‘I think we had better speak in English,’ he said. ‘Don’t you?’
Nicole couldn’t hide her surprise and something in the way he said it made her suddenly want to get honest wi
th him. Because if you couldn’t say what was really on your mind at times like this, then what was the point of anything? She remembered his refusal to use her native tongue when she’d arrived at the house—even rejecting her faltering attempts in Italian as he’d insisted on conversing in Sicilian dialect. ‘Unlike before,’ she said quietly.
He nodded in agreement. ‘That was foolish of me. I recognise that now. I wanted you to integrate fully with life here and I thought that imposing a tough regime from the beginning was the way to do it.’ He gave a croaky little sigh. ‘I wanted so much, but none of it happened the way it was supposed to. I handled it wrong. Just like I handled Rocco all wrong.’
Nicole felt a frown pleating her brow. ‘What do you mean, Nonno? What did you do wrong with Rocco?’
His voice gained more strength as he began to speak. ‘Did he ever speak to you of his childhood?’
She shook her head. ‘Never. He used to shut all my questions right down and make me feel bad about asking them. It was only very recently that he talked about his parents.’
Turi’s eyes were inquisitive. ‘You know he was only fourteen when they died?’
She nodded. ‘Yes, I knew that much.’
‘His brother was nine, his sister only five and the little ones, they were...’ The old man blinked his rheumy eyes rapidly. ‘They were broken,’ he said at last, clearing his throat. ‘I was trying to do it all. My wife was no longer alive and I had the business to run—as well as the younger children to cope with. I leaned on Rocco too much. I see that now. I told him...’
Nicole leaned forward as his words faded away. ‘What, Nonno? What did you tell him?’
He indicated she should plump up the bank of pillows behind his head, and once she’d done so he lay back on them and continued. ‘I told him that the younger children would look to him for strength and that was what he needed to show them. To keep his head down and work hard and carry on, no matter what—because that would hold the family together. To follow my example and never cry or show his feelings. And he didn’t. He learned his lesson well. Too well, perhaps.’
To never show his feelings. A painful breath escaped Nicole’s lips because didn’t Turi’s words explain so much about the man she had married? Why he could appear so distant. Why he had the ability to bury himself in his work, no matter what was going on around him. Was that why he hadn’t reacted as she’d thought he might when she’d had the miscarriage? Why he’d never really talked about it—not even when they’d been having that heart-to-heart in Monaco, when she’d given him every opportunity to do so. ‘Yes, he did,’ she said slowly. ‘But then, I imagine that Rocco must have been an exemplary student in everything he undertook.’
‘Not once did I see a tear fall,’ Turi added shakily. ‘At least, not then.’
Nicole narrowed her eyes as he held her gaze. ‘What do you mean?’ she whispered. ‘Not then?’
There was a pause. ‘When you left, he was heartbroken.’
Angrily, Nicole shook her head. Turi might be old and sick but even he couldn’t convince her of that. Heartbroken? Never in a million years. Rocco had pushed her away and no mistake. She remembered him taking a trip to the States when she’d most needed him, weeks after it had happened, when she’d still been mired in her own sense of misery.
But she hadn’t told him that, had she? She hadn’t really known how and he hadn’t seemed to want her to.
She’d put his emotional distance down to the fact that he’d been forced to marry her and once there wasn’t going to be a baby, there was no reason for the relationship to continue. Yet what Turi had told her made her look at it differently. Wouldn’t Rocco’s behaviour be more understandable if he’d been schooled in the art of concealing his true emotions?
No, she told herself fiercely. It wasn’t like that. Turi was an old man sentimentalising his past in a clumsy attempt to achieve some sort of peace towards the end of a long life. And she wasn’t going to buy into it—because hadn’t she already dealt with her own pain? She’d done that and come out the other side and nothing could be gained by dwelling on what could never be. She could allow herself to feel an aching sympathy for the hardships Rocco must have been forced to endure, but she should never start making the mistake of thinking he was capable of loving her, because that way lay madness. He was capable of having fantastic sex with her, as he’d very recently proved—but nothing more than that. ‘No,’ she said. ‘I don’t believe you.’
‘Yes,’ Turi argued, with a sudden vehemence which belied his frail physique. ‘What benefit would it bring if I started lying at this stage of my life? Didn’t you ask him why he left Sicily? Why he couldn’t bear to live in the house once you’d gone? Why he refused to give away any of your things?’
Fear washed over her—a fear which was motivated by stupid, stubborn hope. And hope was futile where Rocco was concerned. Nicole knew that better than anyone. She could see that Turi was looking tired now, as if the exertion of all he’d just told her had exhausted him, and quickly she stood up and poured out a glass of water before holding it to his lips.
‘I’m going to go and let you get some rest now,’ she said softly.
‘Promise me,’ he croaked as he took another small sip, then waved the glass away, ‘that you will ask him why? Just promise me that, Nicole, even though I have no right to demand such a promise.’
What could she say? How could she possibly refuse a sick man this simple request?
‘I promise,’ she said, putting the glass down and dropping a light kiss on his forehead, and the old man smiled before his eyes closed.
The nurse must have heard the sound of Nicole’s chair scraping against the floor, because the door to the adjoining room opened and she appeared, looking crisp and fresh in her white uniform as she glanced enquiringly at Nicole.
‘Tutto bene, signora?’ she questioned.
Nicole’s Italian might have been basic, but even she could understand this simple query. ‘Sì. Grazie,’ she said and left the room.
But her head was spinning once she stepped out of Turi’s residence with no real idea of what to do or where to go. Buying herself time, she took off to a quiet section of the estate in an attempt to get her thoughts in order, but that proved impossible. She didn’t believe Turi because she didn’t want to believe him. She didn’t dare. Because even if what he said was true, what good would come of raking it up now?