Wronged Sons, The (28 page)

He dug his fingernails into his palm. “I recall him but didn’t know him very well, I’m afraid.”

“Oh,” said Emily, clearly disappointed. “Well it was nice to meet you; see you tomorrow, Mum.”

The door closed and they gradually made their descent back to earth, remaining in a relieved but awkward silence.

“She looks like you…” he began eventually, but she wasn’t interested.

“Don’t,” she replied, “just don’t.”

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Northampton, Ten Years Earlier

August 14, 7.10pm

We sat huddled together staring at a television hanging on the wall of the Fox & Hounds’ function room.
I switched between tapping my nails on a tabletop with nervous excitement and fiddling with a damp beer mat, waiting.

Ten minutes felt like an eternity before a chirpy young presenter announced what we’d gathered to see. The landlord turned the volume up and an instant hush fell across the packed room.

“Next up, it’s a band making their debut Top of The Pops performance. In at this week’s number four, it’s Driver, with ‘Find Your Way Home’.”

A jubilant pub clapped and cheered as the camera cut to a close-up of the guitarist strumming the opening bars of the song. “That’s him! That’s him!” I yelled, unable to stop myself. There for all to see was my son James, on the TV, playing with his band.

James had never given university a first, let alone second thought, especially after forming a group with three other music-minded friends at his upper school. They’d spend a good couple of hours a night rehearsing in your old garage workshop and I made them cover the walls with empty egg boxes from the local poultry farm to stop the neighbours complaining about their racket.

When James turned sixteen, my little boy became a free man, and his first act of rebellion was to leave school with a handful of average GCSE results and all the time in the world to follow his heart.
It wasn’t what I’d have chosen for him; I’d read enough over the years about showbiz casualties to know it was a notoriously unpredictable and unforgiving industry. But like I had done with my dreams and Fabien’s, I encouraged my son to follow his even if they’d only lead him to the unemployment office.

It took his band five long years of playing spit and sawdust venues before their determination paid off. A record company A&R man watched them on the bill at a small rock festival in Cornwall and spotted their potential.

Their second single, ‘Find Your Way Home’, was picked up by Radio One and before long their youthful good looks propelled them into the pages of magazines, gossip columns and the charts. And Top of The Pops was their first major TV exposure.

Tom had remained in the kids’ lives even though we were no longer together and joined us at the pub with his lovely fiancée Amanda. He’d often been to Driver’s gigs and by the time their three and a half minutes of TV fame had ended, he and I were both in tears. Even Shirley dabbed her eyes with a hankie over a gin and tonic.
Everyone in the pub shared my sense of pride.

But I was proud of all my children, of course. Robbie had remained the quietest of the bunch, even into his teenage years. But he’d overcome his self-imposed exile and surprised us all by moving as far away as Sunderland University to study things I didn’t really understand involving computers, floppies and mega-somethings. And when he graduated, he accepted a job in South London designing graphics for games.

Emily took her mother and grandmother’s interest in clothing and design one step further and was loving her second year at the London College of Fashion. And while there was probably no easier way of attracting boys than to tell them your brother’s been on Top Of The Pops, she only had eyes for Daniel, Selena’s son. They’d been sweethearts forever and watching them together making each other laugh reminded me of us at their age. I prayed to God Daniel would never hurt her like you’d hurt me.

I glanced around the pub at my family and friends, happy with my lot. There was no significant other in my life, but I had three children I adored and a business that had expanded to five boutiques across the county. And with plans for three more including one in London, my life was as close to perfect as it was ever going to be. But the greatest moments of your life are exactly that – just moments.

And by their design, moments don’t last.

***

Monte Falco, Italy – Ten Years Earlier

July 3, 1.55pm

“That’s my lot, you win my friend,” I gasped and dragged my leaden legs across the red clay and towards the iced water under the pagoda’s shade.

Stefan, my coach, smiled and gave me the thumbs up while I downed the entire bottle’s contents to quench my thirst. I waved him goodbye, mopped my sweating brow with a towel and caught my breath. I cursed myself for being both a mad dog and an Englishman to schedule a mid-afternoon tennis lesson under the searing Italian summer sun.

I was constantly in awe of my surroundings. I must have stared into our breathtaking valleys and vineyards a hundred times, but I’d never taken for granted the warm embrace of the magnificent country around me until that day.

*

Initially I was hesitant about the prospective life that lay ahead for Luciana and I. It had been second nature for me to live hand to mouth from limited means, but suddenly I’d found myself in love with a woman who’d inherited a wealth I’d never dared to imagine. And the potential for stability would take me worryingly far from what I’d been accustomed to. I’d known the warmth of normality once, and I knew the agony of having it torn away from me.

Luciana sensed my trepidation and squeezed my hand reassuringly as her chauffeur drove his late padrone’s Bentley through the open iron gates and up across the brick paved driveway. I squinted as the sun played hide and seek behind the building ahead of me, darkening its facia and endowing its rear with an orange crown. Lavender bushes in flowerbeds and terracotta pots filled the air with their scent as the vast, sprawling villa Luciana once called home, finally came into view.

We walked through its colossal wooden doors as she explained how a house had stood in that spot for three hundred years. It was deliberately constructed a mile above the village of Monte Falco as if to remind those living under its shadow of its owner’s importance.

As soon as Luciana saw Marianna, her housekeeper, saviour and old friend, she collapsed into her arms and cried with gratitude for her past help. It was the first time I’d seen such vulnerability in her. Together they wandered its haunted corridors reliving lost memories of Luciana’s sister and confronting the ghosts of her father.

I’d heard no positive stories about Signore Marcanio from Luciana’s childhood recollections. But quietly, I found something to admire in a man so vulgar through his home.

He had restored the building’s charm with sympathetic and meticulous effort. Its gaping lounge formed its centrepiece; with double aspect walls supporting an exposed beamed ceiling some twenty feet high. The fireplace below was the room’s focal point, standing like a church altar ready for a congregation that would never be invited inside.

But the pristine decor lacked any personal touch and there were no family photographs or knickknacks scattered around; only carefully purchased abstract paintings, ornate glass ornaments and exotic fish tanks carved into the walls. Luciana had grown up in a man’s design, not his heart.

We weaved our way into the gardens where cobbled patios cut into vast, luscious lawns; some hidden from the sun’s reach under wooden pagodas strewn with leafy vines. The positioning of the main terrace enabled a one hundred and eighty degree view and sloped downwards to a tennis court and swimming pool. And what a view it was; mile after mile of vineyards and valleys painted in alternate shades of greens, browns and blues as far as the eye could see.

“Do you think you could be happy here?” she asked me tentatively as we sat perched on a wall overlooking the canyons and lowlands.

“It’ll take some getting used to, but yes, I could. More importantly, can you?”

“As long as I’m with you, I could be happy anywhere,” she replied.

*

Luciana’s voyage into her past was relatively smooth. Signore Marcanio left no Will before his fatal stroke, so his estate and businesses were automatically awarded to a wife he’d not divorced.

But Madame Lola had no desire to return permanently, and remained in Mexico, visiting us every few months in fortnightly instalments. It was Luciana who needed to be there and had something to prove.

She threw herself into her father’s business interests but it took years to wipe away his presence. His investments were wide and many and their value far exceeded what she’d first predicted. Her own accountants unearthed an Aladdin’s cave of below-the-radar dealings masquerading as reputable, so she culled each black sheep from the company portfolio until only legitimate enterprises remained.

Luciana saw to it that removal men cleansed the house of the few remaining traces of Signore Marcanio. His clothes were given away to charity and his jewellery was sent to auction and the proceeds donated to a shelter for victims of domestic abuse. I briefly wondered what you had done with my things.

Next, she reassured our small army of browbeaten maids, cleaners, cooks and gardeners who’d scuttle past us, heads bowed, that this new regime would not mirror the last.

And while she was kept busy untangling her father’s affairs, I focused on Signore Marcanio’s largely ignored yet sprawling vineyards. He’d considered the production of wine to be a hobby and because it was the place of Catriana’s suicide, it wasn’t an area Luciana was ready to be reminded of just yet.

I however wondered about its potential as my desire to create and construct reared its head once again. I knew nothing about the workings of a distillery but I was a fast learner and a willing student. And the manager patiently taught me all its aspects from land irrigation to pressing harvested grapes and sourcing bottling plants. It would take many years of hard work and determination before I might turn her father’s pastime into a profitable product.

Never had I imagined I could live a life so perfect, but that is what Luciana and I came close to. Perfection comes at a price and I was scared of how much I’d pay in telling her my truths. And as our years together progressed, it became an increasing burden to hide the man I’d been from the woman who’d rebuilt me.

September 1, 7.30pm

I’d held Luciana’s hand when she’d bravely walked me through the complicated chapters of her past. But what had she known of mine?

In truth, I had given away mere morsels – snapshots of a life lived through the destruction of others. She had guessed children had once played a part in my life by observing my paternal instinct when our daughter Sofia was born.

The first time I held her porcelain body in the crook of my arm, I whispered into her ear words I never thought I’d use again: ‘I will never let you down.’ And when our son Luca followed a year later, I vowed never to have reason to go back on my promise, no matter how precarious my journey became.

Most people are fortunate to be given a second chance. My family was my third chance and I no longer wanted to hide my flaws, miss-sell my adventures or conceal my truths from her. I had shown Luciana unconditional love and loyalty, but by keeping many past actions, reactions and repercussions buried deep beneath my skin, my integrity was empty.

We sat on the lowest of tier of the garden terraces in silence, watching the sun melt like ice cream over the vineyards.

“You have the face of a troubled man,” she began. I considered denying it, but she could see through my every mask.

“There are things I think you should know about me,” I replied, afraid to disfigure the beauty around us with my ugly words.

“Tell me because you’re ready and not because you feel you should.”

“I am, but I’m scared of how you’ll react.”

“There is nothing you can tell me that will ever make me think any less of you, Simon.”

Neither my head nor the pounding heart rattling against my ribcage was convinced. But I couldn’t stop my ribbons from unspooling as I explained how I’d met you, and the children we’d had together. Then I recalled in detail how it had gone so very, very wrong; why I had no option but to leave you; where I went; about my mother; both my fathers and then my travels.

I described how I’d relieved a dead man of his identity, why I muted an old friend in Miami and how my guilt manifested into my near self-destruction. And I admitted that given the same circumstances, it was probable I’d do exactly the same all over again because in its own twisted way, it had been worth it. It had led me to Luciana.

I was prepared to accept any punishment or consequence she felt necessary. For the first time, I was in the presence of someone who knew as much about me as I did. And only when my history was complete did my fists unclench and I waited for her to break the silence.

“You did what you had to do,” she said, finally. “Nobody can judge you but God, Simon. I won’t. While I cannot lie and say the things you’ve done haven’t been cruel and selfish and you’ve hurt people who might not have deserved it, you know that for yourself. And if you had to suffer all of that to become the man and the father I love now, then so be it.”

She left her seat, sat on my lap and wrapped her arms around my shoulders while the dam I’d spent fourteen years building crumbled under the weight of my tears.

“But you cannot hide from your family forever,” she whispered. “Catherine deserves to know what happened to her husband and your children deserve to know why their father left. You can’t find peace until you find all the pieces.”

My head pressed against a heart I knew would always be open to mine. But hers wasn’t destined to beat for long.

***

Today, 6.15pm