The Tuscan Tycoon’s Wife

papers.

‘You come alone,’ she told him.

‘I want you with me. After all, you said yourself that it concerns you too.’

‘But there’s nothing for me to sign. I’ll stay home and-’

‘And be there when I get back?’ he asked fiercely. ‘Will you?’

‘Of-of course I will.’

‘I want you with me,’ he repeated with a hint of mulishness around his mouth.

So he sensed it too, she thought.

It was like an ugly demon sitting on the floor between them, forcing them both to sidestep, but without ever admitting that it was there.

More than anyone it was the countess who unsettled her. Her English was so poor that they couldn’t communicate except through an interpreter, and then Selena didn’t know how to interpret her awkwardness. It might be shyness, unease, or downright disapproval. Selena reckoned she could guess which one.

In the last few minutes before they left the countess approached her. There was nobody else there, and in her hand she clutched a dictionary.

‘I speak-with you,’ she said in a voice that showed she was reciting prepared words.

‘Yes?’ Selena tried to look composed.

‘Things are-different now-your marriage-we must speak-’

‘But I know,’ Selena said passionately. ‘You don’t have to tell me, I know. How can I marry him? You don’t want me to, and you’re right. I don’t belong here. I don’t belong in your world. I know.’

A tense, haughty look came over the countess’s face. She took a sharp breath. The next moment there was the sound of footsteps on marble and she stepped back.

The rest of the family appeared, engulfing them. There were goodbyes, attempts at cheer. The boat was at the landing stage, then they were drawing away, the strip of water growing wide, and the problems were just beginning.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

NOW there was the relief of attending to the harvest. All over the valley the vineyards and the olive groves were humming with activity. Carts passed along the lines, gradually filling up with the best the earth had to offer. Selena was there, sometimes with Leo, sometimes alone. Even alone she could communicate with Leo’s people for most of them had a smattering of English and she had mastered a few words of Tuscan, which she used badly enough to amuse everyone. In this way she forged her links with them.

And it might all be for nothing, she would think, looking out over the acres as the sun descended. For who knew how things would be this time next year? Who knew how much of the farm would still belong to him? And these new friends she was making, with whom she felt so much more at ease than her fine new family in their grandiose palace, how many of them would still think of her as a friend?

They too were worried, she sensed it. They would stop and ask her questions, because she was going to marry the padrone, and therefore she must know him best. How could she tell them that she didn’t feel she knew him at all any more? The instinctive fellow-feeling that had united her with Leo increasingly seemed no more than a happy memory.

And besides, she saw him less because he was constantly being recalled to Venice to settle some point or other. He’d sworn it would make very little difference to them, but by now they both knew that it wasn’t in his power to keep that promise. Inch by inch he was being forced onto a road where she couldn’t follow.

These days she often slept in her own room to hide the fact that she sometimes awoke gasping for breath. She had a sense of floundering in a maze from which there was no way out, but only roads growing narrower until they vanished altogether, and herself with them.

She called the Four-Ten, and avidly drank in news about the Hanworth family. Paulie had gone to Dallas to start another internet firm-or so he said, but Barton confided that a jealous husband had been haunting the ranch for a while, uttering dire threats should Paulie ever reappear.

Billie was marrying her guy, Carrie was exercising Jeepers, and they’d had two offers for him. If Selena wasn’t coming back-

‘No,’ Selena said quickly. ‘If I’m not sending you enough money for him-’

‘You’re sending more than enough,’ Barton boomed, offended. ‘Think I grudge you a little horse feed?’

‘I know you don’t. You’ve all been such good friends to me, but I’m not going to take advantage of it-’

‘What else are friends for? You don’t want me to sell Jeepers? He’s a good racer and he’s going to waste right now.’

‘I know but-just hang onto him a little longer, please Barton. How’s Elliot?’

‘He’s fine. Carrie rides him, and she says he’s a real sweet old feller.’

‘Yes,’ Selena said. ‘I remember that.’

She hung up, and went into the kitchen to discuss the evening meal with Gina. Leo was due back from Venice and Gina was preparing sardine and potato bake for him. After that Selena went into the office and worked hard on paperwork for the horse farm.

Then she dropped her head on her hands and wept.

It was dark when Leo drove up, for the nights were drawing in. He ate his meal with gusto but when Selena asked about his trip he had strangely little to say.

She knew what that meant. Bit by bit he was being drawn into their world, and he didn’t know how to tell her.

After supper she headed back to the office, to ‘finish some stuff.’

‘Aren’t you coming to bed?’ he asked.

‘Well, I just thought I’d-’

‘No,’ he said. ‘Come to bed.’

Arms about each other they climbed the stairs. In his room he took her in his arms and kissed her deeply. The desire was always there, perhaps deeper now that it was almost the only way they could communicate. They undressed each other swiftly, eager for the union that was still perfect and in which there were no problems.

For a short, blissful time there was a hot urgency that swept everything before it. She called his name as if from a long distance, and tried to find comfort in his look of tender adoration. As passion faded into contentment she fell asleep with her head against him.

But as soon as she slept her surroundings changed. She was fighting her way through a thicket. She struggled but it was closing in on her, shutting out the air, suffocating her. She awoke, gasping for breath.

‘Carissima-’ Leo sat up and put on the bedside light. ‘Wake up, wake up!’

She held him until the shaking stopped and he drew her close, stroking her hair.

‘It’s all right,’ he murmured. ‘I’m here. Hold on to me, it was only a dream.’

‘I couldn’t breathe,’ she choked. ‘Everything’s closing in on me and I can’t find a way through.’

‘You’ve had that dream before, haven’t you?’ he said sadly. ‘I’ve see you toss and turn and I know you’re unhappy. And then the next night you’ve insisted on sleeping apart. But you never tell me. Why won’t you let me share it?’

As though he didn’t know the answer!

‘It’s nothing,’ she said quickly. ‘Just a dream. Hold me.’

They clung together until he asked quietly, ‘Are you going to leave me?’

In the long silence he felt the darkness fall over his heart.

‘No,’ she said at last, ‘I don’t think so-but-I need to go back for a while. Just for a while-’

‘Yes,’ he said heavily, ‘just for a while.’

He drove her to Pisa Airport next day. They were late arriving and the flight to Dallas had already been called.

‘I’d better hurry then,’ she said.

‘Have you got everything?’