by Kate Hewitt
Wordlessly she nodded, and then she watched as Marco turned and strode from the bedroom. Alone, she sank onto the bed, her legs suddenly feeling weak. Everything feeling weak. She felt nearer to tears now than she had a few moments ago, and why? Because she’d lost Marco? It was better this way, and in any case she’d never really had him. Not like that.
But it still felt like a loss, a gaping wound that was bleeding out. Another deep breath and Sierra turned to her suitcase. She struggled with the zip, but she finally got it closed. And then she sat there, having no idea what to do. Where to go, if anywhere.
After a few moments she worked up the nerve to lug her suitcase down the spiral staircase. Marco stood in the living room, his back to her as he stared out at the darkened city. She hesitated on the bottom step because now that she was here, she didn’t really want to go. Walk out like she did once before, into a dark night, an unknown future.
Yet how could she stay?
The step creaked beneath her and Marco turned around, his dark eyebrows snapping together as he saw her clutching the handle of her suitcase. ‘You’re still planning to go?’ he asked, his voice harsh.
‘I don’t know what to do, Marco.’ She hated the wobble in her voice and she blinked rapidly. Marco swore under his breath and strode towards her.
‘Sierra, cara, I’ve been an utter ass. Please forgive me.’
It was the last thing she’d expected him to say. He took the suitcase from her and put it on the floor. Then he stretched out his hands beseechingly, his face a plea. ‘Don’t go, Sierra. Please. Not yet. Not till I understand. Not till we’ve made this right.’
‘How can we? I know what my father meant to you, and I hate him, hate him—’ She broke off, weeping, half amazed at the emotion that suddenly burst from her, tears trickling down her cheeks. ‘I always have,’ she continued, but then her voice was lost to sobs, her shoulders shaking, and Marco had enfolded her in his arms.
She pressed her face into his hard chest as he stroked his hand down her back and murmured nonsense endearments. She hadn’t realised she had so many tears left in her and, more than just tears, a deep welling of grief and sorrow, not just for the father she’d had, but for the father she’d never had. For the years of loneliness and fear and frustration. For the fact that even now, seven years on, she was afraid to trust someone. To love someone, and the result was this brokenness, this feeling that she might never be whole.
‘I’m sorry,’ she finally managed, pulling away from him a bit to swipe at her damp cheeks. Now that the first storm of crying had passed, she felt embarrassed by her emotional display. ‘I didn’t mean to fall apart...’
‘Nonsense. You needed to cry. You have suffered, Sierra, more than I could ever imagine. More than I ever knew.’ Sierra heard the sharp note of self-recrimination in Marco’s voice and wondered at it. ‘Come, let us sit down.’
He guided her to one of the leather sofas and pulled her down next to him, his arm around her shoulders so she was still nestled against him, safe in his arms. Neither of them spoke for a long moment.
‘Will you tell me?’ Marco finally asked.
Sierra drew a shuddering breath. ‘What do you want to know?’
‘Everything.’
‘I don’t know where to begin.’
He nestled her closer to him, settling them both more comfortably. ‘Begin wherever you want to, Sierra,’ he said quietly.
After a moment she started talking, searching for each word, finding her way slowly. She told him how the first time her father hit her she was four years old, a slap across the face, and she hadn’t understood what she’d done wrong. It had taken her decades to realise the answer to that question: nothing.
She told him about how kind and jovial he could be, throwing her up in the air, calling her his princess, showering her and her mother with gifts. ‘It wasn’t until I was much older that I realised he only treated us that way when someone was watching.’
‘And when you were alone?’ Marco asked in a low voice. ‘Always...?’
‘Often enough so that I tried to hide from him, but that angered him, too. No monster likes to see his reflection.’
‘And when you were older?’
‘I knew I needed to get away. My mother would never leave him. I begged her to, but she refused. She’d get quite angry with me because she loved him.’ Sierra shook her head slowly. ‘I’ve never understood that. I know he could be charming and he was handsome, but the way he treated her...’ Her voice choked and she sniffed loudly.
‘So why didn’t you run away? When you were older?’
She let out an abrupt yet weary laugh. ‘You make it sound so simple.’
‘I don’t mean to,’ Marco answered. ‘I just want to understand. It all seems so difficult to believe.’
How difficult? Sierra wondered. Did he believe her? Or even now did he doubt? The possibility was enough to make her fall silent. Marco touched her chin with his finger, turning her face so she had to look at him.
‘I didn’t mean it like that, Sierra.’
‘Do you believe me?’ she blurted. The question felt far too revealing, and even worse was Marco’s silence after she’d asked it.
‘Yes,’ he said finally. ‘Of course I do. But I don’t want to.’
‘Because you loved him.’
Marco nodded, his expression shuttered, his jaw tight. ‘You know how I told you my own father left? He was hardly around to begin with, and then one day he just never came back. And my mother...’ He paused, and curiosity flared within the misery that had swamped her.
‘Your mother?’
‘It doesn’t matter. What I meant to say is that Arturo was the closest thing to a father that I ever had. I told you how I was working as a bellboy when he noticed me... I would have spent my life heaving suitcases if not for him. He took me out for a drink, told me he could tell I had ambition and drive. Then he gave me a job as an office junior when I was seventeen. Within a few years he’d promoted me, and you know the rest.’ He sighed, his arm still around her. ‘And all the while he’d encourage me, listen to me...accept me in a way my father never did. To now realise this man I held in such high esteem was...was what you say he was...’ Marco’s voice turned hoarse. ‘It hurts to believe it. But I do.’
‘Thank you,’ she whispered.
‘You don’t need to thank me, Sierra.’ He paused, and Sierra could tell he was searching for words. ‘So you wanted to escape. Why did you choose me?’
‘My father chose you,’ Sierra returned. ‘I was under no illusion about that, although I flattered myself to think I had a bit more discernment and control than I actually did.’ She let out a sad, soft laugh. ‘Do you know what convinced me, Marco? I saw you stroking a cat, the day I met you. You were in the courtyard, waiting to come in, and one of the street cats wound its way between your legs. You bent down and stroked it. My father would have kicked it away. In that moment I believed you were a gentle man.’
‘You sound,’ Marco said after a moment, ‘as if you now think you were wrong.’
‘No, I...’ She stopped, biting her lip. It was so difficult to separate what she’d felt then and what she felt now. ‘I was going to marry you for the wrong reasons, Marco, back then. I realised that the night before our wedding. No matter what is between us now—and I know it’s just a fling—it would have never worked back then. I needed to find my own way, become my own person.’
‘So what happened that night?’ Marco asked. ‘Really?’ He sounded as if he were struggling with some emotion, perhaps anger. Sierra could feel how tense his body was.
‘Just what I told you. I overheard you talking with my father. I realised just how close you were. I...I hadn’t quite realised it before. And then I heard my father give you that awful advice.’
‘“I know how to handle
her”,’ Marco repeated flatly. ‘I see now why that would have alarmed you, but...couldn’t you have asked me, Sierra?’
‘And what would I ask, exactly?’ The first note of temper entered her voice. ‘“Will you ever hit me, Marco?” That’s not exactly a question someone will answer honestly.’
‘I would have.’
‘I wouldn’t have believed you. That’s what I realised that night, Marco. I was taking too great a risk. It was about me as much as it was about you.’
‘So you ran away, just as you could have done before we’d ever become engaged.’
‘Not exactly. My mother helped me. When I told her I didn’t love you...’ Sierra trailed off uncertainly. Of course Marco knew she hadn’t loved him then. He hadn’t loved her. And yet it sounded so cold now.
‘Yes? When you told her that, what did she do?’
‘She gave me some money,’ Sierra whispered. ‘And the name of a friend in England I could go to.’
‘And you just walked out into the night? Into Palermo?’
‘Yes. I was terrified.’ She swallowed hard, the memories swarming her. ‘Utterly terrified. I’d never been out alone in the city—any city—before. But I hailed a taxi and went to the docks. I waited the rest of the night in the ferry office, and then I took the first boat to the mainland.’
‘And then to England? That must have been quite a journey.’ Marco didn’t sound impressed so much as incredulous.
‘Yes, it was. I took endless trains, and then I was spat out in London with barely enough English to make myself understood. I got lost on the Tube and someone tried to pickpocket me. And when I went to find my mother’s friend, she’d moved house. I spent a night at a women’s shelter and then used a computer in a library to locate the new address of my mother’s friend, and she finally took me in.’
‘So much effort to get away from me,’ Marco remarked tonelessly and Sierra jerked away from him.
‘No, to get away from my father. It wasn’t about you, Marco. I keep telling you that.’
He gazed at her with eyes the colour of steel, his mouth a hard line. ‘How can you say that, Sierra? It most certainly was about me. Yes, it was about your father, as well, I understand that. But if you’d known me at all, if you’d trusted me at all, you would never have had to go to London.’
She recognised the truth of his words even if she didn’t want to. ‘Understandably,’ she answered stiffly, ‘I have had difficulties with trusting people, especially men.’
Marco sighed, the sound one of defeat, his shoulders slumping. ‘Understandably,’ he agreed quietly. ‘Yes.’
Sierra stood up, pacing the room, her arms wrapped around her body. Suddenly she felt cold. She had no idea if what she’d told Marco changed things. Then she realised that of course it changed things; she had no idea how much.
‘What now?’ she finally asked, and she turned to face him. He was still sitting on the sofa, watching her, his expression bland. ‘Should I leave?’ she forced herself to ask. ‘I can go back to London tonight.’
Marco didn’t look away; he didn’t so much as blink. ‘Is that what you want?’
Was it? Her heart hammered and her mouth went dry. Here was a moment when she could try to trust. When she could leap out and see if he caught her. If he wanted to. ‘No,’ she whispered. ‘It isn’t.’
Marco looked startled, and then a look of such naked relief passed over his face that Sierra sagged with a deep relief of her own.
He rose from the sofa and crossed the room, pulling her into his arms. ‘Good,’ he said, and kissed her.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
MARCO GAZED OUT at the azure sky, his eyes starting to water from staring at its hard brightness for so long. The plane was minutes away from touching down in LA and he’d barely spoken to Sierra for the six hours of the flight.
He’d wanted to. He’d formed a dozen different conversation openers in his mind, but everything sounded wrong in his head. He had a feeling it would sound worse out loud. The trouble was, since her revelation last night he hadn’t known how to approach her. How to handle her.
Guilt churned in his stomach as he replayed in his mind all that Sierra had told him. It was a form of self-torture he couldn’t keep himself from indulging in. A thousand conflicting thoughts and feelings tormented him: sadness for what Sierra had endured, guilt for his part in it, confusion and grief for what he’d felt for Arturo, a man he’d loved but who had been a monster beyond his worst imaginings.
In the end, beyond a few basic pleasantries about the trip and their destination, he’d stayed silent, and so had Sierra. It seemed easier, even if it made him an emotional coward.
‘Please fasten your seat belts as we prepare for landing.’
Marco glanced at Sierra, trying for a reassuring smile. She smiled back but he could see that it didn’t reach her eyes, which were the colour of the Atlantic on a cold day. Wintry grey-blue, no thaw in sight. Was she angry at him? Did she blame him somehow for what had happened before? How on earth were they going to get past this?
Which begged another question—one he was reluctant to answer, even to himself. Why did they need to get past this? What kind of future was he envisioning with Sierra?
A few days ago he’d wanted to be the one to walk away first. But a realisation was emerging amidst all his confusion and regret—he didn’t want to walk away at all.
But how could they build a relationship on such shaky, crumbling foundations of mistrust and betrayal? And how could he even want to, when he had no idea what Sierra wanted? When he’d been so sure he’d never love someone, never want to love someone?
‘Are you looking forward to seeing Los Angeles?’ he asked abruptly, wanting to break the glacial silence as well as keep from the endless circling of his own thoughts.
‘Yes, thank you,’ Sierra replied, and her tone was just as carefully polite. They were acting like strangers, yet maybe, after all they hadn’t known about each other, they were strangers.
The next hour was taken up with deplaning and then retrieving their luggage; Marco had arranged for a limo to be waiting outside.
Once they’d slid inside its luxurious leather depths, the soundproof glass cocooning them in privacy, the silence felt worse. More damning.
And still neither of them spoke.
‘Where are we staying?’ Sierra finally asked as the limo headed down I-405. ‘Since there isn’t a Rocci hotel here yet?’
‘The Beverly Wilshire.’ He managed a small smile. ‘I need to check out my competition.’
‘Of course.’ She turned back to the window, her gaze on the palm trees and billboards lining the highway. The silence stretched on.
Sierra admired the impressive Art Deco foyer of the hotel, and when a bellboy escorted them to the private floor that housed the penthouse suite, Marco experienced a little dart of satisfaction at how awed she looked. It might not be a Rocci hotel, but he could still give her the best. He wanted to give her the best.
And the penthouse suite was the best: three bedrooms, four marble bathrooms, a media room, plus the usual dining room, living room and kitchen. But best of all was the spacious terrace with its panoramic views of the city.
Sierra stepped out onto the terrace, breathed in the hot, dry air of the desert. She glanced up at the scrubby hills that bordered Los Angeles to the north. ‘It almost looks like Sicily.’
‘Almost,’ Marco agreed.
‘I don’t know if we need such a big suite,’ she said with a small teasing smile. ‘Three bedrooms?’
‘We can sleep in a different one each night.’
Her smile faltered. ‘How long are you planning on staying here?’
Marco noted the ‘you’ and deliberately kept his voice even and mild. ‘I’m not sure. I want to complete the preliminary negotiatio
ns for The Rocci Los Angeles, and I don’t need to be back in Palermo until next week.’ He shrugged. ‘We might as well stay and enjoy California.’ Enjoy each other. He only just kept himself from saying it.
‘I have a job to get back to,’ Sierra reminded him. ‘A life.’
And she was telling him this why? ‘You have a freelance job,’ Marco pointed out. ‘What is that if not flexible?’
Her eyebrows drew together and she looked away. So he’d said the wrong thing. He’d known he would all along.
Sierra walked back into the suite and after a moment Marco followed. When he came into the living area he saw how lost she looked, how forlorn.
‘I think I might take a bath,’ she said without looking at him. ‘Wash away the travel grime.’
‘All right,’ Marco answered, and in frustration he watched her walk out of the room.
* * *
Could things get more awkward and horrible? With a grimace Sierra turned the taps of the huge sunken marble tub on full blast. She didn’t know what she regretted more: telling Marco the truth about her father or coming with him to LA. The trouble was, she still wanted to be with him. She just didn’t know how they were going to get past this seeming roadblock in their relationship.
Whoa. You don’t have a relationship.
She might be halfway to falling in love with him, but that didn’t mean Marco felt the same. He’d made it abundantly clear that they were only having a fling and, in any case, she didn’t even want him to feel the same. She didn’t want to be in love herself. Not when she’d seen what it had done to her mother. Not when she’d felt what it could do to herself.
Since meeting Marco again her whole world had been tangled up in knots. Since making love with him she’d felt happier and yet more frightened than she ever had in the last seven years. Happiness could be so fleeting, so fragile, and yet, once discovered, so unbearably necessary. How much was it going to hurt when Marco was gone from her life?