Her mind twisted away and the scorpion whips lashed again. Wielded by the devil that was driving her now, along the desperate path she was taking. But she would take it all the same, and wouldn’t care what she was doing to Vito, wouldn’t care that he hated her for it, would not let herself care.
She would only forge on with it, frantic to cling to the only thing she could cling to—getting her own engagement announced to stop the pitying comments, the veiled sneers, the less than veiled gossip, targeting her as the discarded former inamorata of the noble Count now set on marrying his noble bride...
Because no one, no one, would pity her or sneer at her when she was the wife of one of the most eligible bachelors in Rome! When her husband was the multi-millionaire Vito Viscari with his film star looks, fêted and courted by all, a major European corporate player, and when their marriage had united the ownership of a global hotel chain!
Because if Cesare di Mondave could make a dynastic marriage—well, so could she! And her marriage to Vito would show Cesare she cared as little about him as his engagement to the beautiful Francesca delle Ristori showed that he cared about the woman he’d spent the last six months with! Show him that their time together had been nothing more than a pleasant interlude for both of them, before they’d both taken up their destiny—he to marry his aristocratic bride, she to unite the two halves of the Viscari family.
But she had to get her engagement to Vito announced formally! She had to make it happen—was desperate for it!
The devil drove her on, his reins steering her remorselessly, unpityingly.
Yet still Vito held out.
Balked at committing to her.
Wanted to reject her—just as Cesare had rejected her!
He had no desire to marry her—just as Cesare had no desire to marry her!
Desperation and despair possessed her, darkening her vision. She had to get Vito to publicly commit to her—by any means. Any at all—whatever it took.
Carla could see that as plain as day through the dark flames in her vision. Her mother saw it too. Took steps. Rumours flew—were Guido’s shares for sale? If so, to whom?
The financial press ran with the story, just as her mother had intended. Rival hotel chains’ names were speculated. Nic Falcone, his long-time competitor, was the front runner, keenest to snap up the oh-so-enticing Viscari shares. Yet still Vito would not agree to announce their engagement—now he was saying there was already a woman in his life, an Englishwoman he’d met on his European tour, whom he’d brought to Rome and who was staying at the Viscari Roma.
So Carla paid a visit there. Found the beautiful, long-legged blonde who was so clearly besotted with Vito. Told her that she was no one special—like I was no one special to Cesare—that Vito would have finished with her soon enough anyway—like Cesare did me—and with every stinging, bitter, galling truth, a knife went into her own heart, twisting in agony. And when Vito turned up, full of angry denunciation of what she’d said, she defied him to deny it—defied him to say she was not his fiancée. He could not—not if he wanted her mother’s shares, if he valued them more than the tearful woman clinging to his chest, sobbing...
The blonde’s despairing sobs tore at Carla, tore at her own throat, but she would not recant her words. Found justification for them in her own misery and torment.
It’s better she knows now what’s important to Vito—and it’s not her!
Just as she had not been important to Cesare...
The devil’s scorpion whip lashed at her again, driving her onwards as she dragged Vito away, forcing him on along the dark path she was treading, her eyes glittering with desperate fervour. Damning herself and everyone around her.
CHAPTER EIGHT
CESARE STOOD IN the massive fortified gateway that led to the walled courtyard of the castello, watching the Marchese’s car wind its stately way down the hairpin road snaking into the valley below. Then he turned away, walked back into the castello.
The visit of Francesca and her parents had been a complete success, and now she was going with her parents to the family seat in the north of Italy before flying back to the USA to settle her affairs there.
There was no immediate rush for them to marry—the date was set for late summer, and Francesca’s mother was intent on enjoying every moment of the lavish preparations. Also, Francesca wanted to see if she could secure a post-doctoral position at a physics department in Italy. When she returned from America, visited the castello once more, Cesare would start to take her out and about with him on prenuptial social engagements. Start his personal courtship of her, the woman who would be his bride.
As the woman he had set aside could never be.
Could never be in his life again in any way.
As it always did, the guillotine sliced down in his head. That subject was still not safe. With iron self-discipline—a self-discipline that he seemed to need increasingly now, but which, surely to God, would fade as time passed—he put aside the thoughts he must not have, the memories he must not recall.
He strode indoors, but as he did so, he glanced up the massive oak staircase that led to the upper floor of the staterooms. That floor was dominated by the full-length galleria, once the exercise space for the ladies of the house in bad weather, which now contained the bulk of the artworks here at the castello.
Including the Luciezo-Caradino triptych.
As if impelled, Cesare felt himself heading towards the base of the stairs. Then, abruptly, he pulled away. No, he would not go and look at it. To what purpose? He knew what it looked like. Knew why he wanted to go and look at it.
His expression steeled. His ancestor might have been born at a time when a man could ‘have it all’, but those times were gone. There could be no honour in thinking otherwise—not a shred of it.
I have made my choice and I will abide by it. Carla is in the past now, and she must stay there. My future is with Francesca. And Francesca has made her choice too—she has chosen to be my wife.