them.’
‘If I did I was a sentimental fool. I should have done what you did long ago. Have you kept any souvenirs of James?’
‘I may have something lying around. It’s a while since I looked.’ She saw his wry look and said, ‘All right, I still have one of his shirts. He was wearing it the day he said he loved me-at least, he didn’t actually say that. Now I think of it, he phrased it very carefully, but at the time…’ She sighed. ‘I guess I heard what I wanted to hear.’
‘Yes, we do that when we’re very much in love.’
‘And you were, weren’t you? Very much.’
‘I didn’t think it was possible to love a woman as much as I loved her,’ he said slowly. ‘We met on every level-mentally, physically, everything. No matter how often I made love to her it wasn’t enough. In bed she was never the same woman twice, and I always wanted more of her.’
‘How long were you married?’
‘Ten years.’
‘And all that love you spoke of-it was still there, wasn’t it?’
‘As much as on the first day,’ he said slowly. ‘And she loved me the same way. I would have sworn it. Until she met him, and he changed her.’
‘So you blame James?’
‘I hate him,’ Drago said simply. ‘I don’t hate him any less because he’s dead. I’m glad he’s dead. I hope he suffered agonies. I hate him as much as you must hate Carlotta, or you couldn’t have carved up her clothes. If she’d been there herself, I dread to think what you’d have done to her.’
‘Maybe. I blamed her for taking him from me, but I wonder if she could have done that if he hadn’t been willing.’
He didn’t answer, and she looked up to find him staring into the fire.
‘It works both ways,’ he said at last. ‘You’re saying that she must have been willing too, but I don’t believe that.’
‘Perhaps she was a little restless. Maybe she just meant to have a minor flirtation and it got out of hand.’
‘But did you know what she was thinking? Do we ever know, no matter how close we think we are?’
He grimaced. ‘You mean I was fooling myself then, and I’m still doing it now? Maybe you’re right and I just don’t have your courage. I want to keep my memories. Nothing so beautiful will ever happen to me again, and I can’t let it go.’
‘You still love her.’
‘No,’ he said quickly. ‘The love is dead, but it was glorious while it lasted, and I can’t just consign it to the rubbish heap. If I have to live with dreams for the rest of my life, I’ll do it rather than live without them.’
She regarded him in wonder. On the surface this big, powerful man was armoured against anything the world could do to him. The truth was hidden away inside his heart, in a place so secret that even he feared to visit it often.
He understood her look, and said, ‘I’ve never told that to anyone but you.’
‘And I’ll never repeat it,’ she promised.
‘Thank you. I know I can trust you.’
As he said it he looked away from her. But then he looked back, and the trust he spoke of was there in his eyes, communicating directly without words.
He must have looked at Carlotta like that-with total, defenceless confidence. Only two people in the world had seen it. Carlotta was one, and she was the other. It felt strange to have something in common with that woman.
‘I think you’re right to keep your dreams of her,’ she said. ‘If only for Tina’s sake.’
‘What about you?’ he asked. ‘Is there anyone for whose sake you have to keep quiet?’
‘Nobody.’
The word fell on him like stone, and he recalled what she’d told him of the bleakness of her life. Not that she would call it bleak. She would simply say she was organised.
He moved beside her and put his arms about her, holding her tight.
‘You’ll get my germs,’ she protested.
‘To hell with them.’
After a while she asked sleepily, ‘Are there many more letters to read?’
He pulled over the bag so that several envelopes fell onto the floor. They each took some and began riffling through them. Alysa opened one in James’s handwriting and read:
I never believed in the kind of love you hear about in songs, until I met you, and you showed me it could happen. Before that, I always settled for the easy version of love that I could take or leave. I never risked the kind that tears out a man’s heart and tells him he’d be better dead than losing his woman. But then I met you and knew that you were that woman. You gave me courage. Bless you for that, my darling.
She stared into the fire until she saw Drago looking at her, and handed the letter to him.
‘“Better dead”,’ Drago read aloud. ‘He didn’t know what he was saying.’
‘He was never like that with me,’ she murmured. ‘He was always cheerful, funny-even when we-And it was nice sometimes.’ She broke off to sneeze.
‘Don’t force yourself,’ Drago said gently.
‘I used to think it would be lovely if he was a bit more romantic, but I told myself that he just couldn’t find the right words, and he loved me really. But the way he wrote to Carlotta-all passion and intensity-it’s like a different man. I guess I never really knew him, because he didn’t want me to.’
‘I was luckier than you,’ Drago admitted. ‘Whatever Carlotta did at the end, I know who she was in the years before-the woman who gave me all herself. Nothing can change that.’
‘Good,’ she said with sudden decisiveness. ‘Hold onto that thought. It’ll stop you becoming a psycho like me.’
‘You’re not a psycho.’
‘I was headed that way. I can see it now. I deadened my heart because I thought it would be easier. But it wasn’t. Listen to your friend, Drago. Don’t become like me.’
He grinned tenderly. ‘If my daughter could hear you now. You really took her advice to heart.’
‘You mean about looking after you?’
‘Yes, you’re doing a great job.’
‘Then we’re even.’
She didn’t know how long they sat there on the floor, leaning against each other, but she could happily have stayed for ever. It wasn’t thrilling or dramatic, or any of the things she had known with James. But every moment that passed was healing something deep inside her, bringing her back to life.
And him too. That thought made her almost happy. Let him put Carlotta on a pedestal if that was what he needed. She wouldn’t spoil it for him.
‘Time you were in bed,’ he announced suddenly. ‘I’ll make you a hot chocolate and you can take your pills.’
While he was in the kitchen she took another letter. It was from Carlotta, and she read it with little more than casual interest. She was beginning to feel that nothing else could happen.
Within a few lines she discovered her mistake. Carlotta had written:
We made a pact to be honest with each other, so I’m going to tell you the complete truth. You asked if you were my first lover since my marriage, and, though I’d love to say yes, the truth is that there have been others.
Alysa’s hands tightened on the paper so that it crumpled. When she’d flattened it she read it again, wondering if she’d misunderstood. But there was no mistaking what Carlotta was saying.
I know now that I married before I was quite ready. It was thrilling to defy my mother with an elopement, and Drago was insistent, so I yielded unwisely. I should have lived a more exciting life before I settled down. I realised soon after the wedding that domesticity bored me, so I compensated with a few little ‘adventures’.
‘Bitch,’ Alysa muttered, barely aware that she was speaking.
Drago never found out. I did my best to be a good wife to him in other ways, and I gave him Tina, whom he
