The Millionaire Tycoon's English Rose

father.’

‘You said you were close?’

‘Yes, he made a favourite of me. The joke is that he used to say that of us three boys I was the one most like him. Luke was adopted, Primo was his own son, but for some reason he latched on to me as the kind of son he truly wanted. I loved that. The best thing in the world was when he swept me up in his arms, tossed me the air, then caught me, grinning all over his face. I guess I was a bit of a chauvinist, like boys of three tend to be. Mamma came in handy at feeding time, but the one who mattered was my dad. His love, his approval-they were what made the sun come out.

‘Then suddenly, in one hour, it was all taken away. And I didn’t know what I’d done wrong. I just knew that warmth and safety had vanished without warning, leaving a terrible emptiness.’

‘Poor little boy,’ she mourned.

‘Of course, I learned the details later. He was livid because he’d found out that he wasn’t my father, and it wasn’t anything I’d done, but it was too late to make any difference, and what happened that night got blotted out. All I knew was that the words Get out always had a strange impression on me. If I heard them, it was as though a switch had been thrown.’

‘But surely you didn’t hear them often? How many people would dare tell you to get out?’

He gave a faint bark of laughter. ‘One or two have tried. There was one lady who was so determined to be rid of me that my feet barely touched the floor.’

‘She sounds like a very stupid woman to me,’ Celia said, lying down beside him, her face close to his.

‘No, she was a very clever one. I realised that she was right when I got over my shock enough to do some thinking. I’ve always been a bit forceful, and nobody had really stood up to me before, you see. But it wasn’t just real people. If I was watching television and one character told another to get out the words triggered something in my mind. And I’d be in a black mood for hours, without understanding why. But it passed, and I’d forget again.’

‘But then I screamed the words at you, just like him?’

‘Yes, and that’s when it really began to haunt me. Because it was actually aimed at me. But it was more than that. It was losing you. Everything that I treasured-warmth, safety, love-had vanished again, leaving me stranded in a desert. And then tonight-coming here, seeing Franco, everything they talked about-it came back. Suddenly I could remember everything that happened that night, and the last brick slipped into place.’

‘What happens now?’ she asked anxiously.

‘It’ll be all right now. I can cope because I can confront it.’ He turned his face to her on the pillow. ‘Mind you, I’m never going to be sweetness and light.’

‘Well, I guess I knew that,’ she said, snuggling contentedly against him. ‘But you know me-I like to live dangerously.’

‘You don’t want sweetness and light?’

‘Bor-ing!’ she sang out. ‘Bor-ing!’

He felt for her. ‘Why are you lying outside the duvet?’ he asked.

She scrambled under the covers. ‘Is that better?’

‘You’re still overdressed.’

‘So are you.’

They solved the problem at once, not disrobing slowly, to tease, but quickly, like people who couldn’t wait to get to their destination. They urgently wanted to be naked together, and when they were they lost no time seeking the moment of complete fulfilment. There would be time for tenderness later. This was important.

For Celia it was almost like making love to a different man. He didn’t need to tell her that his shadows had begun to fall away; she could sense it in every movement. But she knew, too, that he needed her presence to escape them completely.

Afterwards they lay together in sleepy contentment, until she said, ‘How lovely that Toni came to the hospital.’

‘He was bound to. It was always there in the way his eyes followed Mamma around.’

After a moment, he said, speaking hesitantly, ‘To be honest, that’s the only thing I mind about you being blind. I’ll never know if your eyes would have followed me.’

‘Then you haven’t been looking properly,’ she said. ‘Because they do-all the time.’

They went to the hospital next day, to hear the news that they had expected.

‘She fell asleep finally about an hour ago,’ Franco said in a slightly unsteady voice. ‘She was conscious almost until the end, and I was able to tell her how much I loved her.’

‘She had no real cause to doubt your love,’ Hope said gently. ‘And in her heart I think she really knew that. You were together for such a long time-nearly forty years.’

Long ago, when they were young and their passion had been at its height, they could have been together. But he had chosen to stay with his wife. The truth behind that choice was there now, as they stood there in the hospital corridor, the slanted sunbeams from the windows falling on their white hair.

As they walked away afterwards Della fell in beside Celia, taking her arm so that Francesco could give his attention to his parents.

‘For a man in his sixties Franco’s incredibly handsome,’ she said in low voice, not to attract attention. ‘He must have been dazzling when he was young. Toni’s delightful, but I doubt if he was ever dazzling.’

‘It’s got nothing to do with a man’s looks,’ Celia told her. ‘If it had, I could never fall in love.’

‘And you are in love, aren’t you?’

‘Oh, yes,’ Celia murmured. ‘Yes, I am.’

‘Is everything all right with you and Francesco?’

‘It’s getting better, but we’ve a way to go yet.’

Toni had remained behind to talk to his brother, and Francesco took the chance to draw his mother’s arm through his and say, ‘Is it all right, Mamma? You know what I mean.’

‘Yes, all is well, my son. I knew years ago that he loved Lisa more than he loved me. So when he offered to stay with me I told him no.’

‘He did offer?’

‘Oh, yes. But I knew I must not accept. If he’d left Lisa for me he wouldn’t have forgiven me in the long run. Not just because of his children, but also because she was his true love.’

She gave his arm a slight pressure.

‘Sometimes the only way you can show how much you love someone is to let them go.’

Lisa’s funeral was held three days later. The whole family was there to see her coffin, covered with flowers, being laid to rest. Despite what Celia had said, Della couldn’t help wondering what Hope was feeling now. Had the past come back to her, making her heart ache with its loss? Had Franco, too, become sharply aware of what had come and gone?

But Franco’s eyes were fixed unwaveringly on the coffin, and his expression was heart-rending. Della stole a glance at Hope, but Hope was looking at Toni.

On the surface life went on as before. The society apologised that Celia’s new dog would not be ready as soon as hoped, but Francesco seemed untroubled by the delay.

Things had reached a strange pass between them. They were lovers again, spending nights in each other’s arms, just as in the past, yet they never spoke of the future, and an air of impermanence hung over them. There were still decisions to be made, but neither of them wanted to face them for a while.

‘We’re cowards,’ she murmured dozily one night, from the shelter of his arms.

‘What’s wrong with that?’ he wanted to know. ‘We’ve tried being brave, and nuts to it.’

She giggled and blissfully snuggled down farther. The big problems still lurked outside the tent, but in the meantime there was a lot to be said for cowardice.

She supposed it was a sign of losing her nerve that she often kept her cellphone turned off, lest the call come from L’Esperienza, demanding that she make her dive from a helicopter. She owed it to the firm that she’d promised to support, but she didn’t want to face that decision yet. Eventually she would feel guilty and turn it on again.

In the end the decision was taken out of her hands, when she slipped up to the flat above to return a CD,