by Maggie Cox
Suddenly something disturbed his outwardly relaxed sleep. He grimaced as though in pain, jerking his head to the side, and a film of sweat broke out on his brow. Alarmed, Kate dropped down onto the edge of the rattan sofa and reached for his hand to comfort him.
‘It’s all right…it’s all right,’ she soothed, keeping her voice low. ‘I’m here, Luca.’
‘Sophia!’ he shouted, and gripped on to Kate’s hand with what felt like every ounce of his impressive strength.
She sucked in her breath as dizzying pain seared through her arm, but she did not try to break free from his hold. In the back of her mind she thought waking him suddenly might be dangerous. But who was Sophia? With her heart pounding fit to burst, she stared in mute shock as a single tear slid out from beneath his luxurious lashes and rolled slowly down his cheek. His eyelids opened, and even the sky at its most bewitching had never looked so heavenly blue.
‘You were dreaming.’ There was such a catch in Kate’s throat that she could barely get the words out. When Luca had cried out her heart had been rent almost in two.
Staring first into her face, then down at her hand, where he still imprisoned it, he blinked with the stunned expression of one desperately trying to disentangle himself from the throes of a deeply troubled sleep. ‘I was?’
‘Luca…do you think you could let go of my hand, please? You’re crushing it.’
‘I did not realise.’ Abruptly releasing her, he moved dazedly into a sitting position. His fingers scrubbed his cheeks, obliterating all trace of that shocking tear, then pressed into his brow as if to banish the lingering traces of his disturbing dream. ‘Forgive me…I did not know what I was doing. Are you all right?’
‘I’m fine.’
She didn’t care about the pain in her hand and arm. All Kate cared about right then was what had caused Luca to cry out like that and…incredibly…put tears in his eyes.
‘You shouted out in your sleep.’
‘I was afraid of that.’
‘You called out a woman’s name…Sophia. Who is she, Luca?’
Laying his hand against his chest, he rubbed it a couple of times beneath the fine cotton of his shirt, as if to soothe a spasm, and then exhaled deeply. ‘She was my wife,’ he replied.
‘Your wife?’ Suddenly Kate’s lips had turned so numb she wondered how she’d managed to move them to speak at all.
‘Sì…’
‘I—I didn’t know you’d been married…What happened? Were you divorced?’
‘No. She died…drowned.’
Drowned? Deepening shock and horror sifted through Kate’s insides. After finally learning what had put those painful shadows behind Luca’s eyes, she was filled with a desperate need to comfort and hold him. In that instant it didn’t matter to her that he had been married, or even that his wife might have been the love of his life. Kate only knew at that moment that she was deeply and irrevocably in love with him. And a fervent hope had begun to burn inside her that perhaps—with the advent of their baby—she could help him see that their future looked much brighter than their pasts?
‘What a dreadful thing to happen! Oh, Luca, I’m so sorry!’
She caught his hand and wrapped her palm round it. For long moments he just stared down at their joined hands, and then suddenly he was the one in command, lifting Kate’s arm closer, to examine the reddening skin round her wrist and further up, near her elbow.
‘I hurt you.’ His voice was throaty and warm and full of regret.
‘You didn’t mean to.’
It seemed as if her heart was so full right then that she felt a burning need to declare out loud that she loved him. How would Luca react to such news when his own heart was still clearly full of sorrow for his deceased wife?
‘How long ago did Sophia die?’ she made herself ask.
Slowly he lowered Kate’s arm. ‘Just over three years ago.’
‘Is that why you seem to put everything into your work—and why you haven’t taken a break when you’ve needed to? Because it helps you stop dwelling on what happened?’
‘Perhaps.’
‘It must have been a terrible time for you.’
‘Some events defy description. You wonder how you survive them…how you keep breathing…but you do.’
‘How did it—how did it happen?’
Kate sensed the change in him even before he replied—understood the deep reluctance and the need to self-protect that made him wary of discussing such a painful episode in his life, even if she yearned for him to do just that.
‘Not now, Katherine.’ He grimaced slightly. ‘It is much too pleasant an afternoon to dwell on such things! If we are lucky, the fine weather may last into the evening. I will ask Orsetta to prepare us something special for our dinner, and perhaps we can enjoy it out here on the terrace? Would you like that?’
Swallowing down her disappointment that Luca was clearly not going to confide in her any further, Kate made herself smile to hide her hurt. ‘That sounds lovely,’ she agreed.
‘And you are quite recovered from the flight over? You slept practically all the way.’
‘I’m sorry I was such a dull travelling companion…but I think the events of the morning finally caught up with me. The flight was amazing, though! It’s not every day a girl gets the chance to travel in a private jet!’
‘And how are you feeling physically? You are not in any pain or discomfort after this morning?’
‘Honestly—I’m fine,’ Kate told him truthfully, her dark eyes examining the face that had become so dear to her.
‘That is good. Tomorrow I will arrange an appointment for you with a specialist in these matters. The sooner you are given a clean bill of health from someone whose judgement I trust, the better I will like it. And then we will be able to relax!’
Whilst she appreciated Luca’s obvious concern about her pregnancy, Kate was anxious to ask him about Sophia, and find out a bit more about the woman who had been his wife. It might give her a clue as to his feelings about having someone new in his life. Specifically discover if he was open to loving someone else. Someone like her? And what Kate was hoping for, too, was a way of somehow reaching into that clearly wounded heart of his and helping to bring about some healing….
CHAPTER NINE
AS LUCA dressed for dinner that night, disturbing threads of the dream he had had about Sophia clung mercilessly to him. Had bringing Katherine here made him dream about the wife he had lost? He hadn’t dreamed about her for months now. Was guilt at the bottom of it? Guilt that he still had a future to look forward to while she did not?
Staring into his own morose gaze in the full-length mirror in his dressing room, Luca could not prevent the unhappy tide of memories that washed over him. The last few weeks of his wife’s life had been the most difficult of their entire marriage, and there had been many despairing moments when he had seriously considered asking her for a divorce. Only the pain and accusation in her eyes every time she looked at him had stopped him. He hadn’t been able to give her what she most wanted and she’d blamed him for it. Therefore didn’t he deserve to suffer? When she had discovered the reason for her inability to conceive lay with her, instead of helping to build a bridge between them for some healing to come about she had simply withdrawn almost entirely, to a place where Luca hadn’t been able to reach her…Where he had increasingly believed she did not want him to reach her…She had shut him out and there hadn’t been much that he could do about it.
At the time he had truly mourned the demise of their once loving relationship, but lately he had found himself wondering whether—if Sophia had lived—he would still be with her now. What future could he have had with a woman whose heart was full of blame and regret? A woman whose whole source of happiness had been tied up with the idea of a baby, and who had withdrawn emotionally, mentally and physically from him as soon as she knew she could not conceive?
Before Luca even realised it, the already fading recollection of Sophia’s featu
res was replaced by Katherine’s in his mind. Genuine warmth and pleasure spread through him when he thought of her waiting out on the terrace, and powerful anticipation arose at the idea of having her all to himself in the house that he truly considered home. His mood began to shift from being morose to a feeling of quiet but undeniable excitement. When she had comforted him after his disturbing dream, he recalled, her beautiful dark eyes had seemed to convey a care and regard that touched him deeply. Struck by the thought, Luca stared harder at his reflection in the mirror, as if for the first time seeing past the pain he carried to the possibility of transforming his life his into something potentially far more hopeful and rewarding.
In deference to the warm evening, Katherine wore her favourite summer dress. It was of peach-coloured linen in a tunic style, with flattering slits at either side of the knee-length hem—a sexy little detail that showed off her firm, shapely legs. Usually she cinched her slender waist with a wide black belt, but—given that she was pregnant, and the soft curve of her belly was getting more defined each day—she had decided to forgo the belt and leave the tunic loose instead.
Sitting out on the terrace, beneath the vine-covered pergola where Orsetta had laid the table in readiness for their meal, she sipped at her glass of sparkling mineral water and waited for Luca to join her. Just the thought of him made her insides flutter nervously.
When he appeared, looking rested and gorgeous after his shower, and dressed in a casual but stylish pair of fawn-coloured trousers and a white linen shirt, Kate knew with certainty that a deep and profound longing was growing inside her to make a truly bonding connection with him that would last a lifetime.
‘Orsetta is convinced we have brought the good weather with us!’ he teased, slipping into the chair opposite Kate’s. ‘She tells me that it has been raining every day for almost two weeks now, and did not stop until yesterday evening!’
‘She believes in signs and omens, then?’
‘Yes…why not?’ The broad shoulders beneath the white linen shirt lifted in a nonchalant shrug.
‘And do you think our unexpected meeting in your office—when I had no idea it was you I had come to work for—could be considered a good omen?’ Kate speculated, her heart hammering as she surveyed him.
‘I hope so.’ Luca smiled.
His reply seemed to lack conviction, and disappointment sat like a stone on her chest.
‘By the way, you look very beautiful tonight,’ he added, the force of his sky-blue glance burning her like little wisps of carnal flame licking across her body.
Struggling to contain the shockingly intimate heat that flooded her, Kate had to draw on every ounce of willpower she owned not to let his disturbing gaze distract her and throw her off track. ‘I hope that you—that you have no regrets about bringing me here, Luca?’ she commented.
‘What do you mean?’
‘Well…after what happened earlier. You seemed so upset…that’s all. I wondered if you might be having second thoughts?’
‘Because of my dream?’
‘Yes. You were dreaming about your wife, Luca. The wife you obviously once lived with here. I thought you might—might resent another woman being here instead of her.’
‘Well, your conclusion is a wrong one!’ He tore his glance away for a moment and stared down hard at the table, as if trying to bring whatever fierce emotion had surfaced inside him under strict control. ‘What happened is all in the past, and that is where it should stay! Besides…I would rather not think about that part of my life tonight. I have something important to ask you, Katherine.’
‘Something important?’ Kate echoed, all her thoughts nervously suspended.
‘Sì. I think we should get married. I believe it is the right thing to do, under the circumstances.’
‘The right thing…?’
‘Yes. I would like you to be my wife, Katherine…will you agree?’ His previous emotions tightly corralled, there was no sign at all on Luca’s arrestingly handsome face of what he was feeling.
In contrast, Kate knew she hadn’t a hope of disguising what she was feeling…nor did she want to! Apart from her initial elation at Luca’s proposal, confusion and not a little anger also pulsed through her.
‘What you mean is that you think we should get married purely because of the baby.’ Her hands clenched tightly round the wrought-iron arms of her chair.
‘Not purely because of the baby. I do believe we have something between us worth building on, Katherine…do you not agree?’
‘Something worth building on?’ It sounded as though he were talking about one of his upcoming projects at work, and it wasn’t what Kate had hoped to hear at all!
‘Besides…’ He shrugged, as though not quite sure what to make of her indignation. ‘Is it not an honourable enough reason that I should ask you to be my wife because you are expecting my child?’
‘Forget honour for a moment! Let’s be real here, shall we?’ Her heart pounding, Kate held her hands in her lap to still their sudden trembling. ‘You’re asking me to marry you as if my feelings about it hardly matter at all! I’m not just a receptacle for a baby, you know! I’m a woman too! A woman with hopes and dreams that might involve something a little bit deeper than a practical marriage of convenience! How am I supposed to raise a child with you, Luca, when you clearly intend keeping me at a distance? Emotionally, at least! You won’t even talk to me about the things in your life that have shaped you or hurt you. Like your wife, for instance. You told me the most shocking thing this afternoon…that she drowned. But when I asked you wouldn’t even tell me how it happened! You completely shut down about it and clearly shut me out! Whilst I understand that you don’t want to keep revisiting the pain and torment you must have gone through, how can you contemplate marrying someone else if you won’t at least share something of what happened with them? That’s how we get to know each other in a relationship—by sharing our sorrows, joys, hopes and dreams, not just sleeping together!’
Looking as stunned by her outburst as though he had just survived some force of nature that had been unexpectedly unleashed, Luca exhaled a long, slow breath and moved his head from side to side.
Unlinking her hands, Kate forlornly realised she had no hope of keeping them from trembling. None! There was simply too much at stake here to remain calm. Luca still hadn’t spoken. Unhappily believing that he obviously wasn’t going to answer any of her highly charged questions, Kate felt hope die inside her. She felt like crying.
But then, with the tension around his sensual mouth lessening just a fraction, surprisingly he seemed to change his mind. ‘We were holidaying with some friends on their yacht on the southern coast…Amalfi, to be precise.’
Her attention irrevocably captured, Kate relaxed against the back of chair, her hands resting protectively over her stomach.
‘Sophia was relaxing on one of the sun decks and told me she just wanted to read her book and try and take her mind off things.’ Looking straight into Kate’s transfixed gaze, Luca swallowed hard. ‘We had been through a difficult time…a very difficult time. For three years we had been trying for a baby, without success. In the last of those three years we decided to have some investigations done as to why we could not conceive a child. We found out that there was a problem with Sophia’s ovaries that could not be rectified and that pregnancy was impossible. She was devastated.
‘From when we were first together we had always known we wanted a family. I was my parents’ only child, and they had both died by the time I was twenty-one. I wanted to fill this beautiful villa they had left me with the sound of my children’s laughter…many children! Sophia was one of six girls, and had had a brother who died. Because of that she dreamed about giving her parents a boy grandchild. All we had seemed to talk about…hope for…dream of…for three long years was having a baby! I told her that we could adopt now we could not have one of our own…that I was happy to do that. I meant it. But Sophia was not happy. Every day she was in tears. Then more
and more she retreated inside herself, and eventually she would barely talk to me about how she felt at all.
‘That morning, about half an hour after I had left her relaxing on the sun deck, I returned to see how she was and found her chair empty and her book left open at the page she was reading beside it. Thinking she might have gone to lie down in the cabin, I searched for her. But, no…there was no sign. Unable to ignore the sense of fear that was building in me, I ran to find my friends and we all searched the boat together.’
Frowning deeply at the memory, his jaw tight, Luca took a couple of moments before continuing. ‘Her body was found later on that afternoon by the coastguard. There were railings around the deck where she had been sitting. There was no way she could have just fallen overboard. After a full investigation by the police the coroner returned a verdict of death by suicide.’
Scrubbing a hand round his jaw, Luca stared hard at Kate. ‘What I want to know…what has been eating me up inside for over three years…is did I help drive Sophia to take her own life by my great desire to be a father? Did I put too much pressure on her when as it turns out she was so fragile?’
‘Oh, Luca! It doesn’t sound remotely to me as if that’s what happened at all!’ Her heart pierced by the way Luca’s wife had died, as well as by the raw pain in his voice as he confessed what had been troubling him the most about her death, Kate leaned across the table and reached for his hand. ‘From what you’ve told me, Sophia wanted children as much as you—maybe more! For some women it can take over their lives…the desire to have a baby. I had a friend it affected in that way. She had a wonderful marriage, a loving, caring husband, but she just couldn’t get pregnant. In the end, because of the obsession that consumed her, the marriage broke up. I met her husband a while afterwards, and he told me that he’d had to leave because he had started to feel as though he’d ceased to exist. My friend cared more about having a baby than him! In a relationship you have to take care of each other too…don’t you think?’
