Christmas in Venice

Lucy Gordon cut her writing teeth on magazine journalism, interviewing many of the world’s most interesting men, including Warren Beatty, Richard Chamberlain, Sir Roger Moore, Sir Alec Guinness, and Sir John Gielgud. She also camped out with lions in Africa and had many other unusual experiences which have often provided the background for her books. She is married to a Venetian, whom she met while on holiday in Venice. They got engaged within two days.

Two of her books have won the Romance Writers of America RITA® award, Song of the Lorelei in 1990, and His Brother’s Child in 1998 in the Best Traditional Romance category.

You can visit her website at www.lucy-gordon.com

Christmas in Venice

by

Lucy Gordon

CHAPTER ONE

JUST a few more minutes—just ten—then five—then they would reach Venice, the city Sonia had sworn never to set foot in again. As the train rumbled across the lagoon she refused to look out of the window. She knew what she would see if she did. First, the blue water, sparkling under the winter sun, then the roofs and gilded cupolas, gradually emerging from the mist on the horizon. It was perfect, magical, a sight to lift the heart. And she didn’t want to see it.

Venice, the loveliest place in Italy, in the world. She’d come here once before, and later fled, blaming it for her misfortunes. But for the summer beauty of the city she might never have been tempted into a disastrous marriage to Francesco Bartini. She knew better now. She’d fled Francesco and the heartbreakingly beautiful surroundings where they’d met, vowing never to be seduced by either of them again.

She tried not to think of him as he had seemed to her then, smiling, at ease with himself and everyone around him. He wasn’t handsome—his features weren’t regular enough for that, his nose too large, his mouth too wide. But his eyes were dark and full of delicious wickedness, his smile was brilliant, and when he laughed he was irresistible. She’d been enchanted by his charm and good nature, the speed with which he’d fallen in love with her, as though he’d been only waiting for her to appear to recognise the love of his life.

‘But that’s true,’ he’d said once. ‘Why delay when you’ve met “the one”?’

He’d been so sure she was ‘the one’ that he’d made her believe it too. But Venice had helped him, with its beauty, its glitter of romance that was there around every corner. Venice had helped to deceive her into thinking a holiday flirtation was a lasting love, and she would never forgive Venice for that.

So why was she coming back?

Because Tomaso, her father-in-law, had begged her, and she had always liked him. Even in the bad days of her marriage the hot-tempered little man had always made her feel how fond of her he was. On the day she left he had wept, ‘Please, Sonia—don’t go—I beg you—ti prego—’

Officially, she was only returning to England for a visit, to ‘see how she felt’. But none of them were fooled, especially Tomaso. He knew she wasn’t coming back.

He’d held onto her, weeping openly, and his wife, Giovanna, had regarded him with scorn, because who cared if the stupid English wife left? She’d been a mistake from the start and thank goodness Francesco had realised at last.

Tomaso had wept despite his wife, and Sonia had wept with him. But still she had left. She’d had to. But now she was back, because Tomaso had begged her.

‘Giovanna is very ill,’ he’d said, the day he turned up at her London apartment. ‘She knows she treated you badly, and it weighs on her. Come home and let her make her peace with you.’

‘Not home, Poppa. It was never a home to me.’

‘But we all loved you.’

And that was true, she reflected. With one exception they had all loved, or at least liked her: Francesco’s sisters in-law, his three brothers, his aunts, his uncle, his endless cousins, had all smiled and welcomed her. Only Giovanna, his mother, had frowned and been suspicious.

How could she return? It was nearly Christmas. Travelling would be a nightmare. Worse, she would have to see Francesco again, and what would they say to each other after the last dreadful meeting in London? He’d followed her there to make one final effort to save their marriage, and when it failed he’d been curt and bitter.

‘I won’t plead with you any more,’ he’d raged. ‘I thought I could convince you that our love was worth saving, but what do you know of love?’

‘I know that ours was a mistake,’ she’d cried, ‘if it was love at all. Sometimes I think it wasn’t—just a pretty illusion.’

He’d given a mirthless laugh directed at himself. ‘How easily you talk love away when it suits you. The more fool me, for thinking you had a woman’s heart. Well, you’ve convinced me. You want no more of me, and now I want no more of you. Go to hell in your own way, and I will go in mine.’

She’d never seen him like that before. In their short marriage he’d been angry many times, with the hot temper of the Latin, flaring now and forgotten a moment later. But this bitter, decided rejection was different. She should have been glad that he’d accepted her decision, but instead she was unaccountably desolate.

She’d tried to be sensible. She’d told herself that that was that, and she could draw a line under her marriage.

But the very next morning she’d woken up feeling queasy, and known that everything had changed. There had been tests but the result was never in doubt. She was carrying Francesco’s child, and she’d learned it the day after he’d stormed out declaring he wanted no more of her.

She heard his voice many times repeating those words. She heard it every time she reached for the phone to tell him about their baby, and it always made her pull her hand back, until at last she no longer tried.

So when Tomaso had arrived in London his eyes had opened wide at the sight that met him.

‘You’re having his child and he doesn’t know?’ he demanded, shocked.

It had touched her heart the way he never doubted the baby was Francesco’s. But Tomaso had always thought the best of her, she recalled. It made it hard to refuse him, although she’d tried.

‘How can I go back now?’ she’d said, indicating her pregnancy. ‘When Francesco sees me like this it will revive things that are best forgotten.’

‘Don’t worry,’ Tomaso had reassured her. ‘Francesco is courting someone else.’

She’d suppressed the little inner shock, the voice that cried out, ‘So soon?’ After all, she had left him. He was a warm-hearted man who wouldn’t stay alone for long. She had no right to complain.

She insisted that Francesco must be warned before she arrived, and Tomaso telephoned his son and gabbled something in the Venetian dialect which Sonia had never been able to follow. When the call was over he’d announced, ‘No problem. Francesco says the baby is yours. He won’t interfere.’

‘That’s fine,’ she’d said, trying to sound pleased.

Well, it was fine. It was exactly what she wanted. If he wasn’t interested in his own baby that suited her perfectly. And if she was being unreasonable, so what? She was eight months pregnant and entitled to be unreasonable.

Because she was so close to her time they couldn’t fly, and had embarked on the twenty-four-hour train journey. That was how she’d made her first trip, because she’d booked at the last minute and couldn’t get a flight. So she’d approached Venice by train over the lagoon and seen it rising from the sea in glory.

Tomaso glanced at her as she sat, refusing to go to the window. ‘After all this time, don’t you want to see Venice welcoming you back?’

‘Oh, Poppa, that’s just a pretty fantasy,’ Sonia protested, smiling to take the sting out of the words. ‘Venice deals in pretty fantasies, and I made the mistake of taking them seriously.’

‘And now you make the mistake of blaming the city for being beautiful,’ he replied.

‘So beautiful that I fell in love with it, and thought that was the same as being in love with a man.’

He was silent, but regarded her sadly.

‘All right, I’ll take a look,’ she said to please him.

But the sight that met her wasn’t what she had expected. Where was the magic, the gradual appearance of gilded cupolas touched by the sun? How could she have forgotten that this was late December? A dank mist lay on the sea, shrouding the little city so that there was no sign of it. When at last it crept into view—reluctantly, it seemed to Sonia—it had a glum, heavy-hearted appearance that reflected her own feelings.

At the station she tried to carry her own bags but Tomaso flew into a temper until she let him take them. He commandeered one of the taxi boats, and gave the driver the name of her hotel. The Cornucopia.

Of course, he didn’t know that this was where she’d stayed that first time. No matter. She would enter the Cornucopia again and banish her ghosts.

She’d had to brace herself for the sight of the Grand Canal on leaving the station. The railway station had a broad flight of steps leading down to the water and, on the far side, the magnificent Church of San Simeone. It had made her catch her breath when she first saw it three years ago, and again when she had arrived there in a gondola to be married, a few short weeks later. Now she tried not to look, but to concentrate as Tomaso handed her carefully down into one of the taxi boats in this city where the streets were water.

The chugging of the motor boat made her a little queasy, so she didn’t have to look at the palaces and hotels gliding past. But she was aware of them anyway, she knew them so well, and every tiny rio as each little side canal was called: Rio della Pergola, Rio della due Torri, Rio di Noale, taking her closer to the Cornucopia, until at last it came in sight.

The Cornucopia had once been the palace of a great Venetian nobleman, and the company that had turned it into an hotel had restored its glory. Beneath the mediaeval magnificence was a good deal of modern comfort, but discreet, so that the atmosphere might be undisturbed.

She was booked into a comfortable suite on the second floor.

‘You look tired,’ Tomaso told her. ‘You need a rest after that journey. I’ll leave you now, and call back in a few hours to take you to see Giovanna.’

He kissed her cheek and departed. It was a relief to be alone, to wash the journey off, and ease her heavy body onto the bed.

At least she wasn’t in the same room as before. Then the city had been full for the Venice Glass Fair, with not a room to be had. Sonia, booking at the last minute, had been forced to accept a place nobody else wanted, at the top of the building.

It had been little more than an attic, she recalled, but she’d had her own bathroom, and she’d hurried into the shower to wash off the journey. When she’d finished she’d taken a whirl around the tiny room, thrilled by her first foreign trip for her employers, and her first visit to Venice. At this height there were only the birds to see her, and she finished by tossing aside her towel and standing, arms ecstatically upstretched in a shaft of sunlight from the window.

The door opened and a young man came in.

She was totally naked, her position emphasising her perfect body, long legs, tiny waist and full breasts. And he was barely six feet away with a grandstand view.

For what seemed like forever they stared at each other, neither able to move.

Then he blushed. Even now it could make her smile to think that he had been the one to blush.

‘Scusi, signorina, scusi, scusi…’ He backed out hastily and shut the door.

She stared at the panels, but all she saw was his face, mobile, vivid, fascinating, blotting out everything else in the world. Only then did she remember to be indignant.

‘Oi!’ she yelled, snatching up her towel and dashing for the door. In the corridor outside she found a pile of large boxes, two hefty workmen and the young man. ‘What’s the idea of barging into my room like that?’

‘But it’s my room,’ the young man protested. ‘At least, it was supposed to be—nobody told me you were here. If they had—’ his eyes flickered over her and he seemed to be having difficulty breathing ‘—if they had, I—I would have been here twice as fast—’

Her lips twitched. Mad as she was, she wasn’t immune to the flattery in those last words, or something in his look that went deeper than flattery.

The towel, inadequate at the best of times, was slipping badly. The two workmen watched her until the young man snapped something out and they vanished hurriedly.

‘Let me put something on,’ she said, retreating into her room, and grabbing a robe. The young man followed as if in a trance. She would have gone into the bathroom but she’d backed herself onto the wrong side of the bed.

‘I don’t look,’ he said, understanding.

He turned away and covered his eyes in a theatrical fashion that made her laugh despite her agitation.

‘No peeking,’ he promised over his shoulder. ‘I am a gentleman.’

‘You shouldn’t have followed me in here. That’s not the act of a gentleman.’

‘It’s the act of a man,’ he said with meaning.

She tied the belt firmly in place. ‘OK, I’m decent now.’

He looked around. ‘Yes, you are,’ he agreed sadly.

‘Will you please tell me what you’re doing in my room?’

‘Tomorrow the Venice Glass Fair starts, and one of the biggest exhibitions is in this hotel. The manager is a friend of mine. He said nobody ever wants this room, so I could use it to store some of my glass.’

‘I booked at the last minute. I think it was the only room left in the city.’

‘Forgive me, I should have checked.’ He gave a rueful, winning smile. ‘But then we would never have met. And that would have been a tragedy.’

There was a note in his voice that made her clutch the edges of the robe together lest he detect that her whole body was singing. Just a few words, and the glow in his eyes, and she felt as though he was touching her all over.

He had a slim, lithe figure and wonderful dark eyes, set in a lean, tanned face, still boyish as it probably always would be. Sonia was a tall woman but she had to look up to see his black hair with its touch of curl.

‘You—you’re exhibiting in the glass fair, then?’ she said.

‘That’s right. I own a small factory, and I’m here to set up my stall.’

‘I’m here for the fair. I’m a glass buyer for a store in England.’

His face lit up. ‘Then you must let me take you on a tour of my factory. It’s here.’ He took a card from his pocket. ‘Only a few tours for specially privileged visitors—’

‘Would you mind if I got dressed first?’

‘Of course. Forgive me. Besides I have to find somewhere for my glass.’

‘But won’t you have it downstairs on the stall?’

‘Some yes, but some will be sold, or given away, or broken. So I must have spares nearby.’

‘Doesn’t the hotel provide you with storage space?’

‘Of course, but—I’ve brought rather more than I should. I thought I could make it all right.’

Later she was to discover that this was his way: bend the rules and worry about the practical problems afterwards. And it usually did work out, because he had such charm and confidence. Even then, ten minutes after their meeting, Sonia found herself saying, ‘Look, I don’t mind—if there isn’t too much.’

‘There is nothing—almost nothing—you’ll never notice it.’

In fact there were ten large boxes, but she didn’t see the danger until they were all crowded into her room so that she could barely move. And then she lacked the heart to tell him to take them away. She’d even helped him carry them in. She’d actually offered. He was like that.

‘Never mind,’ she said brightly. ‘There won’t be so much when you’ve set up your stall.’

‘It’s up,’ he explained. ‘This is just the extras. You really are a bit cramped, aren’t you?’

She gave him a baleful look.

‘There’s nothing for it,’ he said with a sigh. ‘I shall have to take you out to dinner.’

‘That will be impossible,’ she said crossly.

‘Why?’

‘Because all my clothes are in the wardrobe that is now completely blocked by your boxes.’

It took them ten minutes to get the wardrobe door clear, and then he wouldn’t let her choose her dress in peace.

‘Not that one,’ he said, dismissing a deep blue silk that she’d bought specially for this trip. ‘The simple white one. It’s far more you.’

By this time she was beyond argument. In fact, beyond speech.

‘I’ll call for you in one hour,’ he said. Halfway out of the door he looked back, ‘By the way, what is your name, please?’

‘Sonia,’ she said, dazed. ‘Sonia Crawford.’

‘Grazie, Sonia. My name is Francesco Bartini.’

‘How kind of you to tell me—finally.’

He grinned. ‘Yes, perhaps we should have been formally introduced before you—that is, before I—’

‘Get out,’ she said, breathing fire. ‘Get out while you’re still safe.’

‘Beautiful signorina, I haven’t been safe since I opened that door. And nor—I must confess—have you.’

‘Out!’

‘An hour.’

He vanished. At once a light seemed to have gone out of the room. Sonia stared at the door, torn between the impulse to hurl something and an even bigger impulse to yield to the smile that seemed to be taking possession of her whole body.

And the really annoying thing was that she discovered she actually did look best in the simple white dress.

Sonia came out of her reverie to find that she was smiling. However badly their love had ended, it had begun in sunshine and delight. Francesco had been thirty-three then, but so comical and light-hearted that he’d seemed little more than a boy, with a boy’s impulsive enthusiasms. Better to remember him like that than as the domestic tyrant he became, or the embittered man of their last meeting.

Nor, however hard she tried, could she silence the voice that whispered the ending hadn’t been inevitable, that something better could have grown from that first moment when he’d stared at her nakedness, smiling with admiration.

If she concentrated she could banish the lonely hotel room, and see again his expression, full of shock and the start of longing, feel again the happiness that just the sight of him had once brought her…

She forced herself back to reality. What was the use of thinking like that?

There was a knock on the door, and with a start she realised how much time had passed. This would be Tomaso to fetch her to the hospital. Slowly she went to the door, and opened it.

But it wasn’t Tomaso. It was Francesco. And his eyes, as they gazed on her pregnancy, were once again full of shock.

CHAPTER TWO

‘MIO DIO!’ Francesco, murmured, sounding as though he could hardly breathe. ‘Oh, mio dio!’

He came in and shut the door behind him, while his eyes, full of accusation, flew to her face. ‘How could you have kept such a thing from me?’

‘But—you knew,’ she protested. ‘Tomaso told you on the phone when he—’ The truth hit her like a blow. ‘He didn’t tell you, did he?’

‘Not a word.’

‘Oh, how like him! How like this whole family! He spoke Venetian, which he knows I can’t follow unless it’s very slow. And when he came off the phone he said he’d told you about the baby, and you weren’t interested.’

‘And you believed that?’ he demanded.

‘Yes, because he said you had someone else, and—oh, this can’t be happening!’

‘Maybe he thought I had the right to know,’ Francesco said in a voice of iron.

She waited for him to say, ‘Is it mine?’ But he didn’t. Like Tomaso, he never doubted the child was his, and she had a brief flicker of the old warmth. These were good people, kind, eager to think the best. Why had she found it so hard to live with them?

‘Don’t expect me to blame Poppa,’ Francesco said. ‘It’s obvious that he had to lie to get you here.’

‘And I suppose Giovanna’s illness was another invention?’

‘No, that’s true. My mother’s heart is frail. She collapsed a few days ago. She wants me to take you to see her in the hospital.’

She thought of the big bustling woman who had always ruled her family, except for Sonia, who wouldn’t let herself be ruled. To Giovanna, every detail of their lives was her domain. The others accepted it as natural and laughed, shrugging it off. But to Sonia, who’d lived alone since she was sixteen, and kept her own counsel even before that, it was intolerable.

Now Giovanna’s inexhaustible heart was wearing out. It was like the end of the world.

‘You don’t mean she’s dying?’ she asked.

‘I don’t know. I’ve never seen her as tired as this before. It’s as though all the fight’s gone out of her.’

‘Your mother—not fighting?’

‘Yes,’ he said heavily. ‘I can’t remember a time when she wasn’t squaring up to somebody about something. Now she just lies there, and all she wants is to see you.’

‘Why? She never liked me.’

‘You never liked her.’

‘She never wanted me to like her. Oh, look, we can’t have this argument again.’

‘No, we had it so many times before, didn’t we?’

‘And it never got us anywhere.’

The fight had carried them through the first few awkward minutes, but now, with round one over, they retired to their corners, and regarded each other warily.

The six months since their last meeting had made him a little heavier and there was a weary look in his eyes that was new, and which hurt her to see. His eyes had always danced—with mischief, with delight. And they had made her too feel like dancing. Now the dancing had stopped and the sun had gone in, and everywhere was cold.

‘Where is she?’ Sonia asked.

‘In the hospital of San Domenico. It’s not far.’

In any other city they would have gone by car, but there were no cars in this place where the streets were water, so when they left the hotel they strolled across the piazza before plunging into a maze of tiny alleys.

Sonia pulled her coat about her, shivering. A heavy mist had appeared and in the darkness of the narrow lanes it was hard to see far ahead. All she could make out clearly were the coloured lamps that had been hung up for Christmas, and the lights glowing from the windows of homes. People scurried up and down, carrying parcels, wearing smiles. It was Christmas, and despite the gloomy weather the Venetians were set on celebrating.

A turn brought them out beside a narrow canal, the water’s surface pitted by raindrops. Here there were no lights, no people, just a dank chill.

Suddenly she became aware of their direction. ‘Not this way,’ she said sharply.

‘This is the quickest route to the hospital.’

As he spoke they turned another corner and there was the place she hadn’t wanted to see, the Ristorante Giminola, looking just the same as when she’d seen it for the first time. Francesco saw her face.

‘So you’re not as hard-hearted as you would like me to believe,’ he said.

If only he knew, she thought, how far from hard-hearted she was. She should never have come back. It hurt too much. She drew a sharp breath. No weakening. She managed to shrug.

‘As you say, it’s the quickest route to the hospital. Let’s go.’

But she walked past the restaurant without looking at it. She didn’t want to remember the night when he’d taken her to it for the first time, and they’d fallen in love. That had been two and a half years ago, in another world, where the sun had shone and everything had been possible.

The simple white dress was as perfect on her as he had predicted. She tried on three sets of accessories before settling for a necklace of turquoises mounted in silver.