A couple of hours later and groomed to within an inch of her life, those tumultuous emotions and sensations carefully tamped down, Belle scrutinised her reflection with a sharply critical gaze. It was a beautiful dress and her youngest sister would have told her that she looked like a princess in it because Lucia, in common with their late mother, adored feminine frills. Pale pink and full length, the gown was bare at the shoulder and moulded to her figure at breast and hip. Did she look just a little too busty? She hitched the bodice and then almost laughed, pretty much convinced when she thought about it that Cristo would enjoy the view.
Betsy rang Cristo as he emerged from the shower in his own room next door. He listened as he always did but he felt strangely detached from his sister-in-law and her problems. It occurred to him that he had never lusted after Nik’s wife the way he did after his own and he marvelled at that reality, wondering if some internal censor button had somehow prevented it or whether indeed she didn’t appeal to him quite that much on that more basic level, which struck him as an extraordinary possibility.
He was still listening to Betsy recount the latest hostile moves his brother had made in the divorce battle when Belle came downstairs and his mind went totally blank because Belle looked fantastic and he couldn’t think of anything else. He ended the call with an apologetic mutter.
‘Who were you talking to?’ Belle asked, her attention locked to the unusually distracted expression on his lean dark features.
‘Betsy.’
‘Nik’s wife?’
Cristo struggled not to sound defensive. ‘We’re friends.’
‘That must be awkward,’ Belle remarked. ‘Were you friends before they got married?’
Cristo tensed, a muscle pulling taut at the corner of his shapely mouth. ‘No. It happened because of the way they broke up.’
Like a bloodhound on the trail, Belle was in no mood to settle for less than she wanted to know. ‘And why did they break up?’
‘For very private reasons. But something I let slip when I should have kept quiet and minded my own business contributed to it.’ Cristo framed that admission of guilt in a harsh undertone. ‘I’m sorry I can’t tell you more but I caused a lot of trouble by once carelessly revealing a secret which Nik had shared with me and…I definitely have lived to regret it.’
Belle wanted to drag the whole truth out of him there and then because all her suspicious antennae were now waking up to full alert. Exactly what did his ‘friendship’ with Betsy Ravelli entail?
Outside the limousine awaited them. ‘Where are we going?’ she asked to fill the strained silence, which confirmed for her that there had to be a very good reason why Cristo was quite so wary and uncomfortable when it came to discussing his brother’s estranged wife. Was she being fanciful in being so suspicious? Was his reaction simply the result of his guilty conviction that he might have contributed to the breakdown of the couple’s marriage? But if that was true, why did he carry a photo of Betsy in his wallet? That lent an all too personal dimension to the relationship that could only make Belle feel troubled.
‘We’re going to Assisi. There’s a very special restaurant there,’ Cristo imparted, relieved she had dropped the touchy subject of Nik’s marriage breakdown.
‘Assisi…as in the birthplace of St Francis?’
Cristo gave her a droll look. ‘There is only one.’
‘To be actually going there just feels so weird. It was my mother’s lifelong dream to visit Assisi. She was a great believer in the power of St Francis,’ Belle explained, a certain amount of embarrassment at that unsophisticated admission mingling with the very real sadness that claimed her when something touched on her many memories of the older woman.
‘And Gaetano never brought Mary to Italy?’ Cristo prompted in surprise.
‘Are you kidding? He never took Mum anywhere,’ Belle countered between compressed lips of grim recollection. ‘Their relationship only existed behind closed doors.’
‘And your mother didn’t object to that?’
‘No and what’s more she still thought the sun rose and fell on him. Gaetano didn’t take her money, knock her around or get drunk, so in her opinion he was perfection. She wasn’t very bright or well educated,’ Belle proffered in a guilty undertone because she felt disloyal making that statement about the parent she had loved. ‘But she was a very loving, loyal and kind person.’
‘She must also have been very tolerant and forgiving. That’s probably why their affair lasted so long,’ Cristo commented with a wry twist of his mouth.
Belle’s throat thickened with tears and she swallowed with difficulty. ‘Sometimes I miss her so much it hurts,’ she admitted quietly.
Cristo tensed when he noticed the glimmer of moisture on her cheeks. He breathed in slow and deep, unfroze his big powerful body with difficulty and pushed himself to close a hand over her tightly clenched fingers where they rested on her lap. ‘I can’t even say that I can imagine how you feel because it would be a lie,’ he conceded ruefully. ‘I’m not particularly close to my mother and I had no relationship with Gaetano to mourn when he died. You’re fortunate to be a part of such a close family.’
In silence, Belle nestled her fingers beneath the warmth of his and marvelled at that unexpectedly thoughtful gesture of comfort and the sentiment from his corner.
They dined at a table set for two on a massive terrace surrounded by amazing views of the picturesque hillside town. The streets they had driven through had been a geranium-hung blaze of flowering colour and she had caught glimpses of medieval back lanes and piazzas adorned with ancient fountains.
‘Where are all the other customers?’ Belle asked, surveying the empty tables around them.
‘Tonight, we’re the only customers and one of Italy’s most famous chefs is cooking solely for us, bella mia.’
‘And you arranged it that way?’ Belle prompted in amazement.
‘This is the very first time I’ve taken you anywhere,’ Cristo pointed out bluntly. ‘And we’ve been married a week, which basically tells me that I owe you a decent night out. I also owe you for all the work you put in for me without complaint.’