A Shadow of Guilt

by Abby Green

  He walked them into a room with the door wide open and Valentina could see a huge bed revealed in a shaft of moonlight. Instinctively her arms tightened around Gio’s neck. The thought of Gio sleeping in this bed, possibly naked, made her inner muscles clench hard.

  Gio stopped by the bed and let Valentina drop to the floor. Her sandals dropped too, from nerveless fingers. His hands were on her bare shoulders and gruffly he said, ‘I didn’t tell you how beautiful you look.’

  Valentina blushed in the gloom and she looked down. Gio tipped her chin back up. ‘I’m glad you didn’t send them back.’

  Her throat felt very constricted but Valentina finally admitted, ‘Me too.’

  Gio seemed to study her for an infinitesimal moment before he instructed, ‘Turn around.’

  Silently, tingling all over, Valentina turned around. His hands kept contact with her skin. And then she felt him brush her hair over one shoulder before his fingers trailed from the back of her neck down her spine until they reached the top of the zip.

  He pulled the zip down all the way, until she felt his knuckles graze just above her bare buttocks and she shivered. The dress fell open under its own weight and when Gio tugged it gently from her hips it fell to the floor. Gio then undid the clasp of her bra and that, too, was dispensed with.

  Turning her back gently to face him, Valentina was glad of the dim light so she couldn’t fully make out the expression on his face, in his eyes. She could feel his gaze on her though, making her breasts feel heavy and her nipples spring hard and tight.

  When he cupped her breasts in his hands and rubbed his thumbs back and forth over the puckered tips she had to hold on to his biceps to stay standing.

  ‘I want you so much….’

  Valentina took a breath and reached her hands up to his jacket, pushing it off his shoulders and down his arms, dislodging his hands from their torturous touch for a moment. Then she made quick work of removing his shirt.

  The languor of a few seconds ago was gone. Valentina heard the soft slick of leather as Gio removed his belt and then opened his trousers, pulling them down and off, taking his briefs with them. Desperation mounted. Inexperienced and shaky with the extreme desire rising within her, Valentina all but fell back onto the bed at the merest nudging from Gio. He came down beside her and stretched out so that they touched from thigh to thigh, hip to hip, chest to chest.

  Valentina shifted so that she could put her head down on the soft mattress. She reached out a tentative hand to touch Gio’s jaw, suddenly suffused with shyness and said, ‘Take me …’

  CHAPTER NINE

  WHEN VALENTINA WOKE she could feel the sunlight caressing her bare skin and a warm breeze, the scent of grass and earth. Superstitiously she didn’t open her eyes yet. She was lying face down, on one cheek, and could feel the sheet just covering her bottom. Her legs were splayed with wanton abandon and she had the distinct impression of strong arms that had been around her not so long ago.

  She remembered how Gio had tucked her into his body, arms wrapped tight around her, powerful legs cupping her back and bottom as she’d slid into a dreamless sleep with her body humming from the overload of recent pleasure.

  She knew Gio wasn’t in the room any more. Her skin wasn’t tingling with that preternatural awareness. Reluctantly Valentina moved onto her back and winced when aching muscles protested. She blushed when she thought of how tightly she’d gripped Gio’s hips with her legs, the way she’d dug her heels into his buttocks, urging him to go harder, deeper. She blushed even more when she thought of how she’d dug her nails into his back … he might be marked. And then that thought caused a curiously satisfied glow within her.

  Slowly she opened her eyes and took in the room which had been shrouded in darkness last night. It took a few seconds to adjust to the bright light and to realise that there were no curtains on the huge window nearby. Valentina came up on her elbows and looked around.

  The room was starkly bare with only a minimum of furniture that looked old and used. A low table with a lamp nearby, a chest of drawers and a wardrobe. The walls were stripped back as if in readiness to be painted. A chandelier light hung over the bed on an exposed wire. Old and unadorned floorboards were unvarnished and uncarpeted.

  The feel was very much faded grandeur but not in the artful way that people paid through the nose for; this was the genuine thing. It was as if Gio hadn’t cared enough to do it up and something inside Valentina twisted.

  Moving slowly, she got out of bed. Huge and equally faded French doors were half open and led out to a private terraced balcony. The view over the surrounding countryside was stunning. In the far distance Valentina could make out what she thought must be Syracuse with the sea behind it, a faint stain of blue.

  Conscious of her nakedness, she looked around and saw her dress neatly folded on a chair near the chest of drawers along with her underwear and shoes. She blushed again to think of Gio handling them and then she spotted a T-shirt and a pair of sweatpants laid out over the footboard at the bottom of the bed.

  She quickly put them on; they were voluminous but Valentina rolled up the sweats and tied the string tightly around her waist. The T-shirt came to her mid-thighs. After exploring the en suite bathroom which was as undecorated as the bedroom and yet had beautiful antique pieces like a stunning chandelier and a gilt mirror, she went in search of Gio with a distinct prickle of apprehension.

  She didn’t like to remind herself that they’d avoided this morning-after scenario the other day when she’d confronted him about the tattoo and had a minor meltdown. Outside the bedroom was a long corridor but Valentina could see stairs in the distance, the stairs that Gio had carried her up last night.

  When she went down to the ground floor she could see the huge front door wide open, revealing the courtyard and Gio’s motorbike where he’d left it. Flowers trailed haphazardly from pots around the door. Rooms led off the main entrance and Valentina peeked into them. They were slightly more done up than the bedroom but they were still quite bare, with the minimum of furniture.

  She came to what had to be the main living room. The walls were white and there was one long low white couch near the middle of the room. A coffee table and a TV seemed incongruous in the huge ascetic room and again Valentina’s chest twisted with an emotion she didn’t want to look at.

  ‘There you are…’

  Valentina whirled around to see Gio leaning against another doorway she hadn’t yet noticed, arms crossed. He was wearing a dark T-shirt and faded jeans which hung precariously off those lean hips, the top button open. His jaw was dark with stubble and Valentina recalled how the new growth had felt against her inner thighs only short hours before.

  She blurted out, ‘I was just looking for you.’ She gestured to the clothes awkwardly. ‘Thank you … for these.’

  He shrugged minutely. ‘They look far better on you than they ever did on me.’

  Valentina blushed, the enormity hitting her of being here in Gio’s house … the morning after the night before.

  ‘Do you want some coffee?’

  Seizing any opportunity to block out the revelations coming thick and fast in her head Valentina said quickly, ‘Yes, please … and then I really should be getting back to the track.’

  Gio lifted a brow as she walked towards him and she stalled.

  ‘It’s Sunday, the only thing happening at the track will be the massive clean-up and move-out as people start to transport their horses home. And anyway, it’s lunchtime, half the day is already gone.’

  Valentina blanched. Lunchtime. Sunday. No escape. Almost desperately now she said, ‘My parents … I should see my parents.’

  Gio had turned and was walking away, down another long corridor towards the back of the house. He said over his shoulder, ‘I rang the clinic earlier and your father is doing fine. They’re advising the minimum of fuss before he is taken to Naples tomorrow afternoon.’

  Valentina scowled at Gio’s back and then immediately felt g
uilty. He was doing so much for them. Past a constriction in her throat she said, ‘Thank you … for checking up on them.’

  They were in a huge kitchen now and Gio turned to face Valentina, a small smile playing around his lips as if he knew very well what she’d just been thinking. ‘You’re welcome.’

  Valentina sucked in an involuntary gasp; unlike the rest of the house, the kitchen was pristine. A glorious mix of old and new. Slate floors and rustic wooden worktops blended seamlessly with steel and chrome. Her inner chef sighed with sheer joy. ‘This is … stunning,’ she breathed out finally, walking towards the central island and running her hand reverently over the surface.

  She heard the dry tone in Gio’s voice. ‘My housekeeper, Eloisa, insisted on the kitchen being finished. It’s all to her spec, not mine. She’s away this week, visiting family in Messina.’

  Valentina thought of the huge cavernous and undecorated rooms. Thankfully Gio’s back was to her as he busied himself with the coffee pot. Unable to stop herself, Valentina asked, ‘You’ve lived here for nearly ten years—but it’s as if you haven’t settled in yet.’

  Gio turned around, his face curiously blank, and handed Valentina a tiny cup of espresso. The fact that he knew how she liked her morning coffee made her belly swoop.

  Gio took a sip himself and then said, ‘In a way I haven’t … when I got back from Europe and bought this place it needed a mountain of work.’

  Valentina recalled the ongoing construction work whenever she’d been to the castello in the past. That’s why she’d never been inside before now.

  Gio was continuing. ‘That took almost two years … and then …’

  Valentina’s hands clenched so tight around the tiny piece of porcelain that she had to relax for fear of breaking it in two. The significance of what he’d said sank in. Quietly she finished, ‘Mario died …’

  Gio looked pale and he threw the rest of his coffee back in one gulp before turning to place the cup in the sink.

  Valentina put down her own cup and addressed Gio’s obviously tense back. ‘Where did Mario die?’

  He stilled and then he turned around and looked so haunted and bleak for a moment that Valentina quivered inwardly. ‘Valentina …’ His voice was a hoarse plea.

  ‘Please … I need to know.’ To her surprise, she didn’t feel angry or resentful. She just desperately needed to know.

  As if sensing her intractability Gio moved towards a back door and opened it. Valentina followed to see that it led out to a small herb garden. Obviously the housekeeper’s. Gio was holding out a scuffed pair of runners and saying tightly, ‘These might fit, they’re Eloisa’s.’

  Valentina took them, avoiding Gio’s eyes, and slipped them on. They were a size too big, but fine for now. Valentina had to trot to keep up with Gio as he strode down a path with bushes on either side. Somewhere in the distance she could hear the whinny of a horse.

  When they emerged at the bottom of the path the estate was laid out before them. Valentina came to stand beside Gio and saw the vast stables down to their left, surrounded by cypress trees. To the right of that were huge rolling green paddocks, incongruous against the more rocky and bare Siclian landscape and no doubt carefully maintained by Gio’s gardeners.

  From what she remembered the gallops where Mario had died were behind the stables but she couldn’t see them from here. Gio turned to face her, his jaw tight. ‘The gallops are gone, Valentina. I got rid of them … after …’ His voice trailed off.

  She looked up at him. ‘What’s there now?’

  Gio ran a hand through his hair, reluctance oozing from every taut muscle in his body. ‘A garden … I got them to cover it over with a garden.’

  Determined now, Valentina crossed her arms. ‘I want to see it.’

  ‘Why? Valentina—it won’t serve any purpose….’

  She touched his arm then and felt him tense to her touch which sent a cold shiver down her spine. ‘Please, Gio … I need to see this.’

  After a long tense moment he took his arm from under her hand and turned and stalked onwards. For the first time since they’d met again Valentina had a glimpse of another side of Gio. Cold, inscrutable. She shivered slightly when she imagined the dynamic between them being very different.

  They went down past the stables where lots of curious horses’ heads peeped out. Valentina thought she recognised Misfit, who whinnied softly, but she wasn’t sure. A couple of stable hands passed them by but they were obviously put off by Gio’s expression and scurried on. Valentina only realised then that she was still dressed in Gio’s oversize clothes and felt her face flame as she hurried to keep up with him.

  He’d stopped before she realised it and she crashed into his back. He put out a hand to steady her but she noticed how quickly he took it away again and felt a dart of hurt. They’d come through an arbour of some sort and were standing in a huge walled garden. Valentina was taking it all in and noticed that Gio was standing on the edge of an elaborate green structure, about a foot high. Valentina came to stand beside him and frowned. ‘It’s a maze.’

  Gio’s voice was tight. ‘It’s a labyrinth. The one path which leads in also leads back out.’ She heard him take a breath. ‘Mario told me about them once … he’d always been fascinated by them.’

  Valentina had a vague memory of Mario mentioning something about them now too.

  Gio said from beside her, ‘I’ll leave you.’

  And then he was gone. She could hear him striding away again. It was almost too huge to take in—the fact that there now existed a walled garden where the gallops had been, and then this … labyrinth. Valentina was standing at the entrance and slowly started to walk the path.

  It was a curiously meditative experience. Every time she thought she was coming close to the centre of the labyrinth, the path would diverge far away again. She felt exasperated at first until she realised that this was undoubtedly part of the process. She was surprised when she finally found herself stumbling into the centre at last. It was so unexpectedly peaceful that she stood there for long minutes.

  She knew her parents would be incredibly emotional to see what Gio had done in Mario’s name. And she? Like a coward, Valentina didn’t want to explore deeper than the peace she felt right then. Her emotions were far too close to the surface as it was, ambiguous and volatile.

  Eventually she wound her way back from the centre to the entrance of the labyrinth and reluctantly left the garden behind. She couldn’t shake the feeling that some bruised part of her heart had been healed.

  When she got back up to the kitchen door of the castello a grim-faced Gio met her. He’d shaved and changed and was holding car keys, and a bag which she suspected contained her dress. ‘I can take you now if you’re ready to leave?’

  Valentina knew that she should be jumping at this opportunity to run as far away as she could, as fast as possible. But in light of Gio’s clear desire to have her gone something inexplicably rebellious rose up within her.

  She lifted her chin. ‘What makes you think I’m ready to leave?’

  She saw the quickly hidden flare of confusion in his eyes before they narrowed again. Almost as if wanting to goad her now he said, ‘I assumed that seeing where Mario had died would be a passion killer.’

  Valentina sucked in a breath at his crude words. But amazingly, hurt didn’t grip her. She couldn’t articulate it to Gio but it felt right to be here with him. Her blood was already flowing thicker in her veins just standing in front of him, his freshly clean scent on the air between them.

  ‘I was the one who wanted to come here, remember?’

  Again that flare of confusion. Valentina focused on Gio and not on the confusing tumult of emotions within her. She walked up to him and took the keys out of his hands and dropped them to the nearby countertop. Then she took the bag out of his other hand and dropped it to the floor.

  Gio’s eyes were dark, burning. Almost censorious. ‘Do you know what you’re doing, Valentina?’


  Her voice sounded thick to her ears. ‘I want you, Gio, that’s all.’

  Gio smiled and it was grim and hard. ‘As long as that’s all. I’d hate for there to be any confusion.’

  Valentina’s heart lurched but she forced herself to say, ‘No, there’s no confusion.’

  Gio reached out and pulled her into his body and Valentina had to fight not to close her eyes at the way her body sang.

  ‘You’re right,’ he said harshly. ‘There’s nothing but this.’ And then his mouth was on hers and the confusion in Valentina’s heart faded away to be replaced by heat.

  Just over twenty-four hours later Valentina was standing in a private room in a state-of-the-art clinic in Naples listening to a consultant tell them about the operation which her father would undergo the next day. Her father was in bed, pale, and her mother was sitting by his side, looking worried but stoic, holding his hand tightly.

  Gio stood in a corner of the room, arms crossed and face stern as he, too, listened. Dressed in chinos and a white shirt, he looked cool and crisp. And gorgeous, and remote.

  Valentina’s body ached minutely in very secret places. She trembled with awareness just to be this close to Gio. Her brain was still reeling from an overload of sensation and lack of sleep.

  She darted Gio a quick glance now but he wasn’t looking at her. His jaw was tight, impossibly stern. She felt conflicted, confused. From the moment she’d challenged him in his kitchen yesterday, something unspoken but profound had shifted between them.

  She hadn’t had time to dwell on it though—Gio had used his considerable skill and experience to render Valentina all but mute with pleasure.

  When Valentina had woken late that morning, disorientated and more physically replete than she could have imagined possible, it had been to a cool and fully dressed Gio telling her, ‘It’s time to go. The plane is ready to take your parents to Naples.’

  Valentina’s attention came back into the room, guilt washing through her to think that Gio was distracting her even now, when her father’s life was being discussed. She did her utmost to ignore him and her roiling emotions and concentrated on her parents.