Bride By Choice

CHAPTER FIVE

LORENZO sent Helen another little bear to congratulate her on her exam results. She thanked him, but then they were both submerged in work and the correspondence faded for a couple of weeks. He took it up again because he had big news.

‘Just got back from a wedding,’ he wrote. ‘Angie and Bernardo finally tied the knot in Montedoro. He was going crazy because she wouldn’t say yes, so in the end he asked Mamma for help, and we all turned up at Angie’s front door and told her it was her wedding day.’

Helen’s reply came whizzing back with the speed of light.

You kidnapped her and forced her to get married?

‘Nobody forces Angie to do anything,’ he responded. ‘She and Bernardo love each other. They just got into a bit of a tangle.’

You mean, she didn’t do what was expected of her, so she was manipulated.

‘It wasn’t like that.’

This time there was no reply, just silence. Alarmed, he seized up the phone, and dialled Helen’s number.

‘It wasn’t like that,’ he repeated as soon as she came on the line. ‘We’re all nuts about Angie. We couldn’t just lose her.’

‘I’m not going to listen to you,’ she said firmly. ‘You make it sound nice, but actually it just proves I was right all along. Angie should simply have walked out and left Bernardo standing.’

Four thousand miles plus an imp of mischief emboldened Lorenzo to say, ‘In Sicily a woman just couldn’t do that.’

He held the receiver away from his ear quickly. Even so her shriek of outrage reached him clearly.

‘Martelli, you’re so lucky you’re the other side of the Atlantic!’

‘I know. If we’d been face to face I’d have said, “Si, cara, no, cara. Anything you say, cara”.’

Her chuckle reached him down the line, and made the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. Perhaps that four thousand miles really were useful. Otherwise he might have behaved in a way that would ruin their friendship for ever.

‘Lorenzo-are you still there?’

‘Yes, of course I am.’

‘You went silent suddenly.’

‘I was just thinking-’

‘What about?’

‘Um-what about? I was wishing you could have been there with me, and seen for yourself how nice it really was.’

There was a pause before she said quietly, ‘Do you really?’

‘Yes. I keep imagining how it would be if you saw my home and my family, and I could get rid of some of your tom-fool prejudices.’

‘You’ll never do that. My tom-fool prejudices and I come as part of a prickly package. Aren’t you glad you escaped while you could?’

‘Definitely. How are you?’

‘I’m fine. Working hard.’

‘How’s Erik?’

‘He’s away at the moment.’

So he wasn’t in her apartment, Lorenzo thought. He’d been straining to hear any background noise, but to his relief there was nothing.

‘What time is it over there?’ he asked.

‘Eleven. I’d just gone to bed.’

‘Sorry if I got you up.’

‘That’s all right. I never mind the chance to straighten you out on a few things.’

‘Oh, it’s me that needs straightening out, is it?’

‘Sure is. It must be dawn in Sicily. Why aren’t you in bed?’

‘I am, with a lady friend snoozing gently beside me at this moment.’

There was a tiny pause before she said uncertainly, ‘I don’t believe you.’

He sighed. ‘You know me too well.’

‘Of course.’ He heard the smile in her voice. ‘Underneath that playboy exterior you’re just Little Lord Fauntleroy.’

‘It’s a lie,’ he said indignantly. ‘A wicked slander.’

She burst out laughing and the pleasant sound was in his ears as they said goodnight and hung up.

He got into bed, expecting to sleep at once as he usually did. Instead, he lay in the darkness, brooding on something else that he would have liked to tell her, but couldn’t.

Nobody had enjoyed the unorthodox wedding more than Lorenzo. At the reception he’d danced with all the prettiest girls, as his reputation required, and joined in the songs in his light, pleasing tenor. And, as one wedding begets another, he had especially appreciated the moment when his mother had announced her intention to marry Fede, the long-lost beloved of her youth, who had recently come back into her life.

But it seemed Baptista had another marriage in mind, and suddenly Lorenzo had realised that everyone was looking at him.

He’d jumped in alarm, exclaiming, ‘Who, me? No way!’

They all smiled knowingly.

‘Forget it,’ he’d said firmly. ‘I’ll think about it in ten years. In the meantime, no way! Do you hear me?’

That made them smile even more.

And he couldn’t admit to anyone-not even himself-that for a moment he’d seen Helen’s lovely face, which was absurd because she was the last woman he would think of in connection with marriage. They’d settled all that the first evening.

The brief vision passed, he was laughing again, resolved not to think of it any more.

It was harder to ignore the memory of Bernardo’s face as Angie had become his wife. After all their quarrels, all the pride and tension, they had claimed each other with the certainty of true love. Lorenzo saw and understood this with an insight that had mysteriously grown recently.

Later that night he went to his mother’s room to kiss her goodnight.

‘I think that all went very well,’ she said.

‘Yes, I was worried up to the last moment.’

‘I wasn’t. Not after Bernardo came to me and asked me to help him bring his marriage about. That was when I knew that, for him, Angie was the one.’

‘How did you know?’ Lorenzo asked impulsively. ‘I mean, what’s the difference between a woman’s who’s the one and-well-?’ He wasn’t looking at his mother, and a slight flush had crept into his cheeks.

‘Bernardo is a very proud man,’ Baptista said. ‘And he discovered that Angie mattered to him more than his pride. When a woman matters that much, she is the one.’ A gleam of mischief crept into her eyes. ‘Perhaps one day soon, you too-’

‘That’s enough of that,’ he said hastily.

‘If you say so.’ Baptista put her hand over his. ‘I worry about you, my son.’

‘Me? But I have a wonderful life, Mamma.’

‘I know. Dashing here, there and everywhere, as a young man likes to do. But sometimes you seem to me-adrift.’

‘Mamma, you’re not going to arrange my marriage the way you arranged my brothers’,’ Lorenzo said firmly.

‘I just thought you might have been arranging it yourself. Do you know how often you speak of Elena Angolini?’

‘Do I?’ he asked, alarmed. ‘Never mind. You can forget her. She’s practically engaged to a man called Erik. She says she isn’t, but I’m not fooled. They’ll announce it any day.’

‘Is that why you’re scowling?’

‘I’m not. Goodnight Mamma.’

‘Goodnight, my son.’

Helen reached the airport an hour after Lorenzo’s plane was due to land. Her delay had been unavoidable, but she worried lest he was already through Immigration, looking around vainly for her, wondering if she’d let him down.

There was no sign of him in the crowd and she glanced up anxiously at the screen. To her relief the plane was so late that it hadn’t even landed. She got herself a coffee and took it to the window where she could look out on the bright summer day, and the even brighter prospect of her friend’s arrival.

It was amazing how often she’d thought of him, considering how busy her life was. By day she worked long, happy hours as Erik’s assistant. In the evening she dated a variety of men. Some were young, some middle-aged; there were wealthy businessmen, impoverished medical students, the odd theatrical. They wined and dined and adored her, and they all bored her equally, for none of them made her laugh.

Before Lorenzo she hadn’t known that laughter was important, but now every man seemed at fault because he couldn’t show her the comical twist to a situation, or share secret jokes that excluded the rest of the world.

They tried to impress her with romance, offering flowers, gifts and verbal tributes. But such outright gestures only made her think of Lorenzo, whose words were either teasing or seriously confiding, never romantic, but whose eyes held an intense look she would sometimes surprise.

It was June. He had been gone for nearly three lonely months, and he might be away still but for the decision of the Elroy Company to expand.

‘It hasn’t been announced yet,’ she’d told Lorenzo in a hurried telephone call, ‘but they’re buying up hotels all over the States. There’ll be an Elroys in Chicago, one in Los Angeles, Las Vegas, and lots more. And all the contracts will be up for negotiation.’

‘I’m on my way,’ he’d assured her fervently.

In a little while he would be here. She would look into his merry face and the world would be bright again. She was smiling already at the thought.

But as an hour stretched to two, then longer, she frowned. At last she went in search of Charlie, whom she’d met when she was trainee, detailed to meet important guests. She’d never known his last name, or his precise job, but what he didn’t know about the airport wasn’t worth knowing.

When she gave him the flight number, his face fell. ‘There’s a spot of bother with the plane. It can’t get its undercarriage down. It’s up there, circling, while they try to put it right.

Helen went pale. ‘And if they can’t?’

‘It’ll land without the undercarriage. Technically that’s a crash but it won’t be too bad. Everyone will come down the chutes. Probably nobody will get hurt.’

In a daze Helen returned to the window, trying not to heed her mounting dread. Of course Charlie was right. Lorenzo would just slide down a chute and reach the ground safely. She tried to cling onto that thought, but now, her eyes sharpened by anxiety, she could see how ambulances and fire engines were discreetly gathering near the runway.

‘Ladies and gentlemen, we apologise for the late arrival of flight-’

The words seemed to shrill along her nerves. Terror blotted out everything so that she hardly heard the next words.

‘…will land in the next ten minutes.’

But what about the undercarriage? Lorenzo seemed to be there with her, laughing, giving her the wicked look that was so full of life and which she treasured. In a few minutes he might be dead.

She turned and ran to the observation area. There she strained eyes and ears frantically for the first sign. The news must have gone around for the place was crowded with worried-looking people who all stood in silence, gazing at the clouds. They were low today, concealing the plane long after it could be heard. But then it suddenly broke into sight and a storm of cheers and applause broke out.

The undercarriage was down.

Helen never clearly remembered what happened next. Her mind knew that she stood, held to the spot, while the aircraft descended to the runway, touched down perfectly and screamed away into the distance, before turning and taxiing back. She didn’t move even when it came back into sight, gliding to its place and easing to a stop. All about her the crowd was erupting but she seemed locked in a block of ice.

She’d stayed motionless, knowing that soon she would weep tears of joy and relief, but just now she could only hold herself together, because if she didn’t she would fall apart. She knew all this, but she didn’t dare let herself actually think about it.

After a long while she told herself that she ought to wait for Lorenzo at the place where the passengers would be emerging, but her limbs couldn’t move. This was all an illusion. The plane had crashed. He was dead. She would never see him again.

‘Helen-Helen-?’

Lorenzo was standing in front of her, giving her shoulders a little shake.

‘Helen?’ he said again. ‘Why are you crying, cara?’

A tender note in his voice as he said ‘cara’ was almost her undoing, but she made herself be strong. ‘I’m not crying,’ she said quickly, brushing her face.

‘When I couldn’t see you I thought maybe you’d gotten tired waiting and gone home. I’m sorry I’m late. There was a bit of trouble.’

‘Yes, the undercarriage. How much did you know on board?’

‘They told us to prepare for a crash landing.’ His familiar cocky grin was just a little frayed. ‘Of course I knew everything would be all right in the end. They can’t get me.’

‘Yes-yes-I knew that too.’

The tears were coursing down her face again, and this time she didn’t try to stop them. The next moment she was in Lorenzo’s arms, having the breath squeezed out of her in a huge bear hug.

‘I thought I wasn’t going to see you again,’ he said huskily.

‘Don’t say that,’ she gasped, thumping his shoulders. ‘How dare you scare me? How dare you?’ Then she stopped thumping and clung to him, feeling him vigorous and solid, and trying to reassure herself that he was really here.

‘I need a really stiff drink,’ he said at last, in a voice that wasn’t perfectly steady, and they made their way to the bar, holding on tightly to each other.

After three months he looked different. The Mediterranean sun had tanned him, making his curly brown hair lighter and his eyes a deeper, fiercer blue. Anyone seeing him for the first time would have known that this was a healthy male animal who lived through his senses and enjoyed it. Helen’s heart was still thumping from the dread she’d gone through, but as she looked at him she knew there was another reason.

Not that that would stop her being mad at him for frightening her.

Once settled in the bar, they regarded each other suspiciously

‘You weren’t scared for me, were you?’ he asked.

‘As if!’

‘I can see you weren’t,’ he said, sounding satisfied.

‘I just thought how like you it was to be on the plane that fouled up,’ she said crossly. ‘You probably made it happen.’

So she was being unreasonable! So what? The relief from terror was so shattering that she was ready to lash out at him.

‘Probably did.’ He was watching her, a gentle smile on his lips.

‘If you aren’t the most awkward, worrisome, disruptive-’

‘Disruptive? Me?’

‘Well, aren’t you? Don’t give me that innocent look! From the first moment you came into my life-sideways, let me remind you-deceiving me, deceiving everyone-’

‘Deceiving’s a bit strong,’ he objected mildly.

‘Well, it’s your own fault. You’ve done nothing but make my life difficult, kissing me and letting my parents get the wrong idea and-everything else.’

And haunting my dreams, she thought, and making me miss you every waking moment. And then showing me the truth I don’t want to face.

He held her hand for a moment, before saying, ‘When I was eight I went off exploring, the way kids do, and got lost. I was gone for hours and they had the whole island out looking for me. When they finally delivered me, wet and hungry, to Mamma-’ he gave a soft whistle ‘-boy was I in trouble!’

She looked at her hand lying in his, feeling the warmth and strength that she might so easily have lost. Happiness seemed to be taking her over, streaming to her fingers and toes, bringing a silly smile to her face. She controlled it hastily.

‘I think we should be making a move,’ she said.

He seemed to come out of a dream. ‘Yes-yes, of course.’

In the car he resolutely discussed his plans for the trip. ‘A few days here, looking in on my customers, trying to keep them happy, then Richmond, Phoenix, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Memphis, Dallas, New Orleans.’ He blew out his cheeks. ‘I’m really going to be busy!’

‘Are you going straight home from New Orleans, or coming back to New York?’ she asked, carefully neutral.

He didn’t answer at once. At last, he said in a strange voice, ‘I’m not sure. Are you free for dinner tonight?’

‘I think so,’ she said, sounding casual, although it had been marked in her diary for a week.

‘I’ll meet you in the Imperial Bar at eight.’

She had a mass of work that afternoon but she got through it fast and was in the bar a few minutes early. Lorenzo’s eyes opened wide when he saw the soft white dress she was wearing. A gilt belt clasped it in at the waist, and the V neck made the perfect setting for the chain and locket. She wore her black hair loose about her shoulders. He too had dressed up, not formally, but with the casual, silk-shirted elegance that made him even more impossibly handsome.

The sight of him made her heart skip a beat. But that was natural, she told herself quickly. The terrors of the afternoon had heightened her emotions. They would soon fade. But she couldn’t repress a smile as she saw him, and her heart went right on beating fast.

‘You haven’t told me yet where we’re going,’ she said when they were in the taxi.

‘The Jacaranda,’ he said, grinning. Then he took her hand and said, ‘You’re beautiful.’ But he saw her shake her head. ‘What? What have I said?’

‘You sounded like the others. I don’t want you to do that.’

‘Then I won’t,’ he said, alarmed.

Not until they reached the restaurant and were seated, waiting for the wine, did he speak again, saying severely, ‘What’s this about “the others”? As a good brother I demand to know.’

‘I like to be entertained in style, and I’m not short of offers,’ she said lightly.

‘Doesn’t Erik mind?’

‘Not in the slightest.’

‘So what’s the big deal with Erik? Are you two engaged or not?’

‘I told you we weren’t.’

‘Yes, but you’ve also been mighty mysterious. What did he say to you that could only be said here?’

Helen’s lips twitched. ‘First, he wanted to give me this,’ she said, touching the gold chain and locket.

‘That must have set him back a few hundred dollars.’

‘Nearly a thousand, actually.’

‘Oh, yeah?’ He sounded edgy. ‘And you say you’re not engaged?’

‘It was a kind of goodbye and apology.’

‘He’s got someone else?’

‘He’s always had someone else. I was a “front” to fool the world-’

‘The jerk!’

‘-while he plucked up courage to “come out”.’

Lorenzo stared. ‘You mean-?’

‘I’ve met the “someone else”. His name’s Paul. He’s very nice.’

Lorenzo covered his eyes with his hand, struggling to control himself. He failed, and the next moment he’d burst out laughing.

Helen laughed with him. But behind the laughter she was musing on the things she couldn’t tell him: the sudden seriousness in Erik’s face as he’d said,

‘I knew you’d forgive me, my dear, because it’s been obvious to me for some time that you were in love with Lorenzo. You don’t mind my saying so, do you?’

She had minded, but she supposed his mistake was understandable.

‘Now I think of it,’ she said, ‘the way he courted me was always like a performance. Lots of romantic gestures, but he never really got close. I barely noticed because I didn’t care about him that way.’ She glanced up. ‘Why are you looking at me like that?’

‘I’m not,’ Lorenzo said, hastily wiping the silly grin from his face. It was crazy but suddenly he could hear birdsong.

The waiter arrived with the wine, and soon as they were alone he toasted her.

‘To your exam success,’ he said.

‘Thank you. I owe it all to Gigi. What a sweet thought. How did you come to think of a bear? Most people are conventional and just send flowers.’

‘Conventional? Me? You know I never do what the other guys-’ His voice ran down. Something about the gleam in her eyes, plus some worrying entries on a recent credit card statement, told him the worst. ‘Did you-get anything else from me?’

‘Only three bunches of flowers. And three cards.’

He groaned.

‘I tried to tell you when we talked that night, but something you said made me realise you hadn’t meant the flowers to arrive.’

‘I thought they might send the wrong signals, so I cancelled them. But then I got my credit card statement and there they all were.’

Her lips twitched. ‘I loved the cards.’ A wild impulse made her add, ‘especially the first one.’

‘That one said-?’

‘Love and best wishes.’

‘Yes-well, you know how it is-in that sort of message-you say “love”, but-’

‘But what?’

‘But-I don’t know.’

‘Neither do I.’

The silence was jagged. Helen looked up to find Lorenzo watching her, and everything they had tried to deny was in his eyes. She was back in the first night, in his arms, feeling his scorching lips on hers, growing dizzier, crazier.

But then she pulled herself firmly together. What happened that night had been a passing moment, and if she had ached for him ever since that was nobody’s concern but hers.

‘We may have a problem here,’ Lorenzo said at last, speaking with caution.

‘Not-necessarily,’ she replied, trying to sound firm.

‘Oh!’ He sounded deflated. ‘I thought maybe you-sorry, I didn’t mean to embarrass you.’

‘No, it’s not that,’ she said hurriedly. ‘Of course I-it doesn’t have to be a problem unless we let it. It’s really only what happened this afternoon, me thinking you might be dead-’

‘And me thinking I’d never see you again-’

‘Exactly. That sort of thing makes people emotional, but only for a while. It doesn’t mean anything.’

‘Of course it doesn’t,’ he said resolutely.

‘So if we’re sensible, and don’t get it out of proportion-not let it spoil things-’

‘Fine. Ah, here’s the first course. Looks good.’

After that no more was said on the dangerous subject. Helen didn’t feel she’d handled it very well, and half hoped he’d bring it up again. When he didn’t she felt depressed. But he didn’t notice. He seemed rather depressed himself.

Three precious days in New York, so eagerly anticipated, seemed to shrink to nothing. There was a working lunch with Erik, at which Lorenzo was at his best, realising that he’d always misjudged this splendid man. There was a stream of visits to customers old and new. His mobile was never silent.

On the last night there was the unavoidable supper with the Angolinis, suffering under the broad hints of Mamma and Poppa and the impatient touchiness of Giorgio.

‘I’m sorry,’ Helen said in the cab on the way home. ‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.’

‘Don’t worry. Families are a fact of life. But the least you can do is buy me a drink.’

Say no, warned her inner voice. You’re in a mood to be sentimental.

‘Anything,’ she said. ‘I think you’re a positive saint.’

Elroys had its own nightclub, and a reputation for its music. Tonight there was a traditional jazz band, and they arrived to find the place loud and merry. They found a table in a corner, but it was too noisy to talk, so they took the floor and danced energetically for half an hour.

‘I needed that,’ Lorenzo said when they sat down. He fanned himself, breathing hard, and she did the same. The blood was still pounding through her veins in a wild, stomping rhythm, and she felt good.

The lights were low, and in the pink and blue shadows she could just make out his face, and the gleam in his eyes. She looked at him, storing up memories for the weeks alone. The last three days had tired her in every way. Three days of denying what they’d discovered at the airport, of pretending it wasn’t true, of looking to the future with sad eyes.

He was regarding her wistfully and she knew his thoughts were the same, although she tried not to know it.

‘I’m leaving early tomorrow,’ he said. ‘I’ll be gone before you reach work.’

‘I know. So we’ll say goodbye now.’

‘Yes…’ A surge of longing had taken possession of her, making her heart ache. When he seized her hand and pressed it urgently against his lips she felt her control slipping. It was easy in the darkness to lean close to him so that when he raised his head his lips brushed hers, almost by accident.

‘Elena…’ he whispered, using the name he never used. ‘Elena…’

‘Don’t,’ she whispered urgently.

‘But you know…’

‘Yes, I do. But there are some things it’s best not to know. If we forget that-we could lose everything.’

‘Or gain everything?’ he asked softly.

She shook her head, and he sighed.

‘I suppose you’re right,’ he said reluctantly. ‘I just thought I’d ask my friend’s advice.’

‘Your friend,’ she managed to say, ‘doesn’t want anything to spoil your friendship, the most precious she’s ever known.’

If only he hadn’t kissed her that first night. She felt she might just about cope without the memory of his lips scorching hers in a way no other man’s had ever done. But her body had reacted instinctively, yearning towards him, wanting more, wanting him.

‘I think it’s time to say goodbye,’ she said in a strained voice. ‘You have to be up early. I don’t want you to miss your plane because of me.’ She barely knew what she was saying.

‘I guess you’re right,’ he said reluctantly. He knew why she was running away.

They took the elevator up from the club to the hotel entrance. There was nobody else in it, and as soon as the doors closed he took her face between his hands and kissed her on the lips.

‘I can’t do that in the lobby,’ he said. ‘And I’ve wanted to kiss you so badly. We don’t have to say goodbye-not just this minute-’

She tried to answer but he was occupying her lips again with a kiss that tantalised her with thoughts of what might be. They were friends, she thought wildly, just friends. But desire was flowing through her, making a mockery of friendship. She wanted him to touch her everywhere, and to touch him everywhere. The craving for that was so urgent that she could almost feel his hands caressing her intimately, seeking her response. The sensation almost broke her control, and she clung to him, praying for common sense.

But common sense retreated in the face of her need to be naked with him, and to let him see her own nakedness. She knew she was beautiful, and what use was beauty unless the man you wanted could see it, and revel in it? In another moment…

They stopped. The doors opened. People were waiting to get in. They pulled apart hastily and hurried out. The moment was gone.

In the brilliant light of the reception area they parted.

‘Goodbye, Signor Martelli,’ she said, politely offering him her hand.

‘Goodbye, Miss Angolini. I’ve really appreciated your help.’

‘Please contact me if you need anything.’

‘I’ll be sure to do so.’

He was gone. She’d looked forward to this trip so much, but after a few packed days he was leaving for weeks, with perhaps the hope of another few days at the end of it. Then he would be gone again. For good.

She’d done the right thing. There was no doubt of it. When Lorenzo returned to Sicily there was no way she could go with him. Even if he’d asked her. Which he hadn’t.

So she could congratulate herself on the wisdom that had saved her from making a dreadful mistake.

But why was it, she wondered forlornly, that the right thing felt so terribly, terribly wrong?