‘It’s not … you can be very prone to taking a negative stance.’
A rueful smile chased the tension from his well-shaped mouth and he threw his untidy dark head back on the pillow. As dark, bronzed and glossy as a tiger at rest, he looked incredibly handsome. ‘I commissioned the temple above the lake as a tribute to Loredana. The top of that hill was her favourite place—’
‘That was a cheat thought … a sort of positive and negative together,’ Zara censured.
‘I won’t need to commission anything to remember you,’ Vitale teased with sudden amusement. ‘Everywhere I look you’ve made your mark on this household.’
The huge pieces of gilded furniture had already gone into storage in favour of contemporary pieces in oak, which looked surprisingly well against the silk-panelled walls. Welcoming seating had arrived along with cushions, throws, unusual pieces of pottery and flower arrangements to illuminate dark corners and add comfort and character. Edmondo, who thoroughly approved of such nest-building instincts, had cheerfully described the new mistress of the palazzo to her husband as a ‘force of nature’.
‘You don’t need to remember me,’ Zara countered. ‘I’m not going anywhere.’
His attention suddenly fell on the little
jewelled enamel clock by her side of the bed and he stiffened and sat up in an abrupt movement. ‘I didn’t realise it was almost six! ‘
Within ten seconds of that exclamation, Vitale had vacated the bed and the shower was running in the adjoining bathroom. Zara lay on in the bed as stiff as a wooden plank while her mind whirled off on a wheel of frantic resentful activity. Sadly, she knew exactly why Vitale was in such a hurry. Well, at least she knew and she didn’t know …
Once again, after all, it was a Friday night and every Friday night for the past five weeks Vitale had religiously gone out alone and not returned home until around two in the morning. He would only say that he visited a longstanding female ‘friend’, who lived near Florence, for dinner and if Zara tried to extract any more details from him he became irritable and broodingly silent. She suspected and had asked if that female friend was living in the villa for which she had done the garden plan but, rather tellingly, he had ignored the question.
‘You must learn to trust me. You may be my wife but that doesn’t mean I have to tell you everything!’ he had argued without hesitation the previous week.
But Zara thought marriage should mean exactly that even though she had backed off from the looming threat of a row for the sake of peace. When Vitale returned to the palazzo tomorrow, however, she already knew that he would be grim and distant and that it would probably be at least forty-eight hours before he so much as touched her again. His Friday nights away from her, it seemed, did not put him in a good mood.
Was he spending that time placating another woman who mattered to him? A woman he had reluctantly set aside so that he could marry Zara because she had fallen pregnant? It was Zara’s worst fear but what else could explain his tense, troubled attitude in the aftermath of those evenings? Vitale was betraying every sign of a man being torn between opposing loyalties.
It had to be admitted, though, that his mysterious Friday outings were the one and only storm cloud in Zara’s blue sky and at first she had not been at all concerned when he left her to her own company one evening during the week. Her concern had grown only in proportion to his reticence. She did not like secrets and did not feel she could sit back and quietly allow him to maintain his secrecy.
Yet at the same time she had lived in Tuscany with Vitale for eight long weeks and had during that period discovered a happiness and a sense of security that was wonderfully new and precious to her. He had devoted the first three weeks of their marriage entirely to her, but after that point had had to return to the bank and his travels abroad. While he was away she had flown back to London on several occasions to catch up with business at Blooming Perfect and see clients.
Round her neck she wore a teardrop diamond pendant on a chain that Vitale hated her to take off. He had said the flash of the diamond in sunlight reminded him of her hair and her luminous smile. He had said loads and loads of romantic flattering stuff like that, words that she cherished, compliments that she took out and analysed whenever she was on her own or worried about the depth of his commitment to her and their marriage. He was very generous, had bought her innumerable gifts, everything from jewellery to flowers and artworks to pieces of furniture he thought she might like. Even more impressive he had also quietly engaged a speech-language specialist to visit weekly and help Zara overcome the problems caused by her dyslexia. She was already able to read more easily. Even Fluffy had benefited from Zara’s move to Italy, having acquired more toys than even the most spoilt bunny could play with.
Vitale had become Zara’s whole world without her even noticing it until she began to panic on Friday nights, worry about where he was and who he was with, and it made her realise her heart was more vulnerable than she had ever really appreciated. She was hopelessly in love with the guy she had married and to whom she had foolishly suggested a three-month-long trial marriage. Three months? Seriously, what sort of a stupid idea had that been? She already knew that she would not willingly give Vitale up after even a thousand months. What would she say at the end of the trial period if he was the one who turned round and jumped through that escape hatch she had handily provided to ask for his freedom back? It was a prospect that made her blood run cold.
She didn’t know when she had fallen for Vitale or when she had first overcome that bad beginning when he had set her up for the paparazzi. But she was crazy about him and she really did understand that she had landed herself an extremely passionate, ‘all or nothing’ guy, who had switched his original allegiance to his sister’s memory to their child instead. At heart she really did grasp what motivated Vitale more strongly than any other factor.
And what did inspire him was his movingly strong concept of what a man owed to his family. Her pregnancy had shot her right up the pecking order in his mind and brought her out at the top of the pile. She was carrying his baby, she was his wife and he really did treat her as though she was something incredibly precious. It touched her to the heart that even after the horrific experiences he had endured as a child he could still set such a very high value on the importance of family.
His cell phone rang and he emerged from the bathroom, a towel anchored precariously round his lean hips, to answer it. He frowned, thrust long impatient fingers through his damp black hair, spiking it up, and spoke in fluid Italian for several minutes, clearly issuing instructions. Setting the phone down again, he glanced at her. ‘I’m afraid I have to fly to Bahrain this evening to meet a major investor. I won’t be home until late tomorrow.’
As he broke the news Zara found herself smiling. If he had to be in Bahrain he couldn’t also be dining somewhere near Florence with his unknown female friend. But if he didn’t make it there this week he would presumably make it there at a later date. He walked over to the window and made another call, his attractive accented drawl apologetic, gentle in tone. Zara knew in her bones that he was talking to another woman and it wounded her, plunging her straight back into her uneasy thoughts.
Exactly what did Vitale get up to on Friday nights? He was risking their relationship by maintaining such secrecy. Didn’t that bother him? Did he think this woman was worth that risk? Was he keeping a mistress in that luxury villa? A mistress he needed more than he needed his pregnant wife? She had to know. Who was he protecting her from? Or was it that he was protecting another woman from her?
Suddenly, Zara was determined to satisfy some of the questions that Vitale had refused to answer. Once he had left for the airport, she would drive over to the villa, make the excuse that she had come to check on the garden and discover who lived there. She had to know, she needed to know, and tough if he didn’t like it when he found out that she’d gone behind his back to satisfy her curiosity …
CHAPTER TEN
THE local landscaping firm hired by Vitale to bring Zara’s plan for the villa grounds to fruition had done an excellent job. A wide terrace girded by graceful trees and elegant shrubs had removed the old-fashioned formal aspect from the original frontage. Her heart beating very fast, Zara parked the car and approached the front door.
Whatever she discovered she would deal with it quietly and calmly, she reminded herself bracingly. She was ready to handle any eventuality. There would be no distasteful scene, no tears, certainly no recriminations. Hadn’t she promised Vitale that before she married him? She was engaged in a trial marriage, which either one of them could walk away from without a guilt trip. If he was keeping another woman at the villa, if he was maintaining an extra-marital relationship, she had to set him free and get on with her life. Those far-reaching reflections were all very well, she reasoned in sudden dismay, as long as she didn’t acknowledge that the very thought of having to live without Vitale, or raise her child without him, was terrifying.
It was a shock, therefore, while she hovered apprehensively on the doorstep, when without her even knocking to announce her presence the front door suddenly shot open and framed Giuseppina. Zara frowned when she recognised the housekeeper, who had looked after her and Vitale at the farmhouse wher
e she had stayed several months earlier.
‘Buona sera, Signora Roccanti,’ Giuseppina greeted her with a welcoming smile and a further flood of Italian, which Zara did not understand.
With a display of enthusiasm that suggested that it was very unlikely that Vitale could be engaged in an improper extra-marital relationship with the villa occupant, Giuseppina ushered Zara into the hall. Quick light steps echoed across a tiled floor somewhere nearby and a woman appeared in the doorway.