Prince's Virgin In Venice

by Trish Morey

  ‘If we’re going to get married because I’m having your baby,’ she said, ‘why should we pretend otherwise?’

  He looked across at her in the passenger seat. There was a strange note to her voice, as if it was fraying around the edges and she was straining to hold it together.

  ‘Are you tired?’ he said. They had made an early start to make it to Zucca by lunchtime, and with the flight and then the undulating road he wouldn’t be surprised if she was feeling a little motion sick.

  ‘I’m fine,’ she said, looking out of her window.

  ‘Is everything all right?’

  She sighed, still keeping her head turned away. ‘Everything’s fine.’

  He grunted. Clearly something was wrong, but he wasn’t about to argue the point. He’d given her plenty of opportunity to say if anything was bothering her.

  They didn’t speak for the final ten minutes of their journey, and when they pulled up outside the stone walls of her family home they didn’t have to announce their arrival. Their vehicle had obviously been heard, because a swarm of people piled out of the house, their faces beaming, their arms outstretched.

  Rosa just about bounded from the car, casting off her strange glumness like a cloak, laughing and squealing as she was gathered into the warm embrace of her family. The realisation that he was somehow the cause of her mood ratcheted up his own grumpiness.

  He leaned against the car, his arms crossed, watching the reunion. Such a foreign, unknown thing—like an object he had to study to work out the very shape and texture of it.

  So this was family?

  Everyone seemed to be speaking at once, voices piling up one over another, men and women, and the two older babies were being passed around so that Rosa could hug them and cluck over them and remark on how much they’d grown. And there was Rosa, in the midst of the celebrations, hugging and laughing and happy. Everyone was happy.

  In the background, with his hands on his hips as he watched on, stood the man who had to be her father. He wasn’t as tall as his three sons, but he stood broad-shouldered and rosy-cheeked and proud as he waited for a chance to welcome his daughter home.

  ‘Papà!’ he heard her squeal when she saw him, and then they were in each other’s arms and everyone was crying and whooping and back-slapping some more.

  And then, as if Vittorio were an afterthought, Rosa said something and all heads swivelled towards him. In their gazes he saw interest and suspicion, curiosity and mistrust—until Rosa came back and claimed his hand and pulled him into the fray, introducing him to them all.

  It was because he was with her that they welcomed him, he had no doubt. And even if they didn’t trust him they welcomed him as Rosa’s friend, and not as the heir to the throne of a tiny principality that had been irrelevant to their family until now. He knew who mattered here and it wasn’t him, and he felt the power imbalance that she’d pointed out as existing between them tilt markedly the other way.

  In Venice she was alone. Vulnerable.

  But here she was surrounded by her family, like a guard all around her, and he was the outsider, the one who had to prove himself.

  * * *

  They sat down under a vine-covered pergola at a table already spread with platters of antipasto and cheeses and crusty loaves of bread, all sprinkled with dappled light. Rosa handed out gifts for the babies. Gifts she’d made. Sailor suits for the boys and a lacy gown she’d made for the tiny Maria Rosa. Everyone praised Rosa’s needlework—gifts she’d made herself on her mother’s beloved old sewing machine and all the more special for it.

  ‘Tell us about Andachstein,’ Rudi said, pouring ruby-red Puglia wine into glasses.

  And Vittorio found himself telling them all about the principality—a gift of the far corner of his lands by an ancient monarch, bestowed upon a knight in return for faithful service. He told them about the castello, set high on the hilltop above the sparkling harbour far below. He told them of the landscape, of the rugged wooded hills and the pathways lined with thyme and rosemary that scented the air.

  They all listened with rapt attention while they ate and drank wine. Rosa’s beautiful eyes were the widest, and she looked both excited and afraid. He realised he’d never spoken to her of the place where she would one day live.

  He squeezed her hand to reassure her and the conversation moved on.

  The three wives were about to prepare the next course when the sound of a baby crying came from inside the house.

  ‘I’ll come and help with lunch,’ said Rosa.

  ‘No, you stay,’ said Estella, ‘I need you here. Wait.’

  She was back a few minutes later, dropping a bundle on Rosa’s lap. ‘Say hello to your auntie Rosa, Maria.’

  Rosa’s eyes lit up as she took the tiny bundle. ‘Oh, Estella, she’s beautiful. Look at those big eyes...and such long hair!’ The child blinked up at her, her rosebud mouth still moving, tiny hands crossed over her chest.

  Vittorio watched as Rosa cradled the child in her arms. Not a two-year-old this time, and not an eleven-month-old like he’d seen her hold before, already halfway to childhood. This was practically a newborn.

  And he was struck by the beauty of the tableau.

  Something shifted inside him at that moment. It shifted the tiniest of fractions, and yet it was so momentous that for a few moments his throat choked shut.

  In a few months Rosa would be holding their child. And if she could look so beautiful, so beatific, holding somebody else’s child, how much more rapturous would she look when she was holding theirs?

  Everything she did told him that he was doing the right thing. She would be the perfect mother.

  ‘You are so lucky to go to the city and meet your handsome man,’ said Luna, generously ladling pasta into bowls that got passed from hand to hand around the table. ‘You would never have found anyone as good-looking as Vittorio in the village.’

  ‘Hey,’ said Guido, looking aggrieved. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

  ‘Exactly what it sounds like,’ said Fabio, rolling his eyes. ‘Apparently all the hot guys are in the cities.’

  ‘No,’ Rudi said, the voice of authority. ‘Luna means all the good men are already taken, don’t you, Luna?’

  ‘Is that what you meant, Luna?’ laughed Gabriella, clearly not convinced.

  Estella laughed too. ‘I could have sworn you meant something else entirely.’

  ‘These women,’ Rudi said, shaking his head. ‘They are something else.’ He pointed a finger at their guest in warning. ‘Vittorio,’ he said, ‘don’t expect Rosa is going to be any different. And don’t, whatever you do, think that she’s going to be a pushover. These women, they have a mind of their own.’

  ‘Rudi!’ Rosa scolded.

  Vittorio just looked sideways at Rosa and smiled. ‘I’ll keep that in mind.’

  * * *

  Rosa’s father wasn’t old—not in years anyway—but the creases in his leathered face and the oil stains on his hands spoke of a man who had not just worked but rather had laboured his entire life. A man who had suffered the devastating loss of his wife but who had carried on, welcoming the new generation of Ciavarros one by one.

  ‘Come,’ he said to Vittorio after the family had sated themselves on the feast the women had prepared. ‘We need to have a talk, man to man.’

  Rosa squeezed Vittorio’s hand as he rose to follow Roberto. He was inordinately grateful for the gesture. It was ridiculous, but he hadn’t felt this nervous since he was a child, starting boarding school in Switzerland as a seven-year-old, when he’d felt as if he’d gone to a different world, with new languages to grapple with and comprehend, and older boys who’d seen a man-child and decided to take him down a peg or two before he was too big and he got the upper hand.

  They left the family under the vine-covered pergola and Roberto led him to a patio on the
other side of the house via the big kitchen, where he pulled a bottle and two shot glasses from a shelf.

  Both men settled themselves down and Roberto poured a hefty slug into each glass, handing Vittorio one.

  ‘To Rosa,’ he said, and the pair clinked glasses.

  The older man threw his down his gullet. Vittorio followed suit, and felt the liquor set fire to his throat and burn all the way down.

  He set his glass on the table without feeling he’d disgraced himself, only to see Rosa’s father top the glasses up.

  ‘And to you, Vittorio,’ he said, and downed the second glass.

  Vittorio swallowed the fiery liquor down, feeling it burst into flames in his belly.

  ‘It’s good, no?’ said Roberto. ‘I make it myself.’

  ‘Very good,’ Vittorio agreed, thankful that his voice box still worked.

  He was even more thankful to see the stopper placed back in the bottle.

  ‘I hear you want to marry my daughter.’

  ‘I’ve asked her, it’s true.’

  ‘She also tells me that she is carrying your child.’

  Vittorio was catapulted right back to school again—to a summons to the headmaster’s office for punching a boy who had been picking on a junior grader. He’d got the don’t think just because you’re a prince speech then, and he half expected to hear it again now.

  ‘Also true.’

  The other man nodded and sighed. ‘Maria—my wife—was very beautiful. Rosa has her eyes.’

  ‘They’re beautiful eyes. The colour of warmed cognac,’ Vittorio said.

  ‘Yes,’ said Roberto with a wide smile that smacked of approval. ‘That’s it. I used to tell Maria that I could get drunk just by looking into her eyes.’ His eyes brightened. ‘She would tell me, “Go and drink your grappa if you want to get drunk. I have work to do.”’ He laughed a little, then sniffed, ending on a sigh. ‘There is a lot of Maria in Rosa. I can promise you, you will never be bored.’

  ‘I know that.’

  ‘But Rosa says that while she wants what’s best for the bambino, she is not sure.’

  His words were like a wet slap about the face.

  ‘It’s so sudden,’ Vittorio said, ‘and there’s a lot Rosa will need to take on. It’s not a normal marriage, in many respects.’

  Roberto nodded. ‘True. But then, what is a normal marriage? When it comes down to it, every marriage is a game of give and take, of compromise and of bending when one least wants to bend.’

  And breaking, Vittorio thought. Sometimes marriages just broke you into pieces.

  ‘Did Rosa tell you I was married once before?’

  ‘Si,’ he said, with a nod of his head. ‘She says you are a widower.’

  ‘It wasn’t a good marriage and it didn’t end well,’ Vittorio said, studying his feet.

  ‘You see,’ Roberto said. ‘We are not so different. You might be a prince, but we are both widowers, after all. We both know loss.’

  ‘I guess we do,’ he said.

  ‘You know,’ Roberto said, leaning back in his chair, ‘when a man marries a woman for life, and he has a good marriage, and he only gets thirty years, that is nowhere near enough.’ He shook his head. ‘I am sorry that you haven’t found this satisfaction—yet.’

  He leaned forward, removing the stopper from the bottle again. He poured two more slugs before he put the stopper back, raised his glass.

  ‘Here is to the marriage of you and Rosa,’ he said. ‘May it be a good one from the very beginning. And may it be a long one, filled with love.’ He nodded, and said, ‘I give you my blessing,’ before downing the shot.

  The liquor stuck in Vittorio’s throat and burned. Or maybe it was her father’s words as he’d blessed the union.

  Love...

  All Vittorio wanted from this marriage was the heir Rosa was carrying. A spare would guarantee the principality’s survival. Having Rosa in his bed would be a bonus.

  But love?

  Surely her father could see that this was a convenient marriage? That love didn’t factor into it? Surely he wasn’t that unworldly?

  But what was he to say in the face of the man’s reminiscences about his own loving marriage and his wishes for them to be happy? He could hardly tell Roberto that he would never let himself love his daughter, not when he had been embraced so warmly into the family. That was between him and Rosa.

  The man had given his approval. Vittorio swallowed down on the burning in his throat. It didn’t feel altogether comfortable, but wasn’t Roberto’s blessing the thing he’d come for?

  * * *

  The announcement was made. Roberto had given his blessing and the entire family would go to Andachstein for the wedding. Cheers ensued, but a ruddy-cheeked Roberto quelled them, because he had even more news to share—the secret Rosa had shared with him—that in a few months they would be welcoming a new baby into the family, his new grandson.

  Bottles of Prosecco appeared from nowhere and corks popped. Toasts were made, backs were slapped, cheeks were kissed, and Vittorio found himself hugged by everybody, men and women, multiple times. His acceptance into the family was now beyond dispute.

  The one person who didn’t seem to want to hug him was the one he wanted to the most. Rosa had let him quickly kiss her on the lips as everyone had toasted the couple, before she’d swooped upon one of her nephews and sat down, hiding herself beneath him. She knew what she was doing. She was using the child as a human shield. What he didn’t understand was why.

  He stood in a circle of men and watched her with the child, making a fuss of it, talking with her sisters-in-law and avoiding his eye. It was killing him. It had been so many weeks since he’d taken her to bed that magical night, and having her back in his life, being so close, was an exercise in frustration.

  He burned for her. He wanted nothing more than to bury himself in her sweet depths.

  But she’d refused to move into the palazzo with him. She’d refused to sleep with him. Not until everything was settled, she’d said.

  He watched her laughing. Her hair was down today, curling over her shoulders, dancing in the light spring breeze, and her eyes were warm like cognac heated by a flame.

  Well, everything was settled. Her father had given his approval of their marriage. The wedding would go ahead. Andachstein would have its heir.

  And tonight he would hold Rosa and make love to her again.

  * * *

  The celebrations were on the wane by late afternoon, and one by one the brothers drifted off to their own homes with their families and sleepy babies. Roberto was sitting in an armchair, quietly snoring, when Rosa said she was tired and was going to turn in.

  At last, thought Vittorio.

  They collected their overnight bags from the car, and Vittorio felt his anticipation rising with every step back into the house. Rosa was wearing a dress splashed with big bright flowers today, with a full skirt, and a cardigan over her shoulders. He wasn’t sure whether he was going to be able to wait to get the dress off before he rucked up her skirt and took her.

  ‘I hope my family wasn’t too much for you today,’ she said.

  ‘No,’ he said as he followed her through the house, his hands itching to hold her, to glide over her skin, smooth as satin. ‘You have a good family. Noisy, but good.’

  She laughed a little over her shoulder. ‘Definitely noisy.’ And then she opened a door. ‘Here’s where you’re sleeping tonight.’

  He stepped into the room, confused. He looked around. There was one single bed surrounded by girlie things. A basket of dolls in one corner. Pictures of Rosa growing up. Artwork that she must have done as a child on the walls and a poster of a boy band she must have once followed.

  ‘This is your old room?’

  ‘It’s the most comfortable single bed there is. It’s yours tonigh
t.’

  He tried to pull her into his arms. ‘But where are you sleeping? I thought that tonight we could celebrate our engagement.’

  She laughed again and slipped out of his reach.

  ‘Won’t you stay with me?’ he invited.

  She shook her head. Her beautiful face was lit by a sliver of moonlight through the curtain, and he was reminded of liquid mercury and silver, fluid and impossible to contain.

  ‘I can’t make love to you under my father’s roof.’

  ‘He’s asleep. He won’t know.’

  ‘I’ll know,’ she said, shaking her head, smiling softly.

  He reached for her again, knowing he could change her mind if only she would let him kiss her. He knew she would melt in his arms. But she backed off to the door, all quicksilver and evasion.

  ‘Then when?’ he said, a cold bucket of resignation pouring down over him. ‘When can we make love again?’

  ‘Our wedding night, of course,’ she said.

  ‘What? But that’s weeks away.’ Three or four. Too many to contemplate.

  ‘Then it will be all the more special for waiting.’

  ‘Rosa,’ he said, pleading now, raking one hand through his hair.

  ‘No,’ she said. ‘You’re getting what you want. Let me have this.’

  ‘But do you know how long it’s been?’

  She smiled a sad, soft smile. ‘I know how long it’s been for me.’ She blew him a kiss. ‘Goodnight.’

  * * *

  Vittorio was alone. All alone in a single bed dressed with her sheets and her pillows and surrounded by her childhood things. All of which made it impossible to sleep. Impossible to relax.

  It was like being tortured. Being so close to her, surrounded by her, but unable to touch her. It would be better to be sleeping under a tree somewhere far away.

  With a groan, he gave up on sleep and got out of bed, snapping on the light. He moved to a big old chest of drawers and looked at the photos on top—photos of Rosa growing up.

  There was one of her with a gap-toothed smile and pigtails at school. Even then her eyes had been beyond beautiful. Another showed her flanked by her brothers, all on bikes. Rosa had been a young teenager then, wearing shorts and a checked shirt, and there was a view of coastal cliffs and sea behind her. A family holiday by the sea. Another one had been taken of her between her mother and father.