never meant to hurt you, Catherine,” he said, his voice suddenly dropping to a whisper. “I told you that every time I called. What happened to me wasn’t what I’d expected in my life. It was a difficult time.”
“Was it, Dante? Was it really?”
Briefly, he looked at a loss, but that passed all too quickly. “You don’t know a damned thing about it!”
“Don’t I? Because what I seem to recall is that you left medicine and became a race-car driver. People don’t just do something like that, Dante. You know, go to medical school all those years, become a surgeon, then drop all that to spend your life driving around a race track. And, oh, by the way, forget to mention that to the person they intend marrying.”
“And I did apologize for that. Besides, it’s not like you didn’t know my family was in racing. That I’d had a brief try at it when I was younger.”
“And your brother was better, but that was fine with you because your true passion was medicine. You told me all that, Dante. Silly me, I believed it.”
“My father needed me. My family needed me.”
“They needed you to make a worldwide announcement that you were returning to the sport before you even mentioned it to the woman who thought she was marrying a doctor? Or were you ever really planning on marrying me? Maybe that was just another of those conveniences we had, something to make us feel a little more proper about our relationship?”
“I told you—”
“What you told me, Dante, was that you had to race. That was it. No alternatives in there for me.”
“My father was sick, Dario was gone, the entire Baldassare racing team was struggling. At the time I was barely able to get through it, and I coped the only way I knew how. I didn’t mean to hurt you, Catherine, but I’m not going to apologize any more because it’s wasted on you.”
“Yes, it is wasted because while maybe you didn’t mean to hurt me, you also didn’t mean to think about me through all of it. You left me out, Dante. Totally out. But so you’ll know, I wasn’t hurt.” Such a lie, and she knew, full well, that dauncy look was creeping into her eyes again. “Just a little disappointed, but I got over it.”
“Yes, you did, didn’t you? You went on and found yourself a magnificent life. You’ve done well for yourself, and I’m not surprised about that. You were…are…a brilliant doctor. I’m happy you got the life you deserved.”
What was there to say about that? Nothing to argue, nothing to snap at. This was a bit of the old Dante, the one she’d never been able to resist, never been able to stay angry with for more than ten seconds. Damn it all, she still wanted to be angry. Wanted to snap at him, to argue with every little thing he said. But he’d just disarmed her, something he’d always been so brilliant at doing. He’d say something like he just had then they’d tumble into bed and…
Catherine cleared her throat. “I need a fresh look at your ankle, Dante. There’s a reason why you’re not healing as you should, a reason why you’re still having so much pain. The old X-rays your doctor in Tuscany sent didn’t show anything so I need a new look. With any luck I’ll figure out what’s going on, and by end of the day have you on a real road to recovery.” Then out her door, and out of her life. Again. But for good this time.
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