him.
Antonio shuffled wearily out of the home gym. He stopped outside the doorway of the grand salon, a gracious, high-ceilinged room, in this palace once owned by a nobleman. The decor was elegant, with all the prestige money could buy. He’d done this to prove to everyone that he was no longer the pathetic orphan he’d been. But there was one person he’d never been able to convince: himself.
I can’t love you if you won’t love yourself.
Suddenly, Antonio knew he had to make a choice. One choice now that would separate his life forever onto two different paths.
Which would it be?
Gripping his hands at his sides, he looked out the wide windows toward the orange trees in the rainy courtyard. Would he keep the life he’d had? Where he felt nothing, and controlled everything—most of all, his own feelings—out of fear?
Or would he take a risk?
Suddenly, he was tired of being afraid.
He’d lost Hana. What could be worse than that? What more did he have to fear?
Antonio stood totally still. Then his chin lifted, his jaw set.
He would no longer be enslaved by his worst fears about his past. About himself.
His spine snapped straight, and he turned on his heel. Going up the staircase, he went into his bedroom. He picked up the piece of paper Hana had left. He saw his mother’s name, Josune Loiola. An address. A phone number.
Grabbing his phone, he started to dial, then stopped. No. He couldn’t do this on the phone. He had to see the woman in person, to see her face, to demand why she’d left him as a baby, helpless and alone, in a basket on those church steps.
He dialed Garcia instead. “Gas up the jet.”
“Back to New York, señor?”
“No,” he told his bodyguard. “North. Tell the pilot to find the closest airport to a village called Etxetarri.”
It was early evening when Antonio got into the car that awaited him on the tarmac of the tiny private airport on the northern coast. Getting into the car, he left Garcia and his pilot behind.