Cordelia stiffened. The mention of Isabella was a timely reminder of what she had witnessed and, as if sensing her withdrawal, he leaned forward, his body language imparting a searing sincerity that held her spellbound against her better judgement.
‘Then you came. You showed up. In all your stunning glory.’
‘Don’t, Luca,’ she whipped back.
‘Don’t what?’
‘Try to get under my skin again. I’ve had it with you doing that.’
‘You thought you walked in on me sharing something intimate with Isabella and, yes, you did, but not in the way you think. Isabella is gay. I’ve known that for a long time and that’s why the marriage made sense. I didn’t believe in love. It wasn’t for me. And Isabella wanted the cover of a traditional marriage to hide her sexuality from her parents. Not ideal and I tried to persuade her to come out, but she refused, and I suppose, in a way, the arrangement suited me as it stood.’
He sighed, wondered where doing what was right stopped and doing what was convenient began. The lines had become blurred over time when it came to Isabella. ‘She was crying because she’d finally decided to tell her parents so that she could be with her partner of eighteen months. She was a wreck and I was trying to comfort her and tell her that it would be okay. That was the scene you interrupted and I was a fool for not explaining myself immediately, for telling you that you had to trust me. Who the hell did I think I was?’
‘Isabella is gay? But you were planning on getting married...’
‘And who knows? Maybe we would have if she hadn’t met the woman she’s in love with. Or maybe, if I hadn’t broken it off, the worst would have happened and she would have married me because it would have been what tradition demanded. We would have both been miserable in the end.’
‘Luca... I wish you had said something. Told me the situation from the start. You have no idea...what’s been going on in my head.’
‘Old habits die hard.’ He grimaced. ‘And besides,’ he admitted, ‘I might have been forced to recognise what I’d been hiding from myself.’
‘What’s that?’ Cordelia asked breathlessly.
‘That I’m in love with you. That you were the woman I have been waiting for all my life.’
Afterwards, everything happened very fast. It was a blur. He loved her. She’d questioned him, of course she had. He could be making it up! But she knew he wasn’t because it just wasn’t something he would ever make up.
He’d never believed in love, he’d told her. Love had destroyed his father. He had lost his only love and then worse had followed when he had reacted by hurtling from one ghastly and costly mistake to another. And he, Luca, young and grieving the loss of his mother, had been a casualty.
What was there to admire about that lifestyle? Only a fool, Luca had confided, would have chosen to emulate it. Only a fool would have blithely believed in the restorative power of love, having witnessed first hand its ability to destroy.
Not for him, and that was the rule he had lived his life by. He would marry for convenience and that way he would never risk getting hurt.
Every word had been music to her ears.
She had had to pinch herself several times because she couldn’t believe that the man she had given her heart to had given his heart back to her, not when she had spent so long bracing herself for just the opposite.
Now, back in the gown but on cloud nine, she slipped her hand into his and gazed at him at the top of the stairs.
Her father was due any minute. Preparations were well under way. Noise levels had escalated. As she gazed down, she could see that the hall was festive with lights and flowers and the smell of food was wafting through the house, making her mouth water.
‘I love you.’ She smiled at Luca and reached up to kiss him very lightly on the mouth. ‘I feel I’ve spent my life sitting there by the sea, looking out at a horizon and imagining what might lie beyond it. I never, ever thought that I would find everything I could ever hope for and more.’
‘The mermaid who found her legs,’ Luca murmured, curving his hand against her cheek. ‘Mine for ever.’
His eyes slid past her and he smiled.
‘Your father is here,’ he said, ‘and I’m guessing that the buxom blonde clinging to him is none other than the woman he didn’t want around because he was too set in his ways?’
Cordelia stared and then burst out laughing because that was Doris, all right. Her case was bulging and Cordelia could only guess at what outfit might be inside. Doris had never been known for her modesty when it came to dress code.
‘I don’t believe it,’ she breathed as they headed down the stairs. She gave a little wave to her father and braced herself for the conversation that would soon be taking place, although, now, it was a conversation she wouldn’t be having with a heavy heart.
‘Didn’t I say?’ Luca murmured into her ear. ‘All’s well that ends well, wouldn’t you agree?’
Yes, she would.
There could be no
