The Forced Marriage (13 page)

He turned the car through a stone gateway, following a wide curving driveway up to the house.

It was a large, formal structure, built of local stone over three storeys.

The grounds were neat and well-kept, and an ornate fountain played before the main entrance, but for Flora it lacked the wilder appeal of the
castello
. Or was that simply because she was there under a kind of duress?

She sat very straight in her seat as Tonio brought the car to a halt.

‘Please,’ she said. ‘Will you make some excuse to your aunt and take me back to San Silvestro?’

‘Impossible,
mia cara
. She does not take disappointment well.’

He came round and opened her door. His hand gripped her arm, his smile openly triumphant as he observed her pallor—her startled eyes.

He said softly, ‘
Avanti.
Let’s go.’

And he took her up the steps and into the house.

E
NTERING
the house was like walking into a cave. The hallway was vast and lofty, but also very dark. Flora was acutely conscious of Tonio’s hand on her arm, urging her forward. As the elderly maid who had greeted them reached a large pair of double doors and flung them open she shrugged herself free of his grasp with unconcealed contempt, then walked forward, her head held high.

She found herself in a large room, with tall windows on two sides. Although she could at least see where she was going, the heavy drapes and the plethora of fussy furniture made her surroundings seem no less oppressive.

While the atmosphere of hostility, she thought, drawing a swift startled breath, resembled walking into a force field.

And it had to be generated by the two people who were waiting for them.

The Contessa Baressi was a tall woman, with steel-grey hair drawn into an elaborate chignon and the traces of a classic beauty in her thin face. The hands that gripped the arms of her brocaded armchair blazed with rings, and there was a diamond sunburst brooch pinned to the shoulder of her elegant black dress.

The other occupant of the room was standing by one of the windows, staring out. She was much younger—probably in her early twenties, Flora judged. She had a voluptuous figure, set off by her elegant pink linen sun dress, and a mane of black hair cascaded over her shoulders, framing a face that would have been pretty in a kittenish way except for its expression of blank misery. Her entire body was rigid, except for her hands, which were tearing monotonously at the chiffon scarf she was holding. She did not turn to look at the new arrivals, nor give any sign that she was aware of their presence.

Intuition told Flora that this must be the Ottavia on whom she’d expended so many anxious moments, and that her unease might well have been justified.

‘Zia Paolina.’ Tonio walked to his aunt and kissed her hand with easy deference. ‘Allow me to present to you Marco’s latest little friend, the Signorina Flora Graham.’

The Contessa’s carefully painted mouth was fixed in a thin smile, but the eyes that looked Flora up and down were lizard-cold.

She said in heavily accented English, ‘I am glad you could accept my invitation,
signorina
.
Grazie
.’

‘You speak as if I had a choice,’ Flora returned, meeting the older woman’s gaze defiantly. ‘Perhaps you would explain why you’ve had me brought here like this.’

‘You do not think I wish to be acquainted with my
figlioccio’s
—companions?’

‘Frankly, no,’ Flora said steadily. ‘I’d have thought myself beneath your notice.’

She heard a sound from the direction of the window like the hissing of a small snake.

The Contessa inclined her head slightly. ‘Under normal circumstances you would be right. But you,
signorina
, are quite out of the ordinary. And in so many ways. Which made our meeting quite inevitable, believe me.’

‘Then I must be singularly dense,’ Flora said. ‘Because I still can’t imagine what I’m doing here.’

The thin brows rose. ‘Not dense, perhaps, but certainly a little stupid, as a woman in thrall to a man so often is. My godson’s charm has clearly bewitched you—even to the point where you were prepared to break off your engagement and follow him to another country.’ She gave a small metallic laugh. ‘Such devotion, and all of it, alas, wasted.’

Flora’s heart missed a beat. The Contessa, she thought, seemed to know a lot about recent events, even though her view of them was slanted.

She said, ‘I think that’s our business—Marco’s and mine.’

‘Ah, no,’ the older woman said softly. ‘It was never that exclusive, believe me.’ She paused. ‘Did you know that Marco had also been engaged to be married?’

‘Yes.’ It dawned on Flora that she knew where this conversation was leading. ‘But I understood that had been broken off too.’

‘Tragically, yes,’ the Contessa acknowledged. ‘It was a perfect match, planned from the time when they were both children.’

Flora glanced at the still figure by the window, with the busy, destructive hands. She said softly, ‘Only his
fidanzata
preferred another man.’

The Contessa reared up like a cobra preparing to strike. ‘Like you, poor child, she was seduced—betrayed by passion. And because of this she ruined her life. Threw away her chance of true happiness.’

‘I’m sorry.’ Flora stood her ground. ‘But I don’t see how this concerns me. I’d really like to go home now.’

‘Home?’ The plucked brows rose austerely. ‘Is that how you regard the
castello
? You are presumptuous,
signorina
.’

Flora bit her lip. ‘It was just a figure of speech.’

There was a silence, then the Contessa said, ‘Be so good as to tell us how you met my godson.’

‘We happened to have lunch in the same restaurant,’ Flora admitted reluctantly. ‘As I was leaving someone tried to snatch my bag, and Marco—came to my rescue.’

‘Ah,’ said the Contessa. ‘Then that, at least, went as planned.’

Flora stared at her. ‘Planned? What are you talking about?’

‘Yes.’ The Contessa’s voice was meditative. ‘I am afraid you are quite dense. You see, it was not by chance that you encountered Marco that day. He followed you to the restaurant and staged that little comedy afterwards.’ She leaned forward, the cold eyes glinting under their heavy lids. ‘Do you know why?’

Flora found suddenly that she couldn’t speak. There was a tightness in her chest. She was aware of Tonio’s gloating smile. Of the haggard face of the girl by the window, who had turned and was watching her now, the dark eyes burning like live coals.

‘Now, tell me,
signorina
, what your
fidanzato
said when he found you with Marco at that hotel? He must have been very angry. Did he try to hit him—make a terrible scene?’

Numbly, Flora shook her head.

‘And did that not seem strange—a man you had promised to marry simply allowing a stranger to steal you from him without protest? A stranger who had offered him such a terrible insult?’

‘I—I expect he had his reasons.’ Flora did not recognise her own voice.

‘Yes—he had reasons.’ The girl by the window spoke for the first time. Moving stiffly, she walked across the room towards Flora, who forced herself to remain where she was when every instinct was screaming at her to run. ‘Shall I tell you what they were?’ she went on. ‘Shall I explain that as soon as he saw Marco—heard his name—he knew exactly who he was, and why he was there. And he turned away in shame.’

She drew a deep shaking breath. ‘Because Cristoforo is a man without truth—without honour.’

Flora had been hanging on to her
sangfroid
by her fingertips, anyway, but now she felt it crumble away completely.

She was stumbling, suddenly, through some bleak wilderness. Her voice seemed to come from a far distance. ‘You—know Chris?’

The girl threw back her head. ‘He did not tell you about me? I knew he would not—the fool—the coward.’ She spat the words, and in spite of herself Flora recoiled a step. ‘He did not tell you that we met in the Bahamas, on vacation—that from the moment we saw each other nothing and no one else mattered? That we were lovers—and more than lovers. Because I laid my whole life at his feet.’

Her voice shook with frantic emotion. ‘I believed he felt as I did, that we would be together always. He—made me believe that—but he lied. On our last night together—when I offered to return to London with him and confront you with the truth that he no longer cared for you—he pretended surprise. He even laughed. He said that he had no intention of breaking his engagement to you because you suited him, and he did not want a wife who would make too many demands.’

Her shrill laugh was edged with hysteria. ‘He said what we had shared was only a diversion—a little holiday romance—and that he regretted it if I—I, Ottavia Baressi—had taken it too seriously.’

She shook her head. ‘He was so cruel—cruel beyond belief. He said that the best I could do was forget everything that had passed between us and return to my own
fidanzato
. Get on with my life, as he meant to do—with you.’

She wrapped her arms tightly round her body. ‘And when, later, I tried to telephone him in London—to speak to him—to reason with him—he did not want to talk to me.’

Flora said carefully, ‘But why should you want to do that? When he’d made his position so clear? Why didn’t you put him behind you and try and make your—your engagement work?’

‘Because I found I was expecting his child. I thought if he knew that, then he might change—realise that we belonged together.’

Flora felt as if she’d been poleaxed. ‘You—were going to have a baby? Then he must have said something.’

All this, she thought, had been going on, and she’d suspected nothing—nothing…

‘He was so angry. He shouted at me—called me a liar, and other bad names. Said that I was a
sciattona
—a slut—who slept with any man, and that there was no proof that it was his baby. That he wasn’t a fool, and he would fight me in court, if necessary, and make a big scandal. Then he laughed and said, “Or you could always blame Signor Valante and bring the wedding day forward.”’

She shuddered. ‘He thought I would do that—add to the dishonour I had brought to my family—and to Marco. That was when I knew I would be revenged on him. That I would hurt him and ruin his life, as he had done to me. And, because he had left me to go back to you, I decided you should also know what it is to be betrayed and deserted by a man who has pretended to love you.’

Flora’s hands turned into fists, her nails scoring the soft palms as she fought for her last remnants of control.

Her voice was small and cold. ‘And—Marco agreed to this? I don’t believe you.’

Ottavia’s eyes glinted with savage satisfaction. ‘No. Just as I did not believe that Cristoforo would ever leave me. We were both wrong,
signorina
. And Mamma is, after all, Marco’s
madrina
. In Italy that means a great deal. She made him see that it was his duty to avenge me—and his honour also. And that Cristoforo should know what had been done—and why.’ She shrugged almost triumphantly. ‘So—he came to find you, Flora Graham. And the rest you know.’

Flora’s legs felt so weak she was terrified that they would betray her, and she would end up on the floor at Ottavia’s feet. She said, ‘You had your revenge, Signorina Baressi, as I’m sure Marco reported to you. Was it really necessary to tell me all this?’

‘Yes,’ Ottavia threw at her. ‘Because Marco was supposed to leave you in London, to count the cost of your lust and stupidity. Instead he brought you here, to his home. And you were not given a guest suite, like any of his other whores. No—you must sleep with him in his own room—in the bed where he was born—and his father and grandfather before him. The place where I, as his wife, should have slept. Ninetta, who used to work for Mamma, has told us everything. No one at San Silvestro can believe he would do such a thing. It has outraged everyone.

‘And, now, while he is away, you give orders as if you were the mistress of the house, instead of just his fancy woman—for whom his fancy seems to be waning. If it ever existed at all,’ she added contemptuously.

Flora was shaking so violently inside she thought she would fall to pieces, but she couldn’t allow that to happen. Not here. Not yet.

She even managed a note of defiance. ‘Why else would I be here?’

The Contessa shrugged. ‘Maybe he pities you. Or else is grateful for your unstinting co-operation,’ she added with cold mockery. ‘Certainly your willingness to share his bed must have amused him, and my godson likes to be entertained. But your usefulness was expended in England. He should never have brought you here.’

‘Perhaps you had better tell him so.’

‘Oh, we shall have a great deal to say to him,’ the Contessa said softly. ‘Make no mistake about that, Miss Flora Graham.’

She turned to Tonio. ‘Our guest is clearly shocked. Fetch her some brandy.’

Flora shook her head. ‘I want nothing. Except to get out of here.’

The Contessa leaned back in her chair, studying Flora from under lowered lids. ‘No doubt you are eager to go back to the
castello
—to confront Marco on his return and beg him to tell you that none of this is true. If so, you will be disappointed—and even more humiliated than you are now.’

She paused. ‘But there is an alternative.’ She snapped her fingers and Tonio hurried to pass her a narrow folder from a nearby table. ‘This is a plane ticket to England on a flight that leaves this evening. If you wish to take advantage of it my nephew will drive you to the airport. I shall inform Marco myself that you have learned the truth and returned to London. Once you have gone the whole matter can finally be laid to rest.’

She held out the ticket. ‘Take it,
signorina
. Learn sense at last. There is nothing left for you here.’

Flora’s instinct was to tear the folder into small pieces and throw them at the Contessa. But she couldn’t afford to do that, and she knew it. She’d been offered an escape route and she needed to take it, whatever the cost to her pride.

Except she no longer had any pride. Realising how cruelly and cynically she’d been manipulated had left her self-esteem in tatters. She felt bone-weary, and sick at heart. And too anguished even to cry.

She said tonelessly, ‘My clothes—belongings—are still at the
castello
.’

‘No, they are here,’ the Contessa told her. ‘I thought you would see where your best interests lay. I told Ninetta to pack your things and have them brought here. You can leave as soon as you wish.’

Flora lifted her chin. ‘The sooner, the better, I think. Don’t you?’

‘Then—
addio, signorina
.’ The thin lips stretched in a chill smile. ‘We shall not, I think, meet again. Your involvement in this affair was an unfortunate necessity which is now over.’