She was the only one.
‘You still think I should see my mother?’
‘You will never find peace until you do, that much I do know. Speak to her. Hear her side. Admit to yourself that you need her in your life. See if you can build a relationship.’
She fell silent.
‘I can come with you.’
‘Where?’
‘To see your mother. I can come as support.’
Her laugh sounded genuine but as she disentangled herself from his hold he saw fresh tears were streaming down her face.
‘I needed your support five weeks ago.’ She shook her head and wiped the tears away then straightened.
‘Let me give it to you now,’ he urged. ‘I wasn’t there for you...’
‘No, you weren’t.’ Her shining eyes bored into his. ‘And I don’t blame you. I understand what a shock it must have been for you having your sister turn up out of the blue and learning about your father.’
‘I should never have cut you off.’
‘No, you shouldn’t, but I knew the type of man you were when I married you. I knew you didn’t do forgiveness. One strike and the person’s out—humiliating you was my strike and I accept that...’
‘No, don’t accept it. I was a fool to behave like that.’ A fool and a cruel, selfish bastard. ‘If I’d any idea what you were going through I would never have...’
‘It doesn’t matter!’ She took a deep breath and got unsteadily to her feet. ‘None of it matters any more, don’t you see that? Our marriage is over and it’s time I learned to stand on my own two feet.’
The freezing fog in his brain thickened, making his ears ring. ‘It doesn’t have to be over. We can start again.’
‘It does.’ She folded her arms across her chest. There was something in her stance that made her appear taller. ‘We could forgive each other everything that happened, draw a line in the sand and start again, but I’ll never forgive you for what you did to get your revenge.’ She shrugged her shoulders but the whiteness of her face belied the nonchalance she was trying to portray. ‘That was despicable and I hate you for it.’
On legs that were surprisingly weak, he got up to stand before her. Something was scratching at him, clawing at his chest, making it painful to breathe. ‘You said that you loved me.’
‘And I did love you. With all my heart. All through my amnesia I kept thinking you were holding back from telling me you loved me to keep the pressure off my recovery but the truth was you never loved me, did you?’
The pain in his chest increased. He couldn’t form any words. Not one.
‘You killed my love and all my trust in you,’ she spat. ‘If I ever marry again it will be to someone who wants more than just my body and my business brain.’ Her voice caught but when she continued her tone didn’t falter. ‘It will be with someone who can love me too and trust me with their heart. I have to hope for that.’
And with that she turned her back on him, picked up her clutch bag from the table and headed for the front door.
‘Where are you going?’ Things were moving too quickly. She couldn’t just leave like this. ‘Look at the weather out there.’
The rain was lashing so hard it fell like hail against the windows.
She didn’t turn around. ‘I’m going to check into a hotel and in the morning I’m going to go home. My home. Mine and Melissa’s flat. After that, all I know for certain is that I have to stop relying on other people to hold me up and learn to hold myself up. If Melissa stays in Australia then I will give her my blessing.’ Then she did turn and gave the smallest, saddest of smiles. ‘Maybe I will fly out there too. I don’t know.’
There was nothing left to say. He could see it in her eyes. Anna was going to walk out of the door and this time it would be for good.
She didn’t say goodbye.
She closed the door with the softest of clicks but the sound echoed like a ricocheting bullet.
Stefano stood on the same spot for an age, too numb and dazed about everything that had just happened to take it all in. A part of him expected—hoped—that the door would swing back open and she’d walk back in and tell him she’d changed her mind.
It didn’t happen.
Her discarded shoes lay on their sides where she’d thrown them. Her feet were bare...
His legs suddenly propelled themselves to the window that overlooked the street below. He pushed it open and stuck his head out, uncaring that the storm soaked him in seconds and blinded his eyes.
Through the sheet of water running over his face he caught a glimpse of a red dress disappearing into a cab. Seconds later the cab pulled away from the kerb and soon he lost sight of it.
Anna had gone.
* * *
A week later Stefano strolled through the entrance foyer of his London apartment building. The two receptionists on duty greeted him warmly but with the same subtle wariness he’d been receiving at work that had become more marked since his return from San Francisco. He was used to fear but this felt different. Now people treated him as they would when confronted with a dangerous dog they didn’t want to provoke.
Anna had treated him like that before she’d collapsed at his feet with her concussion.
He blinked her image from his mind.
It mattered nothing to him how his staff behaved towards him. He preferred everyone to keep their distance. He didn’t need their chatter. If someone wanted to speak to him, he was all for getting to the point, cut the chit-chat and get on. Small talk was discouraged.
Anna had taught him the term ‘cut the chit-chat’. It had made a sharp but smooth sound in his mouth that amused him. Had amused him. It had been a long time since he’d found anything funny.
He took the bundle of letters one of the receptionists held out for him with a nod and was about to continue to the elevator when he remembered Anna’s not so subtle way of pulling him up on his manners those two and a half years ago.
With two short sarcastic words, you’re welcome, she’d reminded him that being Europe’s top technology magnate didn’t stop you or the others around you being human and that humans needed to feel appreciated.
He paused, looked the receptionist in the eyes and said, ‘Thank you,’ then wished them both a good evening and carried on up to his apartment.
Only after he’d dumped his briefcase and poured himself a bourbon did he sit on the sofa and go through his mail.
He put his thumb and middle finger to the bridge of his nose and squeezed to keep himself alert but, Dio, he was ready for bed.
It was all rubbish. Rubbish, rubbish, rubbish... He should employ someone to take care of his personal life as he did his business life. Then he wouldn’t have to deal with bills and the other necessary parts of life. Considering he’d abandoned running a household within weeks of having one, that thought would be funny if he hadn’t lost his funny bone. Or would it be ironic? Anna had been a great one for finding irony funny. She’d found a lot of things funny. His life was a much less cheerful place without her. He hadn’t noticed that when she’d left him the first time as he’d been too busy wallowing in his own sense of... What had she called it? Self-righteousness? She’d been describing herself when she’d said it but it applied to him too.
It had only been since his return from San Francisco when he’d refused himself the luxury of self-righteousness that he’d really noticed how the colour had gone from his life. Maybe it had been because she’d come back to him for that one week and they’d learned more about each other then than they had in the whole of the two and a half years they’d known each other.
Why couldn’t he stop thinking of her?
He took a healthy slug of his bourbon and opened the last item of mail, a thick padded envelope with a San Francisco postmark.
This must be the gift the concierge in his apartment there had messaged him about. It had been delivered shortly after he’d left for London on the day that was his and Anna’s first wedding anniversary. Not ca
ring what was in it—not caring about anything—Stefano had told the man to forward it to his London address.
And now it was here.
Inside the packaging was a small square gift-wrapped box.
He twisted it in his hands, his heart racing as his mind drifted back to Anna’s insistence on some solo ‘retail therapy’ that afternoon before the awards ceremony.
He’d thought it strange when she’d returned empty-handed.
He could not credit how much he missed her. It hadn’t been this bad before.
No, it had been this bad before but he’d masked it from himself. And it had been more than self-righteousness that had masked it but a mad fury like nothing he’d ever known...
She’d made assumptions about Christina, but hadn’t he made assumptions about Anna being a gold-digger? Hadn’t he been as determined to see the worst in her as Anna had been to see the worst in him?
He sat bolt upright, his brain racing almost as madly as his heart.
Dio, he could see the truth.
Somewhere along the line he had fallen in love with her. The man who had spent his life avoiding serious relationships for terror of being hurt and rejected had fallen in love.
Because he had been terrified. For all his disdain at people who refused to let go of their childhood he could see he’d done the opposite and buried his under a ‘don’t care’ bravado when all the time he’d been running, trying to stop it ever happening again.
He bent his head forward and dug his fingers into the back of his head as he strove to suck in air.
How could he have been so blind and stupid?
He’d blown it.
He loved his wife but the joke was on him because she didn’t love him any more.
Breathing deeply, he looked again at the gift-wrapped box.
Feeling as if he were opening something that could bite him, he ripped the wrapping off and snapped the lid of the black square box open.
Nestled inside it were two gold wedding bands.
CHAPTER TWELVE
ANNA ACCEPTED THE bottle of water from Melissa with a grateful smile of thanks.
The sand on Bondi beach was fine and deliciously warm between her toes, the sun blazing down and baking her skin. As it was a work day and the schools were open, the beach was busy but not packed. While there wasn’t the privacy she’d found at hers and Stefano’s Santa Cruz beach house, there was an easy vibe that almost, almost gave her the peace she so longed for.
The rate she was going she would never find peace. Not in herself.
Melissa stretched out on the sun-lounger beside her and they sat there amiably, sunglasses on, soaking up the rays.
‘What do you want to do later?’ Melissa said after a while.
‘I haven’t got anything in mind. You?’
‘Shall we borrow Mick’s Jeep and go for a drive and explore the suburbs?’
‘You’ll have to drive. I haven’t been behind a wheel in years.’
‘All the more reason you should drive. Use it or lose it.’
Anna laughed but it was a muted sound compared to the way she used to laugh.
‘Shall we invite Mum with us?’ Melissa asked carefully.
‘If you want.’
When Anna had flown out to Australia it hadn’t been to make her peace with her mother but to make her peace with Melissa. She had been determined to do what Stefano had suggested though, and sit down and talk to her mother, if only just so she could move on.
Her mum hadn’t quite seen it like that. Anna had arrived at the house to find the whole ground floor covered in balloons and banners to welcome her. All the neighbours and Mick’s family had been invited round to meet her. Melissa had stood there, eyes pleading for Anna to go along with it—Anna could almost read her mind, realising her sister was begging her not to make a scene.
Making a scene was the last thing she’d wanted to do.
She’d looked at her mum, flanked by her husband and stepkids, and seen the desperate excitement in her eyes, and the fear.
Too much water had passed under the bridge for Anna to throw herself into her mother’s arms as if nothing had happened but she’d returned her embrace coolly.
It had been almost a decade since she’d last seen her and she’d taken in the marked changes time had wrought. Her mother had done the same in return. They’d stared at each other for so long that Anna’s eyes had blurred, her heart so full that it pushed up into her throat and then she really had fallen into her mother’s arms.
As the evening had progressed and she couldn’t make a move without tripping over her mother, Anna had come to understand exactly what it meant for her mum to have her youngest child under her roof and had cancelled her hotel reservation and agreed to stay there, sharing the guest room with Melissa.
That had been two weeks ago.
They had spent a long time talking. They’d been honest with each other. Many tears had been shed. A bucketful of them.
Her mother had apologised over and over for leaving her behind and for the cruel words she’d spoken the last time they’d been together. She hadn’t made any excuses. She knew she’d been selfish and had effectively abandoned her daughters for the sake of a man. Her bone-deep guilt had been her punishment.
If Anna were being cynical she could say that if the guilt had been that bad, she could always have come home to them.
She didn’t want to be cynical any more.
Things were still awkward at times but slowly they were forging a rapport. Perhaps they would never regain their old mother-daughter relationship but Anna was confident that when she returned to London they would retain some semblance of one. It was entirely in her hands. Whatever wrongs her mother had done, Stefano had been correct in his assessment that she had missed her. She needed her mother in her life.
She hadn’t known how badly she’d needed her until she’d found her again and found the courage to let go of her anger and forgive.
She just wished the pain in her heart would ease. Not even the peace she’d made with her sister and the forgiveness she’d found for her mother had eased it. And it was getting worse, especially since Melissa had given her the pin code for her phone—it turned out she’d used Stefano’s birthday—and she’d gone through all her photos and videos. There was one video where she’d sneakily filmed Stefano taking a shower. The footage showed his start of surprise when he’d spotted her, then his wolfish grin as he’d opened the glass shower door. The footage went dark when he grabbed her phone and threw it onto the floor.
He’d then grabbed her, she remembered, and dragged her fully clothed into the shower with him. Her clothes hadn’t stayed on for much longer.
Her heart ached to think of him and when she closed her eyes all she could see was the despair on his face when she’d walked away.
She had never seen him like that before, not her strong, powerful husband. She’d seen him in passion and in anger but never in wretched defeat.
A fresh wave of pain hit her as she imagined him now and all he was having to cope with.
He’d been coping with it ever since she’d burst into his boardroom.
He was dealing with a father who’d been alive his whole life while he’d thought him dead. A father who had wanted him when no one else in his family had cared enough to even buy him shoes that fitted. He was dealing with a sister he hadn’t known existed until a few months ago, his first true familial relationship since he’d been seven.
And now he was having to deal with the knowledge that he and Anna had conceived a child together but that its tiny life had died before he could even celebrate its conception.
She knew too that he carried guilt over his treatment of her.
It was a heavy burden for him to carry and he was having to carry it on his own.
But he probably wasn’t alone, she scolded herself. This was Stefano she was thinking of; his bed was never empty for more than a week.
Immediately she castigated herself. He’d b
een faithful to her throughout their marriage and it was wrong of her to make assumptions now. She’d leapt to conclusions when she’d found Christina in their apartment and had been paying the price for it ever since. For all the horrendous wrongs he’d done, the only solid image in her mind was Stefano watching her leave his apartment, as haunted and haggard as she had ever seen him.
He’d asked her if they could start again...
But she’d dismissed him.
He hadn’t wanted her to go.
She shook her head to clear it. She would have to see him in person soon. She needed to be strong, not let doubts creep in.
He’d had doubts. He’d tried to stop the revenge he’d plotted down to the smallest detail from being carried out.
He’d asked her if they could start again...
Discovering the truth that night in San Francisco had been the most soul-destroying thing she had ever lived through. Learning that he’d seduced her and made her fall in love with him for revenge... She’d understood all this at the same moment the awful memories of their parting and the miscarriage had come back to her. The two had become a singular issue in her mind and the pain it all had unleashed had been too much to bear.
Time apart had given her some perspective.
He’d told her he wanted to start their marriage afresh and she’d dismissed it without properly listening to what he was saying. He’d told her he wanted to start their marriage again after she’d told him she loved him. This from the man who didn’t do forgiveness or love.
Melissa’s voice cut through her rambling thoughts. ‘You okay, chook?’
‘Sorry? Chook?’
‘Mum says it’s an Aussie term of endearment.’
Anna’s lips twitched but that was the nearest thing to a smile she could muster.
‘Anna? You okay?’
She blinked herself back into focus and shook her head. ‘I don’t think I am.’
‘What? You’re not okay?’ Alarm spread across Melissa’s face. ‘Are you feeling unwell? Are you going to be sick again?’
‘No, nothing like that. No. Mel... I think...’
‘What?’
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