“Buongiorno,” she said, when the maid showed Marco in.

“Buongiorno, mia Amore,” he answered, kissing each cheek. “How is your head today?”

“Bene.” She smiled. Fine.

His gaze traveled her pale face before resting on her bruised forehead. “Your black eye is getting worse.”

“It gets uglier before it gets better,” she answered, making space for him on the small sofa in her private salon. “But I deserve a bump on my head if I’m going to run stoplights. It was stupid of me.”

The maid soon returned with two small coffees on a gold tray. “How are things at home?” Marilena asked, cradling her cup.

“Fine.” He looked up and discovered she’d been watching him, her smooth forehead slightly furrowed.

“Something’s wrong,” Marilena said softly.

There was no easy way to do this, no easy way to say this. Marilena was too intelligent, too perceptive to know that his news would change everything.

“Yes?” she prompted gently. And yet there was a new light in her eyes, wariness. Caution.

“Payton’s sick.” He didn’t know how else to break the news. It was difficult to say without skirting the issue. “She has cancer.”

Marilena’s lips parted, eyes widening. “Cancer?”

“Yes.”

“The poor thing.”

And Marco felt like a heel all over again. He was doing the right thing, telling Marilena, letting Marilena know that he had to support Payton as much as possible, and yet he knew this was hard for her, just as this would be difficult for all of them.

“And the girls,” Marilena added, correctly naming his chief worry. “Do they know? What will they do?”

He patted his coat, itching like mad for a cigarette. “They don’t know yet, and—” He muttered an oath, hating all of this, hating the hard decisions that would soon have to be made. “Yet I know what Payton wants.”

He glanced up, met Marilena’s gaze. “She wants the girls to stay with me.”

Marilena didn’t move. Didn’t blink. She just stared at him. “Stay with you? Payton, too?”

“No, not Payton. Just the girls. Payton wants us—you and me—to keep them while she goes through chemotherapy.”

“Oh.” Marilena stood, took a slow turn around the room, her long legs even more elegant in her slim slacks and high leather heels. “Good Heavens.”

“Yes.”

She turned a little, rubbed her temple and looked at him. “What do you think?”

“I think Payton’s terrified. She loves the girls dearly. They’re practically her whole world—”

“She does have a job, Marco. A very visible job as a designer for Calvanti.”

“But she’s taking a leave of absence. She’s not going to try to work, at least not during the first part of her treatment, and she can’t imagine lying around the house sick and having the girls be part of this.”

“She’s certainly been candid with you, hasn’t she?”

“She’s desperate.”

Marilena blew a slow stream of air. “So, what are you proposing? What about the wedding? The honeymoon? Us?”

“We’re still us.