by Tricia Jones
“As will I.”
His tone, low and sincere, stopped the rest of her diatribe in its tracks. “What?”
“I owe my brother more than I could ever repay,” he said almost wistfully. Then the haughty tone returned. “What I cannot understand is why you didn’t tell me, why you didn’t give me the chance to act appropriately? Was I so heartless, cara? So callous? Was I so undeserving of the truth?”
No, she realized, as she looked at him. At the deep hurt masked well by the hardness in his eyes. “Acting appropriately would have meant marrying me,” she said. “You would have demanded it.”
“Si, I would have demanded it.” His nostrils flared as he moved toward her. “It was my right to demand it, and yet you seem to believe you were the only one with rights. You took my child, Faye. You took away my child.”
Devastated, Faye thought, as he came up to her. He looked devastated.
The realization hit her like a body blow. She was the heartless one. She was the callous one. She and Teo. In keeping their secrets they had been dreadfully cruel. They were the merciless ones. Not Enrico. They hadn’t given him a chance.
“I’m sorry.” She whispered it, as guilt and shame, mixed with a good dose of regret, poured through her. “You deserved the truth. I should have told you.”
There was a long, awkward silence, during which she wanted to hurl herself at him, pour it all out. But he stood there, tall and muscular, the proud set of his wide shoulders offering no sanctuary.
She caught her lower lip between her teeth, painfully aware of the huge emotional divide being carved between them. She wanted to weep at the futility of it all.
Then he moved toward the leather chair that had belonged to his grandfather. Wearily, he sank into it and dropped his head back. He watched her from beneath lowered lids.
She wanted desperately to make everything right. But they were too far gone, and from the resigned look in his eyes he knew it too.
“We’re never going to get past this, are we?” Her voice, although weak and tremulous, seemed to bounce off the library walls. It seemed fitting somehow, that they finished it here, in the very place it had started. In the place where she’d given herself to him. Heart and soul.
“I do not know.” He reached up and squeezed the bridge of his nose with his thumb and forefinger. Lowering his hand, he blinked a few times, then looked back at her. “But I deserve the truth now, Faye.” He waited a few beats. “All of it.”
Faye sat opposite him on the sofa, a long walnut occasional table between them. Unlike him, she sat poker stiff. “It all seems such a long time ago. Somehow the reasons don’t seem as vital as they did then.”
She waited, hoping for some small spark of understanding, some tiny sign that they might just weather this. But his implacable expression gave nothing away.
“I knew how you felt about your father, and the way he’d been tricked into marrying Teo’s mother. You said you’d never allow that to happen to you. Then, after we’d made love you said it was a mistake, that it should never have happened. So when I found out I was pregnant, it mirrored your father’s situation somehow. I thought you’d believe I’d done the same thing, got myself pregnant to trick you into marrying me. I didn’t want that. For you or for me. I didn’t want you to feel trapped. I didn’t want you to hate me.”
“Why in God’s name would I hate you? There were two of us that night, Faye. While I admit making you pregnant was the last thing I intended, I would never have abandoned you or my responsibilities.”
“I know.” She brushed an imaginary fleck of something from her jeans. “But I said I was on the pill, when you asked about protection. I said it was safe. Then when I found I was pregnant, I knew you’d think I lied.”
“You did lie.”
“I know…I…” Lord, she was messing this up good and proper.
He stood abruptly and went over to the terrace doors, turning his back on her to look out into the darkness beyond. “And what of you, Faye? Did you expect to become pregnant? What of your life, your plans?” He sighed heavily, and she knew he was probably thinking of the naïve young undergraduate he had taken to his bed. “Had you told me I would have done the right thing.”
“And resented me for the rest of your life. Like I said, I didn’t want a marriage based on duty and responsibility. I didn’t want a husband who felt trapped and manipulated.”
He turned to face her, his eyes like charcoal ice. “Yet you married a man for the sole purpose of letting him raise another man’s child? Did you not once stop to think that he might feel trapped, manipulated?”
The sneer in his tone cut to her core. “It wasn’t like that.”
She brushed her palms over her face, pushing her fingers back into her hair as if to sweep away the heavy weight of conscience. It was getting almost impossible to keep up the pretence, even if she was doing it to protect Teo.
When Enrico walked back, Faye looked down. She stared at her denim-clad knees while he towered over her, his powerful presence making her chest tighten and her breath come in choppy gasps.
“Then exactly how was it, Faye?” he enquired harshly. “Are you saying you were in love?”
The sheer physical power of him made it difficult to breathe, to think straight. His energy surrounded her, sucking all the oxygen from the air.
Please go away, she begged silently. Please just leave me alone.
“Tell me,” he demanded, his voice almost a growl. “Did you marry for love?”
She knew he was talking about her marriage to Teo, but the wording of his question left her free to answer truthfully. About her marriage to him. For once she didn’t have to lie. “Yes.” She raised her head and looked deep into her husband’s eyes. “Yes, I married for love.”
The skin across his forehead tightened. “Was that love returned?”
Aware he was still referring to Teo she nodded. “Yes, it was returned. Teo loved me. In his own way, he loved me.”
For long moments they stared at each other, then his eyebrows drew together.
“How easily you lie to me still.” He strode back toward the terrace doors and flung them open.
Something about the sight of him walking away from her after such an exchange left her desperate to make him see, make him understand he was the one she loved, he was the one she wanted with every piece of her heart. Her very soul.
“I haven’t lied to you,” she said, jumping up so quickly she hit her knee on the coffee table. Ignoring the sharp pain, she hurried out onto the terrace to join him. “Teo and I loved each other, just not in the way—”
“Enough.” He swung around sharply, making her jerk back. “Enough of this. I know the truth, Faye. I know about my brother. I might have refused to pay for the information, but his acquaintance was bitter enough, hostile enough, to tell me anyway. Even to offer me pictorial evidence should I doubt his credibility.”
Faye stood there, her breath hitching.
“Well?” he demanded. “No attempt to deny it?”
Yes, she wanted to deny it. She wanted to protect her dear Teo. But Enrico knew the truth and all she could do now was try and make him understand.
“He didn’t want you to know.”
“That much I have gathered,” he scoffed. “And why did he not want me to know? Was he ashamed?”
“No.” Faye’s chin jerked up. “He had nothing to be ashamed of.”
“On that we are in agreement. I would never have judged him in that way.”
“I know, and Teo knew it as well. He was more worried about your father’s reaction. He didn’t want to give Ruggerio any more reason to hate him.”
Enrico cursed. “Had I been in Matteo’s place I would have taken harsh delight in telling the bastard just to get a reaction.”
“You’re not Teo.”
His eyes went to slits. “You are very understanding for a wife whose husband decided he preferred a man in his bed.”
Before she could answer, he s
pun away, slapping his palms against the stone railing. Faye stared at his back, at those broad shoulders that always felt so strong and muscular beneath her hands. How she wanted to go to him, smooth away some of the tension that tightened his muscles, run her palm over the hard contours of his face, brush her fingers along the chiseled strength of his jaw.
“You need have no concern about the photographs,” he said coldly. “I have arranged for the negatives to be destroyed. You will not be troubled again.”
Faye came to stand beside him. “How…how did you get the negatives?”
He scoffed. “Blackmailers are essentially cowards. This particular coward had no stomach for the consequences of not handing the negatives over to me. You need have no concern.”
Right. Her husband had just pledged to commit bodily harm but she didn’t need to concern herself. “What have you done?” she asked on a breathy gasp. “Rico, please tell me you didn’t do anything.”
He glanced at her, his grin wicked. “Very well, I will not tell you.”
When she caught her bottom lip between her teeth, his expression turned to stone. “The money,” he demanded. “Why were you flying back with the money? Did Matteo decide not to pay? Did he decide he would not be blackmailed?”
Faye shook her head. “The man asked for more. He said he’d changed his mind and thought his silence was worth double what he’d originally asked. He said if we didn’t pay him he would go to the tabloids, he would let them have the photographs. What would it do for the brother of the head of the Lavini Bank to be splashed across the front pages? A man who had left his wife and child to be with his male lover.” Faye stopped to take in a breath. “He said he would tell them about Melita, about you being her real father.”
“How did he know she was—” Enrico shook his head as the answer to his own question became clear. “Pillow talk,” he growled. “A powerful leveler.”
Faye moved a few inches closer. “Teo never meant for you to be hurt by all this.”
“Don’t, Faye.” He held up his hand. “Just don’t.”
“I know it’s hard for you to believe that.”
“Try impossible.” He scrubbed his hands over his face, then pushed them back through his hair. “He should have come to me. I would have dealt with it.”
“That’s exactly why he didn’t come to you. He knew he had to handle it himself. He tried really hard to do the right thing, but it never seemed to work out for him.” She reached out to touch his shoulder, but dropped her hand. “He loved you very much.”
His scornful laugh shattered through the quiet night air. “Yet he demanded I stay out of your lives. He knew I was Melita’s father and yet he ensured I had no contact with my child. No contact,” he emphasized with a sneer. “What kind of love is that?”
“He did it for me,” Faye said gently. “Because I told him I…I didn’t want to see you.”
The look he shot her was filled with contempt. “And Matteo simply obliged? It was all very convenient, was it not? And what did you tell him?” He pushed away from the railing and straightened. “Did you tell him I had taken you against your will? That you had not opened your legs for me willingly?”
“Stop it.” She’d backed up a little, but now she planted her feet. Her face burned and she felt unbearably tired as the weight of deceit crumbled with each revelation. There was a wonderful release in it, a freedom she hadn’t felt in years. It spurred her on, giving her the courage not to let him bully or intimidate her any longer.
“I’ve apologized for what I did and if it’s not enough for you then I’ll have to accept it. But I won’t keep on apologizing. I won’t let you make me into something awful and I certainly won’t let you imply that what I did was intentionally malicious.” She heaved in a couple of breaths as her heart thundered against her chest. “I told Teo about the baby, about how I didn’t want to trap you into a marriage you didn’t want…with a woman you didn’t love. Teo understood only too well how I felt. He’d lived under the weight of your father’s loathing all his life and he knew I didn’t want a child of mine subjected to the same sort of misery.”
His jaw hardened, his eyes flashed. “You dare to suggest—”
“No,” Faye shook her head emphatically. “I didn’t think for a minute you’d be like Ruggerio and take your unhappiness out on your child. But I didn’t want you to be unhappy, that was the whole point.”
As the beginnings of a headache pinched above her left eye, she rubbed at her temple. “I was terrified you’d find out the baby was yours, and that you’d come after me and insist we get married. Teo said he would provide for me and my child. That if we got married he would find a way to make it appear the baby was his, and that you’d never find out because he would ensure you stayed away from us. I felt awful about it and said I couldn’t let him do that for me. That was when he told me he was a homosexual, that he didn’t want it broadcast and marrying me would provide exactly the smokescreen he wanted.” She heaved a sigh of relief as the last threads of deception fell away. “So he promised me that nobody would ever know you were Melita’s father and in return I promised him I’d keep his secret.”
Her words fell away at the look on Enrico’s face. There was genuine shock mixed with disbelief. “He told you he was homosexual?”
“Yes, of course.”
“Before you were married?”
“Yes.” It was her turn to look puzzled. “I’m not sure I understand what that—”
He shook his head, cutting her off, then gave an empty laugh. “So he would marry you and you would lie for him,” he said wearily. “A pact made in heaven.”
Turning back to the balustrade he leaned his forearms on the railing.
“Not such a good track record, have you, cara?” he murmured into the night. “Two marriages of convenience, where love has played no part.”
“Love has played a part.” In both. “I loved Teo.”
And you. With all my heart.
“Then you must have been disappointed. You had the man you loved in your bed, but his love was directed elsewhere. Love makes fools of us all.”
This was awful, Faye thought. From the way he was talking it sounded like he thought she loved Teo like that. “Teo didn’t share my bed,” she said in a hushed tone, both confused by his intimations and uncomfortable discussing Teo’s personal preferences. “He couldn’t share my bed. We both knew and accepted that right from the start.” She moved to where Enrico leaned on the railing. “We were friends, Teo and I, always friends. I loved him as such.”
Since there was no turning back now, since there was nothing left to hide, Faye sucked in a huge dose of courage and prayed the words would come out right. “You’re the only man I’ve ever been with.”
The silence stretched for so long she wondered if she’d actually spoken out loud. If he’d even heard her. Then he turned to face her, his fathomless eyes unblinking.
Nocturnal creatures chirped and croaked in the distance, but above them the sound of her heartbeat pounded fierce and relentless. Still he didn’t say anything. Did he believe her? Did he think she was still lying to him?
“You never slept with Teo?” he questioned in a chilly tone. “You have never had sex with anyone else?”
Faye swallowed. “That’s right.” She placed her hands over her stomach, as if to protect herself from his accusatory tone and the dull ache seeping through her middle. He didn’t believe her, and even if he did, he didn’t seem too bothered either way.
What had she expected anyway? That he’d be overjoyed? That he’d whisk her into his arms and swear undying love?
Something indefinable flashed across his face, although she knew he’d be running everything through in his mind like a movie on a screen. Sifting and sorting…sifting and sorting…
“Where did he get the money?”
It took a moment for Faye to realize he’d spoken. “What?”
“I said where did Teo get the money?”
“Mon
ey? I…” Faye’s frazzled brain struggled to get back on track and away from where she’d been forming the right words to tell him how she really felt about him.
He shook his head impatiently. “Where did he get the money to pay the blackmailer?”
The truth, Faye thought, as she met his accusatory glare, he deserves the truth. After what they’d put him through, he deserved to know it all. “Teo won it, in a poker game.”
He gave a barely audible “Hmm,” then demanded, “and where did the stake money for this game come from?”
“I… We sold a few things. Jewelry and…and the paintings my father left me.”
He swore, ripe and harsh. “Those paintings were important to your father. They were virtually all he had left to leave you.”
“I know, but they were just things. He would understand why I sold them.”
Enrico pressed the heel of his hand to his forehead, then half-turned away from her. “Dio! My brother was a fool.” He swung back with a fury that made Faye gasp. “And you are his equal. Did you think for one moment that paying a few thousand euros would stop the threats?”
Faye opened her mouth, about to protest that it was more than a few thousand, but realized that the situation hardly needed further provocation.
“Did you have more to sell, Faye?” he demanded scathingly. “Did you have more baubles, more heirlooms tucked away?”
His eyes narrowed. “Or perhaps you had something more valuable to sell? Perhaps you were prepared to sell yourself to the highest bidder so you could keep paying—”
