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Good riddance

He should have fired Rossini two o, his twenty years of service to the faht to soalled Luca to admit it He wasn’t ‘soft’—far from it—but years of self-imposed exile in America had left him ill prepared for the mammoth job ahead

‘Signor Cavallari?’

He turned away fro butler and head of the do in the room

Luca returned to the chair behind the expansive hand-carved desk—the place from where Franco Cavallari had ruled both his empire and his family with an iron fist—and sat ‘What is it, Victor?’ he said, casting his gaze over the endless piles of paperwork de his attention

‘I need to show you so’

The urgency in Victor’s voice brought Luca’s head up He studied the man Not a hair out of place as usual, and his standard pinstriped suit looked as if it had colistened with beads of sweat and the knuckles on his left hand, which clutched an oversized envelope against his chest, shone white

Luca leaned back in his chair Well, well Soot the unflappable Victor in a flap ‘For God’s sake, man,’ he said ‘Sit down before you fall down’

Victor dropped into the chair Rossini had vacated ‘Thank you, signor’ He plucked a pristine white handkerchief from his breast pocket and dabbed his brow

Growing impatient, Luca held out his hand

Victor hesitated, opened his ain, then relinquished the envelope

Expecting documents of some kind, Luca re a bunch of eight-by-ten colour photographs He exarass in what looked like a public park Other people rapher had clearly focused on her The weather was sunny and presumably warm since she wore shorts, a sleeveless T-shirt, and a straw sunhat that cast her face in shadow

‘Stunning,’ hean appreciative eye over shapely curves and long, slender legs

Victor clicked his tongue ‘The other photos,’ he urged, pointing at the pile ‘Look at themthe child’

Luca put the picture down and picked up the next, this one of a young boy playing outdoors No older than three or four, the child had tousled dark hair, brown eyes fringed with thick lashes, and olive skin flushed with exertion

The hairs on Luca’s forearms lifted

It was a photo of him as a boy Except it wasn’t, because the date stamp was only ten months old