The Reluctant Husband

by Lynne Graham

  ‘You will be relieved to learn that the X-rays were completely clear,’ Dr Orsini told her in a bracing voice. He didn’t believe her; the man did not believe a word she had said!

  ‘X-rays...what X-rays?’ she mumbled.

  ‘You were X-rayed last night while you were still unconscious,’ Santino informed her.

  ‘Last night...?’ she stressed in confusion.

  Santino nodded in grim confirmation. ‘You didn’t regain consciousness until the early hours of this morning.’

  ‘Where was I X-rayed?’ she pressed.

  ‘In the infirmary wing of the Convent of Santa Maria.’

  Am I in a convent? Frankie wondered dazedly, her energy level seriously depleted by both injury and shock upon succeeding shock. In a room kept for the use of well-heeled private patients?

  ‘Your husband was most concerned that every precaution should be exercised,’ the older man explained quietly. ‘Try to keep more calm, signora.’

  ‘There’s nothing the matter with my nerves,’ Frankie muttered, but she couldn’t help noticing that nobody rushed to agree with her.

  Her head was aching and her brain revolving in circles. While she endured a brief examination, and even answered questions with positive meekness, on one level she was actually wondering if she was still unconscious. All this—the strange environment, the peculiar behaviour of her companions—might simply be a dream. It was a most enticing conviction. But there was something horrendously realistic about Santino’s easy conversation with the doctor as he saw him to the door, apologising for keeping him out so late and wishing him a safe journey home. Her Italian was just about good enough to translate that brief dialogue.

  As Santino strode back to the foot of the bed, Frankie reluctantly abandoned the idea that she was dreaming. With an unsteady hand, she reached for the glass of water by the bed and slowly sipped.

  ‘Are you hungry?’ Santino enquired calmly.

  Frankie shook her head uneasily. Her stomach felt rather queasy. She snatched in a deep, quivering breath. ‘I want you to tell me what’s going on.’

  Santino surveyed her with glittering golden eyes, his eloquent mouth taking on a sardonic curve. ‘I decided that it was time to remind you that you had a husband.’

  Frankie froze. ‘For the last time...you are not my husband!’

  ‘Our marriage was not annulled, nor was it dissolved by divorce. Therefore,’ Santino spelt out levelly, ‘we are still married.’

  ‘No way!’ Frankie threw back. ‘The marriage was annulled!’

  “Is that really your belief?’ Santino subjected her to an intent appraisal that made her pale skin flush.

  ‘It’s not just a belief,’ Frankie argued vehemently. ‘It’s what I know to be the truth!’

  ‘And the name of the legal firm employed on the task...it was Sweetberry and Hutchins?’ Santino queried.

  Frankie blinked uncertainly. She had only once visited the solicitor, and that had been almost five years earlier. ‘Yes, that was the name... and the very fact that you know it,’ she suddenly grasped, ‘means that you know very well that we haven’t been married for years!’

  ‘Does it?’ Santino strolled over to the windows and gracefully swung back to face her again. ‘A marriage that is annulled is set aside as though it has never been in existence. So would you agree that if our marriage had been annulled so long ago I would have no financial obligation towards you?’

  Confused as to what he could possibly be driving at, Frankie nodded, a tiny frown puckering her brows. ‘Of course.’

  ‘Then perhaps you would care to explain why I have been supporting you ever since you left Sardinia.’ Santino regarded her with cool, questioning expectancy.

  ‘Supporting...me?’ Frankie repeated in a tone of complete amazement. ‘You?’

  ‘I was expecting Diamond Lil to show up at the La Rocca hotel. The little Fiat was a surprise. A chauffeur-driven limo would have been more appropriate,’ Santino mused silkily.

  Frankie released a shaken laugh. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’ve been working for the past three years. I support myself. I have never received any money from you.’

  Santino spread fluently expressive lean brown hands. ‘If that is true, it would appear that someone has committed fraud on an extensive scale since we last met.’

  Her lashes fluttering in bemusement, Frankie studied him closely. He didn’t look as angry as he should have done, she thought dazedly. ‘Fraud?’ she repeated jerkily, the very seriousness of such a crime striking her. ‘But who...? I mean, how was the money paid?’

  ‘Through your solicitor.’

  ‘Gosh, he must be a real crook,’ Frankie mumbled, feeling suddenly weaker than ever, her limbs almost literally weighted to the bed. Santino had been paying money towards her support all these years? Even though she hadn’t received a penny of it, she was shattered by the news. Feeling as she did about him, she would never have accepted his money. He owed her nothing. In fact she felt really humiliated by the idea that he had thought he did have some sort of obligation towards her.

  ‘Forse...perhaps, but let us not leap to conclusions,’ Santino murmured, strangely detached from the news that someone had been ripping him off for years.

  Frankie was thinking back to that one meeting she had had with ancient old Mr Sweetberry in his cluttered, dingy office. He had looked like a character out of a Charles Dickens novel, only lacking a pair of fingerless gloves. When he had realised that her marriage had taken place in a foreign country, he had looked very confused, as if it hadn’t previously occurred to him that people could get married outside the UK. In fact he had reacted with a blankness which hadn’t impressed Frankie at all. Her mother had then pointed out that Mr Sweetberry didn’t charge much for his services and that they could not afford to be too choosy.

  ‘Possibly,’ Santino remarked, ‘the guilty party might have been someone rather closer than your solicitor...’

  Someone in Sardinia, someone on his side of the fence, she gathered he meant. Enormous relief swept over her, her own sense of responsibility eased by the idea. She felt incredibly tired but she still felt that she had to say it again. ‘I really wouldn’t have taken your money, Santino.’

  Santino sent her a winging smile, alive with so much natural charisma that her heartbeat skidded into acceleration. ‘I believe you,’ he said quietly. ‘But the culprit must be apprehended, do you not think?’

  ‘Of course,’ Frankie eagerly agreed, grateful that he had accepted that she was telling the truth but still highly embarrassed by the situation he had outlined.

  Without warning a sinking sensation then afflicted her stomach. All of a sudden she understood why Santino had been so determined to see her. He had obviously needed to talk about this money thing! She was mortified. She might pretty much loathe her ex-husband, but the knowledge that he had been shelling out for years in the belief that he was maintaining her could only make her feel guilty as hell. Had he found it difficult to keep up the payments? The quip about Diamond Lil suggested Santino had found it a burden. Frankie wanted to cringe.

  ‘And this greedy, dishonest individual—you...er... think this person should be pursued by the full weight of the law?’

  Frankie groaned. ‘What’s the matter with you? I never thought you’d be such a wimp! Whoever’s responsible should be charged, prosecuted and imprisoned. In fact I won’t be at peace until I know he’s been punished, because this fraud has been committed in my name...and I feel awful about it!’

  ‘Not like hitting me any more?’

  ‘Well, not right now,’ Frankie muttered grudgingly.

  Santino straightened the lace-edged sheet and smoothed her pillows. She didn’t notice.

  ‘If only you had explained right at the beginning,’ she sighed, feeling suddenly very low in spirits. ‘I suppose this is why you invited me to stay. You needed to talk about the money—’

  ‘I am ashamed to admit that I believed that
you might have been party to the fraud.’

  ‘I understand,’ she allowed, scrupulously fair on the issue, and then, just as she was on the very edge of sleep, another more immediate anxiety occurred to her. ‘You’d better have me moved to another room, Santino...’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘My insurance won’t pay out for this kind of luxury—’

  ‘Don’t worry about it. You will not have to make a claim.’

  Santino had such a wonderfully soothing voice, she reflected, smothering a rueful yawn. ‘I don’t want you paying the bill either.’

  ‘There won’t be one...at least...not in terms of cash,’ Santino mused softly.

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘Go to sleep, cara.’

  Abstractedly, just before she passed over the brink into sleep, she wondered how on earth Santino had produced that wedding photograph in a convent infirmary wing, but it didn’t seem terribly important, and doubtless there was a perfectly reasonable explanation. After all, she now knew exactly why Santino believed that they were still married. The perpetrator of the financial fraud had naturally decided to keep him in the dark about the annulment so that he would continue to pay.

  The sun was high in the sky when Frankie woke up again. She slid out of bed. Apart from a dull ache still lingering at the base of her skull, she now felt fine. She explored the adjoining bathroom with admiring eyes. The fitments were quite sinfully luxurious. This was definitely not a convent infirmary wing. She was amused by her own foolish misapprehension of before. She was so obviously staying in a top-flight hotel! She reached for the wrapped toothbrush awaiting her and then stilled again.

  Had this been Santino’s room? Had he given it up for her benefit? Was that why the photo had been sitting out? Why would Santino be carrying a framed photograph of their wedding around with him this long after the event? She frowned, her mouth tightening. She could think of only one good reason. And her mouth compressed so hard and flat, it went numb. Masquerading as a safely married man might well prevent his lovers from getting the wrong idea about the level of his commitment, she conceded in disgust. But then if Santino had genuinely believed that he was still a married man...?

  That odd sense of depression still seemed to be hanging over her. She couldn’t understand it. Naturally she was upset that Santino should’ve assumed that she was happily living high off the fat of the land on his money, but she knew that she was not personally responsible for the fraud he had suffered. And he had believed her, hadn’t he? He also had to be greatly relieved to know that he wouldn’t have to pay another penny.

  Diamond Lil... Just how much cash had he consigned into the black hole of someone else’s clever little fraud? Weren’t people despicable? All of a sudden she felt very sorry for Santino but ever so slightly superior. Evidently he wasn’t half as sharp as he looked or he would have put some check on his method of payment.

  Her suitcase was sitting in the comer of the bedroom. As she dressed, she sighed. Santino must have been desperate to sort out this money business to go to the lengths of pretending that he wanted her to come and stay with him. Why would he have been staying in a hotel, though, if his home was nearby? And this was some hotel. How could he possibly afford a room like this? Unless this wasn’t a hotel but was, in fact, Santino’s home...

  Frankie laughed out loud at that ridiculous idea even though her grandfather, Gino, had told her smugly that Santino was rich and a very good catch. In her eyes too, then, Santino had seemed rich. He had bought the largest house in Sienta for their occupation—an old farmhouse on the outskirts of the village. He had even carted a fancy washing machine home to her one weekend. Not that she had done much with it. She hadn’t understood the instructions and, after flooding the kitchen several times, she had merely pretended that she was using it. Of course, Santino had not seemed rich simply because he could afford a house and a car! He had just been considerably better off than anyone else in Sienta.

  So therefore this had to be a hotel. Without further waste of time, Frankie pulled on loden-green cotton trousers and a toning waistcoat-style top with half-sleeves before she plaited her fiery hair. She discovered two new freckles on the bridge of her classic nose and scowled as she closed her case again, ready for her departure. A knock sounded on the door. A uniformed chambermaid entered with a breakfast tray and then shyly removed herself again. There was no hovering for a tip either.

  While she ate with appetite, Frankie found her eyes returning again and again to that silver-framed photo sitting on the dressing table. Finally she leapt up and placed it face-down. Why had Santino kissed her yesterday? she suddenly asked herself. Curiosity now that she had grown up? Or had he actually started fancying her five years too late? Had her cold and businesslike attitude to him stung that all-male ego of his? Had he expected her still to blush and simper and gush over him the way she had as a teenager?

  Frankie shuddered with retrospective chagrin, only wishing she had found some of that defensive distance in Santino’s arms. But, as for what she had imagined she felt, hadn’t she once been hopelessly infatuated with Santino? Doubtless that adolescent memory had heavily influenced her response. For a few dangerous seconds, the years had slipped back and she had felt like that lovelorn teenager again, a helpless victim of emotions and longings too powerful for her to control.

  And if Frankie went back in time she could easily remember a much younger Santino, a tall, graceful, golden-skinned youth, who had looked startlingly akin to some pagan god of myth and legend. He had only been twenty then, still a student. While he was visiting his great-uncle, Father Vassari, the elderly priest had brought him to her grandfather’s house purely because Santino spoke English and nobody else in the village did.

  In those early days Frankie had picked up little of the ancient Latin-based dialect her grandfather and his sisters, Maddalena and Teresa, had spoken within their tiny home. After months of isolation, the sound of her own language had released a flood of tears and frantic, over-emotional speech from her. She had begged Santino to find out where her father was and when he was returning to take her back to England.

  He had suggested that they go for a walk. ‘I am not going to talk to you as if you are a little girl,’ Santino had told her wryly. ‘I will be frank. Father Vassari believes that you will be happier if you learn to accept that this village is now your home, for the foreseeable future at least.’

  Scanning her shocked face, he had emitted a rueful sigh. ‘He understands that this life is not what you have been accustomed to and that you find your lack of freedom stifling, but you too must understand that your grandfather is unlikely to change his attitudes—’

  ‘I hate him!’ Frankie had gasped helplessly. ‘I hate everyone here!’

  ‘But you have your father’s blood in your veins, and therefore your grandfather’s too,’ Santino had reminded her, endeavouring to reason her out of her passionate bitterness and homesickness. ‘Gino acknowledges that bond. If he did not, he would not have accepted you into his home. You are part of his family—’

  ‘They’re not my family!’ she had sobbed wretchedly.

  ‘Maddalena would be very hurt to hear you say that. She seems to be very fond of you.’

  Her shy great-aunt, who was wholly dominated by her sharp-tongued elder sister and her quick-tempered brother, had been the only member of the household to make any effort to ease Frankie’s misery. She had never shouted at Frankie when she heard her crying in the night. She had quietly attempted to offer what comfort she could.

  ‘I promise that I will try to locate your father, but in return you must make a promise to me,’ Santino had informed her gravely. ‘A promise you must study to keep for your own sake.’

  ‘What kind of promise?’

  ‘Stop running away. It only makes your grandfather angrier, only convinces him that you have been very badly brought up and cannot be trusted out of the house. He is a strict man, and your continued defiance makes him much nastier than he woul
d normally be—’

  ‘Did Father Vassari say Grandfather was nasty?’ Frankie had prompted, wide-eyed.

  ‘Of course not.’ Santino had flushed slightly. ‘But Gino Caparelli has the reputation of being a stubborn, unyielding man. What you must do is bite your tongue in his presence and appear willing to do as you’re told, even if you don’t feel willing—’

  ‘I bet the priest never told you to tell me to act like a hypocrite!’

  ‘You’re smart for a twelve-year-old!’ Santino had burst out laughing when she’d caught him out. ‘My great-uncle is very devout, but he is sincerely concerned by your unhappiness. He wanted me to tell you to respect and obey your grandfather in all things—’

  ‘But you didn’t say that—’

  ‘Where there is as yet no affection, I think it would be too much to ask of you.’

  ‘I just want to go back to London,’ she had mumbled, the tears threatening again. ‘To my mum... my friends, my school—’

  ‘But for now you must learn to live with the Sardinian half of your family, piccola mia,’ Santino had told her ruefully.

  He had been so straight with her and, after long, frightening months of being treated like an impertinent child whose needs and wishes were of no account, she had been heartened by Santino’s level approach. But then he had been clever. He had known how to win a respectful hearing, and the bait he had dangled in reward for improved behaviour had convinced her that he was on her side. She had trusted him to find out where her father was.

  When he had brought instead the news of her father’s death in a car crash, she had been devastated. But, in the years which had followed, Santino had become Frankie’s lifeline. He had visited his great-uncle every couple of months, more often as the old man’s health had begun to fail, and Frankie had learnt to live for Santino’s visits for he always made time for her as well.