Kitabı oku: «Hot Nights with...the Italian», sayfa 6

She stared rigidly past him. ‘You said last night that you wanted me not to—not to dread being with you, but that’s not going to happen. It—can’t. Because, however long you wait, I’m never going to be—ready in the way you wish.’

He was utterly still, she realised, and completely silent. In fact, she could have been addressing a statue. A man of bronze.

Oh, God, she thought. This would have been so much less complicated over dinner. And she wasn’t explaining it all in the way she’d rehearsed down at the pool either. In fact, she seemed to be saying all kinds of things she hadn’t intended. But she’d started, and she had to go stumbling on. She had no choice now.

‘You bought me for a purpose.’ Her voice quivered a little. ‘So you’re entitled to use me—in that way. I—I realise that, and I accepted it when I agreed to marry you. Truly I did. I also accept that you were trying to be kind when you said you’d be patient and—and wait in order to make … sex with you … easier for me. Except, it hasn’t worked. Because waiting has just made everything a hundred times worse. It’s like this huge black cloud hanging over me—a sentence that’s been passed but not carried out.’

She swallowed. ‘It’s been this way ever since we became engaged, and I can’t bear it any longer. So I’d prefer it—over and done with, and as soon as possible.’

She slid a glance at him, and for a brief instant she had the strangest impression that it wasn’t only the corner of his eye but his entire face that was bruised.

Some trick of the light, she thought, her throat closing as she hurried on with a kind of desperation.

‘So I need to tell you that it’s all right—for you to come to my room tonight. I’ll do whatever you want, and—I—I promise that I won’t fight you this time.’ And stopped, at last, with a little nervous gasp.

The silence and stillness remained, but the quality of it seemed to have changed in some subtle way she did not understand.

But all the same it worried her, and she needed it to be broken. To obtain some reaction from him.

She drew a breath. ‘Perhaps I haven’t explained properly …’

‘Al contrario, you have been more than clear, signora.’ His voice reached her at last, cool and level. ‘Even eloquent. My congratulations. I am only sorry that my attempt at behaving towards you with consideration has failed so badly. Forgive me, please, and believe I did not intend to cause you stress by delaying the consummation of our marriage. However, that can soon be put right. And we do not have to wait until tonight.’

Two long strides brought him to her. He picked her up in his arms and carried her towards the open French windows of the salotto.

She said, in a voice she did not recognise. ‘Renzo—what are you doing?’ She began to struggle. ‘Put me down—do you hear? Put me down at once.’

‘I intend to.’ He crossed the room to the empty fireplace, setting her down on the enormous fur rug that fronted it and kneeling over her. He said softly, ‘You said you would not fight me, Marisa. I recommend that you keep your promise.’

She looked up at him—at the livid bruising and the hard set of his mouth. At the cold purpose in his eyes.

‘Oh, God, no.’ Her voice cracked. ‘Not like this—please.’

‘Do not distress yourself.’ His voice was harsh. ‘Your ordeal will be brief—far more so than it would have been tonight. And that is my promise to you.’

He reached down almost negligently, stripping her of the bottom half of her bikini and tossing it aside, before unzipping his shorts.

He did not hold her down, nor use any kind of force. Shocked as she was, she could recognise that. But then he did not have to, she thought numbly, because she’d told him that she wouldn’t resist.

And he was, quite literally, taking her at her word.

Nor did he attempt to kiss her. And the hand that parted her thighs was brisk rather than caressing.

She tried to say no again, because every untried female instinct she possessed was screaming that it should not be like this.

That, whatever she’d said, this wasn’t what she’d intended. That she’d been nervous and muddled it all. And somehow she had to let him know this, and ask him, in spite of everything, to be kind.

But no sound came from her dry, paralysed throat, and anyway it was all too late—because Renzo was already guiding himself slowly into her, pausing to give her bewildered face a swift glance, then taking total possession of her stunned body with one long, controlled thrust.

Arching himself above her, his weight on his arms, his clenched fists buried in the softness of the rug on either side of her, he began to move, strongly and rhythmically.

Marisa had braced herself instinctively against the onset of a pain she’d imagined would be inevitable, even if she’d been taken with any kind of tenderness.

But if there’d been any discomfort it had been so slight and so fleeting that she’d barely registered the fact.

It was the astonishing sensation of his body sheathed in hers that was totally controlling her awareness. The amazing reality of all that potent, silken hardness, driving ever more deeply into her aroused and yielding heat, slowly at first, then much faster, that was sending her mind suddenly into free fall. Alerting her to possibilities she had not known existed. Offering her something almost akin to—hope.

And then, with equal suddenness, it was over. She heard Renzo cry out hoarsely, almost achingly, and felt his body shuddering into hers in one scalding spasm after another.

For what seemed an eternity he remained poised above her, his breathing ragged as he fought to regain his control. Then he lifted himself out of her, away from her, dragging his clothing back into place with frankly unsteady hands before getting to his feet and looking down at her, his dark face expressionless.

‘So, signora.’ His voice was quiet, almost courteous. ‘You have nothing more to fear. Our distasteful duty has at last been done, and I trust without too much inconvenience to you.’

He paused, adding more harshly, ‘Let us also hope that it has achieved its purpose, and that you are never forced to suffer my attentions again. And that I am not made to endure any further outrage to my own feelings.’

He walked to the door without sparing her one backward glance. Leaving her where she was lying, shaken, but in some strange way feeling almost—bereft without him.

And at that moment, when it was so very much too late, she heard herself whisper his name.

CHAPTER SIX

EVEN now Marisa could remember with total clarity that she hadn’t wanted to move.

That it had seemed somehow so much easier to remain where she was, like a small animal cowering in long grass, shivering with resentment, shame and—yes—misery too, than to pull herself together and restore some kind of basic decency to her appearance as she tried to come to terms with what had just happened.

Eventually the fear of being found by one of the staff had forced her to struggle back into her bikini briefs and, huddling her crumpled shirt defensively around her, make her way to her room.

There, she’d stripped completely, before standing under a shower that had been almost too hot to be bearable. As if that could in any way erase the events of the past half-hour.

How could he? she’d asked herself wretchedly as the water had pounded its way over her body. Oh, God, how could he treat me like that—as if I had no feelings—as if I hardly existed for him?

Well, I know the answer to that now, Marisa thought, turning over in her search for a cool spot on her pillow. If I’m honest, I probably knew it then too, but couldn’t let myself admit it.

It happened because that’s what I asked for. Because I added insult to the injury I’d already inflicted by telling him to his face that he didn’t matter. That sex with him would only ever be a ‘distasteful duty’—the words he threw at me afterwards.

She’d sensed the anger in him, like a damped-down fire that could rage out of control at any moment, in the way he’d barely touched her. In the way that the lovemaking he’d offered her only moments before had been transformed into a brief, soulless act accomplished with stark and icy efficiency. And perhaps most of all in his subsequent dismissal of her before he walked away.

Yet, anger had not made him brutal, she reflected broodingly. He had not behaved well, perhaps. After all, she had still been his new bride, and a virgin, but he had not forced her—merely used her confused and unwilling assent against her. And he most certainly hadn’t hurt her.

Or not physically, at least.

Which made it difficult to blame or hate him as much as she wanted to do, she realised, aggrieved.

An important stone that would for ever be missing from the wall of indifference she’d deliberately constructed between them.

And it was a wall that she was determined to maintain at all costs, Marisa told herself, now that Renzo had so unexpectedly come back into her life, it seemed with every intention of remaining there, totally regardless of her own wishes.

Which surely constituted just cause for resentment, however you looked at it?

Suddenly restive, she pushed the coverlet aside and got out of bed, moving soundlessly to the small easy chair by the window.

If ever she’d needed a good night’s sleep to ensure that she was fresh, with all her wits about her for the morning, it was now. And it just wasn’t going to happen—thanks to the man occupying her living room sofa and the memories his arrival had forced back into her consciousness.

Memories of leaning slumped against the shower’s tiled wall, a hand pressed against her abdomen as she realised it would be nearly three weeks before she knew for certain whether Renzo’s ‘purpose’, as he’d so bleakly expressed it, had been achieved, and his child was growing in her body.

Of trying desperately to formulate some credible excuse to avoid having to face him at dinner in a few hours’ time—or ever again, for that matter—and knowing there was none. She would have to pretend that she didn’t care how he’d treated her. That she’d neither anticipated nor wanted anything more from him, and was simply thankful that the matter had been dealt with and need not be referred to again.

Of eventually dressing in a pretty swirl of turquoise silk—not white, because it was no longer appropriate, and not black because it might suggest she was in some kind of mourning—and joining him with an assumption of calmness in the salotto.

Of accepting his coolly civil offer of a drink with equal politeness, realising he had no more wish to speak of the afternoon’s events than she did. And then of sitting opposite him in silence, during an interminable meal.

A pattern, she had soon discovered, that would be repeated each evening.

Not that he’d planned to spend time with her during the day either, as she had found out when she joined him for breakfast the following morning, at his request, conveyed by Daniella.

‘This is a very beautiful part of the world, Marisa, and you will no doubt wish to go sightseeing—to explore Amalfi itself, of course, and then discover the delights of Ravello and Positano.’

Was he offering to escort her? she wondered in sudden alarm, her lips already parting to deny, mendaciously, that she had any such ambition. To say she was quite content to stay within the precincts of the villa while he went off to Ravello, or wherever, and stayed there.

But before she could speak, he added smoothly, ‘I have therefore arranged to have a car placed at your disposal. The driver’s name is Paolo. He is a cousin of Evangelina and completely reliable. He will make himself available each day to drive you anywhere you want to go.’

So I don’t have to …

The unspoken words seemed to hover in the air between them.

‘I see.’ She should have been dancing with relief. Instead, she felt oddly—blank. She hesitated. ‘That’s—very kind of you.’

He shrugged. ‘It’s nothing.’

And that she could believe, she thought bleakly. It was his way of dealing with an awkward and disagreeable situation—by simply ridding himself of the source of annoyance.

After all, he’d done it not that long ago—with Alan.

Renzo paused too. He went on more slowly, ‘I have also ordered a box of books to be delivered here for you—a selection from the bestseller lists in Britain and America. I recall you used to like thrillers, but perhaps your tastes have changed?’

Marisa found she was biting her lip—hard.

‘No,’ she said. ‘Not really. And I’m very grateful.’ Adding stiffly, ‘Grazie.’

‘Prego.’ His mouth curled slightly. ‘After all, mia bella, I would not wish you to be bored.’

A comment, she thought stonily, that removed any further need for appreciation on her part.

For the next few days it suited her to play the tourist—if only because it got her away from the villa and Renzo’s chillingly aloof courtesy. To her endless embarrassment he continued to treat her with quite astonishing generosity, and as a result she found herself in possession of more money in cash than she’d ever dreamed of in her life, plus a selection of credit cards with no apparent upper limit.

She’d often wondered what it might be like to have access to unrestricted spending, only to find there was very little she actually wanted to buy.

Maybe I’m not the type to shop till I drop, she thought, sighing. What a waste.

But she did make one important purchase. In Positano she bought herself three maillots—one in black, another in a deep olive-green, and the third in dark red—to wear for her solitary late-afternoon swim, and to replace the bikinis she never wanted to see again, let alone wear.

In Amalfi she visited an outlet selling the handmade paper for which the region was famous, and dutifully bought some to send back to England to Julia and Harry. She also sent her cousin a postcard, with some deliberately neutral comments on the weather and scenery. After all, she thought wryly, she could hardly write Having a wonderful time.

She was particularly enchanted by Ravello, its narrow streets seemingly caught in a medieval time warp, and thought wistfully how much she would like to attend one of the open-air concerts held in the moonlit splendour of the gardens at the Villa Rufulo. But she acknowledged with a sigh, it was hardly the kind of event she could attend alone, without inviting even more speculation than already existed.

Paolo was a pleasant, middle-aged man who spoke good English and was eager to guide her round his amazing native landscape and share his extensive knowledge of its history. But Marisa was conscious that, like the staff at the villa, he was bemused at this bride who seemed never to be in her husband’s company, and she was growing tired of being asked if the signore was quite well.

Eventually she decided she had visited enough churches, admired enough Renaissance artefacts, and gaped at sufficient pictures. Also, she felt disinclined to give any more assurances about Renzo’s health—especially as the bruise on his eye was fading at last.

Her main danger was in eating far too many of the delicious almond and lemon cakes served in the cafés in Amalfi’s Piazza del Duomo, as she sat at a table in the sunlight and watched the crowds as they milled about in the ancient square.

So many families strolling with children. So very many couples, too, meeting with smiling eyes, a touch of hands, an embrace. No one, she thought, had ever greeted her like that, as if she was their whole world. Not even Alan. But their relationship hadn’t had a chance, being over almost as soon as it had begun.

And then, in her mind, she saw a sudden image of Renzo, standing at the altar only a week before, as if transfixed, an expression that was almost wonder on his dark face as she walked towards him.

And what on earth had made her think of that? she thought, startled, as she finished her coffee and signalled for the bill.

Not that it meant anything—except that the sight of her had probably brought it home to him that his head was now firmly in the noose.

All the same, the buzz of talk and laughter in the air around her only served to emphasise her own sense of isolation.

She thought, with a pang, I have no one. Unless, of course … And her hand strayed almost unconsciously to the flatness of her stomach.

The next morning, when Evangelina enquired at what hour the signora would require Paolo to call for her, Marisa said politely that she did not wish to do any more sightseeing for a while.

‘Ah.’ Something like hope dawned in the plump face. ‘No doubt you will be joining the signore by the pool?’

‘No,’ Marisa returned coolly. ‘I thought I would go up to the village for a stroll.’

‘The village is small,’ said Evangelina. ‘It has little to see, signora. Better to stay here and relax.’ She gave a winning smile. ‘Is quiet by the pool. No disturb there.’

In other words, Marisa thought, caught between annoyance and a kind of reluctant amusement, no one would go blundering down there in case the signore decided to take full advantage of his wife’s company by enjoying his marital rights in such secluded and romantic surroundings.

She shrugged. ‘I’ll swim later, as usual,’ she said casually. ‘After I’ve been for my walk.’ And she turned away, pretending not to notice the housekeeper’s disappointment.

Fifteen minutes later, trim in a pair of white cut-offs topped by a silky russet tee shirt, with her pretty straw bag slung across her shoulder, Marisa passed through Villa Santa Caterina’s wide gateway and set off up the hill.

Evangelina, she soon discovered, had been perfectly correct in her assessment. The village was small, and no tourist trap, its main street lined with houses shuttered against the morning sun, interspersed with a few shops providing life’s practicalities, among them a café with two tables outside under an awning.

Maybe on the way back she’d stop there for a while and have a cold drink. Enjoy the shade. Read some of the book she’d brought with her. Anything to delay the moment when she would have to return to Villa Santa Caterina and the probability of Evangelina’s further attempts to throw her into Renzo’s arms.

At the same time she became aware that every few yards, between the houses and their neat gardens, she could catch a glimpse of the sparkling azure that was the sea.

The view from the villa garden was spectacular enough, she thought, but up here it would be magical, and in her bag she’d also brought the small sketching block and pencils that she’d acquired on yesterday’s trip to Amalfi.

She was standing, craning her neck at one point, when she realised the lady of the house in question had emerged and was watching her.

Marisa stepped back, flushing. ‘Perdono,’ she apologised awkwardly. ‘I was looking at the view—il bel mare,’ she added for good measure.

Immediately the other’s face broke into a beaming smile. ‘Si—si,’ she nodded vigorously. She marched over to Marisa and took her arm, propelling her up the village street while chattering at a great and largely incomprehensible rate—apart from the words ‘una vista fantastica’, which pretty much explained themselves.

At the end of the street the houses stopped and a high wall began, which effectively blocked everything. Marisa’s self-appointed guide halted, pointing at it.

‘Casa Adriana,’ she announced. ‘Che bella vista.’ She kissed her fingertips as she urged Marisa forward, adding with a gusty sigh, ‘Che tragedia.’

A fantastic view, I can handle, Marisa thought as she moved off obediently. But do I really need a tragedy to go with it?

However, a glance over her shoulder showed that her new friend was still watching and smiling, so she gave a slight wave in return and trudged on.

As she got closer she saw that the wall’s white paintwork was dingy and peeling, and that the actual structure was crumbling in places, indicating that some serious attention was needed.

It also seemed to go on for ever, but eventually she realised she was approaching a narrow, rusting wrought-iron gate, and that this was standing ajar in a kind of mute invitation.

Beyond it, a weed-infested gravel path wound its way between a mass of rioting bushes and shrubs, and at its end, beckoning like a siren, was the glitter of blue that announced the promised view.

The breath caught in Marisa’s throat, and she pushed the gate wider so that she could walk through. She’d expected an outraged squeal from the ancient metal hinges, but there wasn’t a sound. Someone, she saw, had clearly been busy with an oil can.

This is what happens in late night thrillers on television, she told herself. And I’m always the one with her hands over her face, screaming Don’t do it! So it will serve me right if that gate swings shut behind me and traps me in here with some nameless horror lurking in the undergrowth.

But the gate, fortunately, displayed no desire to move, and the nameless horror probably had business elsewhere, so she walked briskly forward, avoiding the overhanging shrubs and bushes with their pollen-heavy blossoms that tried to impede her way.

There was a scent of jasmine in the air, and there were roses too, crowding everywhere in a rampant glory of pink, white and yellow. Marisa was no expert—her parents’ garden had been little more than a grass patch, while Julia had opted for a courtyard with designer tubs—but from her vacations in Tuscany she recognised oleanders mingling with masses of asters, pelargoniums, and clumps of tall graceful daisies, all wildly out of control.

Halfway down, the path forked abruptly to the right, and there, half-eclipsed by the bougainvillaea climbing all over it, was all that remained of a once pretty house. Its walls were still standing, but even from a distance Marisa could see that many of the roof tiles were missing, and that behind the screen of pink and purple flowers shutters were hanging loose from broken windows.

But there’d been attempts elsewhere to restore order. The grass had been cut in places, and over-intrusive branches cut down and stacked, presumably for burning.

In the centre of one cleared patch stood a fountain, where a naked nymph on tiptoe sadly tilted an urn which had not flowed with water for a very long time.

And straight ahead, at the end of the path, a lemon tree heavy with fruit stood like a sentinel, watching by the low wall that overlooked the bay.

Rather too low a wall, Marisa thought, when she took a wary peep over its edge and discovered a stomach-churning drop down the sheer and rocky cliff to the tumbling sea far below.

She stepped back hastily, and found herself colliding with an ancient wooden seat, which had been placed at a safe distance in the shade of the tree, suggesting that the garden’s owner might not have had much of a head for heights either.

That was probably the tragedy that her friend in the village had mentioned, she thought. An inadvertent stumble after too much limoncello by some unlucky soul, and a headlong dive into eternity.

She seated herself gingerly, wondering if the bench was still capable of bearing even her slight weight, but there was no imminent sign of collapse, so she allowed herself to lean back and take her first proper look at the panorama laid out in front of her.

One glance told her that ‘fantastic’ was indeed the word, and she silently blessed the woman who’d sent her here.

Over to her left she could see the cream, gold and terracotta of Amalfi town, looking as if it had grown like some sprawling rock plant out of the tall cliffs that sheltered it. The towering stone facades themselves gleamed like silver and amethyst in the morning sun under a dark green canopy of cypresses. And below the town the deep cerulean sea turned to jade and turquoise edged with foam as it spilled itself endlessly on the shingle shore.

She could even see the rooftop swimming pools of the hotels overlooking the port, and the sturdy outline of the medieval watchtower, which no longer scanned the horizon for pirates or enemies from neighbouring city states, but served food in its elegant restaurant instead. Beyond it lay Ravello, and if she turned to glance the other way she could see the dizzying tumble of Positano, and in the far distance a smudge that might even be Capri.

The horizon was barely visible, sky and sea merging seamlessly in an azure blur.

It was also very quiet. The sound of traffic along the ribbon of coast road was barely audible at this distance, and for the first time in weeks Marisa felt the tension within her—like the heaviness of unshed tears—beginning to ease, and something like peace take its place.

So good, she thought. So good to be truly alone and leave behind the pressure of other people’s expectations. To be free of the necessity of changing into yet another charming and expensive dress just to make occasional and stilted conversation across a dinner table with a young man whose smile never reached his eyes.

To be, just for a while, Marisa Brendon again and nothing more, with no apology for a marriage to haunt her.

She looked down at her hand, then slowly slid off her wedding ring, and buried it deep in her pocket.

There, she thought. Now I can pretend that I’m simply here on vacation, with my whole life ahead of me, free to enjoy no one’s company but my own.

Only to hear from behind her a small, mild cough which announced that she was not alone after all. That someone else was there, sharing her supposed solitude.

Startled, she jumped to her feet and turned, to find herself confronted by a small woman with rimless glasses and wisps of grey hair escaping from under a floppy linen sun hat. Her khaki trousers and shirt were smeared with earth and green stains, and she carried a small pair of pruning shears in one hand and a flat wicker basket full of trimmings in the other.

Oh, God, Marisa thought, embarrassed colour flooding her face. That house can’t be as derelict as I thought.

Aloud, she said, in halting and woefully incorrect Italian, ‘Please forgive me. I was not told that anyone lived here. I will leave at once.’

The newcomer’s brows lifted. ‘Another Englishwoman,’ said a gentle voice. ‘How very nice. And I’m afraid we’re both trespassers, my dear. I also came here one day to look at the view, but I saw a potentially beautiful space going to rack and ruin and I couldn’t resist the challenge. No one has ever objected,’ she added. ‘Probably because they think I’m mad to try.’

Her smile was kind. ‘So please don’t run away on my account. And I’m sorry if I startled you. You were a shock to me too, appearing so quietly. For a moment I thought Adriana had returned, and then I realised you were totally twenty-first century. Quite a relief, I have to say.’

She tugged off her thick gardening gloves and held out her hand. ‘I’m Dorothy Morton.’

‘Marisa Brendon.’ Well, I’ve done it now, Marisa thought as she returned the smile and the handshake. Crossed my own small Rubicon back to being single again.

‘Marisa,’ the older woman repeated thoughtfully. ‘Such a charming name. And Italian too, I believe?’

‘After my late godmother.’

‘Ah,’ said Mrs Morton. ‘And did she live locally? Are you familiar with the area?’

Marisa shook her head. ‘No, this is my first visit.’ And almost certainly my last. ‘I’m staying with—some people.’

‘My husband and I were fortunate enough to be able to retire here.’ Mrs Morton looked out at the bay with an expression of utter contentment. ‘We have an apartment nearby, but it only has a balcony, and I do miss my gardening. So I come here most days and do what I can.’ She sighed. ‘But as you see, it’s an uphill struggle.’

‘It must be tiring too.’ Marisa gestured towards the bench. ‘Shall we sit down—if you have time?’

‘My time is very much my own.’ Mrs Morton took a seat at the other end of the bench. ‘I have a most understanding husband.’

‘That’s—lovely for you.’ Marisa was suddenly conscious of the ring buried in her pocket. She added hurriedly, ‘But why has the garden been allowed to get into such a state?’ She glanced around her. ‘Doesn’t the owner—this Adriana—care?’

‘I think she would care very much if she was alive to see it, but she died a long time ago—over fifty years, I gather—and ownership of the property is no longer established.’

‘She didn’t have an heir?’ Marisa asked with a certain constraint. Another topic, she thought, she’d have preferred to avoid.

‘She and her husband were still newlyweds,’ Mrs Morton explained. ‘According to the local stories they made wills leaving everything to each other. And when he pre-deceased her she refused to make another.’

She shrugged. ‘Relatives on both sides have made legal claims to the estate over the years, but I suspect that most of them have died too by now, so the whole thing is in abeyance.’

‘Oh.’ Marisa drew a deep breath. ‘So that’s the tragedy. This wonderful place just left to—moulder away.’ She shook her head. ‘But why on earth didn’t this Adriana change her will?’

‘Oh, that’s quite simple,’ Mrs Morton said quietly. ‘You see, she never actually believed that her husband was dead.’

Marisa frowned. ‘But surely there must have been a death certificate at some point?’ she objected.

‘Under normal circumstances,’ the other woman said. ‘But sadly there was no real proof of death. Filippo Barzoni was sailing back from Ischia—he was a keen and experienced sailor, and had made the trip many times before—when a sudden violent squall blew up. Neither he nor his boat were ever seen again.

‘Some wreckage was washed up near Sorrento, but it was considered inconclusive as the storm had produced other casualties. However, no one but his widow believed that Filippo could possibly have survived. They were passionately in love, you see, and Adriana always claimed she would know, in her heart, if her husband were no longer alive. She felt most strongly that he was still with her, and that one day he would return.’