When he still hesitated she added, “You’ve been belting it down since Friday night, so I wouldn’t worry. I do believe it’s the reason you’re not dead, so drink up.”
He drained the glass and said, “You’re the reason I’m not dead, Helen.”
She didn’t answer, unable to think of a suitable reply to such a tribute.
“Where did you get the medicine?” he asked, handing the empty tumbler back to her.
“My stepmother keeps an entire pharmacy in the bathroom. I just went through the bottles and picked out something from the assortment.”
“The right stuff, apparently. That was clever.”
“Not really. Adrienne has enough drugs in there to outfit the Peace Corps. It was only a matter of looking. She’s probably got the cure for the common cold buried in that closet.”
“Well, you don’t mind if I think you’re clever, do you?” he asked, teasing her.
Helen permitted herself a small smile. He talked just like an American, yet she had seen the foreign labels in his clothes, and sometimes she could hear a faint accent. And he had consumed enough Angel Bites to develop a fondness for them. What was going on here? Why was he in Florida, and why had he been shot? The pieces of the puzzle didn’t fit together, and it was driving her crazy, but she stuck to her resolution not to interrogate him. She wanted to keep the conversation light until he was feeling stronger.
“This house belongs to your stepmother?” he asked abruptly.
“My father, but he never comes here anymore. Adrienne and her children use it mostly; I came during the off season because I wanted privacy and quiet.”
“Which lasted until I arrived,” he concluded.
“It’s still quiet,” Helen said, and he grinned. The effect on Helen was considerable; she looked away so he wouldn’t see the response in her eyes.
“You’re much more alert,” she observed neutrally, fussing with his pillows. “You fell asleep in the middle of our last conversation.”
He sobered instantly. “No more painkillers. They’re knocking me out, and I have to get moving.” He tried to sit up, but fell back, his face pale. A fresh stain began to seep onto the gauze covering his wound.
“What are you doing?” Helen cried, grabbing his hands to hold him down. “You’re in no condition to get out of bed, do you want to open up that arm again?”
He subsided reluctantly. “I’ve been here too long already; there are people who need me, people waiting for me.”
“Well, they’ll just have to wait. If you go anywhere now, you’ll be scraped off the sidewalk in ten minutes and wind up in a hospital, a hospital full of doctors. And do you know what doctors have to do when they treat a gunshot wound? Call the police. How would you like that?”
The question was rhetorical. His eyes slid away from hers, and she picked up his dishes and took them to the kitchen. She made a production out of rinsing them off to give herself time to consider what he had said. Of course he would want to leave. Whatever had brought him to her door was still waiting to be accomplished. If he had succeeded in doing it, he would not have been shot. But the thought of his departure was painful in a fundamental way she didn’t wish to examine too closely. During the past few days Matteo had become the central feature of her existence; his total dependence on her had forged a bond between them that she wished, she now realized, could continue. But he intended to return to his original objective without a thought for her except the gratitude he had already expressed.
Helen dried a dish thoughtfully and replaced it in the cabinet above the sink. Had she expected something more?
When she returned to Matteo’s room he was staring out the window at the ocean. “This is a beautiful spot,” he said to her as she entered.
“Yes, my father had this house built for my mother as a wedding present because she loved this part of St. Augustine so much. It was originally sort of a log cabin, very rustic, but it’s been redone a couple of times since then.”
“Your parents are divorced now?”
Helen noticed that he wanted to know all about her, while offering no information about himself. But then again, she had nothing to hide.
“Yes, and both have remarried twice. I’ve had assorted stepmothers and stepfathers, as well as, let’s see, nine step-siblings at various times. We’re a very modern family.” She tried to make a joke of it, but he didn’t miss the forlorn expression she banished as soon as it appeared.
“Something tells me you won’t follow that pattern,” he said quietly. “You seem like a one-man woman to me.”
“I hope so,” she said lightly, turning her back on him deliberately. “Things are confusing enough right now.”
He sensed that the issue was a sensitive one and sidestepped it. “You must have an interesting time at family reunions,” he said lightly.
She faced him with a grateful smile. “Oh, we’d never get together all at once,” she said. “Too much potential for open warfare. My mother would probably knife Adrienne.”
“Is she jealous?” he asked.
“You bet.”
“Why?”
“Adrienne currently holds the position my mother used to have.”
“And that’s enough?”
“For my mother it is. She regards men as property, once acquired, always owned.” She didn’t have to add that she disagreed with this philosophy; her tone as she said the words spoke volumes.
“Is she still in love with your father?” he asked, not caring about the answer, but about the insight he was getting into Helen’s character.
“I think she is, in a way, although she would never admit it. He was her first real love, and you never forget the first one, no matter who comes after him.”
“You sound like an expert.”
Helen hesitated. “No as a matter of fact, I’m not. But I know I’d never forget.”
He noticed the way she phrased it. The event was still in the future for her, and somehow he wasn’t surprised.
“I don’t think Sophia has felt the same way about another man since my father,” Helen went on. “Or maybe I just like to think that he was special to her. I don’t know.”
“Sophia? You call your mother by her first name?”
“I’d better. She’d have a stroke if I ran around calling her Mom. She likes to tell people that we’re sisters and see if they believe it.”
“Do they?”
“Sometimes. More often than you’d think.” Sophia’s lifetime preoccupation with her physical appearance had paid off handsomely. At forty-seven she was remarkably well preserved.
“You look alike, then?”
Helen smiled wryly. “I don’t know if you’d say that. We have the same coloring, similar features, but my mother is far more flamboyant, stylish. We’re sort of like the original and the photographic negative.”
Matteo was watching her face, noting its changing expression as she spoke about her mother. “I can’t imagine your being a shadowy imitation of anyone,” he said softly, and she looked up to meet his eyes. They were closing, but he smiled at her before he fell asleep.
* * *
Helen got up in the middle of the night to check Matteo’s dressing, and as she touched his shoulder his good hand flashed from beneath the covers and caught hers in a viselike grip. Helen recoiled from the pain; for someone recovering from such a severe illness, he was remarkably strong.
“Matteo, it’s me,” she said quietly. “Helen. I just want to change the gauze pad on your arm.”
He studied her in the half light admitted by the open door to the hall and then released her, moving his fingers up to lay them against her cheek.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “You took me by surprise.”
Not a good idea, Helen thought to herself as she discarded the stained dressing and replaced it with a fresh one. He must have had some rude awakenings in the past.
When she stepped back he grasped her hand and pulled her toward him. She couldn’t re
ad his face, but his intent was clear as he drew her onto the bed and into his arms.
“Stay with me,” he murmured. “You’re too far away.”
Helen lay next to him, snuggling up to his uninjured shoulder and putting her head on his chest. He encircled her with his arm, moving his leg so that she could fit comfortably against his side. He felt warm and solid, and she could hear his voice rumbling in his chest as he said, “While I was sick I dreamed that we were together like this.”
“That wasn’t a dream,” Helen replied, feeling her face flame in the darkness. “You had the chills and couldn’t seem to stop shaking. I got on the bed with you and held you until you quieted down.”
He didn’t answer for a moment, but she felt his lips moving in her hair. When his voice came it was low and husky.
“I don’t know how to thank you for what you have done,” he said quietly. “You probably saved my life. And I’ve got to live long enough to do what must be done.”
There it was again, the hint that his business encompassed more than he could say. Since he had brought it up, she pressed her advantage, asking, “Can’t you tell me what you were doing when you were hurt?”
“No.”
“Why?” She cast about for an idea. “Did you steal something?”
His whole body stiffened, and she was immediately sorry she had said it.
“Do I seem like a thief to you?” he responded softly, and his grip on her shoulders relaxed, as if he didn’t want to touch the person who could ask him such a question. “I told you once I was not a criminal, and I wasn’t lying.”
Helen half sat, looking down into his face. “You admitted that what you were doing is illegal. Most people would say that makes you a criminal.”
“Is that how you see the world,” he replied coldly, “all clear choices, everything black and white?”
“I see,” Helen answered, frustrated by his obstinacy, his distant tone, “that you are treating me like a child.”
“You act like one,” he stated flatly. “‘Tell me, tell me,’ as if this were a game we are playing, keeping secrets. It is not a game. When I say that I do not want you to know in order to keep you safe, you refuse to believe me. You kept me alive when I might have died without you. Should I pay you back by putting you in danger? What kind of friend would I be if I did that, Helen?”
She didn’t answer, unable to argue with him. She noticed that his English became less colloquial when he was upset. He dropped the familiar conjunctions and adopted a more formal style, speaking the way he must have when he first learned the language.
He sighed heavily and reached for her again. “Come here. I don’t want to fight with you.”
Helen curled up with him again, unwilling to pursue the discussion, but still troubled.
“Can you trust me, Helen?” he asked, twining his fingers with hers and inching her closer. “Can you accept that I am making the right decision?”
“I guess I’ll have to,” she replied grudgingly, settling against him.
There was a smile in his voice when he directed, “Go to sleep, my stubborn little American.”
Helen was tired and, despite her misgivings, found it surprisingly easy to obey him. She was almost out when she murmured, “The Chinese believe that you are always responsible for someone whose life you have saved. Do you think that’s true?”
He waited a beat before he answered soberly, “I wonder.”
But Helen didn’t hear him.
She was asleep.
Chapter 2
Helen was reading in the chair next to the bed when Matteo opened his eyes the next morning. He didn’t speak, but studied her covertly, taking in every detail.
She was wearing a blue robe with white lace ruching at the neckline, her blonde hair flowing over her shoulders loosely. Her pose and her clothing reminded him of a painting he had once seen; it depicted a golden girl in a blue dress sitting in a shaft of sunlight, bending her head over a book in her lap. Helen was absorbed, turning the pages without looking up, her expression rapt.
What an unexpected delight she was, Matteo thought. By all indicators, she should have grown up to be a vain, self indulgent woman like her mother. Instead she was a dreamer, a loner who had come to this out-of-the-way place to escape the heedless life her family led. And when he had burst into her self imposed isolation and ruined it, she had saved him with a spontaneous act of kindness.
“What are you reading?” he finally said, and she started, glancing toward him.
“You’re awake,” she said. “Are you hungry?”
“What is that book?” he persisted, and she held it up for his inspection.
“Faust in Hell,” he read aloud, “The Tragedy of Christopher Marlowe. Why tragedy?”
“Oh, because he died so young, in such a senseless way. He might have been greater than Shakespeare, if he had lived.”
“‘Sweet Helen, make me immortal with a kiss,’” Matteo recited. “Is your name a coincidence?”
Helen shook her head, putting the book aside. “No, my father is a Marlowe buff; he named me. Dad also introduced me to his work when I was young.” She smiled ruefully. “I think it’s the only interest we have in common.”
“Something, anyway,” Matteo said gently, and she nodded.
“I have to get through this during the next week or so to remain on schedule,” she said, standing up.
“What schedule?”
“My own. I’m working on my thesis and I have it all mapped out, what areas to cover and how long each should take.” She folded her arms and examined the patient. “You’re looking remarkably chipper today. I have to go to the store; we’re out of food. It won’t take me long. I’ll be back before you know it, okay?”
He forced her to meet his eyes. She seemed to know what was coming, but he said it anyway. “Helen, I’d like you to get me some clothes. I have to take a shower and get dressed.”
“You’re going to leave soon,” she responded.
“Yes.”
“Today?” she asked dismally.
“We’ll see,” he said quietly, relenting. He studied her clouded face and added, “I have no money.”
“I do,” she replied simply. “What should I get?”
He looked thoughtful, trying to remember his American sizes. “Shirt: fifteen and a half, thirty-four. Pants: waist, thirty-four; inseam, uh, thirty-two, I guess. And shoes, see if you can get that tennis kind, what do you call them...”
“Sneakers?” Helen supplied.
“That’s right, sneakers. Size ten. Is that all right?”
“Fine,” she replied briskly, turning for the door.
“Helen,” he said.
She paused.
“I have to go. I don’t want to, but I must.”
She didn’t answer, merely left the room and went across the hall to change. He heard her leave a few minutes later.
As soon as she was gone he swung his legs over the edge of the bed and tried to stand. His knees gave way and he had to grab for the back of Helen’s chair to steady himself, but he was on his feet for the first time in days. He maneuvered into position and sat down slowly, stretching his long legs in front of him. It felt good to be out of the bed, but even he had to question whether he was going to be doing any traveling right away. He felt punchy and lightheaded, which he ascribed partly to the lingering effects of Helen’s miracle pills. As they wore off the wound in his arm began to feel like it was being gouged by a hot poker, but he wanted to be clearheaded when he left.
He had to get back to his men. But just as important, he had to protect this girl who had taken such a risk for him. In his diverse life he had seen other acts of selfless behavior, but nothing quite the equal of this. That a rich, beautiful American woman would shelter a wounded stranger from the police and drop everything to nurse him back to health seemed unbelievable, but it had happened. To him. And now he had to make sure that he got away clean, so that she wouldn’t suffer any repercussions.
Unlike most of his compatriots, Matteo liked Americans, having gone to school in the United States for years. He had developed a solid affection for their open, easy manner, fierce independence and amazing resourcefulness. What he liked best was their romantic unpredictability; this young woman would have had every reason to throw him to the wolves and go back to studying literature and cashing her trust fund checks, but she had done exactly the opposite. And now he had to get out of her life without satisfying her legitimate curiosity or getting her into trouble with the authorities, who were surely still looking for him.
It was not going to be easy.
When Helen returned she came into the bedroom carrying several wrapped packages and a brown paper grocery bag.
“Angel Bites, as requested,” she announced, tossing a cellophane packet into his lap. “And what are you doing out of bed, may I ask?”
“It’s time,” he answered flatly.
“Clothes,” she said, dumping the parcels on the bed. “In the stated sizes. I don’t think you’ll make the cover of Gentlemen’s Quarterly, but they should do the trick as long as you don’t take off the shirt and display that shoulder to anybody.”
“Thank you. Will you help me to the bathroom? I want to get cleaned up.”
“Are you sure you’re strong enough for that?” she asked, challenging him.
For an answer, he stood and took a step toward her. She moved to aid him, slipping her arm around his waist and walking at his side. She could feel the resurgence of his natural strength; it wouldn’t be long before he would depart her life as suddenly as he had entered it. She led him to the bathroom and took him past the whirlpool and the sauna closet to the sunken bathtub, made to order for Adrienne and inlaid with imported Italian tiles. The gold plated faucet had more gadgets and dials then a ship’s boiler, and Helen showed him how to regulate the temperature and flow. She left him leaning against the wall and went to the closet for the things he would need. She returned to find him unbuckling his belt, favoring his injured arm but otherwise holding up very well. Too well.
He paused as she handed him a stack of Lord and Taylor towels, a bar of Adrienne’s gardenia scented soap and a bottle of her henna herbal “specially formulated for the client” shampoo. Adrienne kept the place stocked like a Paris salon, and so Helen had seized the opportunity to travel light and leave her own toiletries at home. She wasn’t sure Matteo would appreciate the amenities; he would probably emerge smelling like a high priced bordello. But he would undoubtedly be clean.
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