rule. Usually I’m here on the weekends only. It’s where I come to unwind.”
A shiver passed over her. “So I’ll be on my own after today?”
“No, Maeve. Until you feel more at home, I’ll stay with you.”
“In the same room and the same…bed?”
Is that what you’d like? he wanted to ask, beset by memories he almost wished he could forget. Once upon a time, they had shared such insatiable passion for each other. “You have your own room for as long as you want it, but I’ll never be far away if you need me,” he said instead, and congratulated himself on providing an answer that neither threatened her, nor shut the door on their resuming a more normal married life at some future point. Peruzzi would be proud of him.
“Oh,” she said, and he might almost have thought she sounded disappointed. “Well, that’s very nice and considerate of you. Thank you.”
“Prego.”
She inched a little closer. “Um…are my clothes and personal effects still here?”
“Yes,” he assured her. “Everything is exactly as you left it.” Except for the blood-soaked outfit she wore the day of the accident. That was one memory he wished he could erase and hoped she’d never recall. “Here’s Antonia now,” he continued, relieved to be able to change the subject as the housekeeper arrived on the scene. “She’ll take you to your suite and make sure you have everything you need.”
She exchanged a tentative smile with Antonia, then turned to him one last time. “Thank you again for everything you’ve done today.”
“It was nothing,” he said. “Sleep well and I’ll see you in the morning.”
As soon as the two women, one so sturdy, the other so frail, left the entrance hall and disappeared toward the lower left wing of the house where the guest bedrooms were located, he turned in the opposite direction and along the corridor that led to the library and his home office. Closing himself in the latter, he picked up the phone and called Giuliana, his sister, who lived next door.
“I was hoping I’d hear from you,” she said, picking up on the first ring. “Did Maeve arrive home safely?”
“She did.”
“And how is she? Is it as bad as we feared?”
“Ah, Giuliana!” Horrified, he heard his voice crack and had to take a moment to collect himself. “She’s fragile as spun glass, inside and out. The journey down here exhausted her. We got in just a few minutes ago and she went straight to bed.”
“Poor thing! I wish I could see her and tell her how much I love her and how glad I am to have her back among us.”
“I wish it, too. I wish you could bring her son home and have her look at him and recognize at once that she’s his mother. Sadly, the time’s not yet right.”
“I know, Dario. Small steps, isn’t that what her doctor said?”
“Yes, but not, I fear, as small as he’d like. Already she’s wormed too much information out of me and knows our marriage was on shaky ground. Not exactly the best way for us to start trying to put our lives back together, is it?”
“But it can be done if you love each other enough to fight for what you once had. The question is, do you?”
“I can’t speak for her, Giuliana.”
“Then speak for yourself. I know that the way you started out together wasn’t ideal, and that you married her because you believed it was the honorable thing to do and you had no other choice, but it seemed to me that you were making it work.”
“Until it all went horribly wrong.”
And therein lay the crux of the matter. Could either of them get past what had happened, or had they lost too much ground ever to trust each other again?
Seeming to read his thoughts, his sister said softly, “Maeve loves you, Dario. I am certain of that.”
“Are you?” he said wearily. “I wish I was. But I didn’t call to burden you with my doubts, I called to find out how you’re holding up having an extra child to care for. Is Sebastiano wearing you out?”
“Not in the least. Marietta is an enormous help. You were lucky to find so capable and willing a nanny. As for Cristina, she loves her little cousin and plays with him all the time. And he’s such a contented baby. He only ever cries if he’s hungry or tired, or needs to be changed.”
“He’s the one bright spot in this whole unfortunate business.”
“And too young to understand what’s happened.”
“Let’s hope he never will.” Dario paused. “Has anyone else in the family stopped by to see him?”
“If by that you mean our mother, then, yes. She came by this morning and again this afternoon. She’s quite adamant that he should be staying with her, and I’m equally adamant that he should not.”
“I’d hoped she’d go back to Milan with our father. The last thing Maeve needs right now is to run afoul of her.”
“Unfortunately, she seems set on staying here. But don’t worry, Dario. I can hold my own with her, as you very well know, and Lorenzo certainly can. He won’t stand for her interfering in our arrangement.”
That much he knew to be true. His mother might be a handful at times, but his brother-in-law was no more a man to be pushed around than Dario himself was. “I’m grateful to both of you for your support. Kiss my son good-night for me, will you? I’d come over and do it myself, but—”
“No,” his sister cut in. “Tonight, at least, it’s more important that you stay home in case Maeve needs you. It wouldn’t do for her to find herself alone before she gets her bearings.”
And how long before that happened, he wondered moodily, ending the call and pouring himself a stiff drink. It was all very fine for Arturo Peruzzi to counsel patience, but Dario had never been a particularly patient man. Already, after little more than an hour, his tolerance was tested to the limit as far as letting nature take its course in its own sweet time. He’d spent too many days neglecting work because he couldn’t concentrate. Too many evenings like this, with a bottle of single-malt Scotch for company. And a damn sight too many nights alone in a bed designed for two.
Irritably, he threw open the glass doors and stepped out onto the terrace. Night had fallen and the dozens of solar lights dotted throughout the garden and around the perimeter of the pool gleamed softly in the dark.
Once upon a time not so very long ago, Maeve had wanted him as much as he wanted her. They’d slipped naked into the warm, limpid depths of the private spa outside their bedroom and made love with an urgency that bordered on desperation. He’d buried his mouth against hers for fear that someone might hear her cries of surrender. He’d withheld his own pleasure in order to prolong hers, and finally come so hard and fast within the confines of her sleek, tight flesh that his heart almost stopped.
So why was he standing here alone now, hard and aching, and she was sleeping in a guest suite? Dannazione,
