‘Thank you—that is encouraging.’ Luca paused. Then, ‘We must take care of him—all of us,’ he said.
Giuseppe nodded. ‘Indeed.’ He inclined his head.
Luca smiled with the familiarity of one who had run tame here all his life. Giuseppe was dedicated to Matteo, and Luca knew he could trust him implicitly.
‘Don’t announce me,’ he said. ‘I’ll go straight in.’
He did, seeing immediately that Matteo was seated in his familiar place in the library, in a leather armchair, with a rug over his knees and a marquetry table at his side bearing a newspaper, a number of books and a jug of water and a glass. Luca let his eyes sweep over him. Illness was visible in the lines around his mouth, in his thin cheeks, but Matteo’s expression lightened immediately.
‘Luca, my boy! I thought I heard that monstrous car of yours!’
Luca laughed. ‘A dead giveaway, I know,’ he said, coming forward, taking the outstretched hand, then settling himself down in the armchair facing Matteo’s.
Giuseppe entered with a tray of coffee, and when he had departed Luca poured Matteo and himself a cup. Then he looked at Matteo.
‘Now,’ he said, striving to keep his voice light, ‘tell me how you are.’
Matteo met his eyes full on. ‘You know how I am, Luca. As do I. I am dying. But as the poet says…’ his eyes rested on the younger man ‘…I am dying “with a little patience”. Enough patience,’ he said, ‘to put my affairs in order. It is time that happened—more than time.’
He glanced at the clock on the mantel, a gilded and ornate nineteenth-century antique. Ticking the seconds away. The hours. The remainder of Matteo’s life.
‘More than time,’ he said again.
* * *
Bianca, just getting home from work, opened the main front door of the house she lived in, glancing at the mail rack. Normally the only contents for her were mailshots or any official communications that still came by post. The envelope she lifted out now seemed to be neither. The address was handwritten in flowing copperplate, the envelope embossed.
She headed upstairs with the bag of groceries she’d picked up on her way from the bus stop. Once inside her own flat, she slit the envelope open, drawing out the thick, folded sheet of paper inside and flattening it out. She frowned. It seemed to be from a firm of solicitors. As her eyes moved down the typewritten contents, her frown deepened.
What on earth—?
Nonplussed, she lifted her eyes, staring out of the small window in her kitchenette. What possible reason could a posh firm of London lawyers have for asking her to get in touch with them? Still nonplussed, she fetched her phone from her handbag, which she had deposited on the table in the living room.
Five minutes later she still had no explanation—only an appointment to call at their offices the next day. As to why…
No possible reason came to her.
* * *
Luca was back on the autostrada, heading for Rome. It was more than a two-hour drive away, and he had a dinner engagement. He’d spent the previous night at his own home, seeing to the various matters that arose at the extensive estate he’d inherited. As well as the ancestralpalazzo, it came with several farms, vineyards and woodlands, plus various local enterprises from wineries to timber yards. He employed a highly competent estate manager—inherited from his father who, as a far-flung diplomat, had not himself been able to take on hands-on management—and Luca, too, pursuing his banking career in Rome, was more than happy to confine his own role to that simply of overseer.
Not that he did not look forward to one day basing himself at thepalazzo…making it a family home once more.
When he married.
Because of course he would marry—at some point.
He was an only child—an only son—and he must look to the future. Cousins were all very well, but they were remoteand distant. No, he must marry himself and generate the next generation. The next Visconte.
Though aristocratic titles in Republican Italy were not official, in his circles they were still used socially. And even though he did not emphasise his own, it meant something to him. Not everyone understood that.
He felt his mind dragged back, as if a hook had caught at it, skewing his thoughts.
An image hovered.
Flaming Titian hair, emerald-green eyes set in a face that had taken his breath away. Abella figurathat combined slim hips and slender waist with pleasingly generous breasts. Breasts that had peaked even more pleasingly beneath his palms as he’d freed them from the confines of the low-cut, clinging outfit she’d donned that evening simply to give him the pleasure of removing it from her.
His pleasure—and hers. Because she had matched him. As hungry for him as he had been for her. As eager for him to strip her down as she was to strip him likewise. She’d been open in her desire for him, revelling in it, wanting everything he was only too happy to bestow upon her. Wanting everything about him. Wanting too much—