by Julia James
‘Vito’s heading back to Rome. He’s been away for weeks, inspecting all the European hotels.’ To her ears, her voice seemed staccato, but Cesare seemed to notice nothing about it. She was glad—grateful.
‘Do you get on, the two of you?’ Cesare’s enquiry was still polite as he demolished the piece of bread roll he’d buttered.
He was not particularly interested, but it was a safe topic of conversation. And right now he needed safe topics.
She blinked, taken aback by his enquiry. Focussed on how to answer it. With a fragment of her mind she registered that Cesare, too, seemed on edge.
‘Surprisingly well, really,’ Carla answered, sounding, with an effort, more composed now. She made herself go on. ‘Considering how my mother and his are usually daggers drawn. She and my mother never hit it off...’ She gave a sigh.
‘That’s often the way between sisters-in-law,’ Cesare observed drily. Their first course arrived, and he began to eat. ‘Vito Viscari has had a lot to knuckle down to, given the successive deaths of both his uncle and his father. It can be tough. I vividly remember—’
He stopped. Talking to Carla about how he’d had to discover—rapidly—just how to fill his father’s shoes after his fatal seizure was not wise.
But Carla did not seem to notice his abrupt cessation. She forked her seafood and nodded.
It was getting easier for her to sound normal, to get her hectic heart rate back under control.
‘Because of his ridiculously gorgeous film star looks, people tend to think Vito lightweight—but he isn’t at all. I have considerable respect for him,’ she said.
Cesare’s eyes rested on her a moment. ‘And he for you, I hope. After all, you had to contend with arriving in a new country, learning the language, adapting to a new way of life.’
‘Vito was very kind to me,’ she answered, her voice warming. ‘Helped me settle in. Improved my Italian, took me about with him to meet his friends. Warned me off several of them!’ she finished with a laugh.
The laugh had sounded quite natural to her ears, and she was again grateful.
Cesare smiled. But he knew it was something of a forced smile. There had been a fond note in her voice, and he had not liked to hear that. Nor did he like to examine why he had not liked to hear it.
‘Would he have warned you off me?’ he heard himself asking.
He’d kept his voice light, deliberately so, masking that slight jab that had come when he’d heard her praising her step-cousin so affectionately—yet he was aware that he had asked the question. Why he had asked it.
For all his light tone, he saw her face still. The expression in her eyes changed.
‘He would not have needed to, Cesare,’ she said quietly. ‘I’ve always known the score with you. Credit me with that much, at least.’
His eyes shifted away, his jaw tightening. Then, abruptly, his gaze came back to her. She was looking at him, again with that veiled expression in her eyes. Impulsively he reached for her free hand, raised it once more to his lips. This was the last night of his life that he would spend with her—he would not stint on his appreciation of her. Of what she had been to him.
What she can be no longer.
He felt again that jab of regret that it should be so. More than a jab. Yet again the words sounded in his head.
Not yet.
But there was no point thinking that—none. He must part with her, and that was all that was possible now. That—and this one last, final night with her.
‘I credit you with a great deal, Carla.’
There was emotion in his voice. She could hear it. And inside she felt again that sudden flare of emotion that she had felt when he’d raised his glass to her, let his gaze rest on her with such intent.
She returned his gaze now, as he let go of her hand and it fell to the table. Her breath seemed dry in her lungs.
Why had he said that? Why was he acting the way he was tonight? There was something about the way he was being that she had never seen in him before.
What does it mean?
She swallowed, feeling her cheeks flush suddenly. Dipped her head to resume her meal. Yet through her consciousness her mind was racing. That same swooping sensation was within her. Cesare was different tonight. She could see, could tell—knew with every instinct that something was changing between them. Something profound that would alter everything...
Can it be—can it really be? After all, if I was in denial for so long, if I told myself over and over again I could not possibly feel love for him...could it be that maybe, just maybe, for him it’s the same?
The thoughts were barely there, barely allowed, barely shaped into words—for she dared not let them be. Dared not give in to the swooping, soaring inside her as their meal progressed, as emotions swirled and formed and dissolved within her.
How could she dare? How could she dare give in to the one emotion above all that she yearned to give in to?
How could she give in to hope?
Hope that he might just feel for me what I now know I feel for him... That—despite everything—he’s fallen in love with me too?
* * *
‘A miracle—a parking space!’
Carla’s exclamation was heartfelt. To find a free parking space on her narrow street was, indeed, a miracle. Yet there it was.
Is it a sign—can it be a sign?
She almost laughed at herself for the notion, yet knew with a fragment of her mind that she was not joking at all.
As Cesare expertly parallel parked in the confined space, she could feel yet again her emotions soaring within her. For hope was a bird that, once released, could not be imprisoned again.
Throughout the evening, Cesare’s air of particular attentiveness to her had been palpable, that sense of something different about him unmistakable.
Now, as they climbed out of the car and she opened the outer door to let them both into the inner courtyard, his closeness to her was even more palpable.
Upstairs in her apartment she went into the kitchen to set the coffee brewing. Usually when he stayed over with her he settled down on the white sofa, his long legs reaching out, and shrugged off his jacket and tie, happy to lounge with her while drinking coffee, and sometimes a liqueur, before arousal took them both and swept them off to bed.
Tonight, however, he followed her into the kitchen.
‘Do you really want coffee?’
She turned. He was standing there, and in his eyes was an expression that wiped all thought of coffee from her mind—all thought at all. An expression that was all too familiar to her. Slowly she shook her head. For one long, timeless moment she did not move, and nor did he. Something flowed between them. Something that took her back to that very first night they’d spent together.
The villa outside Rome, Cesare’s love nest, had seen much use in the months since then. But at this moment all she could think of was that very first night.
Warmth beat up in her. Suffusing her skin, flaring out from her core. He stepped towards her, curved his long fingers around the nape of her neck, drawing her towards him. But not into his arms. He held her in front of him while his other hand rested lightly around her waist. His dark, lidded eyes held hers, unfathomable, unreadable.
Turning her bones to water.
She felt emotion rise up in her like a sweeping tide, pouring through her. Her lips parted and there was a low, frail noise in her throat.
‘Cesare—’ His name was like a whisper in her mouth...an echo deep within her.
The knowledge of what she now knew she felt for him had ripped across her like a revelation and it trembled within her. It was making her tremble again now as the thumb of the hand at her nape reached forward to graze the cusp of her jaw, stroked the hollow below her ear in a soft, sensual caress that sent a thou
sand feathers fluttering through her veins.
‘You are so, so beautiful,’ he said.
Slowly, infinitely slowly, as if he were savouring every long moment of its descent, he lowered his mouth to hers. For one long, timeless moment, his kiss was nothing more than a velvet graze along her lips. Then, with a rasp in his throat, he tightened his fingers at her nape, his hand at her waist, and hauled her to him hungrily, ravenously.
As though she were the last meal he would ever eat.
Like a sheet of flame she went up in an inferno of sensation, of passion and desire, white-hot and incandescent. With absolute mastery he possessed her mouth and then, feasting his way down, he swept her up, clamping her against him as he strode from the kitchen, pushing open the door of her bedroom, coming down on the bed beside her.
Clothes were shed, bodies were arching, limbs twining, mouths meeting and melding. Bodies fusing.
Fusing with that same white heat, that same incandescence. She cried out over and over again, her body shaking. The ecstasy he wrought on her was unbearable, meeting for the first time the flood of emotion that poured through her, the knowledge of what it was he meant to her...
The man she loved. Cesare—oh, Cesare—the man she loved.
The knowledge of it, the certainty and the rapture of it, was a possession of her heart and of her soul even as she gave him possession of her body, took possession of his, giving to him all that was within her. It was a glory, a dedication of herself to him without measure, without reserve. An absolute oblation of herself...
And at the end, as wave after wave of shuddering ecstasy and love finally ebbed from her, she held him in her arms, crushing him to her. His dampened skin cooled, his hectic breathing calmed, and she wrapped herself around him, half cradled by him, their limbs tangled and exhausted. She knew, with certainty and utter conviction, that she had never known happiness until this moment. Never known until this moment what love truly felt like.
She held him close against her, smoothed the strong contours of his powerful back. Wonder filled her—and a gratitude beyond all things. He had cried out as the moment had possessed him, as if it had been the very first time they had made love. The intensity of it had shaken her, overwhelmed her.
It could mean only one thing—surely only one thing? His passion for her had been greater than he’d ever shown, his response more searing than she had ever known it to be, his fulfilment fiercer, more burning than she had ever seen before. And now, as she lay with him, his arms around her were tighter than she had ever known.
As if he would not let her go.
As if he would never let her go...
As if she were his and he was hers for ever now...
For ever...
Eyelids fluttering, she felt the great lassitude of her body sweep over her, and sleep took her.
* * *
She awoke alone. In the bathroom she could hear the shower running. For a few moments she lay, languorous, her mind in a dream state. Wonder still suffused her—like an underground spring filling the receptive earth. Happiness—rich, and full and glorious—ran in her veins like cream. She had never been happier in her life.
Because of Cesare—oh, Cesare, Cesare, Cesare! The world was new-made, new-found. Illumined by love, by joy, by glory.
The shower was cut off. A moment later Cesare was walking into the bedroom, a towel snaked around his hips. He walked quietly, as if not wanting to disturb her. She went on lying there, immobile, watching him through shuttered eyes only just affording vision.
She watched him dress swiftly, surely, fastening his cuffs, knotting his tie—all the tiny, familiar minutiae of the morning. She felt a vague disappointment, for clearly he had an appointment to get to. But then, she had to attend an editorial meeting that morning anyway, and a lunch afterwards, so she did not mind him leaving her like this. There would be tonight—and the night after, and all the nights thereafter. The future was stretching ahead of them. She was sure of it, certain of it.
How could it be otherwise now?
Now that I know I love him.
For now, with love pouring through her, she knew, above all, that she could dare to hope.
Whatever it is he feels for me he does feel for me! I am more to him than I was! I know it—oh, I know it, I know it!
Give him time—just give him time. Make no demands, be as cautious and as careful as ever. But with time—oh, with time he will come to feel more for me. Whatever might happen...
There were no certainties about him, but there were possibilities. Oh, that much she must have faith in. She must and she could—and she did.
Her mother’s warnings seemed a thousand miles away—as did her own warnings, issued to herself all her life, all these months with Cesare.
I can believe in my happy ending—I dare to believe in it! I dare to hope! To have faith in my heart...in his...
Her love could make it happen—she needed only hope and faith. And both were streaming through her as her eyes drank him in, her heart overflowing with wonder and gratitude. With joy.
He crossed to the bed, sat down on it, his hand reaching for her shoulder as if to wake her. She opened her eyes—opened them and smiled, lifting her hand to catch his. For a second he let her, then her lowered her hand to the sheet, taking his own away. His face was expressionless.
Out of nowhere, like a knife sliding into her guts, fear gouged inside her.
‘Carla, there is no easy way to say this...’
His voice was deep, with a tension in it that cut like a wire through flesh. His mouth was compressed, and she could only stare at him, motionless and frozen, while inside the fear widened into a chasm, swallowing her.
He took a breath, got to his feet. Stood tall and powerful, looking down at her. Remote and distant.
‘This is the last time I can see you,’ he said. ‘In a few days I shall be announcing my engagement.’
He looked down at her. His eyes had no expression in them at all.
‘I didn’t want you hearing it from anyone else. Roman gossip is vicious.’ He paused again, his mouth tightening yet more. ‘I want you to know...’
And now, for the first time, there was something in his eyes—something that only plunged that knife into her yet deeper, with a serrated, twisting blade, eviscerating her.
‘I want you to know how good these last six months have been. How...very good.’
He turned away. Reached her bedroom door.
‘I’ll see myself out.’
There was another pause, a whitening around his mouth.
‘Look after yourself, Carla.’
Then he was gone, and she could hear him walking across her living room, reaching her front door. For a second, an infinity of horror, she froze. Then, muscles bunching, she hurled herself from the bed like a tornado, tore after him. Naked—completely naked. As naked as her soul.
Her eyes blazed like furnaces. A single word shot from her.
‘Why?’
He turned. There was no expression in his face. It was tight and closed as the great oaken doors of his castello. Guarding him against all who might invade. He had not let her invade. Would not permit her to do so.
He answered her now, his voice steady, unemotional. As it had to be. As it was essential for it to be. He would tell her what he had had to tell himself. Rigid discipline held him to his course, as if he were urgently steering his car out of an aquaplane that would otherwise send him crashing down into a bottomless crevasse.
This had to be done. It had to be said—had to.
‘You said yourself, Carla, that you’ve always known the score with me. As I said, I gave you full credit for that.’ He took a breath. ‘Full credit for understanding “why”.’ His mouth thinned. ‘I have to marry. I’ve always had to marry. I’ve always had an
...understanding...’
Was there irony in his repetition? He was beyond irony—beyond everything right now except knowing that his only urge was to get away, not to see her standing there, her body naked—the body he had possessed. Still wanted to possess...
‘An understanding,’ he said, ‘for many years. And whilst my...my fiancée...’ He said the word as if it were alien to him, in a language he did not comprehend, had never needed to speak till now. ‘My fiancée has shared that understanding, she has had her own interests to pursue till now. She’s been living in America, but now she needs to decide whether to stay there...or come home. To fulfil the...the understanding...we have always had.’
He took another breath. Every word he was speaking seemed to be impossible to say. It was a clash of worlds and he was crushed between them.
‘She’s now made her decision, and it is to return to Italy. Therefore...’ he swallowed ‘...I must part with you. I apologise that I could not give you more warning, but...’ He took another heavy breath. ‘She’s flying to Italy tomorrow, to visit her parents, and naturally they will want to hear her decision. And then...’ His expression changed again. ‘Then they will all be visiting me at the Castello Mantegna, where our engagement will be formally announced.’
She stared at him.
Her eyes were stretched, distended. ‘Do you love her?’
It seemed the only question she could ask. The only one in the entire universe.
Her voice was thin, like wire pulled too fine. It grated—grated on him. What place had ‘love’ in his life? None that he could permit.
A look of impatience, of rejection, passed over his face. ‘Love is an irrelevance. Francesca and I are...well-suited.’
For a second—just a second—his eyes searched hers. He took a breath, forcing himself to say what he did not want to say, did not want to face.
‘Carla, if you have ever fancied yourself to feel for me anything at all...’ His mouth tightened, his hand on the doorjamb clenching. ‘You must know I never invited any such feelings from you—never consciously or unconsciously sought them. I never, Carla, gave you any indication whatsoever that there could be anything between us other than what has been. Acquit me of any accusations to the contrary. We had an affair. Nothing more. It could never have been anything more. You knew that as well as I.’