The Italian's Love-Child

But when she arrived home from work a few days later there was a postcard sitting on the mat, its glossy colour photo providing welcome relief in between all the boring bills and circulars. She liked postcards, though people never seemed to send them much any more—she guessed that was the legacy of travel becoming so much more accessible and unremarkable, and the advent of the email, of course. But there was a magic about postcards which electronic stuff somehow lacked.

She sucked in a sharp, instinctive breath of excitement when she saw where the postcard was from.

Roma.

The photo was unusual and bizarre—it showed a sculpture of two boys and a rather threatening and grotesque animal.

She didn’t need to turn it over to know who it was from; she knew only one person who was there. And she didn’t need to see his name signed at the bottom to recognise the writing, because somehow she had guessed that he would write like that.

Like a schoolgirl with a crush, she let her gaze drift longingly over his handwriting, like someone discovering a lover’s body for the first time. In black ink, it curved sensuously across the card, like a snake.

It said: ‘I expect you know the cherished legend that Rome was founded by Romulus—here is a photo of him with his twin brother Remus, suckling on a she-wolf! Any time you’re in Rome, then please look me up. It was good to see you. Luca.’

And his phone number.

Eve read it and re-read it, her heart beating fast, feeling ridiculously and excessively pleased while trying to tell herself she shouldn’t. It was only a postcard, for heaven’s sake! And there was no way she would ever ring him.

But she propped the card against the kitchen window, with the backdrop of the sea behind it, and she looked at it, and smiled, because that simple and civilised communication made her able to put that whole passionate yet unsatisfactory scene out of her mind.

But Luca couldn’t get her out of his mind, though he did his level best to—that was when he wasn’t incredulously checking his phone messages.

She hadn’t rung him!

He shook his head in slight disbelief. Did she not realise the intense honour…? He frowned. No. Honour would be too strong a word, and so would privilege—but he wondered just what Miss Eve Peters would say if she realised that he never gave his phone number out to a woman he had only just met!

He stripped off his clothes and stepped into the shower, standing beneath the punishing jets of water with a grim kind of anticipation. Maybe she was playing hard to get. He smiled as he reached for the shampoo. Give her until the end of the week, and she would be bound to ring.

Eve was just setting off for her car when one of the production assistants stopped her. ‘Eve—a man rang for you.’

‘Did he say who he was?’

The production assistant assumed the expression of someone who had been dieting successfully all week, only to be offered a large cream cake minutes before she was due to be weighed. She was getting married in a month, Eve remembered. ‘No.’

‘Oh, well—thanks, anyway. If it was important, I expect he’ll ring again.’

‘He was…’ the assistant gulped ‘…foreign.’

Annoyingly, Eve’s heart went pat-a-pat, then missed a beat completely. ‘Oh?’ she said, with just the right amount of studied casualness.

‘Italian, I think,’ the assistant continued. ‘He sounded absolutely gorgeous! All deep and accented and sexy. You know what they say about a come-to-bed voice? Well, he must have been the man who invented it! Who is he?’

‘I have absolutely no idea,’ replied Eve airily, feeling a brief pang of sympathy for the girl’s fiancé. ‘And it irritates the hell out of me, when someone doesn’t bother to leave their name!’

Which wasn’t quite true. What was irritating the hell out of her was her irrational response to the fact that it had undoubtedly been Luca. What was he doing, ringing her? Ringing her at work, too!

And would he ring again? At home? Until she reminded herself that he didn’t have her number. But she was in no doubt that someone like Luca could always get hold of a woman’s number…

It had been many years since Eve had made excuses to hang around the house, hoping that someone might call her, and she hated it almost as much as she couldn’t seem to stop herself from doing it. Every time the phone rang she jumped like a startled rabbit, but it was never him.

Finally, frustrated with herself—and with him, though she wasn’t quite sure why—she went round to see Kesi and ended up staying for afternoon tea. And it was predictably typical that when she arrived home the red light on her answering machine was winking at her provocatively.

With trembling fingers, she clicked the button and his deep, dark, rich Italian voice began to speak. Just like him, she thought as she listened. Deep and dark and rich.

‘Eve? I find that business brings me to London next week. How would you like to meet for dinner?’ A tinge of amusement entered the voice. ‘An early dinner, of course—leaving you plenty of time to get home for your allotted hours of sleep. Ring me.’

She was appalled to find herself replaying it four times, while silently wondering whether or not to return his call, even while, deep down, she knew with unerring certainty that she would be unable to resist.

But she left it for three days, even though the self-restraint it took nearly killed her. And when she finally got round to it, she had to field her way past a very aloof-sounding secretary who, once she had switched from Italian to perfect, seamless English, sounded very doubtful as to whether Signor Cardelli would wish to be disturbed.