Sicilian's Shock Proposal

by Carol Marinelli

  ‘I can never be your fake husband, Sophie.’

  She looked at him.

  ‘Can we get past this?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ she admitted. Questions were swirling, dates and times and anger and blame, and Luka smiled at her honest answer.

  ‘You get to decide, Sophie. I’ll be there today. Jilt me if you think I deserve it for what he did. Score your point for your fleeting victory but I win because I know you will regret it for ever if you don’t show up today. No one ever shall, or ever could, love you as much as I do.’

  ‘You love me so much that you invite me to end us—?’

  ‘I love you so much,’ Luka interrupted, ‘that I won’t relegate us to a poor future. I would rather have sex with a stranger for the rest of my life than lie next to you cold and blaming. I would rather have half a marriage, half a life, half of me, if I cannot have all of you. For you to deny me that part of you...for you to hold me hostage...’ He shook his proud head. ‘Fight with me about things if you want to, be every inch Sicilian. Call me on what my father did once. I might get that, but if you call me on it twice...’

  And Luka dared accuse her of being Sicilian!

  ‘I don’t give second warnings,’ Luka said. ‘My father was responsible for the death of your mother. I will not let his sins, or your anger, bring me to my knees. If you walk into that church,’ Luka warned, ‘then you’d better know that it’s for ever. You only walk towards me if you can love me more than the shadows of our past. If you can’t, then it is better for both of us that you walk away.’

  Luka did the nicest thing then.

  Her breast was precariously close to falling out again so he redid the tie to her halter-neck and rearranged her dress. He looked after her in a way that no one ever could and he demanded that she match that care.

  Always.

  ‘Show up or don’t,’ Luka said. ‘Hate me at your own peril.’

  ‘What will you do if I don’t turn up?’

  ‘Nothing,’ Luka said. And it was, for Sophie, the darkest response he could deliver. ‘If you don’t show for our wedding then nothing will happen, not ever. I will wish you luck for the future, I will accept that our love could not survive. I’ll be proud of you for having the guts to admit it and,’ he added, ‘I will get on with my life.’

  He left her on the rocks.

  He left her spinning like a Catherine wheel.

  There was a retort she could deliver.

  A proud last word, perhaps.

  There was comeuppance still to be had.

  Or there was a shiny new future?

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  ‘YOU LOOK WONDERFUL,’ Bella said.

  It was possibly the most beautiful dress in the world and might, Sophie knew, remain unseen.

  He had left her with seven hours to grow up.

  She was down to twelve minutes.

  ‘Are you scared he won’t show up?’

  It was no longer a town of secrets but what had happened on the beach Sophie had kept to herself.

  This was between her and Luka.

  She was scared that she might not. Scared that her rapid tongue could not hold its fire.

  Sophie pulled out the necklace.

  I love you, she said in her head to her mother. I come from you but I am not you.

  ‘It looks like the one in the photos that your mother wore,’ Bella said, as she helped her to put it on.

  ‘It is the one my mother wore,’ Sophie said, and she felt Bella’s hands pause on her naked shoulders.

  Bella knew, Sophie realised.

  Here there were secrets even amongst the very closest of friends.

  Her mother would probably have known and would have told Bella the truth long ago. The whole town would have been able to see what a small child could not.

  Rosa had gone and confronted Malvolio.

  A few days later she had died.

  ‘Why didn’t my father insist that they run?’ Sophie asked. She knew the answer—Rosa, with her stubbornness and pride, had been right to want to stay.

  Dead right.

  ‘Can you ever forgive him?’

  ‘Malvolio?’ Sophie scoffed. ‘Never.’

  ‘I mean can you ever fully forgive Luka for what Malvolio did?’ Bella asked, but hushed as Paulo walked in.

  ‘Their names don’t belong in the same breath,’ Paulo said, his eyes filling with tears when he saw that Sophie was wearing Rosa’s chain.

  ‘But they do belong in the same breath,’ Sophie corrected. ‘Just as I belong in the same breath as my mother. Just as I look like her and act like her at times. I’m not her, though.’

  ‘I know that.’

  ‘Even if she’s not here, I’ve learnt from her...’

  ‘The cars are here,’ Bella said.

  ‘Go,’ Sophie said to Bella. ‘I will see you at the church.’ She gave her friend a hug. ‘Good luck with Matteo.’

  She stood alone with her father.

  ‘You are your mother’s daughter. That is not always a compliment. I wanted to leave here, to get away. She told me to stand up to him, to fight for what was right.’ Sophie stood as her father shook his head. ‘So I did. I had our tickets booked to leave. I wanted to get out of here...’

  ‘You were right.’

  ‘I would rather have been wrong.’

  ‘Malvolio is Luka’s father,’ Sophie said. ‘At times they will belong in the same breath. I don’t want a marriage where there are things that cannot be discussed or names that can never be mentioned. I nearly lost Luka, not once but twice. I am not going to do that again. I shan’t make the same mistakes as...’

  ‘Me?’

  ‘As so many people did,’ Sophie said, more aware than ever how words could hurt so very much. ‘You did the best that you could for me. I know that.’

  ‘Not really.’

  ‘Yes, really.’ Sophie smiled at her father. ‘You got one thing very right—you chose the perfect husband for me.’

  ‘You and Luka belong to each other.’

  ‘We do.’

  * * *

  It wasn’t just the bride who was nervous on a wedding day, Luka was finding out.

  The groom stood at the altar when, for the longest time, he had thought that he never would.

  Luka had long ago accepted that he and Sophie were over and, given that he had known he would never love like that again, he had decided he would remain single.

  Until this morning.

  This morning he had chosen for their sakes to take the biggest gamble of his life and to reveal the truth.

  Her own father thought that Sophie could never forgive him and Matteo too was tense.

  And so he stood on his wedding day not even knowing if Sophie would show up.

  He didn’t care about the public reaction if the bride didn’t show.

  He cared only about them.

  ‘Whatever happens—’ Matteo started, but Luka halted him.

  ‘She’ll be here.’

  He had confidence in them, in the love they had found that long-ago afternoon.

  And he was right to.

  He turned around and there was Sophie, dressed in a simple white dress that reminded him of yesteryear. Today her black hair was worn down, as he preferred, and dotted with summer jasmine. In one hand she loosely held a bunch of wild Sicilian poppies and they were as sexy and as decadent and as heady as her.

  The delighted, stunned look on her face when she saw the packed church was something he would remember for ever.

  They loved her and understood too just how hard it had been for Paulo.

  He was home, where he belonged, and ready now for his daughter to leave properly.

&nb
sp; She walked towards him and Luka could see the glimmer of her mother’s cross.

  Guilt, fear, shame left him as her eyes met his.

  Sophie walked and then, as her father let go of her arm, she ran—those last few steps she ran—to the shield of his arms and the freedom they afforded her.

  To him.

  Luka kissed the bride before the service had even started.

  They needed that moment even if it made the priest cough.

  ‘You’re here,’ he said.

  ‘So are you.’

  ‘Always.’

  Paulo stood, even though he was offered a seat. Luka turned just once and his eyes met Angela’s and thanked her.

  She, he was sure, was the one who had told the rest of the townsfolk to give these people the chance they deserved and to forgive Paulo now, while they still could.

  Their vows were heartfelt.

  ‘I love you,’ Luka said. ‘I always have and I always will.’

  ‘I love you,’ came Sophie’s response. ‘I always have and I always will.’ Then she deviated from the priest’s words for she made a small addition. ‘And I shall try to remember that in all that I say and do.’

  No one understood why the groom laughed.

  Matteo was the perfect groomsman, even if cynicism was written all over his face, for just yesterday Luka had told him this wedding would never take place, that it was a sham.

  But for now he went along with it and handed over the rings.

  And tried not to glance at the bridesmaid!

  Luka slid on the ring and then he too deviated from tradition, for he went into this pocket and took out another ring and placed it next on her finger.

  It was rose gold and the diamond was emerald cut and stood high, and Bella stared at it for a moment, her eyes filling with tears.

  She remembered staring in Giovanni’s window and a diamond catching her eye.

  The hope that when Luka got out, that one day...

  There wasn’t time to dwell on it for now.

  They were man and wife.

  The church bells were ringing loudly in Bordo Del Cielo today and as they stepped out, it was to a true Sicilian celebration.

  The street was lined with tables and dressed in ribbons and flowers, the trees were lit with lights that would glow brighter as evening fell.

  Angela and an old friend were helping Paulo out of the church.

  ‘Dance with your father,’ Luka said.

  She did.

  And to hear him laughing and proud was the best medicine for both of them...but then she was back to Luka’s arms.

  She glanced over his shoulder and smiled. Bella and Matteo were dancing a duty dance, not that it looked like duty for Bella—her eyes were closed and her head was resting on his chest. Only Matteo looked as if he was struggling.

  ‘He’s angry,’ Luka said. ‘He thinks that she is still...’ He looked down at Sophie. ‘I want to catch up on all the years we have missed, I want to know everything.’

  ‘You shall.’

  ‘Your father is so happy.’

  ‘He wants us to have a baby now.’ Sophie smiled.

  ‘You could lie and say you are...’

  ‘Knowing him, he would live for another nine months just to make sure that we were telling the truth.’

  ‘We are,’ Luka said. ‘This is for ever.’

  ‘That ring?’ Sophie asked. ‘Is it from Giovanni’s?’

  Luka nodded. ‘As soon as I got out of court I went and bought it. I wanted to take you to London, not as a friend or a date. Those months in prison had taught me many things...’

  Sophie could hardly stand to think of all she had dismissed that day, all the foolish pride she had held onto just to be right.

  ‘I can afford something nicer now.’ Luka offered.

  ‘Nothing could be nicer,’ Sophie said. ‘It belongs with me.’

  ‘So do you.’

  EPILOGUE

  SOPHIE LAY IN that delicious place between sleep and waking and for a moment she thought she was dreaming.

  The lap of the sea, the slow motion of rising and falling with the waves, and Sophie knew she was awake.

  She was on honeymoon with Luka.

  They were taking their time to sail from Corsica to the Greek islands, stopping where they chose to and just enjoying the journey.

  Life was better than she had ever dreamed it might be.

  It had been an emotional time. Her father had held on long enough to know that Sophie was expecting a baby. He had seen a summer and a winter in his beloved town and finally he now lay with Rosa.

  Sophie lay there thinking about the past months.

  It had been Sophie who had thrown her mother’s necklace in the grave. It was her mother’s, not hers.

  She didn’t want to wear it day in, day out.

  Instead, she wore her mother’s earrings, for they spoke of the happiest days with Luka.

  And there had been so many of them.

  Yes, she was stubborn, but never about that.

  ‘Morning,’ Luka said.

  ‘Where were you?’

  ‘Thinking,’ he said. ‘About us. Are you happy?’

  ‘So happy.’ she said, and then looked into his navy eyes. ‘And cross with myself for all the time we wasted.’

  ‘We needed that time,’ Luka interrupted. ‘We were young, there was a lot of pain and little of it was of our making.’

  ‘Even so.’

  ‘We know that what we have is precious,’ he said, and she nodded. ‘Had I married you when you were nineteen you might have always resented that you never got to work on the cruise liners.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Yes.’

  He smiled and always it made her stomach fold over and in on itself. He was so stern and serious with others, but so open with her.

  ‘And had we got together after the court case and then later found that chain...’ Luka thought about it. ‘I needed to find out about my father away from you.’ It was Luka who brought the name up at times and he was so grateful that her eyes didn’t flash in anger; instead, they could hold his gaze as they explored the pains of the past. ‘This is our time.’

  ‘So you don’t think I was wrong?’

  ‘Sophie...’

  ‘I didn’t make us waste all those years?’

  ‘Sophie,’ he warned, but he was smiling. ‘Come on, let’s go and see the sunrise.’

  ‘No, come back to bed,’ she grumbled, but Luka shook his head and she got out of bed, put on her sarong and tied it then headed up to the deck.

  The sky was gorgeous and just dipping out of navy and the stars were fading.

  ‘Where are we?’ Sophie asked, and then she paused as for the first time she saw her home from the sea.

  The sun was rising over Sicily and their yacht was close enough that she could make out the familiar landscape—the church where they had not only married but where both their parents rested. She could make out Luka’s home, the beach where they had made love.

  ‘I used to sit there every day with Bella,’ Sophie said. ‘Dreaming of the future, wondering what our lives would be like. I used to picture myself on a cruise liner out on the seas...’

  ‘And now here you are.’

  ‘I’m here with you,’ Sophie said, and then she told him a deeper truth, one she hadn’t told Bella. Not because she was scared to, she simply hadn’t dared admit it to herself, for it had seemed pointless that long-ago day.

  ‘Even though I didn’t want to be married, I wanted you then. I wanted it all, I just didn’t know how it could happen. How I could be out on the ocean and sailing the seas and somehow be with the man I loved. Yet here I am.’

&nb
sp; ‘We can dock,’ Luka said. ‘Spend a couple of days there if you wish.’

  Sophie thought about it. The people would make them more than welcome. They had their homes back and Bordo Del Cielo was thriving now.

  Yet there was no need to go back, no need to visit.

  Not now

  One day maybe.

  They were having a daughter, and they would take her back and, far more gently than they both had, she would learn about her past, about the pain and the beauty of the land that ran through her veins.

  But not now.

  Now, as Bordo Del Cielo awoke, it was Sophie and Luka that were the glint of a boat on the horizon.

  They were out there, together, and living their dreams.

  * * * * *

  Keep reading for an excerpt from BOUND BY THE BILLIONAIRE’S BABY by Cathy Williams.

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