Loe raamatut: «Husband By Necessity»

“Nothing’s changed.”

“You can’t say that,” Bernardo said flatly. “Everything has changed.”

Angie tried to turn away but he took hold of her shoulders and kept her facing him. If she’d have shown the slightest sign of softening, he would have drawn her into his arms and kissed her ardently. And then, even he, who was uneasy with words, would have tried to tell her of the bittersweet happiness that had possessed him ever since he’d suspected that she was to bear his child. He was an old-fashioned man and, above all, a Sicilian. To create a child with a beloved woman was a joy that wiped out all else.

He stared at her. “The sooner our marriage takes place, the better.”

“Us? Get married?” she echoed. “Why would we do that?”

He was floundering again. Angie’s eyes were full of a cool appraisal that baffled him. “Because we are having a baby,” he said.

Dear Reader,

Being married to an Italian, I take a special delight in writing about Italian men—the most fascinating and endearing men on earth. I’ve enjoyed telling the stories of the three Martelli brothers.

Although linked by kinship, they are all different. Lorenzo, the youngest, is a merry charmer. Renato, the eldest, is head of the family, a man of confidence and power. Bernardo is their half brother. Only part of him belongs to the family. The other part is a loner who finds it hard to accept love.

And then there is Sicily, their home, one of the most beautiful places on earth, where people’s true passions rise to the surface, giving them the courage to follow their hearts.

Husband by Necessity is the story of Bernardo—who has to fight for that courage after nearly throwing away the love of his life—and Angie, a remarkable woman who dares everything to lead him into the light.

With best wishes,

Husband by Necessity
Lucy Gordon

www.millsandboon.co.uk

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

EPILOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

‘ANGIE,’ Heather called, not for the first time, ‘the cab’s here.’

‘I’m ready,’ Angie called back, not entirely truthfully. She would be ready when she’d finished applying her eye make-up and just touched her lips. It was an article of faith with her not to travel unless looking her best, even when time was fast running out.

For ten minutes the cab had been standing in a downpour outside the London house that the two young women shared. The driver had hauled the last of the luggage down the steps, leaving only Heather, standing by the door, frantically calling back into the house,

‘Angie, the cab!’

‘I know, I know,’ Angie called back. ‘You told me.’

‘I know I told you. I told you ages ago and you haven’t moved.’

‘Coming, coming, coming,’ Angie muttered frantically to herself. ‘Have I got everything? Well, if I haven’t, it can’t be helped. Any minute now, she’s going to kill me.’ She raised her voice and called back to Heather. ‘Tell the man to take the bags out.’

Heather sounded as though she were dancing with frustration. ‘He’s already done that. Angie, I’m going to Sicily to get married, and if you don’t mind I’d prefer to get there before the wedding.’

‘But that’s not for a week, is it?’ Angie asked, appearing at that moment.

‘Well, I’d like not to cut it too fine, and that includes not missing the plane.’

It was the perfect day for leaving London. The rain poured down in buckets, making the journey from the front door to the cab a mad dash. The two young women made it, laughing with delight at escaping, at being on their way to the sun, laughing because they were young and happy and one of them was getting married; because life was good despite the rain.

‘Look at that!’ Angie said when the door was shut behind them. ‘Have you ever seen such rain? Oh, it’s good to be going.’ She saw her friend eyeing her askance and added penitently, ‘Sorry I kept you waiting.’

‘I don’t know how you ever got to be a doctor,’ Heather said. ‘You’re the most disorganised person I know.’

‘Ah, but I’m not a disorganised doctor,’ Angie said with truth. ‘It’s just that in my private life I tended to be—you know.’

‘Birdbrained, scatty and infuriating,’ Heather said.

Angie stretched happily. ‘I really need a holiday. I’m worn out.’

‘I should think you are. It must be tiring running away from all your admirers, Bill and Steve and—’

‘Bill and Steve?’ Angie looked aghast.

‘You do remember them don’t you?’

‘Oh, yes. Last month. History.’

‘Do they know they’re history?’ Heather asked.

‘I tried to break it to them gently,’ Angie said. She added, with a touch of wounded innocence, ‘I always do.’

‘So who was that man who came by last night begging you to come back soon?’

‘That was George—I think.’

Heather chuckled. ‘Honestly Angie, you’re incorrigible.’

‘No I’m not. I’m extremely corrigible—whatever that means. Anyway, I need a holiday because I’ve been working so hard. Accident and Emergency is exhausting enough, but when it’s night duty as well—’ She mopped her brow and looked plaintive.

They had shared a house in London for six years. Heather was quietly lovely and her nature was reserved and modest. The attraction of opposites had decreed that her dearest friend should be Angie, a radiant social butterfly who seemed to regard the world of men as provided for her personal entertainment.

At this moment she was contemplating the pleasures to come. ‘Sunshine, sparkling blue sea, miles of golden sand, and lots of gorgeous Sicilian young men, all liberally endowed with S.A. Or at the very least, C.H.’

Angie divided male attractiveness into two categories—S.A., sex appeal, and C.H., come hither. As far as Heather could understand her friend’s marking system, S.A. was the more immediately exciting, while C.H. was the more subtle and intriguing. Since Angie was, herself, liberally endowed with both qualities, she was in a good position to judge.

‘You make C.H. sound like the poor relation,’ Heather objected now.

‘Not really. But it takes time, and I don’t have time. S.A. is better for short stretches.’

‘Well, you behave yourself.’

‘No way,’ Angie said at once. ‘I don’t come on holiday to behave myself. I come to get a sun tan, fall in love, sample the local delights and act outrageously. Otherwise what’s the point?’

It was easy to believe that she meant every word. Angie was daintily built, barely five foot three, with blonde hair and deep blue eyes. Her nature was romantic and impulsive. She became easily infatuated and, since she looked, according to one besotted admirer, ‘Like the fairy on the Christmas tree,’ she had no trouble inspiring infatuation in return. The result had been a string of intense, short-lived relationships which had caused Heather to describe Angie as a serial flirt.

But appearances were deceptive. Dr Angela Wendham’s love affairs were brief because her true, enduring love was her work. Her ethereal look concealed a brain that had carried her through medical school with honours. She’d gone on to four exhausting years post-graduate training, including stints in Accident and Emergency departments, coping not merely with casualties but with drunks and vicious louts. She was skilled at dealing with both kinds of crises.

But now she planned only to enjoy herself. Heather was about to marry Lorenzo Martelli, a young Sicilian. Angie was to be the bridesmaid, and since it was her first real holiday since she-couldn’t-remember-when, she was going to make the most of it.

It was still raining when they reached the airport. They got quickly into the main hall, pushing a trolley piled high with bags, most of which were Angie’s. Her petite figure and striking beauty repaid good dressing, and she happily gave them their due.

As they were waiting to check in there was a strangled cry of, ‘Angie!’ from the crowd, and a damp young man appeared beside them. In his hand he bore one perfect red rose.

‘I couldn’t let you go without saying goodbye,’ he said soulfully, offering it to her. ‘You won’t forget me, will you?’

‘Of course I won’t,’ Angie said, deeply moved. ‘Oh, Fred—’

‘Frank,’ the young man said edgily.

‘Frank, you’ll be in my thoughts every moment I’m away.’

Frank seized her hand and kissed it. Luckily they reached the head of the queue and in the check-in formalities he was forced to retreat. Angie couldn’t meet her friend’s eye.

‘The sooner I get you safely out of the country the better,’ Heather said with feeling.

It was raining even harder as their plane took off, climbing into the clouds. But then they broke through into light, and they both pressed eagerly against the window until the air hostess brought them a snack.

‘I can’t get my head around you being swept off your feet,’ Angie told Heather. ‘Much more my crazy style than yours.’

‘Yes, it’s not like sturdy, dependable me, is it?’ Heather mused. ‘Dashing off to live in another country, practically another world.’

Angie was diplomatically silent but she couldn’t help wondering about Peter who had been Heather’s fiancé for a year before dumping her a week before the wedding.

‘I’m not on the rebound,’ Heather said, reading her un-spoken thoughts. ‘I love Lorenzo, and we’re going to make a wonderful life together in Sicily.’

‘You’re right. New horizons. Lovely.’ Angie’s face assumed a look in which mischief and innocence were evenly matched. ‘You did say Lorenzo had two brothers, didn’t you?’

‘I’ve only met one of them, Renato.’

‘Yes, you told me. I can’t believe that any man would behave like that, actually coming to your counter at Gossways, pretending to be a customer, just so that he could look you up and down.’

Gossways was the most luxurious department store in London, and Heather had been working there, selling perfumes.

‘I don’t blame him for wanting to meet the woman his brother was courting,’ Heather said now. ‘It’s just the way he did it. Not a hint about who he was, and then, when Lorenzo took me to meet him at the Ritz that night, there he sat, just waiting for me to walk into his lair.’

The meeting had been dramatic. Renato Martelli had approved of Heather, but in such a high-handed manner that she’d stormed out of the Ritz, nearly killing both of them under the wheels of a taxi. In the high drama of that evening Lorenzo had begged her to marry him, and she had relented. Now, barely a month later, she was on her way to Sicily for the marriage. She had, as Angie said, been swept off her feet.

‘Tell me about the other brother,’ Angie said now.

‘His name’s Bernardo, and he’s their half-brother. Their father had an affair with a woman from one of the mountain villages, called Marta Tornese, and Bernardo was their son. They died together in a car crash, and Lorenzo’s mother took the boy in and raised him with her own sons.’

‘My goodness! What a woman!’

The plane was banking, showing them the triangular island of Sicily, golden and beautiful against the blue of the sea. In another moment they had started the final descent to Palermo Airport.

As they came out of Customs, Heather broke into a smile and waved at two men standing apart. From Heather’s description Angie knew that the glamorous young giant with light brown curly hair was Lorenzo, her friend’s fiancé. She glanced at the other and felt a smile begin deep inside her.

He wasn’t a tall man, something which the petite Angie greatly appreciated. She hated getting a crick in her neck. So it was a mark in his favour that he was only five foot eight. His shape earned him a good review too. Ten out of ten, she thought, for lean wiriness, narrow hips and a look of hard, compact maleness that sent an uncompromising message to the woman who knew how to read it.

So far, so enjoyable.

It was when she got closer and saw his dark, serious eyes that her inner smile faltered a little. There was something about this man that she couldn’t smile at, something that sent a shiver of excited anticipation up her spine.

As Heather and Lorenzo threw themselves into each other’s arms the young man approached Angie, smiling very slightly. ‘I am Bernardo Tornese,’ he said in a deep voice.

Tornese, she noticed, not Martelli.

She took the hand he was holding out, and felt the whipcord strength of him, even in that light grip. ‘I’m Angela Wendham,’ she said.

‘It is a great pleasure to meet you, Signorina Wendham.’

She could have listened to his voice forever. It was dark, resonant and beautiful. ‘Just Angie,’ she said, smiling.

‘Angie, I am very glad to meet you.’

She sensed that he was studying her, just as she was doing with him. That was fine. She knew she didn’t have to fear being looked at, even when she’d just got off a plane.

The lovers had finished their greeting and disentangled themselves, a little self-consciously. Heather introduced Angie to her future husband, who then said, ‘This is my brother, Bernardo.’

‘Half-brother,’ murmured Bernardo at once.

The drive to the Martelli house just outside Palermo took half an hour. There was so much beauty about Sicily to be taken in that Angie became dazed by the profusion. The hot streets of Palermo soon gave way to the countryside with its riot of flowers and the gleaming blue sea that came more into view as they climbed higher. At last a great three-storied building came into sight, and Lorenzo, from the back seat, called, ‘There it is.’

The Residenza stood on an incline overlooking the sea. It was a magnificent mediaeval edifice of yellow stone. In their own way the Martellis were princes and they lived appropriately.

‘That’s your home?’ Angie gasped.

‘That’s the Residenza Martelli,’ Bernardo replied. He was concentrating on the road, and didn’t seem aware of the quick look Angie gave him.

A moment later they had swung into the courtyard, and there was Baptista Martelli just emerging onto the great steps to wait for them. She was a small, frail-looking woman in her sixties, who looked as though life had aged her prematurely. Her hair was white and her face delicately beautiful. Angie regarded her with interest as Heather’s future mother in law, but she was also fascinated to know what kind of a woman took in her husband’s illegitimate offspring and reared him with her own sons. Baptista greeted her warmly, although Angie couldn’t help reading the message in her eyes.

A will of steel, she thought. She’ll cover it with charm, but it will always be there.

But then Baptista smiled at her, and her sharp eyes softened to warmth.

A dangerous enemy, Angie thought, but a wonderful friend.

She noticed the exuberant hug Lorenzo gave his mother, while Bernardo contented himself with a peck on the cheek. His behaviour was faultless, yet the manner was courteous rather than loving.

A maid was detailed to show the two young women to the bedroom they were to share, and then bring them to the terrace where Baptista would be waiting for them with refreshments.

Their room had two large four-poster beds, hung with white net curtains. More net curtains hung at the floor-length windows that led out onto the broad terrace overlooking a magnificent garden. Angie, who was a demon gardener when she could get the time, promised herself a leisurely exploration of that garden. Beyond it the land stretched away, reaching to dark, misty mountains on the horizon.

The maid was unpacking their cases. Angie hurriedly changed out of the serviceable jeans she’d worn for travelling, into a light, floaty dress of a blue that turned her eyes to violet. When they were both ready the maid led them out onto the terrace and round to the front of the house where Baptista was seated at a small rustic table, laden with refreshments. Bernardo and Lorenzo were also there, handing them to their seats and filling their glasses with Marsala.

‘May I get you something to eat?’ Bernardo enquired, indicating the candied fruit ring, zabaglione, Sicilian cheesecake and coffee ice with whipped cream.

‘My goodness,’ Angie said faintly.

‘Baptista is the world’s greatest hostess,’ he said. ‘When she doesn’t know what her guests will like, she orders everything, just in case.’

‘Baptista’, Angie noticed. Not ‘my mother’. She remembered how quickly he’d said ‘half-brother’ at the airport, and for a moment she felt a frisson in the air. Her instincts were telling her that this was a complicated man who carried his own tensions everywhere. She felt her curiosity rising.

He helped her to food and wine, and gently asked if she had everything she needed, but he took little part in the general conversation. Angie thought she would never have known him to be a brother of Lorenzo, about whom so much was light, from his curly hair to his smile. Everything about Bernardo was dark. His skin had the weather beaten swarthiness of a man who lived amongst the elements. His eyes were so dark they seemed almost black, and his hair was truly black.

His face intrigued her. When in repose it had a set, rock-like quality. His eyes were deep set and full of secrets, his mouth slightly heavy. But it became mobile and changeable as soon as he spoke, and animation glowed from him.

At last Baptista indicated that she would like to be left alone with Heather. Lorenzo slipped away and Bernardo turned to Angie. ‘May I show you the gardens?’ he asked.

‘I should love that,’ she said happily, taking the hand he offered.

The great garden of the Residenza was a show place, tended by a dozen gardeners. At its centre was a large stone fountain featuring mythical beasts spouting water in all directions. From this relayed a dozen paths, some wandering past flower beds, others curving mysteriously into the trees. Bernardo conscientiously pointed out every variety of plant, and she had the feeling that he had learned them as a duty. It was as though this magnificent place forced him to be something he wasn’t. Angie’s curiosity increased.

‘Have you and Heather known each other very long?’ he asked.

‘About six years. She had a job in a paper shop just around the corner from where I was doing my medical training.’

‘Ah, you’re a nurse?’

‘I’m a doctor,’ Angie said, slightly nettled at his assumption.

‘Forgive me,’ he said hastily. ‘Sicily is still a little old-fashioned in some respects.’

‘Evidently.’

They walked side by side for a few minutes. ‘Are you annoyed with me?’ he asked at last.

‘No,’ she said too quickly.

‘I think you are. Try not to be. I spend my life in the mountains where people still hark back to an earlier age. To you, perhaps, we would appear rough and uncivilised.’

He didn’t smile, but there was a gentleness in his manner that won her over. Her curiosity about him was growing.

‘I’m not annoyed,’ she said. ‘It was silly of me to make a fuss about nothing. I was telling you about Heather. We got to know and like each other, and eventually moved in together. We’ve shared a home for several years now.’

‘Can you tell me something about her? She’s so different from—that is, Lorenzo—’ He stopped in some confusion.

It was odd, she thought, that this man from a wealthy background should seem so shy and ill at ease. Whatever else he might be, he wasn’t a smooth-tongued charmer, and she liked him better for it.

‘Lorenzo has played the field with ladies of easy virtue and you’re wondering what Heather is like,’ she supplied cheerfully.

Bernardo coloured and pulled himself together. ‘Since Renato approves of her I know she’s not a lady of easy virtue,’ he said hastily. ‘He speaks of her in the highest terms.’

‘She doesn’t speak of him in the highest terms,’ Angie said darkly. ‘She says he behaved outrageously.’

‘Yes, I’ve heard the story about that evening. I think those two will always be at odds, with Lorenzo in the middle, being pulled each way.’

‘I’m interested to meet Renato. What’s he like?’

‘He’s the head of the family,’ Bernardo said with a hint of austerity in his tone.

‘And that really means something here, I guess.’

‘Doesn’t it mean something in your country?’

‘Not really,’ Angie said, considering. ‘Of course, we all respect my father, but that’s because he’s been a doctor for forty years and helped thousands of people.’

‘Is that why you became a doctor too?’

‘We all did, my two brothers and me. And my mother was a doctor when she was alive. She died while I was still doing my training.’

‘Then your parents founded a dynasty.’

Angie laughed. ‘I wish Dad could hear you. He never encouraged us to follow his footsteps. I remember him saying, “Whatever you do, don’t go into medicine. It’s a dog’s life and you won’t get any sleep for years.” Of course, we all did. But I must tell you—’ she eyed Bernardo mischievously, ‘that in England a man doesn’t get respect just for being a man. In fact—’

‘Go on,’ Bernardo said with a smile far back in his dark eyes. ‘You are longing to say something that will be “one in the eye” for me.’

‘When I took my medical exams, it was a point of honour with me to get higher marks than either of my brothers. I did too.’ She giggled as gleefully as a child. ‘They were so mad.’

The smile had reached Bernardo’s mouth. He was regarding her with delight. ‘And your Papa?’

‘Before the exams he said, “Go for it!” and afterwards he said, “Good on you!”’

‘And what did your brothers say?’

‘Before or after they’d put arsenic in my soup? They just doubled up with laughter at the thought of what I had in front of me.’

‘And what was that?’

‘Four years of post-graduate work. General medicine, general surgery, accident and emergency, obstetrics, gynaecology, paediatrics, psychiatry and general practice.’

‘It sounds terrible,’ Bernardo said, half laughing, half frowning.

‘It was. I think it’s made as nightmarish as possible to discourage the weaklings. But I’m no weakling. Look at that.’ She clenched her fist and bent her arm in a ‘Mr Muscleman’ pose.

Bernardo laid tentative fingers on the barely perceptible bulge. ‘I’m terrified,’ he said with a smile. ‘All these qualifications, and you’re only—’ he regarded her warily. He’d been going to say ‘only a little girl’ but decided hastily against it.

‘I’m twenty-eight years old,’ she declared, ‘and a lot tougher than I look.’

‘You could scarcely be less,’ Bernardo observed, with an admiring glance at her fairy figure.

She laughed and ran a few steps ahead of him to where the path vanished into a tunnel of trees, and turned, skipping backwards, teasing him. As holiday romances went, this one showed signs of going very well. He didn’t run after her as another man might have done, but simply held out his hand, watching her, until she stopped skipping and laid her fingers lightly in his palm.

Hand in hand they strolled among the trees, while a sense of enchantment crept over her. It was nothing he said or did. He wasn’t the most handsome man in the world. He wasn’t even the most handsome man she’d romanced, but his looks pleased her deeply. The smile that had started at the airport was growing by the minute.

‘I think this garden is wonderful,’ she sighed, gazing around her.

‘Yes, it’s perfect,’ he agreed.

A touch of constraint in his voice made her look at him quickly. ‘But you don’t like it?’

‘I’m—not comfortable with perfection,’ he said after a moment. ‘For me, it is too precise. A man cannot feel free in a place like this.’ He checked himself abruptly and gave a polite smile.

‘Where can he feel free?’ she asked, her interest growing every moment.

‘When he’s up high among the birds, where the golden eagles fly so close that it feels as though he’s their brother.’

‘Golden eagles?’ she echoed eagerly. ‘Where?’

‘In my home in the mountains. I come here very little. My real home is Montedoro.’

‘Let me see—monte means a mountain, and “oro” is gold. Is that right?’

‘You know Italian?’

‘My mother’s sister married an Italian. When I was a child we visited them every summer.’

‘And you are right. It is “mountain of gold”.’

‘Because of the golden eagles?’

‘Partly. But also because it’s the first place the sun touches at dawn, and the last place it leaves at sunset. It’s the most beautiful place on earth.’

‘It sounds like it,’ Angie said wistfully.

He gave her a curious look. ‘Would you—?’ He broke off with a grunt of embarrassed laughter. ‘That is, I wonder if—?’

‘Yes?’ she encouraged him.

Bernardo drew a deep breath while Angie waited eagerly for what she was sure he was going to say.

‘Hey—Bernardo.’

He came back to himself with a start. Angie had the strangest feeling of waking from a dream. And there was Lorenzo, coming along the path, hailing them. ‘Time to get ready for dinner,’ he called.

As Angie returned to the house with the two of them she was disappointed but not discouraged. Bernardo wanted to show her his home, she was certain of it, and she was every moment growing more eager to learn all about him. The evening lay ahead, and if she couldn’t tempt that invitation out of him, she was losing her touch.

She joined Heather in their room and threw herself onto her bed, putting her hands behind her head, with a sigh of pleasure.

‘C.H. or S.A?’

‘S.A.,’ Angie said happily. ‘Definitely S.A.’

Heather looked alarmed. ‘You be careful!’

‘I don’t know what you mean,’ Angie said innocently.

‘Oh, yes, you do. I’ve seen you when you’ve set your heart on twisting a man around your little finger. You’ve got all the tried and tested tricks and a few you invented. But Bernardo doesn’t strike me as a man to be fooled with.’

‘He isn’t,’ Angie confirmed. ‘He’s terribly serious and thoughtful.’ She chuckled. ‘That’s why he’s going to be such a challenge.’

‘I give up.’

‘Yes, do, darling. I’m beyond redemption.’

For dinner she wore a dress of blues and greens in the kind of glowing shades that belonged on a peacock. Many blondes couldn’t have got away with it, but Angie looked like a star. She wondered if Bernardo would think so.

She had her answer as she descended the great stairway a little behind Heather, and had the satisfaction of seeing Bernardo look right past the bride, the official guest of honour, to seek out herself. There was even more satisfaction in the subtle change that came over him at the sight of her. He became more alive, every inch of him responding to her as intensely as she was responding to him. She felt a tingle of happy expectancy deep inside as he took her hand and began to take her around his friends and family, introducing her.

Now that she had a chance to study Lorenzo more closely she realised how delightful he was, and she could understand her serious minded friend being bowled over by him. Perhaps he was a touch immature, but his looks and charm were both overwhelming, and no doubt he would soon grow up.

But she couldn’t warm to Renato, who struck her as an unpleasant, cynical man, harsh and overbearing. He was tall and splendidly built, but although there was no doubt about his physical attractions, and he greeted her pleasantly, she disliked him, and she could see that her friend was going to have to fight him some time soon.

There were two long tables, each seating thirty. The Martellis were the great family of the area, and the wedding was the event of the year. Baptista headed one table, with the bride and groom. Renato and Bernardo headed the other. Renato was an accomplished host, but Bernardo gave most of his attention to the lady by his side. Perhaps this was fair, as, being English, she needed to have Sicilian cuisine explained to her.

‘Bean fritters?’ he offered. ‘Or perhaps you would prefer stuffed rice ball fritters, or orange salad?’

‘That’s just one course?’ Angie asked, wide-eyed.

‘Certainly. The next course is the rice and pasta dishes, pasta with cauliflower, sardines—’

‘Yum, yum. Lead me to it.’

Like many petite women Angie could eat like a starved lion without gaining an ounce. This she proceeded to do, to Bernardo’s delight. He watched entranced as she demolished a dish of rabbit in sweet and sour sauce, then pressed her to fried pastries with ricotta cheese, which she accepted with relish.

‘I have never seen a woman eat like you,’ he said admiringly. Then horrified realisation dawned, ‘No, I didn’t mean it like that! I meant—’ He stopped, for Angie was convulsed. Her laughter had a rich, resonant quality that made him smile. He felt his embarrassment evaporate. She understood, and everything was all right. Of course it was.

‘I’m an awkward clod,’ he said. ‘I never know the right thing to say.’

She made a face. ‘Who wants to be saying the right thing all the time? It’s more interesting if people say what they really mean.’

‘Some of the things I say and mean disconcert people,’ he admitted ruefully.

‘I can imagine.’

The meal was ending, the guests were rising from the table and splitting into groups. Bernardo drew her aside, oblivious to his duties to the other guests. Nor was he the only brother being a poor host. Renato had just returned after twice leaving the table to take a phone call. Bernardo saw her looking in his direction.

‘Renato is the Worker of the family and Lorenzo the Charmer,’ he said.

‘And what are you?’

‘I don’t know,’ he said simply.

He took two glasses from a passing waiter, handed one to her and led the way through a small side door. He hadn’t asked if she wanted to draw apart with him, but there had been no need. Angie slipped her hand in his and went gladly.