One Night In…

‘Maybe you had.’

He looked so calm, so urbane, dressed in pale cream trousers with a leather belt, a light green button-down shirt open at the throat, scuffed yet exquisitely made leather loafers on his feet. His hair was still damp and curly from the shower.

‘What do you think it was?’ Meghan couldn’t resist asking. She folded her arms, staring him down.

Alessandro chuckled. ‘Meghan, I don’t think what it was. I know.’

‘Oh?’ She was half inclined to tell him she wouldn’t marry him now. He didn’t have to look so certain!

‘You’d made up your mind before I had even left the room,’ Alessandro continued. The smugness was gone, replaced by simple soft honesty. ‘And if you hadn’t, it didn’t matter. Because I’d made up mine.’

‘You can’t force me to marry you!’

‘Who said anything about force?’ His eyes had darkened dangerously, and Meghan felt her pulse thrum in response. It didn’t take much to have her swaying into him, longing for his look, his touch.

She was conscious of Ana behind them, pots and pans clanking ominously as she moved around the kitchen.

He reached for her hand, pulling her to him slowly, even though she made a pretence of resisting. When she stood only inches away, their bodies still not touching, he brushed his lips against her palm.

‘You look beautiful like that—so natural, so unaffected.’

Meghan looked up, startled. ‘Sloppy, more like.’

‘No.’ Alessandro touched her cheek, trailing his fingers down to gently grasp her chin. ‘I meant what I said. You’re beautiful.’

‘Thank you,’ Meghan whispered. ‘You’re beautiful too.’

Alessandro smiled, and she saw it reached his eyes.

‘And you’ll marry me.’

She wanted to argue, to deny it simply to resist his autocratic dictates, but she couldn’t. It was true, and she wanted it to be true.

I can make you happy, she thought.

‘Yes.’

Alessandro’s smile deepened, and she saw a new satisfaction there, deeper than any she’d seen before. A hunger satisfied.

‘Thank you,’ he said simply, humbly, accepting her acceptance as a gift, a treasure. Meghan’s heart ached.

I can make you happy. Give me a chance. Even if there’s no love. The words buzzed in her mind. She almost said them, gulping them back, choking on air.

Alessandro smiled. ‘Let’s eat.’

Over breakfast, with Ana serving in courteous if rather stony silence, Alessandro informed Meghan of their plans.

‘We must leave for Milan after breakfast. I have business to attend to, and I want to introduce you to my family. The sooner they know you, the sooner we can get married.’ His expression darkened briefly before he turned brisk and businesslike again.

‘Why does it have to be so quick?’ Meghan asked. Her mind was spinning and she took a steadying sip of coffee. ‘We could take time to get to know each other. Be sure we’re not making a mistake.’

‘I’m not making a mistake,’ Alessandro replied with easy confidence. ‘And I want to marry quickly because I want you in my bed every night.’

Meghan flushed. ‘And we need to be married for that?’

He paused, his lips twitching. ‘You do. I won’t have you feeling guilty or ashamed about what happens between us. Ever.’

Meghan was conscious of Ana clearing their dishes. She didn’t think the housekeeper understood much English, yet surely Alessandro’s intimate caressing tone came across in any language?

‘Thank you for that respect,’ she managed stiffly.

Ana loaded the dishwasher while they finished their coffee, and then retreated to another part of the house. Meghan watched her broad back disappear with a twitch of unease.

‘She doesn’t like me,’ she said suddenly.

Alessandro glanced up from the newspaper headlines he’d been scanning once more. ‘Who? Ana?’

‘Yes, she disapproves of me. I can tell. She glared at me when I came into the kitchen.’ Meghan toyed with the handle of her coffee mug. ‘Is it always going to be like that?’

‘Not when we are married,’ Alessandro replied in a flat, final tone. ‘And you’ll discover that Ana doesn’t disapprove of you. She disapproves of me.’

Meghan looked up in surprise, but Alessandro had moved on. He swept the newspaper aside with unconcern and smiled.

‘There are other matters to attend to in Milan. You will need clothes—that haversack cannot hold much. I have a flat in Milan, but perhaps you would like to live somewhere new? I leave such decisions to you.’

‘I’m sure the flat you have now is fine,’ Meghan said faintly. She was reeling from the barrage of information. What was she actually going to do in Milan, in her new life?

‘You know, I was a teacher in Stanton Springs,’ she said hesitantly. ‘Languages. I quit my job when …’

‘A teacher?’ Alessandro glanced at her swiftly, assessingly.

‘Well, of course if you want to teach again in Milan I have no problem with it. Perhaps at one of the English or American schools? Something part-time, so you can travel with me if needed?’ His voice lowered, filled with promise. ‘I don’t want to leave you alone … or to be alone myself.’

She nodded. ‘Yes … part-time. I’ll look into it.’

‘Buon. But first my family, and the wedding.’

The thought of meeting other di Agnios sent a stab of fear through her. Taking another sip of coffee to quell the nerves rising queasily upwards, Meghan asked, ‘What exactly is your business? You mentioned the jewellery boutiques, the property and the finance, but are there other things as well?’

‘My grandfather started with the jewels. My father chose to branch out into property, electronics, shipping.’ He shrugged. ‘A piece of every pie. The jewellery, of course, is our flagship enterprise—what we are truly known for.’ He drummed his fingers on the table. ‘The man you met yesterday, as unpleasant as he was, owns one of the largest chains of department stores in the United States. We were negotiating a contract to feature Di Agnio jewels in select stores—our own boutique within the department store, as it were.’ He shrugged. ‘It’s no matter.’

‘It sounds like quite a big business deal,’ Meghan said after a moment.

‘There are other deals,’ Alessandro replied in dismissal. ‘And no deal, business or otherwise, is worth making if you lose your self-respect.’

‘Is that what we’re making?’ Meghan asked suddenly. Her hands tightened on her coffee mug. ‘A business deal?’

Alessandro frowned. ‘Marriage is a contract, certainly,’ he replied. ‘But I do not consider it business.’ His eyes narrowed. ‘Having second thoughts, cara?’

‘What if I was?’

‘I would tell you it is too late. We drive to Milan within the hour.’

‘Too late?’ Meghan echoed incredulously. ‘Are you always going to be this bossy, Alessandro? Because I won’t have you ordering me around—’

In response, Alessandro plucked the coffee cup from her fingers and set it on the table. ‘Go and get ready. I’ve just decided I want to leave as soon as possible.’

‘You mean,’ Meghan retorted, ‘you want to stop this conversation.’

‘As a matter of fact, yes. Why don’t you pack your things? It won’t take long.’

Wordlessly Meghan rose from the table. She wasn’t going to waste her energy or emotions on arguing over such petty things. She knew she’d need to save them for later—for the bigger, more important battles that were sure to come.

She went upstairs. Stuffed her few paltry possessions into the worn haversack.

‘What am I doing?’ she muttered, a bubble of hysteria rising inside her, threatening to escape in a wild peal of laughter. ‘What am I doing?’

She was leaving for Milan to meet the di Agnio family … to be introduced as Alessandro’s fiancée. Bride.

It was so crazy. It was so real. She didn’t know what to do but continue to move forward, one inch at a time. If she looked further than the next day, the next moment, she would fall into an abyss of fear and doubt.

‘I washed your things.’ Ana stood in the doorway, her expression close to a glare. Meghan’s waitressing uniform was folded neatly in her hands.

‘Thank you, Ana,’ she replied in Italian.

Meghan took the clothes hesitantly. Disapproval and dislike rolled from the woman in waves, and she felt compelled to say something.

‘You know I am marrying Signor di Agnio?’ she said, and Ana nodded stiffly.

‘You will—’ she began, struggling to find the words. ‘You will make him happy?’ It was as much an order as a request.

Meghan blinked in surprise. ‘He told me you didn’t like him,’ she blurted out.

‘I don’t like the man he has become. The boy he was … here … I loved.’ Ana blinked and shrugged, impatient. ‘Goodbye, signorina.’

She left the room, and Meghan stuffed the clothes into her haversack, her mind whirling.

The man he has become.

The man I mean to be.

What was the difference?

‘Ready?’ Alessandro asked from the doorway. He’d shrugged on a beautifully tailored jacket, worn with unselfconscious ease and grace. ‘It takes about two hours to drive to Milan. We’ll go straight to my mother’s house, if you don’t mind.’

With the sunshine turning the distant green fields to gold, Meghan watched the Villa Tre Querce disappear as they drove down the steep, winding hill and through the wrought-iron gates.

‘When will we be back?’ she asked after a moment.

Alessandro glanced at her. ‘To the villa? Who knows? We can plan a honeymoon, of course. Somewhere different … somewhere neither of us have ever been.’

Meghan regarded him thoughtfully. It almost sounded as if she were not the only one who was used to running away.

What are your secrets? she wanted to ask. What are you hiding from me? She could hardly ask for the truth now, when she was hiding so much herself. There was time. There had to be time.

Neither of them spoke as Alessandro drove past Spoleto into Tuscany. The fields on either side of the motorway were a blur of browns and greens, and Meghan leaned back in her seat and closed her eyes.

She was, she realised, completely exhausted. She must have dozed, for she woke up as the car began to climb the foothills into Lombardy. Alessandro smiled at her as she sat up, shrugging strands of hair from her eyes.

‘We’re about an hour away. I’ve telephoned my mother. She expects us for lunch.’

‘Great.’ Meghan swallowed nervously. ‘Maybe you could tell me about your family?’

He shrugged. ‘There is not much to know. My mother, Gabriella, lives in the house I was born in—in Milan. My father died four years ago of a heart attack. My sister, Chiara, lives in London. She works for Di Agnio Enterprises there.’

‘And your brother?’

He pressed his lips together, shook his head. ‘I told you before. He is dead.’

‘Right. I’m sorry.’ Meghan felt as if every word she spoke was prodding a nest of vipers, full of poisonous secrets. ‘When did he die?’

‘Two years ago.’

‘Was it from a disease?’

‘Car accident.’ He spoke so tightly that Meghan almost didn’t hear the bitten-out words.

‘And what about his wife…?’

‘She lives in Rome. You’ll find Paula will have nothing to do with me. With us. We needn’t consider her at all.’ Alessandro spoke so dispassionately, so coldly, that Meghan knew it was a subject she must drop.

For now.

‘So I’m just meeting your mother today?’ That was easier than a houseful of faceless disapproving di Agnios. One woman she hoped she could handle.

‘Yes. Chiara, I hope, will fly to Milan for the wedding.’ He glanced at her enquiringly. ‘That is, if you agree to a wedding in Milan? Naturally I assumed you did not wish to return to Stanton Springs.’

‘Naturally.’ Meghan felt the beginnings of a headache. She massaged her temples. ‘A wedding in Milan is fine. Something small.’

‘Of course. Small, but tasteful.’ His mouth quirked in a smile. ‘Elegant. Do you wish to notify your family? Perhaps there is someone—a friend—you would like to attend?’

Meghan thought of her family—her two older sisters, safely married and quick to judge, the disapproval and disappointment of her parents who hadn’t been able to understand how it had come to this. As for friends—Stephen had pushed them all away, and now she was too embarrassed to tell them the truth.

No one wanted to hear a truth like this. Not in a small town.

‘No,’ she said after a moment, her voice a thread of sound. ‘There’s no one.’

Alessandro’s mouth tightened, but he did not insult her with pity. ‘Just as well. Everything will be easier to arrange.’

The fields and foothills gave way to houses as they entered Milan. On the horizon Meghan saw a cluster of skyscrapers bearing silent witness to the fact that Milan was one of the most glamorous and cosmopolitan cities in Europe.

‘Will … will your mother like me, do you think?’ Meghan asked, trying to keep her voice diffident.

Alessandro laughed once—a sharp, bitter sound. ‘Don’t waste your time trying to make people like you, Meghan.’

She blinked. ‘But, Alessandro, this is your mother. Of course I want her to like me.’

‘Why? She doesn’t like me.’ He stared straight ahead, his expression grim.

‘Is that why you don’t love her?’ Meghan asked after a moment.

‘No. I don’t love her because I don’t love anyone.’ Alessandro flexed his hands on the steering wheel as he navigated the increasing city traffic. ‘You’re not thinking you can change me, Meghan, are you?’ he said, his voice pleasant but with the hint of a warning. ‘Because I told you once before—you can’t. Don’t make the mistake of entering this marriage thinking you can change me, save me.’

Save me. The words echoed through Meghan’s mind. Did she think she could save Alessandro? Make him believe in love?

No, surely not. Surely she wasn’t that desperately naïve. Besides, Meghan thought, you couldn’t save anyone. You could only believe they were worth saving.

Did Alessandro think he needed saving? Didn’t he think he was worth it? The questions buzzed round in her brain with no answers.

Meghan stared straight ahead. The gothic spires of Il Duomo rose in the distance, as elegant and ostentatious as the decorations on a wedding cake.

‘No,’ she said flatly. ‘I’m not that foolish.’

‘Good.’

She glanced at him curiously. ‘If you don’t care what your mother thinks, why introduce me to her at all?’

His mouth tightened, his fingers flexing once more on the steering wheel. ‘She’s family,’ he said shortly, and Meghan knew it was time to drop the subject.

A few minutes later they entered a residential section of Milan, where the elegantly fronted town houses were as grand as small palazzos. On a large, sweeping square with a fenced green in the middle, Alessandro pulled his car to a stop.

‘Here we are.’ A dark-suited man had exited the house and approached the car before Alessandro had even killed the engine.

He opened Meghan’s door and she clambered out, standing on the kerb while a brisk wind blew her hair into tangles.

The man opened Alessandro’s door, and Alessandro tossed him the keys.

They exchanged some rapid Italian, and Meghan caught enough to understand that the man was taking the car round to the back.

‘Grazie, Manuelo,’ Alessandro said, and Manuelo gave a short bow. He asked something else in Italian, but the wind carried the words away. After hesitating for the briefest of seconds, Alessandro answered. Meghan heard her name being mentioned, and cast him a curious glance after Manuelo had left.

‘What did you say about me?’

‘You’re staying here,’ Alessandro explained briefly. ‘I’ll reside at my flat until our wedding.’

Alarm prickled along her spine. ‘Why can’t we stay together?’

Alessandro barely spared her a glance. ‘It’s not appropriate.’

Appropriate? Surely staying in separate rooms, chaperoned by Alessandro’s own mother, was appropriate enough? Meghan wondered uneasily how Alessandro’s attitude towards her might change now that she was becoming his wife and not just his lover.

And yet she knew he was doing it to protect her. To make her feel safe, secure, unashamed. Just as he’d promised. She smiled at him.

‘Thank you.’

He shrugged in response. ‘It is my duty.’

They entered the town house through a pair of impressive double doors covered with an intricate iron trellis.

The foyer was decorated in cool marble, with a crystal chandelier suspended above a polished mahogany table with a large bowl of chrysanthemums on it.

Gabriella di Agnio entered from a short flight of steps that led to the rest of the house. She was a small, slender woman in her mid-sixties, dressed in a designer suit in cerise, her silver hair elegantly coiffed.

Meghan immediately felt gauche and underdressed, standing there, dazzled by wealth and glamour, dressed only in a jumper and jeans.

Gabriella’s pale blue gaze swept over the pair of them before she inclined her head.

‘Alessandro.’

Alessandro inclined his head back. ‘Mamma.’

It was hardly a warm greeting, Meghan thought. Tension crackled in the air.

‘I’m so glad you came. And your companion—Signorina Selby.’ She smiled graciously at Meghan, and Meghan ducked her head back.

‘Thank you.’

‘Luncheon has been served in the dining room. Will you come?’

‘Of course.’ Alessandro put his hand on Meghan’s back, propelling her forward with gentle pressure.

Gabriella watched this careless movement with narrowed eyes before smiling and leading the way upstairs.

Meghan imagined she could almost see the thread of hostility pulsating, taut and thin as a wire, between Alessandro and his mother. Why didn’t they like each other? What had happened?

The dining room was a long, narrow room, with frescoes painted on the walls and ceiling. Meghan drew her breath at the beautiful and obviously old paintings. She’d seen similar work on the walls and ceilings of churches in Umbria and Florence.

The Di Agnios, she realised afresh, were rich. Powerful.

It was unfamiliar, and yet soon it would be hers. Hers.

The wealth … the safety.

The table was set with a fragrant dish of beef risotto. There was an opened bottle of red wine on the sideboard.

Alessandro and his mother sat at opposite ends of the long polished table, and Meghan was forced to sit in the middle. She felt as if she were watching a tennis match.

‘I didn’t realise you were in Umbria,’ Gabriella began, as she beckoned a servant forward to serve the risotto.

‘Business,’ Alessandro replied briefly.

‘Are you back in Milan for long?’

Alessandro’s mouth tightened imperceptibly. ‘A few weeks. Maybe more.’

‘Business is well?’ Gabriella persisted, her voice eerily neutral.

‘You should know—you check our stock prices every day.’ Alessandro’s mouth curled upwards in a mocking smile.

‘I like to know what’s going on. Now,’ Gabriella replied with dignity.

‘I know how much it pains you to see me at the helm,’ he countered silkily, although his eyes glittered with—what? Meghan couldn’t be sure. Rage?

Hurt?

‘You almost wish I would make a mess of things, don’t you, Mamma?’ The word sounded crass. ‘It would be easier for you, then, wouldn’t it? You’d finally be justified.’

Gabriella dabbed at her lips with a linen napkin. When she raised her head to look at her son, her expression was stony.

‘No, Alessandro. I don’t want that.’ She paused, a new bleakness in her eyes. ‘I have never wanted to be justified.’

He shrugged—restless, unconvinced. ‘I said almost.’

Meghan gazed down at the risotto on her plate, steaming and richly scented with saffron. Her mouth was so dry she didn’t think she could manage a bite, delicious as it looked. She didn’t want to look at either Alessandro or Gabriella, or to feel the bitter antagonism that vibrated between them.

She was relieved when the wine was poured, and she took a grateful sip of the rich, ruby liquid. It slid like velvet down her throat.

‘What about you, Signorina Selby?’ Gabriella turned her rather brittle smile on Meghan. ‘Are you staying in Milan for long?’

‘I …’ Meghan looked helplessly at Alessandro. Obviously his mother was missing some salient details about their relationship.

‘As a matter of fact, Mamma, Meghan will be staying as long as I am.’ Alessandro smiled, but his eyes were cold and hard. ‘We’re getting married.’

The silence in the room was a physical thing, a separate presence, stifling, choking. Alessandro kept eating, and Meghan listened to the clink of his silverware while his mother simply stared, her face quite blank.

She recovered herself admirably, giving Meghan a forced but gracious smile. ‘Then of course I must offer my felicitations. When is this wedding to be?’

‘Next week.’ Alessandro barely looked at her as he kept eating. Meghan stared down at her food. Colour scorched her face. She ate a forkful of risotto, and it turned to ash in her mouth.

‘So very soon?’

He glanced up darkly. ‘For the simple reason that I want to begin my new life with my bride, Mamma. No matter what conclusions you have jumped to about her or me.’

Good heavens, did Gabriella think she was pregnant? Meghan’s cheeks burned hotter.

‘I am very happy for both of you, then,’ Gabriella said after a tiny pause.

There could be no mistaking that she was not pleased with this news. And what mother would be? Her son had brought home a stranger—one from another country, another world—and announced he was marrying her within a week.

Was this what Alessandro called appropriate?

‘I’d appreciate it,’ he said now, ‘if you could take Meghan out to buy some suitable clothes. She has very little with her, and of course there is no one with better taste than you, Mamma.’ Somehow he turned it into an insult. ‘I will be quite busy for the next few days, managing some business from America.’

‘I would be delighted.’ Gabriella turned to Meghan with a smile that bordered on genuine. ‘It will give me a chance to know my future daughter-in-law a bit better.’

Better than what? Meghan thought. A complete stranger? She pressed her napkin to her lips, suppressing the bubble of hysterical laughter that threatened to escape.

This was so, so crazy.

So wrong.

Yet when she’d been with Alessandro it had felt so right.

The man he’d been with her, alone in Umbria, was so different from this angry, haunted stranger.

Who was he?

Had she made the most enormous mistake of her life in agreeing to this?

And could she get out of it?

Somehow she thought that would prove difficult to do.

She glanced up, saw Alessandro take a sip of wine. He was gazing at his mother with a disappointed, almost sad look on his face, before the mask of masculine authority slipped back into place.

I’m not making a mistake.

Meghan clung to that hope, thin as it was.

Right now it felt as if it was all she had.

After lunch Alessandro excused himself to go to the office, announcing that he would be back for dinner. Gabriella showed Meghan to her room, tactfully suggesting she might appreciate a rest.

Meghan was grateful. Not only was she exhausted, but she couldn’t endure an afternoon of strained conversation with Gabriella—and she had a feeling the older woman felt the same.

She drew the heavy brocade drapes, kicked off her shoes, and crawled under the soft duvet, closing her eyes against the oppressive environment of the house around her, the tensions unspoken, unrecognised, and yet so very evident.

Sleep came with blessed speed.

When she awoke the room was in shadow, late afternoon sunlight filtering through the crack in the curtains. She stretched, luxuriating in the warm, comfortable bed, knowing the memories and fears would rush back soon enough.