A Family For Keeps

Then he moved quickly, pulling back one of the long curtains that hung beside the window, revealing her, pressed against the wall, eyes wide with dread and hostility.

'Dio Mio!' he exclaimed. 'A ghost.'

He put out his hand and would have laid it on her shoulder, but she flinched away.

'Don't touch me,' she said hoarsely in English.

His hand fell at once.

'I'm sorry,' he replied, also in English. 'Don't be afraid of me. Why are you hiding?'

'I'm-not-hiding,' she said with an effort, knowing she sounded crazy. 'I just-didn't know who you were.'

'My name is Vincenzo, a friend of Piero's. I was here last night but you were asleep.'

'He told me about you,' she said jerkily, 'but I wasn't sure-'

'I'm sorry if I startled you.'

He was talking gently, soothing her as he would have done a wild animal, and gradually she felt her irrational fear subside.

'I heard you coming,' she said, 'and-' A fit of coughing drowned the rest.

'Come into the warm,' Vincenzo said, beckoning her to the stove.

When she still hesitated he took hold of her hands. His own hands were warm and powerful, and they drew her forward irresistibly.

He eased her down onto the sofa, but instead of releasing her he slid his hands up her arms and grasped her, not roughly but with a strength that felt like protection.

'Piero says your name is Julia.'

She hesitated for a split second. 'Yes, that's right. Julia.'

'Why are you trembling?' he asked. 'It can't be that bad.'

Something in those words broke her control and she shuddered violently.

'It is that bad,' she said, in a hoarse voice. 'Everything is that bad. It always will be. It's like a maze. I keep thinking that there must be a way out, but there isn't. Not after all this time. It's too late, I know it's too late, and if I had any sense I'd go away and forget, but I can't forget.'

'Julia.' He gave her a little shake. 'Julia.'

She didn't hear him. She was beyond anything he could say or do to reach her. Words poured out of her unstoppably, while tears slid down her face.

'You can't get rid of ghosts,' she wept, 'just by telling them to go, because they're everywhere, before you and behind you and most of all inside you.'

'Yes, I know,' he murmured grimly, but she rushed on, unheeding.

'I have to do it. I can't stop and I won't, and I can't help who gets hurt, don't you see that?'

'I'm afraid the person who gets hurt will be you,' he said.

For answer she grasped him back, digging her fingers into him painfully.

'It doesn't matter,' she said. 'Nobody can hurt me any more. When you've reached your limit, you're safe, so I don't have to worry, and there's nothing to stop me doing what I have to.'

Abruptly she released him and buried her face in her hands as the feverish energy that had briefly sustained her drained away, leaving her weak and shaking.

For a moment Vincenzo was nonplussed. Then he put his arms right around her and held her in a tight clasp.

He didn't try to speak, knowing that there was nothing to say, but his grip was rough and fierce, silently telling her she was not alone.

After a long time he felt her relax, although even that had a strained quality, as though she had forced it to happen.

'I'm all right,' she said in a muffled voice.

He relaxed his grip and drew back slightly. 'Are you sure?'

'I'm all right,' she insisted fiercely. 'I'm all right, I'm all right.'

'I just want to help you.'

'I don't need anyone's help!'

Instantly he got to his feet and stepped back.

'I'm sorry,' she said, 'I didn't mean to be rude, it's just-'

'You don't have to explain. I know how it is.'

She looked up at him, and in the dim light he had an impression of a pale face, surrounded by long fair hair, like one of the other-worldly creatures that populated the pictures that had once filled this palace. He had grown up with the ghostly faces, accepting them as a normal part of his world. It startled him to meet one in reality.

'It's like that for you too?' she asked.

After a moment's pause he said, 'For everyone in one way or another. Some less-some more.'

He said the last words hoping she would tell him about herself, but he could see her defences being hastily reassembled. The moment was already slipping away, and when he heard the sound of Piero approaching he knew it had gone.

CHAPTER TWO

Piero pushed open the door, his face brightening when he saw the visitor.

'Ciao,' Vincenzo said, clapping him on the shoulder.

'Ciao,' Piero said, looking around. 'Ah, you two have met.'

'Yes, I'm afraid I gave the signorina a fright.'

'Why so formal? This isn't a signorina. It's Julia.'

'Or are you perhaps a signora?' Vincenzo queried.'You understand, a signora is-?'

'Yes, thank you, I speak Italian,' she said edgily. 'A signora is a married woman. I'm asignorina.'

She wasn't sure why she insisted on parading her knowledge of Italian at that moment, unless it was pride. Vincenzo's understanding had made her defensive.

'So you speak my language,' Vincenzo said. 'I congratulate you. So often the English won't trouble to learn other languages. Do you speak it well?'

'I'm not sure. I haven't used it for a while. I'm out of practice. I can brush up on it here.'

'Not as easily as you think. In Venice we speak Venetian.'

After that he dived into the bags he'd brought, seeming to forget her, which was a relief. She took the chance to wander away to the window and stand with her back to them, watching the canal, but not seeing it.

Instead she saw Vincenzo in her mind's eye, trying to understand the darkness she sensed, in his looks and in the man himself. Everything about him was dark, from his black hair to his deep brown eyes. Even his wide mouth, with its tendency to quirk wryly, suggested that he was not really amused. Or, if so, that the humour was bleak and fit only for the gallows.

A man whose inner world was as grim and haunted as her own.

But still she tried to thrust him from her mind. He was dangerous because he saw too much, tricking her into blurting out thoughts that had been rioting in her head, but which she'd kept rigidly repressed.

I have to do it-I can't help who gets hurt.

Say nothing. Never let them suspect what you're planning. Smile, hate, and protect your secrets.

That was how she had lived.

And in one moment he had triggered an avalanche, luring her into a dangerous admission.

Nobody can hurt me any more-so there's nothing to stop me doing what I have to.

She looked around, and saw to her relief that Vincenzo had gone. She hadn't heard him leave.

Piero was beaming at her, waving a bread roll in invitation.

'We feast like kings,' he announced grandiloquently. 'Sit down and let me serve you the Choice of the Day. Trust me, I was once the head chef at the Paris Ritz.'