Accidentally Expecting! (10 page)

He said nothing about the day before, but there was something in the happy atmosphere that told her everything was different. He’d come to the edge of saying the words that would bind them closer, that it was almost as though they had already been said. Looking up, she saw him watching her with a contented smile that told her she was right.

When they reached home there was work to do, and they both settled down at computers.

‘It’s coming on really well,’ he said, looking over her shoulder. ‘How did I ever sell houses without you?’

‘You don’t have to butter me up,’ she said sleepily. ‘You’re stuck with me, whether you want me or not.’

‘That’s what I like to hear. Why don’t you go to bed?’

‘I think I will.’ She shut down her computer.

‘Leave it,’ Dante said. ‘I’ll put it away with mine.’

She kissed him and drifted away, yawning.

He watched her go, wondering if she would think it strange that tonight he didn’t come to bed with her. In fact he was hatching a plan—reprehensible, no doubt, but he didn’t think she’d mind too much when she found out.

She had never done as she’d promised and emailed him the pictures he had taken of her. Now he proposed to conduct a raid and claim them. Waiting until he could see that she’d turned the bedroom light off, he switched her computer back on.

He located the folder without difficulty, and within moments was looking at the pictures he’d taken. He’d thought he knew them, but now they struck him with new force. So much had happened since then. He hadn’t meant to grow so close to her, but it had happened despite his resolutions. Perhaps it was fate. He, a man who believed in fate, had to believe in this possibility.

Now he couldn’t understand why he hadn’t seen her clearly
before. Entranced by her loveliness, he’d overlooked the strength and honesty in her face. It was this, as much as her passionate body, that had broken down his defences, so that only a day ago he’d been on the verge of telling her things he’d never told another living soul, things he’d sworn never to tell anyone in his life—however long or short that life might be.

He’d come to the very edge, then backed off. But not very far. The thought was still there in his mind that if he plucked up courage he could tell her everything, beg her to risk the future with him. If not her, then nobody, for there was nobody else in the world that he trusted as much.

She was smiling at him from the screen, her eyes wide and clear, offering hope where there had been none before, a future where there had been only blankness.

Quickly he connected the laptop to his portable printer and printed out a copy of the picture.

That was enough for now. Tomorrow he would confess what he’d done and they would laugh together, revelling in their private world where nobody else was allowed, and where they kept each other safe.

He was about to log off when he noticed the file called ‘ZZZ’.

Through her light sleep Ferne was vaguely aware of the sound of the printer coming from the next room, then a long silence, until she heard the printer again. When it ended there was another silence that dragged on and on. Without knowing why, she was suddenly filled with fear.

Moving slowly, she left the bed at the same moment that Dante entered the room. Strangely, he too was moving slowly, as though struggling to recover from some terrible blow. He switched on the light, and she saw he was holding some papers, which he tossed onto the bed. She drew a sharp breath
as she recognised some of the files about his condition that she’d stored on her computer.

At the sight of Dante’s face filled with cold rage, her heart nearly failed her. It was the face of a stranger.

‘I printed them off your computer,’ he said. ‘What are they?’

‘Just—something I’ve been reading.’

‘Just something you
happened
to be reading?’ His voice was calm but as cold as ice. ‘I don’t think so. There are at least a dozen downloads in that folder. You’ve been searching the Internet for anything you could find on this one subject, and you didn’t just chance on it by accident, did you?’ When she hesitated, he added, ‘Don’t lie to me, Ferne.’

If only he would return to being the Dante she knew, and not this frightening stranger. She tried to find some warmth in his eyes, but there was only a cavern of emptiness that filled her with dread.

‘I won’t lie to you, Dante. I knew you had a problem.’

‘Who told you? Hope, I suppose?’

‘Yes, she was worried about you. You had that funny turn on the ladder the day of the fire, and then a bad headache.’

‘And you both put two and two together and came up with five. I was sick with smoke that day, but you had to make a big thing of it.’

‘All right, you think we were fussing about nothing, but people who care about you
do
fuss. That’s how you know they care. You told me once that Hope has been the nearest thing to a mother that you’ve known since your own mother died. Well, mothers fuss. They may have to hide it, but it’s what happens.’

‘So, she told you—when? How long ago?’

‘I—’

‘How long ago?’ he repeated relentlessly. ‘Before we came away together?’

‘Yes.’

‘You’ve known all this time?’ he said softly. ‘There was I, like a fool, thinking I could guard my privacy, never dreaming you were spying on me.’

‘I wasn’t spying.’

‘
This
is spying.’ His voice was like the crack of a whip, making her flinch back.

‘Is it wrong to care for you, to want to see you safe?’

‘My safety is my own affair.’

‘Not always,’ she said, beginning to get angry. ‘What you do affects other people. You can’t spend your life cut off from everyone.’ She drew a sharp breath. ‘But that’s what you’ve tried to do, isn’t it?’

‘That’s my business.’ His face was deadly pale, not white but grey. ‘Is that why you came with me? As a kind of guardian, watching over me like a nurse with a child—or worse?’

‘I never thought of you like that.’

‘I think you did—someone so stupid that he has to be kept in the dark while he’s
investigated
behind his back.’

‘What did you expect me to do when you kept the truth from me?’ she cried.

‘
You’ve
been hiding secrets from
me
,’ he shouted.

‘I had to, but I didn’t want to. I always hoped that you’d come to trust me.’

‘But that’s the irony; that’s the ugly joke. I
did
trust you. I’ve never felt so close to anyone.’

‘Then you were fooling yourself,’ she said hotly. ‘How could we be close when you were concealing something so important? That’s not real closeness. That’s just a pretence of it on your terms.’

‘Exactly: “how could we be close when you were concealing something so important?” That says it all, doesn’t it?
When I think of you watching me, judging me, adjusting your actions to keep me fooled…’

He drew a sharp breath, and she saw sudden, bitter understanding overtake him. ‘That’s the real reason you refused to take that job, isn’t it? And there was I thinking that maybe you wanted to be with me as much as I—Well, it just shows you how a man can delude himself if he’s stupid enough. I must remember to pay you back the money you sacrificed for me.’

‘Don’t you dare say that!’ she cried. ‘Don’t you
dare
offer me money.’

‘Do you feel insulted? Well, now you know how I feel.’ His voice rose on a note of anguished bitterness. ‘But can you also understand that at this moment
I can’t bear the sight of you
?’

A
S IF
to prove it, he turned away and began to pace the room, talking without looking at her.

‘What a laugh I must have given you!’

‘You don’t really think that?’ she said. ‘You can’t. I have never laughed at you.’

‘Pitied, then. That’s worse. Can’t you understand?’

Wearily, she understood only too well. Dante was staggering under the weight of humiliation as he realised how close he’d come to opening his heart to her. For years he’d held off, never risking deep emotion and trust, until he’d met her. Now he felt betrayed.

She’d known that he guarded his privacy, but it was worse than that. He shut himself away from the world’s eyes in a little cave where he dwelt alone, and even she wasn’t allowed to venture. She thought of his loneliness in that bare cave, and shivered.

‘I’ve always wanted to talk to you about it,’ she said. ‘I hated deceiving you. But I’d have hated it more if you’d died, and you might die if you don’t have it properly checked.’

‘What is there to check? I know the chances.’

‘I wonder if you know as much as you think you do!’ she
said in a temper. ‘You’re a conceited man, Dante, proud, arrogant and stubborn, in a really stupid way. You think you know it all, but medical science moves on. If you’d let the doctors help you, something could be done. You could be fit and strong for years ahead.’

‘You don’t know what you’re talking about,’ he said harshly. ‘Don’t tell me what happens with this, because I know more about it than you ever will. I’ve watched what it’s done to my family, the lives it’s ruined; not just the people who suffer from it, but those who have to watch them die. Or, worse, when they don’t die, swallowing up the lives of the people who have to care for them. Do you think I want that? Anything is better. Even dying.’

‘Do you think your death would be better for me?’ she whispered.

‘It could be, if it set you free, if I’d made the mistake of tying you to me so that you longed for my death as much as I did.’ A withered look came into his face. ‘Except that I wouldn’t long for it, because I wouldn’t understand what was happening to me, wouldn’t know. Everyone else would know, but I’d know nothing. I’d just carry on, thinking I was a normal man.
And I would rather be dead
.’

Then he stared at her in silence, as though his own words had shocked him as much as they had her. When the silence became unbearable, Ferne said bitterly, ‘What about what I want? Doesn’t that count?’

‘How can you judge when you don’t know the reality?’

‘I know what my reality would be like if you died. I know it because I love you.’

He stared at her with eyes full of shock, but she searched them in vain for any sign of pleasure or welcome. This man was dead to love.

‘I didn’t mean to, but it happened. Did you ever think of what you were doing to me?’ she pleaded.

‘You weren’t supposed to fall in love,’ he grated. ‘No complications. We were going to keep it light.’

‘And you think love is like that? You think it’s so easy to say “don’t” and for nothing to happen? It might be easy for you. You arrange things the way you want them, you tell yourself that you’ll get just so close to me and no further, and that’s how things work out, because you have no real heart. But I have a heart, and I can’t control it like you can.

‘Yes, I love you. Dante, do you understand that? I
love
you. I am deeply, totally in love with you. I didn’t want that to happen. I told myself the same silly fantasies that you did—how it could be controlled if I was sensible. And it crept up on me when I wasn’t looking, and, when I did look, it was too late.

‘Now I want all the things I swore I’d never let myself want: to live with you and make love with you, marry you and bear your children. I want to crack jokes with you, and hold you when you’re sleeping at night.

‘You never thought of that, did you? And you don’t think it matters. I wish I was as heartless as you.’

‘I’m not—’

‘Shut up and listen. I’ve listened to you, now it’s my turn. I wish I didn’t love you, because I’m beginning to think you don’t deserve to be loved, but I can’t help it. So there it is. What do I do now with this love that neither of us wants?’

‘Kill it,’ he snapped.

‘Tell me how.’

His face changed, became older, wearier, as though he had suddenly confronted a brick wall.

‘There is a way,’ he murmured. ‘And perhaps it’s the best way, if it will convince you as nothing else could.’

‘Dante, what are you talking about?’

‘I’m going to kill your love.’

‘Even you can’t do that,’ she said, trying to ignore the fear that was growing inside her.

‘Don’t be so sure. When I’m finished, you’ll recoil from me in horror and run from me as far and fast as you can. I promise you that will happen, because I’m going to make sure it does. When you look back on this time, you’ll wish we’d never met, and you’ll hate me. But one day you’ll thank me.’

The brutal words seemed to hang in the air between them. Ferne stared at him hopelessly, vainly looking for some softening in his face.

He checked his watch. ‘We have time to catch a flight if we hurry.’

‘Where are we going?’

‘Milan.’ He gave a frightening smile. ‘I’m going to show you the future.’

‘I don’t understand. What is there in Milan?’

‘My Uncle Leo. Have they told you about him?’

‘Toni said he was a permanent invalid.’

‘
Invalid
doesn’t begin to describe it. They say that in his youth he was a fine man, a banker with a brain like a steel trap that could solve any problem. Women basked in his attention. Now he’s a man with the mind of a child.’

‘I’ll take your word for it. I don’t need to see him.’

‘I say that you do, and you’re going to.’

‘Dante, please listen—’

‘No, the time for that is passed. Now
you
listen. You wanted me to show you how to kill your love, and that’s what I’m going to do.’

She tried to twist away but his hands were hard on her shoulders.

‘We’re going,’ he said.

‘You can’t make me.’

‘Do you really think I can’t?’ he asked softly.

Who was this man who stared at her with cold eyes and delivered his orders in a brutal
staccato
that brooked no argument? Why did he have Dante’s face when he wasn’t Dante, could never be him?

Or was he the
real
Dante who had lived inside this man all the time?

‘Go and pack your things,’ he said in a voice of iron.

She did so, moving like an automaton. When she came out with her bag, he was waiting.

‘The taxi will be here in a minute,’ he said.

Neither spoke on the way to the airport; there was nothing to say. Ferne had the feeling of coming to a huge bridge stretching so far into the distance that she couldn’t see the other side. It led to an unknown place that she feared to visit, but to turn back now was impossible.

Worst of all was the sensation of travelling there alone, for there was no comfort to be found in the steely man beside her.

Then she caught a glimpse of his blank face, and remembered that he was the one in need of comfort. But he would accept none, especially from her.

On the flight to Milan, she ventured to say, ‘What kind of place is he in?’

‘A care home. It’s clean, comfortable, kind. They look after him well. Sometimes his family visit him, but they lose heart after a while, because he doesn’t know them.’

He added wryly, ‘One strange thing that you may find useful, he still speaks excellent English. With all the damage that was done to the rest of his brain, that part has remained untouched. The doctors can’t say why.’

At the airport he hailed a taxi to take them to the home, where a nurse greeted them with a smile.

‘I’ve told him you called to say you were coming. He was so pleased.’

That sounded cheerful, Ferne thought. Perhaps Uncle Leo was better than Dante imagined.

She followed them through the pleasant building until they came to a bedroom at the back where the sun shone through large windows. A man was there, kneeling on the floor, solemnly decorating a Christmas tree. He looked up and smiled at the sight of them.

He was in his late sixties, plump and grey-haired, with twinkling eyes and an air of friendly glee.

‘Hello, Leo,’ said the nurse. ‘Look who I’ve brought to see you.’

‘I promised to come,’ Dante said to him in English. ‘And I brought a friend to see you.’

The old man smiled politely.

‘How kind of you to visit me,’ he said, also in English. ‘But I can’t talk for long. My nephew is coming, and I must get this finished.’ He indicated the tree, immediately returning to work on it.

‘It’s his latest obsession,’ the nurse said. ‘He decorates it, takes it all down then starts again. Leo, it’s all right, you can leave it for the moment.’

‘No, no, I must finish it before Dante gets here,’ Leo said urgently. ‘I promised him.’

‘I’m here, Uncle,’ Dante said, going to him. ‘There’s no need to finish the tree. It’s fine as it is.’

‘Oh, but I must. Dante will be so disappointed otherwise. Do you know Dante, by any chance?’

Ferne held her breath, but Dante was unfazed. It seemed that he was used to this.

‘Yes, I’ve met him,’ he said. ‘He’s told me all about you.’

‘But why doesn’t he come?’ Leo was almost in tears. ‘He keeps saying he will, but he never does, and I so long to see him.’

‘Leo, look at me.’ Dante’s voice was very gentle. ‘Don’t you know me?’

‘No.’ Wide-eyed, Leo stared at him. ‘Should I?’

‘I’ve often visited you before. I hoped you’d remember me.’

Leo’s gaze became intense. ‘No,’ he said desperately. ‘I’ve never seen you before. I don’t know you—I don’t, I don’t!’

‘It’s all right, it doesn’t matter.’

‘Who are you?’ Leo wailed. ‘I don’t know you. You’re trying to confuse me. Go away! I want Dante. Where’s Dante? He promised!’

Before their horrified eyes, he burst into violent tears, burying his face in his hands and wailing. Dante tried to take the old man in his arms but was violently pushed away. Raising his voice to a scream, Leo barged his way out of the room, racing across the lawn towards the trees.

The nurse made to follow him, but Dante waved her back. ‘Leave this to me.’

He hurried out after Leo, catching up with him as they reached the trees.

‘Oh dear,’ Ferne sighed.

‘Yes, it’s very sad,’ the nurse said. ‘He’s a sweet old man, but he gets fixated on things, like that tree, and things just go round and round in his head.’

‘Is it normal for him not to recognise his family?’

‘We don’t see much of them here. Dante comes more often than anyone else. He’s so gentle and kind to Leo. I shouldn’t tell
you this, but he pays the lion’s share of the expenses here, plus any special treats for the old man; he gets nothing back for it.’

‘And Leo has been like this for how long?’

‘Thirty years. It makes you wonder how life looks from inside his head.’

‘Yes,’ Ferne said sadly. ‘It does.’

‘I suppose he doesn’t really know, and that makes it bearable for him, poor thing. But then Dante visits him, and it brings him no pleasure because he never recognises him.’

Heavy-hearted, Ferne wandered out into the gardens, heading for the trees where she’d seen them go. She could understand the way Dante flinched from being reduced to this, being pitied by everyone. If only there was some way to convince him that her love was different. Inside her heart, hope was dying.

She heard them before she saw them. From somewhere beyond the trees came the sound of weeping. Following it, she came across the two men sitting on a fallen log. Dante had his arms around his uncle, who was sobbing against his shoulder.

He looked up as she approached. He said nothing, but his eyes met hers in a silent message:
now you understand. Be warned, and escape quickly
.

‘Stop crying,’ he said gently. ‘I want you to meet a friend of mine. You can’t cry when a lady is here—she’ll think you don’t like her.’

The gentle rallying in his voice had its effect. Leo blew his nose and tried to brighten up.

‘Buon giorno, signorina.’

‘No, no, my friend is English,’ Dante said. ‘We must speak English to her. She doesn’t understand foreign languages as we do.’ He emphasised ‘we’ very slightly, clearly trying to create a sense of closeness that would comfort Leo. ‘Her name is Ferne Edmunds.’

Leo pulled himself together. ‘Good evening, Miss Edmunds.’

‘Please, call me Ferne,’ she said. ‘I’m so glad to meet you.’ Floundering for something to say, she looked around at the trees. ‘This is a lovely place.’

‘Yes, I’ve always liked it. Of course,’ Leo added earnestly, ‘it’s a lot of work to keep it in good condition. But it’s been in my family for such a long time, I feel I must—I must—’ He broke off, looking around in bewilderment.

‘Don’t worry about it,’ Dante said, taking his hand and speaking quietly. ‘It’s all being taken care of.’

‘I so much wanted everything to be right when he came,’ Leo said sadly. ‘But he isn’t coming, is he?’

‘Leo, it’s me,’ Dante said urgently. ‘Look at me. Don’t you recognise me?’

For a long moment Leo gazed into Dante’s face, his expression a mixture of eagerness and sadness. Ferne found herself holding her breath for both of them.

‘Do I know you?’ Leo asked sadly after a while. ‘Sometimes I think—but he never comes to see me. I wish he would. He said once that he was the only person who really understood me, and he’d always be my best friend. But he doesn’t visit me, and I’m so sad.’

‘But I do visit you,’ Dante said. ‘Don’t you remember me?’

‘Oh no,’ Leo sighed. ‘I’ve never seen you before. Do you know Dante?’

At first she thought Dante wouldn’t answer. His head was bowed as though some terrible struggle was taking place within him, consuming all his strength. At last he managed to say, ‘Yes, I know him.’

‘Please, please ask him to come to see me. I miss him so much.’

Dante’s face was full of tragedy, and Ferne’s heart ached
for him. He’d been right; the reality was more terrible than anything she could have imagined.