She was shaking even harder now. His words didn't pass by harmlessly. She felt them. They struck her right through the heart. He loved her.
But she'd put herself once before in the house of people who'd claimed to love her. She'd been completely dependent on them, trusted them—and then lost the most precious thing in her life. She couldn't do it, couldn't take that chance again. If she were wrong—
There was only one way to get out of this. "Perhaps," Sabrina said, using her last, most deadly weapon. "Perhaps I don't love you."
His eyes widened. Her weapon had hit home.
For a second, she felt bad at the obvious pain she'd caused him.
But he wasn't done. He stepped closer. His voice lowered, rough-edged. "Perhaps you do not. But remember Sabrina, I know you better than anyone on the face of this earth. Sometimes I think I know you better than you do yourself." His lashes hooded his eyes. "Down deep you know that I am right. You know that your place is with me. But you have much fear, because you insist on holding onto your pain."
"Of all the arrogant, presumptuous—"
"You don't need the pain, Sabrina. You can survive without it." He stepped back, one step, then two. "But apparently I am not the one who can teach you this. Apparently you are going to have to find out for yourself."
There was anger in his eyes. That's what she remembered later of her last sight of him. His anger. No more pain, no pity, no sense of loss, just a hard fury. "I wish you luck, Sabrina," he said. Then he turned and walked away.
The door to the connecting hotel room closed firmly behind him.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
A month later, Sabrina was on the other side of the country. Behind the wheel of yet another rental car, she drove through the lush countryside of an exclusive part of Long Island. Her hands were firm on the wheel, her eyes steady on the road. An outside observer wouldn't have guessed the uncertainty that roiled through her innards.
She was on her way to fulfill a ten-year-old dream, and yet she was suddenly, at the last minute, plagued by doubts.
No, not last-minute doubts, truth to tell. Truth to tell, doubts had been plaguing her ever since leaving Santa Barbara. Ever since leaving Vincenzo.
He'd put the doubts in her head, Sabrina thought bitterly as she maneuvered the car over the gentle curves of the road. Overhead, trees arched full branches of lush spring foliage. Speeding past the car were the elegant gates of substantial estates. Occasionally a brick or granite wall sprang up, draped in vines and flowers. Sabrina barely noticed any of it. Instead she remembered the last time she'd seen Vincenzo.
She remembered watching him walk away, his back straight, his bare feet silent on the hotel carpet. She remembered a sudden panic and wondering if she actually knew what the hell she was doing.
She knew. Sabrina assured herself of this as her hands flexed on the wheel of the car. She had no regrets.
The house on the hill was visible for an instant before a curve in the road let stately pine and oak hide it again. Sabrina caught a glimpse of brick chimneys and steep, slate-tiled roofs.
Her sense of uncertainty, of standing on slippery shale, expanded. All the cards were in her hand; this time she held the power, but she was becoming less and less sure of what she wanted to do with it.
Just outside the barred gate, Sabrina brought her car to a halt. Staring out the windshield, she wondered what had happened to the anger she'd expected, the hatred. For ten years bitterness had guided her path. But now, seeing those gates, all she felt was dread.
She got out of the car. The air was clear and fresh. Healthy. Birds were calling to each other from the haven of well-foliaged trees. This was where her child lived. Flesh and blood of her womb breathed this air, heard these birds. An ache of longing joined her dread.
The gate had been painted. The bars were white now, not black. White was the color of innocence, Sabrina thought, walking up to them. That wasn't right. There was no innocence here.
With a sharp pang in her heart, she wrapped her hands around the cold metal. Bitterness returned for a moment, sharp frustration and loss. Her eyes closed and tightened as pain swept over her. She barely heard the quiet steps on the gravel drive behind her.
"Maria?" Someone said. "Oh, God, Maria is that you?"
Sabrina froze, her hands gripping the white-painted metal bars. No one had called her that name in ten years. Slowly she turned, her face carefully impassive.
The woman who stood on the gravel drive outside the gate with her was recognizable, if noticeably aged. The hair that had once been a rich brown was now streaked with gray. Her plaid skirt and sweater were conservative, and expensive. Age, well tended, softened and rounded her face.
"My husband said you'd be back," the woman whispered, obviously horrified. Her brown eyes were wide on Sabrina. It was precisely the reaction Sabrina had planned all these years. Utter fear and horror. So why did it leave her so empty?
Sabrina pursed her lips. "How is Robert?"
"Robert's dead," Jane Castlewright informed her. "I remarried. My husband, John, warned me you'd come back one day. He begged me to contact you first. But I—I didn't know where to start looking."
And she'd been scared. Sabrina could see that. She hadn't considered the dread Jane Castlewright must have lived in all these years, never knowing when the real mother of her child might come knocking on the door.
A cool breeze swept the navy wool around Sabrina's knees. One of her hands went up to finger an agate button. She'd felt compelled to wear Vincenzo's dress for this mission. She'd been angered by the odd compulsion, but now she was glad for the support it seemed to give her.
"And how is Jimmy?" Sabrina asked, lifting her chin. She didn't know why she, too, felt so scared.
"Jimmy?" For a moment Jane's cream-smoothened forehead furrowed. Then, apparently understanding, she reddened and looked to the side. "Uh, we didn't end up naming him after your— We named him Craig."
"Craig," Sabrina repeated and felt a new ache of loss. Poor Jimmy hadn't even been left his name to carry on for him. "Oh."
"He's fine," Jane went on, shooting a brief, wary glance toward Sabrina. "A beautiful child. I—" She stopped, her face a picture of consternation. A breeze blew between the women again, lifting the scarf around Jane's neck. "What we did was wrong," she suddenly confessed, her voice low and harsh. "That's what John wanted me to tell you. It was wrong. I knew it at the time, but Robert— Well, I can't blame it all on Robert. I was too weak to tell him no."
Sabrina felt something strange and alien shifting inside of her. It was an uncomfortable, frightening sensation. "Yes, you were wrong," she agreed. But it took an effort to infuse her voice with suitable venom. "It's taken me ten years to get back here, to—to—" Her sentence died out, uncertain of its conclusion.
Jane's gaze flicked briefly over her and then away. "What are you going to do?" she asked, her voice faint.
This was the moment. The woman was in Sabrina's power, and better yet, she knew it. This was the moment for the ax to fall.
And Sabrina couldn't think of a thing to say. She couldn't think of an appropriate punishment. Nothing.
Instead all she could do was lock eyes with Jane Castlewright, the woman who'd raised her child the past ten years, and feel an astonishing, overwhelming sympathy.
Vincenzo! Sabrina thought, emotion cresting in her chest. He'd done this to her. He'd made her weak. He'd made her forget her vengeance. He'd created this—this softness!
"Maria." The other woman looked vastly relieved. Somehow she knew what had happened inside Sabrina. She could see the killing instinct had fled. Jane actually reached out and touched Sabrina's shoulder. "Would you like to meet him?"
Another wave of emotion, this time gratitude. Gratitude! "Yes," Sabrina said. It was all she could say, all she could manage to get out her mouth.
With a faint smile, Jane walked forward and unhitched the catch on the gate. It hadn't even been locked. She turned back to Sabrina. "We'll walk
in," she suggested. "That way we'll have time to talk. John and I— Well, there's something I'd like to offer you, if you want it."
Side by side, the two women started up the gravel drive. The grass was long and waved in the breeze. Leaves fluttered gaily on the trees overhead. At the far end of the rolling lawn Sabrina could see two children at a swing set.
She stopped, her heart contracting. One of them was several years older than the other, a boy, his hair the color of the sun. Jimmy's hair. "Oh, God," she murmured.
The boy turned, saw his mother. He grinned. Even across that expanse of space Sabrina could see that it was Jimmy's smile. "God," she whispered again. Maybe he didn't have Jimmy's name, but he had everything else.
"He's coming this way." Sabrina turned to Jane, panicking. What was she going to do?
The boy came running, the girl, a brunette, trying in vain to keep up. He had something in his hands. "Mom!" he called. "Mom, look what I got!" He barely glanced at Sabrina as he came skidding to a halt before Jane. "Look," he panted out. "A lizard." Carefully he lifted the lid of his cupped hands to show her.
"My, that's a cute little fellow, isn't he?" Jane politely observed.
"Can I keep him? Please, Ma?" The eyes that shone up at her were the color of summer grass.
"I helped!" The little girl ran up, her coat falling off one shoulder and trailing. "I helped catch him."
"Well, I don't know." Jane tilted her head, regarding the boy and his cupped hands. "Would you be able to feed him, Craig? Do you even know what lizards eat?"
"I could find out at the pet store," the boy replied quickly. His gaze turned earnest.
"Oh, all right. See if Cook has some kind of container in the kitchen where you can put him."
"All right!" the boy shouted. He was just turning to run toward the house when he noticed Sabrina. "Oh," he said. "Who are you?"
Sabrina forestalled Jane's imminent reply. "Sabrina," she said, giving her chosen, rather than her given name. There was Jimmy's face, her eyes, but this was still an alien creature, someone she didn't know. She felt Jane take her arm.
"Sabrina," Jane said, testing the name out, "is your godmother."
The boy just stood there, his brow furrowed.
"Wow," the little girl said, her eyes widening. "Like Cinderella?"
"Just like Cinderella," Sabrina replied. The warm sensation was unfurling within her again and this time she recognized what it was. Forgiveness. She'd come for revenge, but instead she was finding it in her heart to forgive. That was Vincenzo, again. Automatically, her hand reached up to finger the top button on her dress.
The boy tilted his head. "Is that like an aunt?" he asked. "You send presents at Christmas and birthdays?"
Sabrina had to bite her lip. The bottom line. "Yes," she agreed. "Something like that, and definitely presents."
"Cool." He grinned, then turned and ran up the drive, kicking up gravel. A happy, healthy kid. His sister followed close on his heels.
"Godmother, eh?" Sabrina turned to face Jane.
Jane's face turned a pink color in the cool spring breeze. "That's what John and I decided. You could stay in touch that way. It's not what we originally promised, but—"
"I accept," Sabrina said. "It'll be a long-distance relationship, though." She could see the relief in Jane's face and smiled slyly to herself. The woman wanted to be fair, but she wasn't that sure about allowing this new intrusion in her life.
"I'll make sure he writes to you," Jane promised.
"Buy international postage," Sabrina advised. "I'm moving to Italy."
"Italy?" Jane queried, surprised.
"Yes," Sabrina answered. She'd been wronged ten years ago. That hadn't changed. Being turned into a godmother didn't make up for it. But she didn't require strict justice. She didn't need the satisfaction of an eye for an eye. No, what she needed was the sweet balm of peace that was now settling inside of her.
And that was Vincenzo's doing, too. Love, he'd said. Love was what she needed.
If the man had not most thoroughly conned her!
"You see, I've got a score to settle," Sabrina explained. "With a certain crazy Italian."
~~~
A solid little weight sat in the front pocket of Sabrina's cotton halter top dress. It reassured her as she looked out the bus window at the village plaza. The plaster fronts of the two-and three-story buildings were covered in gently fading pastel colors. Iron railings adorned with flowers and potted plants guarded quaint shuttered windows. Down below, cats of various colors strutted around the empty wire chairs and tables of an open-air café, deserted at this siesta hour.
The general aura was one of peace and tranquility. It wasn't like any place Sabrina had visited—or wanted to visit—in her life.
She wondered why it was so appealing.
"I head back to Milan in twenty minutes," the bus driver said, eyeing Sabrina in the mirror affixed above his windshield. "If you don't find your friend here."
Realizing she was the last to remain on the bus, Sabrina rose to her feet, feeling a little unsteady. "Oh. Sorry to keep you waiting."
"It's okay." The driver had a thick beard and seemed fascinated by the way the halter top fit over Sabrina's breasts. "You can leave your suitcase here, if you want."
Sabrina stopped, considering her one bag set atop the rack over the seats. "All right," she agreed. "Twenty minutes." Then she stepped off the bus.
He was here. Her hunter's instinct told her that much. She was closing in on the prey. Sabrina made a slow revolution to take in the square. This job, however, was going to be more difficult than most. She didn't kid herself. She figured only a fifty-fifty chance of success.
Directly across the way was the church. Her heart jumped. That was the church where the Madonna della Montagna had once hung, where Vincenzo had had his vision. Her instincts bit another notch into her nerves.
A simple structure, the church was also of plaster construction, with three dusky rose arches in front. Someone had twined white flowers along wire around the curve of the arches and those flowers now bounced gaily in a tiny shift of breeze.
Her hand tightened around the soft weight in her pocket as Sabrina started across the time-worn stones of the plaza.
The feet of centuries of worshippers had hollowed the shallow steps leading up to the porch of the church. As Sabrina neared the open door, she caught the faint whiff of incense and the stronger aroma of more white flowers, festooned along the main aisle inside.
It was cool and dim in the church, empty of people. She paused for a moment on the threshold, taking in the jewel tints of the simple stained glass windows, the unadorned wood timber framing, the plain cross nailed to the wall past the altar. Out of once-familiar habit, Sabrina knelt and crossed herself. It would have felt strange not to. Then, hugging her hands about her cooling bare arms she proceeded up the aisle.
Not a soul heard the echo of her sandalled feet as they trod the uneven stone floor. It would have made more sense, logically, to have inquired at the café for Vincenzo's residence. She only had twenty minutes, after all. But somehow this felt right. Significant.
Sabrina came to a halt before the plain wood table that served as the altar. To either side stretched the arms of the transepts. She glanced toward the right. What she saw transfixed her.
"No," she murmured aloud. "It isn't possible."
And yet, the colors were as brilliant, the textures as rich. Her eyes locked on the painting that hung on the wall. Slowly, Sabrina walked closer.
But Vincenzo had left his copy of the Madonna with Francesca Miller. Hadn't he? So how could this painting hold the same fire, maintain the same mesmerizing intensity? The eyes of the woman gazed out of the frame, seemingly lit from within. Or maybe that was a trick played by the hundreds of candles that were burning below her.
Sabrina came to a stop before the low iron rail that protected the silently flickering candles. The eyes of the Lady looked down on her with a humorous, fiery spirit.
An inexplicable sensation shot up Sabrina's spine. "My God," she whispered hoarsely. "It's the real thing!"
"Yes, it is," someone answered. His voice, too, sounded hushed, low and reverent.
Sabrina spun on her heel, her heart jumping wildly.
Vincenzo leaned against the wall of the transept. His silky dark hair was groomed carefully and his arms were crossed over the immaculate white front and black jacket of a full-dress tuxedo. As usual, he looked worth his weight in clothes. But his mouth was a hard sculpture amid the gentler planes of his face. Its uncompromising line reminded Sabrina of the terms upon which they'd parted.
Terror seized any attempt she might have made to greet him. An oblique question was possible, however. "Where on earth did you find her?"
Vincenzo straightened. It looked like he was about to take a step toward her, but he stopped. Maybe he felt the air crackling between them the same way Sabrina did. "She was here," he told her.
"Here?" Sabrina frowned.
"Yes, here," Vincenzo repeated, as if this made any sense. He turned and gestured. "Specifically...there. Hidden in a crypt beneath the altar."
Sabrina stared at the altar. "You're kidding."
"Not at all. If you look, you'll note two notches on either side of the stone just beneath the table. I'd never noticed them before I came back home, but they're actually handholds. The painting was in a niche underneath, carefully wrapped."
"It was here," Sabrina repeated, gazing toward the altar. "The whole time."
"The whole time," Vincenzo affirmed.
An hysterical bubble rose in her chest. "For four years you were traipsing the globe, and that Lady was here in your own church the whole time."
There was a note in his voice that was almost a smile. "So it seems."
She couldn't help it then. She laughed. Her head shifted, their eyes met.
She hadn't counted on the power in those eyes of his. They demanded now, silently, relentlessly. She knew what he wanted. It was what she must give him. Faith. Honesty. Trust. For once in her life, Sabrina was going to have to make an even trade.
Your Scheming Heart Page 19