by Liz Fielding
Louise swallowed. ‘No?’
Oh, that hurt. For the last sixteen sleep-deprived hours, she’d been too numb for the pain to bite, but suddenly, hearing Max say that one word brought her whole body to agonising life and she had to bite back the cry of pain.
‘No,’ he repeated, then rolled his head to look at her. ‘How else would I have known how it would feel to lose you? How much it would hurt?’
No, no, no…‘Please, Max, don’t do this.’
‘I have to. I have to explain. If, when I’ve done, you don’t want me here, I’ll move to another seat. Go away. Never bother you again.’
That wasn’t what she wanted to hear, either, but she took in a deep breath, let it out. Nodded.
‘I spent most of the night thinking about us. About how, all my life, I’ve been pushing you away. Not just the surface stuff, avoiding each other, making sarcastic comments about the boys, the men who trailed after you like puppies. Deeper than that.’
‘I didn’t know there was anything deeper,’ Louise said. Then shook her head. It was so easy to fall into the habits of a lifetime. Dangerous. Sniping led to anger and anger led to passion. And after passion there was only pain…
‘I thought about the night I was supposed to take you to your school prom,’ Max said, not rising to it. ‘We were short-staffed, I didn’t lie about that, but if I’d said to Dad that I had to go, reminded him that Uncle John had asked me to be your escort, he’d have found someone to cover.’
‘You were more interested in the business even then, Max.’
‘No. The truth is that your father had drafted me in as a safe pair of hands, someone he could rely on not to forget himself with “his little princess”, was the way he put it. I knew just how you’d look. Sweet, innocent, in a demure frock but with that look in your eyes that said everything. A look I’d have to resist or burn in hell.’
‘You were so wrong about that.’
‘Wrong?’
‘Anything but sweet and innocent. I had a killer dress stashed away in my bag and I had designs on you. You were right to run scared.’
‘Really?’ A ghost of a smile lit up eyes that were grey with tiredness. ‘Uncle John nearly scalped me for standing you up. What he’d have done if he’d even suspected…’
‘It didn’t happen.’ She found an answering smile from somewhere. ‘I suppose I should thank you for saving me from myself.’
‘I haven’t finished, yet. There was the time you were flying to Italy. A year older, you were learning to hide your feelings, but I didn’t want you to go. I knew those Italian men would be all over you. That they could have what I wanted.’ He dragged his hand over his face. ‘When you came back, I could see…’
‘What could you see, Max?’
‘One look was all it took. One look and I knew that you’d taken that step away from me. I thought something inside me had died.’
‘Only thought?’
‘When you dropped that slinky dress at your feet,’ he said, with a grin, ‘I realised it had only been wounded.’
‘His name was Roberto,’ she told him, by way of punishment. ‘Six-foot two, short dark hair, blue eyes.’ She shook her head, realising, too late, that she wasn’t punishing him, but herself. ‘I knew by then that I couldn’t have you. Mustn’t want you. He was the nearest I could get.’ Then, desperate to put that behind her, ‘This is ancient history, Max.’
‘But don’t you see, Lou? It established a pattern. Last week’s kitchen flood was just the latest in a long line of similar excuses.’
‘But we were together.’
‘Were we? Hiding away as if we were ashamed of our feelings?’ She waited. ‘This was different, Louise. You’d asked me out on a date and it wasn’t like dinner with Patsy and Derek-something that could be brushed off as a family thing. It would have been just the two of us at a gala where we’d be recognised by half the audience. You were ready to make that statement, say to the world we’re a couple, while my sub-conscious was still programmed to sabotage anything that seemed like a relationship. That was anything more than sex.’
‘Is that supposed to be some kind of excuse?’
‘Yes. No…I’m just trying to explain that this is what I’ve been doing all my life. Running away from you. Unable to commit to anyone else. Telling myself that love is fool’s gold, no more than a meaningless convention to lend the lustre of respectability to baser desires. A lesson I learned at my father’s knee.’
‘So?’
‘So last night wasn’t like that. I was frantic. I couldn’t leave that stupid girl. I didn’t have my cell phone to call you. But I was sure someone would have told you what happened. I only learned today that Jane, the one person who knew the whole story, had been too shaken up by the incident to come to the party.’
‘Oh.’
‘Last night I tried to help someone in trouble. You need to know that I’ll always do that, even when it isn’t convenient. Even when it’s downright inconvenient. Just as you need to know that I will always put you before Bella Lucia. I meant what I said the other night. I love you.’
He produced the ring from his pocket, held it in the palm of his hand. ‘You can stop looking at the horizon, Lou. I’m here. This is yours. Along with my heart.’
When she didn’t take it, he closed his hand around it, took a document from the envelope, tucked the ring inside.
‘Maybe this will convince you I’m serious.’
‘What is this?’
‘A partnership in Bella Lucia.’
‘A partnership?’ For a moment she didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Did he really think that would make a difference?
‘An equal partnership. Take it, Louise, be my partner in everything, or I’m going to quit the business.’
What? ‘You can’t do that, Max. It’s your life.’
‘No, you are my life. And without you…’ she waited ‘…what would be the point?’
Her words. What she’d said to him. When he’d asked her why she’d stopped dating. What would have been the point?
‘What, my love? You think I don’t know? You think I haven’t been there? One woman in my arms and another so deeply ingrained in every cell that nothing I do can drive out the thought of her?’
She searched his face, saw the truth. That he had reached deep, found something within himself. Surrendered himself in a way that she’d never thought possible.
Not that he wouldn’t get distracted, drawn towards some new scheme and forget everything else for a moment. But it would be the normal distractions that everyone lived with. He would never be running from her again.
‘What would you do?’ she asked. ‘If I said no?’
‘Become a beach bum,’ he said. ‘Take up surfing. Cal Jameson promised to give me lessons.’
‘Cal?’
‘He was the one who found out what plane you were on. Organised the upgrade so that I could sit beside you.’
‘You mean it wasn’t just luck? That you paid…’ She frowned. ‘So where were you? Why did you wait until we’d taken off?’
‘Our date was for six-thirty. It was the one time I knew you’d be thinking of me.’
‘Oh.’
‘And I wanted to be sure you couldn’t walk away. And once I’d shown the stewardess the ring, she let me stay in club class until after take-off.’ He picked it up, held it between his thumb and finger. ‘Will you marry me, Louise?’
‘A beach bum?’ she said. Then, laughing, ‘You are such a liar, Max Valentine.’ But she held out her left hand, allowed him to slip the ring onto her finger. Kiss her.
‘Shall we get married in Queensland?’ he asked.
‘I’m not going to Queensland. I’m going to Melbourne to open my Australian office,’ she reminded him.
‘Yes, I saw your little goodbye note in the Courier, but I’m going to Queensland. I’ve been given a lead on a fabulous new resort opening up there. Rainforest. The barrier reef. A marina…’
‘Sounds wonderful.’
‘So come and give me your opinion. Then I’ll help you set up your own empire if that’s still what you want.’
‘Mmm. Maybe I should think about that. As a partner in Bella Lucia, I’m going to have other responsibilities.’
‘As my wife, the mother of my children and a partner in Bella Lucia, you may have a point.’
‘As my husband and the father of my children, you’re going to be pretty busy yourself.’
‘So, we have a deal?’
‘No, we have a partnership, but forget the quiet wedding, Max. This time you have to turn up and face the music, a full dress occasion with a dozen bridesmaids, emotional family members and enough rose petals to scent all of Richmond Hill. She grinned. ‘Do you think you can manage that?’
‘Wild horses wouldn’t keep me away.’
‘Well, just in case you need reminding,’ she said, unfastening a tiny gold pin from under the collar of her jacket, transferring it to his, ‘you’d better have this. Don’t lose it again.’
Louise was driven to her wedding in a ribbon-bedecked open carriage drawn by two white horses, her father at her side.
At the church gate, she was met with a barrage of photographers eager to get pictures of the high-society guests, of the bride herself. Inside the church porch, Jodie, who’d flown over for the wedding to be her matron of honour, was waiting to straighten her veil and train.
She had the bright nosegay of tiny bridesmaids, the daughters of Bella Lucia staff, each wearing a dress a different shade of pink from palest rose to darkest fuchsia, as well as two distinctly unimpressed page boys, firmly in hand and they all fell in behind the bride and her father without a fuss.
‘The groom did manage to turn up, then?’ John Valentine asked the verger.
‘Oh, very eager, sir. First to arrive. I always think that’s a good sign.’
‘Hmmph. Well, yes, I’m sure you’re right.’
Louise smiled behind her veil. She hadn’t doubted Max, not for one moment. It wasn’t that he never missed a date, but these days he never failed to phone and let her know if he was having a problem. If he’d be late.
‘Ready?’ the verger asked.
‘Ready,’ Louise assured him. ‘And just as eager as the groom.’
A signal was given and as the first notes of the Wedding March reached them she leaned against her father just for a moment and said, ‘You have been the best father a girl could ever have. Thank you.’
For once lost for words, he just squeezed her hand in reply, tucked it beneath his arm before setting off with her up the aisle.
The church was full, not just with their parents, but crammed with Valentines from all over the world. Rachel, Luc and their baby, Rebecca, Mitch and their children, Emma, Queen of Meridia, with her king, Melissa, who had eyes for no one but her sultan, thanks, it appeared, to a little help from Max, Jack with Maddie, Beverley. Daniel and Stephanie, and Dominic with his wife and children. Patsy and Derek were there somewhere, too, but Louise saw only one man. Not even his best friend, Sheikh Surum AlThani of Qu’Arim, in all his robes, standing at Max’s side, could eclipse the joy shining from the vivid blue eyes of the man she had loved all her life. From this day forward they were to be together for always. Partners. Lovers. Friends. Husband and wife.
As she reached him he smiled, took her hand, raised it to his lips and a soft sigh rippled through the church. Then they turned to face the vicar and the service began.
‘Dearly beloved…’
Only when the vicar asked, ‘Who giveth this Woman to be married to this Man?’ was there the slightest hiccup in the service. Instead of simply putting her hand into Max’s, her father said, quite distinctly, ‘Me. I do…’
Afterwards, in the vestry as they signed the register her mother scolded him, but he was unrepentant. ‘I just wanted Max to know,’ he said. ‘I wanted everyone to know that I’m happy.’ He turned to his brother, put his hand on his shoulder. ‘Really happy. It’s a wonderful day.’
Max and Louise stood at the head of the receiving line, to greet their guests as they arrived for the reception. The guest list of family and friends read like an international Who’s Who. They had come from Australia, America, France, Meridia, Qu’Arim. Old family from Italy mingled with Ivy’s aristocratic relations.
And there was Patsy.
She came in last with her new husband and Louise kissed them both, then turned to her mother and said, ‘Mum, may I introduce Patsy Simpson Harcourt and her husband Derek. Patsy, this is my mother.’
For a moment both women seemed frozen, then Ivy Valentine stepped forward, put her arms around Patsy and said, ‘Thank you. Thank you, Patsy, for giving me the most wonderful daughter any woman could ever ask for.’
Louise might have cried, but at that moment Jack tapped a spoon against a champagne glass and said, ‘We’re going to have the best afternoon and evening of our lives here, but before we get started I want us all to raise a glass in memory of William Valentine, who opened the first Bella Lucia restaurant sixty years ago and without whom we wouldn’t be here today.’
A murmur of assent ran around the room.
‘With Max and Louise now in charge the future is assured, so a toast to William Valentine and the great family he founded, to Bella Lucia. And to the next sixty years.’
‘Sixty years?’ Max looked adoringly at his bride. ‘Are you game for that, my Valentine?’
‘To be honest, I’m not into these short-term relationships,’ she said, with an impish smile. ‘But ask me again in sixty years. I’ll give you my answer then.’
One Summer in Italy… by Lucy Gordon
CHAPTER ONE
NOTmuch longer-if I can just hold out-please, please, don’t let them catch me…
The soft vibration of the speeding train seemed to be part of her thoughts. It was five minutes late but she should still reach Rome in time to get to the airport and catch her plane home.
Just a hundred miles to Rome-that’s not much really-unless the police saw me get on this train…
Had anyone seen her? She’d hurried, keeping her head down, trying to get lost in the crowd. Nobody had troubled her so far, but it was too soon to feel safe.
Perhaps she would never feel truly safe again. The man she had loved and trusted had betrayed her, throwing her to the wolves to save his own skin. Even if she managed to keep her freedom, the world had changed, becoming ugly and bitter, like the inside of her own mind.
Somebody eased past her in the corridor and she turned hastily away, staring out of the window to conceal her face. Outside, the Italian countryside, bathed in the glowing colours of summer, rushed by, but she was barely aware of its beauty. Only her fear existed.
When she next looked, she could see two uniformed men at the end of the corridor.
Police!
She must escape before they reached her.
Edge away slowly. Don’t attract attention. Try to look casual.
She wondered exactly what kind of description of her they had: Name, Sarah Conroy, but answers only to Holly; a young woman in her late twenties, tall, perhaps a little too slim, with light brown hair, cut short, blue eyes and a face with nothing special about it: a face that hadn’t lived very much.
Nondescript. Yes, that was the word for her, and for the first time she was glad. It might save her now.
Here was the end of the carriage. A short step and she was in the next one. It was first class, divided into compartments. But each one had the blinds down and it was too risky to take shelter in one of them without some idea of what she would find.
Without warning, the blind beside her flew up and she found herself staring straight at a little girl. She was about eight years old and in a childish temper. That was all Holly had time to take in before making a lightning decision.
It took a split-second to open the door, dart inside and pull the blind down again.
In the corner a young woman looked up from her book and opene
d her mouth, but Holly just managed to get in first.
‘Please don’t make a sound. I need your help desperately.’
She realised too late that she was speaking English. They wouldn’t understand a word. But before she could call on her unreliable Italian the child broke in speaking English.
‘Good afternoon, signorina,’ she said with quaint formality, ‘I am very happy to meet you.’
Her temper had vanished as if by magic. She was smiling as, with perfect self-possession, she offered one small hand. Dazed, Holly took it in her own.
‘How-how do you do?’ she murmured mechanically.
‘I am very well, thank you,’ the child responded carefully. ‘My name is Liza Fallucci. What is your name, please?’
‘Holly,’ she said slowly, trying to understand what was happening.
‘Are you English?’
‘Yes, I am English.’
‘I am very glad you are English.’
She was beaming as though she really was glad, as if someone had given her a big, beautiful gift.
The train slowed suddenly and the child nearly fell. The young woman put out a hand to steady her.
‘Careful, piccina. You’re still not steady on your feet.’
Now Holly saw clearly what she had missed before. The little girl was unable to walk properly. One leg was encased in a support, and as she moved she reached out to hold on to the seats.
‘I’m all right, Berta,’ she insisted.
Berta smiled. ‘You always say that, but you want to do too much too soon. I’m here to help you.’
‘I don’t want to be helped,’ Liza told her stubbornly.
She tried to haul herself up onto a seat, but slithered off and was only saved from falling by Holly’s hand. Instead of throwing it off, Liza used it to steady herself, and even allowed Holly to assist her as she wriggled to safety.
Berta gave a wry grimace, but the child’s snub did not seem to trouble her. She was in her twenties, robustly built with a cheerful, good-natured face.
‘I’m sorry,’ Holly began to say.
‘Is all right,’ Berta assured her in careful English. ‘The piccina is often cross with me, but-she hates to be an invalid. I am her nurse.’
