Chapter 5 - The Crib in the Guest RoomThe tension in the grand dining room was thick enough to cut with a butcher’s knife. Thirty pairs of eyes were glued to the drama unfolding near the entrance, nobody daring to whisper, sip their wine, or even breathe too loudly.
Luca turned his back on Vanessa entirely, dismissing her as if she were a piece of stray furniture. He looked down at his daughter, the fierce, terrifying boss melting away instantly to reveal a father whose heart had just been handed back to him on a silver platter.
“Who’s the father?” Luca asked gently, his voice softening.
Emily sniffled, a tiny, genuine smile breaking through her tear-streaked face. “Michael.”
“The high school history teacher?”
She nodded, wiping her cheek with her palm. “He’s wonderful, Dad. He wanted to come tonight, but… well, we didn't think you’d want to see either of us.”
“And are you two…?”
“We’re getting married in the spring,” Emily whispered.
A sound escaped Luca’s throat—a sudden, wet, disbelieving laugh. It wasn't a laugh of humor; it was the sound of a man whose chest had finally unspooled from six months of agonizing, suffocating worry. All the dark scenarios his mind had conjured—that she was sick, that she was in danger, that she wanted nothing to do with him anymore—evaporated in a single second.
He opened his arms wide.
Emily didn't hesitate. She threw herself forward, burying her face directly against the expensive wool of his tuxedo jacket. Luca wrapped his thick, powerful arms around her, burying his face in her hair, his shoulders shaking with silent, profound emotion.
“I would have come,” Luca whispered fiercely against her ear, his eyes tightly shut.
“To what, Dad?” she sobbed into his chest.
“Everything,” he muttered. “Doctor appointments. Ultrasound scans. Setting up the nursery. Whatever you needed, whenever you needed it.”
Emily pulled back slightly, looking up at him with utter confusion written across her features. “But… Vanessa said you didn't want to be involved. She said you told her you wanted space from my mess.”
Luca’s face darkened, the warmth vanishing to be replaced by a terrifying, arctic fury. He looked down at her. “I bought a crib last month.”
Emily blinked, her tears pausing. “What?”
“I saw an antique cherry-wood crib in a specialty shop window down on Michigan Avenue,” Luca said, his voice thick with emotion. “I felt completely ridiculous walking in there and buying it when I didn't even know whether you wanted children yet—or if you’d ever forgive me for spending too much time at the offices.”
Emily covered her mouth with both hands, her eyes wide. “You bought a crib?”
“It’s sitting right upstairs in the guest room next to your old childhood suite,” Luca said softly, brushing a stray lock of hair away from her forehead. “I put it together myself. Took me four hours because the instructions were written in German, but I got it done.”
Vanessa went completely, deathly still against the far wall. Her hands were clenched so tightly into her silk skirt that her knuckles were entirely bloodless.
Luca noticed her reaction. The shift in his demeanor was instantaneous—the protective father vanished, and the dangerous, calculated head of the Moretti family stepped back into the light.
He looked slowly from his daughter back to his fiancée.
“Why,” Luca asked, each word dropping like a lead weight onto the marble floor, “did you tell my daughter I didn't want this baby?”
Vanessa opened her mouth, but no sound came out. She swallowed hard, her eyes darting frantically toward the door as if she were calculating her chances of running out into the rain in her gold stilettos.
“I didn't want your engagement overshadowed,” she finally managed, her voice sounding thin and brittle.
“My daughter having my first grandchild,” Luca said, his voice dropping into that quiet, terrifying register that made grown men beg for mercy, “does not overshadow anything. It is the only legacy that matters.”
Then, Emily seemed to remember something. Her eyes lit up through her lingering tears. She reached down into the small paper gift bag she had clutched through the entire ordeal.
“Dad?” she asked softly.
“Yes, sweetheart?”
She pulled out a tiny, perfectly folded white cotton onesie. She held it up by the shoulders so he could read the bold, dark blue block letters printed across the front:
GRANDPA LUCA
Luca stared at it.
For several agonizing seconds, the most feared man in Chicago couldn't speak, couldn't move, couldn't draw a breath. His chest heaved. Then, with trembling fingers, he reached out and took the onesie from her hands, pressing it directly against his heart as if it were a sacred relic.
Emily smiled, a watery, beautiful thing. “I was going to give it to you six weeks ago.”
Luca looked up from the onesie, his gaze returning to Vanessa. She had stopped trying to look dignified; she was staring at the floor, defeated, cornered, and entirely exposed.
But Emily wasn't finished yet. The adrenaline of the moment was still carrying her forward, and as she looked around the grand room, a sudden flash of doubt crossed her face.
“Dad?” she asked again, her voice dipping into uncertainty.
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