The Italian's Passionate Revenge

CHAPTER ELEVEN

ELISE knew that she’d done well at the ball and when it was finally time to bid everyone goodnight and retire to her room she wore a smile of pleasure. There had been a development this evening that greatly pleased her. Things were looking up.

‘Have you come for the diamonds?’ she asked as Vincente appeared. ‘It’s best to lock them away as quickly as possible.’

She was removing them as she spoke, but he whisked them out of her hands and tossed them on to the bed. His face, she was delighted to notice, was that of a man at the end of his tether, and it was no surprise when he seized her in his arms.

‘Shut up,’ he said.

His kiss was everything she wanted-fierce, furious, desperate. She returned it, but only so far.

‘Aren’t you pleased with me?’ she asked when she could speak. ‘Did I impress your guests?’

‘Too damn much,’ he said against her lips.

She laughed and he released her mouth abruptly.

‘I enjoyed myself,’ she said. ‘We have lots of dinner invitations. They all want you to take me to visit them.’

‘They can want.’

‘Nonsense! I’ll be a prize asset. Think of how much business you can do.’

This was true, and the knowledge inflamed him further. How dared she talk to him of business?

‘Unzip me,’ she said, turning away.

He pulled the zip down, down, right down to the swell of her hips and beyond. The gorgeous black dress fell away, revealing her body to his furious eyes. She seemed unaware of his reaction, unaware of him, as she stepped out of the gown.

‘I am really ready for a good night’s sleep,’ she said. ‘Goodnight.’

‘Goodnight?’ he said, pulling her around. ‘Am I expected to just go away after the performance you put on tonight?’

‘That’s just it. It was a performance, nothing more. To please you, I’ve let men fawn over me, hold me too tight, kiss my hand, but all I felt was boredom. It’s amazing how boring a man can be.’

‘And you’re very good at the performance, aren’t you?’

‘As good as I have to be. I’ve had a lot of practice.’

‘But it’s not always a pretence, is it. You and I both know that.’

He was reminding her of the time he’d incited her blazing passion only to disappoint her. She hadn’t been pretending then, and the knowledge lay between them now.

Vincente moved gently, laying his hand over one breast, challenging her to feel nothing. His caress was soft, almost tender, and it nearly weakened her. This was dangerous. It brought him too close to being the man she loved, and she would banish that man at all costs. He no longer belonged in her life.

‘Can we have nothing for ourselves?’ he whispered against her neck.

Smiling, she played her ace. ‘But we do have something,’ she said.

She took hold of his hand and moved it from her breast, sliding it down to lie over her stomach.

‘We have this,’ she said. ‘Have you forgotten?’

It was true that he had forgotten. Dazzled by her, tense with frustrated desire, maddened by her elusiveness, he’d lost sight of her as a mother. Now the simple action shocked him into stillness.

The moment was gone. She was a conjurer again, waving a wand and changing herself in a flash from a siren to a matron, carrying his child. Whatever he’d been going to do, he wouldn’t do it now.

‘You’re quite right,’ he said raggedly. ‘I’ll leave you in peace.’

He gathered up the diamonds. Before leaving, he paused to say, ‘You need not worry about my troubling you again. Goodnight.’

Elise stared at the closed door as though expecting it to open again. But it wouldn’t, she knew. She’d defeated him.

‘I’m winning,’ she said to herself. ‘I’m winning.’

But it was a hollow victory.

Vincente returned home early the next day to find that Elise was missing and nobody knew where to look for her. Mario, the chauffeur reserved for her and Mamma, knew little.

‘I drove the Signora into town, as far as the Vatican. Then she sent me away and said she’d call when she wanted to be collected. That was four hours ago and she hasn’t called.’

‘She’s probably just sightseeing,’ Mamma tried to reassure him. ‘The Vatican’s a big place.’

‘Of course, Mamma.’

He smiled and spoke reassuringly, but inwardly he was in turmoil. Not for one moment did he believe that Elise was sightseeing. She’d simply waited for Mario to drive away, then gone to her real destination-wherever that was and whoever she was meeting.

It meant nothing, he told himself. She was teasing him, playing one of her tricks in their private war. At any moment now she would walk in and all would be well.

But the memory intruded of her and Carlo Vansini dancing, sitting with their heads together, smiling with some private understanding.

When she returned-if she returned-she would shrug and refuse to admit that she’d been with him.

And he would murder her.

‘Sorry, Mamma, what did you say?’ he asked, pulling himself back to reality with an effort.

‘I said here she is. I just saw a taxi pull up outside.’

He strode out in time to see her pay the driver. She turned and waved to him, smiling. In a searing moment he took in how beautiful she was, how perfectly presented, how suspiciously content.

‘There’s been a misunderstanding,’ he said coldly. ‘Mario said you were going to call him.’

‘I was, but a taxi was passing and it was simpler to just get in.’

‘Have you had a good afternoon?’

‘Wonderful, thank you,’ she said with a sigh of happiness.

He took her arm in a firm grip, escorted her inside and drew her into an ante-room.

‘I want to know where you’ve been,’ he said through gritted teeth.

‘Boy, you really come out of the nineteenth century, don’t you! Yes, my lord and master. No, my lord and master.’

‘I said I want to know where you’ve been-and who with.’

She gave him a look that, if he hadn’t been so wrought up, he might have recognised as pity.

‘I’ve spent the afternoon in my apartment,’ she said.

‘Alone?’

‘No, with Carlo Vansini.’

His face grew hard. ‘You dare to stand there and admit it in that brazen way?’ he snapped.

‘What’s brazen about it?’ she asked innocently. ‘Selling property is a perfectly respectable occupation.’

‘Selling-?’

‘Oh, Vincente, if you could only see your face! I’ve sold Carlo my apartment. It was exactly what he was looking for. He told me last night he wanted a place where he could have a private life. He finds living with his mother a bit inhibiting.’

Vincente couldn’t speak. Something had caught in his throat.

‘I told him I had a place for sale,’ she went on, ‘and we agreed to meet there this afternoon. He loved it at once.’

‘That’s where you’ve been?’ he asked.

‘Of course. What’s the matter?’

‘You never thought to tell me first?’

‘Why should I? I don’t need your permission.’

But that wasn’t why and they both knew it. She’d put him through hell for the fun of it, or perhaps to make a point.

‘Besides, I didn’t want to risk you putting off another buyer,’ she added.

‘Why should I do that? I know I did last time, but things are different now.’

‘Not really. You’re still trying to control me. The money I’ll get is my independence, and I’m going to have that, make no mistake. Carlo and I went to the agent and told him to put the sale through fast. He’s anxious to take possession at once, so the money should be through in a week. Then I’ll be able to pay off all my debts, including my debts to you.’

‘You owe me nothing.’

‘That’s not true. After that, I went to the lawyer, and he let slip about all the bills Ben left outstanding, that you’ve been paying. That’s very kind of you-’ but she didn’t sound as if she really considered it kind ‘-but you’ll get every last penny back, with interest. I’ll still have enough left to start my own business when I’ve finished my fashion course.’

‘Business? When I can buy you everything you want?’

She met his eyes and said softly, ‘The thing I want most is something you can’t buy me, Vincente. Don’t you know that by now?’

That silenced him.

She moved away, saying, ‘I want my independence, my freedom. I’ll still be here. You’ll have your wife and your child, but I’ll be free.’

He didn’t answer. He seemed to be considering.

To soften the atmosphere, she said, ‘How could you think-what you were thinking?’

‘Because I don’t know you,’ he said simply. ‘I don’t know who you are any more.’

‘You never did. At least now you recognise it. By the way, the estate agent asked me to give you a message. He thinks he has a buyer for your own flat.’

‘Good.’

‘So now we’re even. You didn’t tell me that you were selling, either.’

‘Tell you? And have you crow over me?’ He managed to say this with a very faint glimmer of humour. Inwardly, relief was sending him slightly crazy.

‘I wouldn’t do that. When did you put it on the market?’

‘The day you agreed to marry me.’

‘There was no need for you to sell, if it was because of a foolish joke I once made-’

‘About the legions of women I could entertain there? I haven’t the slightest wish to do that.’ In a voice heavy with irony he added, ‘I’m a devoted family man now.’

‘Ah, yes! Ruthless entrepreneur, man about town, the complete many-sided image. But it’s a good idea to adjust one of the sides now and then. I congratulate you.’

His face darkened. ‘You know better than that.’

‘Do I?’

‘Unless you’re very stupid, and I never thought you were. Not before this. All I want now is you and our child.’

‘And you’ve acquired us very thoroughly. Well done.’

It was like trying to argue with steel, he thought grimly. But who could he blame but himself?

Both sales went through quickly. At her insistence Vincente accepted the money she owed him, but there was still enough left to make her feel that she could have a life of her own.

Life at the Palazzo was more pleasant than she had feared, chiefly because her mother-in-law adored her. When she had a giddy spell it was Elise she clung to until the doctor appeared and ordered her to bed. And it was Elise who promised faithfully not to disturb Vincente, and then promptly broke a promise she’d never intended to keep by calling him at the office.

Luckily he was there, and able to return home at once. Mamma chided Elise for her disobedience, but her eyes shone with affection.

Later that night Vincente knocked on her door. ‘May I come in for a few minutes?’

She’d already undressed for bed and was wearing a silk nightdress and robe, but he showed no awareness of this as she stood back to let him pass, and even seemed to avoid looking at her.

‘I just wanted to thank you for taking care of Mamma,’ he said.

‘No need. I thought being here would be difficult but she’s easy to love.’

‘Yes, she makes a lot of things tolerable,’ he agreed, changing her meaning slightly, knowing she would understand.

‘Elise,’ he said suddenly, ‘have you looked ahead, down the years, to the kind of marriage we’re going to have?’

‘You’ll be a good father, I know that. You do everything efficiently once you’ve set your mind to it.’

He looked at her, wearing the soft silk that seemed to conceal her body while actually suggesting so much, and he remembered the times when she would have thrown it aside and opened her arms to him.

He wondered if she realised that she was standing against the light from the bedside lamp, so that the material became transparent, revealing her perfect shape beneath. It was still early in her pregnancy and, beyond a slight extra voluptuousness, her shape was unchanged.

Efficiently. Did she know how the word savaged him?

He knew he ought to leave now while he was still in some sort of control of himself. The other night she’d dared him to take her in anger, and they’d both known he couldn’t do that. Not now. But if she would soften to him there was still hope.

He moved towards her, close enough to lay a gentle hand on her cheek. It was a touch she’d always loved, just as he had always loved the slight frisson he could sense inside her when he did it.

Now there was nothing. She might have been made of stone. He escaped quickly.

A few days later a large box was delivered to the house. Later that night Elise told Vincente quietly, ‘I’d like to talk to you before you go to bed.’

When he called in her room she handed him an envelope.

‘When I came to Rome I left a lot of things in store in England. I sent for them recently and they arrived today. This is the letter I wrote Angelo, the one Ben stole. I want you to read it.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘Quite sure.’

He took it slowly and turned away to the window. He wanted to read it, yet he desperately wanted to refuse.

It was as terrible as he’d feared. For the first time he saw Elise as she had been then, pouring out her heart with all the fervour and passion of young love and grief at parting.

Try to forgive me, my darling…I never meant it to be this way…

She told the whole story, just as she had told it to Vincente: how Ben had arrived suddenly in Rome and snatched her away, using threats to her father.

I heard you calling under my window and I tried to call back to you, to let you know that you were the one I loved…but he gripped me so tightly I couldn’t escape…I love you, I shall always love you…try to forgive me…forgive…forgive…

‘If you showed me this to prove that I misjudged you,’ he said, ‘there was no need. I’ve known that a long time. I didn’t want to know it. When you first came to Rome-and we were together-I tried not to see what was happening to me, but in the end I had to face it. I wanted you to be innocent, so that I could love you without feeling guilty.’

‘That’s the trouble.’ She sighed. ‘Guilt destroys everything. I live with my guilt all the time, and there’s hardly anything of me left. I don’t feel anything any more.’

‘Don’t say that.’

‘It’s true. I prefer it that way. It’s safer. Perhaps we might have loved each other if we’d met differently-’

‘There’s no perhaps about it,’ he said harshly. ‘We were meant to love each other, despite all the things that came between us. Sooner or later, you have to accept that.’

‘Have to?’ She shook her head firmly. ‘No, I don’t “have to”. Don’t try to give me orders, Vincente. This is one thing that isn’t in your control. I won’t love you. I can’t, and if I could, I wouldn’t.’

‘And suppose I love you,’ he snapped furiously.

How different this might have been. Once her face would have softened with joy at a hint of love. Now she merely gave a sad little sigh and said, ‘Then you’re unfortunate. What right have I to be happy with you or any man, when Angelo lies in his grave and I put him there?’

‘But you were innocent,’ he said passionately.

‘How can I be? But for me he’d be alive. That’s the plain truth of it and all the rest is talk. You were right to hate me.’

‘I never hated you,’ he said in a low voice.

She smiled then. She actually smiled.

‘You must have forgotten a great deal. You hunted me down, hating me. You lured me into a trap, hating me. You watched me struggle, hating me. You took me to bed, hating me. You did something that you made me think was love-making, but actually you were studying me all the time, always in control, watching to see if the moment had come to destroy me.’

‘No!’ he said violently. ‘That’s how it was meant to be, not how it was. You were different from everything I’d expected-I tried not to see it, but it was too much for me. You were too much for me. If you hadn’t found out when you did, I was going to tell you everything.’

‘That’s a delusion. There’s no way you could ever have told me.’

‘It would have been hard. That’s why I was putting it off, but I’d have found a way because I knew we had to be together.’

‘Well, we are together,’ she said, sighing.

Together? They stood staring at each other, while the distance between them stretched wide.

He looked again at the letter.

‘“Try to forgive me,”’ he read aloud. ‘“Forgive…forgive…”’

He came closer. ‘Can you never forgive? We both said things that were cruel and harsh, but surely you know now that I meant none of them?’

‘They were true anyway.’ She sighed.

‘Angelo loved you. He wouldn’t want you to suffer like this for something you couldn’t help.’

‘Don’t,’ she whispered, covering her eyes. ‘Don’t talk to me about him, I can’t bear it. I thought I’d learned to live with the worst, but I didn’t know what the worst was. I never knew I’d killed him, but I should have guessed it was something like that.’

‘You didn’t kill him,’ Vincente raged.

‘As good as. I drove him to it. I killed him. In here-’ she pounded her chest with a clenched fist ‘-I know I killed him, and nothing’s ever going to change that.’

A violent sob broke from her, making him go to her. At that moment he would have done anything to ease her pain. But he was the last man who could help her. He touched her but she immediately dried her tears.

‘You know-’ she sighed ‘-if I seem to hate you, it’s mostly because I hate myself.’

‘What are we going to do?’ he said quietly.

‘I don’t know,’ she said sadly. ‘I’m not sure that there’s anything to be done.’

Summer moved on through the heat of August and September. Elise’s health was good and, despite her increasing size, she coped with the high temperatures well.

Not that everything was easy. There was one terrible evening when Mamma insisted on the three of them celebrating Angelo’s birthday. He would have been twenty-nine.

The evening was an endurance test. Mamma had looked at every photograph she possessed of him. Elise went through them nervously, dreading to find one that chanced to show herself.

In this, at least, she was lucky. There was nothing to give away her secret. She gazed at the face of her young love, looking back at her with an endless smile.

Then she looked up at Vincente, and found him regarding her with desperation.

That night he slipped into her room without knocking, as he usually did.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said at once. ‘I had no idea that was going to happen.’

‘I suppose it’s because I was here. She said she wanted to “introduce me” to Angelo. Never mind, it’s over now, and it gave her a little happiness.’

He said abruptly, ‘You’re rather wonderful, d’you know that?’

She turned away so that he wouldn’t see how affected she was by something in his voice that she’d never heard before. Passion, laughter, these she was used to, but the note of gentle admiration she heard now caught her off guard.

‘I’d like to go to sleep now,’ she said. ‘Goodnight.’

‘Goodnight.’ He hesitated. ‘Thank you for everything.’

He kissed her cheek and was gone.

Elise lay down, trying to clear her mind of the smiling images of Angelo that she’d seen that day. But he pursued her even in sleep, and she awoke to find herself crying aloud.

‘Hush,’ said Vincente’s voice close by in the darkness. ‘It’s all right.’

She found that she was sobbing and could barely speak. ‘What happened?’

‘You were calling out in your sleep. I heard you and I thought I’d better come in. You might have called his name aloud.’

So he’d known who was in her dreams, she thought.

‘Does he trouble you very much?’ Vincente asked quietly.

‘I feel guilty about him all the time.’

He said nothing. Her answer didn’t tell him what he really wanted to know. Did she dream of Angelo with longing? Was he, after all that had happened, still her one true love?

He waited for her to say more, but after a while he felt her head grow heavy against his shoulder and her breathing become slower. She had fallen asleep again.

He kissed the top of her head.

‘It’s all right,’ he said again, tightening his arms. ‘I’m here.’

After a while he laid her gently down and pulled the sheet up over her. Taking care not to awaken her, he left the room noiselessly, returned to his own room and took out his cellphone.

‘Razzini?’ he said softly. ‘Yes, I know it’s late. Wake up, man.’

Razzini’s voice rasped down the line. ‘Signore Farnese? I never expected to hear from you again. The last time we met you were ready to kill me.’

‘I still might, but first I have a job for you. And it’s urgent, so drop everything else.’

‘That won’t be easy-’

‘Yes, it will, for the price I’ll pay. I want your undivided attention. You’ll work on this, day and night, until you can tell me what I want to know.’

‘Sounds important.’

‘It is important,’ Vincente said sombrely. ‘It’s a matter of life and death.’

Paradoxically, as she grew larger Elise also felt stronger. As Christmas neared and Vincente embarked on a spate of business entertaining, she flowered, taking a full part in the preparations.

After one particularly lively evening he called at her room to say goodnight.

‘My friends admire you very much,’ he said. ‘You couldn’t have done better. Are you all right?’

‘Yes, just a little tired.’ She patted her stomach. ‘I shall be glad when this is over. He’s very lively.’

‘Or she.’

‘No, definitely a he. From the way he’s kicking, this is a footballer.’

‘Perhaps I should stay in case something happens.’

‘Nothing will happen for another two months. I’m fine.’

‘Babies have been known to come early,’ he persisted.

She laughed. ‘If those men out there could see you now! They’re all afraid of you.’

‘And I’d like them to go on being afraid of me.’

‘Then I won’t tell them what a fusspot you can be.’

‘They wouldn’t believe you,’ he said simply. ‘Nobody but you has ever seen me like this. Nobody else ever will.’

‘Silence, I swear it. Look, here’s the buzzer you gave me. If anything happens I’ll press it and wake you.’

‘Be sure you do.’

As she bid him goodnight her smile held a touch of fondness. These days a blessed peace had crept over her, so that it was possible to relax and detach herself from sadness, even to feel content with him. She knew he sometimes slipped into her room at night to hold her when the bad dreams came, but he didn’t stay long, and they never spoke of it by day.

It was February when the birth began. Vincente took her to the hospital and stood back, waiting as they settled Elise in the side ward. She turned her head, needing to keep him in sight all the time. A pain went through her.

‘The contractions are coming fast,’ somebody said. ‘This won’t take long.’

The pain was sharp, which had the strange effect of sharpening her mind. Through a brilliant light she seemed to see him standing there, just like before, when she’d first come to this hospital and nearly lost their child. She’d known then that he wouldn’t come to her unless she asked, and nothing would have made her ask.

But it was different now. Her hand went out to him, seeking, inviting, imploring. He was there at once, his grip giving her the message she longed for.

‘Don’t leave me,’ she begged.

‘Never,’ he whispered.

In the same moment the pain came again, making her tighten her fingers on his so that he actually winced.

‘Sorry,’ she gasped.

‘It’s fine if it makes you feel better. Can’t I take some of it away from you?’

She was about to tell him that pain didn’t work like that but, mysteriously, it did, for there was comfort to be found in his supporting clasp, and even more in his eyes, watching her with fond anxiety.

The contractions came again and again, growing more frequent as the moment neared. Even so, Vincente demanded frantically of the doctor, ‘Can’t you hurry it up?’ which made everyone laugh, including Elise.

‘I think you should leave this to me,’ she suggested.

‘No, we’re in it together,’ he said seriously.

‘Then get ready,’ she screamed suddenly. And the next moment the baby was there.

‘It’s a girl,’ said the doctor.

‘Is she all right?’ Elise asked urgently.

His reply was drowned out by a furious yell from the mite in his hands.

‘Fit and healthy,’ he said, raising his voice in order to be heard.

They cleaned the baby and wrapped her in a shawl, but it was Vincente who took her and carried her to the bed, to lay her in her mother’s arms. Elise held her in silence, awed that this tiny scrap had drawn its life from the two of them, months ago when they had known the beginning of love, before it had been beaten down, almost to nothing.

Almost.

A nurse wheeled in a cot and settled her in it. Vincente went to look down at the baby.

‘Would you have preferred a son?’ she asked.

He shook his head, not taking his eyes from the child. ‘No, this is better,’ he said. A sudden smile breaking over his face, he looked down at his daughter. ‘She smiled at me.’

‘That’s impossible; she’s only a few minutes old. They don’t smile for weeks.’

‘My daughter isn’t like other children,’ he said firmly. ‘She can do anything.’

Elise watched him tenderly, loving him for what she could tell was happening. Already she could see how this birth could help to heal old wounds.

Yet the ghost was still there. She’d sensed it when Vincente had said, ‘This is better.’ He’d meant it was better not to have a son since Mamma had set her heart on calling him Angelo. And Elise had understood him at once.

While that was true there would never be the true peace between them that both of them wanted.

She gave a soft sigh as weariness closed in. It wouldn’t have surprised her if, absorbed in the miracle in the cot, Vincente had failed to hear her. But he was beside her at once, laying his lips gently on her forehead.

‘Thank you,’ he murmured as she slid into sleep. ‘Thank you for everything-my love.’