by Jennie Lucas
A wave crashed on the rocks below, sending spray high, droplets that sparkled like diamonds in the thin sun before spinning into nothingness.
‘I can never make up to you all the wrongs I have committed,’ he said. ‘I’m so sorry.’
For a few moments she said nothing, and he imagined that any time now she would pull her hands from his, thank him for his explanation and justifiably remove herself from his life once again. This time for good.
But her hands somehow remained in his. And then came her tentative question. ‘Why did you need to drive me away so very badly?’
He looked into her eyes, those amber pools that he had come to love, along with their owner. ‘Because otherwise I would have had to admit the truth. That I love you, Valentina. And I know you will not want to hear this from me—not after all that has happened—all that I have subjected you to. But I had to come and see you. I had to ask if there was any way you could ever forgive me.’
She looked up at him incredulously. ‘You love me?’
He wasn’t surprised she didn’t believe him. It was a miracle she hadn’t slapped him again for saying it. ‘I do. I’m an idiot and a fool and every type of bastard for the things I’ve said to you and done to you, but I love you, Valentina, and I cannot bear the thought of you not being part of my life. When you left Venice, you took my heart with you. But I know I am clutching at straws. That you are too good for someone like me. That you deserve better. Much better.’
‘You might be right,’ she said, fresh tears springing from her eyes, and his freshly opened heart fell to his feet. ‘Maybe I do deserve better. But damn you, Luca Barbarigo, it’s you who I love. It’s you I want to be with.’
Could a man die of happiness? he wondered as he cradled her face in his hands, letting her words seep through his consciousness, all the way through the layers of doubts and impossibilities, all the way through to his heart. ‘Valentina,’ he whispered, because there was nothing better he could think of to say, not when her lips were calling.
He loved her.
Tina could see it in his eyes, could feel it in his gentle touch. Could feel it in the shimmer of sea salt air between them and in the connection of his heart to hers.
Their lips meshed, the salt of their tears blending with the salt of the sea, and she tasted their shared loss and the heated promise of life and love.
‘I love you,’ he said. ‘Oh God, it’s taken too long to realise it, but I love you, Valentina. I know I don’t deserve to ask this, but will you do me the honour of becoming my wife?’
His words, his rich voice, vibrated through her senses and her bones and found a joyful answer in her heart, her tears a rapturous celebration. ‘Oh, Luca, yes! Yes, I will be your wife.’
He gathered her up and held her tight, so tight as he spun her around in the boom and spray from another crashing wave, that she felt part of him. She was part of him.
And when he put her down on her feet again, it was to look seriously into her eyes. ‘Perhaps, after we are married, if you like, then maybe we could try again. For another child. A brother or sister for Leo.’
She shuddered in his arms. ‘But what if...’ He looked down at her with such an air of hope that it magnified her fear tenfold. ‘I’m afraid, Luca,’ she said, looking up the hill towards the plot where their one child already lay. ‘Nobody knows why it happened and I don’t think I could bear it if it happened again. I don’t think I could come back from that.’
‘No.’ He rocked her then, wanting to soothe away her fears. ‘No. It won’t happen again.’
‘How do you know that?’
‘I don’t. I wish to God I could promise you that it won’t happen again, but I can’t. But what I can promise you is this, that if it did happen again, if life chose to be so cruel again, that this time you would not be alone, that I will be there alongside you, holding your hand. And this time your loss would be my loss. Your tears would be my tears. I will never let you go through something like that alone again.’
The sheer power of his words gave her the confidence to believe him. The emotion behind his words gave her the courage to want to try.
‘Perhaps,’ she said plaintively, lifting her face to his, ‘when we are married...’
And he growled at the courage of this woman and he pulled her close and kissed her again and held her tight, against the wind tugging at their clothing and the spray from the crashing waves—against the worst that life could throw at them.
And knew that whatever came their way, their love would endure for ever.
EPILOGUE
THEY were married in Venice, the wedding gondola decked out in black and crimson with highlights of gold. The cushions were made of silk and satin, the upholstery plush velvet. And while the gondolier himself looked resplendent in crisp attire, propelling the vessel with an effortless looking rhythm, it was to the bride sitting beaming alongside her proud father that every eye was drawn.
It was the bride from whom Luca couldn’t tear his eyes.
His bride.
Valentina.
She stepped from the vessel in a gown befitting the goddess that she was, honey gold in colour, a timeless one-shouldered design, skimming her breasts before draping softly to the ground, both classic and feminine, the necklace of amber beads Luca had given her at her throat.
They married in the Scuola Grande di San Giovanni Evangelista, the opera house where they had seen La Traviata, the night Tina had felt the ground move beneath her feet and realised she had fallen in love with Luca. Her father gave her away, passing her hand to Luca’s with a grudging smile, before taking his place in the front and curling his fingers possessively around those of his guest, none other than Deidre Turner. Tina smiled, happy for her father, happier for herself when the service began, the ceremony that would make her Luca’s bride.
And if the wedding was magnificent, the reception was a celebration, held in the refurbished palazzo where Luca had grown up. Now restored to its former glory, its piers strengthened and renewed, its façade was as richly decorated as it once had been, befitting one of the oldest families in Venice.
‘It’s such a beautiful wedding,’ said Lily to her daughter with a wistful sigh as the pair touched up their lipstick in the powder room together. ‘But then you look beautiful, Valentina. I don’t think I’ve ever seen such a radiant bride.’
Tina hadn’t been able to stop smiling all day, but now her smile widened as she turned towards her mother. ‘I love him, Lily. And I’m so very happy.’
Her mother took her daughter’s hands in hers. ‘It shows. I’m so proud of you, Valentina. You’ve grown into a wonderful woman, and I’m just sorry for all the grief I’ve caused you along the way. But I promise I will be a better mother to you—I am the same person, but I am trying to change, I am trying to be better.’
‘Oh, Lily.’ Tears sprang to her eyes and she blinked them away as Lily swung into action and passed her tissues before she tested the limits of her waterproof mascara.
‘And now I’ve made you cry! Sacre bleu! That will not do. So let me tell you something instead to make you smile—Antonio was so moved, he proposed to me right after the ceremony.’
Tina gasped, her tears staunched by the surprise announcement. ‘And?’
‘I said yes, of course! I can’t hope to change everything about me at once.’ And then they were both reaching for the tissues, they were laughing so hard.
‘Lily’s agreed to marry Antonio,’ she told Luca, as he spun her around the ballroom’s centuries-old terrazzo floor.
Luca smiled down at her. ‘Do you think Mitch will agree to give her away too?’
‘I don’t know,’ she reflected, as she watched her father spin past them with Deidre, their gazes well and truly locked. ‘There’s a good chance he might be otherwise engaged.’
/> Luca laughed, and hugged her closer. ‘You don’t mind then, that you might lose your father to another woman?’
‘Not a chance. I’m happy for him. Besides—’ she turned her face up to his ‘—look at all I’ve won. I must be the luckiest woman in the whole world.’
‘I love you,’ he said, whirling her around. ‘I will always love you.’
His bride beamed up at him, felt her amber eyes misting. ‘I love you too,’ she pledged, ‘with all my heart.’
His eyes darkened, his mouth drew closer, but she stilled him with a fingertip to his lips. ‘But wait! That’s not all I have to tell you. There’s more.’
She leaned up closer to his ear and whispered the secret she’d been longing to share ever since she’d found out, and Luca responded the way she’d hoped, by whooping with joy as he spun her around the floor in his arms until she was drunk with giddiness. And then he stopped spinning and kissed her until she was giddy all over again, but this time on the love fizzing through her veins.
And both of them knew the day could not have been more perfect, and yet still it was nothing compared to what happened seven months later.
Mitchell Eduardo Barbarigo came into the world bang on time and boasting a healthy set of lungs. True to his word, Luca was by Tina’s side, clutching her hand, sponging her brow or rubbing her back or just being there, the whole time. True to his word, she was not alone.
And just as true to his word, her tears were his tears, except this time they were tears of joy. Tears of elation.
Tears of love for this brand new family.
* * * * *
Living the Charade
By Michelle Conder
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Excerpt
CHAPTER ONE
IF the world was a fair place the perfect solution to Miller Jacobs’s unprecedented crisis would walk through the double-glazed doors of the hip Sydney watering hole she was in, wearing a nice suit and sporting an even nicer personality.
Unlike the self-important banker currently sitting at the small wooden table opposite her who probably should have stopped drinking at least two hours ago.
‘So, sexy lady, what is this favour you need from me?’
Miller tried not to cringe at the man’s inebriated state and turned to her close friend, Ruby Clarkson, with a smile that said, How could you possibly think this loser would be in any way suitable as my fake boyfriend this coming weekend?
Ruby arched a brow in apology and then did what only a truly beautiful woman could do—dazzled the banker with a megawatt smile and told him to take a hike. Not literally, of course. Chances were she’d have to work with him at some point in the future.
Miller breathed a sigh of relief as, without argument, he swaggered towards the packed, dimly lit bar and disappeared from view.
‘Don’t say it,’ Ruby warned. ‘On paper he seemed perfect.’
‘On paper most men seem perfect,’ Miller said glumly. ‘It’s only when you get to know them that the trouble starts.’
‘That’s morose. Even for you.’
Miller’s eyebrows shot up. She had good reason to be feeling morose. She had just wasted an hour she didn’t have, drinking white wine she wouldn’t even cook with, and was no further towards solving her problem than she’d been yesterday. A problem that had started when she’d lied to her boss about having a boyfriend who would love to come away for a business weekend and keep a very important and very arrogant potential client in check.
TJ Lyons was overweight, overbearing and obnoxious, and had taken her ‘not interested’ signs as some sort of personal challenge. Apparently he had told Dexter, her boss, that he believed Miller’s cool, professional image was hiding a hot-blooded woman just begging to be set free and he was determined to add her to his stable of ‘fillies’.
Miller shuddered as she recalled overhearing him use that particular phrase.
The man was a chauvinistic bore and wore an Akubra hat as if he was Australia’s answer to JR Ewing. But he had her rattled. And when TJ had challenged her to ‘bring your hubbie’ to his fiftieth birthday celebration, where she would also present her final business proposal, Miller had smiled sweetly and said that would be lovely.
Which meant she now needed a man by tomorrow afternoon. Perhaps she’d been a little hasty in giving Mr Inebriated the flick.
Ruby rested her chin in her hand. ‘There’s got to be someone else.’
‘Why don’t I just say he’s sick?’
‘Your boss is already suss on you. And even if he wasn’t, if you give your fake boyfriend a fake illness, you still have to deal with your amorous client all weekend.’
Miller pulled a face. ‘Don’t mistake TJ’s intentions as amorous. They’re more licentious in nature.’
‘Maybe so, but I’m sure Dexter’s are amorous.’
Ruby was convinced Miller’s boss was interested in her, but Miller didn’t see it.
‘Dexter’s married.’
‘Separated. And you know he’s keen on you. That’s one of the reasons you lied about having a boyfriend.’
Miller let her head fall back on her neck and made a tortured sound through her teeth.
‘I was coming off the back of a week of sixteen-hour days and I was exhausted. I might have had an emotional reaction to the whole thing.’
‘Emotional? You? Heaven forbid.’ Ruby shivered dramatically.
It was a standing joke between them that Ruby wore her heart on her sleeve and Miller kept hers stashed in one of the many shoeboxes in her closet.
‘I was after sympathy, not sarcasm,’ Miller grumped.
‘But Dexter did offer to go as your “protector”, did he not?’ Ruby probed.
Miller sighed. ‘A little weird, I grant you, but we knew each other at uni. I think he was just being nice, given TJ’s drunken pronouncements to him the week before.’
Ruby did her famous eye roll. ‘Regardless, you faked having a boyfriend and now you have to produce one.’
‘I’ll give him pneumonia.’
‘Miller, TJ Lyons is a business powerhouse with a shocking reputation and Dexter is an alpha male wannabe. And you’ve worked too hard to let either one of them decide your future. If you go away this weekend and TJ makes a move on you his wife will have a fit and you’ll be reading the unemployment pages for the next twelve months. I’ve seen it happen before. Men of TJ Lyons’s ilk are never pinned for sexual harassment the way they should be.’
Ruby took a breath and Miller thanked God that she needed air. She was one of the best discrimination lawyers in the country and when she ranted Miller took note. She had a point.
Miller had put in six hard years at the Oracle Consulting Group, which had become like a second home to her. Or maybe it was her home, given how much time she spent there! If she won TJ’s multi-million-dollar account she’d be sure to be made partner in the next sweep—the realisation of a long-held dream and one her mother had encouraged for a long time.
‘TJ hasn’t actually harassed me, Rubes,’ she reminded her friend.
‘At your last meeting he said he’d hire Oracle in a flash if you “played nice”.’
Miller blew out a breath. ‘Okay, okay. I have a plan.’
Ruby raised her eyeb
rows. ‘Let’s hear it.’
‘I’ll hire an escort. Look at this.’ The idea had come to her while Ruby had been ranting and she turned her smartphone so Ruby could see the screen. ‘Madame Chloe. She says she offers discreet, professional, sensitive gentlemen to meet the needs of the modern-day heterosexual woman.’
‘Let me see that.’ Ruby took the phone. ‘Oh, my God. That guy would seriously have sex with you.’
Miller looked over Ruby’s shoulder at the incredibly buffed male on the screen.
‘And they cater to fantasies!’ Ruby continued.
‘I don’t want him to have sex with me,’ Miller yelped, slightly exasperated. The last thing she needed was sex, or her hormones, to derail her from her goal at the eleventh hour. Her mother had let that happen and look where it had got her—broke and unhappy.
‘You can have a policeman, a pilot, an accountant—urgh, seen enough of them. Oh, and this one.’ Ruby giggled and lowered her voice. ‘Rough but clean tradesman. Or, wait—a sports jock.’
Miller shuddered. What intelligent woman would ever fantasise over a sports jock?
‘Ruby!’ Miller laughed as she took the phone back. ‘Be serious. This is my future we’re talking about. I need a decent guy who is polite and can follow my lead. Someone who blends in.’
‘Hmmm...’ Ruby grinned at one of the profile photos. ‘He looks like he would blend in at an all-night gay bar.’
Miller scowled. ‘Not helping.’ She clicked on a few more. ‘They all look the same,’ she said despairingly.