Bella Rosa Marriages
The Bridesmaid’s
Secret
Fiona Harper
The Cowboy’s
Adopted Daughter
Patricia Thayer
Passionate Chef,
Ice Queen Boss
Jennie Adams

www.millsandboon.co.uk

The Bridesmaid’s Secret

About the Author

As a child, FIONA HARPER was constantly teased for either having her nose in a book or living in a dream world. Things haven’t changed much since then, but at least in writing she’s found a use for her runaway imagination. After studying dance at university, Fiona worked as a dancer, teacher and choreographer before trading in that career for video editing and production. When she became a mother she cut back on her working hours to spend time with her children, and when her littlest one started preschool she found a few spare moments to rediscover an old but not forgotten love—writing.

Fiona lives in London, but her other favourite places to be are the Highlands of scotland and the Kent countryside on a summer’s afternoon. she loves cooking good food and anything cinnamon flavoured. of course, she still can’t keep away from a good book or a good movie—especially romances—but only if she’s stocked up with tissues, because she knows she will need them by the end, be it happy or sad. Her favourite things in the world are her wonderful husband, who has learned to decipher her incoherent ramblings, and her two daughters.

PROLOGUE

NO ONE else must see the contents of this letter, Scarlett! Give it only to Romano.

Her older sister’s words echoed through her head as Scarlett ran through the woods on the outskirts of Monta Correnti, her long dark hair trailing behind her. Jackie would be cross if she knew Scarlett had peeked at the sheets of the scrawled, tear-stained writing, but one corner of the envelope flap had been a little loose and it had been too tempting.

Before she went to the piazza to find Romano and give it to him, she had to show Isabella, her cousin and partner in crime. This was way too big a secret to keep to herself. Although she and Isabella were both the same age, Isabella was the eldest in her family and always seemed to know what to do, how to take charge when anyone needed her.

It was totally different in Scarlett’s family. She was the youngest of the three sisters. The one who was always left out of important discussions because she ‘wouldn’t understand’. She was fed up with it. Just because Jackie was four years older she thought it was okay to boss Scarlett around and make her do her errands, which wasn’t fair. So just this once Scarlett was going to do things her way, to make it fair.

There were too many hushed voices and whispered insults in her family already, and no one would tell her why.

She was heading for a small clearing with a stream running through it at the bottom of the hill. No one else knew about this spot. It was her and Isabella’s secret. They would come here to talk girl-type stuff, when Isabella could get away from looking after her nosey little brothers. They would build camps out of branches and leaves, and make up secret codes and write in their diaries—which they always let each other read. Sometimes they would whisper about Romano Puccini, the best-looking boy in the whole of Monta Correnti.

That was another thing that wasn’t fair!

Just as Scarlett had decided she was old enough to notice boys and develop her first crush, Jackie had got in there first—as always. Jackie had been seeing Romano for weeks and weeks! Behind Mamma’s back as well. Just wait until Isabella found out!

Scarlett’s breaths were coming in light gasps now and the small sigh she let out was hardly noticeable. So Romano only had eyes for bossy old Jackie! Scarlett hated her for it. At least she did when she remembered to.

A flash of pink sundress through the trees told Scarlett that Isabella was in the clearing already. They’d whispered their plans to meet earlier, in the piazza outside their parents’ restaurants.

As Scarlett burst into the clearing Isabella looked up. Her raised eyebrows said it all. What are you in a flap about this time, Scarlett?

Scarlett just slowed to a walk and held the letter out to Isabella, her arm rigid.

Isabella shrugged as she took the envelope and pulled three sheets of paper out of it. But she wasn’t sitting and shrugging and rolling her eyes at Scarlett for long. Once she’d read the first page she was on her feet and joining in the flapping.

After all the exclamations, they stood and stared at each other, guilty smiles on their lips.

‘Oh, my goodness!’ Isabella finally whispered. ‘Jackie and Romano! Really?’

This was the reaction Scarlett had been hoping for. She nodded. She’d hardly believed it herself when she’d read all that mushy stuff Jackie had written to Romano! Okay, some of it hadn’t exactly made sense, but she’d got the general gist. She nodded to Isabella to keep reading.

Isabella didn’t need much encouragement. She quietened down and carried on, stopping every now and then to ask Scarlett to decipher her sister’s handwriting.

When she’d finished she looked up. This time there were no guilty smiles. There was no flapping. The look on Isabella’s face wiped away the giddiness Scarlett had been experiencing and the spinning feeling moved swiftly to her stomach.

‘What are you going to do?’ Isabella asked.

Scarlett frowned. ‘Give the letter to Romano, of course.’

Isabella shook her head. ‘You can’t do that. You need to show this to Aunt Lisa!’

A noise of disbelief forced its way out of Scarlett’s lips. ‘Do you know what Mamma will do if she finds out? Jackie will be in so much trouble!’

Isabella looked at the sheets of paper between her fingers, now looking less than pristine and just a little crumpled. ‘It’s too big a secret.’ The letter made a crinkling noise as she tightened her grip.

Scarlett suddenly had a nasty feeling about this. Isabella wouldn’t, would she? She wouldn’t take the letter to Mamma herself? But then she saw the glint of determination in her cousin’s eyes and knew that Isabella just might take the matter into her own hands.

If that happened, not only would Jackie suffer their mother’s wrath, but Scarlett would be in big trouble herself. Jackie had a temper every bit as fiery as Mamma’s. Scarlett snatched for the letter.

Isabella was fast, though, too used to dealing with a pair of rambunctious younger brothers to be caught off guard, and Scarlett only managed to get a grip on one bit of paper. They pulled at either end of the sheet. Isabella was shouting that Scarlett needed to let go, because she wasn’t going to tell. Just as the words were starting to make sense to Scarlett, as the page was on the verge of ripping in two, Isabella released it. The sheets of pink writing paper and matching envelope flew into the air.

Both girls froze and watched them flutter slowly towards the ground.

Just before it landed in the dirt, one wayward sheet decided to catch its freedom on a gust of air. It started to lift, to twirl, to spin. Suddenly Scarlett was moving, jumping, reaching, trying to snatch it back, but it always seemed to dance out of her fingers just as she was about to get a hold of it.

Now Isabella had finished collecting up the rest of the paper, she was trying to get it too. The wind heaved a sigh and the piece of paper fluttered tantalisingly close. Scarlett jumped for it. Her fingers closed around it.

But then Isabella collided with her and she found herself crashing onto the damp earth of the stream bank. She hit the ground hard and every last bit of air evacuated from her lungs, and she momentarily lost the ability to control her muscles. The page saw its chance and eased itself out of her hand and into the waiting stream.

Isabella started to cry, but all Scarlett could do was watch it float away, the ink turning the paper a watery blue, before it disappeared beneath the surface.

She pulled herself up and brushed the dirt off her front. ‘Stop it!’ she yelled at Isabella, who was sobbing. And before she could dampen the rest of the pages with her silly crying, Scarlett pulled them from Isabella’s fist and tried to smooth them out.

‘Page three is missing! Page three!’ She glanced back towards the stream, her face alive with panic.

Oh, why couldn’t it have been page two, with all the love-struck gushing and rambling? Romano would never have noticed. But it had been page three—the one with the really big secret.

‘What are we going to do?’ Isabella said quietly, dragging a hand over her eyes to dry her tears. More threatened to fall, but she sniffed them away.

Scarlett shook her head. ‘I don’t know.’

The icy fear that had been solidifying her limbs suddenly melted into something much warmer, much hotter.

This was all Jackie’s fault! Why couldn’t she have taken the letter to Romano herself? Why had she involved her baby sister in the first place? Didn’t she know that was a stupid thing to do? According to everyone else, Scarlett couldn’t be trusted with anything!

She turned to Isabella, her mouth pulled thin. ‘We can’t give the letter to Romano like this.’Jackie would just have to do her own dirty work and talk to him herself. ‘And Jackie will kill me if I tell her what I did. There’s only one thing we can do.’

Isabella started to sniff again, mumbling something about it all being her fault, but Scarlett wasn’t listening; she was staring at the gurgling waters of the stream.

Slowly, she walked back to the very edge of the bank. Between thumb and forefinger, she lifted another page high and then, in a very deliberate motion of her fingers, let it go. Another page followed, then the envelope. It seemed an almost solemn procedure, as if she were scattering dirt on a coffin. Thick, funereal silence hovered in the air around them as they held their breath and watched Jackie’s secret float downstream.

No one else must see the contents of this letter, Scarlett.

Now no one ever would.

CHAPTER ONE

THE air conditioning of the limo was functioning perfectly, but as Jackie stared out of the tinted window at the rolling hills, at the vineyards and citrus groves, she could almost feel the sun warming her forearms. It was an illusion. But she was big on illusions, so she let it slide and just enjoyed the experience.

The whole process of coming home would also be an illusion. There would be loud exclamations, bear hugs, family dinners where no one could get a word in—not that it would stop anyone trying—but underneath there would be a wariness. There always was. Even the siblings and cousins who didn’t know her secret somehow picked up on the atmosphere and joined in, letting her keep them at arm’s length.

They became her co-conspirators as she tried to deny her Italian side and laced herself up tight in Britishness—the one thing her father had given her that she treasured. She had learned how to shore herself up and keep herself together, but then Jackie always excelled at everything she did, and this was no exception.

She hadn’t called ahead to let the family know what time she was arriving. A limousine and her own company were preferable at present. She needed time to collect herself before she faced them all again.

It had been a couple of years since she’d been home to Monta Correnti. And when she did come these days, it was always in the winter. The summers were too glorious here, too full of memories she couldn’t afford to revisit. But then her older sister had chosen a weekend in May for her wedding celebrations, and Jackie hadn’t had much choice. It seemed she hadn’t been able to outrun the tug of a big Italian family after all, even though she’d tried very, very hard.

She turned away from the scenery—the golds and olives, the almost painful blue of the sky—and picked up a magazine from the leather seat beside her. It was the latest issue from Gloss! magazine’s main rival. Her lips curved in triumph as she noted that her editorial team had done a much better job of covering the season’s latest trends. But that was what she paid them for. She expected nothing less.

The main fashion caught her attention. Puccini—one of Italy’s top labels. But she hadn’t needed to read the heading to recognise the style. The fashion house had gone from strength to strength since Rafael Puccini had handed the design department over to his son.

With such a man at the helm, you’d expect the menswear to outshine the women’s collections, but it wasn’t the case. Romano Puccini understood women’s bodies so well that he created the most exquisite clothes for them. Elegant, sensuous, stylish. Although she’d resisted buying one of his creations for years, she’d succumbed last summer, and the dress now hung guiltily in the back of her wardrobe. She’d worn it only once, and in it she’d felt sexy, powerful and feminine.

Maybe that was why the house of Puccini was so successful, why women stampeded the boutiques to own one of their dresses. Good looks and bucketloads of charm aside, Romano Puccini knew how to make each and every woman feel as if she were as essentially female as Botticelli’s Venus. Of course, that too was an illusion. And Jackie knew that better than most.

She frowned, then instantly relaxed her forehead. She hadn’t given in to the lure of Botox yet, but there was no point making matters worse. Although she was at the top of her game, Editor-in-chief of London’s top fashion magazine, she was confronted daily by women who wore the youthful, fresh-faced glow that she’d been forced to abandon early. Working and living in that environment would make any woman over the age of twenty-two paranoid.

Her mobile phone rang and, glad of the distraction, she reached into her large soft leather bag to answer it. The name on the caller ID gave her an unwanted spike of adrenaline. Surely she should be used to seeing that name there by now?

‘Hello, Kate.’

‘Hey, Jacqueline.’

Her own name jarred in her ears. It sounded wrong, but she hadn’t earned the title of ‘mother’ from this young woman yet. Maybe she never would.

‘Is there something I can help you with?’

There was a pause. A loaded sixteen-year-old pause.

‘Are you there? In Italy?’

Jackie’s gaze returned to the view beyond the tinted windows. It whipped past silently, the insulation of the limousine blocking out any noise from outside. ‘Yes. I left the airport about twenty minutes ago.’

There was a sigh—which managed to be both wistful and accusatory—on the other end of the line. ‘I wish I could have come with you.’

‘I know. I wish you could have too. But this situation…telling my family…it needs some careful handling.’

‘They’re my family too.’

Jackie closed her eyes. ‘I know. But it’s complicated. You don’t know them—’

‘No, I don’t. And that’s not my fault, is it?’

Jackie didn’t miss Kate’s silent implication. Yes, it was her fault. She knew that. Had always known that. But that wasn’t going to help calm her mother down when she announced that the child she’d handed over for adoption sixteen years ago had recently sought her out, that she’d been secretly meeting with that daughter in London for the last few months—especially when it had been her mother’s iron insistence that no one else in the family should ever know. To a woman like Lisa Firenzi, image was everything. And a pregnant teenage daughter who’d refused to name the father of her baby didn’t fit in the glossy brochure that was her life.

Jackie hadn’t even been as old as Kate when it had happened. Back then, every day when she’d come down the stairs for breakfast, her mother had scrutinised her profile. When she hadn’t been able to disguise the growing swell of her stomach with baggy T-shirts, she’d been quietly sent away.

She’d arrived in London one wet November evening, a shivering fifteen-year-old, feeling lost and alone. The family had been told she’d gone to stay with her father, which was true. He’d been husband number two. Lisa had managed to devour and spit out another husband and quite a few lovers since then.

So, not only had Jackie to reconcile her mother to the fact that the dirty family secret she’d tried to hide was now out in the open, but she had to break the news to her uncle and cousins—even Lizzie and Scarlett, her sisters, didn’t know. She was going to have to handle the situation very, very carefully.

Lizzie’s wedding would be the first time she and all her sisters and cousins had been together in years and she couldn’t gazump her sister’s big day by turning up with a mystery daughter in tow, and it wouldn’t have been fair to drop Kate into the boiling pot of her family’s reactions either. Jackie had absolutely no idea how they were going to take the news and the last thing her fragile daughter needed was another heap of rejection.

She drew in a breath through her nostrils, the way her Pilates instructor had taught her. ‘I know, Kate. And I’m sorry. Maybe next time.’

The silence between them soured.

‘You’re ashamed of me, aren’t you?’

Jackie sat bolt upright in the back seat. ‘No!’

‘Well, then, why won’t you let me meet my uncles and aunts, my cousins—my grandmother?’

There was no shyness about this girl. She was hot-headed, impulsive, full of self-righteous anger. Very much as her biological mother had been as a teenager. And that very same attitude had landed her into a whole heap of trouble.

‘Family things…they’re difficult, you know…’

A soft snort in her ear told Jackie that Kate didn’t know. That she didn’t even want to know. Jackie only had one card left to play and she hoped it worked.

‘Remember how you told me your mum—’ Your mum. Oh, how that phrase was difficult to get out ‘—found it difficult when you told her you wanted to find your biological mother, even though you weren’t eighteen yet? It was hard to tell her, wasn’t it? Because you didn’t want to hurt her, but at the same time it was something you needed to do.’

‘Yes.’ The voice was quieter now, slightly shaky.

‘You’re just going to have to trust me—’ Sweetheart. She wanted to say ‘sweetheart’ ‘—Kate. This is something I need to do first. And then you can come on a visit and meet everyone, I promise.’

Just like every other girl of her age, Kate was rushing at life, her head full of the possibilities ahead of her, possibilities that dangled like bright shiny stars hung on strings from the heavens. They tempted, called. If only she could make Kate see how dangerous those sparkly things were…how deceptive.

Something in her tone must have placated her newly found daughter, because Kate sounded resigned rather than angry when she rang off. Jackie slid her phone closed and sank back into the padded leather seat, exhausted.

She hadn’t realised how hard the reunion would be, even though she’d been waiting for it since she’d put her name on the adoption register when she’d been twenty. When she’d got the first call she’d been overjoyed, but terror had quickly followed. She and Kate had had a tearful and awkward first meeting under the watchful eye of her adoptive mother, Sue.

Kate had been slightly overawed by Jackie’s high-fashion wardrobe and sleek sports car. Sue had taken Jackie aside after a few weeks and warned her that Kate was dazzled by the fact her ‘real’ mum was Jacqueline Patterson, style icon and fashion goddess. Don’t you dare let her down, Sue’s eyes had said as she’d poured the tea and motioned for Jackie to sit at her weathered kitchen table.

Jackie was doing her best, but she wasn’t convinced she could make this work, that she and Kate could settle into a semblance of a mother-daughter relationship. They’d gone through a sort of honeymoon period for the first month or two, but now questions and emotions from the past were starting to surface and not everything that was rising to the top was as glossy and pretty as Jackie normally liked things to be.

Once she told her mother, Kate’s grandmother, the cat would be out of the bag and there would be no going back. But Jackie had no other option. She wanted…needed…to have her daughter back in her life, and she was going to do whatever it took to make a comfortable space for her, no matter how hard the fallout landed.

The limo swung round a bend in the road and Jackie held her breath. There was Monta Correnti in the distance, a stunningly beautiful little town with a square church steeple and patchwork of terracotta tiled roofs seemingly clinging to the steep hillside. It was currently a ‘hot’ holiday destination for Europe’s rich and notorious, but it had once been Jackie’s home. Her only real home. A place filled with memories, yellow and faded like old family photographs.

Before they reached the town centre, the limo branched off to the left, heading up a tree-lined road to the brow of the hill that was close enough to look down its nose on the town but not near enough to feel neighbourly.

The road to her mother’s villa.

Jackie tided the magazines on the back seat, made sure everything she needed was in her handbag and pulled herself up straight as the car eased through gates more suited to a maximum-security prison than a family home.

Romano opened the tall windows of his drawing room and stepped onto the garden terrace. It all looked perfect. It always looked perfect. That pleased him. He liked simple lines, clean shapes. He wasn’t a man who relished anything complicated or fussy. Of course, he knew that perfection came at a cost. None of this happened by accident.

In his absence, the low hedges of the parterre had been clipped by an army of gardeners, the gravel paths raked and smoothed until they were perfectly flat and unsullied by footprints. The flowers in the vast stone urns had been lovingly weeded and watered. And the attention hadn’t been confined to the garden. Every inch of the Puccini family’s old summer home was free from dust. Every window and polished surface gleamed. It was the perfect place to retreat from the grime and noise of Rome in the summer months. And Romano enjoyed it so much here he’d recently decided to keep it as his main residence, even in winter, when Lake Adrina was filled with waves of polished pewter and the wind was less than gentle.

Palazzo Raverno was unique, built by an ostentatious count in the eighteenth century on a small island, shaped like a long drawn-out teardrop. On the wider end of the island Count Raverno had spared no expense in erecting a Neo-gothic Venetian palace, all high arches and ornate masonry in contrasting pink and white stone. It should have looked ridiculously out of place on a tranquil wooded island in the middle of a lake—but somehow the icing-sugar crispness of the house just made it a well-placed adornment to the island. From what he knew of the infamous count, Romano suspected this had been more by accident than design.

And if the palazzo was spectacular, the gardens took one’s breath away. Closer to the house the gardens were formal, with intricate topiary and symmetrical beds, but as they rolled away to the shore and reached to the thin end of the island they gave the impression of a natural Eden.

Romano could resist it no longer. His wandering became striding and he soon found himself walking down the shady paths, stopping to listen to the soft music of the gurgling waterfall that sprang out of a rockery. He didn’t plan a route, just let his feet take him where they wanted, and it wasn’t long before he arrived in the sunken garden.

The breeze was deliciously cool here, lifting the fringes of the drooping ferns. Everything was green, from the vibrant shades of the tropical plants and the dark glossiness of the ivy, to the subtle sponginess of the moss on the walls of the grotto.

It was all so unbearably romantic. The island was the perfect place for a wedding.

Not his wedding, of course. He smiled at the thought. Nobody would ever be foolish enough to think the day would come when he’d pledge his body and soul to one woman for eternity.

A month or two, maybe.

He sighed as he left the leafy seclusion of the sunken garden and walked into the fragrant sunshine of a neatly clipped lawn. From here he climbed a succession of terraces as he made his way back towards the house. The days when this island had been a playground for the idle rich were long gone. He had work to do.

However, he was whistling when he headed into the ground-floor room he’d converted into a studio to collect the paperwork for his afternoon appointment. When a man had a job that involved dressing and undressing beautiful women, he couldn’t really complain, could he?

Before Jackie’s stiletto-heeled foot could make contact with the driveway, her mother flew out of the front door and rushed towards her, her arms flung wide.

‘Jackie! There you are!’

Jackie’s eyes widened behind her rather huge and rather fashionable sunglasses. What on earth was going on? Her mother never greeted her like this. It was as if she were actually overjoyed to see—

‘You’re late!’ Her mother stopped ten feet shy of the limo and her fists came to rest on her hips, making the jacket of her Chanel suit bunch up in a most unappealing manner.

This was more the reception Jackie had been anticipating.

Her mother looked her up and down. Something Jackie didn’t mind at all now she knew her mother could find no fault with her appearance, but once upon a time it had sent a shiver up her spine.

‘I don’t believe I mentioned what time I—’

‘The other girls arrived over an hour ago,’ her mother said before giving her a spiky little peck on the cheek, then hooking an arm in hers and propelling Jackie inside the large double doors of the villa.

What girls?

Jackie decided there was no point in reminding Mamma that she hadn’t actually specified a time of arrival, only a date. Her mother was a woman of expectations, and heaven help the poor soul who actually suggested she deviate from her catalogue of fixed and rigid ideas. Jackie had come to terms with the fact that, even though she was the toast of London, in the labyrinthine recesses of Lisa Firenzi’s mind her middle daughter was the specimen on a dark and dusty shelf whose label read: Problem Child.

Although Jackie hadn’t seen her mother in almost a year, she looked the same as always. She still oozed the style and natural chic that had made her a top model in her day. She was wearing an updated version of the classic suit she’d had last season, and her black hair was in the same neat pleat at the back of her head.

The excited female chatter coming from her mother’s bedroom and dressing room alternated between Italian and English with frightening speed. Three women, all in various states of undress, were twittering and cooing over some of the most exquisite bridal wear that Jackie had ever seen. In fact, they were so absorbed in helping the bride-to-be into her wedding dress that they didn’t even notice Jackie standing there.

Lizzie, who was half in, half out of the bodice, looked up and spotted her first, and all at once she was waddling across the room in a mound of white satin. She pulled Jackie into a tight hug.

‘Your sister finally deigned to arrive for the dress fitting.’

Jackie closed her eyes and ignored her mother’s voice. Dress fitting? Oh, that was what Mamma had her knickers in a twist about. She needn’t have worried. Jackie had sent her measurements over by email a couple of weeks ago and she knew her rigorous fitness regime would not have allowed for even a millimetre of variation.

‘We all know Jackie operates in her own time zone these days, don’t we?’

Ah. So that was it. Mamma was still irritated that she hadn’t fallen in with her plans and arrived yesterday. But there had been a very important show she’d needed to attend in Paris, which she couldn’t afford to miss. Her mother of all people should understand how cut-throat the fashion industry was. One minor stumble and a thousand knives would be ready to welcome her back as a sheath.

She wanted to turn round, to tell her mother to mind her own business, but this was neither the time nor the place. She wasn’t about to do anything to spoil the frivolity of her sister’s wedding preparations. She squeezed Lizzie back, gently, softly.

‘It’s been too long, Lizzie!’ she said in a hoarse voice.

As she pulled away she tried to file her mother’s remark away in her memory banks with all the others, but the words left a sting inside her.

‘Here, let me help you with this.’ She pulled away from Lizzie and walked round her so she could help with the row of covered buttons at the back. The dress was empire line, gently complementing Lizzie’s growing pregnant silhouette. And true to form, the bride was positively glowing, whether that was the effect of carrying double the amount of hormones from the twins inside her or because she was wildly in love with the groom Jackie had yet to meet, she wasn’t sure. Whatever it was, Lizzie looked happier and more relaxed than she’d ever been. If it was down to Jack Lewis, he’d better know how to keep it up, because Jackie would have his hide if he didn’t.

‘Thanks. I knew there was a reason why we had a fashion expert in the family,’ Lizzie said, smiling as she pulled her long dark hair out of the way.

Jackie concentrated on the row of tiny silk-covered buttons that seemed to go on for ever. ‘This dress is exquisite,’ she said as she reached the last few. Which was amazing, since it had to have been made in mere weeks.

Jackie stood back and admired her sister. Getting a dress to not only fit somebody perfectly, but complement their personality was something that even cold, hard cash couldn’t buy, unless you were in the hands of a true artist.

Isabella and Scarlett came close to inspect the dress and mutter their appreciation. Jackie turned, a smile of utter serenity on her face, and prepared herself to greet her fellow bridesmaids.

Isabella first. They kissed lightly on both cheeks and Isabella rubbed her shoulder gently with her hand as they traded pleasantries. Jackie kept her smile in place as she turned to face her younger sister. They kissed without actually making contact and made a pretence of an embrace.

She and Scarlett had been so close once, especially after Lizzie had gone to university in Australia, when it had just been the two of them and she’d felt like a proper big sister rather than just Lizzie’s deputy. She’d even thought vainly that Scarlett might have hero-worshipped her a little bit.

But that had all changed the summer she’d got pregnant with Kate. Scarlett had never looked at her the same way again. And why should she have? Some role model Jackie had been. Who would want to emulate the disaster area that had been her life back then—Jackie in tears most of the day, Mamma alternating between ranting and giving her the ice-queen treatment?

Not long after that Scarlett had moved away too. She’d followed in Lizzie’s footsteps and flown halfway round the world to live with her father. They’d never had a chance to patch things up, for Jackie to say how sorry she was to make Scarlett so ashamed of her. No more late-night secret-sharing sessions. No more raiding the kitchen at Sorella, one of them rifling through the giant stainless-steel fridge for chocolate cake, one of them keeping guard in case the chef spotted them.

Now they talked as little as possible and met in person even less. Jackie released Scarlett from the awkward hug and took a good look at her. They hadn’t laid eyes on each other in more than five years. Scarlett hadn’t changed much, except for looking a little bit older and even more like their mother. She had the same hint of iron behind her eyes these days, but the generous twist of the mouth Jackie recognised from their childhood tempered it a little.

Of course, Lizzie was far too excited to notice the undercurrents flowing around amidst the tulle and taffeta.

‘Come on, girls! You next. I want to see how fabulous my bridesmaids are going to look.’

Scarlett and Isabella had already removed their dresses from their garment bags. They were every bit as stunning as Lizzie’s. She’d been told that all three dresses would be the same shade of dusky aubergine, but she hadn’t realised that they would vary in style and cut.

Isabella’s was classic and feminine, with a gathered upper bodice, tiny spaghetti straps and a bow under the bustline, where the empire-line skirt fell away. Scarlett’s was edgier, with a nineteen-thirties feel—devoid of frills and with a deep V in the front.

Jackie appointed herself as wardrobe mistress and zipped, buttoned and laced wherever help was needed. When she’d finished, Isabella handed her a garment bag.

Jackie hesitated before she took the bag from her cousin. It had been a bad idea to help the others get dressed. Now they had nothing else to do but watch her strip off. She clutched the bag to her chest and looked for the nearest corner. Isabella and Scarlett just stood there, waiting.

Then she felt the bag being tugged gently from between her fingers. ‘Why don’t you use Mamma’s dressing room?’ Lizzie said as she relieved Jackie of the bag and led her towards a door on the other side of the room. ‘You can freshen up a little from your flight, if you need to.’

Jackie sent her sister a grateful look and did exactly that.

Lizzie had been the only one she’d confided in about her body issues. It had started not long after she’d given Kate away. At first, eating less and exercising had been about getting her shape back before she returned to Italy, removing all evidence that her body had been stretched and changed irrevocably. Mamma had been pleased when she’d met her off the plane, had complimented her on her self-discipline. But back in Italy she’d been confronted with the sheer pleasure of food, the sensuality of how people ate, and she’d shied away from it. Somewhere along the line the self-denial, the discipline, had become something darker. She’d sought control. Punishment. Atonement.

She’d liked the angles and lines of her physique and, when she’d finally escaped Monta Correnti at eighteen and moved to London to take the position of office assistant at a quirky style magazine, she’d fitted right in. Her new world had been full of girls eating nothing but celery and moaning that their matchstick thighs were too chunky.

It had taken her quite a few years to admit she’d had a problem. To admit that the yellowish tinge her skin had taken on had been more than just the product of her Italian genes, that the sunken hollows beneath her cheeks weren’t good bone structure and that it hadn’t been natural to be able to count her ribs with such ease.

Quietly she’d got help. Putting the weight back on had been a struggle. Every pound she’d gained had been an accusation. But she’d done it. And now she was proud to have a body that most women her age would kill for. It was meticulously nourished on the best organic food and trained four times a week by a personal trainer.

Even though she knew she looked good, she still didn’t want to be gawped at without her clothes on. It was different when she was in her cutting-edge designer suits. Dressed like that she was Jacqueline Patterson—the woman whose name was only uttered in hushed tones when she walked down the corridors of Gloss! magazine’s high-rise offices. Remove the armour and she became faceless. Just another woman in her thirties with stretch marks and a Caesarean scar.

With the dressing-room door shut firmly behind her, Jackie slipped out of her linen trouser suit and went through the connecting door to Mamma’s en suite to freshen up. As she washed she could hear her cousin catching Lizzie up on all the latest Monta Correnti gossip, especially the unabridged story of how Isabella had met her own fiancé.

When Jackie felt she’d finally got all the traces of aeroplane air off her skin, she returned to the dressing room and removed her bridesmaid’s dress from its protective covering.

Wow. Stunning.

It reminded her of designs she’d done in senior school for the class play of Romeo and Juliet. Like the other dresses, it was empire line, with an embroidered bodice that scooped underneath the gathered chiffon at the bust and then round and up into shoulder straps.

Not many people knew enough about fashion design to see the artistry in the cutting that gave the skirt its effortlessly feminine swell. Nor would they notice the inner rigid structure of the bodice that would accentuate every curve of a woman’s torso but give the impression that it was nature that had done all the hard work and not the fine stitching and cutting. She took it off the hanger and undid the zip. As she stepped into the dress there was a knock at the door that led back out into the bedroom.

‘Everything okay in there?’ Lizzie’s voice was muffled through the closed door. Jackie smiled.

‘Almost ready,’ she yelled back, sliding the dress over her hips and stopping to remove the bra that would ruin the line of the low-cut bodice.

She’d been right, she realised as she started to slide the zip upwards. If her instincts were correct, this dress was going to fit like the proverbial glove. She doubted it would need any alteration at all.

As she got to the top she ran into problems with the zip. Despite all the yoga and Pilates, she just couldn’t get her arms and shoulder sockets to do what was necessary to pull it all the way up.

‘Lizzie? Isabella? I need a hand,’ she yelled and dipped her head forwards, brushing her immaculately straightened hair over one shoulder so whoever rushed to her aid had easy access to the stubborn zip.

There was a soft click as the door opened. The thick carpet hushed the even footsteps as her saviour came towards her.

‘If you could just…’ She wiggled her shoulders to indicate where the problem was.

Whoever it was said nothing, just stepped close and set about deftly zipping her into place. For a second or so Jackie let her mind drift, wondering if it would look as dreamy as it felt when she raised her head and looked into the full-length mirror, but then she realised something was out of balance.

The fingers brushing her upper back as they held the top of the bodice’s zip together didn’t have Scarlett’s long, perfectly manicured fingernails. Lizzie was already getting too big with the twins to be standing quite this close and, at five feet five, Isabella was a good inch shorter than she was. This person’s breath was warming her exposed left ear.

Jackie stilled her lungs. Where fingers touched bare back, the pinpricks of awareness were so acute they were almost painful.

The person finished their job by neatly joining the hook and eye at the top of the bodice and then stepped back. Jackie began to shake. Right down in her knees. And it travelled upwards until her shoulders seemed to rattle.

Even before she pushed her hair out of her face and straightened her spine, she knew the eyes that would meet hers in the mirror would be those of Romano Puccini.

CHAPTER TWO

HIGH in the hills above Monta Correnti was an olive grove that had long since been abandoned. The small stone house that sat on the edge of one of the larger terraces remained unmolested, forgotten by everyone.

Well, almost everyone.

Just as the sun’s heat began to wane, as the white light of noon began to mellow into something closer to gold, a teenage girl appeared, walking along the dirt track that led to the farmhouse, a short distance from the main road into town. She looked over her shoulder every couple of seconds and kept close to the shade of the trees on the other side of the track. When she was sure no one was following her, she moved into the sunlight and started to jog lightly towards the farmhouse, a smile on her face.

She was on the way to being pretty, a bud just beginning to open, with long dark hair that hung almost to her waist and softly tanned skin. When she stopped smiling, there was a fierce intensity to her expression but, as she seemed to be joyfully awaiting something, that didn’t happen very often. She rested in the shade, leaning against the doorway of the cottage, looking down the hill towards the town.

After not more than ten minutes a sound interrupted the soft chirruping of the crickets, the gentle whoosh of the wind in the branches of the olive trees. The girl stood up, ramrod straight, and looked in the direction of the track. After a couple of seconds the faint buzzing that an untrained ear might have interpreted for a bee or a faraway tractor became more distinct. She recognised the two-stroke engine of a Vespa and her smile returned at double the intensity.

Closer and closer it came, until suddenly the engine cut out and the grove returned to sleepy silence. The girl held her breath.

Her patience ran out. Instead of waiting in the doorway, looking cool and unaffected, she jumped off the low step and started running. As she turned the corner of the house she saw him jogging towards her, wearing a smile so bright it could light up the sky if the sun ever decided it wanted a siesta. Her leg muscles lost all tone and energy and she stumbled to a halt, unable to take her eyes from him.

Finally he was standing right in front of her, his dark hair ruffled by the wind and his grey eyes warmed by the residual laughter that always lived there. They stood there for a few seconds, hearts pounding, and then he gently touched her cheek and drew her into a kiss that was soft and sweet and full of remembered promises. She sighed and reached for him, pulling him close. Somehow they ended up back in the doorway of the old, half-fallen-down cottage, with her pressed against the jamb as he tickled her neck with butterfly kisses.

He pulled away and looked at her, his hands on her shoulders, and she gazed back at him, never thinking for a second how awkward it could be to just stare into another person’s eyes, never considering for a second what a brave act it was to see and be seen. She blinked and smiled at him, and his dancing grey eyes became suddenly serious.

‘I love you, Jackie,’ he said, and moved his hands up off her shoulders and onto her neck so he could trace the line of her jawbone with his thumbs.

‘I love you too, Romano,’ she whispered as she buried her face in his shirt and wrapped herself up in him.

Jackie hadn’t actually believed that a person could literally be frozen with surprise. Too late she discovered it was perfectly possible to find one’s feet stuck to the floor just as firmly as if they had actually grown roots, and to find one’s mouth suddenly incapable of speech.

Romano, however, seemed to be experiencing none of the same disquiet. He was just looking back at her in the mirror, his pale eyes full of mischief. ‘Bellissima,’ he said, glancing at the dress, but making it sound much more intimate.

She blinked and coughed, and when her voice returned she found a sudden need to speak in English instead of Italian. ‘What are you doing here?’

Romano just shrugged and made that infuriatingly ambiguous hand gesture he’d always used to make. ‘It is a dress fitting, Jacqueline, so I fit.’

She spun round to face him. ‘You made the dresses? Why didn’t anyone tell me?’

He made a rueful expression. ‘Why should they? As far as anyone else is concerned, we hardly know each other. Your mother and my father are old friends and the rest of your family thinks we’ve only met a handful of times.’

Jackie took a shallow breath and puffed it out again. ‘That’s true.’ She frowned. ‘But how…? Why did you…?’

‘When your mother told my father that Lizzie was getting married, he insisted we take care of the designs. It’s what old friends do for each other.’

Jackie took a step back, regaining some of her usual poise. ‘Old friends? That hardly applies to you and I.’

Romano was prevented from answering by an impatient Lizzie bursting into the room. Still, his eyes twinkled as Lizzie made Jackie do a three-sixty-degree spin. When she found herself back at the starting point he was waiting for her, his gaze hooking hers. Not old friends, it said. But old lovers, certainly.

Jackie wanted to hit him.

‘It’s beautiful!’ Lizzie exclaimed. ‘Perfect!’

‘Yes. That is what I said,’ Romano replied, and Jackie had to look away or she’d be tempted to throttle him, dress or no dress.

‘Come and show the others!’ Lizzie grabbed her hand and dragged her outside for Isabella and Scarlett to see. Isabella was just as enthusiastic as Lizzie but Scarlett looked as if she’d just sucked a whole pound of lemons. What was up with her? She just kept glowering at Jackie and sending daggers at Romano. Somebody or something had definitely put her nose out of joint.

The fitting was exhausting for Jackie. Not because her dress needed any alterations—she’d been right about that—but because she kept finding herself watching Romano, his deft fingers pinching at a seam as he discussed how and where he would make alterations, the way his brow creased with intense concentration as he discussed the possibilities with the bride-to-be, and how easily he smiled when the concentration lifted.

She’d spent the last seventeen years studiously avoiding him. It was laughable the lengths she’d gone to in order to make sure they never met face to face. Quite a few junior editors had been overjoyed when she’d sent them on plum assignments so that she wouldn’t have to cross paths with that no-good, womanising charmer.

How could she chit-chat with him at fashion industry parties as if nothing had ever happened? As if he’d never done what he’d done? It was asking too much.

Of course, sometimes over the years she’d had to attend the same functions as him—especially during London fashion week, when she was expected to be seen at everything—but she had enough clout to be able to look at seating plans in advance and position herself accordingly.

However, there was no avoiding Romano now.

At least not for the next twenty minutes or so. After that she needn’t see him again. Her dress was perfect. No more fittings for her, thank goodness.

Her mother chose that moment to sweep into the room. She gave Romano an indulgent smile and kissed him on both cheeks. Jackie couldn’t hear what he said to her mother but Mamma batted her eyelashes and called him a ‘charming young man’.

Hah! She’d changed her tune! Last time Lisa Firenzi had seen her daughter and Romano Puccini within a mile of each other, she’d had no compunctions about warning Jackie off. ‘That boy is trouble,’ she’d said. ‘Just like his father. You are not to have anything to do with him. If I catch you even talking to him, you will be grounded for a month.’

But it had been too late.

Mamma had made Jackie help out at Sorella that summer, to ‘keep her out of trouble’. And, if her mother had actually had some hands-on part in running the restaurant rather than leaving it all to managers, she would have known that Jackie and Romano had met weeks earlier when he’d come in for lunch with his father.

Of course she’d paid him no attention whatsoever. She’d seen him hanging around the piazza that summer, all the girls trailing around after him, and she hadn’t been about to join that pathetic band of creatures, no matter how good-looking the object of their adoration was. But Romano had been rather persistent, had made her believe he was really interested, and, when she’d noticed that he hadn’t had another girl on the back of his Vespa in more than a fortnight, she’d cautiously agreed to go out on it with him.

She should have listened to her mother. ‘Like father, like son,’ Lisa had said at the time. Jackie had always known that her mother and Romano’s father, Rafe Puccini, had known each other in the past, but it wasn’t until she’d moved to London and heard all the industry gossip that she realised how significant that relationship had been. By all accounts they’d had a rather steamy affair.

Look at her mother and Romano now! They were laughing at something. Her mother laid a hand on his upper arm and wiped a tear from under her mascara, calling him an ‘impossible boy’. That was as much as Jackie could take. She strutted off to the dressing room and changed back into her trouser suit, studiously ignoring her reflection in the mirror. She didn’t even want to see herself in his dress at the moment.

Keep a lid on it, Jacqueline. In a few minutes he’ll be gone. You won’t have to see him again for another seventeen years if you don’t want to.

When she emerged, smoothing down her hair with a hand, her mother was just finishing a sentence: ‘…of course you must come with us, Romano. I insist.’

Jackie raised her eyebrows and looked at the other girls. Scarlett stomped off in the direction of the en suite, while Isabella just shrugged, collected up her clothes and headed for the empty dressing room.

‘Give me a hand?’ Lizzie asked and turned her back on Jackie so she could help with the covered buttons once again. As she worked Jackie kept glancing at her mother and Romano, who eventually left the room, still chatting and laughing.

‘What’s going on?’ she muttered as she got to the last couple of buttons.

Lizzie strained to look over her shoulder at her sister. ‘Oh, Mamma has decided we’re all going to the restaurant for dinner this evening.’

Jackie kept her focus firmly on the last button, even though it was already unlooped. ‘And she’s invited Romano?’

Lizzie nodded. ‘He’s been spending a lot of time at the palazzo in the last few years. He comes into Monta Correnti regularly and eats at both Mamma’s and Uncle Luca’s often.’

Jackie stepped back and Lizzie turned to face her.

‘Why?’ Lizzie said, sliding the dress off her shoulders. ‘Is that a problem? That she’s invited Romano?’

Jackie smiled and shook her head. ‘No,’ she said. ‘No problem at all.’

She looked at the door that led out to the landing. Would her mother be quite as welcoming, quite as chummy with him, if she’d known that Romano Puccini was the boy who’d got her teenage daughter pregnant and then abandoned her?

She’d always refused to name the father, no matter how much her mother had begged and scolded and threatened, too ashamed for the world to know she’d been rejected so spectacularly by her first love. Even a knocked-up fifteen-year-old had her pride.

Jackie picked up her handbag and headed for the door. It still seemed like a good plan. There was no reason why her mother should ever know that Romano was Kate’s father. No reason at all.

Refusing an invitation to dine with five attractive women would not only be the height of bad manners but also stupidity. And no one had ever accused Romano Puccini of being stupid. Infuriatingly slippery, maybe. Too full of charm for his own good. But never stupid. And he’d been far too curious not to come.

He hadn’t had the chance to get this close to Jackie Patterson in years, which was odd, seeing as they moved in similar circles. But those circles always seemed to be rotating in different directions, the arcs never intersecting. Why was that? Did she still feel guilty about the way their romance had ended?

That summer seemed to be almost a million years ago. He sighed and took a sip of his wine, while the chatter of the elegant restaurant carried on around him.

Jackie Patterson. She’d really been a knockout. Long dark hair with a hint of a wave, tanned legs, smooth skin and eyes that refused to be either green or brown but glittered with fire anyway.

Yes, that had been a really good summer.

He’d foolishly thought himself in love with her but he’d been seventeen. It was easy to mistake hormones for romance at that age. Now he saw his summer with Jackie for what it really had been—a fling. A wonderful, heady, teenage fling that had unfortunately had a sour final act. Sourness that obviously continued to the present day.

She had deliberately placed herself on the same side of the table as him, and had made sure that her mother had taken the seat next to him. With Lisa Firenzi in the way, he had no hope of engaging Jackie in any kind of conversation. And she had known that.

Surely enough time had gone by that he and Jackie could put foolish youthful decisions behind them? Wasn’t the whole I’m-still-ignoring-you thing just a little juvenile? He wouldn’t have thought a polished woman like her would resort to such tactics.

And polished she was. Gone were the little shorts and cotton summer dresses, halter tops and flip-flops, replaced by excellent tailoring, effortless elegance that took a lot of hard work to get just right. And even if her reputation hadn’t preceded her, he’d have been able to tell that this was a woman who pushed herself hard. Every hint of the soft fifteen-year-old curves that had driven him wild had been sculptured into defined muscle. The toffee and caramel lights in her long hair were so well done that most people would have thought it natural. He’d preferred it dark, wavy, and spread out on the grass as he’d leaned in to kiss her.

Where had that thought come from? He’d seen it in his mind’s eye as if it had happened only that morning.

He blinked and returned his attention to his food, an amazing lobster ravioli that the chef here did particularly well. But now he’d thought about Jackie in that way, he couldn’t quite seem to switch the memory off.

The main course was finished and Lizzie’s fiancé appeared and whisked her away. Isabella disappeared off to the restaurant next door and when Lisa was approached by her restaurant manager and scuttled off with him, talking in low, hushed tones, that left him sitting at the table with just Jackie and Scarlett. He made a light-hearted comment, looking towards his right at Jackie, and saw her stiffen.

This was stupid. Although he didn’t do serious conversations and relationship-type stuff, there was obviously bad air between them that needed to be cleared. He was just going to have to do his best to show Jackie that there were no hard feelings, that he could behave like a grown-up in the here and now, whatever had happened in the past. Hopefully she would follow his lead.

He turned to face her, waited, all the time looking intently at her until she could bear it no longer and met his gaze.

He smiled at her. ‘It has been a long time, Jackie.’

Jackie’s mouth didn’t move; her eyes gave her reply: Not long enough.

He ignored the leaden vibes heading his way and persevered. ‘I thought the March issue of Gloss! was particularly good. The shoot at the botanical gardens was unlike anything I’d ever seen before.’

Jackie folded her arms. ‘It’s been seventeen years since we’ve had a conversation and you want to talk to me about work?’

He shrugged and pulled the corners of his mouth down. It had seemed like a safe starting point.

‘You don’t think that maybe there are other, more important issues to enquire after?’

Nothing floated into his head. He rested his arm across the back of Lisa’s empty chair and turned his body to face Jackie, ready to engage a little more fully in whatever was going on between them. ‘Communication is communication, Jackie. We have to start somewhere.’

‘Do we?’

‘It seemed like a good idea to me,’ he said, refusing to be cowed by the look she was giving him, a look that probably made her employees perspire so much they were in danger of dehydration.

Now she turned to face him too, forgetting her earlier stiff posture, her eyes smouldering. A familiar prickle of awareness crept up the back of his neck.

‘Don’t you dare take the high ground, Romano! You have no right. No right at all.’

He opened his mouth and shut it again. This conversation had too much high drama in it for him and, unfortunately, he and Jackie seemed to be, not only on different pages, but reading from totally different scripts. He looked across the table at Scarlett, to see if she was making sense of any of this, but her expression was just as puzzling as her sister’s. She looked pale and shaky, as if she was about to be sick, and then she suddenly shot to her feet and dashed out of the restaurant door. Romano just stared after her.

‘What was that all about?’ he said.

Jackie, who was obviously too surprised to remember she was steaming angry with him, just frowned after her disappearing sister. ‘I have no idea.’

He took the opportunity to climb through the chink in her defences. He reached over and placed his hand over hers on the table top. ‘Can’t we let the past be the past?’

Jackie removed her hand from under his so fast he thought he might have a friction burn.

‘It’s too late. We can’t go back, not after all that has happened.’ Instead of looking fierce and untouchable, she looked very, very sad as she said this, and he saw just a glimpse of the young, stubborn, vulnerable girl he’d once lost his heart to.

‘Why not?’

Suddenly he really wanted to know. And it wasn’t just about putting the past to rest.

She looked down at his hand on the tablecloth, still waiting in the same spot from where she’d snatched hers away. For a long time she didn’t move, didn’t speak.

‘You know why, Romano,’ she whispered. ‘Please don’t push this, just…don’t.’

‘I don’t want to push this. I just want us to be able to be around each other without spitting and hissing or creating an atmosphere. That’s not what you want for Lizzie’s wedding, is it?’

She frowned and stared at him. ‘What on earth has this got to do with Lizzie’s wedding?’

Didn’t she know? Hadn’t Lizzie or Lisa told her yet?

‘The reception…Lizzie wanted to have it at the palazzo. She thought the lake would be so—’

‘No. That can’t be.’ She spoke quietly, with no hint of anger in her voice, and then she just stood up and walked away, her chin high and her eyes dull, leaving him alone at the table, drawing the glances of some of the other diners.

This was not how most of his evenings out ended—alone, with all the pretty women having left without him. Most definitely not.

Back at the villa, Jackie ignored the warm glow of lights spilling from the drawing-room windows and took the path round the side of the house that led into the terraced garden. She kept walking, past the fountains and clipped lawns, past the immaculately groomed shrubs, to the lowest part of the garden, an area slightly wilder and shadier than the rest.

Right near the boundary, overlooking Monta Correnti and the valley below, was an old, spreading fir tree. Many parts of its lower branches had been worn smooth by the seats and shoes of a couple of generations of climbers.

Without thinking about the consequences for her white linen trousers, Jackie put one foot on the stump of a branch at the base of the trunk and hoisted herself up onto one of the boughs. Her mind was elsewhere but her body remembered a series of movements—a hand here, a foot there—and within seconds she was sitting down, her toes dangling three feet above the ground as she stared out across the darkening valley.

The sun had set long ago, leaving the sky a shade of such a deep, rich blue that she could almost believe it possible to reach out and sink her hand into the thick colour. The sight brought back a rush of homesickness, which was odd, because surely people were only supposed to get homesick when they were away, not when they came back. It didn’t make any sense. But not much about this evening had made sense.

She’d expected Romano to be a grown-up version of the boy she’d known: confident, intelligent, incorrigible. But she hadn’t expected such blatant insensitivity.

She closed her eyes and tried to concentrate on the sensation of the cool night breeze on her neck and cheeks.

Thank goodness she hadn’t given into Kate’s pleading and let her daughter come on this trip. If Romano could be so blithe about their failed relationship all those years ago, she’d hate to think how he might have reacted to their daughter.

If only things had been different…

No. It was no good thinking that way. Time had proved her right. Romano Puccini was not cut out to be a husband and father. The string of girlfriends he’d paraded through the tabloids and celebrity magazines had only confirmed her worst fears. Maybe, if he’d settled down, there would have been some hope of him regretting his decision to disown his firstborn. Maybe a second child might have melted his heart, caused him to realise what he’d been missing.

A huge sigh shuddered through her. Jackie kicked off her shoes and looked at her toes.

And Romano had made her miss all of those moments too. Without his support she’d had no choice but to go along with her mother’s wishes. How stupid she’d been to believe all those whispered promises, all those hushed plans to make their parents see sense, the plotting to elope one day. He’d said he’d wait for ever for her. The truth was, he hadn’t even waited a month before moving on to Francesca Gambardi. One silly spat was all it’d taken to drive him away.

For ever? What a joke.

But she’d been so in love with him it had taken right up until the day she’d handed her newborn daughter over to stop hoping that it was all a bad dream, that Romano would change his mind and come bursting through the door to tell her he was so sorry, that it was her that he wanted and they were going to be a proper family, no matter what his father and her mother said.

Well, she’d purged all those silly ideas from herself about the same time she’d tightened up her saggy pregnancy belly. It had taken just as much iron will and focus to kill them all off.

‘Jackie?’

It was Scarlett’s voice, coming from maybe twenty feet away. Jackie smiled. She’d never quite got used to the Aussie twang that both her sisters had developed since moving away. It seemed more prominent here in the dark.

‘Up here.’

‘What on earth are you doing up there?’

Scarlett walked closer and peered up at her, or at least in her general direction. She’d only just left the bright lights of the house behind and her eyes wouldn’t be accustomed to the dark yet.

‘Come up and join me. The view’s lovely,’ she said.

‘I know what the view looks like.’ Scarlett stared up at the tree. ‘You’re being silly.’

That was altogether possible, Jackie conceded silently, but she wasn’t going to admit that to anyone. Scarlett folded her arms and stared off into the distance.

‘What? You’re not going to tell me I had too much wine at dinner?’ Jackie said.

Scarlett just shook her head, the movement so small Jackie guessed it was more an unconscious gesture than an attempt at communication. She had that same can’t-quite-look-at-you expression on her face that she always wore in Jackie’s presence. It made Jackie want to be twice as prickly back. But it became obvious as she continued to observe her sister that Scarlett hadn’t taken into account that Jackie had been out here long enough to get her night vision and could see her sister’s features quite clearly. After a few seconds the hardness slid out of her expression, leaving something much younger, much truer behind.

‘No. I’m not going to tell you that.’ Her voice was husky but cold.

Jackie stopped swinging her legs. She knew that look. It was the one Scarlett had always worn when she’d heard Mamma’s footsteps coming up the stairs after she’d done something naughty. Was Scarlett…was she hiding something?

Just as she tried to examine Scarlett’s face a little more closely, her sister turned away.

‘Mamma wants us all in the drawing room for a nightcap. She says she’s got some family news, something about Cristiano not being able to come to the wedding.’

Jackie swung herself down off the branch in one fluid motion and landed beside her sister. She supposed they’d better go and make peace with their mother. Mamma hadn’t been best pleased when she’d returned from her powwow with the restaurant manager to find that all her illustrious dinner guests had deserted her.

CHAPTER THREE

DESPITE the lateness of the hour, Romano stripped off by the edge of the palazzo’s perfect turquoise pool and dived in. Loose threads hung messily from the evening he’d left behind and in comparison this felt clean, simple. His arms moved, his muscles bunched and stretched, and he cut through the water. Expected actions brought expected results.

But even in fifty laps he couldn’t shake the sense of uneasiness that chased him up and down the pool. He pulled himself out of the water, picked up his clothes and walked across the terrace and through the house, naked.

Once in his bedroom he threw the floor-to-ceiling windows open and let the night breeze stir up the room. But as he lay in the dark he found it difficult to settle, to find any trace of the tranquillity this grand old house usually gave him.

More than once during the night he woke up to find he’d knotted the sheet quite spectacularly and had to sit up and untangle it again before punching his pillow, lying down and staring mutely at the inky sky outside his windows.

When dawn broke he gave up trying to sleep and put on shorts, a T-shirt and running shoes and set out on an uneven path that ran round the perimeter of the whole island. When he’d been a boy, he’d always thought the shape of Isola del Raverno resembled a tadpole. The palazzo was on the wide end, nearest the centre of the lake, and the long thin end reached towards a promontory on the shore, only a few hundred metres away. As he reached the ‘tail’ of the island he slowed to a jog, then came to a halt on the very tip. He stood there for quite some time, facing the wooded shore.

Monta Correnti was thirty kilometres to the west, hidden by rolling hills.

He’d waited here for Jackie once. His father had been back in Rome, either dealing with a business emergency or meeting a woman. Probably both. When he and his father had spent the summers here, Papa’s presence had been sporadic at best. Romano had often been left to his own devices, overseen by an assortment of servants, of course.

He’d hated that when he’d been young, but later he’d realised what a gift it had been. He’d relished the freedom that many teenagers yearned for but never experienced. No wonder he’d got a reputation for being a bit of a tearaway.

Not that he’d ever done anything truly bad. He’d been cheeky and thrill-seeking, not a delinquent. His father had indulged him to make up for the lack of a mother and his frequent absences and, with hindsight, Romano could see how it made him quite an immature seventeen-year-old, despite the cocky confidence that had come with a pair of broad shoulders and family money.

Perhaps it would have been better if Papa had been stricter. It had been too easy for Romano to play the part of a spoiled rich kid, not working hard enough at school, not giving a thought to what he wanted to do with his life, because the cushion of his father’s money and name had always been there, guarding his backside.

He turned away from the shore and looked back towards the palazzo. The tall square tower was visible through the trees, beautiful and ridiculous all at once. He exhaled, long and steady.

Jackie Patterson had never been just a fling, but it made things easier if he remembered her that way.

She’d challenged him. Changed him. Even though their summer romance had been short-lived, it had left an indelible mark on him. Up until then he’d been content to coast through life. Everything had come easily to him—money, popularity, female attention—he’d never had to work hard for any of it.

Meeting Jackie had been such a revelation. Under the unimpressed looks she’d given him as she’d waited tables at her mother’s restaurant, he’d seen fire and guts and more life in her than he’d seen in any of the silly girls who had flapped their lashes at him in the piazza each day. Maybe that was why he’d pursued her so relentlessly.

Although she’d been two years his junior, she’d put him to shame. She’d had such big plans, big dreams. Dreams she’d now made come true.

He turned and started to jog round the remaining section of the path, back towards the house.

After they’d broken up, he’d taken a long hard look at himself, asked himself what he wanted to make out of his life. He’d had all the opportunities a boy could want, all the privileges, and he’d not taken advantage of a single one. From that day on he’d decided to make the most of what he had. He’d finished school, amazing his teachers with his progress in his final year, and had gone to work for his father.

Some people had seen this as taking the easy option. In truth he’d wanted to do anything but work for the family firm. He’d wanted to spread his wings and fly. But his mother had died when he’d been six, before any siblings had come along, and the only close family he and Papa had were each other. So he’d done the mature thing, put the bonds of family before his own wishes, and joined Puccini Designs with a smile on his face. It hadn’t been a decision he’d regretted.

He’d kept running while he’d been thinking and now he looked around, he realised he was back in the sunken garden. He slowed to a walk. Even this place was filled with memories of Jackie—the most exquisite and the most intimate—all suddenly awakening after years of being mere shadows.

Did she ever think of the brief, wonderful time they’d had together? Had their relationship changed the course of her life too? Suddenly he really wanted to know. And more than that, he wanted to know who Jacqueline Patterson was now, whether the same raw energy and fire still existed beneath the polished, highlighted, glossy exterior.

Hopefully, the upcoming wedding would be the perfect opportunity to find out.

‘What’s up, little sister?’

Jackie put down the book she was reading and stared up at Lizzie from where she was sitting, shaded from the morning sun by a large tree, her back against its bark. ‘Nothing. I’m just relaxing.’

Lizzie made a noise that was half soft laugh, half snort. ‘Jackie, you’re the only person I know who can relax with every muscle in their body tensed,’ she said as she carefully lowered herself down onto the grass.

Jackie took a sideways look at Lizzie’s rounded stomach. Carrying one baby had been hard enough. She couldn’t imagine what it would be like to have two inside her.

Lizzie was smiling at her. An infuriatingly knowing, bigsister kind of smile.

Okay, maybe trying to do the usual holiday-type thing wasn’t such a great idea. She found relaxation a little…frustrating. She kept wanting to get up and do things. Especially today. Especially if it distracted her from remembering the look in Romano’s eyes last night when he’d reached for her hand across the table.

He’d made her feel fifteen again. Very dangerous. She couldn’t afford to believe the warmth in those laughing grey eyes. She couldn’t be tempted by impossible dreams of love and romance and for ever. It just wasn’t real. And he shouldn’t be able to make her feel as if it were. Not after all that had happened between them.

The nerve of the man!

Ah, this was better. The horrible achy, needy feeling was engulfed by a wash of anger. She knew how to do anger, how to welcome it in, how to harness its power to drive herself forwards. Who cared if it left an ugly grey wake of bitterness that stretched back through the years? She was surviving, and that was what counted.

Being angry with Romano Puccini was what she wanted, because without the anger it would be difficult to hate him, and she really, really needed to hate him.

Jackie exhaled, measuring her breath until her lungs were empty. This was better. Familiar territory. Hating Romano for rejecting her, for abandoning her and their daughter.

How could the man who had left her pregnant and alone, a mere girl, flirt with her as if nothing had happened?

‘You’re doing it again.’

Jackie hurt her neck as she snapped her head round to look at her sister. She’d half forgotten that Lizzie was sitting there and her comment had made Jackie jump. ‘Doing what?’

‘Staring off into space and looking fierce. Something’s up, isn’t it?’

‘Yes.’ The word shot out of her mouth before she had a chance to filter it. Lizzie leaned across and looked at her, resting her hand on Jackie’s forearm.

‘No…’ Jackie said, wearing the poker face she reserved for fashion shows, so no one could tell what her verdict on the clothes would be until it was printed in the magazine. ‘It’s nothing.’

Why had she said yes? It wasn’t as if she’d been planning on telling Lizzie her problems, certainly not in the run-up to her wedding. She looked at her sister. The poker face started to disintegrate as she saw the warmth and compassion in Lizzie’s eyes.

Could she tell Lizzie now? It would be such a relief to let it all spill out. Over the years, her secrets had woven themselves into a corset, holding her in, keeping her upright when she wanted to wilt, protecting her from humiliation. Seeing Romano last night had tightened the laces on that corset so that, instead of giving her security, it made her feel as if she were struggling to breathe. Suddenly she wanted to rip it all off and be free.

But it wasn’t the time to let go, even if her sister’s open face told her that she would understand, that she would comfort and not condemn. Already Lizzie was tapping into her maternal side, helped along by the buzzing pregnancy hormones. It brought out a whole extra dimension to her personality. She was going to be an excellent mother, really she was.

The sort of mother you have never been. May never be.

A shard of guilt hit Jackie so hard she almost whimpered, but she was too well rehearsed in damage limitation to let it show. Just as an underwater explosion of vast magnitude happening deep on the ocean floor might only produce a small irregularity on the surface, she kept it all in, hoping that Lizzie couldn’t read the ripples on her face.

She smiled back at her sister, squinting a little as she faced the morning sun. ‘It’s just wedding jitters.’

Lizzie’s concerned look was banished by her throaty laugh. ‘I thought it was me who was supposed to get the jitters.’

Jackie saw her chance and grabbed it, turned the spotlight back where it should be. ‘Have you? Got any jitters?’

Lizzie shook her head. ‘No. I’ve never been more certain of anything in my life.’ She went quiet, gazing out over the gardens, but the look on Lizzie’s face wasn’t fierce or hard; it was soft and warm and full of love. Jackie envied her that look.

She leaned in and gave her sister a kiss on the cheek. ‘Good.’ This was about as expressive as communication got in their family. But Lizzie got that. She knew how pleased her little sister was for her.

Lizzie began to move and Jackie stood up to lend her a hand as she heaved herself off the slightly dewy grass. ‘Why don’t you get rid of those jitters of yours by going into town with Mamma and Scarlett? They’re planning to leave shortly.’

‘Maybe.’

As she watched Lizzie walk away Jackie decided against the idea of joining her mother and other sister on their jaunt. A morning in the company of those two would give her grey hairs.

Going into Monta Correnti, however, taking some time to rediscover her home town, to see whether it still matched the vivid pictures in her head, now that was a plan she could cope with.

Exploring Monta Correnti was fun, but it didn’t take more than an hour or so, and Jackie soon returned to feeling restless. She kept wandering anyway, and ended up in the little piazza near the church, outside Sorella.

It was late morning and Scarlett and Mamma were probably inside, having a cool drink before they decided what they were going to eat for lunch. She really should go in and join them.

But beautiful smells were coming from Uncle Luca’s restaurant next door and, despite the fact she’d sworn off carbs, she had a hankering for a simple dish of pasta, finished off with his famous basil and tomato sauce.

So, feeling decidedly rebellious, she sidestepped her mother’s restaurant and headed for Rosa. Uncle Luca was always good for a warm welcome and she wanted to pump him for more information on all of Isabella’s brothers. This year had certainly been a bombshell one for her extended family. So much had happened already. First, there had been the shocking announcement that Uncle Luca had two sons living in America that nobody had known about. Isabella had been trying to get in contact, but she wasn’t having much luck. The family had thought that sending invitations to Lizzie’s wedding might help break the ice, but Alessandro had declined and Angelo hadn’t even bothered to reply.

Personally, Jackie wasn’t too optimistic about Isabella getting any further with that. This family was so dysfunctional it wasn’t funny. But she understood the need to heal and mend, to ache to bring forgotten children back into the fold.

She also wanted news of Isabella’s little brothers. She didn’t know if Valentino was in Monta Correnti at the moment or not, but it would be great to catch up with him before the hustle and bustle of Lizzie’s wedding. She also wanted to find out the latest news on Cristiano. Mamma had announced last night that he’d been injured at work, fighting a fire in Rome, and was currently in hospital. Of course, Mamma had made it all sound totally dramatic, even though he’d only suffered minor injuries. Jackie would have preferred an update straight from her uncle, minus the histrionics, hopefully. Cristiano wasn’t going to make it to the wedding either, which was such a pity. She’d always had a soft spot for him.

The entrance to Rosa was framed by two olive trees in terracotta pots. Jackie brushed past them and stood in the arched doorway, looking round the restaurant. The interior always made her smile. Such a difference from Sorella’s dark wood grain and minimalist decor.

Everything inside was a little outdated and shabby, but, somehow, it added to the charm. There was a tiled floor, wooden tables and chairs in various shapes and styles, fake ivy climbing up the pillars and strings of garlic and straw-covered bottles hanging from the ceiling. Locals knew better than to judge a restaurant’s food by its decor. Sorella, next door, was where the rich visitors and tourists ate, but Rosa was where the locals came, where families celebrated, where life happened.

At this time of day, the restaurant was deserted, but not silent. There was a hell of a racket coming from the kitchen. A heated argument seemed to be taking place between two women, but Jackie couldn’t identify the voices above the banging of pots and pans and the interjections of head chef Lorenzo.

Unfortunately his fierce growling was not having the desired effect, because nobody shot through the kitchen door looking penitent. However, she heard someone enter the restaurant behind her.

Jackie had never been one for small talk. She didn’t chat to old ladies at bus stops, or join in with the good-natured banter when stuck in a long queue. Perhaps it was her upbringing in Italy. When things went wrong, she wanted to complain. Loudly. So she didn’t turn round and make a joke of the situation; she just ignored whoever it was. For a few seconds, anyway.

‘Buon giorno.’

The warm tones, the hint of a smile in the voice, made her spine snap to attention. She licked her lips and frowned.

‘Are you stalking me?’ she said, without looking round.

Romano had the grace not to laugh. ‘No. I came to see Isabella, but I won’t lie—I was hoping I would run into you this morning.’

She didn’t dignify the pause that followed with an answer.

‘Jackie?’

She took a deep, calming breath, opening her ribs and drawing the air in using her diaphragm, just as her personal trainer had taught her. It didn’t work. And that just irritated her further. She’d bet the man standing behind her didn’t have to be taught how to breathe, how to relax.

He wasn’t standing behind her any more. While she’d been on her way to hyperventilating he’d walked round her until she had no choice but to look at him.

‘I would like to talk with you. I believe we have some things to discuss, some mistakes from the past to sort out.’

Now she abandoned any thoughts of correct breathing and just looked at him. That, of course, was her big mistake. The expression on his face was so unlike him—serious, earnest—that she started to feel her carefully built defences crumbling.

What if he actually wanted to acknowledge Kate after all these years? What if he really wanted to make amends? Could she let her pride prevent that?

No.

She couldn’t do that to her daughter. She had to hear him out.

As always, Romano had sensed the course of her mood change before it had even registered on her face.

‘Have lunch with me,’ he said.

Lunch? That might be pushing it a bit far. She opened her mouth to tell him so, but the kitchen door crashed open, cutting her off.

‘We have to, Isabella!’ Scarlett said, marching into the dining area, looking very put out indeed. ‘What if she talks to him again? What if—?’

‘I don’t think it is the right time,’ Isabella countered in Italian. ‘After the wedding, maybe.’

Scarlett, as always, was taking the need for patience as a personal affront. ‘After the wedding might be too late! You know that.’

Isabella’s hands made her reply as she threw them in the air and glared at her cousin. ‘You’re so impulsive! Let’s just wait and see how things—’

It was at that moment that she spotted Jackie and Romano, her view half blocked by a pillar, both staring at her.

‘—turn out,’ she finished, much more quietly, and gave Scarlett, who was still watching Isabella intently, a dig in the ribs. Scarlett turned, eyes full of confusion, but they suddenly widened.

‘Jackie!’ she said warmly, smiling and rushing over to give her a hug. Jackie stayed stiff in her embrace. It felt awkward, wrong. But she had to give Scarlett credit where credit was due—she was putting on a wonderful show.

‘Isabella and I were just talking…’

That much had been evident.

Scarlett paused, her gaze flicked quickly to the ceiling and back again. ‘We’re planning a surprise hen party for Lizzie and we want to drag you out to lunch to help us organise it!’

Isabella looked at Scarlett as if she’d gone out of her mind.

Isabella voiced Jackie’s very thought. ‘I don’t think Lizzie—’

‘Nonsense!’ Scarlett said with a sweep of her hands. ‘And there’s no time like the present. You don’t mind, do you, Romano?’

Romano didn’t really have time to say whether he minded or not, because Scarlett grabbed Jackie’s elbow and used it as leverage to push her back out into the sunshine, while Isabella followed.

Yep, thought Jackie, rubbing her elbow once she’d snatched it back, Scarlett was getting more and more like their mother every year.

Once they were clear of the tables and umbrellas out front of the restaurant, Jackie turned and faced them. ‘You two are deranged!’

Isabella looked at the cobbles below her feet, while a flash of discomfort passed across Scarlett’s eyes. ‘We need to talk to you,’ she said. ‘Don’t we, Isabella?’ She hung a lead weight on every word of that last sentence.

Jackie looked towards the restaurant door, not sure if she was annoyed or relieved that her chance meeting with Romano had been unexpectedly hijacked. She looked back at her cousin and her sister in time to see a look pass between them. Isabella let out a soft sigh of defeat.

‘I suppose we do. But we need to go somewhere private,’ she said. ‘Somewhere we won’t be interrupted or overheard.’

The three of them looked around the small piazza at the heart of Monta Correnti hopelessly. Growing up in a small town like this, you couldn’t sneeze without the grapevine going into action. And, this being Italy, the grapevine had always had its roots back at your mamma’s house. She’d be waiting with a handkerchief and a don’t-mess-with-me expression when you got home.

That was why Jackie and Romano had gone to such lengths to keep their relationship secret once their respective parents had warned them off each other. They’d been careful never to be seen in public together unless it was when Romano and his father had eaten at Sorella on one of Jackie’s waitressing shifts.

Scarlett stopped gazing around the piazza and put her hands on her hips. She fixed Isabella with a determined look. ‘I know one place where we won’t be disturbed.’ She raised her eyebrows and waited for her cousin’s reaction.

‘You don’t mean…?’ Then Isabella nodded just once. ‘Come on, then,’ she said and marched off across the old town’s market square. ‘We’d better get going.’

A low branch snapped back and hit Jackie in the face. She lost her footing a little and gave her right ankle a bit of a twist. Nothing serious, but she’d been dressed for a stroll around town and a leisurely lunch, not a safari.

‘Sorry,’ called Scarlett over her shoulder as she tramped confidently down the steep hill.

Jackie said nothing.

What had started off as a brisk walk had turned into a full-on hike through the woods. Her stomach was rumbling and she was starting to doubt that food was anywhere in the near future. What kind of shindig was Scarlett planning for Lizzie that involved all this special-forces-type secrecy?

Eventually the trees thinned and the three women reached a small, shady clearing at the bottom of the hill with a small stream running through it. Jackie smoothed her hair down with one hand and discovered far too many twigs and miscellaneous seeds for her liking. When she’d finished picking them out, she looked up to see Isabella and Scarlett busy righting old crates and brushing the moss and dirt off a couple of medium-sized tree stumps.

As she looked around more closely Jackie could see a few branches tied together with twine lying on the floor, obviously part of some makeshift construction that had now collapsed. A torn blue tarpaulin was attached by a bit of old rope at one corner to the lower branch of a tree while its other end flapped free.

Scarlett sat herself on the taller of the two tree stumps and motioned with great solemnity for Jackie to take the sturdiest-looking crate. Isabella took the other crate, but it wobbled, so she stood up and leaned against a tree. Jackie suddenly wanted to laugh.

It all felt a bit ridiculous. Three grown women, sitting round the remains of an ancient childhood campfire. She started to chuckle softly, but the shocked look on Scarlett’s face killed the sound off while it was still in her throat. She looked from her sister to her cousin and back again.

‘So…What’s this all about? You’re not planning something illegal for Lizzie’s hen do, are you?’

Scarlett looked genuinely puzzled and every last trace of hilarity abruptly left Jackie at that point. Despite the summer sun pouring through the leafy canopy, she shivered.

‘It’s you we need to talk to,’ Isabella said. ‘The party was just an excuse.’

Scarlett looked scornful at Jackie’s tardiness to catch on. ‘Can you imagine what Lizzie would do if we planned a night of debauchery and silliness? Not very good for her public image.’

Not good for anyone’s image, Jackie thought.

Scarlett stood up and looked around the clearing. ‘This was our camp. Isabella and I used to come here to share secrets.’

‘I remember how close you both were—joined at the hip, Uncle Luca used to joke. It was such a shame that you fell out. I thought—’

‘Jackie! Please? Just let me talk?’

The hint of desperation in her sister’s voice sent cold spiralling down into Jackie’s intestines.

‘This is difficult enough as it is,’ Scarlett said, and stood up and ran a hand through her hair. She looked across at Isabella.

‘There’s no easy way to say this,’ Isabella continued. She pushed herself away from the trunk of the tree she’d been leaning on and started pacing. Jackie just clasped her hands together on her knees and watched the two women as they walked to and fro in silence for a few seconds, then Scarlett planted her feet on the floor and looked Jackie squarely in the eye.

‘We know your secret.’

Although her mouth didn’t open, Jackie’s jaw dropped a few notches. Her secret? Not about Kate, surely? They had to mean some other secret—the anorexia, maybe. Her eyes narrowed slightly. ‘And what secret would that be, exactly?’

The leaves whispered above their heads, and when Isabella’s answer came it was only just audible. ‘About the baby.’

An invisible juggernaut hit Jackie in the chest.

‘You know I…? You know about…?’

Their faces confirmed it and she gave up trying to get a sentence out.

But exactly how much did they know? All of it? She stood up.

‘You know I was pregnant when I went away to live with my father?’

They both nodded, eyes wide.

‘You know I gave the baby up for adoption?’

Isabella nodded again. ‘No one told us, but it was kind of obvious when you came home the following summer without a baby.’

Oh, Lord. They knew everything. She sat down again, but she’d chosen the wrong crate and it tipped over, leaving her on her hands and knees in the dirt. Both Isabella and Scarlett rushed to help her up. She was shaking when she grabbed onto their arms for support.

They got her to her feet again and she met their eyes. There was no point in trying to hide anything now.

‘My daughter—Kate—contacted me a couple of months ago. We’ve met a few times—’

‘Kate?’ The strangled noise that left Scarlett’s mouth was hardly even a word. Jackie watched in astonishment as her normally feisty, bull-headed little sister broke down and sobbed. ‘You had a little girl, a little girl,’she whimpered, over and over.

Jackie was stunned. Not just by Scarlett’s reaction, but by the outpouring of emotion; it must mean that, on some level, Scarlett didn’t despise her as much as she’d thought. She’d always seemed so indifferent.

‘I’m so sorry,’ Scarlett finally mumbled through her tears. Jackie turned to Isabella, hoping for an explanation, but Isabella wasn’t in a much better state herself.

A thought struck her. ‘You can’t tell anyone about Kate!’ she said quickly. ‘Not yet.’

My goodness, if this was going to be the reaction to the news, she’d been right to decide to keep her mouth shut until after the wedding.

‘It’s okay,’she added, taking a deep breath. ‘Things are going to be okay. Kate and I are getting to know each other. Things are going to work out, you’ll see. So don’t be sad for me—be happy.’

She’d hoped she sounded convincing, but she’d obviously missed the mark, because Scarlett and Isabella, who had been in the process of mopping up a little with a few tissues that Isabella had pulled from her pocket, just started crying even harder. Jackie stood there, dumbfounded, as they sat down on the two tree stumps looking very sorry for themselves indeed.

And then another thought struck her. One that should have popped into her head at the beginning of this surreal ‘lunch’, but she’d been too shocked to even think about it.

‘How?’

Both the other women went suddenly very still.

‘How did you find out? Did Mamma tell you?’

They both shook their heads, perfectly in time with each other. If she weren’t in the middle of a crisis, Jackie would have found it funny.

‘Then how?’

Scarlett looked up at her, her eyes full of shame. She didn’t even manage to maintain eye contact for more than a few seconds and dropped her gaze to the floor before she spoke.

‘The letter.’

What letter? What was Scarlett talking about? Had Mamma written a—

White light exploded behind Jackie’s eyelids. She marched over to Scarlett’s tree stump and stood there, hands on hips, just as she would have done when she’d been a stroppy fifteen-year-old, and made her sister look at her.

‘You read the letter? My letter?’

Scarlett bit her lip and nodded.

‘How dare you! How dare you! How—’

She was so consumed with rage she couldn’t come up with any new words. Not even wanting to share a woodland clearing with the other two women, she strode over to the stream, as far away from them as she could possibly get without getting tangled up in trees, and stared into the cool green tranquillity of the woods.

Another thought bubbled its way to the surface. She turned round and found them twisting round on their tree stumps, watching her.

‘Then you know who…’

Isabella swallowed. ‘Romano.’

Jackie covered her mouth with her hand. This was worse than she’d imagined. Hen nights involving L-plates, obscene confectionery and tiaras would have been a walk in the park compared to this.

She exhaled. It all made sense now—why they’d freaked out when they’d seen her and Romano together back at the restaurant. But why had they dragged her away? Why tell her now?

‘We didn’t ever tell anyone else,’ Isabella added hastily.

Jackie breathed out and sat down on the crate—the good one—and looked at her sister and her cousin.

They knew. And that had been her secret mission this visit, hadn’t it? To tell everyone. Did it really matter if Scarlett and Isabella had known all along? Probably not. It would just be one difficult conversation she could cross off her list. They’d actually done her a favour.

Her anger had faded now, and she even managed a tiny smile. ‘I was planning on telling you all after the wedding, anyway. Kate would really like to meet her aunts and uncles and I think it’s time this secret came out into the open.’

Why weren’t Scarlett and Isabella looking more relieved? They were still folded into awkward positions on their tree stumps. She decided to lighten the atmosphere.

‘The least you two can do after all this is help me break the news to Mamma. I think you owe me!’ And to let them know she was rising above it, dealing with the past and moving on, she gave them a magnanimous smile.

‘You don’t understand,’Scarlett said, rising from her stump, her forehead furrowing into even deeper lines. ‘There’s more.’

More? How could there be more? She’d told them everything. There were no more secrets left to uncover.

CHAPTER FOUR

SCARLETT gulped and cleared her throat. ‘The letter…I brought it here to show Isabella.’

Jackie felt her core temperature rise a few notches.

‘You have to remember—’ Scarlett shot a glance at Isabella ‘—we were only eleven…’

Jackie’s voice was low and even when she spoke. This was the tone that made her staff run for cover. ‘What else, Scarlett? You did give my letter to Romano yourself, not pass it to someone else to give to him? If someone else knows—’

Isabella, who’d been unable to stand still for the last few moments, jumped in. ‘It was my fault. I wanted to tell Aunt Lisa at first…’ She trailed off at the look on Jackie’s face. ‘I didn’t!’ she added quickly.

‘We fought,’ Scarlett said, her voice gaining volume but at the same time becoming toneless, emotionless. ‘Isabella had hold of the letter and I tried to snatch it away from her. It just seemed to leap out of my hands…’

They ripped the letter a little? Got it dirty? What? Jackie willed Scarlett to say either of those things. Just a little smudge. No harm done. But she could tell from the look of pure desolation on Scarlett’s face that the fate of her letter had been much worse.

‘What happened to it?’ she asked, and her voice wobbled in unison with her stomach.

Scarlett didn’t say anything but her gaze shot guiltily towards the stream innocently bubbling over the stones, and lingered there.

‘No!’ It was barely a whisper, barely even a sound. Suddenly Jackie needed to hold something, to cling onto something, but nothing solid was within easy reach. Everything was moving in the breeze, shifting under her feet.

Tears started to flow down Scarlett’s cheeks again. ‘I’m so sorry, Jackie. I’m so sorry…’

Jackie tried to breathe properly. Her letter to Romano had ended up in the stream? Thinking became an effort, her brain cells as slow and thick as wallpaper paste. She knew it was awful, her worst nightmare, but she couldn’t for the life of her seem to connect all the dots and work out why.

‘I didn’t realise at the time what I’d done,’ Scarlett said, dragging the tears off her cheeks with the heels of her hands. ‘I didn’t realise what it meant, that Romano was even the father…It was only later, when you and Mamma were shouting all the time.’ She hiccupped. ‘And then she sent you away. I knew I’d done something bad, but it wasn’t until I was older, that I put all the pieces together, and understood what it all meant for you and Romano.’

Romano.

The letter had been for Romano.

Work, brain. Work!

She looked at the stream.

And then the forest upended itself. She didn’t faint or throw up, although she felt it likely she might do either or both, but the strength of the revelation actually knocked her off her feet and she found herself sitting on the hard compacted earth, her bottom cooling as its dampness seeped into the seat of her trousers.

She closed her eyes and fought the feeling she was toppling into a black hole.

Oh, no…Oh, no…Oh, no.

The truth was an icy blade, slicing into her. Adrenaline surged through her system, making clarity impossible. She had to do something. She had to go somewhere.

Jackie staggered to her feet and started to run.

Romano didn’t know.

Romano had never known.

There was a knock at the bedroom door. Jackie hadn’t been moving, just lying spreadeagled on the bed staring at the ceiling, but she held her breath and waited. When she heard footsteps getting quieter on the landing she let the air out again slowly, in one long sigh.

From her position flat on the bed she could hear voices murmuring, the occasional distant chink of an ice cube. Mamma must have opened the drawing-room doors that led onto the terrace. She glanced at the clock. Ah, cocktail hour. Vesuvius could erupt again and Mamma would still have cocktails at seven.

But there were no Manhattans or Cosmopolitans for Jackie this evening, just an uneasy mix of truth, regret and nausea, with an added slice of bitterness stuck gaily on the edge of the glass.

A migraine had been the best excuse she’d been able to come up when she’d arrived back at the house, uncharacteristically pink, sweaty and breathless. And to be honest, it wasn’t far from the truth. Her head did hurt.

Mamma had moaned in her sideways way about self-indulgence, but she hadn’t pushed the issue, thank goodness. She was far too busy to deal with her middle daughter. Nothing new there, then.

No way was Jackie going downstairs tonight. Mamma and Scarlett would be more than she could handle in her present state of mind. No, she wouldn’t leave this room until she had pulled herself together and done the laces up tight.

Now the threat of interruption had diminished she hauled herself off the bed and looked around her old bedroom. If she squinted hard she could imagine the posters that had once lined the walls, the piles of books on the floor, the certificates in frames.

Of course, none of it remained. Mamma wasn’t the kind to keep shrines to her darling daughters once they’d flown the nest. She’d redecorated this room the spring after Jackie had moved to London for good. In its present incarnation, it was an elegant guest room in shades of dusky lavender and dove grey.

Jackie caught herself and gave a wry smile.

Here she was, undergoing the most traumatic event since giving birth, and all she could think about was the decor. What was wrong with her?

Nothing. Nothing was wrong with her.

It was just easier to notice the wallpaper than it was to delve into this afternoon’s revelations.

Uh-oh. Here came the stomach lurching again. And the feeling she was stuck inside her own skin, desperate to claw her way out. She steadied herself on the dressing table as her forehead throbbed, avoiding her own gaze in the mirror.

Everything she’d believed to be true for the last seventeen years, the foundation on which she’d forged a life, had been a lie.

She stood up and walked across the room just because she needed to move. She couldn’t get her head round this. Who was she if she wasn’t Jacqueline Patterson, a woman fuelled by past betrayal and life’s hard knocks? Possibly not the sort of woman who could have climbed over a mountain of others, stilettos used as weapons, to become Editor-in-chief of Gloss! And if she weren’t that woman, then she had nothing left, because work was all she had.

Romano didn’t know.

He’d never known.

She closed her eyes and heard a gentle roaring in her ears.

Would that have changed things? Would he have stood by her after all, despite the fact they’d been so young, despite the argument that had sent them spinning in different directions? A picture filled her mind and she didn’t have the strength to push it away: a young couple, awake long after midnight, looking drained but happy. He kissed her on the forehead and told her to climb back into the bed they shared, to get some sleep. He’d try and rock the baby to sleep.

No.

It wouldn’t have been like that, couldn’t have been. They couldn’t have lost their chance because of a few sheets of soggy paper.

She had to be real. Statistics were on her side. She was more likely to have been a harried single mother, burned out and bored out of her mind, while her friends dated and went to parties and were young and frivolous.

Yes. That picture was better. That would have been her reality. She had to hang onto that. But the tenderness in the young man’s eyes as he looked over the downy top of the baby’s head at its mother wouldn’t leave her alone.

She walked towards the window but kept back a little, just in case any of the family were milling on the terrace with their cocktails. She stared off into the sunset, which glowed as bright as embers in a fire, framing the undulating hills to the west. Tonight the sun looked so huge she could almost imagine it was setting into the crystal-clear lake that lay behind those hills. Where Romano probably was right now.

All these years she’d hated him. For nothing. What a waste of energy, of a life. Surely she must have had something better to do with her time than that? Maybe so, but nothing came to mind.

Slowly, quietly, she began to feel the right way up again. Get a grip, Jacqueline. You’re not a terrified fifteen-year-old now; you’re a powerful and successful woman. You can handle this.

Romano wasn’t the monster she’d needed to make him in her imagination. And he probably wasn’t the boy-father of her fantasies either. The truth probably lay somewhere in between.

She had to give him a chance to prove her wrong, to find out what the reality would be. He had a daughter on this planet, one who was hungry to know who she was and where she came from.

Jackie walked away from the window and sat back down on the edge of the bed. This changed all her plans. She couldn’t tell her family about her daughter’s existence yet. She had to tell Romano first. It was probably a bit late for cigars and slaps on the back, but he needed to know that he was a father.

Warm light filtered through the skylights in Romano’s studio, dancing across the walls as tiny puffy clouds played hide-and-seek with the sun, daring him to come out and play. That was one of the downsides of having a home office in a home like his. Distractions, major and minor, bombarded him from every direction. One of the reasons he’d accepted Lizzie’s wedding invitation was that it had given him a perfect excuse to spend two whole weeks at the palazzo. The plan had been to use the free time running up to and after the festivities to think about the next Puccini collection.

Just as he’d managed to dismiss the idea that the sky was laughing at him for sitting indoors working on a day like this, his mobile rang. He stood up with a growl of frustration.

He didn’t recognise the caller ID. ‘Hello?’

There was a slight pause, then a deep breath. ‘Romano?’

He stopped scowling and his eyebrows, no longer weighted down with a frown, arched high.

‘It’s Jackie,’ she said in English. ‘Jackie Patterson.’

It wasn’t lack of recognition that had delayed his reply, but surprise. After all these years her voice was still surprisingly familiar. It was her reasons for calling that had stalled him.

Why, when she’d been at pains to avoid him at all costs for the last couple of days—including that ridiculous show of some ‘secret’ lunch with Isabella and Scarlett—had she called him? As always, Jackie Patterson had him running in circles chasing his own tail. It was to his own shame that he liked it.

He smiled. ‘And to what do I owe the pleasure?’

There was a pause.

‘I believe you owe me lunch.’

He might be laid-back, but he wasn’t slow. She hadn’t actually agreed to lunch before she’d been whisked away.

He let it pass. If thirty-two-year-old Jackie was anything similar to her teenage counterpart, the starchy accusation was only the surface level of her remark. With Jackie, there were always layers. Something that had both bewitched him and infuriated him during their brief summer fling. Her about-face could only mean one thing: Jackie wanted something. And that also intrigued him.

‘So I do,’ he said, injecting a lazy warmth into his voice that he knew would make her bristle. Jackie might like to play games, rather than come straight out and say what she thought and felt, but that didn’t mean he was going to lie down and let her win. The best part of a game was the competition, the cycle of move and counter-move, until there was only one final outcome. ‘Do you want to go to Rosa?’

‘No,’ she said, almost cutting the end of his sentence off. ‘Somewhere…quieter.’

Romano smiled. ‘Quieter’ could easily be interpreted as intimate.

‘Okay,’ he said slowly, letting her lead, letting her think she was in control.

He racked his brains to think of somewhere nice…quiet… to take Jackie. He doodled on a pad as he came up with, and rejected, five different restaurants. Too noisy. Bad food. Not the right ambience…

He looked out of the window, at the shady lawns and immaculate hedges. ‘You want to talk? In private?’

‘Yes.’

Did he detect a hint of wariness in her voice? Good. Jackie was always more fun when she was caught off guard. She always did something radical, something totally unexpected. He liked unexpected.

‘Come to the island, then,’ he said. ‘We’ll have all the quiet we want. We’ll eat here.’

There was a sharp laugh from Jackie. ‘What? You can cook?’ Her response reminded him of the way he’d used to tease her until she just couldn’t take it any more and had either walloped him or kissed him. He’d enjoyed both.

He laughed too. ‘You’ll just have to accept my invitation to find out.’

There was a not-so-gentle huff of displeasure in his ear. He waited.

‘Okay.’ The word was accompanied by a resigned sigh. ‘You’re on.’

Jackie was on time. He hadn’t expected anything less. She parked a sleek car on a patch of scrubby grass near a little jetty on the shore of Lake Adrina, just south of Isola del Raverno. He had been waiting in a small speedboat tied at the end of the rough wooden structure. The gentle side-to-side motion lulled him as he watched her emerge from the car looking cool and elegant.

She had style—and that wasn’t a compliment he assigned easily.

She was dressed casually in a pair of deep turquoise Capri pants and a white linen halter-neck top, which she immedi-ately covered with a sheer, long-sleeved shirt the moment she stepped into the sunshine. Her hair was in a loose, low ponytail and the honey highlights glinted gold in the midday sun. Bewitching. She pulled a large pair of sunglasses down from the top of her head to cover her eyes and it only added to the effect, making her seem aloof and desirable at the same time. He’d always been a sucker for forbidden fruit.

There was no doubt in his mind, though, that when she’d got dressed for this meeting, she’d thought very carefully about the ‘look’ she wanted to create. The clothes said: Think of me as any other woman—down-to-earth, non-threatening, relaxed. Romano was intrigued with her choice, why she’d felt the need to dress down when most other women would have dressed up.

He stood up, vaulted out of the boat and walked towards her. She didn’t smile, and he liked her all the more for it. A smile would have been a lie. He was very good at reading women, their bodies, the silent signals their posture and gestures gave off, and as he watched Jackie walk towards him the signals came thick and fast—and all of them contradictory.

Greeting people with visible affection, even if little or no emotion was involved, was part of their world and, almost out of reflex, they leaned in, he kissed her on the cheek and took her hand. He’d done it a thousand times to a thousand different women at a thousand different fashion shows, seen her do the same from across the room, but as he pulled away a wave of memories as tall as a wall hit him.

She smelled the same. Warm. Spicy. Feminine.

And suddenly the hand in his felt softer, more alive, as if he could feel the pulse beating through it, and his lips, where they had touched her cheek, tingled a little.

Up until now the idea of embarking on a second summer fling with Jackie Patterson had been a mentally pleasing idea rather than a physical tug. He sensed that afterwards he would be able to erase the niggling questions about their romance that surfaced every few years from his subconscious, only to be swiftly batted down again. A rerun now they were older and more sensible would soothe whatever it was that jarred and jiggled deep down in his soul, wanting to be let out. But this time they would end it cleanly. No fuss, no ties.

As he ushered her into the small speedboat he realised that his only half-thought-out plans had moved up a gear. Now he didn’t just want to get close to Jackie again to put ghosts to rest; his body wanted her here and now. But it wouldn’t do to rush it. While she was all cool glamour on the surface, underneath she was awkward and nervous. Skittish. If he wanted to take Jackie to his bed, he was going to have to see if he could peel back some of those layers first.

He smiled. Not many men would guess what warmth and passion lay behind the glossy, cool exterior. But he knew. And it made the anticipation all the sweeter.

There were several mooring sites on the island and he chose the one that gave them a walk through the lush gardens to the palazzo. Jackie didn’t say much as she walked in front of him, looking to the left and right, a slight frown creasing her forehead as she climbed the sloping steps from terrace to terrace. Now and again he saw her eyelids flicker, the very bare hint of colour flare in her cheeks, and he knew she was remembering the same things he was—memories of soft naked flesh, cool garden breezes that carried the scent of flowers. Heat and fulfilment.

It was here that they’d first made love, one night when his father had been away. He’d managed to invent an excuse to send the housekeeper and cook off for the evening—making sure they’d prepared food before they’d left, of course—and he and Jackie had spent the evening eating at the grand six-metre-long dining-room table, sneaking sips of his father’s best vintage wine and pretending they were older and more sophisticated, free to love each other without remark or interruption.

He hadn’t intended to seduce her. He’d just wanted some time alone with her far away from prying eyes, somewhere nicer than a dusty old run-down farmhouse. She’d been too young, and he’d been holding himself back, but that night…when they’d taken a walk in the gardens after dinner and she’d turned to him, kissed him, whispered his name and offered herself to him with wide eyes and soft lips, he hadn’t been able to say no. Not when she’d purposely played with fire, done things that she knew got him so hot and bothered that he could hardly think straight.

But he couldn’t regret it.

It had been intoxicating, and for the rest of the summer they’d lived in a blissful, heated bubble where the only thing that had mattered was time they could spend alone together. Foolish, yes. Forgettable, no.

They reached the large terrace with the parterre and giant urns. He watched her amble round a few paths, stooping to brush the tops of the geometric hedges and leaning in to smell the flowers dripping over the edges of the stone ornaments. This time it would be different. An adult affair, free from all the teenage angst and complications. He had a feeling it would be just as memorable.

On a large patio around to the side of the palazzo a table was set with linen and silver, a cream umbrella shading the waiting food. He led her to it. Crisp white wine was chilling in a bucket of ice, a dish on a stand stood in the middle of the table. She lifted her sunglasses for a moment and he noticed her eyebrows were already raised. He knew what she was thinking.

‘I had a little help,’ he said, not being able to resist teasing her, even though he’d prepared most of the meal himself. He liked cooking. It was just another way to be creative, and the results brought such pleasure, if the right amount of time and precision was lavished upon a dish. And he was all for pleasure, whatever the cost.

‘Would you prefer to sit in the sun? I can remove the umbrella.’

She shook her head. ‘I don’t do sun. It’s aging.’

He shrugged and pulled her chair out for her and she sat down, her eyes fixed on the domed cover over the central dish. He whipped it away to reveal a mountainous seafood platter: oysters, mussels, fat juicy prawns, squid and scallops, all stacked high on a mound of ice. Jackie forgot for a second to wear her mask of composure. He’d remembered well. She loved seafood.

‘Wow.’

‘See? I can cook.’

For the first time since he’d zipped her up in her mother’s dressing room, she smiled. ‘You don’t really expect me to believe you prepared all this?’ She swept a hand across the table. ‘Even the salads?’

He handed her a serving spoon and nodded towards the platter. ‘Any fool can shred a lettuce or slice a few tomatoes and drizzle a bit of oil and vinegar on them.’

She fixed him with a sassy look. ‘It seems that any fool did.’

Warmth spread outwards from his core. He’d always loved her acerbic, dry sense of humour. Jackie was funny, intelligent, and with a quirky prettiness that had fascinated him; she’d been his favourite summer fling. His last, actually. After that he’d had other things to concentrate on. Learning the ropes at Puccini Designs, proving he wasn’t a waste of space. It wasn’t until success had come that he’d returned to finding women quite so distracting. And by then he’d been older, and summer flings had had their day.

Lunch was pleasant. He almost forgot that he’d sensed Jackie had a secret agenda for their meeting. They talked about work and what was new in the fashion world. She listened with interest as he bounced a few ideas for the next collection off her. Jackie Patterson deserved to be where she was. She knew her stuff. Not one person he’d ever come across in the length of his career had ever dared to suggest she was a success because her mother had once been a famous model. Quite the reverse, actually.

Lisa’s prima-donna tendencies had been legendary. No one who’d been in Jackie’s company for more than five seconds would accuse her of being anything but highly focused, knowledgeable and professional. He was so taken with getting to know her again that he almost forgot his own secret agenda.

‘How long are you staying in Monta Correnti?’ he asked as he served her second helpings of almost everything from the platter, hoping that she wasn’t going to announce some urgent meeting back in London straight after the wedding.

She swallowed the scallop she’d been chewing. ‘Two weeks. Mamma convinced me to take a holiday since Scarlett would be visiting.’

He nodded, too preoccupied with his own calculations to fully register the heat that suddenly burned in her eyes and died away. Two weeks would be perfect. Long enough to seduce her—it was his turn this time, after all—but not long enough to tie them together for life.

When they’d finished eating, there was a natural lull. They sat in silence, staring out at the lake, which was showing off for them, flipping its waves into frothy white crests. Out of the corner of his eye he noticed a subtle shift in Jackie’s posture, felt rather than heard her take in a breath and hold it. He moved his head so he could look at her.

For a moment she was motionless, but then she pushed her sunglasses back onto her head and stared at him. He blinked and refused to let his muscles tighten even a millimetre.

‘Romano…’

She broke off and looked at the lake. After a long, heavy minute, she turned to him again. ‘I…I wanted to talk to you about something.’

Although they’d been talking Italian all this time, she switched into English and the consonants sounded hard and clunky in comparison. He stopped smiling.

‘Would you consider an exclusive fashion shoot for Gloss!, timed to come out the day after the new Puccini collection is revealed?’

He opened his mouth and nothing came out. For some bizarre reason he hadn’t been expecting that at all.

But that was Jackie Patterson all over. She had a way of overturning a man’s equilibrium in the most thrilling manner. It was a pity he’d forgotten how that excitement was always mixed with a hint of disorientation and a dash of discomfort. Didn’t mean he liked it any less.

This could be the perfect opportunity to keep close to Jackie for the next few days, easing that frown off her forehead, making her relax in his company until she remembered how good they’d been together instead of how messily it had ended.

‘It’s a possibility,’he said and gave her a long, lazy smile. ‘But let’s save the details for later—say, drinks tomorrow evening?’

CHAPTER FIVE

IT WAS just as well that Jackie knew the road to Monta Correnti like the back of her hand, because she wasn’t really concentrating on her driving as she travelled back to her mother’s villa. Just as well she’d only drunk half a glass of wine at lunch too. Romano had her feeling light-headed enough as it was and she’d decided she needed her wits about her if she was going to tell him what could be the biggest piece of news in his whole thirty-four years on this planet.

Only, it hadn’t quite turned out that way, had it?

She’d chickened out.

Jackie sighed as she made her way up the steep hill, hogging far too much of the road to be polite.

She’d thought she’d been ready for it, thought she’d been ready to open her mouth and change his life for ever.

What she hadn’t counted on was that, without the benefit of almost two decades of hate backing her up, Romano’s effect on her would be as potent as ever. He’d always made her a little breathless just by standing too close, just by smiling at her. It had got her completely off track. Distracted. She’d do well to remember the mess she’d ended up in the last time she’d given in to that delicious lack of oxygen.

All the chemistry she was feeling probably didn’t have anything to do with her. He couldn’t help it, just exuded some strange pheromone that sent women crazy. While Romano had built a solid foundation and long-lasting reputation in his professional life he wasn’t the greatest in the permanence stakes, and she’d started panicking that he’d be a bad father, that he wasn’t what Kate needed.

Jackie muttered to herself as she took a hairpin bend with true Italian bravado.

What did she know? Did she have any more ‘permanence’ in her life? The truth was, after Romano, she’d never really let anyone get that close again. Oh, she’d had relationships, but ones where she’d had all the power. They’d dragged on for a couple of years until the men in question had realised she never was going to put them ahead of her work, and when they’d left she’d congratulated herself for having the foresight not to jump into the relationship with both feet.

Jackie slowed the car and pulled into a gravelly lookout point near the top of the hill. She switched off the engine, got out and walked towards the railing and the wonderful view of the lake.

She’d wanted to run, to get as far away from him as possible. Was that why she’d chickened out of telling Romano the truth? Was she once again thinking of herself, of keeping herself safe, of keeping the illusion of perfection intact?

No. She’d been scared, but not for herself—for Kate. She’d imagined all the different scenarios, all the different reactions he might have. Would Romano be angry? Horrified? Ambivalent?

What if she scared Romano off by dropping this bomb-shell? It was too sudden, too much, after seventeen years of silence. She wouldn’t get a second go at this. It had to be right the first time.

She swallowed and gripped the wonky iron railing for support, but instead of staring at the majesty of Lake Adrina, she just stared at her feet.

Her heart might just break for Kate if Romano didn’t want to have anything to do with her. She knew what it was like to lose a man like that. It hurt. Really hurt. And Kate might hate her for doing it all wrong and scaring him away. She couldn’t have that.

Lunch had been good, but it had only been a starting point. They had to build on the fragile truce they’d started to mesh together. Whether they liked it or not, she and Romano would be for ever linked once he knew the truth.

So she’d invented a reason to keep him talking to her, to keep them seeing each other. They needed to get to know each other again. Then she could work out a way of telling him about Kate that wouldn’t send him running.

She’d just have to ignore the glint of mischief deep in those unusual grey eyes, forget about the fact her body thought it was full of adolescent hormones again when she clapped eyes on him. At least Romano hadn’t tried anything; he’d been the perfect gentleman, even though she was sure there’d been a hum of remembered attraction in the air. Thank goodness they were older and wiser now and both knew it would be a horrible mistake to act on it.

When Jackie finally drove through the gateposts of her mother’s villa, she spotted Scarlett sitting on the low steps that led to the front door, watching her rental car intently as she swung it round and parked it beside her mother’s sports car. She pressed her lips together as she switched off the engine. She knew that look. Scarlett was in the mood for a showdown and Jackie really wasn’t.

She got out of the car and tried to ignore Scarlett, but as she neared the steps Scarlett stood up and blocked her path.

‘What?’ she said with the merest hint of incredulity in her voice. ‘Have you been waiting for me here all afternoon?’

Scarlett returned her stare. ‘Basically.’

Jackie shook her head and moved to pass her sister. Stubborn wasn’t the word.

‘Please?’ Scarlett said, just as they were about to brush shoulders.

It wasn’t the tone of her voice—slightly hoarse, slightly high-pitched—that stopped Jackie in her tracks, but the desperation in her sister’s eyes. Neither of them spoke for a few seconds, and Jackie found it impossible to look away or even move.

‘Okay,’ she finally said.

Scarlett nodded, a flush of relief crossing her features, and set off towards the garden at breakneck pace. Instead of heading for the table and chairs on the terrace, or the spacious summer house, Scarlett kept marching downhill through the gardens. Without even glancing back over her shoulder at Jackie, she launched herself at the old tree and swung her leg over one of the thicker, lower branches.

‘I thought we might as well talk on your territory,’ she said.

Jackie just stared at her. This week had to be the most bizarre of her entire life.

Scarlett smiled at her—not her usual bright, confident grin, but a little half-smile that reminded Jackie of the way she’d looked when she’d stuck her head round Jackie’s bedroom door and had asked her to read her a bedtime story when Mamma had been too busy.

‘I can’t believe I’m doing this.’ Jackie hoisted herself up onto ‘her’ branch again. ‘I thought you said this was silly,’ she said, shooting a look across at Scarlett, who was now sitting quite merrily astride a branch, swinging her legs.

‘It is.’

Jackie grunted and pulled herself upright and straddled the branch so she could look at Scarlett.

‘We always used to come here to whisper about things we didn’t want Mamma to know,’ Scarlett said. She picked at a scrap of loose bark on the branch in front of her, then studied it intently for a few seconds. ‘Are you going to tell her?’ she said, not taking her eyes off the flaking bit of tree she was destroying.

Jackie waited for her to meet her gaze.

‘I have to. It’s all going to come out into the open shortly.’

Scarlett nodded.

Jackie drew in a breath and held it. ‘But I have to tell Romano first.’

A look of pain crossed Scarlett’s features. ‘I’m so sorry, Jackie. I should have told you earlier…’

Jackie kept eye contact. Scarlett didn’t shrink back; she met her gaze and didn’t waver.

‘Yes, you should have,’ she eventually replied.

Scarlett sighed. ‘It was easier to pretend it had all been some horrible nightmare once I’d moved to the other side of the world. I thought I could run from it, pretend it hadn’t happened…But as time went on, I realised the true implications of my actions and I…’her chin jutted forward ‘…I chickened out. I’m sorry.’ She shrugged one shoulder. ‘What can I say? The gene for self-preservation is strong in our family.’

Jackie exhaled. She knew all about chickening out, all about desperately wanting to let the truth out but not being able to find the right word to pull from the pile to start the avalanche.

It was much harder than she’d anticipated to stay angry at Scarlett. Just yesterday she’d thought this fierce sense of injustice would burn for ever. But these weren’t just pretty words to smooth things over and keep the family in its disjointed equilibrium. Scarlett’s apology had been from the heart. After all that had passed between them, could they use this as a starting point to building their way back to what sisters were supposed to be?

‘At least I understand why you hated me all these years.’ She’d done it herself many times—made an error of judgement and turned her fury on the nearest victim rather than herself. A trick they’d both learned from their mother, she suddenly realised.

She wanted to say she was sorry too, for disappointing Scarlett, for setting up the series of events that had forced her to leave her home and live with her father, but she couldn’t mimic Scarlett’s disarming honesty. The words stuck in her throat.

In one quick movement Scarlett swung herself off her branch and landed on the same one as Jackie, side on, so both her legs dangled over one side. Her eyes were all pink but she hadn’t surrendered to tears yet.

‘Is that what you thought? That I hated you?’

Jackie felt the skin under her eyebrows wrinkle. ‘Didn’t you?’

‘No!’ The volume of her reply startled both of them. ‘No,’ she repeated more quietly.

‘But…’

Now the tears fell. ‘I didn’t leave because of you, Jackie. I left because I couldn’t live with myself.’ Scarlett hung her head and a plop of salty moisture landed on her foot. ‘When you came back from London you looked so different, so sad…I couldn’t face seeing you like that. So I did what any self-respecting little girl would—I ran away and told myself it wasn’t my fault.’

Jackie hadn’t thought the pain could get any worse. She’d only ever thought about how she’d felt, how she’d been wronged. Emotionally, she’d never matured past fifteen on this issue, too concentrated on her own wounds to see the others hurting around her. It was as if she’d only just woken up from suspended animation, that she could suddenly see things clearly instead of through a sleepy fog of self-absorption.

Romano had a daughter he didn’t even know existed. He’d missed all those years; he’d never be able to get them back.

And Scarlett had carried the scars of this terrible secret round with her all her life. It had affected their relationship, Scarlett’s relationship with their mother…everything.

Jackie’s eyes burned. She closed her lids to hide the evidence and grabbed at the sleeve of Scarlett’s blouse, using it to pull her into a hug. They stayed like that just resting against each other, softening, breathing, for such a long time.

‘I was too proud,’ Jackie whispered. ‘I should have gone to Romano myself, but I took the coward’s way out. I shouldn’t have dragged you into it, Scarlett.’

Scarlett pulled back and looked at her, eyes wide. ‘You mean that? You forgive me?’

Jackie had to stop her bottom lip from wobbling before she could answer. ‘If you can forgive me.’

Scarlett lunged at her, tightening the hug until it hurt. Unfortunately it caught Jackie off guard and she lost her balance. Scarlett let out a high-pitched squeak and it took a few moments for Jackie to register what that meant. Uh-oh. They clung even tighter onto each other as the tree slid away from them and they met the ground with a whomp, leaving them in a tangle of arms and legs.

‘Ow,’ said Scarlett, and then began to laugh softly.

Jackie wasn’t sure whether she was moaning in pain or laughing along with Scarlett. The pathetic noises they were making and their fruitless attempts to separate their limbs and sit up just made them laugh harder.

‘Girls?’

Their mother’s voice sliced through the late-afternoon air.

Scarlett and Jackie held their breath and just looked at each other. Unfortunately this prompted an even more explosive fit of the giggles, and Lisa found them crying and laughing helplessly while trying to wipe the dirt off their bottoms at the foot of the old pine tree.

The boy slowed his Vespa to a halt at the back of the abandoned farmhouse and cut the engine. Everything seemed still. He looked up. The sky was bright cobalt, smeared with thin white clouds so high up they were on the verge of evaporating, and there was the merest hint of moisture in the air, a slight heaviness that he hadn’t noticed while the wind had been buffeting him on his moped. Now he was motionless, he felt it cling to his skin and wrap around him.

Wasn’t she here? Why hadn’t she come running round the side of the farmhouse at the sound of his arrival as she usually did?

Frowning slightly, he jogged round the old building calling her name. No one answered.

He found her sitting on the front step, her back against the rotted door jamb, her long legs folded up in front of her. She didn’t move, didn’t look at him, even though she must have heard him arrive.

‘Jackie? What’s the matter?’

He sat down on the step beside her and she swiftly tucked her legs underneath herself. Her long dark hair was pulled into a high, tight ponytail and combined with the coldness in her hazel eyes it made her look unusually severe.

‘I’m surprised you managed to drag yourself away,’ she said, looking up, her tone light and controlled. ‘I thought you’d be down in the piazza still, letting that Francesca Gambardi make eyes at you.’

Romano turned away. He was getting tired of this. Ever since they’d spent the night together almost three weeks ago Jackie had been acting strangely.

Oh, most of the time she was her normal, fiery, passionate self—a fact he was capitalising on, since they didn’t seem to be able to keep their hands off each other for more than a few seconds at a time—but every now and then she just went all quiet and moody. And then she’d come out with some outrageous statement. Just as she had done a few moments ago. His head hurt with trying to figure it all out.

He sighed. ‘We were just talking.’

Jackie humphed. ‘Well, you seem to do a heck of a lot of talking with Francesca these days!’

He felt unusually tired and old when he answered her. ‘There’s nothing wrong with talking to a friend and, besides, I was only in the piazza because I was waiting for a chance to ask you to meet me here. Which I did. And you came. So I can’t see what the problem is.’

She rolled her eyes and Romano felt his habitually well-buried temper shift and wake. ‘What more do you want me to do?’

Jackie’s answer was so fast it almost grazed his ears. ‘Tell her you’re not interested!’

‘I have told her! She keeps asking me why, wanting a reason. I can’t very well tell her it’s because I’m seeing you. The news would be all over town in a flash and we’d never be able to see each other again. So, until we can convince our parents to take us seriously, I’m just going to have to let Francesca talk and I will pretend to listen.’

‘How very convenient for you. Sounds like you’ve got the perfect excuse to flirt with whomever you want and still have me on the side.’

There was a hint of grit in his voice when he replied. ‘It’s not like that.’

She knew it wasn’t. How could she believe he’d spend every moment he could making love with her, whispering promises, making plans, and the next moment be chasing around after girls like Francesca? Did she really believe him capable of that?

Jackie’s silence, the thin line of her mouth told him all he needed to know.

He stood up and walked away. Only a few paces, but hopefully far enough from her distracting presence to let him think.

‘You’re not being logical,’ he said.

Jackie jumped to her feet. ‘I’m as logical as the next girl!’

That was what he was worried about.

She put her hands on her hips, looked at him as if she wanted to melt the flesh from his bones with just her stare. Jackie always had the oddest effect on him. Instead of making him cower, it made him want to stride over to her and kiss her senseless, persuade her she was everything he wanted.

He was on the verge of doing just that when she shot his plan full of holes by marching over to him and poking him in the chest with one of her fingernails. ‘I don’t need your so-called logic when I’ve got eyes in my head. You like her, don’t you? Francesca?’

He shoved his hands in his pockets and walked swiftly back towards the farmhouse and went inside, hoping the cool air would improve his mood.

Jackie had fooled him.

At best the rest of the world saw him as a financial drain on his famous father, at worst a spoiled brat who knew no limits and respected no authority. He’d always thought that Jackie was the one person who credited him with more depth than that—more than he did himself even. So it stung for her to accuse him like this, it stung. It was the worst insult she could have flung at him.

It was a pity that just a few short months ago she would have been right. He’d been all those things. But that was before he’d met her, before she’d challenged him to join her in seeing who he could be if he was brave enough. But he’d obviously failed her, and that hurt.

There was a noise behind him and he looked over his shoulder to find her standing in the doorway, backlit with dust and sunshine and looking anything but penitent.

‘This is stupid,’he said, sounding steelier than he’d meant to.

Instead of agreeing with him, softening and running to him and throwing her arms around him as he’d hoped she would, she just lengthened her spine and looked down her nose at him.

‘Hit a raw nerve, did I?’

He didn’t even bother answering her and she took a few steps towards him. ‘Francesca is a very pretty girl, isn’t she?’ She blinked innocently and her voice was suddenly all syrup and silkiness.

He didn’t know what kind of game she was playing but he had a feeling he’d lose, whichever tack he took. She went on and on, asking him over and over again, until he began to think she wanted him to agree with her, that on some level his capitulation would give her satisfaction, and eventually he got so cross with her incessant prodding that he walked over to her and gave her what she wanted.

‘Yes. Okay? Francesca is very pretty.’

There. That had shut her up.

Jackie seemed to shrink a little, wither, as her eyes grew round and pink.

‘You like her better than me,’ she said, her voice husky.

Romano ran his hand through his hair, sorry he’d let her goad him into agreeing with her. He loved her, he really did, but if he’d known that taking their relationship to the next level would have opened this Pandora’s box of female emotions, he might have resisted and sat on the lid a little longer.

She hadn’t been ready for this. Neither had he.

Suddenly a summer of sweet, stolen kisses and innocent eye-gazing had morphed into an adult relationship, full of complications and blind alleys.

‘I see you’re not denying it,’ she said, her voice colder than ever.

That was it. Romano didn’t lose his temper very often, but when he did…

His thoughts were red and bouncing off the inside of his skull, searing where they touched. Perhaps this wasn’t all worth it. Perhaps he would be better off with a girl like Francesca—a simple girl who wouldn’t tax him the way this one did. This jealousy of Jackie’s…it was ugly. And he was just furious enough to tell her so.

‘At this precise moment in time, I’m starting to think you are right.’

The look on Jackie’s face—pure horror mixed with desolation—warned him he’d gone too far, crossed a line. It wouldn’t help to tell her that he hadn’t jumped over it willingly, that she was the one who’d given him an almighty shove.

‘In that case,’ she said, backing away, walking heel-to-toe in an exaggerated manner, ‘I never want to see you again.’

And then she turned and sprinted out of the farmhouse, leaving him only one option. It didn’t take him long to catch up with her, despite those long toned legs.

‘Jackie,’ he yelled, when he was only a few metres away, that one word a plea to cool down, to see sense.

She stopped dead and turned around. ‘I mean it. If you try to call me, I’ll slam the phone down. And if you come to the house, I’ll set the dog on you!’

His burst of laughter didn’t help her temper, but surely when he explained she’d see the funny side and it would pop this bubble of tension. Then they could walk hand in hand to the bottom of the grove and spend the rest of the afternoon making up.

She was still glaring at him, but he stepped forward, brushed her cheek with his thumb. ‘Your mother’s dog is a miniature poodle,’ he said, a join-me-in-this smile on his face. ‘What is he going to do? Fluff me to death?’

It was at that moment that he realised he’d stupidly taken one of those blind alleys he’d been trying to avoid. Jackie was not amused by his observation in the slightest. She called him a few names he hadn’t even known were part of her vocabulary then set off down the dirt track. As she passed his Vespa, she gave it a hefty kick with her tennis shoe and it fell over.

Romano didn’t bother following.

There was no salvaging the situation this afternoon. He might as well get his Vespa vertical again and take off on a ride to clear his head. Jackie would calm down eventually—she always did—and then he would go and see her and they would both say sorry and things would get back to normal.

Jackie couldn’t help thinking about Romano as she slid into her bridesmaid’s gown. As Scarlett helped her zip it up it wasn’t her sister’s fingers she felt at her back, but his. Wearing his gown, knowing he had designed the ridiculously romantic bodice with her in mind, made her feel all fluttery and unsettled. And as the thick satin brushed against her skin she was reminded of what it had felt like to feel the tips of his fingers on her shoulder blades, the weight of his hands around the small of her waist, the tease of his thigh against hers…

‘There,’ Scarlett said as she did up the hook and eye at the top of the zip. ‘I’m just going back to my room to get my bag. I’ll meet you downstairs.’

Jackie just nodded. She needed to snap out of this, really she did.

There was no point in thinking about…remembering…Romano that way. Romantically, they were explosive. An unstable force. But what Kate needed right now were parents who could stand in the same room without tearing each other to shreds, and she knew from personal experience just how destructive bad parental relationships could be.

No, Kate needed security, stability. Sensible, supportive co-parent was the only relationship she wanted with Romano these days.

Jackie leaned towards the mirror on the dressing table and checked her make-up. It hadn’t helped that in the last couple of days she and Romano had been in constant contact. But that had been the plan, hadn’t it? They’d talked on the phone, had coffee together, another lunch. Conversation had mainly revolved around business, but she’d felt she’d accomplished what she’d set out to. They had the beginnings of a friendship, one that she hoped would survive the bombshell she was about to drop.

It was time to tell him.

Not today, of course. Tomorrow. She’d have to catch him at the wedding reception and arrange a meeting, somewhere far away from her family’s straining ears.

‘Jackie?’ Scarlett yelled for her as she ran past her bedroom door and headed down the staircase.

‘Coming,’ she called back and grabbed both her wrap and her bag. She ran as quickly and elegantly as she could in heels to meet the rest of the bridal party, which had now assembled in the wide marble entrance hall. She slowed as she reached the last couple of stairs.

‘Lizzie, you look absolutely perfect. Glowing.’

A slight blush coloured her elder sister’s cheeks just adding to the effect.

‘Well, it’s good to know I’m glowing, especially as these two—’ she paused to rub her tummy ‘—have been having a two-person Aussie rules football match inside me since five a.m.! I’m absolutely exhausted.’

Jackie kissed her on the cheek. ‘You’re not glowing in spite of those beautiful boys, but because of them.’ She sighed. ‘You have so much to look forward to…’

She hadn’t meant to say that. Her mouth had just done its own thing. Her mouth never did its own thing. She was always in control, always careful about what she said and what she projected, and she was horrified to have heard her voice get more and more scratchy, until it had almost cracked completely as she’d trailed off.

Lizzie did have so much to look forward to. And it had suddenly hit her again that she’d missed all those things with Kate. Moments she wished she’d witnessed, had treasured, instead of giving them to someone else for safekeeping. Moments she would never get back.

Scarlett rested a hand on her shoulder, gave her a knowing squeeze.

‘Are you okay?’ Lizzie asked, ruining her ‘glow’ a little with a concerned frown.

Jackie instantly brightened, glossed up. ‘Of course. Absolutely fine. Just the…you know…emotion of the day getting to me.’

At that her mother gave a heavenwards glance. ‘Not everything is about you, Jackie.’

A couple of months ago, maybe even a couple of days ago, she would have bristled at that remark, stored it away with the others to be brought out as ammunition at some time in the future, but today she turned to face her mother and did her best to stop her eyes glinting with pride and defiance.

‘I know that, Mamma,’ she said quietly. ‘Believe me, I finally get it.’

CHAPTER SIX

THE wedding ceremony at Monta Correnti’s opulent courthouse was simple and moving. The way Jack Lewis looked at his new bride as he slid a ring on her finger brought a tear to almost every eye in the place. And then they were whisked away in limousines and a whole flurry of white-ribboned speedboats to Romano’s island for the rest of the celebrations. Jackie’s heart crept into her mouth and sat there, quivering, as the boat neared the stone jetty just below Romano’s over-the-top pink and white palazzo.

Only close friends and family had been at the courthouse. Now a much larger guest list was assembling for a religious blessing and reception in the palace and formal gardens of Isola del Raverno.

Jackie tried not to think about Romano, but the conversation she knew they must have the following day was looming over her.

Today wasn’t about that. Wasn’t about her. Her mother had been right, even if only accidentally. During the winding journey from Monta Correnti to Lake Adrina, she’d thought hard about her mother’s words. For as long as she’d been able to remember, even before she got pregnant with Kate, everything had been about her. Being a middle child, she’d felt she had to fight for every bit of attention, had learned to be territorial about absolutely everything, even though Lizzie and Scarlett hadn’t been treated as favourites in any way.

And she’d never let go of that need to be the hub of everything, of needing the adulation, position…supremacy.

Until she’d rediscovered her lost daughter, she hadn’t realised she’d had any of those sacrificial maternal feelings, hadn’t let herself remember what she’d buried deep inside. She hadn’t ever let herself feel those things, not even when she’d been carrying Kate. It had been easier to bear the idea of giving a piece of herself up if she imagined it to be nothing but a blob—a thing—not even a human being. Of course, all that clever thinking had fallen apart the moment Kate had come silently into the world, in the long moments when Jackie had been helpless on an operating table with doctors and midwives hurrying around and issuing coded instructions to each other. She’d felt as if her heart had stopped, but the monitor attached to her finger had called her a liar.

When Kate had finally let out a disgruntled wail, Jackie had begun to weep with relief, and then with loss. She hadn’t had the right to care about this baby that way. She’d decided to give that right away to someone else, someone who would do a better job.

And somebody else had done a better job. She didn’t know if that was a blessing or a curse. Whichever way she’d thought about it, it hurt.

She’d caused all of it. All of this mess.

The boat hit the jetty and jolted her out of her dark thoughts. She grimaced to herself. So much for today not being all about her. She’d spent the ten-minute ride to the island submerged in self-pity.

Today is not the day, she told herself. You can do it tomorrow. You’ll tell Romano and then you’ll have plenty of reasons to feel sorry for yourself—and for him.

The wedding breakfast was held in the palazzo’s grand ballroom—the late count’s pride and joy. ‘Ostentatious’ didn’t begin to do it justice. There was gold leaf everywhere, ornate plasterwork on every available surface and long mirrors inserted into the panels on the walls at regular intervals. Totally over-the-top for casual dining, but perfect for an elegant wedding. Perfect for Lizzie’s wedding. And she looked so happy, sitting there with her Jack, alternately rubbing her rounded belly through the flowing dress and fiddling with the new gold ring on her left hand as she stared into his eyes.

Jackie tried to keep her mind on the celebrations, but all through the afternoon she would catch glimpses of Romano—talking to some other guests with a flute of champagne in one hand, or walking purposefully in the shadows, checking details—and it would railroad all her good intentions.

Perhaps it would be better if she just got it over and done with, went and sought him out. Then she wouldn’t be seeing him everywhere, smelling his woody aftershave, listening for his laugh. Every time her brain came up with a false-positive—when she’d thought she’d detected him, but hadn’t—her stomach rolled in protest. It brought back memories of morning sickness, this uncontrollable reaction her body was having. She pushed the heavy dessert in front of her away.

In the absence of dry crackers and tap water, what she really needed was some fresh air. She needed time on her own when she wasn’t expected to chit-chat and smile and nod. At the very least she owed it to her cheek muscles to give them a rest.

The meal was over, coffee had been served and the cake had been cut. Jack and Lizzie were making a round of the room, talking to the guests. No one would notice if she slipped out for a few moments. If anyone missed her, they’d just assume she’d gone to powder her nose.

But escape was harder than she’d anticipated. She was only a few steps from the double doors that led onto the large patio when her mother swept past, hooked her by the crook of her arm and steered her towards a huddle of people.

‘Rafe?’ her mother said.

Rafael Puccini looked very distinguished with his silver-grey hair, dressed in an immaculate charcoal suit. Even though he must be a few years over sixty, he still had that legendary ‘something’ about him that made women flock to him. He turned and smiled as her mother herded her into their group, and she couldn’t help but smile back.

‘Jackie asked me a while ago about those sunglasses of yours…you know the ones.’ Her mother waved a hand and tried to give the impression she didn’t give a jot about the subject of their conversation.

Jackie didn’t react. Everyone knew that her mother had been Rafe Puccini’s muse back in the Sixties. His Lovely Lisa range of sunglasses were modern classics, and were still the best-selling design in the current range.

What had surprised her was her mother’s sudden mention of the glasses. She’d asked her—oh, months ago—about finding some vintage pairs for a feature for Gloss! Normally most of what she said to Mamma tended to go in one ear and out the other. If anything was retained, it usually had a wholly ‘Mamma’ slant to it, and was often completely inaccurate.

Rafe took her mother’s hand and kissed it. ‘Certainly I know which glasses you mean. How could I forget something inspired by those sparkling eyes?’

If Kate had been here, she’d have made gagging noises. Jackie wasn’t actually that far from it herself. She’d met Romano’s father many times before, of course, and had often seen him in full flirt mode, but never with her own mother. Lisa wagged a disciplinary finger at her old paramour, smiling all the while.

Well, she’d been fishing for a compliment and she’d hooked a good one. Why wouldn’t she be pleased?

Just as Jackie broached the possibility of buying or borrowing some of the vintage sunglasses, Romano materialised for real.

Fabulous. The last thing she needed was her eagle-eyed mother picking up on a stray bit of body language and working out there was some sort of undercurrent between her and Romano. Mamma was very good at that. That was why Jackie had such excellent posture. Being able to snap to attention, give nothing away, had been her best survival mechanism as a teenager. As for today, she was just going to have to extricate herself from this cosy little group and try and catch up with him on his own later.

That plan was also a little tricky to execute. Rafe and her mother greeted Romano and drew him into the conversation. Jackie had no choice but to stand and smile and hope against hope that Lizzie would send for her to fulfil some last-minute bridesmaid’s duty.

As the discussion turned towards hot new designers to watch, Jackie’s attention moved from the outrageous flirting on the part of the older generation to the interaction between father and son. She’d never thought of Romano as being particularly family-oriented. He didn’t have those heavy apron strings most Italians had to tie them to their families. But there was a clear bond between him and his father these days. Quick banter flowed easily between them, but it never descended into insults or coarseness. They both had the same mercurial thought patterns, the same sense of humour.

Jackie became suddenly very conscious of the lack of even polite conversation between her and her mother. They didn’t know how to relate to each other without all their defences up, and the realisation made her very sad.

If only she could work out how Romano and his father did it, she might be able to analyse and unpick it, work out how to reproduce it with Kate.

The need to have more than an awkward truce with her daughter hit her like a sledgehammer. She was so tense around Kate, even though she tried not to be. But the knowledge that she’d failed her daughter pounded in her head during their every meeting, raising the stakes and making her rehearse and second-guess everything she said and did. And the feeling that it was all slipping through her fingers just added to the sense of desperation every time they were together. And the more desperate she got, the harder it seemed to be natural.

She wanted her daughter to like her. Needed her daughter to like her. Maybe even love her one day.

Sudden jabs of emotion like this had been coming thick and fast since she’d reconnected with Kate and, to be frank, she was feeling more than a little bruised by all the pummelling she was giving herself. She’d never had to keep such a lid on herself, do so much damage control to keep the illusion of omnipotence in place.

She made sure none of her inner turmoil showed on her face, pulled in some air and slowly let it out again without making a sound.

Back in the here-and-now, she joined the conversation again, but even that was difficult. She could feel Romano watching her. She tried not to look at him, tried to let her eyes go blurry and out of focus if she needed to glance in his direction, but it was as successful as trying not to scratch a mosquito bite. Eventually she had to give in, and the more she did it, the more she needed to do it again.

Even when she managed a few moments of victory and maintained eye contact with Rafe or her mother, she could sense his gaze locking onto her, pulling her. Her skin began to warm. The outsides of her bare arms began to tingle.

She made the mistake of glancing at him for the hundredth time and, instead of the warm sparkle of humour in his eyes, they were smouldering. Her mouth stuck to itself.

How stupid she’d been to think she’d been safe from that look, that the delicate friendship they’d been threading together had wiped it from existence. It hadn’t diluted its power one bit. Romano wasn’t looking at her like a friend. He was looking at her as if he wanted to…

No. She wasn’t going to go there.

One problem with that, though: she wasn’t sure that she wasn’t returning that look, measure for measure.

It was just as well he’d decided that today was the day he was going to make his move. The way Jackie looked in that dress—his dress—made it impossible to wait any longer.

When he’d first spotted her walking through the gardens with the rest of the bridal party, he’d actually held his breath. It looked perfect on her. Exactly as he’d imagined it would when it had been nothing more than a fleeting image in his head and a quick sketch on the page. Exactly the same, but at the same time so much more.

She brought life to his design, made it move, made it breathe.

Of course he’d seen hundreds of his ideas translated into fabric and stitching before, but not one had had this impact on him. Not one. It was more than just the fit. Jackie’s dress—the romantic bodice, the gently flaring chiffon skirts—brought out a side of her he’d thought she’d lost.

Jacqueline Patterson, Miss Editor-in-chief, was attractive in a slick, controlled kind of way, but now…now she was all curves and softness. So feminine. From the coiled hair at the back of her head with the soft ringlets framing her face, to the tips of her satin sandals. All woman.

His woman.

That thought snapped him back to the present pretty fast, to the conversation his father and Lisa and Jackie were having about sunglasses.

Hmm. He’d never had the desire to own the women who wore his creations before, or the women who flitted through his life. They were on loan—as was he. Nothing permanent. Nothing suffocating. Nothing…meaningful.

Must be an echo. Of things he’d felt long ago. Maybe once he’d dreamed of having and holding for ever. But he’d been so young. Naive. And he knew Jackie well enough to know she was far too independent to be anyone’s trophy. She’d always been that way. Seventeen years ago he hadn’t been worthy of that prize, and she’d let him know in no uncertain terms. Just as well he wasn’t interested in that this time around.

And, with his current agenda fresh in his mind, he immersed himself again in the conversation that had been flowing round him.

It was time. The fact he was letting his imagination run away with him only served to highlight how bright his desire for her was. But he still needed to act with finesse, with respect and patience. It was that instinct that had kept him hovering on the fringes of the wedding celebrations, holding back until he felt in control of himself, be close to her without dragging her into the garden.

His father turned to Jackie. ‘Ah, your glass is empty, my dear. Let us find you another.’

Before Jackie could answer her mother piped up, mentioning the need to have a stiff word with the head waiter, and their parents disappeared with a nod to say they’d be back in only a few moments.

Jackie smiled at him. Actually smiled. And it was real—not that perfect imitation she normally did. Once again he felt a tug deep inside him. Not yet, he told himself. Running headlong into this will only get you kicked in the teeth, and you will walk away with nothing. Play this right and you’ll have a summer affair hot enough to give you your own private heatwave.

‘He’s quite something, your father, isn’t he?’ she said with an affectionate glance over her shoulder. ‘I was too young and too in awe of him when I used to serve you at Sorella to realise what a charmer he is.’

He smiled back, carefully, tactically. ‘I don’t think that’s stopping your mother from falling for it again.’

‘Now that’s a scary thought.’ She looked behind her again to where her mother was tearing strips off one of the catering staff, while his father smoothed any ruffled feathers with a smile and a wink. It was an odd kind of teamwork, but strangely effective.

Jackie took a long look at their parents, then turned to look at him. She raised her eyebrows. ‘Do you think history will repeat itself?’

A sudden burst of heat filled his belly. He didn’t glance over at their parents, but kept his gaze concentrated on Jackie. ‘I’m counting on it,’ he said, his voice coming out all rough and gravelly.

Jackie, being Jackie, wasn’t swept away by one simmering look and loaded comment, but she laughed gently. He took it as a point scored.

‘I see he has taught you all of his tricks,’ she said.

Although he was tempted to laugh with her, he moulded his facial muscles into a look of mock-seriousness. ‘Oh, I think the old dog has had a bit of an education from me too.’

She laughed again. ‘You’re incorrigible.’

Now he flashed her a smile, timing it to perfection. ‘So I’ve been told. Come on.’ He looked towards the open doors, only a few feet away, that led onto the terrace ‘Andiamo!’

Jackie followed his gaze and then they were both moving, both picking up speed and heading for the delicious coolness of the shady edges of the garden. He grabbed two glasses of champagne from a waiter’s tray as they made their escape, and it struck him that he hadn’t needed to drag her to get her to go outside with him after all. They hadn’t even touched.

Not yet, anyway.

This is ridiculous, Jackie thought, as she ignored the pain on the balls of her feet and jogged in her high heels. They fled across the terrace, out of the view of the wedding guests inside the grand dining room and down a shady path. Romano was so close behind her she could hear his breath, practically feel it in the little ringlets at the nape of her neck.

When they’d reached relative safety, beyond a curve in the path, she gave in to the nagging fire in her feet and stopped. Romano just grinned at her and handed her a glass of champagne.

‘You hardly spilled a drop! That’s an impressive skill.’

Romano took a step closer. ‘Oh, you have no idea of the skills I’ve picked up since we were last together.’

A slight rumble in his voice caused her to flush hot and cold all over. Just the thought that Romano might be better at some things—other things—was not good for her equilibrium. She steadied herself on the wooden rail that followed the path downhill and looked out to where the lake was sparkling at them through the trees.

What are you doing? You can’t behave like this. Not with Romano. Not now. Not ever.

She closed her eyes briefly, took a sip of champagne and opened them again. How could she have let herself start thinking this way, feeling this way? Her daughter’s whole happiness hung in the balance and she’d forgotten all about that, had been too busy being selfish, letting herself relive the unique buzz of attraction that still hummed between her and the man standing just a few short steps away.

She decided to start walking again, because standing there in the shadowy silence, feeling his gaze resting softly on her, was somehow too intimate. She had to break this strange feeling that had encapsulated her. It was as if she and Romano were trapped in a bubble together, with the rest of the world far, far away. She had to find a way to pop it before she did something stupid.

Her stiletto would be perfect. She took a step away from him, hoping that the heel of her shoe would be sharp enough to cut through the surface tension and let reality flood back in. He followed her and, if anything, the skin surrounding them, joining them, just bounced back and thickened.

She kept walking and didn’t stop until she’d realised her subconscious had led her to the one place on the island that she’d really wanted to avoid.

The sunken garden was as beautiful as it had always been, full of ferns, some dark and woody, some small and delicate in a shade of pale greenish-yellow that was almost fluorescent. There was something timeless about this garden. The memory of the dark, waxy ivy that had worked its way up and around every feature was still fresh in her mind. The grotto still beckoned silently, promising secrecy and shelter in its cocoon-like depths.

She tried to keep the memories, and the man she was here with, even her own desires, at bay with her next words. It was time to stop getting carried away and ground herself in reality, in the sticky, complicated present, not some half-remembered adolescent fantasy.

‘I…I wanted to ask you if you were free tomorrow,’she said, without looking him in the eye. That would be far too dangerous. ‘There’s something important I need to discuss with you.’

She heard—no, felt—Romano move closer.

‘Look at me, Jacqueline,’ he said in a low, husky voice.

She licked her lips. She didn’t want to look at him, but not looking at him would be an admission that she was feeling weak, that he was getting to her, and she needed to give at least a semblance of control. She inhaled and met his gaze.

He was wearing that lopsided smile he’d always had for her. The one that had turned her heart to butter.

‘We both know that we have talked the idea of the Puccini shoot for Gloss! to death over the last few days.’ His fingers made contact with her wrist, ran lightly up her forearm. ‘We’re both adults now.’

Jackie decided she had need of a fire extinguisher. She didn’t trust herself to say anything helpful, so she just kept looking at him. Had she blinked recently? She really didn’t know.

‘So…’ he continued, ‘let’s not play games as we did when we were younger. If we want to spend time together, we should just say it is so. There is no shame in it.’

Jackie tried hard to deny it, but he shook his head.

‘Don’t lie to me. I can see it in your eyes.’ He dipped his head closer, until she could almost taste him in the air around her. ‘I know we both want this.’

Heaven help her, she did.

She didn’t push him away when he dragged his lips across hers, so gently it was as if they were barely touching. Too gently, teasing, so her nerve endings went up in flames. More so than if he’d started off as hot and hungry as she’d half-wished he would.

Boy, Romano could kiss.

He’d always been able to kiss. But he was right. There was new skill here too. Enough to make her forget her own name.

Romano had disposed of his champagne glass—she hadn’t noticed when or how—and now his hands were round her waist, pulling her closer to him. She needed to touch him, hold him, but her own glass was still dangling by its stem from her right hand. They were right beside one of the water features and she felt with the base of the glass for a flattish patch on the knobbly surface of the pool’s edge. She hardly registered the plop a second or two later, too busy running her hands up Romano’s chest, relishing the feel of him.

She kept going all the way up his body until she could weave her fingers through the deliciously short hairs at the back of his head. Still kissing her, he let out a gruff moan from the back of his throat. She smiled almost imperceptibly against his lips.

This was the wonder of Romano Puccini. He made her feel beautiful and feminine and alive. Not by wading in and taking control, dominating, but by acknowledging her power, meeting her as an equal, making her feel sexy and confident.

Romano’s lips moved from hers. He kissed a line from her chin down to the base of her neck, then along her collarbone to her shoulder, nipping the bare skin there gently with his teeth.

Jackie just clung to him. She hadn’t known how much she’d missed this. Missed him. Hadn’t realised that subconsciously she’d been waiting to feel his lips on her skin again for almost two decades. How could she have denied herself so long? Why had she thrown this away?

‘Jackie…’ His breath was warm in her ear. ‘I want you. I need you.’

He was whispering her name in that way that had always made her melt, but it was another name that suddenly crystallised in her consciousness, freezing out all other thoughts and sensations.

Kate.

In a split second what had been hot and tingly and wonderful between them seemed nothing more than an undignified grope in the bushes. And it was selfish. So selfish.

She pushed Romano away. Or maybe she pulled herself out of his arms—she wasn’t quite sure. He blinked and looked at her, his eyes hooded and clouded with confusion.

‘We can’t do this,’ she said in a shaky voice.

He reached for her and she was too numb to react fast enough. He breathed in her ear, knowing just what he was doing, before whispering, ‘What’s to stop us?’

Jackie prayed for strength, prayed for a clear head. She couldn’t lose herself like that again. She needed to focus on the reason she needed to get close to Romano, and it certainly wasn’t this reason. It was about Kate. It was all about Kate. But then his lips found hers again and she almost went under.

‘No,’ she said softly, firmly, and she grabbed his chin with her hand, doing whatever she had to do to stop him.

He sighed and gave her a wistful look. ‘I thought we said we weren’t going to play games.’

Part of her softened, found his cheeky confidence charming. Another part of her took umbrage. He was too sure of himself. Too sure he could have her if he wanted her.

‘I’m not playing games,’ she said, looking him in the eye, refusing to waver.

‘Good,’ he said, wilfully misunderstanding her.

Jackie felt like wilting. They could do this all day, go back and forth, back and forth. Romano was as persistent as she was contrary, and she feared she might eventually weaken. That would do lasting damage to her plan to build a solid relationship with him, the kind of relationship that would give Kate stability and confidence in them as parents. Unfortunately, there was only one way she could think of to shock Romano out of seducing her amidst the ferns.

‘The reason we can’t do this,’ she said, ‘is that there’s something you don’t know. Something important.’

He froze. ‘You’re not married?’

She shook her head and the smile returned, saucier than ever. ‘Buono.’ And he went back to placing tiny little teasing kisses on her neck.

It was no good. Romano had obviously decided she was playing along with him, albeit in a very ‘Jackie’ way. He stopped what he was doing and straightened, one eyebrow hitched high, but paused when his lips were only a few millimetres from hers. She had to do this now.

‘There’s something you don’t know about that summer we were…together.’

He was too close to focus on properly, but she sensed him smiling, felt him sway just that little bit closer. ‘Oh, yes?’

‘When I left for England that autumn, after our summer, I was…’

Oh, Lord. Did she really have to say it? Did she really have to let the words out of her mouth?

‘I was pregnant.’

CHAPTER SEVEN

I WAS pregnant.

Those words had the combined effect of a cold shower and a slap round the face for Romano. His arms dropped to his side and he stepped back.

She had to be joking, right? It had to be some unfathomable, Jackie-like test. He searched her face as she stood there with all the flexibility of an ironing board, her eyes wide and her mouth thin.

‘You mean…you…and I…?’

She bit her lip. Nodded.

Now, Romano was a man who usually liked to indulge in the elegant use of language, but at that moment he swore loudly and creatively. Jackie flinched.

He looked at her stomach. After making that dress he knew her measurements to the millimetre, had crafted it to hug them. There was no hint. Fewer curves, even, than when he’d…than when they’d…

A million questions flooded his mind, all of them half finished. And then the awful truth hit him.

‘You had a…You lost it?’ he said, unable to work out why a solid wall of grief hit him as he uttered those words.

She shook her head, and the sorrow reared its head and became an ugly, spitting monster. He clenched his fists, spoke through his teeth.

‘You got rid of it?’

The look of pure horror on her face was more than enough of an answer. He didn’t need to hear the denial she repeated over and over and over. But that meant…

It couldn’t.

He’d never heard mention of a child…a family…in all the years he’d worked in the same gossip-fuelled industry as Jackie. She was a private person, sure enough, but could that fact have slipped by him unnoticed?

He turned in a circle but came back to face her.

Of course it could.

When had he ever been interested in colleagues’ pictures of pink-faced, scrunched-up newborns? He tuned out every single conversation about their children’s ballet recitals and football games, preferring to amuse himself with statistics of a different kind. Cup sizes, mainly.

He looked around his sunken garden, at the grotto, which now seemed less like a lovers’nest and more like a crime scene.

‘Romano?’

He looked back at her, confused. The soft, vulnerable expression she’d worn only moments ago had been replaced with something much harder.

‘You have a daughter,’ she said, voice as flat as if she’d been reading random numbers in the phonebook.

A baby? He had a baby?

He backed away, and, when he could go no further, sat down on a low, mossy wall.

No. Don’t be stupid. It had been such a long time ago. She was a girl by now. Almost a woman. He stood up again, suddenly fuelled by another revelation.

‘You kept this a secret from me? Why?’

There was a flicker of discomfort before Jackie resumed her wooden expression. ‘I tried, but—’she looked away ‘—it’s complicated. I’ll explain in a minute, when you’ve calmed down a bit.’

When he’d…?

This woman had been sent to test him to the limits. All these years she’d kept this from him. All these years she’d preferred to bring up their child on her own rather than involve him. Who gave her the right to make such decisions?

And why had she done it?

The answer was a sucker-punch, one from his subconscious: she hadn’t believed him ready or capable to take on that responsibility, hadn’t even entertained the thought he might be able to rise to the challenge. Just as she hadn’t deemed him worthy of her love. Inside his head something clicked into place.

‘Is that why you ended it? Refused to see me? Or take my calls?’

She inhaled. ‘No. I didn’t know then. I only realised…later.’

Then why hadn’t she told him later? The words were on his lips when he remembered he already knew the answer. He matched Jackie’s stance, returned ice with ice as he looked at her.

‘Where is she now?’ He looked to the terraced garden above them, back to the house. ‘Is she here?’ His stomach plummeted at the thought, not from a fear of being trapped, he realised, but in anticipation.

‘She’s in London.’

London. How many times had he been in that city over the last seventeen years? It was a massive place, with a population of millions, and the chances of having walked by her in the street were infinitesimal, but he was hounded by the idea he might have done just that.

‘Does she know about me? Does she know who her father is?’

At that question, the inscrutable Jackie Patterson wavered. ‘No.’

He closed his eyes and opened them again. Even though he’d had the feeling that would be her answer, it felt like a karate kick in the gut.

‘What about the birth certificate? You can’t hide it from her for ever. One day she’ll find out.’

To his surprise, Jackie nodded, but the words that followed twisted everything around again and sent him off in an even more confusing direction.

‘I didn’t tell anyone who her father was. Not even Mamma. The birth certificate has my name alone on it.’

Romano sucked in a breath. That was it, then. He was nothing more than an empty space on a form. All these years trying to prove himself, trying to get the world to understand he was something in his own right, and that was what this woman had reduced him to. An empty box.

Jackie came a little closer, but not so close that she was within touching distance. He didn’t have any more words at the moment, so he just looked at her. Her hands were clasped in front of her, her fingers so tense he could clearly see the tendons on the backs of her hands.

He came full circle again. ‘Why?’ he whispered. ‘Why have you never told me?’

‘I thought I had.’

Her answer turned his pain into anger. And when he was angry his usual good humour became biting and sarcastic. ‘That’s funny,’ he said, aware that the set of his jaw was making it blindingly obvious he was anything but amused, ‘because I think I would have remembered that conversation.’

Jackie walked over to a low stone bench and sat down, staring at the floor. Reluctantly he followed, sensing that keeping close, pushing her, would be the only way to uncover more facts.

As he sat there staring at the fountain bubbling away she told a ridiculous story of lost letters, secret rendezvous and missed opportunities. She told him she’d waited at the farmhouse for him. Waited for him to turn up—and dash her hopes, he silently added, because, surely, that was what she’d expected.

‘Why didn’t you try to reach me again when I didn’t show up? You had no way of knowing if I’d been prevented from meeting you there.’

Jackie leaned forward and covered her face with her hands. For a long time the only sound she made was gentle, shallow breathing.

‘I wondered about that at first,’ she said through her hands, and then she sat up and looked at him. ‘I waited for hours, way past when I should have been back home. Just in case you were late. And I would have come back day after day until I saw you. I wanted to believe you were coming.’

The look of exquisite sorrow in her eyes tugged at him. It felt as if she were pulling at a knot of string deep inside him, a knot that was just about to work itself loose. He refused to relax and let it unravel.

‘I thought you knew me better than that, Jackie. If I’d got the letter, of course I would have come.’

She made a tiny little noise and he couldn’t tell whether it was a laugh or a snort. ‘And you would have done…what?’

‘I don’t know.’ He frowned. ‘We would have worked something out.’

Jackie stopped staring straight ahead and turned her whole body towards him. ‘You’re not saying that you would have stood by me?’

‘Yes.’

‘No!’ She blinked furiously. She spoke again, softer this time. ‘No.’

‘You can’t know that!’

He would have stood by her. He would have. At least that was what the man he was now wished he would have done.

‘Think about this, Romano! You’re saying you would have wanted to keep her, that you would have put a ring on my finger and we have had our own little teenage Happy Ever After?’

He looked deep inside himself, saw a glimmer of something he’d hoped he’d find. ‘Maybe.’

Instead of her laughing in his face, Jackie’s eyes filled with tears, but she didn’t let a single one fall, not even as her hands shook in her lap. ‘Don’t be ridiculous.You’re just daydreaming.’

He jumped up, started pacing. All this sitting around, keeping everything in, was far too British for him. He needed to move, to vent.

‘Is that so hard to believe? Am I that much of a disappointment?’

Jackie opened her mouth to answer, but there was a sudden rustling and the sound of voices further up the path. Without thinking about how or why—maybe it had been the memories of all that sneaking around in the past—Romano grabbed Jackie by the arm and manhandled her into the shelter of the grotto, silencing her protests with a stern look. This was one conversation neither of them wanted to have overheard.

He was close to her again now, pressed up against her, her back against the wall of the grotto. If they stayed in exactly this position they couldn’t be seen from most of the sunken garden. She was rigid, all of the soft sighing, the moulding into his arms, over and done with. Just as well. Any desire to fling with Jackie Patterson had completely evaporated.

But how much worse would it have been if she’d told him afterwards? She’d been right to put a stop to what had been going on. However, that one small mercy in no way balanced out her other sins.

‘It’s Lizzie and Jack,’ she mouthed at him, obviously recognising the voices.

He nodded and tilted his head just a little to get a better view, hoping that the happy couple weren’t looking in his direction. He was lucky. Bride and groom were too wrapped up in each other to spot an inconsistency in the shadows at the far end of the garden.

Lizzie laid her head against Jack’s shoulder and let out a loud sigh. He stroked her back, kissed her hair. Romano and Jackie weren’t the only ones who had needed a bit of fresh air. He hoped, however, that the newly-weds’ walk was going to turn out better than his had done.

Jack and Lizzie wandered briefly round the sunken garden, hand-in-hand, stopping every now and then to kiss, before moving on down the path towards the small beach.

Romano stepped out of the grotto as they disappeared out of view and stayed there, staring at the spot where he’d last seen a flash of white dress.

They seemed so happy.

From his short observation of the bride and groom, they were a wonderful complement for each other. They had so much to look forward to: their honeymoon, starting a new life together, raising the twins Lizzie was carrying and building their own little family.

He realised he was outrageously jealous, which surprised him. He’d never expected to want all of that. He’d got on quite well since the death of his mother without feeling part of a traditional family, and he’d never guessed he’d harboured a longing for it, preferring to keep his relationships light, his ties loose.

How ironic. He could have had it all along. He could have been the man in the morning suit looking captivated by his fresh-faced bride. He could have been the one looking forward to seeing his child born, to rocking her when she cried and, when she was older, scaring the monsters away from under her bed. But now, when he realised how much he wanted those things, those moments were gone, never to be salvaged. They’d been stolen from him by the woman steadying herself against the grotto wall with wide-spread hands, looking as much like an out-of-her-depth teenager as he’d ever seen her.

The sight drew no pity from him. He wouldn’t allow it. Instead he looked away.

Marry her? Have a Happy Ever After with her? Right at this moment it was the last thing he wanted to do. In fact if he never saw her again he’d be ecstatic. But that wasn’t an option. She was his sole link to his daughter. A daughter he could still hardly believe existed.

He spoke without looking at Jackie. ‘What’s her name?’

‘Kate,’ she said blandly.

Kate. Very English. Probably not what he would have chosen, given the chance. But he hadn’t been given the chance—that was the point. He wanted to shout, to punch, to…do something to rid himself of this horrible assault of feelings. Normally he could bat negative things away, dissolve them with a joke or distract himself—usually with something female and pretty—but this just wouldn’t go away and he didn’t know how to handle it.

Facts. Stick to facts.

‘Kate,’ he echoed. ‘Short for Katharine?’

She didn’t answer. He let out a rough sigh. How could she still be playing games with him after what she’d revealed? How did she have the gall to make him work for the answers?

Because she’s Jackie. She sets tests. You have to prove yourself to her over and over and even then she’ll never believe you.

He swivelled round and looked her in the eyes, knowing that the lava inside was bubbling hard, even though he was desperately trying to keep a lid on it. Instead he let its heat radiate in his stare, let it insist upon an answer.

She swallowed. ‘I suppose so. I’m not sure.’

Was a straight yes or no so hard to come by? Suddenly, it was all too much for him. He couldn’t do this now. He needed time to think, to breathe. One more of her cryptic answers and he was going to lose it completely.

‘Fine. If that’s the way you want to play it, I’ll go.’

She looked shocked at that. He didn’t care why.

‘But don’t think you’ve heard the end of this,’he added. ‘You owe me more.And you can start paying tomorrow with answers. Facts. Details. Call them what you want, but I will have them.’

Jackie got over her surprise and pushed herself away from the wall of her grotto with her hands so she was standing straight. She fixed him with that flesh-melting stare he remembered so well. He refused to acknowledge the ripple of heat that passed over him in response.

‘Don’t you dare act all high and mighty about this, Signor Puccini! You and I both know you weren’t ready for fidelity and commitment back then.’

That lid he’d been trying to keep tightly on? It popped.

But he was aware Lizzie and Jack might well still be within earshot and he didn’t have the luxury of using the volume he would have liked to. He did the next best thing and dropped his voice to a rasping whisper.

‘You have no right to judge me. No right at all. You don’t know what I would have done, how I might have reacted. Who do you think you are?’

Jackie marched out of the grotto and for a moment he thought she was going to leave him standing there, all his anger unspent, but she got halfway up the garden and then turned back and strode towards him.

Of course. She always had to have the last word. Well, let her. It still wouldn’t make what she’d done right.

‘Who do I think I am? I’ll tell you who I think I am!’ Her face twisted into something resembling a smile. ‘I’m the poor, pathetic girl who waited at the farmhouse all afternoon for you, scared out of her wits, feeling alone and overwhelmed.’

She wasn’t making any sense.

‘You know I didn’t get your letter,’ he said. ‘You can’t blame that on me.’

She took her time before she answered, her eyes narrowing, faint glimmer of victory glittering there. ‘I saw you, Romano, that afternoon.’

Saw him? What was she talking about? He’d thought the whole point had been that he hadn’t turned up.

‘When I finally gave up waiting, I walked back up the track towards the main road, and that was when I saw you.’ She waited for him to guess the significance of her statement, but all he could do was shrug. ‘I saw you drive past on your Vespa with…her. With Francesca Gambardi!’

Ah.

He’d forgotten about that.

So that was the afternoon he’d finally given in to Francesca’s pestering, had agreed to take her out on his bella moto, as she’d called it, because he’d hoped her presence would make him forget the crater Jackie had left behind when he’d finally got the message she’d wanted nothing more to do with him.

It hadn’t been one of his finest moments. Or one of his best ideas.

And it hadn’t worked. Francesca hadn’t been enough of a distraction. Every time she’d looked at him, every time she’d brushed up against him, he’d only been plagued by the feeling that everything had been all wrong, that it should have been Jackie with her arms around his waist as they whipped through the countryside, that it should have been Jackie sidling up to him as they’d stopped to look at a pretty view. In the end, he’d taken Francesca home without so much as a kiss. A first for him in those days.

Jackie was way off base, thinking he’d had something going with Francesca, but he remembered how insecure, how jealous she’d been of the other girl, and he knew how it must have looked to her. But if she’d only asked, only would have deigned to talk to him, she would have known the truth. He’d acted foolishly, yes, but she hadn’t behaved with any more maturity.

‘And that was why you didn’t bother telling me you were carrying my child? Because you saw me with another girl on the back of my Vespa? Jackie, that’s a pathetic excuse.’

The smug look evaporated and she looked as if she’d been slapped across the face with the truth of his statement. Her jaw tensed. It didn’t take her long to regroup and counter-attack.

‘But I thought you’d read my letter, remember? I thought you knew I was pregnant, that I was waiting for you to discuss our future. And when you rode past the farmhouse—our special place—with that girl pressing herself up against you…well, it sent a message loud and clear.’

Okay, things might not be as black and white as he’d thought.

It was all so complicated, so hard to keep track of who knew what and when. Jackie had always been hot-headed and quick to judge and while he didn’t like her reaction to the situation he could understand it, understand it was the only way she could have acted in that moment. What he didn’t understand was why that one, unlucky coincidence, when he’d driven past with Francesca, had decided everything, had defined both their futures.

‘But you didn’t think to ask me? To find out for sure? Maybe not right then, when you were still angry, but what about the next month or the one after that? What about when the baby was born, or when you registered her? On her first birthday? On any of her birthdays? Hasn’t she asked questions? Doesn’t she want to know?’

Jackie just stared at him.

Maybe his daughter took after her mother. Maybe Jackie had brought her up to be as hard and self-obsessed as she was. Unfortunately he could imagine it all too easily. The elegant flat in one of the classier parts of London, the two of them being very sophisticated together, eating out, going to fashion shows. What he couldn’t imagine was them laughing, making daisy chains or having fun.

He sighed. Jackie had always been such hard work, had always kept him on his toes. What would it be like if he had two such women to placate? It would leave him breathless.

He’d drifted off, almost forgotten Jackie was there. Her voice pulled him out of his daydream…nightmare…whatever.

‘I did think of you when she was born, in the days following…’ She paused, made a strange hiccupping noise. ‘And don’t think that every birthday wasn’t torture, because it was. But by then it was too late. It had already been done. And I wouldn’t have turned back time if I could have done. It would have been selfish and wrong.’

His first reaction was to stoke his anger—she was talking in riddles again—but the weighty sorrow that had settled on her, making her shoulders droop, diluted his rage with curiosity.

‘What do you mean “it was too late”?’

Jackie looked up, puzzled. ‘She’d gone to her new family—the people who adopted her.’

The words didn’t sink in at first. He heard the sounds, even knew what they represented, but, somehow, they still didn’t make sense. He walked away from her, back towards the grotto and stuck his hand—shirtsleeves and all—into one of the chilly black pools, just because he needed something physical, something to shock his body and brain into reacting.

It worked all right. Suddenly his brain was alive with responses. Unfortunately, the temperature of the water had done nothing to cool his temper. He flicked the water off with his hands and dried them on the back of his beautifully crafted, mortgage-worthy suit.

‘You’re telling me that, rather than raise our daughter yourself, rather than telling me—her father—of her existence, that you gave her away to strangers? Like she was something disposable?’

He marched up to her, grabbed her by the shoulders.

‘Is that what it was like, Jackie? She didn’t fit into your nice, ordered plans for your life, so you just put her out of sight…out of mind?’

Jackie’s jaw moved, but no sound came out. She had gone white. And then she wrenched herself free and stumbled out of the garden on her high heels, gaining speed with every step.

For a man who lived his life in the shallows, Romano experienced the unfamiliar feeling of knowing he’d gone too deep, said too much, and he didn’t know how to deal with that. There wasn’t a quip, a smart remark, that could save the situation. He was in open water and land was nowhere in sight.

Jackie had disappeared along the path and into the small patch of woodland that hid the sunken garden from the island’s shore.

The path. The one that led down to the beach.

Oh, hell.

He sprinted after her, even though he couldn’t rationalise why stopping her from bumping into Jack and Lizzie was so important. In his mind she deserved all she got. He told himself he was speeding after her to stop her putting a huge dampener on the wedding and ignored the pity that twinged in him every time he thought of how much she would hate anyone—especially her adored older sister—to see her in such a mess.

It didn’t take long to catch her up, only twenty steps away from where the trees parted and she would have a full view of the shingle beach.

‘Jackie!’ It wasn’t quite a shout, wasn’t quite a whisper, but a strange combination of the two.

She faltered but didn’t alter her course. He was closer now and put a restraining hand on her arm, spoke in a low voice. ‘Not that way.’

All of her back muscles tensed and he just knew she was getting ready to let rip, but then they heard a rumble of low laughter from the direction of the water’s edge and she jolted in surprise.

‘This way,’he said, as quietly as possible, and led her through the trees in the opposite direction, heading for the narrow tip of the island, away from the house, where they would be less likely to be disturbed by wandering wedding guests. They reached a clearing with a soft grassy bank and she just seemed to lose the ability to keep her joints locked. Her knees folded under her and she sat down on the grass with a thud.

‘It wasn’t like that at all,’ she said, enunciating each word carefully. ‘You don’t know…’

It took Romano a couple of seconds to realise she was continuing the conversation she’d walked out on as if no time had passed. And that wasn’t the only strange thing that had happened. He no longer wanted to erupt. He didn’t know why. Maybe he’d experienced so many strong emotions in the last half-hour that he’d just run out, had none left. He sat down beside her.

‘So tell me what it was like.’

He knew his request didn’t sound exactly friendly, but it was the best he could do under the circumstances.

She kicked off her shoes and sank her bare feet into the grass. Even the shade of her toenails complemented her outfit. So Jackie…

She hugged her legs, drew them up until she was almost in a little ball, and rested her cheek on her knees. Her face was turned in his direction, but her eyes were glazed and unfocused.

‘I wanted to believe you’d come,’ she said in a voice that reminded him of a little girl’s. ‘I wanted to believe that it would all turn out right, but I truly didn’t think it was ever going to happen.’

Another nail in the coffin. Another confirmation from her that he was a loser. He ought to get angry again, but there was something in her voice, her face, that totally arrested him.

Honesty. Pure and unguarded.

It was such a rare commodity where Jackie was concerned that he decided not to do anything to scare it away. He needed answers and she was the only one who could provide them.

‘Mamma was so cross when I told her I was pregnant that I thought she was going to break something.’

One corner of his mouth lifted. Yes, he could well imagine the scene. It wouldn’t have been pretty.

‘She insisted that adoption was the only way. How could I argue with her? I couldn’t do it on my own.’

‘What about your father?’

She snorted. ‘He might be a blue-sky-thinking entrepreneur, but he’s smart enough to do what Mamma tells him to do.’ She blinked, looked across at him as she lifted her lashes again. ‘I don’t think he knew what to do with me. He’s good with big ideas and balance sheets, but not so great with the people stuff. I think he wanted the problem to just go away. It was as much as he could manage just to let me go and live with him until the baby was born.’

Romano didn’t say anything. He’d always thought of Jackie as being just like him—a child of a wealthy family, secure in the knowledge of her place in the world. He’d even envied her the sisters and the multitude of cousins compared to his one-parent, no-cousin family. His father hadn’t been perfect, but he’d always shown him love, and that had made Romano too sure, too cocky, when he’d been young, but he realised that Jackie had never had that.

One loving parent—however unique he might be—had to be better than two clueless ones. His father would never have forced him to do what Jackie’s parents had made her do. Yes, her mother had been the driving force, but her father had to take responsibility too. He’d let her down by omitting to stand up for her, to fight for her, to do anything he could to make her happy. That was what fathers were supposed to do.

That was what he was supposed to do now.

Jackie lifted her head from her knees. ‘Once I was too big to keep it a secret any more, Mamma packed me off to London to live with Dad, and you know what?’ She rubbed her eyes with the heels of her hands and took a long gulp of air.

‘What?’ he said softly. No longer was he trying just to keep her talking, aiming to get dates and times and details from her. He really wanted to know.

‘When I went to live with him, he never even mentioned my pregnancy, even though I was swelling up in front of his face. He just…ignored it. It was so weird.’ She shook her head. ‘And when I came home from the hospital without…on my own…the only emotion he showed was relief.’

She hugged her knees even tighter and rested her chin on top of them. He could see her jaw clenching and unclenching, as if there were unsaid words, words she’d wanted to say to her father for years, but never had.

She’d been so young. And so alone.

He didn’t have a heart of stone. He would have been a monster if he couldn’t have imagined how awful it must have been for her. And she’d only told him bare details.

There wasn’t anything he could say to change that, to make it better. For a long time they sat in silence.

‘What was it like?’ he finally said. ‘The day she was born?’

Jackie frowned. ‘It rained.’

He didn’t push for more, sensing that the answer he wanted was coming, he just needed to give her room. The sun had started to set while they’d been in the clearing and, through the trees, the sky was turning bright turquoise at the horizon, and the ripples on the lake glinted soft gold. The temperature must have dropped a little, because Jackie shivered.

Not a monster, he reminded himself, and pulled his jacket off and draped it around her shoulders. The sleeves hung uselessly by her sides.

When she spoke again, she went on to describe a long, complicated labour that had ended in a distressed baby and an emergency Caesarean section. All the half-formed ideas of cute newborns sliding easily into the world were blown right out of the water. Real birth, it seemed, was every bit as traumatic as real life. And she’d done it all on her own, her father away on a business trip and her mother still in Italy keeping up at the façade, lest anyone suspect their family’s disgrace.

‘What was she like? Kate?’

Jackie’s face softened in a way he hadn’t thought possible. ‘She was perfect. So tiny. With a shock of dark hair just like yours and a temper just like mine.’

He wanted to smile but he felt strangely breathless.

A single tear ran down her cheek. ‘She’s amazing, Romano. Just so…amazing.’

He sat up a little straighter. ‘You’ve met her?’

She nodded. ‘She started looking for me a few months ago and we’ve been meeting up, trying to establish a bond.’ She pulled a face. ‘It’s not been going very well.’

Well, if she had Jackie’s temper, that was hardly surprising.

He watched Jackie as she stared out into the gathering dusk, not sure he’d ever seen her like this before, with all the armour plating stripped away.

‘I was going to tell my family after the wedding,’ she said. ‘She wants to meet them, find out where she comes from. And then Scarlett told me about the letter and I realised I had to tell you too—tell you first. But I was going to do it after today, to avoid all…this.’

You stupid fool, he told himself. All this time you thought she was coming on to you and all she was doing was paving the way for the truth to come out.

‘What are we going to do?’ she said, with equal measures of fear and uncertainty in her eyes.

He stood up and offered her his hand. She took it, and he pulled her to her feet and waited while she slid her feet back in her shoes.

He stared at a cluster of trees, looking for answers.

Honesty deserved honesty.

‘I don’t know,’ he said, ‘but it’s time we went back to the party and faced everybody.’

CHAPTER EIGHT

JACKIE felt as if her skin were too thick, as if sensations from the outside world couldn’t quite get through. She was floating and heavy all at the same time. The details of the walk back towards the terrace were fuzzy; she didn’t remember which path they took, or any of the sights and sounds. Just before they emerged from the trees and into the open, she stopped, pulled at Romano’s shirtsleeve.

‘Here. You’d better have this back.’

She started to slide his jacket from her shoulders, but he hooked the collar with a finger and pulled it back up. ‘Keep it. You look cold.’

She was cold. Ever since Romano had said those things to her in the grotto, she hadn’t been able to ignore the shivering deep, deep inside. Sometimes it worked its way outwards and she had to clench her teeth to stop them rattling, but it all felt a little disconnected from her, as if it were happening to someone else.

‘But—’

‘What’s the point, Jackie?’

‘I…’

She didn’t know. Just that it seemed the right thing to do, to hide the fact she’d been in the garden with Romano. The need to keep everything about their relationship under the radar had become a habit she’d never thought to break.

‘We don’t have to keep it a secret that we went for a walk in the garden,’ he said, taking her by the hand and leading her forwards. ‘Who cares if anyone sees us together? Your family will know all there is to know soon.’

Jackie nodded, because she recognised the need for response of some kind. Her brain wasn’t working fast enough to keep up. Romano’s words seemed to make sense. Why hadn’t she thought about this before? Somehow in the confusion of recent days she hadn’t connected the fact that telling her family also meant that they would know about Romano, that they would all know the secrets she had kept to herself for seventeen years.

Seventeen years.

That was more than half of her life. She’d hated Romano, believed him to be heartless and superficial, for all that time. But now the truth was out. Her secret had been revealed. Wasn’t she supposed to feel free? Lighter? But she was too numb to feel anything but the pressure of Romano’s fingers on her hand and the warmth spreading all the way up her arm.

In their absence the party had spilled outside. The tall glazed doors that led from the ballroom onto the patio had been thrown open and guests were wandering through the upper terraces, champagne flutes in hands. The large paved area where she and Romano had lunched the other day had been cleared of furniture and planters, and a swing band played while couples danced.

She tugged on Romano’s hand, not really knowing why. Just that she didn’t want to throw herself headlong back into the party. She didn’t know what to do now, how to behave. How could she just go and rejoin her family as if nothing had happened?

He squeezed her fingers lightly and nodded towards the palazzo.

Good idea. Perhaps there was somewhere quiet inside where she could sit and recover.

Despite the fact she was still wearing his jacket, nobody took any notice of them as they weaved their way through the neatly clipped bushes. Romano walked slightly ahead, his face serious but not forbidding.

He’d surprised her by taking her news incredibly well. Too well—he was handling it much better than she was, even though she’d had more time to adjust to recent revelations. Under normal circumstances, doing better than Jackie Patterson at anything simply wasn’t allowed, but at this moment she was heartily relieved.

They were only a matter of steps from one of the entrances to the ballroom when she spotted her mother inside, heading their way. Jackie suddenly veered in another direction, following the curve of one of the low hedges. Their hands were still joined and she took Romano with her. He let out a grunt of surprise, then muttered something about quick thinking. Jackie was looking directly ahead but with all her attention behind her as she strained to pick out her mother’s footsteps, as she waited to hear her name in that shrill voice.

Just as they reached the edge of the dance floor it came.

‘Jackie?’

She kept going. There was no way that she could deal with her mother in her present state. The only fireworks planned for this evening were the ones that Jack and Lizzie had arranged, and she’d very much like to keep it that way.

‘Jacqueline!’

She should have known that she’d need a more sophisticated plan than just trying to outrun Mamma.

‘Sorry, Lisa,’ she heard Romano say beside her as he slipped his jacket off her shoulders and pulled it away. Jackie didn’t see how he disposed of it. ‘Jacqueline promised me a dance. You don’t mind, do you?’

And then he took her in his arms and spun her away. When the motion had taken her one hundred and eighty degrees and they were disappearing into the crowd, she looked back to see her mother standing there, holding Romano’s jacket, with her mouth open.

‘I can’t believe you just did that!’

Romano smiled his twinkly smile. ‘What was it that you called me? Incorrigible?’

A soft laugh escaped her lips. ‘I never thought I would say this, but I’m very glad that you are.’

He turned again with some nimble footwork and her mother disappeared from view.

‘Glad to know I have a redeeming feature,’ he said softly so only she could hear. ‘I’ve been trying very hard to develop one.’

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