by Helen Brooks
‘I’m quite happy to go on to Festina Lente if it’s easier.’ She had become aware he was waiting for a reply and now her voice was rushed. ‘I did eat on the plane.’
‘Cardboard rubbish.’ He dismissed the truly delicious meal she had enjoyed in the opulent surroundings of the first-class luxury with a disparaging flick of one hand. ‘Besides which I haven’t had lunch and I’m peckish. That is a wonderful English word, yes? Peckish? Like kicking the bucket and coming a cropper? I have found it difficult to translate such words and phrases into Italian.’
He was trying to put her at her ease. Daisy knew it but it actually made her all the more tense. She opened her mouth to make some sort of response but he continued seamlessly, ‘I want Francesco to have an understanding of such things. You will find he speaks very good English and he likes the language, which is a bonus, but it is the little things—the colloquialisms—that are so important. I do not want textbook correctness.’
‘Right.’ Daisy nodded in what she hoped was a brisk fashion.
‘Your name—where did Daisy come from?’ he asked suddenly.
‘What?’ He had startled her.
‘I said, why Daisy? Isn’t that an unusual name these days?’ Slade asked quietly, his eyes on the road ahead.
‘I suppose so.’ She didn’t want to discuss her name with him; she didn’t want anything of even a remotely personal nature between herself and this big, dark frighteningly attractive man, but in the circumstances maybe that was a little ridiculous, Daisy acknowledged weakly as she forced herself to continue. ‘My mother’s name is Lily and when she had me my father thought it would be fun to have another flower name.’
She had never liked her name and something in her voice indicated this as she continued, ‘And then my sister was born four years later—she’s Rose—and then Violet arrived two years after that. My father—’ She stopped abruptly and then forced herself to go on. ‘My father used to call us his precious bunch of flowers,’ she finished tightly.
‘Used to?’ He glanced at her quickly for a moment.
‘He died just over sixteen months ago.’ Exactly twenty-four hours after the miscarriage.
‘I’m sorry.’ And somehow he sounded as though he was.
Daisy swallowed hard and then shrugged quickly. ‘These things happen.’ But it didn’t make them fair, she added silently. She had been ill after losing the baby—a nasty post-natal haemorrhage which had been followed by further complications and an infection—and she had been unable to make the journey to America for her father’s funeral. And because of her father dying so unexpectedly from a massive heart attack her mother and sisters had been tied to their home base when she had needed her mother most. Two separate tragedies intrinsically linked, the after-effects of which had rippled on in an ever increasing circle.
Even now she sometimes woke in the middle of the night after a bad dream unable to believe her father was really gone. If she could have seen him—attended the funeral—shared the outward display of grief—something—it would have been a means of coming to terms with her loss—or so the doctor had said. But then doctors didn’t know everything…
‘It’s a beautiful drive. Why don’t you relax and enjoy it?’
‘I am relaxed.’ She glanced at him quickly and the narrowed eyes were black and unblinking on her troubled face as the big car growled impatiently at the traffic lights.
‘Are you?’ he murmured quietly without expression, but the dark gaze moved to her lap and Daisy was mortified to find her hands were clenched fists where they rested against her lower stomach, the knuckles showing white.
There was nothing she could say and so she kept quiet, turning to look out of the window with as much dignity as she could muster. This was going to be great, just great, she told herself miserably as she sucked in a shaky breath. She already had one little English phrase lined up for Francesco—out of the frying-pan into the fire!
But then, as the beautiful car ate up the miles, Daisy found she was beginning to unwind. The scenery was breathtaking and truly awe-inspiring and the mild golden sunlight showed the magnificent mountain vista to full advantage.
Good things could still happen in a world like this one, Daisy thought soberly as the Bentley passed an old bent man walking at the side of the dusty road and leading an aged donkey who was sporting a great straw hat on its furry head.
In the last sixteen months she had felt her life was a never-ending battle, her physical and mental strength constantly tried and tested and her emotions up and down like a yo-yo. Sometimes she had had the faith to believe Stephanie and other close friends when they had assured her she would come through the turmoil and pain and find peace of mind again; at other times her grief and bitterness had taken her down into the depths and she had felt she would never fully rise above them.
Her mother had encouraged her to move to the States, but although she had visited her family twice since her father’s death she had felt no inclination to live in America. Her mother and her sisters had made a new life for themselves there and even with her father gone they felt they were in the right place.
But she had felt strange living back in the family home—maybe it was because her father wasn’t there, or that she had been a married woman with her own home and independence—she didn’t know—but the two short visits had been enough to convince her that at this moment in time it would have been a mistake for her to join them. And so she had got on with life, alone.
Slade talked to her now and again, easy, light conversation that required very little in the way of response, and gradually Daisy found a sense of well-being beginning to invade her senses. She still felt a little on edge, but that was more to do with the narrow-waisted, lean-hipped, broad-shouldered figure at the side of her than dark thoughts.
‘Here we are—our halfway house.’ Slade had turned the car off the road and into the massive cobbled courtyard of an old Italian inn, the ground dappled by the sunlight slanting through the surrounding orange trees and peaks of majestic mountains in the far distance.
‘What a gorgeous place.’ He had come round to the passenger side of the car and now, as he helped her alight, Daisy breathed in the scents of sweet blossom and clean fresh air as she spoke.
‘One of many in this part of the world.’ There was a ring of pride in the deep voice he couldn’t quite hide, and it was particularly endearing in such a cold, controlled, authoritative man who seemed to let very little of himself come to the surface.
Endearing? Daisy caught at the thought in horror as her mind screamed a warning. She had thought Ronald endearing at one time; his apparent unawareness of the interest of smitten females, his boyish pride in his ambition to own his own business—for the two of them, of course—and his devotion to her. Oh, a hundred things. And it had all been a cold-blooded act.
She had been unhappy before she had found out about Susan; for a good twelve months before that fateful Christmas she had struggled with doubts and anxieties and a general feeling of unease about her marriage, but Ronald had the ability to make people believe black was white and so she had blamed herself for any misgivings. And when she had discovered she was pregnant she’d been over the moon at the thought of having a baby—all her qualms and fears had evaporated in the wave of maternal euphoria that had engulfed her.
She had been stupid, very stupid. Her mouth tightened. And she had learnt the hard way that no one ever really knew what was going on in someone else’s heart.
‘The cannelloni ripieni is particularly good here, or perhaps you’d prefer carpaccio? No one makes it like Alberto.’ Slade was talking again and she forced herself to concentrate on the deep husky voice with its slight lilting accent in an effort to dispel the demons.
‘Carpaccio?’ He had taken her arm as they walked, the action naturally courteous, but it was all she could do not to jerk away from the contact. He was too close, too big, she thought feverishly, and she didn’t like it. She didn’t like him. ‘What is carp
accio exactly?’ she asked shakily.
‘You have never eaten carpaccio?’ he asked mockingly, shaking his head in sorrow. ‘I can see I am going to have to educate you in the finer things of life, Miss Summers.’ He eyed her face—which had stiffened at his words—from under his thick lashes, and now his voice held a definite note of amusement as he continued, ‘Carpaccio is a dish of paper-thin slices of fillet steak garnished with fresh egg mayonnaise and finely slivered Parmesan. It is quite delicious, especially when it is washed down with a glass of fruity red wine. The wines of this region are second to none,’ he added appreciatively.
Daisy nodded carefully. She had noticed the lush vineyards and fruit orchards, along with the picture-book villages, en route and assumed the wine trade must be big business.
The interior of the honey-coloured building was even more charming than the outside and very Italian, the white walls bright with beautiful pottery plates and the terracotta-tiled floor dotted with pots of flowering plants and ferns. Slade led her to a table at the far end of the main dining room, where French windows were open to the warmth of the weak sunlight and two fat tabby cats were basking on the stone slabs beyond the windows as they soaked up the May sunshine.
This really was another world—a world of light and colour and warmth—and suddenly England, and all the horrors of the last months, receded in a sudden glow of well-being.
‘That’s better.’ There was dark satisfaction in Slade’s voice.
‘What?’ Daisy turned to look at him, startled.
And just before a portly, smiling middle-aged man—whom Daisy took to be Alberto—came bustling up Slade murmured, ‘You’re loosening up at last,’ his mouth curving at her outraged expression.
The carpaccio was delicious and for the first time in a long, long time Daisy found she was hungry. Not even the curiously intimate quality of their cosy table for two or Slade’s uncomfortably close proximity put her off from eating with gusto, if not actual greed as she gobbled down the wonderful meal.
‘That was gorgeous.’ She gave a sigh of gluttonous contentment as she finished the last luscious mouthful and lay back in the upholstered cane chair, her cheeks a little rosy from the two glassfuls of wine she had consumed with the meal. ‘Thank you, Slade.’
‘My pleasure.’ He looked at her quietly for a moment before adding, ‘So you are not one of those women who insist on nibbling on lettuce leaves and carrots after all?’
‘Did you think I was?’ The glow of warm satisfaction vanished and she straightened in her seat, her voice indignant.
He shrugged, but his amused expression told her he was enjoying her pique. ‘I wasn’t sure. You wouldn’t be the first and you certainly won’t be the last in this modern age which seems to be obsessed with turning women into stick insects.’
‘Stick insects?’ There was even more colour in Daisy’s face now. Had she got this right? He was calling her a stick insect? ‘You like your women fat, is that it?’ she asked with a haughtiness that covered blazing anger.
‘No, that is not it,’ Slade answered calmly. ‘I like women to be exactly the way God intended them to be—fat, thin, tall, short—whatever. When a woman is truly herself, when she is confident in her inner soul and comfortable with herself, that is what is beautiful and it shines through to the face and body beyond.’
‘Really.’ She was glaring at him, she knew it, but she just couldn’t do anything about it. He made her so mad. ‘So you are saying you find fat, plain women just as attractive as thin, beautiful ones?’ she asked with caustic sarcasm. She just bet!
His gaze had sharpened now and she suddenly realised she was displaying far too much emotion.
‘Before I married my wife my last girlfriend was fourteen stone and five foot six inches tall, and she was one of the most beautiful women I have ever seen.’ His voice was still quiet but there was a bite to the words that told her he was annoyed at her refusal to believe him. ‘Not on the outside—on the outside the world would have considered Josephine very ordinary—but when you looked into her eyes she was beautiful.’
‘So why didn’t you marry her instead of your wife?’ And then she stared at him, appalled, as she realised what she had said, her hand clapping over her mouth. She had no right to ask a question like that, she told herself in utter horror, no right at all. She couldn’t believe she had been so unforgivably rude. ‘I’m sorry, Slade.’ She spoke quickly before he could open his mouth. ‘That was inexcusable.’
He looked at her for a long moment, his dark face straight and his glittering eyes probing, and Daisy waited for the explosion. It didn’t come. Instead he settled further back in his chair, raking the hair off his brow before he said, his voice even, ‘Hardly. A little impolite, perhaps, but it could be argued the frankness of our conversation merited such a question.’
‘Could it?’ Daisy stared at him doubtfully, her cheeks on fire. What was it about him that brought out the worst in her?
‘Josephine died,’ he said after another brief pause. ‘Very unexpectedly. She was a keen yachtswoman and there was an accident—it was nobody’s fault.’
‘Oh, I’m sorry.’ If ever coals of fire had been heaped on her head it was now and they showed in the scarlet of her cheeks.
‘We had been seeing each other for some three or four months before she died,’ Slade continued imperturbably, ‘but whether our association would have developed into marriage I have no idea. It certainly wasn’t at such an intense stage when she died anyway. But she was a lovely girl.’
Daisy nodded quickly. She just wanted this horribly embarrassing conversation to end, she told herself miserably. She hadn’t realised until just this very minute how much Ronald’s infidelities had soured her. The women had all been beautiful, very beautiful—at least the ones she knew about. And more than one or two had been wealthy to boot. But of course there were still men who looked beyond a lovely face and perfect figure, even handsome, charismatic, powerful men—men like Slade Eastwood. She just found it difficult to take on board, that was all, she admitted ruefully.
‘What about you?’
‘What?’ Daisy came out of her painful self-analysis with a bump as the deep voice challenged her across the table.
‘What do you think the female sex looks for in a partner?’ Slade asked coolly. ‘What do you look for?’
‘Me?’ She clenched her hands beneath the concealing folds of the heavy linen tablecloth and prayed for just an ounce or two of the easy self-assurance Slade was displaying. ‘I…I don’t know,’ she stammered, wondering how on earth they had progressed to this point. ‘I…I suppose kindness, tenderness, that sort of thing?’ she proffered uncomfortably.
He nodded slowly, his black eyes hooded, and then his lids lifted as the piercing, laser-sharp eyes seized hers. ‘I won’t ask you if your husband had these attributes because it is none of my business,’ he said with devastating matter-of-factness, ‘but I doubt it. Now, here comes Alberto with the cheese and fruit, and we will have coffee, yes?’
‘Coffee?’ For a moment she simply echoed the word, her brain refusing to engage, and then she nodded quickly. ‘Oh, coffee. Yes, yes, please,’ she said tremblingly. If ever she could do with a hearty shot of adrenalin it was now!
For the next fifteen minutes or so until they left the inn the conversation touched on nothing more controversial than the beauty of the countryside and the domestic arrangements at Festina Lente, but all the time—every second—Daisy was vitally aware of the big dark man sitting opposite her. He had stirred something inside her she didn’t want to examine but which was fighting to have conscious consideration. But it was too painful—it was much, much too painful—to even begin to think she could believe what he had said. She didn’t want to, she admitted baldly. And she wasn’t going to. End of story.
The confusion lifted—she was in control again, and that was the way she intended to stay, she told herself firmly. No man would ever make a fool of her again, and the only way she could ensur
e that was to keep the world at arm’s length. It was really very simple. She had done the till-death-do-us-part and happy families bit and it had nearly destroyed her; she would be content, more than content, with peace of mind now—if she could ever achieve it. But she would. One day she would.
They arrived at Merano in the middle of the afternoon, and Daisy thought it was the most beautiful town she had ever seen. Sheltered by high mountains and surrounded by orchards and vineyards, the air was mild and sweet and there was a profusion of magnolias, oleanders, pomegranate shrubs and other lush vegetation colouring the promenades, parks, streets and houses.
Slade’s villa was situated on the outskirts of the town, and Daisy found herself leaning forward in her seat for her first sight of Festina Lente.
The air was warm and moist as the Bentley passed through open iron gates—worked in a lacy pattern which was striking—and onto a long, sweeping, curved drive. The gardens on either side of the drive were ablaze with colour and there was the very English fragrance of burning leaves somewhere in the distance, but then they had turned the corner and the house was in front of them.
‘Festina Lente,’ said Slade quietly as Daisy’s gaze swept over the lovely elegant building in front of them. ‘I would like to say it has been in my family for generations but I cannot make such a claim. Suffice it to say I shall endeavour to pass the estate down to Francesco who seems to love it as much as I do.’
Daisy nodded slowly. She had not expected such magnificence although she had known Slade was wealthy, of course. But this—this was spectacular.
Horseshoe-shaped stone steps led up to the massive front doors of the house which was built in a fairy-tale-castle design of spiral towers and turrets topped with deep red tiles. The house itself was mainly white although red and green ivy had been encouraged to wander where it would, along with rambling roses of every hue imaginable.
Lacy iron balconies projected from some of the bedrooms on the first and second floors, and these were covered in scarlet geraniums, morning glory and other vibrant plants, red and purple bougainvillaea trailing down to the ground floor in some places.
