The Count of Castelfino Read online

  ‘That reminds me—you’ll have to take my details off your BlackBerry,’ Meg said, hoping he would ignore the quaver in her voice.

  ‘I can’t,’ he said frankly, ‘because they were never on there.’

  The pain that had tortured Meg for so long swam into her eyes. Working hard to master her features, she managed to look up at him in undiluted defiance.

  ‘But all your vital numbers are stored on there!’

  Shocked by her tearful response, Gianni’s retort was rapier swift.

  ‘Not yours. Oh, don’t look at me like that—what else did you expect? Would you rather I lied to you, and said it was on there? No, thanks. I leave deception to people like my mother.’

  ‘Gianni! How could you be so heartless?’ she said bitterly. ‘If you ask me, I think you just use your father’s experience as an excuse not to marry because you’re too selfish! I’ll bet in reality he couldn’t wait to see you safely married!’

  ‘What?’

  Her jibe threw him completely off balance. For long seconds he stared at her, totally unable to summon up enough English to reply.

  ‘While you were stuck in a time warp of commitment-dodging, your father was always more interested in the future. I spoke to him often enough to know the Bellini traditions wore him down. He was ready for change. I think he would have loved to see you married, Gianni. He’d probably got to the stage where he didn’t care who she was, as long as she loved you for all the right reasons, and that you’d chosen her for all the wrong ones—such as your raging testosterone.’

  ‘What do you mean by that?’ Gianni retorted, but his surge of anger brought more turbulent emotions to the surface. He frowned. ‘I was his heir. He had to care. When I think of the times he raised his eyebrows over breakfast when I was headline news again…when he asked me why I never brought any of the girls home to meet him, I thought he was being sarcastic. And the celebrity dinner parties he held in New York or Athens where all the guests had daughters…’ Gradually his voice faltered. When it disappeared altogether he gazed into the middle distance as though in search of it.

  ‘So that’s your defence against marriage blown right out of the water. He wanted you to get moving. Now you’ve got no excuses left, Gianni. Say goodbye to me now, so you can go and present the orchid I brought you to the poor long-suffering woman who is going to become your wife.’

  The mention of excuses brought him straight back to the present. Grabbing her hand, he began to pull her through the lounge. Meg thought he was about to throw her out of his suite altogether, but she was in for a shock. Instead of heading for the main door, he took her into an adjacent dining room. An intimate dinner for two was planned. The central table was set with a battery of silver cutlery and bone-china plates decorated with a discreet pattern in gold leaf. In the centre stood the orchid she had brought, still decked in its cellophane and ribbons. The lights were low, and the room warm and welcoming.

  ‘An aristocratic Italian girl is the last thing I want,’ he muttered, guiding her around the table. The far wall was almost completely filled by an enormous mirror in a heavy gilded frame. Below it stood a highly polished walnut sideboard. As they got closer Meg saw a young lemon tree in a terracotta pot standing in the centre of the sideboard. Everything glowed and shimmered in the light of dozens of candles.

  Gianni looked as distracted as she felt. His tousled hair and open necked shirt gave him a reckless look, but his manner was anything but spontaneous.

  ‘Your resignation was a real wake up call to me. I’ve spent every second since then examining my motives. I’m still convinced you did the wrong thing, Meg.’

  ‘That doesn’t surprise me.’

  Before the accusation had fully left her lips Gianni grabbed her by the shoulders.

  ‘Wait! Listen to me—you’ve driven a hole right through my reasoning, Meg. Do you hear that? All my life I’ve been working towards what I thought my future should be. I wanted a legitimate son to carry on my family name. That’s still my objective, but you’ve made me realise I was going about it all the wrong way.’

  Meg narrowed her eyes. ‘How many ways are there to break a woman’s heart, exactly?’

  He flung his arms wide with exasperation.

  ‘I thought I was being the ideal forward-thinking executive, but in reality I was always looking back over my shoulder. I was surrounded and haunted by the expectation of the past and the duty of being count.’

  She watched him carefully, wishing she could read his expression. Gianni had hurt her more than she could bear, but she should have expected that. They weren’t simply from different sides of the track, they were from opposite sides of Europe. Aristocrats were one thing. Foreign aristocrats were still more enigmatic. She loved Gianni so much it hurt, and would have done almost anything to take this look off his face. The only thing she could not bear to do was sacrifice her pride by asking how she could help. Meg might be meek, but acting as a doormat was not her style. She shook her head. With that, he indicated the potted lemon tree standing before them.

  ‘And so I came to a decision. Presto! What do you think of this?’

  From every branch hung a small package wrapped in red velvet. Each one was suspended from fine gold wire and the weight caused the little bush to bow and tremble in the warm air.

  ‘It looks like a Christmas tree,’ Meg said slowly.

  ‘They’re all for you.’

  Hesitantly, she took a step forward. The little presents begged to be touched, taken and opened. Somehow, she couldn’t do it. He must be trying to buy her off. In her fevered imagination they represented drops of her heart’s blood, and they sprang from loving him. Slowly, she ran her hand over the back of his as he held her by the wrist. She knew every contour as well as her own. This would be the last chance she had to savour that smooth, taut skin. His fingers had to be peeled away from her. She had to release him so that both he and her baby could be free. It tore strips from her heart.

  ‘Go on—they’re yours,’ he insisted. ‘If you want them.’

  ‘They’re all for me? Why? I don’t want anything more from you, Gianni. Not now.’

  He started to say something but she held up her hand and stopped him. ‘I never expected to see you again, but since I’m here there’s something I really must tell you. I can’t possibly keep it a secret. You won’t like it, but I can’t keep the truth from you—’

  ‘Wait. I have a confession of my own,’ he interrupted swiftly. ‘It’s one I should have made a long time ago, Meg. Let me say it while I can. If only I could have been honest with myself from the start, I could have saved us both so much pain.’

  ‘Gianni…’ Light-headed with lack of oxygen, Meg struggled for words but couldn’t think straight, much less speak.

  ‘When I first saw you, I was having the time of my life. All the women I wanted, more money than I could spend—I was the original man who had everything. But it was all a sham. All my life I’ve been fooling myself that happiness could be bought. I was wrong. It has to be earned. When I was a child, I watched my parents tear each other apart. The connection must have been made deep in my mind between marriage, anger and despair. My father tried to do the right thing by conforming to the model our ancestors carved out of ancient history. But after growing up to the sounds of screams and smashed crockery, I headed in exactly the opposite direction.’

  ‘I suppose that’s understandable,’ Meg said faintly, her stare unblinking. She couldn’t take her eyes off the man who, always such an enigma, was struggling to open up in front of her.

  ‘I used to hear my mother goading my father, right up to the end. She had so many lovers even she couldn’t put an end to the press speculation about the identity of my half-brother’s father.’

  ‘Oh, Gianni…’ Tentatively, Meg reached out towards him. He was staring at the ground as though his eyes could bore right through to the centre of the earth. It made her hesitate, her hand halfway to his shoulder.

  ‘That
’s why I told myself I’d never get married. I’d seen what it was like, from the inside.’ He recoiled with a grimace. ‘But, Dio, in my book if a man makes love to a virgin, marriage is the only option. I should have made you my wife the very next day. The trouble was…I couldn’t face the possibility that marriage would turn us into the sort of monsters I remembered from my own childhood. What if I failed in the one and only thing in life that truly matters—love? And to expose another innocent child to the hell I endured—I couldn’t do it. Then again, I wasn’t going to lose you. So I carried on with the fiction that you’d always be my mistress but never my wife. Every time I told you that, it was my guilty conscience talking.’

  It went very quiet. For endless seconds, they neither moved nor spoke. Tears clawed at Meg’s throat, eager for release, but she was determined never to weaken in front of him again. He’d admitted he’d wanted to marry her, but couldn’t bring himself to do it. If she mentioned the baby now, he would think she was trying to force his hand. She stood in silent, bitter, lonely darkness until she could stand it no longer.

  ‘Then I’ll say goodbye,’ she said in a small voice. ‘You’ve unburdened that guilty conscience of yours, so there doesn’t seem to be anything more to say.’

  ‘Goodbye? Is that what you truly want, Meg?’

  ‘What do you think?’

  For once their roles were reversed. Meg’s voice was low with determination. When at last Gianni spoke again he sounded unusually reluctant. ‘You said you had something to tell me. I interrupted you, tesoro.’

  The uncertainty in his voice was so unnatural Meg’s eyes flew open.

  ‘Don’t call me that. You don’t mean it.’

  ‘Yes, I do. Of course I do. I’ve never meant anything more sincerely in my entire life.’

  Meg stared at him. Now she really was confused. Perhaps she was hearing things. She certainly felt feverish enough to imagine his touch—

  No, that at least was true. He had extended his hand until it was resting on her arm. His touch was as light as an orchid petal.

  ‘Open your presents, Meg.’

  Every ounce of his usual authority filled the order. Meg jumped towards the pretty little decorated tree before she could stop herself, but the second she could, she did.

  ‘Go on. You know you want to.’His voice was slow and certain. Still she hesitated. ‘Accept them, tesoro.Ifyou don’t, then no one else will ever get the chance. I shall take them back home unopened, and straight into the river Arno they go.’

  His eyes were warm with all the feeling she had seen there in his unguarded moments. This must be another one. Hardly daring to hope, she lifted one hand a fraction. Then she stopped. Gianni lowered his chin and slowly raised his eyebrows, encouraging her silently.

  Her fingers automatically went towards the smallest present. Gianni moved as though to stop her, hesitated, but then decided that he couldn’t leave well alone even now.

  ‘No—don’t take that one. Open this one first.’

  She said nothing, but the look on her face as she accepted a different red velvet parcel told Gianni all he wanted to know.

  ‘Believe me, it’s not another example of me dictating to you. There is a reason why you should open these in a special order.’

  He was moving uncomfortably under her scrutiny, and his voice was as close to apologetic as a man like Gianni was likely to get. Meg almost smiled, but couldn’t bear to hurt his feelings.

  Pulling open the fine gold ribbon, she unwrapped a battered leather case. It so obviously contained jewellery; she looked up at him in alarm.

  ‘This must be one of the only occasions when a woman says “you shouldn’t have” and means it from the bottom of her heart. Oh, Gianni, what have you done?’

  ‘Open it, and see.’

  His gaze was steady and level, but she could see a pulse in his neck. It was flickering almost as fast as her heart.

  Obediently she dropped her gaze and concentrated on the small golden catch fastening the jewel case. The lid sprang open to reveal an extravagance of diamonds nestled in a bed of red velvet.

  ‘It’s a tiara.’

  As quick as a flash Gianni lifted it out and set it on her hair.

  ’It feels funny…’ she said with a puzzled smile.

  ‘You’ll get used to it.’

  ‘No…no, I can’t…I mustn’t…’

  Raising one hand to the gold and diamond crown, Meg tried to take it off. Gianni’s hand met hers and held it there, in place on her head.

  ‘Do you recognise it?’

  ‘It looks like the coronet your mother was wearing in that portrait of your parents hanging in your suite.’

  With his hand enfolding hers, Meg had no intention of struggling but she was worried. Her eyes flickered nervously over the little lemon tree. She was trying to remember exactly what else the contessa had been wearing in that frighteningly glamorous painting. As well as the coronet she had been draped in earrings, a necklace, a bracelet, rings…Meg racked her brains, wondering if there had been a wristwatch, too. That was the only thing she might have considered accepting, but nothing decorating the little tree looked remotely run-of-the-mill.

  ‘I can’t wear this,’ she repeated.

  ‘It’s for you. It’s all for you,’ Gianni said quietly. Presenting her with a second, smaller package, he released her hand to let her unwrap it. Inside an antique case was a pair of stunning earrings to match the tiara. A waterfall of rose-cut diamonds fell from a fine filigree of eighteen-carat gold lace. Meg knew she couldn’t possibly take them. These exquisite trinkets were exactly the sort of prizes awarded to women like Thomas Hardy’s ‘Ruined Maid’. Mistresses. If she fell under Gianni’s spell again she would be lost for ever. He would trample over her heart, her life would never be her own and all the diamonds in the world could never restore her self-respect.

  She could hardly find the words to speak. ‘These are the most beautiful earrings I have ever seen,’ she breathed eventually. ‘But I can’t possibly accept them—or any of these lovely things!’

  ‘I’ll put them on for you,’ he said, moving forward quickly. Before she could refuse, he silenced her with a look. Lifting the first earring out of its red velvet bed, he fastened it expertly into her lobe. Soon he had fixed the second network of precious stones to her other ear. ‘If you can’t wear them, Meg, then no other woman in the history of the world is going to have the benefit of them. I mean that. They’re yours. You’re entitled to them.’

  She gazed up at him, her eyes troubled. ‘Gianni, you owe me nothing. That’s what I said, and I meant it.’

  ‘Are you sure?’ He looked at her uncertainly.

  It was the first time Meg had seen him wear an expression other than supreme self-confidence. Suddenly she was scared. Her world had started spinning out of control when she’d discovered she was pregnant. The only dependable thing left in her universe was Gianni’s certainty. To discover that was no longer set in stone terrified her. They couldn’t both be adrift in wild, uncharted waters. Desperately, Meg tried to restore the natural order of things. When she delivered her bombshell, he would bounce back to furious normal.

  ‘Look—Gianni—I thought nothing could ever tear this secret out of me, but you’re forcing my hand…’

  Instantly all the old Bellini pride returned. Gianni drew himself up and regarded her with hooded eyes. Meg took a deep, steadying breath. She had spent hours dreading his fury, planning her defence and going over and over what she would say. Now the moment was here, she felt strangely calm. Reliving every possible way he might explode had prepared her for the very worst. It had convinced her she could cope. After all, an angry Gianni was far less scary than the man who stood before her now, trying unsuccessfully to hide shadows of doubt.

  ‘You need to know exactly how little all your wealth and possessions mean to me, Gianni? Well, I’ll tell you.’ Her palms were damp. She clenched her fists. Gianni’s eyes darted to the movement, then up to her face. Hi
s suspicion stiffened her nerves. This was the man she knew—tough, uncompromising—a lone wolf if ever there was one. With all the emphasis on the word lone, she thought nervously.

  ‘The truth is, Gianni…I loved working on the Castelfino Estate, and making the decision to leave was so hard…so very hard, I don’t know how I survived.’ She took a deep, noisy breath, bracing herself to put the awful truth into words. Her hand automatically went to her waist again, reminding herself of her new responsibility. ‘I would soon have swallowed my pride and tried to get my job back. But now there’s something stopping me, Gianni.’

  He stared at her until the pulse throbbing in her veins rang through her head.

  ‘Don’t tell me—I know what you’re going to say.You fell in love with me. When all I did was to tell you—and myself—over and over again that I didn’t want any emotional ties?’

  Unable to bear his scrutiny any longer, she closed her eyes and shook her head.

  ‘No, it’s not that.’ Through all her pain she heard him take a sharp breath.

  ‘I find it very hard to believe you didn’t fall in love with me,’ he said indignantly.

  All Meg’s tensions exploded in laughter.

  ‘Oh, Gianni! Only you could say something like that at a time like this! Of course I fell in love with you! That was the main reason I had to get away. I loved you, but you could never love me. When I found out you didn’t even respect me, well, that was the end. And then when I discovered I was pregnant—’

  She stopped with a squeak of horror. After all her careful build-up, the word escaped by accident. She was as shocked by her simple revelation as Gianni was. She had been mentally mapping out all sorts of complicated ways of breaking the news a little bit at a time. In the end, it popped out all by itself.

  They stared at each other until finally Gianni broke the spell and looked away.

  ‘I—I don’t know what to say.’