The girl’s head came up and she beamed at Salvatore as if he was some sort of benevolent benefactor when Elisa knew he was anything but.
‘Thank you signor.”
‘From the look of the ring, congratulations are in order are they not?” It was David’s turn to smile. ‘oh yes. We’re going to be married as soon as we get back home.”
‘lsn’t that romantic?” gushed the girl. She looked warmly at her soon-to-be husband. ‘We met while we were on a European tour. We loved Italy so much we decided to stay an extra couple of days’
‘And then we decided to get married.” David sounded very satisfied by that state of affairs, his Texas drawl putting emphasis on the word married.”
‘congratulations. I’m sure you’ll be very happy,” said the man for whom the word “commitment” was considered equivalent to a four-letter word of the worst order.
Elisa ignored him while the couple thanked him for his good wishes, bought the ring and the matching wedding bands that went with it and then left.
After they were gone, she busied herself arranging the jewelry in the case to disguise the hole left by the sold merchandise. She didn’t have anything else to put there and wouldn’t until after the auction.
There were no funds to buy more stones much less the gold to set them.
“Pretending I’m not here will not make me go away.”
She turned and faced him despising the physical impact his presence even now had on her body.
Her nipples tightened and she felt a reaction in her inmost being she had not had in twelve long months. It was the reaction of her body to its natural mate. Even if her mind and her heart detested him, her body insisted on behaving as if they had been created one for the other.
Not likely.
‘Why are you here?” As if she couldn’t guess.
She’d lived in Italy most of her adult life and her father was Sicilian. One thing she’d come to realize: Italian guilt was a heavy burden but Sicilian guilt was even heavier.
And Salvatore had a lot to feel guilty about. More than he knew. More than she would willingly tell him .
Did he want absolution? He shifted his six-foot-four-inch frame into a leaning position against one of the cases. your father sent me.”
‘papa?” Her heart contracted. ‘ls something wrong?” Dark eyes probed hers and she wanted to close the lids to protect her inmost thoughts from a man who saw too much while at the same time seeing far too little. He had seen her desire for him but had not recognized the love. He had seen her reticence about becoming involved but had been blind to the innocence that had spawned it.
In the end he had seen her pregnancy, but not his own imminent fatherhood in it.
He sighed now, as if what he saw in her eyes bothered him. bother than the fact you have not come home in over a year?”
‘sicily is not my home.”
‘lt is where your father lives.”
‘And his wife.”
‘your sister also.”
Yes, Annemarie lived with her parents still. Only three years younger than Elisa’s twenty-five years, Annemarie showed no signs of wanting to move out and make it on her own in the world.
Shawna, Elisa’s mother, would be appalled, just as she had been by even the slightest inclination to cling shown by her own daughter.
Elisa had been raised to be fiercely independent. Her sister had been cosseted in true Sicilian tradition. ‘Annemarie will probably live at home until she marries.”
‘This is not a bad thing.”
Elisa shrugged. ‘To each her own.” She was pleased with her life in the small town outside of Rome. Her job allowed her to travel at least when there were the funds to do so and she had no one to dictate to her. No one at all.
‘The announcement buzzer did not go off when I entered the store.”