She all but snatched it back, and with a rasp in her throat turned and headed along the corridor, her pace more rapid than required. He watched her until she’d disappeared inside her own bedroom, shutting the door firmly. She had not looked back, or said anything else, but the stiff set of her shoulders told him why.
Luca’s mood suddenly improved, and he strolled downstairs.
* * *
Once again, Bianca was sitting in the passenger seat of Luca’s car. She vaguely recognised the distinctive logo on the long, lean bonnet—it was one of the latest supercars, she knew, and its styling matched its powerful engine with a characteristic throaty roar as Luca accelerated along theautostrada, effortlessly overtaking humbler vehicles.
Her mouth compressed. The car was like him. Sleek, powerful, expensive…and gorgeous to look at.
All the qualities that I fell for hook, line and sinker when I first set eyes on him. Knocking me sideways with my first glance. Making me go ‘Wow!’ and catch my breath, my mouth practically falling open.
Her eyes slid sideways to him as he overtook yet another vehicle. It was a guilty pleasure to look at him. Sheacknowledged that. Reluctantly, resentfully… But still true. She felt a stab of anguish, Oh, God,whydid he still have this power over her?
No answer came.
The low burring of a mobile phone penetrated her troubling thoughts as he sped along the autostrada. It was hers, not his, she realised. She picked up her handbag from the footwell, getting out her phone and glancing at it.
‘Excuse me,’ she said, ‘but I must take this.’ Her voice warmed as she spoke to her caller. ‘Andrew. Hi! No, this is a good time. I’m being driven. Have you had a chance yet to see what I sent you?’
Beside her, she could see Luca had stiffened. Five minutes later, when she’d hung up, he turned towards her. There was an open question in his glance. Astonishment behind it. She knew the reason for it.
‘As you probably took in,’ she said dryly, replacing her phone in her handbag, leaving it on her lap, ‘I work at an environmental science consultancy. That was my boss, Dr Andrew Stevens, who was very understanding when I told him about my uncle’s diagnosis and prognosis. I have been very kindly given an indefinite leave of absence, but I’m using my spare time, when Matteo’s resting, to put in some research and collate some information from various reports, surveys and scholarly papers into specialist briefing notes for our team.’
‘On environmental science?’ Luca’s voice was expressionless.
‘On environmental science, yes,’ Bianca echoed.
His gaze had, perforce, gone back to the road, but she went on speaking. Her own voice had an odd quality to it, she thought. Part defiant—part defensive.
‘Luca, six years ago, when you told me that as well as being common-as-muck I was also pig-ignorant—yes, I know you never used those actual words, but believe me that was whatI heard—it hit home. Itreallyhit home. It made me angry, as well as hurt—and I wanted to fight back. Oh, you were gone, and I wasn’t getting you back—I knew that. But I wanted… I don’t know… I wanted to show you—prove you wrong! I realised I couldn’t do anything about being common-as-muck, but Icoulddo something about being pig-ignorant. So I did. Ididdo something about it.’
She paused a moment and he glanced at her again. Her hands were clenched over the handles of her handbag as she went on, not looking at him but out through the windscreen, dead ahead.
‘I hated school. I told you as much, I remember. I thought I was too smart to need it. That I was fine not knowing all that “stupid stuff” as I thought it. But you threw a light on me that for the first time in my life I didn’t like. So…’ She swallowed. ‘I enrolled in my local further education college…signed up for some classes. I didn’t know what I wanted to study, but eco stuff was popular, so I went for that. And—amazingly—I took to it. Got really interested. I passed the exams I needed and then…’
She took another breath.
‘And then I went to uni. I went as a mature student, to an east London campus, and I went and I stayed the course. A year ago I got my degree—Bachelor of Science—and then I got a job as a junior researcher at the consultancy I work for. And… Well, that’s it, really. I find it fascinating, and sometimes I have a hard time remembering just how pig-ignorant I was when you knew me.’
Her voice changed.
‘The thing about education is that when you start learning about one thing you realise there’s a hell of lot of other interesting stuff out there. Being a student exposed me to things I’d never paid any attention to before—like cultural stuff and history, arty things.’ An acid note crept into her voice now. ‘It was while I was a student that I also realised that the world wasa lot more welcoming if I spoke RP English. I got taken more seriously…was much more accepted. It’s hypocritical, I know, but it’s made it easier to progress in my career. It shouldn’t, but it does.’
She paused again. Then, ‘People are quick to judge—for good or ill.’
For a long moment Luca was silent. Then he spoke. ‘And I was one of them, wasn’t I, Bianca?’
‘Yes, you were. But…’ She took a breath. ‘Your condemnation did me good in the end, didn’t it? Without it—without you dumping me so brutally and making no bones about why I would never fit into your elite world—I doubt I’d have been angry enough…hurt enough…to do what I did. Achieve what I have. I’d probably still be pulling pints in the East End.’
She could see Luca’s hands tighten on the steering wheel. When he spoke there was an edge in his voice, a self-condemning one.
‘That gives me a degree of comfort I don’t deserve.’
‘No,’ she agreed, ‘you don’t deserve it. But you can take the credit for doing good by me in the end.’
‘I never said you were stupid, Bianca, at least allow me that.’
‘Just not fit for the elite world you live in.’ She knew her voice had gone back to being flat again.