She said, her voice croaky, ‘It’s a big decision.’
‘I know, but you’re happy here.’ He gave her hand a squeeze. ‘We’re good together, Carrie. Let’s hang onto what we’ve got.’
Carrie’s heart was throbbing. But what have we got? she felt like shouting. An affair, that’s all it is, and that’s clearly the way you want to keep it. She dropped her gaze away as pain lashed inside her. There was no way she could stay on for just an affair.
She said, sick with misery, ‘I’ll have to think about it.’
‘OK. Think about it.’ He reached with his free hand and tilted her chin, forcing her to look at him. ‘I know it’s a big decision.’ He looked at her for a long time and the expression in the blue eyes was dark and persuasive. Then he smiled again, though still serious, and told her, ‘I really meant it, you know. I won’t let you go.’
Carrie returned home that evening in a state of turmoil. There could be no more hiding her head in the sand now. It was time she faced all the questions that were troubling her.
She stood before the big illuminated mirror in the bathroom and stared intently at her reflection. On the one hand she was afraid that if the relationship progressed she might not be able to handle some of the baggage that went with it. The paparazzi. The public scrutiny. She would find all that unbearable. She just wasn’t cut out to be a countess.
But on the other hand she couldn’t settle for being less than his wife. It just wasn’t in her to accept the role of mistress. She felt a clench inside her. And it was starting to look as though that was the only role Leone had in mind for her. He certainly wasn’t rushing to invite her to become his countess!
So it seemed as though the relationship was destined to go nowhere. But she loved him. Maybe it was hopeless, maybe it was all wrong, but she simply couldn’t bear to lose him. She sank her head into her hands and tried to stifle her cold fear. She was a fool, but somehow she just had to keep on hoping.
And so she did. For a while. She even told him she might stay on—to which he predictably replied that he would give her no choice. But then came the final blow that wiped all that out.
She was in the waiting room of a local optician—who also happened to be a keen collector of Castello porcelain and with whom she had arranged to do an interview—and it was pure chance that she picked up that particular magazine, which was one of several in the pile that were in English. It was also pure chance—or was it really fate?—that she flicked the magazine open at that fatal page and saw the article that was to turn her heart into a wasteland.
‘I’LL NEVER MARRY A COMMONER, COUNT LEONE TOLD ME.’ That was the headline that screeched across the page. And attached to it was the story of one of Leone’s ex-girlfriends, who’d been spurned because she wasn’t good enough for him.
Carrie read the story from start to finish, her hands trembling, her poor heart turning to stone.
He told me he loved me. I thought he was serious. I thought we would marry. But then, when I pressed him, he admitted he would never marry me. I wasn’t suitable to be his wife. I was only a commoner. He said he would only ever marry someone with a title.
The story ended with a sober warning. It claimed:
Any ordinary girl who gets mixed up with Count Leone is simply asking for heartbreak. He’ll charm you and lead you on and make you fall in love with him—but don’t be fooled. Really, he’s just using you. To him you’re nothing but a disposable plaything.
Somehow, Carrie managed to get through her interview. But once she was back home she collapsed in her room and gave way to a helpless storm of tears.
Well, one thing was quite clear. She’d be a fool to go on hoping now. What had happened to that girl was what would happen to her. Leone would never marry her. It was all just a cynical game to him. He had simply made a fool of her from start to finish.
She brushed the tears from her face and wondered bitterly if perhaps, after all, she ought to be pleased that he had never told her that he loved her. At least he had been honest about that. Well, he hadn’t needed to lie, had he? She’d fallen into his arms like a ripe plum anyway.
The tears came again. Tears of anger and grief and a terrible, all-consuming black despair. There was no way she could stay now. She must return to the States. It was the only decent option open to her.
But he had said he would not let her go—for he wanted their affair to continue—and he’d be a hard man to fight. And there was the danger that she might weaken. But she must not. She must simply find a way to convince him. And preferably as soon as possible.
The solution cropped up, miraculously, just two days later. Carrie was having breakfast alone—she’d told Leone she was tired last night—when she received a phone call that turned out to be a gift from heaven.
It was from her old friend Bud, calling from New York.
‘I’m coming to San Rinaldo in a few days,’ he told her. ‘I’ve got to stop off there on my way to a conference in London. I was rather hoping,’ he told her, ‘that we might be able to meet up.’
‘Of course! I insist on it!’
Carrie would have been delighted to see him anyway. She’d known Bud for years and he was always fun to have around. But even as she was speaking to him a plan was brewing in her head. Having Bud around could provide the ideal solution.
By the time she laid down the phone her plan had taken firm shape and she knew now exactly how she must proceed. And she must do it. She clenched her fists. She must not lose this opportunity. For this plan of hers would work. She was absolutely sure of it.
She closed her eyes. She must be brave. She must allow nothing to divert her—even though, just at the thought of what lay ahead, she could feel the very life drain out of her.
Carrie decided to put her plan into action that evening. To put off would be fatal. If she waited, she might lose her nerve.
Not that she was exactly serene when Leone came to pick her up. Though she was struggling to hide it, inside she was a bag of nerves.
‘Let’s go to my place,’ Leone suggested as she climbed into the car. Then, seeing her strained look, he frowned. ‘Are you all right?’
‘I’m just tired,’ Carrie lied. She could scarcely bear to look at him. She knew it was probably false, just as their whole relationship was false, but that concerned look on his face was cutting her to the quick. You’re a fool, she told herself. A weak, gullible fool. ‘I’ll be OK,’ she told him, ‘once I have something to eat.’
It was a totally wretched evening. Carrie ate, tasting nothing, as she floundered about trying to make trite conversation, waiting for a suitable moment to present itself so that she could plunge into the set speech she had been rehearsing in her head. And all the while she was aware of Leone’s eyes on her face, piercing, probing, feigning concern.
It was after Silvestro had brought them coffee that she decided to take the plunge. Leone had told him he wouldn’t be required any more, so she could do what she had to do without fear of interruption.
Her heart as heavy as a stone, she sat back stiffly in her seat. ‘Leone, there’s something I have to tell you.’
He did not look surprised. He too sat back a little and regarded her calmly across the table. ‘In that case,’ he said, ‘you’d better get on and tell me. I’ve sensed there was something wrong all evening.’
So he had not been taken in by her pale attempts at subterfuge. Somehow, that made her task a little easier.
She took a deep breath. ‘This isn’t easy,’ she began, ‘but I’ve decided it’s time I made a confession.’
‘A confession?’
One straight black eyebrow had lifted. His eyes held hers. Expressionless. Unblinking.
‘Yes, a confession, I’m afraid.’
The words were strangling her. I could stop here, she was thinking, feeling sudden panic at what she was doing. I could say it was just a joke. Pretend I was only teasing him.
But all the hurt and the anger in her answered swiftly
, No! Where’s your pride? they demanded. This guy’s taken you for a ride!
So she forced herself to continue, clearing her throat again. ‘I feel terrible about this. I know you’re going to hate me. . . but I haven’t been quite truthful with you, I’m afraid. . .’
Leone said nothing, just continued to look at her unblinkingly.
‘You see, what I haven’t told you. . . what I should have told you from the beginning. . . is that I already have a boyfriend over in the States. Bud’s his name, though he’s more than a boyfriend, really. . . I mean, we’re virtually engaged to be married.’ She licked her parched lips. ‘And now I’m afraid I’ve been caught out. He phoned this morning to say he’s coming over to visit me.’
As she stopped speaking, a silence as solid as a stone wall fell with a deafening crash between them. It was, Carrie would always remember, the worst moment of her life.
Then Leone said, ‘You’re right—you definitely should have told me. I’m rather astounded that you didn’t.’
He sounded so cold that she could feel the blood freeze in her veins. She’d never thought she would ever hear him speak to her like that.
She said lamely, stiffly, ‘It never came up.’
There was another long pause. The blue eyes narrowed as they watched her. As sharp as sabres. As hard as steel.
‘Never came up?’ He smiled a dark, humourless smile. ‘I would say it came up every time we were together. Every time I kissed you. Every time we made love.’
‘I mean you never asked me.’
‘You’re right—I never asked you. One expects to be told such things without having to ask.’
Yes, he hated her now. Carrie could hear it very clearly in every clipped and hostile syllable he spoke. He didn’t mind playing with girls like her, but he didn’t like being played with. Which was fine, she decided. Her plan had worked perfectly. There was no way he would try to make her stay now. In fact, she sensed that he couldn’t wait for her to walk out the door.
She stared into her lap, rather wishing she could walk out now. She had achieved what she’d wanted, but she felt sick to her soul.
‘I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner,’ she mumbled.
‘Oh, don’t apologise to me. The one you should apologise to is your fiancé.’ For a moment he regarded her with undisguised distaste, then he straightened in his chair and glanced at his watch. ‘In the circumstances, I would say that our original idea to wind this evening up early was a very good one indeed.’
He tossed down his napkin. ‘Just as soon as you’ve finished your coffee, it’ll be my pleasure to take you home.’
In fact, Leone did not escort her home personally. While she was getting her jacket he made a phone call, and when they got down to the courtyard a chauffeured limousine was waiting.
He pulled the door open for her and stood aside as she climbed in. ‘Goodbye,’ he told her tonelessly. And then he slammed the door behind her.
And Carrie didn’t even have a chance to say her own goodbye before the car was sweeping round and heading for the gates, taking her away from the Palazzo Verde for ever.
CHAPTER NINE
IT WAS all nonsense, of course. A lie from start to finish. But it had served its purpose and that was all that mattered.
Or was it? Now that it was done, Carrie felt torn apart with horror, her heart gripped by a grief so fierce and so terrible that at times she felt she must surely die from it.
So this, she reflected numbly, was what it felt like to lose him. This sense of utter, total desolation. And she almost laughed out loud to remember how she’d worried that she might not want to share her life with him because of the lack of privacy. That seemed ludicrous now. All the paparazzi in the world were just a small inconvenience compared to the agony she felt now.
And the agony was compounded over the days that followed by a spine-chilling, steadily growing conviction that she’d just made the biggest mistake of her life. She should never have done it. She’d been far too hasty. For—who knew?—maybe that story in the magazine had been a lie. Maybe Leone had never said he would never marry a commoner. Maybe the girl had just invented that, out of spite and to make money.
No, she had ruined things for nothing. She became more and more convinced of it. She’d always felt that Leone loved her, even though he’d never said so. Hadn’t she sensed there was a special bond between them?
And the question of marriage? Well, it was early days for that yet. There’d been no need for her to get all anxious and paranoiac. She should have just been patient and let things take their course.
And one thing was for sure. Whatever happened—whether in the end he wanted to marry her or just to keep her as his mistress—nothing could be worse than being without him. She could cope with anything else, but not with that.
So, taking her courage in both hands, she picked up the phone and punched in Leone’s private number at the palace. Somehow, she must undo this ghastly mistake.
‘I want to speak to Count Leone,’ she said firmly when his secretary answered.
‘I’m afraid the Count is out at the moment. Can I take a message?’ Pierre responded.
Carrie hesitated and then said, ‘No. I’ll phone back tomorrow. Tomorrow morning early, if that’s all right?’
‘I’m sure he’ll be available then. Can I take your name, signorina?’
But already Carrie was saying goodbye and quickly breaking the connection. She didn’t want to leave her name and alert him that she’d be calling. He might decide not to be there and she couldn’t bear that. No, she must catch him by surprise and throw herself on his mercy. Tell him she’d been mad, crazy with confusion, and that the story she’d spun him had been an entire pack of lies. Forgive me, she would beg him. I love you. I love you.
But next morning, just as she was about to pick up the phone, she made the mistake of quickly glancing at the morning paper. And there on the front page were splashed two stories, adorned with photographs and blaring headlines, that caused her heart to turn to sawdust in her chest.
The first, the bigger one, was about Caterina. There was a photograph of her climbing into a car in tears, and below the photograph was a story about how the Duke had refused her permission to marry her lover. If she went ahead, according to the report, she would be cut off without a cent.
As Carrie read the story she almost wept for Caterina. Poor girl, she had been so in love, so happy. And now all that was gone because of her brother—about whom Carrie now swiftly revised her opinion. She had thought he seemed a fair man, but she bad been seriously mistaken. He had forbidden his sister’s marriage simply because her boyfriend was a commoner.
Carrie’s heart had turned to a block of ice when she’d read that. Here she’d been trying to persuade herself that that magazine article, the one she’d read in the optician’s waiting room, was probably just a pack of malicious lies, that Leone had never said he would never marry a commoner. But even if he hadn’t, she realised now, it really made no difference anyway. What applied to Caterina would apply also to Leone. The Duke would never allow his brother to marry a commoner.
She smiled wryly and glanced down at the second picture on the front page. Not that Leone could be said to have marriage on his mind anyway. He was back to his old ways—if indeed he had ever left them—and, to prove it, here he was dancing the night away, cheek to cheek, with a rather stunning brunette.
Carrie laid down the paper with stiff, cold fingers. Well, that settled that, then. For one thing was quite clear—she wouldn’t be making any phone calls now to the palace.
In fact, she did make one, for it seemed only decent to call Caterina and tell her how sorry she was about what had happened.
The conversation was brief, for Caterina was still very upset, though she was at pains to tell Carrie how much she appreciated her gesture.
‘I’ll phone you some time soon,’ she said, ‘once I’m feeling a bit better. Right now I’m hardly capable of putting two wo
rds together.’
Carrie was well acquainted with the feeling. These days, misery was her constant companion. It followed her like a black cloud wherever she went.
But at least Bud’s arrival the following day cheered her up a bit.
She and Bud had known each other since college. They’d always been just friends—never any question of romance—and Carrie had always enjoyed his company enormously. A big, jovial man, he was always full of funny stories—and that was precisely what she needed now. Someone to lift her out of herself.
And their two days together were definitely a tonic, though Carrie discovered that even Bud’s company couldn’t lift her out of herself for very long.
At times, when they were together, she would briefly find herself forgetting about the aching misery in her heart. But at other times it was as though the very normality of Bud’s company simply served to underline how hopeless she felt. It was as though she would never again be able to function normally. To be able to laugh and joke and feel light-hearted. It was just impossible to imagine the blackness of her soul ever lifting.
These feelings were at their worst on Bud’s last evening. They had dinner at a restaurant—though Carrie ate very little and found herself barely contributing to the conversation. Then Bud walked her home, up the winding road beneath the trees, and it was just as they were coming around the final curve, at the point where the villa suddenly sprang into sight, that, surprising her, Bud took hold of her arm and said, ‘I wish you’d tell me why you’re so sad.’
The total unexpectedness of the kind gesture—for Carrie had told him nothing about her heartbreak—caught her by the throat and made the tears fly to her eyes. Unable to speak, she stared hard at the ground.
And neither she nor Bud noticed, as they walked the final few yards, the black sports car, hood up, parked on the other side of the road.
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