Gino’s Arranged Bride

CHAPTER ONE

O NE of the most beautiful men Nature ever made, Laura thought appreciatively. And I don’t just mean good-looking. Beautiful!

The young man leaning back on the park bench would have caught anyone’s attention. His shaggy dark hair was just beginning to curl. His features were lean and fine, except for his mouth which was wide and generous, sensually curved even when he was asleep.

There wasn’t a spare ounce on his tall body with its long legs, stretched out gracefully. An old jacket, worn jeans, and a day’s growth on his chin, made him look like a hobo, but a stylish hobo.

With his eyes closed, his face raised to the sun, he might have stood for a pagan symbol of physical perfection.

He’s probably got nothing between his ears, she thought, amused, but with looks like that, he doesn’t need it.

But then she thought again. There was something in his face that told another story. Heavy shadows beneath his eyes, and a fine-drawn tension about his mouth suggested a man who lived on his nerves, and who hadn’t slept properly for months.

‘Mummy.’

Laura turned to where her eight-year-old daughter was standing beside her, clutching a football, eagerly waiting for the fun to begin.

‘Sorry, darling,’ she said, turning away from the man on the bench.

‘Please let’s play a game, Mummy.’

On the first real day of spring Nikki had wanted to get out of the house and celebrate in the park. Laura had protested at first.

‘It’s not really warm enough yet.’

‘It is, it is,’ Nikki had insisted indignantly.

And it was. The weather was lovely. But Laura had another reason for being reluctant to face the world, one that she couldn’t put into words for the little girl, although Nikki understood without words.

Before leaving the house she had run a brush through her fair, generous curls that rioted in disorder no matter how she tried to control them. Her appearance told two different stories. Her hair seemed to belong to a cheerful, careless teenager, and at thirty-two she still had the slim figure of those years.

But her face had been shaped by sadness and weary patience. It was too soon for lines, but a shadow had come into her blue eyes years too soon.

What devastated her was that the same shadow was beginning to appear in her daughter’s eyes. At eight, Nikki was already losing her childish light-heartedness, for a terrible reason. And there was nothing her frantic mother could do about it.

The park was already filling up. Children were kicking balls about, adults were leaning back in the sun.

Laura recognised some of the other mothers and waved to them. They waved back, but then turned away quickly. She glanced quickly at Nikki to see if she had noticed the rejection, and found her daughter regarding her with an understanding smile.

‘It’s all right,’ she said in a confiding voice. ‘We’ll play together.’

At such moments Laura wanted to scream to the world, ‘How dare you reject my daughter? So what if her face is a little different? What harm does it do you?’

But Nikki was already darting away, deftly dribbling the ball between her feet. She seemed to have put the incident behind her.

If only I could do that, Laura thought. If only I could still believe the world will turn out to be a good place in the end, as she does.

She took a last glimpse at the glorious young man, still sitting motionless, bathed in the sun.

Not that Laura set much store by looks. Jack, too, had been handsome, with a broad, good-natured smile and an air of loving the world-until the day he walked out on his wife and daughter without a backward glance.

Nikki was still playing with her junior football, which she bounced hopefully, looking around her.

‘I don’t see anyone that we know, darling,’ Laura said. ‘Let’s just play together.’

‘You mean they wouldn’t want to play with me?’ Nikki asked.

Laura’s heart lurched, and her eyes reacted before she could stop herself. Nikki watched and understood.

‘It’s all right, Mummy.’ The little girl rubbed her face. ‘People don’t understand about this.’

‘No, they don’t understand,’ Laura said gently.

‘Was that why you didn’t want us to come here?’

Dear God! Laura thought. She’s only eight years old. She knows far too much.

She nodded. ‘Yes, because of people who don’t understand, being unkind to you.’

‘They’re not unkind exactly,’ Nikki said, speaking like a wise little old woman, ‘it’s just that they don’t like to look at me. Never mind.’

She ran a little distance ahead and began dribbling the ball, while Laura stood still for a moment, suppressing the instinct to commit murder.

But murder who? The malign fate that had caused her child to be different to others? The stupid world that made everything worse for her with its cruel, imbecilic ignorance? The unthinking idiots who couldn’t see past that damaged face to the sweet loving soul beneath.

‘Come on, Mummy,’ Nikki called.

They kicked the football around for a while, until Nikki gave an unexpectedly powerful lunge and the ball went sailing high in the air.

For a moment it seemed to hover before plunging like a stone to land right on the stomach of the young man on the bench. He awoke with a yell, clutching his middle.

Nikki had run forward until she pulled up short in front of him and stood looking at him steadily.

He looked back at her. He was holding the ball.

‘This is yours?’ he asked. He had a foreign accent.

‘Yes. Sorry.’ Nikki moved closer, positioning herself just in front of him, so that he couldn’t help but see her clearly. Her eyes were fixed on his face, watching, waiting for the moment when his glance faltered.

Where does she get the courage to do that? Laura wondered.

‘I hope you really are sorry,’ he said, regarding her steadily and speaking in a tone of grievance. ‘I was enjoying a beautiful dream when Poof! There is a dead weight on my stomach.’

He hadn’t reacted to her face. Nikki moved again, placing herself squarely before him, grimly determined, daring her good luck not to last.

‘I didn’t mean to,’ she said.

‘Of course not.’

‘I do apologise,’ Laura said, catching up with them. ‘I hope you’re not hurt.’

He gave them both a brilliant grin that seemed to light up the whole world. Laura had never seen a grin like it. It was life enhancing.

‘I guess I’ll survive,’ he said.

‘And it’s left a dirty patch in your shirt.’

He studied the shirt which was already the worse for wear. ‘How can you tell?’ he asked plaintively.

Nikki giggled. He directed his grin at her.

Laura watched him carefully, wondering if this was really happening. Other people flinched at the sight of Nikki, or became elaborately kind, which was almost worse. This man seemed not to have noticed anything different about her.

‘I’m Laura Gray,’ she said, ‘and this is my daughter, Nikki.’

‘I’m Gino Farnese.’ He engulfed her hand in his. It was a big hand with a powerful, muscular look that suggested some kind of hard manual work. Even through the gentle handshake she could feel the strength.

Then he grasped Nikki’s hand, giving her the same courtesy as her mother, and saying solemnly, ‘Buon giorno, signorina. Sono Gino.’

‘What does that mean?’ the child asked.

‘It means, “Hello, young lady. I am Gino.”’

Nikki frowned. ‘You’re foreign,’ she declared bluntly. ‘You talk funny.’

‘Nikki!’ Laura exclaimed. ‘Manners!’

‘It’s true. I’m Italian,’ he said, not seeming to be offended.

‘Are you any good kicking a football?’ Nikki demanded, keeping him to important matters.

‘Nikki!’

‘I reckon I’m pretty useful,’ he said, adding warily, ‘as long as my opponent doesn’t get too rough.’

She bounded away, calling to him, ‘Come on, come on!’

‘I apologise,’ Laura said helplessly.

He gave his life-enhancing grin again. ‘Don’t worry. I’m on my guard against further assaults from your ferocious offspring.’

‘That wasn’t what I-’

But he was gone, dancing around the ball. He really was skilled, Laura thought. Not every man could have kicked it here and there, never too hard, just far enough to make her work for it. And it all looked natural.

Smiling, Laura took his place on the bench, almost tripping over a suitcase that stood beside it.

It was shabby, like the rest of him. His clothes looked as though he’d spent several nights sleeping in them, and the suitcase had a hole in the corner.

Like a tortoise, she thought, carrying everything on its back. Not that there was anything tortoise-like about the deft way he was darting back and forth.

At last he contrived to lose the ball to Nikki so cleverly that she could think she’d won it. She promptly gave it another of her mighty kicks straight at him. Gino Farnese lunged like a goalkeeper, just contriving to miss.

‘Goal!’ he yelled triumphantly, sitting on the ground, and bawling so loudly that several people stared at him and moved hastily away.

‘That always happens,’ he said. ‘People run away from me because they think I’m crazy.’

‘Are you crazy?’ Nikki wanted to know.

He seemed to consider. ‘I think so, si. So you can’t blame them.’

‘I won’t run away,’ Nikki said.

‘Thank you.’ He was still sitting on the ground, gasping, looking her in the eyes. ‘Oh, I can’t do this, piccina. You’re too much for me.’

He jumped up and went off to retrieve the ball. Nikki darted to her mother and spoke in a hurried whisper.

‘He didn’t see it, Mummy. He didn’t see it.’

‘Darling-’

‘It’s like a magic spell. Everyone else can see it but not him. Do you think there’s really a spell on me?’

With all her heart she longed to say yes. She was saved from having to answer by Gino’s return. She came to a swift decision.

‘It’s time we were going back to have some tea,’ she said. ‘I hope you’ll come with us. The least I can do is feed you when my daughter has run you off your feet.’

‘That’s very kind-’

‘Fine, then you’re coming.’ She wasn’t going to let him escape. ‘The house is just over there. Besides, I don’t think Nikki is ready to let you go yet.’

She was right. The little girl was hopping excitedly from one foot to the other. Laura could see that she’d formed one of those instant, inexplicable friendships that sometimes happened with children.

Or was it inexplicable? He’d treated her exactly like any other child, which was all Nikki asked. No, not inexplicable at all.

The little girl danced beside him all the way home, chattering, giggling at his accent. He promptly exaggerated it, making her giggle more. Laura gave him full marks for a kind heart.

Her home was a huge three-storey Victorian house with a shabby appearance, although inwardly it was clean and comfortable in a ‘no frills’ kind of way.

‘You two live here alone?’ he asked.

‘No, I rent out rooms.’

‘Ah! Are you expensive?’

‘Not very. In fact my only remaining room is smaller than the others and always the last to go, so it’s dirt cheap.’

She hoped she didn’t sound too eager. She had made her own decision as firmly as Nikki had apparently made hers. She wanted him to move in as a tenant, and make her little girl smile.

The front door led into a wide hallway, with a flight of stairs on one side and a door on the other.

‘That’s the living room,’ Laura said, pushing it open. ‘It’s got the only television in the house. This place is as basic as that, I’m afraid. And along here, at the back of the house, is the kitchen.’

It was old-fashioned, large and comfortable, with a large table in the centre. Of the six chairs around it only three of them matched.

As Laura put the kettle on Gino Farnese said, ‘You should know something about me before you let me come here.’

Nikki was putting her ball away in the hall cupboard, and Laura took the chance to say quietly, ‘I know that you can cheer her up. That’s important.’

‘But it’s not the only thing,’ he said, also dropping his voice. ‘To make a little girl smile-is important, si. But you don’t know me. I might have married six wives and abandoned them all.’

‘You’re a bit young to have married six wives,’ she said, apparently considering the matter seriously. ‘You can’t be much more than twenty-five.’

‘Twenty-nine,’ he said with wounded dignity.

‘I’m sorry, twenty-nine. So tell me, have you abandoned six wives?’

‘No, no, only four-no, five,’ he assured her quickly. ‘It’s not so bad, si?’

A giggle from the door told them Nikki had been eavesdropping.

‘Five’s all right, isn’t it Mummy.’

‘I suppose we can overlook five,’ she agreed, laughing.

‘But when I said you should know about me, that’s not when I meant,’ he told her. ‘I must tell you that I have hardly any money at the moment. I was-er-’ he struck his forehead while he fought for the English word ‘come si dice?-I was mugged.’

‘Goodness, when?’

‘In London. I don’t like London. It’s too big and noisy. Three of them jumped me, grabbed my bags and ran. I didn’t even get a good look at them.

‘Luckily I had my passport and a little money in my back pocket, but my wallet with credit cards was in one of the bags. So were my decent clothes.’

‘Did you go to the police?’

‘Sure, but what can they do? I’ve cancelled the credit cards, but now I must get some more money. I bought some old clothes in a charity shop, also an old suitcase. Now I wear the old clothes so that my good suit stays in the bag.

‘I had just enough money to get a train out of London, to anywhere. I just got off here because it looked nice, a small town, some countryside. But I don’t know where I am. The station board said Elverham, but where is Elverham? What is Elverham? Is it real, or did I imagine it?’

He saw her looking at him and came down to earth.

‘I’m sorry. I warned you I’m a little crazy.’

‘I guess you’re entitled to be. Elverham is about sixty miles north of London, and it’s a market town, surrounded by country. It’s a quiet place. Nothing very dramatic ever happens here. So you got off the train and did what?’

‘I wandered about and found the park. It looked nice so I lay down under a bush and stayed the night. That’s why I look a bit-well-’ His gesture indicated his dishevelled appearance.

Nikki beamed, evidently not liking him less for looking like a tramp.

‘Tomorrow I’ll try to open a bank account and get some money sent from Italy,’ he said. ‘Until then I have almost nothing, so if you want a deposit for the room I can’t do it today, I’m afraid.’

‘There’s no rush. You should try the room out first. You may not like it.’

‘After the way I slept last night, I’ll like it,’ he assured her, and they all laughed.

‘I’ve done Italy in geography,’ Nikki said proudly. ‘It looks like a boot. Which bit do you come from?’

She thought he hesitated a moment before replying, ‘Tuscany.’

Nikki frowned. ‘Where’s that?’

‘When you look at the map, it’s the bit on the left, near the top,’ he explained.

‘And that’s where your home is?’ Nikki persisted.

The question seemed to trouble him. His expression became a little vague, and he murmured, ‘My home,’ in an almost inaudible voice.

‘Yes, you know, a place where they have to let you in, even if they don’t like you.’

‘Nikki,’ Laura groaned again.

‘It’s not a bad description,’ Gino said with a faint smile. ‘Yes, there’s a place where they’d have to let me in.’

‘Is it like this?’ Nikki wanted to know.

He laughed outright. ‘No, it’s a farm.’

‘Is it big?’

‘Too big. Too much work. I just ran away. Something smells good.’

‘It’s only a cup of tea,’ Laura pointed out. ‘I’ll pour you one.’

Laura did so, appreciating the neat way he’d slid away from the subject of his home. She wondered exactly what he was running from. Not hard work, as he’d implied. But he was escaping something. There had been an odd look on his face, that hinted at troubled currents beneath.

She wasn’t sure how much of this robbery story she believed. It might just be his way of saying that he wasn’t really a vagrant, no matter how things looked.

An instinctive clown, she thought, but one who clowned as a way of hiding himself.

If it came to that, she supposed it was true that she knew nothing about him. He might be all kinds of a weirdo.

But then she looked at him, and calculations fell away. This was a good man. All her instincts told her so.

‘I’ll get your room ready,’ she said.

He followed her up the stairs to the next floor where three of the rented rooms were located, the other two being on the floor above. She led him to the one at the far end of the corridor, with Nikki bringing up the rear.

As Laura had warned him, it was tiny. The bed was narrow and only just long enough for his tall figure. There was a wardrobe, a chest of drawers, a chair and a small washbasin attached to the wall.

Even so, he had space enough for his meagre possessions.

Laura fetched sheets and blankets and began making up the bed with Nikki’s help, so that Gino had to hop out of the way in that narrow space.

‘Can’t I do anything useful?’ he asked.

‘You could put the pillow in its case,’ Nikki told him kindly.

‘Thank you ma’am.’

As they worked Laura said, ‘I have five other guests. Sadie and Claudia are sisters, and they both work at making computers in a local factory. Bert is a night-watchman, Fred is a bouncer at a nightclub, and Mrs Baxter is a widow and retired teacher. She keeps an eye on Nikki when I have to work in the evening.’

‘You work, as well as running this place?’ he asked, startled.

‘I do a few hours as a barmaid. The pub’s not far away.’

When it was all finished they stood back and regarded the result.

‘I’m afraid it’s a bit bare,’ Laura said.

‘I know what we can do,’ Nikki said. She disappeared and returned a moment later, clutching something that she laid triumphantly on the little chest of drawers by the bed.

It was a small soft toy in the shape of a dog.

‘His name’s Simon,’ she said. ‘And he’ll keep you company.’

Gino sat down on the bed so that his eyes were on a level with hers.

‘Thank you,’ he said gravely. ‘That was very kind. Now I shall have a friend.’

‘Three friends,’ Nikki said at once. ‘’Cos you’ve got us too.’

He raised his eyes to Laura, signalling a question.

‘Yes, you’ve got three friends now,’ she agreed. ‘I’ve got to go and start the supper. Come along Nikki. If Gino slept on the ground last night he’s probably longing to get some sleep now.’

He smiled and didn’t deny it.

When they had left he threw himself back on the bed and lay looking at the ceiling, waiting for sleep to come. After the uncomfortable night he’d had, it should happen easily.

But, as he’d feared, there was only restless wakefulness. By now he was drearily used to that happening. Once he’d been a man who slept easily, like a contented animal, living through his happy physical instincts.

But in the six months since he’d left Italy that had all changed. Now it seemed that he rested properly only one night out of two. The others were spent in chasing wretched dreams and visions, wrestling with regrets and ‘if onlys’.

The child’s mention of ‘home’ had caught him off guard, as so many things seemed to do these days.

‘A place where they have to let you in, even if they don’t like you.’

Home was Belluna, the great farm in Tuscany. If he knocked on the door, his brother and Alex, his brother’s wife-for so he must force himself to call her now-would let him in. They would have to, since he owned half the property.

They would smile and say how good it was to see him, how concerned they’d been while he was away, how they’d thought about him every day.

And it would all be true.

But there was something else, also true, that nobody would mention. They would worry, lest he rock the boat of their happy marriage with his bitterness and anger, his anguished, unrequited love. They would look at each other behind his back, and know that an alien had come among them. And they would long silently for him to leave.

‘I could never love you,’ Alex had said. ‘Not as you want, anyway.’

But even she had never understood how deeply in love with her he had fallen. Before that he’d loved as a very young man, plunging into infatuation and out again, like the giddy whirl of a carousel.

But when he met Alex the carousel had stopped, tossing him to the ground so that he rose into a new world, one where she existed. The one. The only one, for, like many young men who love lightly and carelessly, he had been struck by the real thing like a thunderbolt. After that no more carelessness was possible.

‘Not as you want,’ she had said.

He had wanted everything from her, love, tenderness, passion, a promise to last a lifetime.

And he’d thought he had them, until the night he returned to find her in his brother’s bed.