‘Sometimes I don’t understand why.’ Lucy’s voice was muffled. ‘Sometimes all I can think is why? Why did she protect me? What was it about me that was worth dying for? And if she hadn’t protected me, then she wouldn’t have died and maybe other people might not have got hurt. My father might not have used me—’
‘You cannot think like that, civetta,’ he interrupted quietly. ‘The past is something you can’t change, so there is no point in going over all the what-ifs and might-have-beens. You did not kill your mother. She made a choice to protect you and she made that choice because she loved you. If you are going to assign blame to anyone, assign it to your father. He is the villain here, not you.’
‘A villain I worked for. I did everything he told me to and if I hadn’t been so afraid...’
Vincenzo tightened his fingers in her hair, drawing her head back. Her face was wet with tears, her eyes red-rimmed and her nose pink. She looked so sad and yet so unutterably lovely. How had he ever thought her plain?
‘You cannot blame yourself for that, Lucy.’ He put force into the words. ‘You escaped him. You were afraid, but you made a promise to your mother and so you didn’t let that stop you. In the end, you were brave and you escaped, and that’s the only thing that matters.’
But pain lingered in her eyes. ‘If I had truly been brave, I would have stood up to him. My mother did. She knew he would hurt her and yet she stood up to him anyway. I should have done that. Should have refused to do all those things, gone to the police.’ A tear ran down her cheek. ‘And I didn’t. I...allowed him to keep me prisoner because I was just terrified.’
He cupped her cheek in his palm, his thumb brushing away the tear. ‘You had reason to be terrified, civetta. He is ruthless and violent and he would have hurt you very badly if you’d done any of those things.’
Even the thought of what Armstrong could have done to her made Vincenzo’s blood run cold and a red haze of rage descend over his vision.
Does she really matter that much to you?
But he ignored that thought entirely.
Lucy shook her head. ‘Mum was afraid of him, but she didn’t let it stop her. She was so brave, while I just sat in my room cowering for years. She would have been so ashamed.’
‘No,’ he said flatly and with absolute conviction, tightening his fingers in her hair for emphasis. ‘To see you now, she would have been proud. And she would have thought her death worthwhile if it kept you from harm.’
Lucy’s lovely face was tearstained, and she looked at him, as if she was searching for something that only he could give her. ‘How do you know that?’
He didn’t, of course. He didn’t know anything about loving mothers who protected their children. But he did know this little civetta and what she’d done for him. Because she had changed him. With her honesty and her trust, with the heat of her passion and the cold grip of her fear. With the heart she wore on her sleeve...
‘Because you are worth saving, Lucy Armstrong,’ he said quietly.
Lucy flushed and the pain in her eyes eased, and he found himself going on, for what reason he didn’t know. Maybe because he didn’t want her to feel alone.
‘And because I have done things I regret too, things I cannot change no matter how I wish I could.’
She blinked, tears glittering on the ends of her lashes. ‘What things?’
He shouldn’t tell her. No one knew. And he hadn’t thought he’d want anyone to know either. But somehow it felt wrong to hold this back, to let her know that she wasn’t as alone in the world as she might think. That he understood in a way few other people would.
You weren’t supposed to let your emotions become a part of this.
No, but it was too late for that now and he knew it. His emotions were engaged already. All he could do now was to make sure he didn’t allow them to get in the way of what needed to be done.
‘I never knew what my family was.’ He kept his voice quiet, his thumb moving on her cheek. ‘My mother maintained a fiction of the proud de Santi legacy, an aristocratic family of warriors fighting to protect what was theirs. I believed her. A proud de Santi prince, she called me, and that’s what I believed myself to be. I was arrogant and spoiled. So sure of myself and my place in the world. I didn’t see what was wrong with that place until it was too late. Until people died because of what I’d become.’
Lucy’s eyes were very wide. ‘What did you become?’
‘I became complicit.’ He couldn’t stop the bitterness that coloured his tone. ‘Though I was always complicit, I just chose not to see it.’
A deep crease lay etched between her brows. ‘What did you choose not to see?’
Even now he didn’t like to think about it. But he couldn’t not tell her, not when she’d shared what had happened to her.
‘My mother was beautiful and very loving, but she was also a de Santi through and through. I wasn’t a son so much as her tool. She used me from a young age, mostly as a spy or a distraction, since children could be useful for manipulating adults and since they were so easy to manipulate themselves. She told me I was her brave soldier and that if I wanted to be a general, I had to prove my worth and follow orders.’
He could feel the creeping dread of the night he never thought about. The inexplicable dread that he always tried to hold at bay, because nothing had ever really happened. Or, at least, that was what he’d told himself. What he’d been telling himself for years...
‘We were at the opera one night in Naples, and at the end of the production my mother pointed to a woman in the theatre foyer and told me to bring her to the alleyway a couple of doors down from the theatre. She said that if I pretended to be lost, and cry a few tears, no one would question it. I was seven and I loved my mother with all my heart. I only wanted to make her happy, and so I did what she asked.’ Years ago now, and yet that dread still wrapped around him and squeezed him tight. ‘The woman was so kind. She hugged me when she found me crying, and gave me a sweet, and she followed me when I told her to come with me to the place I’d last seen my family. She held my hand and told me a funny story...’ He stopped, took a breath, and then went on, ‘There was a van in the alleyway. And when we approached, the door opened and some men got out. They grabbed her and pushed her into the van and drove off. She didn’t even have a chance to scream.’
Lucy’s gaze darkened. ‘Oh, Vincenzo.’
He could hear the sympathy in her voice, but he knew he didn’t deserve any of it. ‘My mother was so pleased with me. And I felt proud that I’d done what she wanted me to do. And yet... I couldn’t stop seeing that woman’s face as they grabbed her. The look of fear on it. Even then I knew that something had happened to her, but I didn’t let myself remember it or think about it. But that memory was always there, and then Gabriella happened.’
Lucy placed a hand on his chest, her palm a small ember of heat. ‘Gabriella?’
He didn’t want to talk about this either, but it was too late for silence.
‘When I was twelve, Mama encouraged me to be friends with the daughter of a rival family. She was my age and wasn’t afraid of me like the other kids were. I liked that very much. I didn’t question why my mother wanted me to be Gabriella’s friend, I just let her encourage it because it suited me too.’
‘Other kids were afraid of you?’
‘Because of my family. The de Santis were very much feared, though I didn’t understand why at the time.’ He paused, the bitterness sinking deeper into his heart. ‘I liked that though. I liked being the de Santi prince that everyone was afraid of. And I was very loyal to my mother, wouldn’t hear a bad word said about her. I ignored the rumours and doubts that I picked up as I grew older. That the de Santis were a family of murderers and traitors, and that my mother was the most feared of all, because of her reputation for brutality. I didn’t believe them. Mama was small and beautiful and adored me. I co
uldn’t even conceive of her being brutal.’ Tension wound through him, though he tried not to let it. ‘Then when I was eighteen Mama mentioned that we needed to know the location of Gabriella’s father on a particular night, and could I perhaps find out? I knew, deep down. After that night in Naples, I suspected. There was a reason why she wanted that information and that the reason wasn’t going to be good. But I was so completely her creature that I ignored my doubts. I took Gabriella out and I got the information I needed from her. I knew she had feelings for me, and I used them the way my mother used mine for her.’
His heart clenched tight at the memory. Of Gabriella’s pretty face and the way she’d looked at him, as if the sun rose and set in his eyes. ‘It was easy. She told me everything, because she trusted me. And I betrayed her. I passed the information on to my mother.’ He’d been so oblivious. So stupid. So blinded. ‘Two days later Gabriella’s father was killed in a hit carried out by unknown assailants.’
Lucy’s eyes widened and he could see the shock in them. Now it was his turn to face judgment, and it would happen. She would soon see his own special brand of hypocrisy.
‘Gabriella knew what had happened. She knew that I’d betrayed her. But she didn’t blame me. She blamed herself instead.’
Lucy’s hand pressed hard against his chest, as if she could sense his self-loathing and wanted to ease the burn of it. But nothing would. Nothing would ever make that get any better. Only the fire of justice ever came close.
‘I was complicit in her father’s death,’ he said flatly, so there could be no mistake. ‘I’d ignored the doubts I’d had for years about my mother, too blinded by my love for her to think that everything she’d told me about our family, about myself, could be a lie. But after Gabriella’s father died I couldn’t ignore it any longer.’ He remembered the weight of his own realisation. The crushing burden of understanding that had nearly annihilated him. ‘I confronted my mother about it and she laughed. Told me it was just business. That if I wanted to remain part of the family I should get used to it. That I’d already done so much to help, after all...’
He gritted his teeth, remembering his mother’s warm, familiar smile. And the cold, cold look in her eyes. ‘It was a threat and we both knew it. A reminder that I was as guilty as she and that she had the power to do something about it if I became a problem.’ His mouth moved in a smile, though there was no humour at all in it. ‘It was common knowledge that there was only one way out of the de Santi family and that was in a box.’
Lucy’s gaze was dark and liquid, but she didn’t say anything.
‘So I made a decision.’ He could still feel the flame of that decision, burning hot and strong. It never went out. He couldn’t afford to let it. ‘I gathered all the pieces of information I could find on my mother’s activities and I forwarded them to the police. I made sure I was at her trial to give evidence and I made sure she went to prison. She didn’t look at me at all as they led her away. I was dead to her already.’
There were so many things that had scarred him in that moment. The knowledge that he’d negotiated his own immunity from prosecution by betraying his mother. An immunity he’d wanted so he could dedicate his life to pursuing his own justice.
The way she’d ignored him so completely. He didn’t blame her in the end, but it had hurt all the same. Confirmation, as if he’d needed it, that he’d never been her son to love.
There was silence afterwards, but he couldn’t hear anything above the pounding of his own heartbeat.
‘If I can’t blame myself for what happened with my mother, then you can’t blame yourself for what happened with yours, Vincenzo,’ Lucy said quietly. ‘You weren’t complicit. You were used.’
CHAPTER NINE
VINCENZO’S DARK EYES were full of fire. ‘You think I don’t know that?’
‘I do think you know that.’ The anger in his face told her that clearly. ‘But you don’t feel it, do you?’ She’d phrased it as a question, but it wasn’t meant to be one. Not when she knew the truth so intimately herself. ‘You feel responsible.’
‘Of course I feel responsible. I lured that woman to that van. And I used my friendship with Gabriella to betray her father. My actions caused his death, and I knew all along that something wasn’t right about it. I knew all along that there was doubt. But I didn’t listen to that doubt. I didn’t listen to my instinct. And if I had—’
‘If you had, what would have changed?’ She didn’t know why she was arguing with him. It was only that there was pain in his heart the way there was in hers, and that he blamed himself just as she blamed herself. They were so alike. Both children of monsters. It made her feel his agony as if it were her own. ‘You might have saved him, but someone else might have got hurt instead. And if the past doesn’t matter for me, then it can’t matter for you. We can’t be complicit when both our parents used us, and we can’t change what happened.’
His expression had become hard, like stone, but his eyes glittered, sharp as volcanic glass. ‘No, I can’t. Which is why the only thing of importance is what I do now. And that is taking down the people like my mother. Those families who have caused so much harm to so many people. Justice is the only way forward.’
And he was burning with it, that was clear.
Foreboding fluttered deep inside her, but she ignored it. She understood all too well where he was coming from and she could see how heavily guilt weighed on him. Gabriella hadn’t blamed him, but he blamed himself, and that surely had to be an impossible burden.
You know about those too.
Oh, yes, she did. She’d carried the weight of her mother’s death for a long time, after all. But this life he’d set out for himself, this crusade, had to be a lonely one. She knew better than anyone how difficult it must be, to be constantly on your guard, to never feel safe. Never to be able to trust anyone.
Her heart ached for him and there was nothing she could do. No words to make the burden he bore for the deaths of those people lighter, no way to ease it. All she could do was offer him understanding, because she carried those same burdens.
He’d told her that she wasn’t to blame and that she was worth saving, but the feeling in her heart was still the same, the doubt and the fear.
He felt those things too.
Maybe, though, there was some help she could offer him...
She shifted in his lap. ‘Wait here. I’ll be a couple of minutes.’ Before he could stop her or ask what she was doing, she’d slipped off him, going quickly into the house and to her bedroom. Her laptop was still sitting in her bag on the armchair near the bed, so she got it out and went back to the terrace.
Vincenzo had risen to his feet, that dark menace gathering around him again, staring at her fiercely. But she ignored him. She opened up the laptop and typed in her password, then opened up the files she’d encrypted only a week ago.
Then she held out the laptop to him. ‘Here. All the information you need about my father is in this file. It’s yours, Vincenzo.’
He didn’t look at it or make any move to take it. ‘You were going to give me that at the end of the week. That was the deal.’
‘I know. But justice is important to you, and I don’t want to cower in fear any more. I want to do something. I want to help.’
‘But why now? Why not before?’
‘Because I understand better now why you’re doing it and where you’re coming from. And I don’t want to keep that information from you. More people could get hurt the longer I hold on to it, and I don’t want that either.’ She lifted her chin, held that fierce stare. ‘Take what’s on that laptop. Use it to put him behind bars for the rest of his life, because that’s what he deserves. At the very least for my mother’s sake. And at the end of this weekend I won’t protest. I’ll go quietly to the authorities.’
Still he didn’t take the laptop.
‘If I have the information
now, what’s to stop me from handing you over immediately?’
He wouldn’t, though. She knew in her bones that he wouldn’t.
‘You won’t.’ She dared him to contradict her. ‘You gave me your word and I think that’s important to you too.’
Once again he said nothing, that look on his face like a judge debating a sentence. ‘You’re really prepared to give yourself up? Just like that?’
That he didn’t deny it caused her heart to miss a beat, just once. But she ignored it, because what else could she do? After all the things he’d told her about himself and his motivations? His reasons for what he was doing? He was taking responsibility for his actions and trying to make amends, and she couldn’t fault that. She couldn’t pretend that she didn’t have amends to make either because, although logically she knew she wasn’t responsible for her mother’s death, the guilt remained. And maybe answering for the crimes she’d committed afterwards would help ease it.
‘You’ve devoted your life to justice, Vincenzo. You took responsibility for yourself and the wrongs your mother did, and you’re making up for that harm by preventing harm to others. By stopping those responsible. Yet what have I done? I broke the law and my actions would have caused people pain.’ That guilt was so heavy, weighing her down. ‘I need to pay for that. I don’t want to go to jail, but not wanting to doesn’t put me above the law. And besides... I don’t want to manipulate you into helping me escape. That would be forcing you to compromise your principles and I can’t ask that of you.’
He had set her an example and all she could do was follow it. She couldn’t claim a freedom that she didn’t deserve, and she couldn’t ask him to ignore everything he believed in just for her sake.
Slowly, Vincenzo reached for the laptop and took it from her. But even then he didn’t look at it. He put it down on the stone bench and reached for her, drawing her close. He was so tall she had to tilt her head back to look up at him. Her glasses were still on the arm of the bench, but she didn’t need them to see those burning, dark eyes, and the expression on his face, like stone.
The Italian's Final Redemption (Mills & Boon Modern) Page 13
