* * *
Bianca took a sip of her citrus spritzer, welcoming its chilled, tangy fizz. They were sitting outside on the wide terrace, shaded by a sail parasol, and Luca was on the phone to Giuseppe, as he’d promised.
Her mood was strange. Almost melancholy.
She hadn’t wanted to come here…to see Luca’s ancestral home. But now she had seen it she was glad she had. Her words to him at the temple had been sincere. Having seen how he lived—what he called home—had showed her just how hopelessly unrealistic she’d been all those years ago. And although the realisation hurt—how could it not?—it seemed, it was also draining from her some of the six long years of anger at his dismissal. The anger that had possessed her ever since. A wound was finally cleansing itself. Was that what was happening?
If it is, then I must be glad of it—welcome it.
‘Let it go, Bianca,’Luca had told her.
Was that, finally, what she was doing? Was she able to do it?
But seeing Luca here, in his ancestral home, as beautiful as it was, was engendering other emotions within her. She could feel them plucking at her.
How wonderful it must be to have a place like this to call one’s home.
He belongs here—I can see that, now I’m seeing him here. In London he was only passing through—but here…here he is at home.
He had grown up here, come to manhood here—then endured the horror of losing both his parents so tragically and taken his father’s place as the Visconte.
And one day there will be a woman to take his mother’s place here.
One day Luca would bring his bride here—the woman he’d choose to spend his life with. He would make her hisviscontessa. He would present her with the heirloom betrothal ring that the jeweller had known all about. She would make her home here…be at home in Luca’s home, loved and cherished. She would be a fortunate woman…
A pang went through her, but she pushed it away. It was nothing to do with her…
Could never be.
She drew her thoughts back from that inevitable future to the present. Till then, what would Luca do? Amuse himself with passing affairs as he had once, in London, amused himself with her?
She pulled her thoughts away again. It was not sensible to think of that. Not sensible at all. For so many reasons.
Past and present.
No, she must not go there. Neither in the past nor in the present.
Yet as she watched him talk to Giuseppe in rapid Italian that was too fast for her to follow with her primitive grasp of thelanguage, her gaze still rested on him, unable to look away. Unwilling…
Again she felt it welling up inside her…that response to him—the same response that had always been there, unquenchable. She was as susceptible to him as ever—as that oh-so-passionate helpless kiss that first evening had shown her…shown her so disastrously.
And her time with him yesterday in Pavenza, and today here at thepalazzo, was only reinforcing the fact.
Wariness flickered within her like an early warning system. One she knew she must pay heed to.
Luca disconnected, dropping his phone on the table. ‘Giuseppe reports that Matteo gives no cause for concern. He has had a quiet day, and Paolo is pleased with him. He looks forward to seeing you.’ He smiled at her. ‘I hope that reassures you?’
‘Thank you, yes,’ she answered, back in control of her wayward thoughts. She made her eyes meet his, keeping in hers nothing but due civility. ‘And thank you, too, for showing me your home, Luca. Matteo was right to urge me to see it, even if he is only imagining the reason for it. It’s so very beautiful.’
‘I’m glad you think so,’ Luca said in reply. ‘And I am glad to have invited you here.’
A wry twist formed at her mouth. ‘You didn’t reallyinviteme,’ she said. ‘It was forced upon you.’
‘And I am glad that it was,’ he answered. He lifted his glass to her, tilting it slightly. ‘To your visit here, Bianca.’
Three was something in his eyes—something in the way he was looking at her—that quickened her pulse. It was a quickening she knew she must not allow. Six years ago she had allowed it, indulged it, and it had cost her so much. Today—seeing the reality of Luca’s life, the world he came from—had finally allowed her to accept how impossible her longing to staywith him had been. It had enabled her to let go of her anger at his dismissal of her, his rejection. And now she must let go and deliberately set aside what had led to that impossible longing. Quench it as she had not six years ago.
She cast about for something anodyne to say that would break the moment. ‘Did Giuseppe say whether Matteo will be up to dining downstairs? Will you have dinner with us at the villa, or return here?’