Wife By Arrangement

by Lucy Gordon

  She thought of the sensations that had almost drowned her as he rubbed oil into her back. But more than that was the moment of tender understanding between them as she held his wrist and looked at the scar. No passion then. Just an alarmed awareness of each other as people with thoughts and feelings.

  ‘Well?’ he persisted. ‘If I’d forgotten my honour that day, would you have forgotten yours?’

  ‘It was different. I was in love with Lorenzo.’

  ‘Love is a complication,’ he agreed. ‘Even when it’s an illusion.’

  She longed to remind him of his own words about love-‘I believed in things I don’t believe in now’-and ask if he still meant them. Surely their closeness must have made him feel differently? But her courage failed at the last moment.

  ‘I guess we’ll never know the truth,’ she said lightly.

  ‘Probably not. But I knew how badly I wanted you, and I kept my distance. When Lorenzo took flight I was secretly glad, except that after that you hated me. I couldn’t blame you, but there seemed no way of approaching you.’

  ‘If Mamma hadn’t decided to arrange a marriage between us, would you have let me go away?’

  ‘No,’ he said simply. ‘I wanted you.’

  Wanted, she noted. Not loved.

  ‘But when we talked you became angry,’ he continued. ‘She was the only one you would listen to.’

  ‘You mean-you were behind it?’

  ‘I knew what was in her mind. I could have discouraged her. I didn’t.’

  ‘But you hit the roof at the idea of marrying me.’

  ‘Only after you roared with laughter. What did you expect me to say after that?’

  She stared at him. It was on the tip of her tongue to demand, But why didn’t you just ask me to marry you?

  But she couldn’t say it. It would reveal too much about her emotions, and she was safer not doing that with a man who kept his own emotions hidden.

  And that, of course, was the answer. Renato wouldn’t risk asking because it meant revealing himself. So he’d sought to negotiate a deal at arm’s length.

  Now she remembered something else he’d said. ‘I would invite betrayal by expecting it.’

  Not betrayal. She could never betray him. But withdrawal. A man who kept his heart hidden made it impossible for her to do anything else.

  ‘So Mamma was acting as your emissary?’ she asked lightly.

  ‘After the way you’d been hurt, an impersonal approach seemed wiser.’

  It was all so reasonable. She wanted to scream at how reasonable it was. Or maybe she just wanted to scream that he had so little to offer.

  Baptista was her tower of strength. After the marriage she had never relinquished her role as intermediary.

  ‘That’s what I call it,’ she observed one day as they sat together at Bella Rosaria, watching the rain. ‘Some people would call it being an interfering mother-in-law.’

  Heather smiled and squeezed her hand. ‘You know better than that.’

  ‘Before you there was no woman who could make him stop and think, force him to forget his arrogance, and learn to trust and love again. So I “acquired” you because he needed you so much. But was I being selfish to you?’

  ‘No, Mamma. We’re very happy in many ways. And sometimes I can feel him wanting to reach out to me, but he always pulls back. How can I ever tell him that I love him?’

  ‘Must it be told in words?’

  ‘For me it must.’

  ‘I think his feelings for you were coming alive since before your first “wedding”. Maria vergine, how lucky we all were that Lorenzo had the good sense to abort it!’

  ‘Lorenzo?’ Heather echoed with a chuckle. ‘Good sense?’

  ‘He saw what needed doing to avert disaster, and he did it. How miserable you’d all be now if he hadn’t! He’s still rather irresponsible. But he’s developing into an excellent and sensible young man.’ She added with a twinkle, ‘But don’t tell him I said that.’

  ‘I won’t. Besides, if he became too sensible he wouldn’t be Lorenzo. Now, Renato is all good sense. It’s his driving force. He doesn’t love me because he doesn’t understand love. He understands need and want and acquisition. But he knows nothing about the heart.’

  ‘You are mistaken,’ her mother-in-law said firmly. ‘He simply hasn’t yet discovered that you matter to him more than anything else in the world. That will take time. Perhaps years.’

  Heather said nothing, but in her heart she wondered if she could spend years waiting for what might never happen. She saw Baptista watching her, and knew that she wondered too.

  Winter was passing, the rains eased off, leaving the soil rich and black for the spring sowing. Everywhere there was a sense of life renewing. Her first spring. Her first lambing. The harvest that was gathered in this year would be truly her harvest.

  She was managing the estate well. Everyone said so, even Luigi, who really did the work of managing it.

  ‘You at least can’t be fooled,’ she chided him.

  ‘No fooling. You do well. You stand back and let me do my job. That’s clever.’

  Her revenues were excellent. She spent as Luigi advised, otherwise practised thrift, and built up such excellent credit with the bank that she was able to assist Renato through a minor cashflow problem. There was pleasure in that, but it was lessened by his insistence on paying her a proper rate of interest, ‘to keep the books straight’. It was an entirely reasonable explanation, and she couldn’t find the words to explain her irrational sadness.

  These days she saw little of Lorenzo, whose job occupied him abroad almost permanently. His next visit to England coincided with Renato’s departure to spend ten days in Rome. Renato didn’t suggest that Heather should go with him.

  She spent a couple of days at Bella Rosaria and returned to the Residenza to find that Baptista was out visiting friends, and not expected back until late. In her room she unpacked, trying to ignore the feeling of restlessness that had seized her. She chided herself for being ungrateful. She had everything-almost everything that she could want. But it seemed that all the world was waking to new life and she alone was going nowhere.

  From her bedroom window she could see the sea, almost as far as the harbour and the Santa Maria, the boat on which she’d first known danger: not the danger of nearly drowning, but the first stirrings of desire and emotion for her fiancé’s brother.

  How terrible everything would have been if the wedding had gone ahead. Baptista had been right about that. For she no longer believed that making love with Lorenzo would have deadened her to Renato. It would have done the opposite. The more she’d discovered about physical passion, the more she would have craved the man who could make passion absolute for her. And that would not have been Lorenzo.

  Instead she was married to the man she wanted, perhaps loved.

  She sighed, realising that there was always a perhaps. She was holding back, refusing to admit to herself that she loved a man she wasn’t sure was capable of love. Renato lived his life on very precise terms. What he wanted, he found a way to have. Just now he wanted her, and in bed he was as pleased with their bargain as she was herself. But that wasn’t love. She’d told Baptista that he knew nothing about the heart. She still feared that was true. And while she believed it, she couldn’t open her own heart to him.

  There was a knock on her door. It was Sara the maid returning some ornaments she’d taken for washing. As she was laying them out the phone rang on the bedside table.

  ‘Hello,’ Heather said, snatching it up. ‘Lorenzo?’

  He sounded strange and troubled. ‘Heather, are you alone?’

  ‘No, just a moment.’ She signalled to Sara to leave. ‘All right, I’m alone now.’

  ‘I need to talk to you-but Renato mustn’t know.’ His voice became urgent. ‘Nobody must know.’

  ‘Lorenzo, what is it?’

  ‘I want you to come to London.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I nee
d you. Please, it’s important. There are things I-please, Heather, please-’

  The words poured out of him, frantic, desperate, and her refusal died on her lips.

  ‘All right,’ she said at last. ‘I’ll get the next plane. With luck I should be with you tonight.’

  She found her passport and put a few things into an overnight bag, relieved that Baptista’s absence gave her the chance to leave without answering questions.

  She found Sara and said casually, ‘I’ll be back tomorrow, or maybe the next day.’ Then she got out quickly. She couldn’t tell the truth about where she was going or why.

  Renato wasn’t due home for a week, but the following afternoon he threw the house in turmoil by arriving early, striding into the house like a man with no time to waste. He was smiling, picturing his wife’s face at seeing him early, and hearing that he’d abandoned a week’s work to return to her. Perhaps she would even relax the slight distance he still felt she kept between them.

  ‘Amor mia,’ he called, throwing open the door to their bedroom. ‘Where are you?’

  The room was empty. He shrugged and went quickly downstairs. She would be on the terrace, probably talking with his mother. Or perhaps she was at the estate. Why had he gone first to their bedroom? He grinned, knowing full well why.

  ‘Sara, where is my wife?’

  The maid paused as she crossed the hall. She looked worried.

  ‘I don’t know, signore. Signor Lorenzo called yesterday, and after that she left in a great hurry.’

  ‘Did she say where she was going?’

  ‘No, signore. Only that she would be back today, or perhaps tomorrow.’

  ‘Where is my mother?’

  ‘Lying down in her room.’

  He opened Baptista’s door quietly, but she was sound asleep. He would have to bear his soul in patience. But the question went round and round in his head. What could Lorenzo have said to make Heather leave so quickly?

  Renato went to his study and tried to settle to work. For an hour he managed more or less well. At least, he thought he was managing well. Then he put the phone down on a long conversation and realised that he couldn’t remember a word of it. After that he gave up and called Lorenzo in London.

  Lorenzo wasn’t staying at the Ritz this time but at a newly opened luxury hotel that the firm was hoping to supply. As soon as the phone was answered Renato said, ‘Lorenzo Martelli’s room, please.’

  ‘I’m sorry sir, but Mr Martelli checked out a few hours ago.’

  Renato sat up straight. ‘This morning? I understood he was there for a week.’

  ‘So did we, sir. But after Mrs Martelli arrived yesterday they decided to leave early.’

  ‘Mrs-Martelli? Do you mean the young English lady?’

  ‘That’s right. Mrs Heather Martelli. They checked out of their room this morning.’

  The blow over the heart almost winded him. He didn’t know how he managed to replace the phone. All the nerves seemed to have died in his hands, and his body was cold with shock.

  He ought to have seen this coming. He’d always known that Lorenzo still lingered in her heart, but he’d charged ahead, arranging things as he wanted, as he always did, only to see them disintegrate in his hands.

  Suddenly he couldn’t breathe. It was like being caught in an avalanche with snow swirling around you from the back, the sides, the top-no way of stopping it-and then it froze solid about you.

  He wanted to howl and fight his way out, but he was trapped, unable to move because he didn’t know which move was the right one. He only knew that he wanted to turn time back to before this nightmare started. And he couldn’t.

  His wife had betrayed him with his brother. Thinking he would be away for another week, she’d hurried back to England to be with Lorenzo.

  No, it was impossible. If it came out it would break Baptista’s heart, and Heather would never do that to her. Renato tried to tell himself that she would never do it to him, but somehow the words wouldn’t come.

  It was impossible because of the kind of person she was, honest, decent, incapable of deceit. But only recently she’d said to him, ‘What do you and I know of each other? In bed, everything. Outside, nothing.’

  He was brought out of his reverie by the sound of a car drawing up outside. Moving like an automaton, he went out, and was in time to see the taxi door open and his brother emerge, looking dishevelled. Lorenzo, the dandy who would agonise over the perfect tie, was unshaven and his clothes looked rumpled.

  He met Renato’s eyes, made a helpless gesture, indicating that he couldn’t face talking now, and went into the house.

  ‘I need a shower,’ he declared, and passed on up the stairs.

  Renato made a gesture for Heather to join him in his study. As she walked past him he could hear his heart hammering. His whole life hung on the next few moments, what he would ask and what she would answer.

  ‘What are you doing back so early?’ she asked.

  ‘Never mind that. Where in damnation have you been?’

  Riled by his tone, she retorted crisply, ‘I’ve been to London.’

  ‘Without telling anyone where you were going, or why.’

  ‘There were very good reasons for that.’

  ‘I’ll bet there were.’

  Something in his voice made her look at him sharply. ‘Be careful, Renato. I’m tired and I’m out of patience. If you’ve got something to say, say it.’

  ‘Very well. Did you spend last night in his room?’

  Heather stared at him in amazement. ‘What-?’

  ‘Answer me, damn you! Did you spend last night in Lorenzo’s room?’

  Her eyes flashed with temper. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘What are you accusing me of?’

  ‘It’s plain enough, isn’t it? You always clung onto your image of him, no matter what he did. You’re a fool, and I was a fool to marry you.’

  ‘Well, nobody forced you to,’ she cried. ‘You were the one who insisted on this marriage.’

  ‘Yes, and I’m well repaid for it. I thought you were the most wonderful woman in the world. I thought all beauty and honour lived in you-the one true and honest woman in a world of greedy deceivers. I knew you didn’t love me when we married but we had time and I let myself believe-but the minute my back was turned you go to him-to his room, to his bed.’

  ‘Renato-’

  ‘Did you sleep in his bed?’

  ‘Yes,’ she yelled.

  It was only now that he knew how desperately he’d longed to hear her deny it. It was undeniable, but surely she would find a way to make the terrible truth untrue. There was a roaring in his ears. It was like suffering the agonies of death, except that he stayed alive and died again and again.

  Renato was a Sicilian. In this society a faithless wife could cause a blood feud that could last a century. But the only thought in his mind was to implore her to take back her words, let it be as it was before, let him believe in her again. Because if she was a deceiver then nothing in the world was worth anything.

  ‘Do you know what you’ve just said?’ he asked hoarsely. ‘No, don’t answer.’ He held up an arm as if to ward her off. ‘Perhaps it was time you said it. Or perhaps I should have listened long ago, when you tried to tell me there was no hope for me. But I’m not good at hearing what it doesn’t suit me to hear, as you’ve often mentioned.’

  ‘Renato-what are you saying?’

  He gave a bark of mirthless laughter. ‘I’m saying I give in. You’ve won-you and that boy who’s wound himself around your heart so tightly that I can’t find a way in. If you want him you can have him. I’ll make it easy for you.’

  ‘You mean-you’d free me to marry Lorenzo?’

  ‘What else can I do?’

  ‘What about Mamma?’

  ‘She’ll be all right if she sees that I’m perfectly happy about it.’

  ‘And are you-perfectly happy?’

  He didn’t answer her in words but the truth was there in his eyes. He w
as dying inside.

  ‘You survived something like this,’ he said quietly. ‘Maybe you can teach me how.’

  ‘But-happy?’

  ‘That isn’t your concern any more. We could have been happy. Or at least I thought we could. I loved you, and I thought in time I could win your love. I hadn’t reckoned on your heart being so stubborn and awkward. Why do you think I used my mother as an intermediary? Because I knew it was too soon for you to have got over him. If I’d approached you myself, talking of love, it would only have driven you off further.’

  ‘But you knew-I mean there were things between us even then-’

  ‘Yes, desire, not love. Sometimes I felt you wanted me, but with your body, not your heart. That wasn’t mine, and if only you knew how much I wanted it, to have you look at me as I’d seen you look at him. I tried to keep it businesslike, not to alarm you, but that day in the temple-well-’ He sighed. ‘I couldn’t always stick to my good intentions. And all the time I loved you so desperately that I thought you’d see and understand. But you never saw, because you never wanted to. It was all Lorenzo with you.

  ‘We talked, once, about our day on the boat and what might have happened. You said you’d been in love with him, and I said love was a complication even when it was an illusion. If you knew how hard I prayed for you to say then that your love for him had been an illusion. I was holding my breath, willing you to say it-but you didn’t. And I suppose I knew the truth.’

  His face was as bleak as a winter’s day, and for the first time his eyes weren’t closed to her, but open, defenceless, letting her see the suffering man within. She put her hand out but he flinched away from it. She couldn’t speak. Everything in her was concentrated on hearing what he would say next.

  ‘I should have let you go then,’ he said at last, ‘and this wouldn’t have needed to happen. Well, it’s happened. I brought it on myself, and I make no complaint.’

  ‘I don’t believe it’s you I’m hearing say all this,’ she breathed.

  ‘No? Well, I’ve been unlike myself since I knew you.’ He took a shuddering breath. ‘I’ll make it easy for you, but go quickly. I’m not sure how long I can keep this up.’

  ‘Renato-’

  ‘For God’s sake go!’ His face was livid. ‘Get out of here, and never let me see you again.’