‘I understand,’ he said. His voice changed. ‘Carla, look...now that we’ve made our peace with each other I think we should show Rome that the family rift...is no more.’
He held up his hand decisively. ‘I know that the gossips couldn’t decide just why our wedding never took place, but I want to show them that whatever has happened since—’ he did not spell out what her mother had done ‘—you and I, at least, are friends. So I think we should be seen out socially, while you’re here in Rome, to confirm that.’
She looked at him uncertainly. ‘If...if you want,’ she said.
How could she refuse anything that Vito asked of her, given how badly she had treated him? Socialising in Rome might be the most gruelling ordeal she could imagine right now, but she must face it for Vito’s sake.
And if I fear I might see Cesare—well, why should I? Viscari circles don’t usually overlap with his, and anyway Cesare’s probably in his castello planning his wedding...
She felt the nausea bite again—and something worse than nausea. Much, much worse.
‘Good.’ Vito nodded. He smiled. ‘How about tonight?’
She paled. ‘Tonight?’ she echoed faintly.
Vito quirked an eyebrow. ‘You have something more pressing?’
Slowly she shook her head, realised that in all conscience she could not refuse.
* * *
That evening, as she stood staring blankly at her reflection in the mirror, she knew the last thing she wanted was to go out into society—even though she owed it to Vito. So, ignoring the knots in her stomach, she threw one last glance at herself, reassured by the dark indigo evening gown, generously cut—nothing clinging or curvaceous now—and her immaculate hair and make-up.
Her phone buzzed to tell her that Vito was waiting for her in his car below, and she left her apartment.
She had spent the afternoon with estate agents and her solicitor, booking a removal company to transfer her possessions to her mother’s house. She would tell Vito this evening that she was going to hand him the proceeds of the sale—it wasn’t much, compared to the loss he’d suffered, thanks to her mother, but it was all she could do.
She paid little attention to where he was taking her, but as they walked inside an ornate palazzo, the venue for the fundraising reception for a museo di antiquity that Vito was attending, she suddenly froze.
Her hand clawed on Vito’s sleeve. ‘This is the Palazzo Mantegna!’
He glanced at her. ‘I know,’ he said. ‘That’s why I brought you here—Cesare will be here as one of the museo’s patrons.’
Desperately, Carla tried to pull away.
But Vito’s hand clamped over hers. ‘Carla—he has to know. He has to!’
A drumming filled her senses.
* * *
Cesare was talking to his fellow museo patrons, but for all his polite conversation he had no inclination to be there. His mood was grim.
Francesca was still in America, vacating her apartment, making ready to move back to Italy and become his contessa. He was glad of her absence. How could he face her after what he had done? Committing an act of folly so extreme he could not now believe that he had done it.
Folly? Was that what it had been? That final, self-indulgent, devil-driven night with Carla? The sour taste of self-disgust filled him. Of shame.
I went to her with my betrothal ring on Francesca’s finger! And yet I presumed to accuse her of being prepared to marry another man! As if she had betrayed me...spurned me for another man.
In that one shameful night he had behaved unforgivably to the woman he’d undertaken to marry and the one whom he could never marry. Could never again possess. Could never again see, or have anything to do with.
She is lost to me for ever.
As he said the words, he felt something twist inside him, as if the point of a knife had broken off, stayed in his guts. It would stay there, lodged for ever. Scar tissue would grow around it, but it would remain for all his life. A wound that would not heal...
‘Signor Conte—’
He was being called to the podium to make a short speech. The moment he’d done that he’d leave. Tomorrow he’d