Gia didn’t back down easily and she wasn’t going to be intimidated now.

To think she was only three years old! Payton knew already these two were going to really butt heads, as Gia grew older.

Marco looked at her. “They’re not too old for blankets?”

“No,” Gia answered smartly, indignantly. “They’re our lovies. The doctor says we can have a lovie.”

Again Marco’s gaze lifted and he stared at Payton rather incredulously. “You tell them this stuff?”

“No,” Payton replied. “Their pediatrician told them. Dr. Crosby explained to the girls that they were too old for pacifiers, but understood that Gia and Liv still needed a lovie. The blankets became the lovie.” Payton’s chin rose. Things you’d know if you’d been part of their lives, she wanted to spit at him, but wouldn’t, not with the girls here, not when they were already so unsettled.

The girls needed breakfast and a nap. They needed routine. They needed time and attention and lots of love, but Payton said none of these things, biting the inside of her lip so hard that she nearly drew blood.

Wasn’t it ironic that at Calvanté Design in San Francisco, she had was known for her warmth, her skill, her compassionate approach in dealing with people and problems, yet the moment she came face-to-face with Marco she felt wildly out of control?

“I’m not crazy about the word, lovie,” Marco said with a grimace, “but if she needs her blanket, we’ll get the blanket.”

He lifted Gia out of Payton’s arms and into his. Gia stiffened, resisting him. She turned her small face away, giving him her fierce profile but she didn’t utter a word.

Gia was scared. Gia, who wasn’t afraid of anyone, or anything, was afraid of her own father.

Payton’s heart squeezed. It was never supposed to turn out like this. It was never supposed to come down to this. If it hadn’t been for that lab report she wouldn’t be here now, either.

Marco reached into his elegant suit-coat and retrieved his phone. “When did you last have the blanket?”

“Sometime between boarding in San Francisco and changing planes in New York.”

Gia turned her head slightly to look at Marco.

“So it’s on the first plane,” he said.

Payton’s shoulders lifted. “Or in La Guardia’s terminal.” It was difficult changing planes in the middle of the night with two sleepy little girls, a tangle of carry-on bags, and a fistful of boarding passes. Payton could have sworn she’d double-checked the girl’s tiny backpacks for the blankets but obviously she’d overlooked Gia’s.

Marco punched in a number and rattled off directions in Italian. Payton hadn’t spoken Italian in a couple of years but she had no problem following his rapid speech.

He’d called his assistant, the one that handled his travel, and he was telling her to track down the lost blanket. If his assistant couldn’t locate it from her desk in Milan, he wanted her on the last flight out that day to try to retrieve it in person.

Marco hung up the phone and put it away. Payton felt reluctant admiration. She didn’t always like his tactics but they worked. He usually got what he wanted.

Except he hadn’t wanted her, and he’d gotten her anyway.

Payton’s faint smile faded. “Thank you,” she said, hating the tangle of emotion inside her chest. She’d told herself she was going to handle this calmly, told herself that she wasn’t going to let the past influence this reconciliation but that was easier said than done.

Marco nodded. “Do you have everything?”

Payton remembered her suitcase. “My bag never made it.”

He bit back a sigh and his flash of irritation stung her.

He never minded helping the girls but he objected to helping her.