The Italian Count's Defiant Bride

by Catherine George

  ‘Grazie, Giacomo,’ said Francesco in dismissal as the old man put the cases down. ‘We shall be down in a few minutes.’

  Alicia took in a deep breath as she looked at the intricately carved furniture, and the big tester-bed that dominated the room.

  ‘If,’ began Francesco, before she could say a word, ‘we are to preserve the fiction of reconciliation—even a short time—we must share my rooms, Alicia, to convince the servants. Do not be alarmed. I shall sleep in my dressing room, but this is good because I shall be at hand if you have the nightmare again.’

  Alicia nodded reluctantly. ‘I suppose you’re right. Now, if you’ll excuse me I need time in the bathroom to make myself presentable enough to join the ladies. Incidentally, I was surprised by my welcome. Giacomo seemed genuinely pleased to see me.’

  Francesco smiled crookedly. ‘He is, cara. He worries that I am lonely.’

  ‘And are you?’

  He shrugged. ‘Sometimes, yes. I work hard during the day, and in the evenings I dine alone, or with Zia Luisa and Bianca when Zia is well enough, and then fall weary into my bed. Most of my friends are married with families, and sometimes I am invited to dine with them, or I entertain them here. But Roberto Alva, an old friend who is now our local doctor, and still solo, sometimes asks me down to his place for a game of chess.’ The brilliant eyes took on a sardonic gleam. ‘It must sound most dull compared with your life, Alicia.’

  ‘What about all these ladies you discourage by telling them about me?’ she demanded.

  He shrugged. ‘I do not seek such pleasures in Montedaluca, or even in Florence, where I am also known. If the need for feminine company becomes pressing, I go to Rome and look up old acquaintances.’

  Alicia’s eyebrows rose. ‘And are these acquaintances always ready to drop everything to—to accommodate your pressing need?’

  Again the shrug. ‘Since the ladies in question are widows or divorcees, or successful businesswomen who have chosen to stay single, they usually find time to dine with me.’

  I bet they do, thought Alicia acidly. She looked down at her linen trousers and tailored cotton shirt. ‘If I put my jacket on will I do, Francesco?’

  He nodded slowly as his eyes moved over her in leisurely appreciation. ‘Yes,’ he said simply. ‘You will do very well indeed. You have much style now, Alicia.’

  ‘Thank you. But it’s all down to Bron that I go to work looking smart. I wear jeans and T-shirts otherwise.’

  ‘Then wear them here, also.’ He smiled. ‘You looked delightful in those jeans yesterday. As you did the first time I saw you.’

  She smiled wryly. ‘I’ve moved on a bit since then, Francesco.’

  A few minutes later, make-up touched up and every curl imprisoned in the severe knot she’d kept to for her return to the castello, Alicia slid her arms into the jacket he held for her and squared her shoulders. ‘Right. Shall we go?’

  ‘First I must ask you to wear this, Alicia.’ Francesco held out his hand, and she tensed as she saw the wide gold ring in his palm.

  ‘So that’s why you held my hand—you were concealing my bare ring-finger from Giacomo.’

  ‘It also gave me much pleasure to hold this little hand in mine.’ Francesco slid the ring on the third finger, startled her by raising the hand to his lips, then opened the door. ‘Come then, contessa.’

  She winced. ‘Please don’t call me that.’

  ‘If we are to convince others that we are reunited, it is best you get accustomed to it.’ He took her hand again to lead her out onto the gallery, and through the formal dining room with its big, carved fireplace and tall glass doors, out onto a vast terrace she remembered only too vividly. Its stone columns, softened by entwining greenery, had made a superb setting for their wedding feast. It had also been the scene of her first meeting with Francesco’s mother. Alicia batted the thought away as she looked out over the panoramic view of vine-covered Tuscan hills and silvery olive groves.

  But this time there was no cold, elegant woman giving out rays of disapproval to mar Alicia’s pleasure. Instead the two ladies sitting at the table at one end of the terrace beamed as they approached, and the younger sprang up, hands outstretched.

  ‘Contessa, how lovely to see you! And you too, of course, Signor Francesco,’ she added with a smile.

  ‘Grazie, Bianca,’ he said dryly.

  Alicia grasped the hands, smiling warmly. ‘How do you do, Bianca?’ She moved to greet the older woman, smiling down into the lined, handsome face that lit with pleasure as Alicia bent to kiss both soft, powdered cheeks. ‘Signora, how are you?’

  ‘I am well, Alicia, but why “signora”?’ retorted the old lady. ‘Am I not Zia Luisa now you are the grown up lady?’

  Alicia laughed. ‘I was just waiting for permission, Zia Luisa.’

  ‘Ring the bell, carina, so Giacomo knows we’re ready,’ said Francesco, holding a chair for her.

  It was strange to ring the bell that no one but Francesco’s mother had ever dared touch, and even more so to sit in her chair. It brought it home to Alicia that she was now the contessa, and must behave accordingly if the charade was to be successful. She smiled at Francesco as he sat beside her. ‘I’d forgotten the wonderful view from here.’

  ‘Or perhaps you would not let yourself remember it?’ he said in an undertone.

  ‘Perhaps.’

  Giacomo arrived with a tray of assorted crostini, and then presented a bottle of wine to Francesco for approval before filling the glasses.

  ‘Grazie, Giacomo,’ said Alicia, and with a bow the smiling man left them to their meal.

  ‘Now,’ said Zia Luisa as she selected a morsel of crisp, toasted bread spread with pâté, ‘Francesco says you had an interesting job, Alicia. Tell us all about it. But talk slowly. I have not spoken much English since you were last here, cara.’

  Had a job? Was she supposed to have given it up, or was Zia Luisa just rusty on her tenses? Alicia shot a questioning look at Francesco. ‘Yes,’ she agreed smoothly. ‘It’s interesting work. I’ve been very busy lately.’

  ‘It is to do with the rugby football?’ said Bianca.

  Alicia agreed that it was, and tried to give the ladies an idea of what her work entailed. They listened, enthralled, amazed at a career in such a masculine environment.

  ‘My wife has been very successful,’ said Francesco. ‘But she has also worked very hard. She needs rest.’

  ‘You must sleep a lot, as I do, cara,’ said his great-aunt, with a twinkle in her blue da Luca eyes. ‘Keep her in bed in the mornings, Francesco.’

  ‘I will do my best, Zia,’ he promised, poker faced, and refilled the old lady’s wine glass.

  Alicia refused more wine. She needed a clear head. Because one thing was becoming clearer by the minute. Their smiling encouragement made it plain that Zia Luisa and Bianca believed the reconciliation was for real.

  ‘We ordered just a light lunch for today,’ said Bianca, when cheese and fruit were served to finish the meal. ‘But Pina has something more substantial planned for dinner, and is waiting for your instructions, contessa, as to your wishes for other meals.’

  ‘My first wish,’ said Alicia promptly, ‘is that you call me by my name, Bianca, not the title.’

  ‘I should be most happy,’ said the woman, delighted, and turned to Zia Luisa, who was nodding in her chair. ‘And now I must help the signora to bed for her nap. She does very well for her age, but she tires easily.’ Bianca smiled fondly. ‘And she so enjoys her two glasses of wine.’

  ‘Unlike Alicia, who has barely touched one,’ commented Francesco, and got up to assist his aunt to her feet. He spoke to her gently in her own tongue, and she touched a hand to his face, smiled drowsily at Alicia, and let Bianca lead her away to the bedrooms in the other tower.

  ‘So,’ said Francesco, resuming his seat. ‘You have survived lunch with the ladies of the house, Alicia, but you have eaten very little.’

  ‘I was a bit tense,’ she admitted. ‘N
ot least because both Bianca and Zia Luisa seem to think I’m back here for good.’

  He shrugged. ‘When they knew you were coming to stay, they were so pleased I had persuaded you to return to me I could not disillusion them. And now you are here it is only sensible to let them think—as we need others to think,’ he added significantly, ‘That we are reconciled.’

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  ALICIA sat very still, looking at but not seeing the view while Francesco peeled a peach. He sliced it, put it on her plate and touched her hand.

  ‘Eat, Alicia.’

  She came to with a start and looked down at the luscious fruit. ‘Oh. Thank you.’ She smiled as she tasted a sliver. ‘Mmm, delicious.’

  ‘You always liked the peaches here.’

  She raised an eyebrow as she looked up. ‘My “always” here was so brief I’m surprised you remember that.’

  He brushed back a lock of hair the breeze had ruffled. ‘I remember everything about you, Alicia. I was very much in love with my little English fidanzata.’

  ‘Welsh,’ she corrected, to hide the sudden, unwanted wave of emotion that swept over her. ‘Or British, if you prefer.’

  He smiled slowly. ‘You do not like me to speak of how I felt?’

  She ate another slice of peach. ‘We are not the same people we were then, Francesco. After years of trying to hate you—’

  ‘Trying?’ His eyes lit with heat that set her pulse leaping as he leaned nearer.

  Her chin lifted. ‘It was impossible to change from one emotion to the other with a flick of a switch, like a machine. Even if you didn’t want me I couldn’t stop loving you—though I had a darned good try!’

  ‘And in time you succeeded?’

  ‘I thought I had. Completely. But since I’m now here in Montedaluca, in the last place on earth I ever thought I’d come back to again, I suppose I didn’t have quite as much success as I thought.’ She turned in relief as Giacomo appeared with a coffee tray. ‘Grazie.’ She smiled at him, glad of the interruption as he removed the used plates. With an effort of will she mustered all the Italian she could remember to tell him that she would go down to see Pina later.

  ‘Now you’ve spoken to him in his own tongue—with that delightful accent—Giacomo is your slave forever,’ remarked Francesco, after the smiling man had left them.

  ‘I won’t be here that long.’

  ‘You told me you have two weeks of holiday. You must at least stay for that—if you wish to convince Gareth we are reconciled,’ he added with emphasis.

  Alicia was pretty sure it would take a lot longer than two weeks to do that, but didn’t say so in case Francesco took it as encouragement. Did he really want her to stay as long as possible? She gazed in thoughtful silence at the idyllic panorama before her. Now she was here, it would be no hardship. Not least because the castello felt so much more welcoming without the glacial presence of Francesco’s mother.

  ‘Is it so difficult for you to remain here for a while?’ he demanded.

  ‘If you want the truth—’

  ‘I probably do not. But say it anyway.’

  ‘It’s not as difficult as I thought it would be, because there’s a more relaxed atmosphere.’

  ‘Now my mother is no longer here,’ he said, resigned.

  ‘Yes. I tried so hard to please her, to make her like me, but of course it’s not possible to make someone like you.’ Alicia came to a decision. ‘But, now we’re talking about this in a reasonable way, you should know exactly why I ran away in Paris.’

  Francesco frowned, surprised, and moved his chair nearer. ‘I thought I knew well why you ran. I said such terrible things, I broke your heart.’

  ‘It wasn’t just the things you said that did that. Probably you’d have won me round in a little while because I was so much in love with you.’ Alicia took in a deep breath. ‘What tipped the scale was the bitter hurt of what the contessa had done. I was so thrilled to get her present, but, when I saw your appalled reaction to my attempt to please you as she instructed, I couldn’t believe she’d been so cruel. Of course, I realise now that it must have been Cinzia’s doing. But I didn’t know that at the time. I had ignored my misgivings before the wedding because I loved you so desperately, and believed you loved me. But your disgust, combined with the contessa’s apparent cruelty, made the prospect of my future at Montedaluca unbearable.’

  Francesco said something under his breath and refilled her coffee cup. ‘Drink it, Alicia. Your face is white again.’

  ‘I have pale skin, remember?’ She smiled crookedly. ‘It goes with the hair.’

  ‘One thing you must believe,’ he said urgently. ‘I did love you. I adored you. Can you imagine my feelings when I heard you were seen getting into a car that evening, Alicia?’ His handsome face darkened. ‘I pictured such terrible things—kidnap, or worse.’

  She bit her lip. ‘But I rang you, Francesco.’

  ‘That cold little message was supposed to comfort me?’

  ‘I didn’t want to comfort you!’ She cleared her throat impatiently as her voice cracked.

  ‘Tell me what happened,’ he said quietly.

  Alicia took a deep, calming breath. ‘I shot out of the hotel to hail a taxi, hoping to catch the Eurostar, but there was no cab in sight. An elderly couple were loading their car outside. They saw me crying, and offered me a lift home via the ferry.’

  ‘You told them you were running away from your husband?’ he demanded.

  She flashed him a scornful look. ‘Of course not. I said I’d quarrelled with my boyfriend and was desperate to get home to my mother. They were really lovely people, showed me their passports as identity, even gave me their son’s telephone number to ring in case I needed confirmation. But all I needed was to get away from you. So my kind Samaritans took me back to the UK, and eventually even put me on a train to Cardiff. You know the rest.’

  Francesco was silent for a long time, his face set in sombre lines. When he spoke his voice was harsh. ‘It is no wonder you hate me.’

  ‘I don’t any more, Francesco.’ She managed a smile. ‘As I’ve said more than once, it’s time to forget the past and go on from here.’

  He turned to look at her. ‘Go on?’

  ‘Well, yes. We can’t go back.’

  ‘If you were not so worried about Gareth, would you have agreed to stay here for a while?’

  ‘Probably not. I only came to sign some papers, remember. But in the circumstances it’s a practical idea.’ Alicia shrugged. ‘I’ve only just split up with Jason, so if he heard I’d acquired some other man in my life right away Gareth wouldn’t believe it. But to avoid hurting his parents and Megan—which is the whole point of all this where Bron and I are concerned—he must hear we’re together again, Francesco. And once he does he won’t be able do a thing about it—except try to rearrange your pretty face,’ she added flippantly.

  His face hardened. ‘I repeat, Alicia, he would not find that so very easy.’

  ‘That’s what my mother said.’

  ‘Cosa?’

  ‘You were the first one Bron thought of as a deterrent for Gareth. And because you were a rugby player too, she was sure you’d be able to take care of yourself.’

  His eyebrows rose. ‘I am most gratified. When I see her, I will thank her.’

  Alicia tried to stifle a yawn. ‘Sorry! All this emotion is exhausting stuff. Would you mind if I follow Zia Luisa’s example and have a rest?’

  ‘No, carina.’ Francesco got up quickly. ‘It is a very good idea. You slept very little last night.’

  ‘I’ve been sleeping very little any night for a while, due to Bron’s revelations on top of the fright Gareth gave me.’

  On the way back to their tower, Alicia looked round at the grandeur of the dining room she’d found so overwhelming when she’d eaten there every night with Francesco and the contessa at a table big enough for a banquet. ‘Does Zia Luisa get up for dinner these days?’

  ‘Sometimes, sometimes not.
But we no longer eat in here unless we have guests. When I reduced the staff, I ordered dinner to be served in the small room which opens on the loggia downstairs, sometimes on the loggia itself on warm evenings. It is easier for Pina, and much—what is the word?’

  ‘Cosier?’

  He smiled. ‘Esattamente. I cannot imagine living anywhere else but here at the castello, but I do not require the formality that my mother demanded.’

  ‘Understandable, when she’d never known anything different.’

  Francesco shook his head as he opened the door to their suite. ‘That is not true, though it is the impression she strived to give. When she met my father she was working in her father’s hotel in Milano. She was very beautiful as a girl.’

  ‘She was still beautiful when I met her,’ said Alicia. ‘So your father fell in love with her?’

  ‘Possibly. Mamma confided very little. It was Zia Luisa who told me my father had enjoyed the company of many women in his life, but had managed to avoid marrying any of them. Then at the age of fifty-six he suddenly acquired a bride.’ Francesco smiled wryly. ‘Fortunately, since I was born just nine months after the wedding, my resemblance to my father is unmistakeable.’

  ‘I know, I’ve seen the photographs.’ Alicia stacked the pillows against the carved headboard of the bed and curled up against them, her eyes thoughtful. ‘No wonder your mother was disappointed with your choice of fidanzata. She’d obviously set her heart on a truly aristocratic bride for you, not a little nobody with a dodgy pedigree like me. How about her family? I don’t remember meeting any of them at the wedding.’

  ‘She refused to invite them. When she was young her father owned a small trattoria, but in time he expanded and began buying other properties. Instead of waiting on tables in the trattoria, Sophia began work as receptionist in the new hotel in Milano, and so met my father. To marry Conte Ettore da Luca was a great triumph for her. Papa Lusardi provided his daughter with a very acceptable dowry, which included the apartment building in Florence, but he himself was not socially acceptable to her after her grand marriage so they became estranged. I went to visit him with news of her death, and invited him to stay here for her funeral, and it was touching to see him grieve for his daughter. I never knew until Mamma was ill that her cold dignity was a mask to conceal her humble origins.’ Francesco sat down on the chaise between the windows, his legs outstretched. ‘My father died when I was a small child. I hardly remember him. Whatever her faults, my mother was the rock in my life, Alicia. I loved her very much.’