It Takes Two (Italian Summer Book 1)

by Lily Zante

  “It takes two, Carlos, it takes two to make a marriage work. Two of us made those vows. Sometimes it feels as though I’m in this relationship alone.”

  “You act as though I’ve abandoned you. As though I’m a lazy good-for-nothing who treats you badly. I do everything in my power so that we won’t go broke. I hear you talk about Ava and Nico and the life he gives her and I know I can’t compete—but I try.”

  She looked up at him. “I don’t ask you to compete. I don’t compare you.”

  “It’s in your eyes. Sometimes I think you wish you had met someone like Nico.”

  She shook her head, her eyes brimming with tears. Was that what he thought? “I never asked for that.”

  “You want the glitz,” he told her, moving closer so that she could see the lines on his face, the lines creased around his eyes. “I want you. That’s all.”

  “I don’t want the glitz, Carlos. I thought I did, but that’s not what I want, not any more. What I really want is what you won’t give me.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Your time. You for me.”

  He huffed, as though she was bluffing him. “You have me.”

  “Do I? Or does the restaurant have you?”

  “You can’t blame me for spending time working. If I didn’t work, we would have problems.”

  “You work and we still have problems.”

  He closed his mouth and ran his hand over his forehead.

  “I love you. I know that more than ever now. I knew it before but we were beginning to drift apart. The closeness we used to have just wasn’t there anymore. I made a mistake I will regret forever. The kiss happened, it wasn’t planned—” she said quickly, seeing a flash of fire in his eyes. “It happened and I know that’s not an answer or a reason. I’ll ask myself that question in years to come—why did I risk it? I still don’t know. It was a moment in time, Carlos. You say I want glitz? It’s not glitz that I’m after. I want the fizz, the sparkle back in our marriage. Remember how we used to be?”

  He looked away, and she saw his face relax. Had she succeeded in making him see her point?

  “We’re still that way,” he said. “Nothing changed for me, except you and the way you feel about me. We were still that way until you messed it all up. Let me ask you something.”

  She tilted her face up at him, interested to hear what he had to say.

  “What if I did with Celine what you did with him? Would you be so forgiving then?”

  She had no answer for him, because she knew she wouldn’t ever forgive or forget and yet she was expecting him to. He turned the other way and she was left staring at his bare back.

  She got up quietly and left the room, not wanting to spend a moment longer here.

  Elsa would be here in a few days and they would all have to put on a brave act. She couldn’t’ wait for the wedding to be over—and she’d already decided to return to Denver soon after. She couldn’t stay here while Ava was on honeymoon.

  And suddenly she was engulfed by the frightening reality that she had lost him forever.

  Chapter 30

  “Let’s go.”

  “Where?” she asked, feeling frazzled with the baby clinging to her neck. Since their argument a few days ago the tension between them had become unbearable so that when he now spoke to her she was always wary. Things were still icy between them and even though they slept in the same bed, he always turned his back to her.

  Things at work weren’t so easy either and today had been a particularly trying day. Ava was stressed out with the wedding looming so close and her dress fitting was still up in arms.

  She had been relieved to get back to the pensione and had been looking forward to an early night, not going out, with Carlos of all people. Something was brewing.

  “I thought we could go out?”

  Out? “Where?” she asked, weakly.

  “To the restaurant, the one in town that we went to once. Gioberti’s, I think was the name.”

  She looked at him and blanched. Was he doing this on purpose? She tried not to appear too ruffled by his request. To turn him down would only make him question her motives. She couldn’t very well suggest another place.

  “Are you sure you want to go there?” she asked, as he took Tori from her. She half wondered what he’d done today but to ask him would only bring more cold remarks.

  “Why not? This hasn’t felt like much of a vacation for me. I’d like to go out, if you’re free.”

  “Of course I’m free,” she said, her voice faltering. “But what about Tori?”

  “I’ve asked Lizzi to look after her.” She felt a quiver in her belly. Why? There was more to this than he was letting on and she didn’t like the sound of it. Yet to turn him down also did not bode well.

  Lizzi duly arrived on time an hour later and she and Carlos made their miserable way to the familiar restaurant. Rona felt on edge the whole way there. She was restless and fidgety as though her clothes had been sprinkled with sand. Yet Carlos seemed to be the epitome of. tranquility

  This time when Gioberti came up to her and kissed her on both cheeks, she stiffened.

  “Good evening,” he beamed. For a moment he looked perplexed seeing her with Carlos.

  “This is my husband, Carlos,” Rona said.

  Carlos nodded and followed while Gioberti seated them at a different table, Rona noted, to the one he usually seated her at.

  “Is this where you met him?” Carlos asked while casually perusing the menu.

  Rona felt on a knife-edge. How did he know?

  “I’m guessing,” said Carlos, easily. “By the way the owner seems to know you but doesn’t want to make it so obvious, and by the way the waiters are looking at you, as if they recognize you.”

  She felt her body tense up all over. Was this what he was going to do? Put her through this misery the entire evening?

  “Is this where you met?” he asked again.

  “Do we have to talk about that?”

  “Answer me.”

  She tugged on a lock of her hair. “Why are you doing this?”

  “Answer me.”

  “Yes. Yes, it was.” She hissed, closing her menu and looking around. She’d become a familiar face here and the waiters smiled and acknowledged her as they walked past, much to her continuing misery.

  “You’re not ordering?” he asked, closing his menu.

  “I’ve lost my appetite.”

  “Is it because I’m not him?”

  “No,” she said, leaning forward, her whispers harsh. “Can’t you let this go, Carlos? Can’t we move on?”

  “How can we?” he said, his voice calm but cold. “You took everything about us and threw it away.”

  “Are you never going to let me forget it?”

  “Never.”

  She rested her forehead in her hand. “We need to move on, for our sakes. For Tori’s. How much longer are you going to punish me?”

  Gioberti slipped by their table and seeing their hardened faces, slipped away quickly again.

  “Let’s pretend we can have one nice evening here, shall we?” said Carlos, opening his menu again. But she could clearly see by the hard set of his mouth how difficult this was for him, too.

  “You don’t want to be here anymore than I do. Let’s just go home. Why are you putting both of us through the same torture.”

  “Because I live this torture every moment that I’m here. You think this is easy to forget?” he snapped.

  Tears misted in her eyes and his face blurred through her sadness. Caught between loathing for herself and the guilt that enveloped her, she fidgeted with her hands.

  “I love you, Carlos.”

  “Words come so easy to you.”

  A tear rolled down her cheek and she hastily brushed it away, hanging her head, wishing she was anywhere but here. “You’re doing this to humiliate me. You can’t face talking about things, about us, and instead you seem to be getting enjoyment from watching me go through thi
s pain.”

  He didn’t have anything to say to that.

  “Can we go?” she pleaded, her eyes bleary, her appetite long gone. She doubted that Gioberti’s would ever hold the same allure for her again.

  He looked at her closely before throwing his menu back to the table. “Let’s go.” He got up abruptly and she didn’t know what hurt more, that he was so callous towards her or whether they couldn’t sit together and talk things through. That even now when they should have been trying to mend things, they were so clearly unable to do so and move forward. She grabbed her bag and stood up only to find that Gioberti rushed to her side, concerned. “You are leaving?”

  She attempted a smile. “I’m not hungry, Gioberti.” He glanced at her and appeared to notice that something was wrong. Just over his shoulder she caught sight of Ruben walking towards her with a takeout bag in his hand. He looked fine, his nose normal. Relief colored her mood as their gazes locked. She tried to look away but it was too late.

  Carlos had seen him too. His face darkened.

  “I couldn’t have planned it better myself.” He thundered, his voice loud enough for the people at tables close by to look up and stare.

  Ruben walked past her, his face solemn. Then Carlos spoke. “Stay away from her,” he threatened.

  Not here, not now, she thought and considered moving towards the door. She didn’t need another embarrassing scene.

  Ruben had stopped right beside their table. He put his hand up, almost in a surrender movement. “She’s not mine to have.”

  “Just you remember that,” Carlos growled.

  “Maybe you should appreciate her more. You might get to keep her, that way.” Ruben taunted.

  “What did you say?” Carlos asked, his nostrils flaring, his knuckles ready by his side.

  Not again. Her insides gave way to anxiety but Carlos, his mood fueled by Ruben’s blatant taunting, didn’t back down. She moved between them and saw out of the corner of her eye that Gioberti and the waiters were all staring at them.

  “Come on, Carlos. Let’s go.” She started to head out but to her dismay the two men were squaring off across the table.

  “Carlos,” she urged, eager for no more displays of violence or blood; desperate for normality to return to her once ordered life.

  “You should appreciate her more. Then perhaps she wouldn’t go looking elsewhere.” Ruben slid past them and she was left horrified by his words. Incensed, Carlos made to go after him but she placed herself in front of him.

  “Please, no. Can’t you see he’s doing this deliberately? Please, Carlos.” The desperation in her voice tugged at him and he seemed to consider her suggestion. Daring, she slipped her hand into his and pulled him along outside.

  They stepped out and she breathed easier; Ruben was nowhere to be seen. Carlos moved his hand away and they walked along silently, strangers drowning in their indifference. She looked around her, wishing that she was back in Denver, that her friends were close by to give her comfort and much needed advice.

  The evening was young even though the sun had started to sink, leaving the sky a beautifully woven quilt of salmon pink and robin’s nest egg blue.

  It should have been a perfect evening in Verona.

  Carlos seethed silently as they sat in the taxi with a gap as wide as the ocean between them. Angry thoughts pricked at him. You should appreciate her more. What had Rona told him?

  He did appreciate her. But he despised the fact that she’d been talking about their relationship to another man. Heat flushed through his body at the idea of their clandestine meetings.

  What else had she been telling him? As angry as he had been since the day he’d found out, the anger had at last slowly began to ebb away. Tonight he’d hoped to begin to put things right. He’d simmered enough and he’d had the time and solitude to think things through. He also knew that she wasn’t about to throw away everything they had for a quick flirtation in Italy. His friends back home would tell him otherwise, that kisses didn’t just happen. But he had a feeling that she’d been unhappy, more discontent than unhappy, and she’d found comfort in another man’s attention.

  It was something he could not forget easily but he wasn’t about to let his marriage and his family fall apart over something that he knew they could fix and put right.

  Stupidly, wisely—he wasn’t sure which, he chose to believe her because he needed to believe in the woman he had married. He knew her like nobody else did and he knew he wanted to spend his life with her and nobody else. Even despite what she’d done.

  He’d seen she was sorry. He could read her moods, even when she thought he wasn’t paying attention. He didn’t need to tell her or ask her, but he knew she was hurting. Rona wasn’t the type of person to hurt for too long—she was too self-obsessed to think much for anyone else, except Tori, and him, he liked to think. But her downcast expression and her constant attempts for them to talk it through and move on, had finally gotten through.

  It wasn’t just her—it had been him too. Lately, he’d put the restaurant first, assuming she would always be there, assuming she would be content. Not understanding that she needed to know she mattered. And so it was time he had decided to take a step and fix things. He’d made her suffer enough and he wasn’t prepared to lose everything he had just because his pride and ego got in the way.

  This evening out had been intended to do just that. It was bad enough that they were in the place where everyone seemed to know her. But that asshole had been there and it had been like waving a red flag in front of a bull. The idea had poured gasoline over the fire that he’d try to put out.

  He looked across at her, saw that defiant chin jutting out as she stared out and ignored him. His heart softened. What had been bruised was his ego. He knew she cared. He could see she was sorry. One look at her face told him all he needed to know.

  But seeing that man again had burned a hole inside his heart and the bitterness had returned.

  “Turned out to be a perfect evening, didn’t it?” he said, slamming the car door.

  “It’s always the perfect evening with you.” Sarcasm flew from her words.

  “If you’d rather have gone with someone else you should have just said.”

  She gave him an icy stare.

  “I had no idea your boyfriend would be there. I had no idea that was your place.”

  “Stop it, Carlos.” Their voices were raised, and instinctively they knew it was better to have this out here, before they went inside and simmered some more, with the danger of waking up Tori.

  “I’m trying to get over it, but I can’t help it. It makes me wonder what other lies you must have told me during our time together.”

  She jerked her head towards him. The taxi driver had long driven off and it was the two of them squaring off at each other outside the driveway. Night was slowly falling and it was still light outside.

  “There’s never been anything before. There’s never been anyone before. There isn’t anyone now.”

  He shook his head. “I can’t believe that. I might have at one time but not anymore.”

  Her eyes, wide and full of fear and surprise accosted him—eyes that had once looked at him with deep love. “You don’t think I…” Shock stained her voice, turning it into a whisper.

  “I don’t know what to think. It makes me question everything we ever had before.”

  “I’ve never cheated on you.”

  “Yet.”

  “I know you’ll probably never trust me again, and I have to live with that. And you’re right. If you did the same with Celine, I’d be the first one to give you hell.” Her forehead puckered and she ran her hand across the base of her neck, nervous. They gazed at one another, faces ugly, full of loathing and contempt. So embroiled were they in their torture that they didn’t see Nico’s car slide into the estate, until he stopped and parked.

  Through the open car window, Elsa stared at them both with disappointment weighing on her face.

&nbs
p; Chapter 31

  Rona’s face glazed over in surprise as she watched Elsa slowly get out of the car. Nico took her luggage out of the car boot then glanced over at her and Carlos, his gaze questioning.

  “Mom?” Her insides withered as she enveloped her mom in a hug. She’d forgotten all about her mother’s arrival. Carlos grabbed a suitcase from Nico and the two men acknowledged one another.

  “What’s going on?” Elsa asked. Her mom seemed slower in her movements. Carlos put an arm around her shoulders and gave her a hug. “Nothing, nothing at all.” He assured her but she seemed to see right through it. Her expression hardened.

  “I’ll catch up with you tomorrow. Ava’s waiting,” said Nico, kissing her on the cheek. “You get some rest. I’ll tell Ava you said ‘hi’.”

  “I’ll be over first thing tomorrow to see her,” she told him. Rona took her mother’s arm and gently guided her into the pensione,

  “I thought you two would have time to spend together?” Elsa asked, seeing right through them with her incisive laser intuition.

  “We did. We have,” said Rona brightly.

  “Then why do you both look as though you’re about to knock one another out?”

  Rona emitted a tiny laugh. “Is that what you thought? We’ve just come back from dinner if you really must know.”

  “We went to Gioberti’s. Do you remember that place?” Carlos asked her as they walked inside. Elsa nodded, then slipped her handbag onto the coffee table. Lizzi walked out of the bedroom and into the living room with Tori in her arms, wide awake. Elsa squealed in delight and in that moment she only had eyes and ears for her granddaughter who wriggled excitedly at the sound of her grandmother’s voice.

  “This is Lizzi, Mom,” said Rona, introducing the babysitter.

  “You’ve been taking good care of my granddaughter?” said Elsa warmly, and took Tori into her arms and hugged her tightly. Everything and everyone else was now secondary.

  But Rona knew her mother. Knew that Elsa didn’t forget things like this easily and she braced herself for more questions in the coming days.

  “I don’t understand why they’re still having problems,” said Elsa, sitting in Ava’s office the next day. She scratched away a dried up crust of Tori’s cereal from her trouser leg. Seeing Rona and Carlos at odds with one another wasn’t the welcoming sight she’d hoped for.