by Maggie Cox
She paused to brush away the tears that dampened her cheek, and her lower lip trembled.
‘I mean … they needed me at the orphanage, but I was still exhausted from my last trip out there and I felt the effects almost straight away. Because we were so short-staffed the situation was almost unbearable at times. Perhaps I was arrogant, believing I could make a difference … that I could help make the situation better in some way. The three of us working together using all of our wits and know-how … every ounce of our energy … could only just about hold it together. You’d better not accuse me of seeing things clearly again, because it’s not true. If I’d listened to my body and not my heart I wouldn’t have got sick.’
Tenderly stroking back the hair that brushed the sides of her face, Marco frowned. ‘Listen to me. To do what you did was the bravest and most selfless thing I’ve ever heard, and I had no right to try and make you change your mind about going when we last saw each other. You weren’t arrogant to believe you could make a difference, and I’ll wager if you asked any one of those children whether they felt safer and more secure because you were around not one of them would deny it. Talking of which—did any more children or staff go down with the fever? Apart from you, I mean?’
‘One little girl of about four years old.’ Grace gave a slight shake of her head, as if the memory pained her. ‘But she was recovering well, thank God, by the time I was taken ill myself.’
‘And what have the doctors said about your condition, hmm?’ He was almost afraid to ask in case the news was bad. He could hardly attest to breathing as he anxiously waited for her reply.
‘They’ve said that I’m suffering from both physical and nervous exhaustion. I didn’t get the fever, thank God. But the heat out there sucked all the energy from me. It didn’t help matters that the resources and help were so inadequate, and caring for the children was much harder than usual. I’m afraid I lost my appetite completely, which was an added complication, and one morning I just passed out. When I came to I didn’t have the strength to get up. My co-workers said I was muttering incomprehensible things and sounding delirious. Next thing I knew I was in the hospital. Anyway … all that’s behind me now. Give me just a few more days of rest and relaxation and I’ll be as right as rain, I’m sure.’ She glanced over her shoulder at the bucketing rain that still poured, as if to confirm it to herself.
‘Hmm.’ Marco wasn’t nearly so sure. The faint bruising smudges beneath her eyes and the haunted look they held told a rather different story. ‘Are you planning on staying here in Britain for very long?’ she asked him, her tone a little nervous.
‘Do you imagine I am going to get on the next plane back to Portugal and leave you here while you are ill?’
‘I don’t know. I don’t know what you plan to do. How could I?’
‘You look like you’re about to cry again. Does my being here distress you so much?’
She dropped her hand to his sleeve and laid it there. Marco was so sensitive to her every touch that he swore he felt her heat burn him right through to his bones, even through the thick suede of his jacket.
‘I don’t want you to go. I know it probably won’t do me any good, telling you that. You’ve no doubt had enough of my ridiculous demands. And I’m so sorry if I tried to force you in any way to confront your past, like I was some kind of expert. I’m not. Sometimes I just get carried away with my desire to make everything right for everybody. It’s crazy, I know.’ She gave a tired smile. ‘I guess I’m more like my parents than I realised.’
‘It’s not crazy to want to help. And you did help me by getting me to look at my past and not run away from it. You certainly didn’t force me. Somehow being with you, having your own bravery as an example, I wanted to face my demons. I only wish there were more people like you in the world, Grace.’
‘I’m not unique. I told you that before. Look … I know you’re a very busy and important man, and you’re probably anxious to get back to your work—wherever that might take you in the world—and I know I let you down, but I hope you can stay … for a little while at least.’
Marco took a deep breath in, then wiped the back of his hand across lips that were still throbbing from his and Grace’s passionate kiss. ‘I’m not going anywhere in a hurry … you can count on that. And you didn’t let me down. You were fulfilling your dreams, that’s all, and I can’t be upset about that when I’ve always tried to fulfil my own. But nothing is more important to me right now than seeing that you’re all right. What I’ve seen so far tells me that you’re a long way from being fully recovered from your trip—so, like I said, I will not be doing anything other than staying here with you until you’re well again. I’ve booked a room in a hotel nearby, so I can be on hand whenever you need me. Plus, you and I need to have a long talk about things. But first I would like to have a word with your father, if I may?’
Grace’s blue eyes widened warily. ‘What for?’
‘I’d like to get an update from him about what your doctors have said. I’d also like to recommend one of my own doctors to look at you. I have access to the very best medical care in the world, Grace, and I’d like you to benefit from it—if you agree?’
She turned away, folding her arms across the thin white sweater that so starkly highlighted the fact she’d lost weight. ‘You don’t need to talk to my dad. I’ve already given you an update on my health. And nor do I need to see one of your doctors. I told you … I’ll be fine.’
There was something wrong. Marco sensed it the moment she dipped her head and turned away. His mouth went dry as a desert plain. ‘You’re keeping something from me … what is it?’
‘It’s nothing.’ All of a sudden she moved back to the rocking chair. Lowering herself down into the seat, she returned her hands to its polished wooden arms and started to rock herself slowly back and forth.
Outside, the rain thundered against the conservatory’s glass roof, with no sign of letting up any time soon. Staring at her, Marco curled his hands into anxious fists down by his sides. ‘If you won’t tell me then I’ll go and find your father and ask him.’
The chair stopped rocking, and the incandescent blue eyes couldn’t hide her apprehension and fear. ‘You don’t need to go and find my dad. It’s just that … when the doctors did all the usual tests on me in the hospital … something turned up that none of us expected.’
‘If you have any idea of how much agony of mind I’m going through right now, then for God’s sake please just come out with it and tell me!’ Marco implored.
Holding her hand to her middle, as if a debilitating pain had just shot through her, Grace suddenly turned as pale as new milk. He was already moving to her side when she slumped forward in the chair in a dead faint.
‘Grace, wake up! Querido Deus!’ Crouching down in front of her, he gently positioned her so that she was sitting more securely in the chair, with her head dropped onto her chest. Quickly he felt for her pulse. His own was probably just as out of kilter in fear and concern.
He was just about to leap up and call for Grace’s father to ring for an ambulance when she opened her eyes and stared at him in confused distress. ‘Marco,’ she murmured, ‘what happened?’
‘You fainted that’s what happened, Grace. I think you should be in bed rather than sitting in here. Your hands are freezing!’ Saying so, he took her pale, slender hands in his and vigorously rubbed them, as if to invigorate her blood once again and restore her to the land of the living.
His mind was running at a mile a minute in search of solutions that might help. No matter how much Grace pleaded with him not to, Marco fully intended to speak to her father about her condition, followed by consulting his own doctors. It was unbearable to imagine that she might be taken from him through illness when he’d so recently realised that he couldn’t possibly live without her …
‘I’m fine.’
‘Stop saying that when it is clearly not the truth!’ Breathing hard, Marco couldn’t—wouldn’t—take h
is eyes off her, in case she fainted again. ‘Just before you passed out you were holding your stomach as if you were in pain. Are you hurting, Grace? If you need medical help then you must tell me.’
A wan smile briefly touched her lips. ‘I wasn’t in pain. I just felt a little nauseous, that’s all. Can you pass me that glass of water on the table behind you? I’d like a sip.’
He did as she asked and quickly returned. As he watched her sip the water his mind careened in all directions, imagining all the dire reasons why she would be feeling nauseous.
Reaching forward, Grace put the glass carefully down on the white ledge beside the conservatory doors. ‘It’s perfectly natural for a woman to feel nauseous sometimes when she’s pregnant,’ she announced, her tone unbelievably matter-of-fact, ‘especially in the first three months.’
‘What did you say?’
‘I’m telling you that the reason I’m feeling nauseous is that I’m pregnant.’
Even the rain that thundered so powerfully against the roof couldn’t drown out the enormous sense of shock and disbelief that rolled through Marco.
If she hadn’t felt quite so weak just then Grace would have quickly reassured him that he needn’t worry … she wasn’t about to demand he marry her or anything crazy like that. There were plenty of women all around the world who raised their children on their own, and if he didn’t want to be with her then that was what she would do.
The way his arresting features had turned almost pale beneath his bronzed skin had already told her that it was hardly welcome news. Now she wished she’d kept quiet about the pregnancy—at least until she felt strong enough to deal with the emotional fall-out should Marco tell her he was sorry but he didn’t want to assume the responsibility of being a father, not on the kind of regular basis that a truly loving relationship required that he be …
But now, looking a little more recovered, he clasped her hands more tightly, his hooded dark eyes roving her face as if she was indeed the moon, the stars and the sun that he’d asserted that she was earlier.
‘The child—the child is …’ he started to say.
‘Don’t you dare ask me if it’s yours,’ Grace leapt in, feeling her cheeks flush with some much needed colour.
‘I wouldn’t dream of it.’ His lips twisted with gentle mockery, then he stared at her in wonder, laying the flat of his palm gently against her abdomen. ‘I’m going to be a father.’
‘Yes, you are. Do you mind?’
‘Do I mind?’
‘You told me once that you didn’t know what it meant to be a father because you’d had no good example of a father yourself.’
‘That’s true. But I never said I was averse to learning if the right woman came along, did I?’
Grace’s heart skipped. ‘Am I the right woman, then?’
‘I thought you were clever … But if you still haven’t worked it out yet, then I guess I will have to enlighten you, won’t I?’
Staying silent, she minutely examined every curve and facet of his extraordinarily handsome face, wondering how she had lived for so long without the sight of it, yet still wary of having her longed-for treasure cruelly taken away if anything untoward should happen to either of them.
‘For once you’re lost for words.’ Chuckling, Marco touched his fingertips to her lips and tenderly traced them. ‘I love you, Grace. You have become the ground beneath my feet, the person by which I stand or fall, because I can’t … I won’t live without you. You’re the most courageous, loving and loyal woman I have ever met.’
Grace’s eyes had filled with tears the moment he’d said, ‘I love you’. Was she allowed to be this happy? she wondered. When there was so much pain and sadness in the world, it was incredible that she should be blessed with so much joy, she thought gratefully. ‘I love you too, Marco. I adore you more than you can ever know, and I promise to spend the rest of my life trying to show you just how much.’
‘Are you two sufficiently reacquainted to have that cup of tea now? Only you’re mum’s got her best china laid out in the dining room, and she’s wearing a hole in the kitchen floor waiting to get the go-ahead.’
Her dad put his head round the door just as they were about to embrace passionately. Grace met Marco’s melting brown eyes and giggled helplessly.
‘If we can have just five minutes more, then yes. A cup of tea would be most welcome,’ Marco murmured in her ear.
Before Grace had the chance to convey this to her dad, Marco moved his face closer. ‘Marry me,’ he whispered—just before his lips ardently claimed hers …
EPILOGUE
THE VIP lounge at Heathrow was surprisingly quiet that morning. Apart from Grace, Marco and their six month old baby boy, Henry, there was a smart elderly couple and a striking lady dressed in the colourful full regalia of the African region she came from.
Their beautiful little son was already a veteran when it came to travelling. Marco wouldn’t leave them at home whenever he had to travel abroad for work, and neither did Grace want him to. They’d been married for just over a year now, and she still couldn’t bear to be apart from him—not even for a day.
Just a couple of months after Henry was born they’d flown back to Portugal, where her entrepreneur husband had been developing a golfing academy specifically for disadvantaged young men and women. And now, after a fortnight staying in their lovely new home in Kensington, they were at the airport again—this time to fly out to Africa and visit not only the newly erected orphanage, but also the on-site medical centre, staffed by highly trained professionals. Marco had had it set up and, they’d named it after Azizi.
She was so proud of her wonderful husband. Not only had he confronted his fears surrounding his past, he had transcended them to give his unstinting help to children raised in an orphanage just like him.
Their little son was fretting, and Grace rocked him in her arms to try and soothe him. Behind them the loud roar of a jumbo jet taking off drowned out any other sounds.
‘I think his first tooth is coming through. He’s been dribbling a lot, and he keeps sucking his fist,’ she told her handsome husband anxiously. He was dressed as immaculately as ever, in an Italian tailored suit. Marco never failed to take her breath away with his striking appearance. But, expensive suit or not, he didn’t hesitate to reach for his son.
‘Give him to me. Why don’t you go and sit down and relax for a while? Pour yourself some juice.’
‘I wish I could have another cup of coffee. I didn’t sleep much last night.’
‘It’s not a good idea to have too much coffee when you’re breastfeeding, my angel. Remember what the paediatrician said?’
‘I know. She said not to have more than three cups a day. I suppose I ought to save my quota until we board the plane, at least. No doubt it’s going to be a long, tiring day.’ Grace handed over the baby with a hard-to-suppress yawn.
Marco carefully nestled the infant in the crook of his arm and began to mimic the rocking motion that his wife regularly used to calm him or get him off to sleep.
Henry’s still-blue eyes drifted closed immediately, and Grace shook her head in wonder. ‘And you were worried about being a good father? You’re a natural. You seem to have a magic touch where Henry’s concerned.’ She saw him flush a little beneath his tan, and he didn’t need to tell her how proud of his son he was.
Wanting to take care of their newborn herself, she’d declined his offer of hiring a full-time nurse to help her. Yet when Henry woke up for his feed during the night it was Marco who leapt out of bed to fetch him and bring him to her. Then, after he’d fallen asleep again, he’d hold him for a long time—‘father-and-son bonding time’ he called it—before taking him back to his cot.
‘Sometimes it’s hard to believe how fortunate I am,’ he said now. ‘You and Henry have given me everything I ever dreamed of and more. For the first time when I say I’m going home I mean it. I love you with all my heart, my beautiful, clever girl.’
Leaning toward
s him, Grace stole a gently lingering kiss. The three other passengers in the lounge glanced at each other in approval. ‘I love you too, my darling.’ She smiled seductively. ‘And I’ll show you how much tonight—after we put Henry to bed,’ she whispered.
His eyes gleamed with love and desire. ‘If I wasn’t holding our son, I wouldn’t hesitate to demonstrate what I think about that, you little temptress!’
‘Promises promises …’ Grinning, Grace sashayed over to a luxurious leather armchair and sat down, knowing without any conceit at all that her husband’s compelling dark eyes hungrily tracked her all the way …
Read on for a sneak preview of Carol Marinelli’s
PUTTING ALICE BACK TOGETHER!
Hugh hired bikes!
You know that saying: ‘It’s like riding a bike, you never forget’?
I’d never learnt in the first place.
I never got past training wheels.
‘You’ve got limited upper-body strength?’ He stopped and looked at me.
I had been explaining to him as I wobbled along and tried to stay up that I really had no centre of balance. I mean really had no centre of balance. And when we decided, fairly quickly, that a bike ride along the Yarra perhaps, after all, wasn’t the best activity (he’d kept insisting I’d be fine once I was on, that you never forget), I threw in too my other disability. I told him about my limited upper-body strength, just in case he took me to an indoor rock-climbing centre next. I’d honestly forgotten he was a doctor, and he seemed worried, like I’d had a mini-stroke in the past or had mild cerebral palsy or something.
‘God, Alice, I’m sorry—you should have said. What happened?’
And then I had had to tell him that it was a self-diagnosis. ‘Well, I could never get up the ropes at the gym at school.’ We were pushing our bikes back. ‘I can’t blow-dry the back of my hair …’ He started laughing.
Not like Lisa who was laughing at me—he was just laughing and so was I. We got a full refund because we’d only been on our bikes ten minutes, but I hadn’t failed. If anything, we were getting on better.