The Millionaire Tycoon’s English Rose
Lucy Gordon

www.millsandboon.co.uk

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER ONE

‘SLIGHTLYto your left…bit more…bit more…reach out now…can you feel it?’

‘Yes,’ Celia called in delight.

Her fingers made their way through the water until they touched the rock, eased around it, up, down, exploring in all directions, while the man’s voice on the radio spoke in her ear.

‘Try a little farther along. Feel the shape of it.’

‘I’ve got it,’ she said into her own radio. ‘Now I want to go down farther.’

Ken, controlling her lightly from on land, asked into the microphone, ‘Sure you haven’t had enough for the day?’

‘I’ve barely started. I want to do lots more yet.’

From the radio in her ear she heard Ken’s chuckle as he recognised her familiar cry of ‘lots more yet.’ It was the mantra by which she lived, her shout of defiance in the face of her blindness. She’d learned it from her blind parents whose motto had been, ‘Who needs eyes?’

‘I want to go down much deeper,’ she said.

He groaned. ‘Your boyfriend will murder me.’

‘Don’t call him my boyfriend as though we were a couple of kids.’

‘What, then?’

Good question. What should she call Francesco Rinucci? Her fiancé? No, for they’d never talked about marriage. Her live-in companion? Yes, but that didn’t begin to explain it. Her lover? That was true, she thought, shivering pleasurably with the thought. Yes, definitely her lover. But also so much more.

‘Don’t worry about Francesco,’ she said. ‘I didn’t tell him I was coming here. If he finds out, he’ll be too busy murdering me to bother with you. C’mon, let me down. You know I’ll be all right.’

‘If it’s OK with Fiona,’ Ken said, naming her diving partner.

‘Fine with me,’ Fiona sang out on the same frequency. ‘Let’s go.’

She took Celia’s hand and the two of them sank lower and lower into the water of Mount’s Bay, just off the coast of Cornwall in England. They, Ken and his crew had set out from Penzance an hour ago, stopping about a mile from the coast in a place that reputedly concealed a sunken pirate galleon.

‘Went down in a fierce battle with the British Navy,’ he’d told them as they made their way out to sea. ‘And they never recovered the treasure, so you may be lucky.’

‘You don’t need to give me your professional spiel.’ Celia had laughed. ‘Just having the experience is treasure enough for me.’

She’d forced herself to be patient while they strapped the cylinders onto her back and demonstrated how everything worked. She was wearing a full-face mask, which she had at first resisted.

‘I thought it would just be goggles and a mouthpiece connecting me to the oxygen cylinders,’ she’d protested.

‘Yes, but I want to keep radio contact with you, so you need a full-face mask,’ he had said firmly.

She’d yielded under pressure. Then Fiona had taken her hand and the two of them had gone into the water together.

Now Celia could feel her whole body deliciously chilly from the water encasing her outside the rubber suit.

There were more rocks to be felt, plants, sometimes even the exquisite sense of a large fish flapping past, which made her laugh with delight. But the real pleasure lay in the sensation of being free of the world and its tensions.

Free of Francesco Rinucci?

Reluctantly, she admitted that the answer was yes. She adored him, but she’d run away from him as far as she could go. She’d planned this dive a week ago, and kept it a secret from him, saddened by the need, but determined not to yield. If you were blind it was hard enough to keep control of your own life without having to deal with a man who loved you so much that he tried to muffle you in cotton wool.

‘All right?’ came Fiona’s voice over the radio.

‘Yes, it’s so beautiful,’ she said eagerly.

Nobody who knew Celia would be surprised at her saying beautiful. She had her own notion of beauty that had nothing to do with eyes. Everything that reached her through the pressure of the water—the coolness and the freedom—all this was beauty.

‘You can let me go,’ she said, and felt Fiona’s hand slip away.

With Ken still holding the other end of the line she wasn’t completely free, but she could rely on him to back off as much as possible, and give her the illusion. Francesco could learn so much from him. But Francesco would never face how much he didn’t know.

She kicked out with her flippers and powered through the water, relishing the sensation of it streaming past her. Suddenly she was at one with the water, part of it, glorying in it.

‘Wheeeeeeee!’ she cried.

‘Celia?’ Ken sounded nervous.

‘It’s all right,’ she said, laughing. ‘It’s just me going crazy.’

‘No change there, then.’

‘Nope. Wheeeeeeee!’

‘Do you mind?’ he complained. ‘That was my eardrum.’

She chuckled. ‘How far down am I?’

‘About a hundred feet.’

‘Let me have another forty.’

‘Twenty. That’s the limit of safety.’

‘Twenty-five,’ she begged.

‘Twenty,’ he declared implacably.

The line loosened and she sank farther, reaching out at plants and rocks, anything and everything in this marvellous world.

There had been another time when she’d thought the world was marvellous, when she’d just met Francesco. He’d walked into her workplace and stood talking to the receptionist. Celia had been alerted by a soft, ‘Wow!’ from Sally, her young assistant, who was sighted.

‘Wow?’ she queried.

‘Wow!’

‘That’s a lot of wow.’ Celia chuckled. ‘Tell me about him.’

‘He’s tall and dark with deep blue eyes. Probably late thirties, black hair, waves a bit. I like the way he moves—sort of easy and graceful—and he knows how to wear an expensive suit.’

‘You’ve priced his suit?’ Celia’d demanded, amused.

‘I’ve seen it on sale and it costs a fortune. In fact, from the way it fits, I’ll bet he had it specially made for him. He’s got that sort of something about him. An “air”—like the world is his, he’ll take it when it suits him, and in the meantime it can wait until he is ready.’

‘You’re really studying the subject, aren’t you?’ Celia’d said, chuckling.

‘Naturally I want to give you an accurate description. Oh, yes, and he’s got a brooding look that you only see in film stars—Oh, gosh, I forgot you haven’t seen any film stars. I’m really sorry.’

‘Don’t apologise,’ Celia’d said warmly. ‘I work hard to make people forget that I can’t see. You just told me I’ve succeeded. But I’ve always been blind, so I can’t imagine anything. I don’t know what colours look like, or shapes and sizes. I have to discover them by touch.’

‘Well, his shape and size would really be worth discovering by touch,’ Sally’d said frankly, and Celia’d burst into a peal of laughter.

‘He’s looking this way,’ Sally’d hissed. ‘Now he’s coming over.’

Next thing Celia heard a quiet, deep voice with the hint of an Italian accent. ‘Good morning. My name is Francesco Rinucci. I’m looking for Celia Ryland.’

The moment she heard his voice she could ‘see’ him—not in the kind of detail Sally had explained, but in her own way. Easy and graceful, an air as though the world was his; those she had understood at once.

Now, making her way through the water and remembering, she thought that the world really had been his. And when she was in his arms, the world had been hers.

But that had been five months ago. In five short months she’d loved him passionately, fought with him furiously, and learned that she must escape him at all costs.

Five months, and so much had happened in between. So much joy, so much bitterness, so much regret that they had ever met, so much thankfulness that she had known him even for a brief time.

She remembered everything of their meeting. Details reached her differently from other people, but more intensely. As was her way, she had been the first to offer her hand, and had felt him clasp it in return. His hand felt strong and good, with long fingers and a feeling of suppressed power. It had made her wonder about the rest of him.

‘Worth discovering by touch,’ Sally had said.

Celia had tried to put the thought out of her mind but without success. She’d been vividly aware of him moving carefully in the confined space near her desk, where much of the room had been taken up by Wicksy, her golden Labrador guide dog.

Wicksy’s manners were beautiful but reticent. He had accepted Francesco’s admiration as his due, returned it to the extent of briefly resting his snout in Francesco’s hand, then returned to curling up beneath Celia’s desk, apparently relaxed but actually on guard.

The newcomer had sat down close to her, and she’d been able to sense his height, the breadth of him, and something else, a pleasing aroma that shifted between spice and wood-smoke, borne by the breeze. It had spoken of warmth and life, and it had told her that she was living in a shell and should try to reach outside, where he might be waiting.

Only might?

It would be a chance worth taking.

‘Why were you looking for me?’ she asked.

He explained that he was part of Tallis Inc., a firm famous for the manufacture of luxury furniture. Its wares were excellent and it was expanding all over Europe.

‘We need a good PR firm,’ he said. ‘The one we’re using has gone downhill. I was advised to come here, and to ask for you personally. They say you’re the best.’

Being a gentleman, he made a valiant effort to keep the surprise out of his voice, without quite managing it.

‘And now you’re wondering why someone didn’t warn you that I was blind?’ she said impishly.

That threw him; she could tell. She burst out laughing.

‘No—I wasn’t—’ he said hastily.

‘Oh, yes, you were. Don’t deny it to me. I’ve been here too often. I know what people think when they meet me unawares.’

‘Am I that easy to read?’ His tone suggested a hesitant smile.

‘Right this minute you’re thinking, How the hell did I get into this, and how am I going to get out without being rude?’

It was a favourite joke of hers—to read their minds, trip them up, make them feel a little uneasy.

But he wasn’t uneasy. He took her hand and held it tightly, speaking seriously.

‘No, I’m not thinking that. I don’t think you could guess what I’m thinking.’

He was wrong. She could guess exactly. Because she was thinking the same thing.

It was unnerving to find such thoughts possessing her about a man she’d only just met, but she couldn’t help herself. And a part of her, the part that rushed to meet adventure, wasn’t sorry at all. True, another part of her counselled caution, but she was used to ignoring it.

But for the moment she must act with propriety, so she showed him the array of equipment that helped her to function.

‘I talk to the computer and it talks back to me,’ Celia said. ‘Plus I have a special phone, and various other things.’

He took her to lunch at a small restaurant next door, and he talked about his firm while she tapped information into a small terminal. Afterwards he began to walk her back to the office, but she stopped, saying, ‘I have to take Wicksy to the park.’

He went with her, watching, fascinated, as she plunged into her bag and brought out a ball.

‘If I throw it now, I won’t hit anyone, will I?’ she asked anxiously.

He assured her she wouldn’t, then wished he’d been more cautious. Instead of the ladylike gesture he’d expected, she put all her force into hurling the ball a great distance, so that a man contentedly munching sandwiches had to jump out of the way with an angry yell.

‘You told me it was safe,’ she said in mock complaint.

‘I’m sorry. I didn’t realise you could throw that far.’

With a bark of joy, Wicksy bounded after the ball, retrieved it and charged back to drop it at her feet. After another couple of throws he came to sit before her, his head cocked to one side, gazing up at her with a significant expression.

‘All right, let’s go,’ she said, taking the ball from his mouth and putting it away. ‘This next bit is rather indelicate, so you may want to go away.’

‘I’ll be brave,’ he said, grinning.

She found a spot under the trees, said, ‘OK, go on,’ and Wicksy obeyed while she reached into her bag for the scoop and plastic bag.

‘Would you like me to do that for you?’ he asked through gritted teeth.

‘That’s being gallant above and beyond the call of duty,’ she said, liking him for it. ‘But he’s my responsibility and I’ll wield the pooper-scooper.’

‘Well, I offered,’ he said, and something in the sound of the words told her he was grinning with relief.

When the business was complete they made their way back across the park.

At the door of her building he said, ‘I meant to tell you a lot more about my firm and our requirements, but there wasn’t time. Can I take you to dinner tonight and we can talk some more?’

‘I would like that.’

She spent the rest of the afternoon hard at work, for she wanted to impress him. Then she went home, showered, and put on a gold dress that she’d been told looked stunning with her red hair.

In the apartment next door lived Angela, a good friend who worked in a wholesale fashion house, and one of the few people Celia trusted enough to ask for help. Having called her in, she twisted and turned before her.

‘Will I do?’

‘Oh, yes, you’ll do, and then some. You look gorgeous. I was right to make you get that dress. And those sandals. Lord, but I envy you your long legs and your ankles. If you knew how rare it is for a woman to have ankles as slender as yours, and yet have perfect balance so that you can walk on them without wobbling! I could murder you for that alone.’

Celia chuckled. She owed Angela a lot, for it was she who’d taught her how to win the admiring glances that she knew followed her even without seeing them. Angela had decreed the colours that went with Celia’s red hair.

‘But what does it mean—red hair?’ Celia had asked.

‘It means you’ve got to be very careful what you wear with it. You’re lucky in your complexion, pale and delicate, the perfect English-rose style.’

‘What’s an English rose?’ Celia had asked at once.

‘Let’s just say men go for it. That’s what you’re hoping for, isn’t it?’

‘Certainly not. This is a business meeting to discuss strategy and forward planning.’

‘Boy, you really have got it bad.’

Celia laughed, but inwardly she could feel herself blushing. Her friend’s words were true. She had got it bad already.

When she opened the door to Francesco that evening she heard what she’d been hoping for—a brief hesitation that said he was taken aback by her appearance. She smiled at his wolf whistle and inclined her head in mock acceptance.

There was the tiniest hint of their future disagreements when he wanted her to leave Wicksy behind.

‘He goes with me everywhere,’ she said firmly

‘Surely he doesn’t have to? I’ll keep you safe.’

‘But I don’t want to be kept safe,’ she said, still smiling. ‘Wicksy treats me as an equal in ways that nobody else does.’

‘But you don’t need him if you’ve got me,’ he insisted. ‘Besides, restaurants don’t like dogs.’

‘There’s one two streets away that knows Wicksy and always welcomes him. Let’s not argue about it. Wicksy belongs with me and I belong with him.’

She kept her tone pleasant, but he must have sensed her determination because he yielded. She knew a twinge of disappointment. Understanding her need for independence was one of her silent ‘tests’ and he’d failed it. But there was time yet, and she was determined to enjoy her evening with him.

They walked the short distance to the restaurant, and settled down at their table to talk.

‘Did you have to bring that great folder in with you?’ he asked.

‘Of course. How else could I make my pitch? This is a working dinner, remember? I have several ideas that I think you’ll like.’

She talked for several minutes, illustrating her points by pushing various pages towards him. She’d earlier marked them with nail scissors, so that she could tell by feel which was which.

‘You seem to know everything about everything we’ve ever made,’ he said, awed.

‘I’ve been working hard.’

‘I can tell, but how on earth—’ he asked.

‘I accessed a lot of information about your firm on line this afternoon.’

‘And your computer delivers it vocally?’ he hazarded.

‘There is software that does that,’ she said vaguely.

In truth she’d got Sally to read it out to her, a method she sometimes used when she was short of time. But she wasn’t going to tell him that.

There were two conversations going on here, she realised. On the surface she sold her abilities, while he admired her work. It was pleasant, restrained, but beneath the surface they were sizing each other up.

Celia listened closely to every nuance of his voice. Without being deep, it had a resonance that excited her and made her want to touch him.

She’d chosen this restaurant and insisted on taking Wicksy because in that way she could keep some sort of control. The trouble was that she increasingly wanted to abandon control and hurl herself headlong into the unknown.

She sensed that he, too, was putting a brake on himself, but his caution was greater than hers. Francesco eased her away from the subject of work, and made her talk about herself.

‘How did your parents cope with you being blind?’ he asked.

‘Easily. They were both blind, too,’ she explained.

‘Mio Dio! How terrible!’ he said instinctively.

‘Not really. You’d be amazed how little you miss what you’ve never had. Since they couldn’t see, either, and I’m an only child, I had almost no point of comparison. The three of us formed a kind of secret society. It was us against the world because we thought everyone else was crazy. They thought we were crazy, too, because we wouldn’t conform to their ideas about how blind people ought to behave.

‘They met at university, where he was a young professor and she was one of his students. He writes books now, and she does his secretarial work. He says she’s more efficient than any sighted secretary because she knows what to watch out for. They used to say they fell in love because they understood things that nobody else did. So I grew up accepting the way we lived as normal, and I still do.’

There was a slight warning in her voice as she said the last words, but she didn’t make much of the point.

She managed to turn the conversation towards him. He told her about his family in Italy, his parents and his five brothers, the villa perched on the hill with the view over the Bay of Naples. Then he caught himself up, embarrassed.

‘It’s all right,’ she told him. ‘I don’t expect people to censor their speech because I’ve never seen the things they describe. If I did that I wouldn’t have any friends.’

‘And you’ve never seen anything of the world at all,’ he said in wonder. ‘That’s what I can’t get my head round.’

‘Yes, I suppose it is hard,’ she mused. ‘This morning my friend told me you had deep blue eyes, but I had to tell her I couldn’t picture them.’

In the brief silence she could sense him looking around, and strove not to smile.

‘Why—did she tell you that?’ he asked, almost nervously.

She assumed a wicked, breathy innocence. ‘You mean, it’s not true? Your eyes are really deep red?’

‘Only when I’ve had too much to drink.’

She laughed so much that Wicksy, dozing at her feet, pushed his snout against her, asking if all was well.

Something other than laughter was happening that evening. It was in the air between them. Another woman might have read it in his eyes. Celia sensed it with the whole of her being.

The talk drifted back to his family.

‘My mother’s English, but you’d never know it. At heart Signora Rinucci is a real Italian mamma, determined to marry all her sons off.’

‘Six sons? That’s quite an undertaking. How’s she doing?’

‘Four married, two left, But my brother Ruggiero has just got engaged. He’ll marry Polly fairly soon, and then Mamma will turn her firepower on me.’

So now he’d contrived to let her know that he wasn’t married, she thought, appreciating his tactics.

‘Don’t your parents do the same with you?’ he asked casually.

‘It’s the one thing they’ve never given me advice about,’ she said. ‘Except when Dad’s been at work in the kitchen Mum will say, “Never marry a man who cooks squid.” And she’s right.’

After a brief silence he said, ‘We have squid in the Bay of Naples. Best in the world, so the fishermen say.’

‘But you don’t cook it, do you?’

‘No, I don’t cook it,’ he assured her.

And then a strange silence fell, slightly touched by embarrassment, as though they’d both strayed closer to danger than they’d meant.

Celia found that she couldn’t be the one to break the silence, because she was so conscious of what had caused it, but his manner of breaking it brought no comfort. He offered her coffee and another glass of wine, his manner polite and impeccable. Earlier he’d been warm and pleasant. Suddenly only courtesy was left, and it had a hollow feel.

The truth began to creep over her, and with it a chill.

At her front door he said, ‘I’ll take your folder with me. I like your ideas, and I think we’ve got a deal, but I’ll know more when I’ve read it again.’

‘You’ve got my number?’

‘I made sure I got it. Good night.’

He didn’t even try to kiss her.

Now she knew the truth.

When he didn’t call her, she understood why. As though she was inside his head, she followed his thoughts, his dread of getting too close to a blind woman, his common sense advice to himself to back off now, before it was too late.

‘They all do it,’ she mused to Wicksy as they took their final walk one evening. She sat on a bench beneath the trees and felt him press against her. ‘We’ve both known it to happen before. Remember Joe? You never liked him, did you? You tried to tell me that he wouldn’t last, and you were right.’

His nose was cold and comforting in her hand.

‘Men are scared to become involved with me in case it disrupts their pleasant lives, their successful careers.’

The nose nudged gently.

‘I know,’ she said sadly. ‘We can’t blame them, can we? And maybe it’s better for him to be honest and retreat now rather than later.’

Another soft nudge.

‘It’s just that I thought this time it might have been different. I thought he was different. But he isn’t.’

There was a whine from beside her knee, with a distant air of urgency.

‘What’s that? Oh, the biscuit. I’m sorry. I forgot. Here.’

She felt it vanish from her hand.

‘What would I do without you, my darling? You’ve got more sense than the rest of us put together. As long as I’ve got you, I don’t need anyone else.’

Celia leaned down and rested her cheek against his head, trying to take comfort from their loving companionship.

But the truth was that her heart was aching. Something about Francesco had reached out to her, and she had reached back because it had felt so right. It was crazy to feel like this about a man she’d only just met, but with all her heart and soul she wanted him.

Now, floating in the blessed anonymity of the ocean, she wondered how she could have loved him so agonisingly then, and five months later be running away from him?

The question tortured her as she sank deeper into the water, reliving the events of yesterday, when she’d slipped out of the home they shared without telling him where she was going. She’d left him a note that she’d managed to write on a large pad:

I’LL CALL YOU LATER TODAY, CELIA.

She’d hated the deception, hated herself for doing it, but she’d had no choice. She loved him now as much as she’d done on that evening, five months ago, when she’d wondered, sadly, if she would ever see him again. If anything, she loved him more.

And yet she’d escaped him, knowing that if she didn’t she would go mad.

CHAPTER TWO

THE PR contract had been arranged the next day, and over the following week there had been a good deal of coming and going between the two firms. But it had never been Francesco who arrived. Celia had resigned herself to not meeting him again when there was a knock on her front door in the evening.

She’d gone to the door, switching on the light as she went, so that the visitor should have some illumination. She lived without lights.

‘Who is it?’ she called.

‘It’s me,’ came his voice from behind the door.

He didn’t need to identify himself further. They both understood that there was only one ‘me.’ She opened the door and put out her hand, feeling it enfolded in his.

‘I came because—’ He stopped. ‘There are things we need to—Will you let me in—please?’

She stood back. ‘Come in.’

She heard the click as the door closed behind him. He was still holding her hand, but for a moment he didn’t move, as if he was unsure what would come next.

‘I didn’t think you’d come back,’ she said. ‘The contract—’

‘The hell with the contract,’ he said with soft violence. ‘Do you really think that’s why I’m here?’

‘I don’t know what to think,’ she whispered. ‘I haven’t known all week.’

‘I’ll tell you what to think of me—that I’m a coward who runs away from a woman who’s different, more challenging than other women. I run away because secretly I’m afraid I can’t match up to her. I just know I’ll let her down and she’ll be better off without me—’

‘Isn’t that for her to decide?’ she asked joyfully.

His hand tightened on hers and she felt him raise it, then his lips against her palm.

‘I couldn’t keep away from you,’ he said huskily. ‘I tried, but I can’t. And I never will be able to.’

‘I’ll never want you to,’ she said in passionate gratitude.

His lips were burning her hand, igniting her whole body so that she longed for him to touch her everywhere. She drew his face towards her and felt the urgency of his mouth at the first touch of hers. It was as though she’d given him the signal he’d been waiting for.

Now she knew that she’d wanted this since she’d sat with him in the restaurant, listening to his words and trying to picture the mouth that shaped them. His lips on hers, coaxing, inciting, urging, pleading, had been the temptation that teased and taunted her.

And all this week, after he’d gone, she’d been haunted by dreams of the impossible, of his body lying naked against her in the equality that darkness would bring. Now he was here, and joy and excitement possessed her body and soul.

‘Celia,’ he said huskily. ‘Celia—’

She stepped back, drawing him after her towards the bedroom, reaching up to turn out the hall light, so that the place was dark again and only she knew the way.

It might be madness to rush helter-skelter into love. Caution was indicated. But her circumstances and a combative nature had always made her despise caution. Besides, Francesco had tried it and it didn’t work. It was a relief, setting her free.

She touched his face, letting her fingers gently explore its planes and angles, the wide mouth and sharply defined jaw, the slightly crooked nose. He was just as she wanted him to be.

She remembered everything. Floating now on the cushion of water, cut off from the world, she recalled details that she’d barely noticed at the time. They’d been obscured by the sweet fire flaming through her, engulfing all in its path, yet they’d endured in some corner of her consciousness, to be relived later.

Now they made her heart ache for their cruel contrast with the present. Francesco was still the same man who’d won her love by his gentleness and his open adoration of her. He was still the man who’d taken her to bed and loved her with slow, reverent gestures that had brought her flesh to eager life.

The pressure of the water on every part of her body was bringing back those memories. With his very first touch she had felt that he was touching her everywhere. As his lips had lain gently against her breast the reaction had flowed up from her loins and out to every part.

She had been eager to welcome him in, reaching for him, drawing him close, moving with his rhythm. Everything had felt natural because it was with him. His skin, touching hers, had been warm, growing more heated as his passion mounted.

To make love in blindness was an act of trust, but hadn’t failed her. He had been a tender lover, gentle, considerate even in the intensity of his ardour, and above all, generous. Looking back, she often said that her passion had started the day they’d met. Her love dated from that first night together.

When the first explosion of delight had been over and they had fallen apart, stunned and joyful, she’d propped herself up on one elbow and begun to explore him.

‘After all, I can’t see you,’ she teased. ‘I have to find out in my own way.’

‘I guess you were going to discover my feeble muscles and pot-belly some time or other.’ He laughed.

‘Yup. Let’s see, now, is this your shoulder?’

‘It’s at the top of my arm, so I guess it must be.’

‘Nothing feeble about that muscle,’ she murmured. ‘And it continues very nicely along here.’

‘You’ve left my arm behind. That’s my chest.’

‘Mmm,’ she whispered, kissing the pectoral muscles one by one. ‘You don’t have any hair on your chest. I prefer that.’

‘Are you saying you’re an expert?’

‘Blind teaching is very modern these days,’ she said in a serious voice. ‘We take lessons in everything.’

There was the briefest pause before he said cautiously, ‘Everything?’

‘Almost everything.’

‘Are you making fun of me?’

Her lips twitched. ‘Do you think I am?’

‘I wish I could be sure.’

‘Well, you can decide about that later. Where was I?’

‘Exploring my chest.’

‘Let’s leave that for the moment. I don’t want to rush this.’

‘I don’t want to rush it, either,’ he said huskily, letting her fingers roam over his thighs, relishing every moment.

‘You have very long legs,’ she murmured in a considering voice. ‘At least, I suppose they are. I don’t have many points of comparison.’

‘I wish you didn’t have any—unless, of course, you learned that in the leg class?’

She stifled her laughter against his chest, and at last she felt him relax enough to laugh, as well.

Francesco didn’t relax easily, she could tell. It had been a real shock to him when she’d made a joke about her blindness, but he’d soon get the hang of that. She would teach him. In the meantime, they had other business.

‘Now, about that pot-belly of yours,’ she murmured, letting her fingers continue their work. ‘It doesn’t feel very pot to me.’

‘I don’t keep it precisely there,’ he said in a tense voice.

‘You want me to move?’

‘No, just…keep doing…what you’re doing.’

She did as he wished, realising that their previous loving had barely taken the edge off his passion and he was once more in a state of heated arousal. He was hard and hot in her palm, and she indulged herself in pleasure until, at the precise moment she intended, he lost control and tossed her onto her back.

Her own control was fast vanishing. She was eager for him to move over her and repeat the experience that had been so thrilling the first time. She reached for him, barely able to contain herself, clasping him so firmly that they were united in an instant.

At the feel of him inside her she gave a shout of pleasure that mingled with his and began to move strongly, urgently, wrapping her legs around him and holding him close. She wanted to keep him like that always.

Afterwards they slept in each other’s arms for a couple of hours and awoke hungry. She went into the kitchen, refusing his offer to make the food himself.

‘I know where everything is,’ she assured him.

‘Yes, you just proved that,’ he murmured.

‘Don’t be vulgar.’ She chuckled, aiming a mock punch at him.

But she misjudged the distance and caught him across the face, making him yell more in surprise than pain.

‘Darling, darling, I’m sorry,’ she cried, kissing him fiercely. ‘I didn’t mean that.’

‘You’re a violent woman,’ he complained.

‘No, just a blind one. You’ll be covered in bruises in no time.’

‘How can you talk like that?’

‘Because it’s true. You should escape me now, while you still can!’

‘I didn’t mean that. I meant the other thing.’

‘About being blind?’

‘Yes. Never mind that now. Let’s have something to eat.’

She made sandwiches and coffee and they picnicked in the bedroom.

‘It upsets you when I make jokes about being blind, doesn’t it?’ she mused, munching.

‘It confuses me. It’s like invading sacred ground.’

‘It’s not sacred to me. Anyway, it’s my ground and I’ll invade it if I want to. And if I can, you can. So hush!’

They had laughed, and loved again, laughed again and loved again. That was how it had been in the beginning.

And even then the first danger signs had been there, but they’d both been too much in love to heed them. If only…

‘Time to come in,’ came the voice over the radio.

‘Just a few more minutes,’ Celia begged.

‘Your air will be running out soon. Did you find any pirate treasure?’

‘Not this time, but I always live in hope,’ she said, determinedly cheerful.

It was time to go back and face the world. Fiona was close by, calling her, and together they made their way to the boat, where hands came down to welcome them aboard.

‘How was it?’ Ken asked.

‘Wonderful!’ Celia exclaimed. ‘The most glorious feeling—being weightless, and so free—such freedom—as though the rest of the world didn’t exist.’

‘Is that your idea of freedom?’ Fiona asked. ‘Escaping the rest of the world?’

‘Escaping the world’s prejudices, yes,’ Celia murmured thoughtfully.

‘Ah,’ Ken said in a significant voice. ‘I’m afraid that the world has followed you here. I’ve just heard on the radio that when we get back to land you’ll find Francesco waiting for you.’

‘How did he find me here? I just said I was going. I didn’t say where.’

‘I guess he’s got a very good surveillance team working on it,’ Ken suggested lightly.

He meant it as a joke, but Celia’s face tightened and her voice was hard as she said, ‘Evidently.’

‘What do you want to do?’ Ken asked. ‘You’ve paid for the whole day, and there’s two hours left, so we don’t have to go back before then.’

It was on the tip of her tongue to tell him to head out to sea for a long as possible. But she mastered the impulse and said in a resigned voice, ‘No, let’s go back now. I’ve got to face him sooner or later.’

‘Why have you got to face him?’ Fiona asked indignantly. ‘This is the twenty-first century. A woman doesn’t have to put up with an abusive man.’

‘But he isn’t abusive.’ Celia sighed. ‘He’s gentle and loving and protective. He wants to shield me from every wind that blows.’

‘Oh, Lord!’ Fiona said in sympathy. As they neared land she said, ‘I can see his face now. He doesn’t look loving and protective. He looks mad as hell.’

‘Good!’ Celia said. ‘Then can I be as mad as hell and throw something at him?’

‘What would you do about aiming?’ Fiona wanted to know.

‘I wouldn’t need to,’ Celia said despairingly. ‘If he saw me lifting a heavy vase he’d get in front of me and let it hit him. Ooooh, what am I going to do with a man like that?’

‘Leave him,’ Fiona said at once. ‘Or you won’t survive.’

‘I know, I know, but it’s so drastic.’

‘Yes, but I know what it’s like. I broke my leg once, and my boyfriend drove me crazy fussing round me—do this, don’t do that, let me get this for you, don’t strain yourself. In the end I thumped him with my crutch. It was the only way.’

‘What happened to him?’ Celia asked, fascinated.

‘Don’t know. I never saw him again.’

Celia laughed, but the laughter soon faded and she leaned on the rail, her head bent down in the direction of the water that she could hear foaming beneath.

When they reached their destination Francesco was the first on board, coming straight to her and taking her hand.

‘I’ll take you ashore,’ he said. ‘And we’ll go home.’

‘No, thank you,’ she replied firmly. ‘As part of my day out I get a meal with the crew. And I’m hungry.’

‘I’ll get you a meal on the way home,’ he persisted.

His hands were on her arms, urging her so firmly that her anger began to grow.

‘Let go of me, Francesco,’ she said in a low voice.

‘I only want to guide you—’

‘So you say. But you’re that close to dragging me. Please let go, because I’m going to eat here.’

‘If it makes it any easier we’ll give you a refund for that part of the fee,’ Ken offered.

It actually made things harder for her, by cutting the ground out from under her feet, making her sound childishly stubborn for the sake of it. But he meant well, so she smiled and yielded.

She was forced to let Francesco help her off the boat and escort her towards the changing rooms. But she knew he was waiting for her outside. She must face him. And then what?

She knew him so well. She could feel his moods tearing apart the darkness around her, and could sense that behind his courteous charm he was in a furious temper that he was determined to conceal. She, too, was in a temper, but less sure about the virtue of concealing it.

Celia said her goodbyes and thanked Ken for a wonderful day.

‘And I don’t want a refund,’ she said. ‘I had a great time.’

‘Er—actually, I’ve already given the refund to your friend.’

‘What? I never said I was going to agree.’

‘He thought he was doing what would please you,’ Ken said placatingly.

‘You mean, he took it for granted that he knew best,’ Celia snapped. ‘How much did you give him?’

He told her, and she immediately plunged into her bag and produced the amount.

‘I do not want a refund,’ she said.

‘Celia, c’mon—’

‘Take it!’

One look at her set face was enough to make him accept the notes.

‘Good,’ she said. ‘Now, where’s the driver I hired for the day? He should be here to take me home.’

‘I’m here,’ said the voice of a middle-aged man beside her. ‘But there’s a feller over there keeps trying to make me go away. He says he’ll drive you. But I can’t just go off unless you say so. What should I do?’

For a moment she was on the verge of getting into the car and leaving Francesco standing there, looking foolish. But the impulse died. This wasn’t the time nor the place for the coming battle.

‘Tell him you’ll do what he wants,’ she said. ‘But only in return for a huge tip.’

‘How huge?’

‘Take him for all you can,’ she said crossly.

‘Yes, ma’am!’

‘Remind me never to get on your wrong side,’ Ken said with feeling.

She laughed reluctantly. ‘Yes, I’m told I scare strong men.’

‘I believe it. But here’s Fiona with Wicksy. He isn’t scared of you.’

Her guide dog came forward, relieved at recovering her after an absence of several hours. For a few moments they nuzzled each other.

‘Sorry to leave you alone, my darling,’ she murmured. ‘I couldn’t take you onto the boat—’

‘I think he’d have jumped into the water after you,’ Ken said.

‘Yes, he would,’ he said fondly.

‘Are you ready?’ That was Francesco’s voice. ‘I’m driving you home.’

‘What about the driver I hired?’ Celia asked, contriving to sound innocent.

‘I persuaded him to go.’

‘You had no right to do that.’

‘Then no doubt you’ll be pleased to know that he exacted a hefty price,’ Francesco said grimly.

‘Really? Shocking!’

‘And don’t try to sound surprised, because I saw him talking to you, and it wouldn’t surprise me to learn that you put him up to that bit of blackmail.’

‘Who? Me?’

‘Here’s the car. In you go, boy.’

When Wicksy was safely installed on the backseat Celia got into the front, immediately feeling his cold nose against her neck—his way of reminding her that he was still here. She put her hand behind her to touch him, silently saying, Message received, and after that they were both able to relax.

She needed all Wicksy’s calming influence to silence her inner rage at what Francesco had done. It was a long drive home, and she didn’t want to fight in the car.

At first it seemed he didn’t want to, either, but after a while he said through gritted teeth, ‘How could you? How could you do it?’

‘I did it because I had to. Because I wanted to find out if I could.’

‘And now you know. Is anything better?’

‘It might have been if you hadn’t spoiled it. I could just as easily ask, How could you? No, no, don’t answer that. We mustn’t fight about this now. We’ve said it all so often. Let’s just get home.’

Nobody spoke for the rest of the drive, but it didn’t feel like silence because the air was jagged with anger and with all the words being suppressed. By the time they reached their destination she was exhausted.

Home was still the flat she’d lived in before, which had been adapted for her in so many ways that it had made sense for him to move in with her five months earlier. After that one sweet loving there had been no question about their living together. Neither of them could have borne to do anything else.

‘I’ll take Wicksy for his walk,’ she said as she got out of the car.

‘I’ll come with you.’

‘No!’ The word came out in a flash, before she could stop it, and she was instantly contrite. ‘I’m sorry—it’s just that I need to be alone. I’m all tensed up.’

‘I’ll be waiting at home, then,’ he said in a colourless voice.

She was out for a long time, deliberately delaying her return home because of the fearful voice in her mind that warned her they were approaching a crisis, and the wrong words could destroy them both.

Part of her knew the problem had to be faced, and she wanted to go forward and deal with it. Part of her shrank away, arguing that things could be smoothed over with more time, and perhaps everything would be better in future. He might even be asleep when she returned.

But he wasn’t asleep, and she knew that the evil moment couldn’t be postponed any longer.

‘You were gone a long time,’ he said edgily. ‘I was—’

‘Don’t!’ she told him quickly. ‘Don’t say you were worried about me. Just don’t say that.’

‘Is it wrong for me to be worried about you?’

‘You overdo it. That’s all I meant.’

‘I know what a tough day you’ve had, and when you vanish into the darkness like that—’

‘Francesco, for pity’s sake,’ she groaned. ‘Why do you say things like that?’

‘Like what?’

‘Vanish into the darkness. I’m always in the darkness. It’s where I’m at home. I’m not lost in it, as you would be. Why can’t I make you understand that?’

‘I do understand it in one way—’

‘It’s not enough,’ she cried. ‘I’m not helpless, I’m not an invalid, but in your mind I’m always slightly less than a whole person.’

‘No—not really. But—you do have a disadvantage that other people don’t have—’

‘I also have advantages that other people don’t have. My memory is twice as good as yours, because I’ve trained it. I can hear things in people’s voices that you’d miss. I saved you a lot of money once by warning you that the man you were planning to do business with was untrustworthy. I could hear it in his voice. You were very lofty about that at the time. “You and your intuition!” you said. But at least you had the sense to listen to me and throw him out. He’s just started a two-year stretch for fraud, in case you didn’t know.’

‘Yes, I did. I was going to tell you, and say thank you. But I might have known you’d hear it first.’

‘Yes, you might. Perhaps I’m not as much at a disadvantage as you think.’

He sighed, and she could hear him pacing the room.

‘How did you know where to find me?’ she asked.

‘I remembered Ken from when we met him at that party. You talked to him for so long that I got jealous—until I realised it was his diving that fascinated you. You’ve called him several times since then, haven’t you?’

‘Yes, I have. It took time to set up today.’

‘I’m sure there must have been a lot of planning,’ he said in a bleak voice. ‘Booking the day, hiring the car to drive you down there, leaving the flat secretly, not telling me where you were going—that took some organising. When I found your note I checked up on Ken’s firm and discovered that you had a booking.’

‘So you jumped into your car and came down to tell me that I mustn’t dive because I didn’t have your permission?’ she said through gritted teeth.

‘Because it isn’t safe for you.’

‘It’s as safe for me as for anyone. I was on a line. Ken could have hauled me in at any time.’

‘You went behind my back,’ he said harshly.

The bitterness in his voice dulled the edge of her anger, reminding her how easy it was to hurt him. She didn’t want to hurt him, She wanted to love him as she’d done in their first carefree days; days that she knew would never come again.

‘You don’t give me any choice,’ she cried. ‘I had to do it without telling you because you’d have made such a fuss. You always do that if I try to do anything a little bit unusual.’

‘A little bit?’ he echoed. ‘You were scuba diving.’

‘Yes, and I managed perfectly well. As I knew I would. But you can’t bring yourself to believe that, can you? Sometimes I think you actually hate it when I manage to do something without you.’

‘For God’s sake, do you know what you’re saying?’

‘Yes, I’m saying I want to live my life as an adult, without having to apply to you for permission to take every breath.’

‘I’m only trying to keep you safe.’

‘I don’t want to be safe. I want the freedom to take the same risks as other people, and before I met you I had it. I loved it. But you set yourself to take it away from me, wrap me in cotton wool and lock me in a cocoon. I can’t live in there, Francesco, not even if you’re there with me. It’s like a prison, and I have to break out.’

‘Aren’t you being a bit melodramatic?’ he demanded

‘Not from where I’m standing.’

‘Meaning that I’m a gaoler?’

‘The kindest, most loving gaoler in the world,’ she said, trying to soften it. ‘I know that you love me, and it’s your love that makes you overprotective, but I can’t live that way. I’ve got to get as far out on the edge as I can without you trying to drag me back.’

‘Drag you—Now you’re talking nonsense.’

‘Anything you disagree with is nonsense, according to you. I can’t live my life wondering if you’re standing there behind me, trying to bring everything to a halt.’

‘You don’t—’

‘Francesco, listen to me, please. The really sad thing about today is that I would have loved to share it with you. It would have been wonderful to go into the water together and sink down, hand in hand. I even came to the edge of telling you. But I backed off at the last minute because I knew you’d do everything to stop me.’

‘Because I don’t want to lose you,’ he growled.

‘But you are losing me,’ she said piteously. ‘Oh, why can’t you see that?’

‘By trying to protect you? Isn’t that my job? We’re practically husband and wife, and a man looks after his wife—’

‘That shouldn’t mean putting a ball and chain on her.’

She heard his sharp intake of breath. ‘That’s a lousy thing to say.’

‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like that.’

‘I’d sure as hell like to know how you did mean it,’ he said bitterly.

‘It’s just that to you life is one big word—no.’

‘All right, maybe I take things a little too far,’ he grated, ‘but I don’t just ask you to say no to things you want. I wouldn’t do that without being prepared to do the same.’

‘What do you mean by that?’ she asked, with a sudden keen edge to her voice.

He failed to hear its significance,

‘My firm asked me to start an Italian branch, in Naples—’

‘Your home town,’ she gasped in delight. ‘That’s great. When do we leave?’

‘We don’t. I turned it down.’

‘You did what?’

‘How could I possibly ask you to come to Italy with me? You manage well enough in England, but what would you do in a strange country?’

‘Meaning that I’m too stupid to find the way? Are you forgetting that I’ve already learned Italian?’

‘We’ve done some together, cara, and it’s been delightful—’

‘A delightful game, you mean?’ she said in a hard voice. ‘Humouring me. You made a big decision like that without consulting me because you didn’t think I was up to the task?’

‘I only meant—’

‘How dare you? How dare you?’

‘I was only thinking of you,’ he retorted.

‘Did I ask you to think of me? I’m not a child, Francesco, and I’m not an idiot. And I’ve had enough of you treating me that way.’

‘Look, we’ll talk about it when you’ve calmed down.’

‘I’m not worked up. Inside I’m as cold as ice, and I’m telling you that I want you to go.’

‘Go where? I live here.’

‘Not any longer. It doesn’t work between us. I think perhaps it never could. Please go quickly. I don’t want to see you here again.’

‘You don’t want to what?’

‘Go!’

‘Celia, for pity’s sake, stop this before it’s too late.’

‘It’s been too late for a long time,’ she whispered.

‘Look, I’m sorry if I went too far. But after all we’ve been to each other you can’t just—’

‘It’s over,’ she said, feeling that she would start to scream in a minute. ‘Please go, Francesco. Just pack a bag and go tonight. You can get the rest of your things later. But go now.’

In the silence she could sense that he was totally stunned. He knew she meant it.

Suddenly she broke.

‘Get out!’ she screamed. ‘Just get out!’

CHAPTER THREE

‘GET out. Just get out.’

He heard the words before he awoke. They echoed in the darkness behind his eyes, screaming around his head like curses.

Then his eyes were open and he was sitting up in bed, trying to understand the world around him. He didn’t know where he was. Surely this was his home back in London, but where was she? Why not in bed with him?

Then the haze cleared, the walls fell into place. He was back at his parents’ home, the Villa Rinucci in southern Italy, a place where he hadn’t lived for years.

Now he was using it as a refuge until he could clear his head. Nothing had been straight in his mind since the day Celia had thrown him out. Somehow he’d organised himself, agreed to return to Naples to set up the Italian branch of his firm, and left England. There had been one brief meeting with Celia when he’d collected his things, but they had spoken to each other like strangers, and he hadn’t seen her again. She was behind him. Finished. Over and done with.

Except that her cry of ‘Get out!’ still echoed with him, day and night. And the worst thing, the thing that actually scared him, was that it wasn’t only her voice he heard. It was as though someone had cast a malign spell, triggered by those words and those alone. And he couldn’t escape.

Francesco got out of bed and went to the window, seeing the dawn beginning to break over the Bay of Naples. As he sat there, unwilling to return to bed and risk a repetition of the nightmare, he heard a soft footstep in the corridor outside and knew that it was Hope, refusing to accept that a man in his late-thirties didn’t need to be hovered over protectively by his mother.

He heard her stop outside his door and waited with dread for the knock. He loved his mother, but he shrank from the questions he couldn’t answer because he didn’t want to face them.

After a while she went away, leaving him alone with the brightening dawn that had no power over the darkness inside him.

‘Are you looking at those again?’ Toni Rinucci asked his wife warmly.

Hope smiled, looking up from the book of wedding photographs she was studying.

‘I can’t help it,’ she said. ‘They are so beautiful.’

‘But Ruggiero has been married for three months now,’ he said, naming one of their twin sons.

‘The pictures are still beautiful after three months,’ Hope said. ‘Look at little Matti.’

Ruggiero’s toddler son stood just in front of his father and Polly, his new stepmother. Although only two years old, he’d already managed to steal the limelight.

‘He looks like a little angel in that pageboy suit,’ Hope said sentimentally.

‘Yes—you’d never know that he’d covered it with mud ten minutes later,’ Toni observed with grandfatherly cynicism.

‘He’s real boy,’ Hope declared happily. ‘Oh, look!’

She’d reached the picture showing all six of her sons.

‘It’s so good to see them all together.’ She sighed. ‘Francesco has been away so much—first America, then England—but this time he was here. Oh, it’s so good to have him finally back where he belongs.’

Toni was silent as they went down the stairs together, and Hope, who could read his silences, glanced at him.

‘You don’t think so?’ she asked.

‘I’m not sure he’s home to stay. He’s not a boy any more.’

‘But of course he won’t stay with us for ever,’ Hope conceded. ‘He’ll find his own place and move out. But we’ll still see him far more often than when he was living abroad.’

Hope made some coffee for the two of them, and took it out onto the terrace with its view over the bay. They both loved these moments when they had the house to themselves and could indulge in gossip about everyday matters—their household, their sons, their growing army of grandchildren, their upcoming thirty-fifth wedding anniversary—or just about nothing in particular.

‘That isn’t really what I meant,’ said Toni as she set his coffee before him, just as he liked it. ‘I sense something strange about his coming home now.’

‘He came home for the wedding,’ Hope pointed out.

‘Yes, but we thought he’d be here a few days, and bring Celia with him. Instead, he came without her, and stayed. Why did he suddenly leave England? He had a good career there, in a successful firm. He owns shares in it and was making a fortune.’

‘But he’ll do even better by setting up here,’ Hope pointed out. ‘It made sense for them to send him to his own country.’

‘I don’t like things that are too sensible,’ her husband complained. ‘There’s something else behind it.’

Hope nodded. ‘I think so, too,’ she conceded. ‘I just hope it isn’t—’

‘What?’ Toni asked, laying his hand over hers.

‘He used to tell us so much about Celia. Every phone call, every letter was all about her. I was surprised when he said she was blind, because he’s not a man who—Well—’

‘Yes, I can’t imagine him living with a woman he has to care for all the time,’ Toni agreed. ‘But I thought we were wrong. I was proud of him. He even sent us photographs of her, and called her his English rose. I’d never known him to be so committed to a woman before.’

‘Then suddenly it’s all over,’ Hope said, ‘and he comes home without her. He’s been back for three months now, and he never speaks of her. Why?’

‘What are you afraid of?’

‘That he left her because his love wasn’t great enough for him to cope. I should be sorry to think that was true of any son of mine.’

‘But you didn’t like him living with her at the start,’ Toni pointed out. ‘You said her blindness would hold him back.’

She made a face.

‘All right, I admit I’m not consistent,’ she conceded. ‘Is anyone?’

‘Never, in all the years I’ve known you, have you been consistent,’ her husband said fondly.

‘I wanted him to be sensible.’ she said, ‘But I suppose I don’t like him to be too sensible. I wanted to believe that my son is better than myself, kinder and more generous.’

‘Nobody is more generous than you,’ Toni protested. ‘But for the generosity of your love my life would be nothing.’

‘You praise me too much,’ she said with a little smile. ‘It isn’t generous to love a man who gives you everything you want.’

He returned the smile, and she kissed him, but they both knew that it wasn’t really true. Despite his love, he didn’t give her everything she wanted. Only one man could have done that, and Toni was not that man. It would have been too much to say that he knew it, but he’d always had a suspicion, which he proved by determinedly refusing to ask questions.

Thirty-five years ago he had met Hope, an Englishwoman visiting Italy, a divorcee with three sons: Luke, adopted; Francesco, born during her marriage, but not by her husband; and Primo, the stepson she’d come to love. Toni had loved her from the first moment, and had been overjoyed when she’d agreed to marry him. Only his own children could increase his happiness, and that had come about the following year, with the birth of twin sons, Carlo and Ruggiero.

Since then he had sometimes wondered if Francesco was her secret favourite, but her adoration of each one of her sons was so all-encompassing that it was hard for Toni to be sure of his suspicions. Nor did he ever allow himself to brood about them.

Hope had missed Francesco badly since he’d left home to work in America, later moving to England, but she would have missed any of them who vanished for years, making only brief visits home.

But suddenly, three months ago, he’d returned to Naples from England, ostensibly for his brother’s wedding, and full of plans for setting up a branch of his firm and increasing his already healthy fortune. While he looked for somewhere to live he’d moved back into the Villa Rinucci, in the room that had always been kept for him, even when it had seemed he would never occupy it again.

But he had come without the woman he’d once seemed to love, and he would never speak of her.

‘You’re afraid he just dumped her because she was a burden, aren’t you?’ Toni asked his wife gently. ‘But I don’t believe that. Not our Francesco.’

‘I’ve told myself that many times.’ Hope sighed. ‘But how well do we know him these days?’

‘Maybe she dumped him?’ Toni suggested mildly.

‘Toni, caro, you’re talking nonsense. A girl with a disability dumping a man who could look after her? No, it’s something else—something that gives him bad dreams.’

‘He tells you this?’ Toni asked, startled.

‘No, but sometimes he mutters in his sleep. I’ve heard him through the door. Last night I heard him cry, “Get out!” At other times he gets up and walks the floor for hours, as though he was afraid to go back to sleep.’

‘Now it is you who are talking nonsense,’ he told her firmly. ‘If he walks the floor, surely it’s because he’s making plans for the factory? Why should he be afraid to sleep?’

‘I wish he would tell me,’ Hope said sadly. ‘There is something about this situation that he’s keeping a secret, and it hurts him.’

‘Does he know that you heard him last night?’

‘No, I meant to knock on his door, but I lacked the courage.’

‘Don’t tell me that you’re afraid of your own son?’ he said in a rallying voice.

‘Not exactly. But there’s a distant place inside himself, where nobody else is allowed.’

‘That’s always been there,’ Toni pointed out. ‘As long as I’ve known Francesco he’s protected that inner place—sometimes fiercely. I remember the very first day we met. He was three years old, and the wary look was already in his eyes.’

‘Perhaps he was just nervous at meeting a stranger?’ Hope mused.

‘Francesco has never been nervous of anyone in his life. People are nervous of him. He’s always kept himself to himself. That way he doesn’t have to bother with anyone who doesn’t interest him.’

‘Caro, what a cruel thing to say!’ Hope protested.

‘I don’t mean to be cruel, but he’s the man he is. He isn’t wide-open to people, and his heart is difficult to reach. He prefers it like that. It saves having to make small talk. He’s impatient with small talk. It’s a waste of time. He told me so.

‘You make him sound so grim,’ Hope objected.

‘He is grim in many ways. He lacks charm, and that’s another thing he’s glad of.’

‘I’ve always found him very charming,’ Hope said, offended.

‘So have I. Inside this family he can be delightful. To those he loves he shows warmth and generosity, but to them only. Generally he’s indifferent to the world and its opinions, and nothing’s going to change him. That’s why if this young woman really was the right one, breaking up with her was a greater tragedy than it would be with other men.’

‘But he dismissed her.’

‘Did he? I wonder. What a pity you didn’t manage to talk to him when you heard him call out in his sleep. He might have opened up at that moment.’

‘You’re right.’ She sighed. ‘I’m afraid I’ve missed the chance. This morning he rose early and left before the rest of us were up.’

‘Careful to avoid us,’ Toni murmured.

‘No, no, I’m sure we’re making too much of this, and all is well with him,’ she said, as lightly as she could manage.

Toni rested his hand fondly on her shoulder.

‘If you say so, carissima,’ he said.

For the rest of the day Hope was inwardly disturbed. The conversation of the morning haunted her, and she found herself repeatedly going out onto the terrace to look down the path to where a car would climb the hill, hoping that Francesco would return early.

But there was no sign of him, and at last the light began to fade.

Despondently, she was about to go inside but stopped at the sight of something moving on the road below. A vehicle was climbing the hill, and for a moment she allowed herself to hope. But then she saw that it was a taxi. It stopped at the steps and the driver got out to open the rear passenger door.

The first creature out was a dog, a beautiful black Labrador, wearing the harness of a guide dog. A strange feeling came over Hope, and she began to understand even before she saw the other occupant unfold her long, graceful legs and step out. It was the young woman in the pictures Francesco had sent her.

‘Good afternoon,’ Hope called, speaking her native English. ‘You must be Signorina Ryland.’

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