Forbidden Fruit

by Charlotte Lamb

  'So? Shall we do it?' Angela had challenged. 'Come on. Let's walk round to that travel agent in Wilberforce Street and pick up some brochures. It will be fun just looking at them.'

  They hadn't needed brochures. The travel agent had told them that there was a fortnight on offer, beginning two weeks later, at a reduced price because it had been under-booked, in Italy, at a lively resort on the Adriatic coast. When he'd shown them a picture of the hotel, and told them the overall cost, Angela had looked eagerly at her.

  'What do you think? Shall we? It's a terrific bargain.'

  Leonie had hesitated just for a second, but then she had thought of getting away from everything familiar, everything that reminded her of Malcolm, and she had made up her mind.

  'Yes, let's go.'

  Now they had been here a week and she was very glad she had come. She couldn't say she was happier, exactly; only that she had begun to believe it was possible to be happy again one day. She had begun to lift her head and look about her and notice the world again, and for that much she was very grateful to Angela.

  Smiling, her friend relaxed again, screwed the top back on to her bottle of nail varnish, and lay down beside her, closing her eyes. 'Mmm…this is the life. I could stay here, doing nothing but sunbathe, all year round, couldn't you?'

  'I wouldn't go so far as to say that! I've an idea it might get boring after a while.'

  'Maybe.' Angela stretched again, but her nature was not suited to idleness, and after five minutes' silence she shifted restlessly, turned on to her side and asked, 'Shall we go on this trip this afternoon to Ravenna, to see the Byzantine church?'

  Leonie laughed outright at that. 'If you want to! I would quite like to see it, although I don't know much about Byzantine churches. It will make a change from lying on the beach or looking at the shops.'

  'That's what I thought,' Angela admitted, caught her friend's amused grin and grinned back.' Well, we have done a lot of sunbathing!'

  The hotel organised a weekly coach trip to the ancient town of Ravenna, an hour's drive away—it was a popular event. When they went to buy their tickets, the girls were told they were lucky to get the last two available, and the coach was already crowded by the time they arrived. They weren't able to sit next to each other. Angela found herself sitting next to a very chatty lady in her late seventies, and Leonie had to sit down next to a skinny young man in denim shorts and a T-shirt, who had already spent a lot of time staring at her in the hotel restaurant.

  Delighted, he made the most of his opportunity to get to know her, telling her in a rush that his name was Adrian, he was a trainee architect, and lived with his parents in Sheffield, be-fore going on to ask her endless questions. Where did she live? Did she live alone or with her family? Was Angela her friend or her sister? Where did she work? Oh, a solicitor's office—how interesting; did she like her job?

  Leonie kept her replies short and as uninformative as possible, but then he became more personal, shifting closer to her so that his knee touched hers and she could smell the overpowering scent of his manly aftershave.

  'I've been dying to get to know you, Leonie… that's a lovely name; I never met anyone called Leonie before. I expect you realised I've been watching you—you're far and away the prettiest girl in the hotel, in the whole town, come to that… but I suppose you've got a boyfriend?'

  Leonie was spared having to answer that one, her throat hurting and her face pale under her light tan, because at that moment to her relief they drove up to San Vitale, the Byzantine cathedral in Ravenna, and everyone started exclaiming and staring out of the windows.

  'Oh, we're here!' Adrian said, his attention mercifully distracted. I'm longing to see the mosaics here; they're the most famous in the Byzantine world, you know.'

  'No, I didn't,' admitted Leonie, and he looked round at her with the eagerness of an expert given a chance to educate.

  'Really? Oh, yes; in a lot of Byzantine churches the mosaics were defaced or even destroyed centuries ago, especially in places where the Moslems conquered a city, but here in Ravenna they have been kept in marvellous condition, although they date back to the sixth century, and you'll see amazing portraits of the Emperor Justinian and his wife, Theodora. Have you heard about her? The story is that she was once a prostitute, or at least a highly paid courtesan, before she married the emperor— although I don't know how true that is…but…'

  As they got off the coach with everyone else Adrian talked on and on in Leonie's ear, stunning her into silence and making Angela give her an amazed and laughing grin. Leonie hurried to catch up with their party, hoping that once the official guide had taken over Adrian would stop talking, but he shadowed her throughout the visit, giving her his own version of the history of Ravenna, until the irritated guide came over and asked him to be quiet while he was in the cathedral.

  Then Adrian did lapse into silence, and a few moments later Leonie managed to slip away while Adrian's attention was fixed on the mosaics.

  She wandered out into the dazzling Italian sunshine and decided to look at the local shops to see if she could find a present for her mother.

  It might placate Martha if she could find something really special; an elegant sweater or a handsome leather bag, both items for which Italy was famous.

  Martha Priestley loved clothes and wore them well. Strangers often took Martha for a woman in her late thirties, but, of course, she was a good ten years older than she looked, although she hated admitting it, which was one reason why she had insisted that, from an early age, Leonie should not call her Mother, or Mummy, but should use her first name. Martha loved it if new acquaintances took them for sisters. She hadn't much wanted a child at all, Leonie had soon realised, but Martha positively hated having a grown-up daughter.

  'I was a mere child when I was married,' she always said plaintively. She had, in fact, been eighteen when she was married to Leonie's father, and nineteen when Leonie was born, but somehow she made it sound as if she had been a child in school uniform.

  If her audience knew Leonie was her daughter, Martha would add with a wistful sigh, 'And then what did he do but die, leaving me alone in the world, with a baby…'

  If the audience was a man, who didn't know she had a child, Leonie suspected that her mother did not mention her. It wasn't necessary, because from an early age Leonie had not lived with her mother. After the death of her father, when she was nine, Leonie had been sent to stay with her father's mother, Granny Priestley, down in Hampshire, and there she had stayed until her grandmother died during Leonie's last year at school.

  It had not been an unhappy childhood: Leonie had loved her grandmother and known that she, in turn, was loved and needed by a lonely old woman whose husband and only son were dead. It had, in some ways, been idyllic, living in the country, in a village, near the sea and the forest, with ponies to ride and lots of friends at school.

  Leonie didn't bear her mother a grievance; she understood that a child did not fit in with the sort of life Martha Priestley wanted and worked hard to achieve for herself.

  Now she had a very smart dress shop, and lived in the flat above. She had a circle of like-minded friends, and several male admirers, although she apparently didn't want to marry again. She had found marriage disappointing, and preferred the endless excitement of courtship to the routine which succeeded a wedding.

  She was a very attractive woman—her hair more or less the same shade as Leonie's, but worn in a fine chignon, drawn back to reveal the exquisite bone-structure of her face. Her eyes were paler than her daughter's: a blue close to grey, cold and slightly hard. She relentlessly dieted, and had a wand-like figure. She wore classic clothes, which never went out of fashion, cost a great deal but lasted for years, and suited her perfectly, her cold English beauty at home in black or good tweeds, in pastel twin sets and pearls or in the elegance of Paris designs from Chanel or Dior.

  Leonie had grown up seeing very little of her. Indeed, they had only really got to know each other after
Leonie got engaged. That was when Leonie really began to understand her mother, and see her clearly, and she had not much liked what she saw.

  Malcolm's family was very rich, had a lovely home and moved in social circles Martha had always longed to join—Leonie's news had made her mother very happy. She had begun to plan the wedding at once: it was going to be the social event of the year, if Martha had anything to do with it, and she spared no expense, insisting on making all the arrangements herself.

  Malcolm's death had wrecked all those plans, and Martha had been white when she'd arrived at her daughter's flat that day. White, not with grief, but with rage. Leonie would never forget what she had said. 'I've spent a fortune, and all for nothing… will his family help me pay the bills?' And later, in a sudden outburst, 'How could he be so reckless? Skiing, just before the wedding…why did you let him go there alone? You should have gone. It wouldn't have happened if you had been there.'

  Remembering the sharp, cold voice, Leonie closed her eyes. Ever since her mother had said it she hadn't been able to help wondering… was it true? If she had insisted on going along with Malcolm would he be alive today?

  She felt people watching her, and made herself walk on, looking straight ahead. A second later she saw a man sitting at a table in a street cafe on the other side of the road; their eyes met, and Leonie stopped dead, trembling.

  It couldn't be. She was imagining it. A shiver ran down her spine, in spite of the hot Italian sun. Giles Kent? Here?

  He got up and strode over to her, looking more casual than she had ever seen him; his cream trousers and open-necked caramel-coloured shirt elegantly relaxed. Designer holiday wear, Leonie thought wildly. She might have expected it from him. He was always perfectly dressed for every occasion.

  'What on earth are you doing in Ravenna?' he demanded sharply, as though suspecting her of following him around.

  'I'm on holiday,' she snapped back. 'What are you doing here?'

  'A business trip,' he said in that curt voice, and she winced, turning pale. It had always been Malcolm who went on these overseas selling trips—that had been the major part of his job; he had been good at talking people into buying the company's products. He had had such charm and warmth; people always liked him, and he could probably have sold anything.

  'The new sales manager has just gone down with flu, so I had to take over some of his work,' said Giles, and she felt grief pour through her like smoke through a burning house.

  Malcolm was dead; there was someone else doing his job now, life had to go on without him. It hurt. She couldn't stop the tears welling up in her eyes.

  Giles watched her with a frown. Her tears probably embarrassed him; they were embarrassing her. 'Sorry, sorry,' she whispered, turning as if to run away, but Giles moved too and she cannoned into him, her face coming up against his chest. Before she could back, his arm came round her and held her there, his fingers briefly closing over the back of her head in a soothing movement while he murmured wordlessly.

  'Ssh…'

  She stood there, face buried, wanting to let go completely and cry out all the misery of the past weeks, but she wouldn't let herself do that, not with Giles Kent, of all people.

  She pulled herself together and straightened up. 'I'm OK now, thanks,' she muttered, grateful for his kindness, and surprised by it because she knew how hostile he had been from the minute his brother had taken her home like his mother, he had never thought she was good enough to marry into his family.

  'You don't look it!' Giles brutally told her. 'You should sit down for a while.' He propelled her towards the table at which he had been sitting and drew out a chair. Leonie sat down in the shade of a yellow-striped parasol. He was a very overbearing man, she thought as he sat down opposite. She watched his hard face with some perplexity. Even his kindness had a touch of tyranny.

  A waiter arrived. 'Coffee?' asked Giles, and she nodded. 'Yes, thank you.'

  When the waiter left there was a fraught little silence; Leonie wished Giles wouldn't watch her like that. There was something so male about that tough face, those hard grey eyes, that it made her conscious of being a woman, and that was not an awareness she wanted any more, especially not from him.

  'So, why are you here?' he asked quietly, and huskily she repeated, 'On holiday.'

  'In Ravenna?' he queried with lifted eyebrows, because although Ravenna attracted many tourists it was not a holiday town.

  'No,' she said, 'We're staying at Rimini, having a seaside holiday; sunbathing and swimming. We came to Ravenna on a coach trip.'

  'We?' he questioned sharply.

  'I'm with Angela, the friend who made my…' She broke off, biting her lip, suddenly remembering that day he'd come to tell her Malcolm was dead and she'd stood there in her wedding dress, her life torn apart as she'd listened.

  Giles watched her, his brows together; she wondered if he was remembering, too. What had he thought when she'd begun acting like a crazy woman? She had tried to forget everything about that day, but seeing him again had triggered off the memories—had she really pulled off her wedding dress and kicked it away?

  She had been almost out of her mind, she had not cared then what he thought, but suddenly a hot flush swept up her face. She couldn't meet his eyes. She would never have behaved like that normally, stripping off her clothes in front of Giles Kent, of all men!

  'Your wedding dress?' he murmured drily, and she knew he remembered. She was afraid of what he might say next, so she began to stammer disconnected words.

  'Yes… that beautiful dress… what a terrible… terrible way to treat… something made with such loving care; Angela took such trouble with it… she must have been upset when she saw what had happened to it.'

  Leonie broke off suddenly, remembering how delighted she had been just minutes before-staring happily at her reflection in the mirror. The dress had been pure magic, she had loved it; and then Giles had arrived with his bitter news, and she had feverishly pulled off her lovely dress and left it in a heap on the floor. She had never seen it again. Angela must have taken it away with her when she'd come next morning, but she had not said anything, and Leonie had never been able to ask her about the dress. She had wanted to forget everything that had happened that day.

  'I'm sure she understood,' Giles said quietly.

  Leonie nodded. 'She's my oldest friend; we were at school together. It was her idea to come to Italy—the weather has been so bad in England lately, nothing but endless rain, and Angela felt she had to get some sun. She loves beach life. I think she would be perfectly contented to lie in the sun all day.'

  She was chattering stupidly—she didn't really know what she was saying to him—but he made her nervous; she didn't know what he was thinking as he watched her with that thoughtful gaze. He had always been her enemy, he had been dead set against her marriage to his brother, but he no longer seemed so angrily hostile. Well, why should he be now? She was no threat to him and his family any more.

  'What about you?' he asked. 'Do you like beach life? Are you happy, lying in the sun all day?'

  'Well, it has been a restful week,' she admitted.

  'Even though you're so pale I can see you're getting a tan,' he observed, running his glance down over her face, throat and shoulders, and she turned pink again, hoping he had forgotten all about seeing her half naked.

  His grey eyes held mockery. 'Maybe I should take another day off and spend it on the beach, too?' he drawled, watching the confusion in her face.

  Was he flirting with her? Leonie found it oddly hard to breathe, and was relieved when the waiter arrived at that moment with their coffees. She managed a smile and a shy, 'Grazie!' She hadn't known a word of Italian until she came here, but now she was beginning to speak a little of the language, enough to communicate with waiters and shopkeepers.

  The waiter smiled, said something polite, which she did not understand, and went away. Leonie felt Giles Kent's wry gaze on her but self-consciously didn't meet his eyes. She picke
d up the small cup instead and gratefully sipped the black liquid it held. Italian coffees rarely seemed the same twice; sometimes she was given a frothy milky coffee, other times a tiny cup of almost lethally strong coffee arrived, and she was only now beginning to sort out what to order.

  'Do you speak Italian?' Giles asked, and she shook her head.

  'I've picked up a few words, that's all. Do you?'

  'Yes,' he said, and she might have expected it. Malcolm had once said that Giles was good at everything; whether at work or play, he'd said, Giles was so successful that he was. terrifying.

  Malcolm's secretary had interrupted, grimacing, 'You can say that again! He makes me nervous every time he walks into my office!'

  'That's because of your guilty conscience, Joanne!' Malcolm had said. 'You're afraid he'll find out how little work you ever do!'

  Everyone had laughed, but Leonie had taken the other girl seriously. She could imagine how unnerving it could be to have Giles Kent suddenly walk into your office.

  Giles didn't have Malcolm's looks, or charm, of course. He didn't have Malcolm's light touch, either. He didn't chat cheerfully to people who worked for him, make jokes, talk as if he were one of them.

  He wasn't exactly popular with the firm's employees. They respected, even admired him, but they made no secret of the fact that they were afraid of him. They certainly did not grin as soon as they saw him, the way they did when they saw Malcolm.

  'Are you in Ravenna to sell paper to a client?' she asked him politely, without caring much, but making conversation.

  'No, I'm here for the day, too. Of course, I'm not with a coach party…'

  'Of course not,' she said with a faint irony that made him look sharply at her. She could not imagine Giles joining a coach party on a day's outing.

  'I'm driving myself,' was all he said, though. 'I flew over, naturally, and then I hired a car so that I could get around without needing to use public transport or hire taxis all the time. I prefer to drive myself. I've always wanted to see Ravenna, and since I was only a couple of hours' drive away I decided to fit a visit into my schedule, and I must say it has been worth it.'