She leapt away as he did and somehow stepped back straight into him, her back pressed against his chest and he instinctively wrapped his arm around her waist to steady her and himself. And for one glorious second she pressed against him and all he wanted was to hold her and nuzzle kisses on the tantalising allure of her neck, to bury his face in the glossy, silken strands of her hair.
The instant vanished. He released her immediately and she sprang forward. ‘Sorry,’ they both said, their voices vying for supremacy.
Ava busied herself at the drawer, snatched up what looked like a random selection of cutlery and moved at pace towards the table, her back to him, whilst he dished up the food.
Eventually she cleared her throat and turned to face him, and for a moment there was silence as their gazes locked. ‘So,’ he managed. ‘Do you cook?’ It was the best he could do.
‘Yes.’ The assertion was over-emphatic, as if it characterised her relief that he’d initiated conversation. ‘My mum insisted on me doing extensive cordon bleu courses. She believed a woman should be able to cook for her man.’
‘You don’t sound as if you agreed with her.’
‘I didn’t have a problem with learning a necessary skill—I just didn’t understand why my dad never had to cook just because he didn’t want to, but I had to learn how to make a soufflé when I didn’t like it. To be fair I suppose Mum did a lot of the cooking as well.’
‘I always imagined your family as having an array of staff, a butler and a cook and—’ He broke off, knew the words were a mistake even as he said them.
‘Did you imagine my family a lot?’ Her voice held no judgement or censure yet the question irked him.
‘Yes. I did. It was hard not to. In my father’s mind your life of huge privilege should have been ours and he tended to dwell on it. His imagination fed by the nume
rous articles depicting the glittering life and times of the Cassevetis. It felt as if your success had a direct inverse correlation to my family’s decline.’ He knew his tone was bitter but right now he didn’t care. ‘Whilst you were learning how to bake a soufflé I was learning how to make nutritious meals on a shoestring. Meals that my dad would eat to soak up the booze. If I didn’t cook he wouldn’t eat.’ Whoa. Let’s not turn this into a pity party. And yet...it rankled. The realisation that whilst Karen Casseveti was cooking for her man his mum was working more and more extra shifts to try to pay the bills.
‘I’m sorry.’ Ava’s voice was small but clear. There was compassion in her amber eyes and he didn’t want that. It was too close to pity and his dad would have hated that from a Casseveti.
‘There is no need for you to be sorry. You didn’t do anything.’
Ava hesitated, ate a mouthful of the pasta and then looked at him. ‘No, I didn’t. But my father did. His actions were the catalyst that drove your father to alcohol.’
Innate honesty compelled Liam to point out, ‘No one forced the whisky bottle to my dad’s lips.’ He did know that, would never understand why that was the choice his father had made. Had vowed it would never be his—he would always stand and fight. In Terry Rourke’s place he would have taken the fight to the Cassevetis, proved himself to be the better man. ‘That was his choice.’
‘A choice that impacted on you and your mum.’
There was that compassion again and he wanted none of it. Neither would he brook any criticism of his father however implicit. Liam had loved his dad and known, for all his faults, Terry had loved him too. ‘Yes, it did, but looking after my dad helped me too. Kept me off the streets. I got a Saturday job so I could get him vitamins.’ All in his quest to try to get his dad better, back to normal, so that his parents could reunite, so that his father would become the man he had once been. ‘The shop owner was in the army reserves and that got me interested in the army. You don’t need to be sorry for me.’
‘I’m not. But I am sorry for my father’s actions. More to the point, so was he.’
‘Perhaps.’
‘What do you mean “perhaps”?’ Now anger sharpened her tone. ‘He asked me to come and make amends. He regretted his actions.’
‘But not enough to apologise in person, to contact my dad or to meet me face to face. Or pick up the phone himself. Over all the years.’ His anger matched hers now. Say what she would, James Casseveti had been a coward and a cheat.
‘My father found it hard to face his past. I think he tried to block it out. Seeing you would have evoked memories he didn’t want to think about.’ Now her voice was sad. ‘So he decided to make amends for his wrongs after he was gone—that way he wouldn’t have to face the consequences himself.’ Liam saw the confusion, the resignation that shadowed her face and he realised that now it was Ava who had to do just that. Ava who was left at the helm of Dolci, undermined by her father’s shock decision to leave two thirds of her legacy to his first two children. Children who the press alleged he had deserted in their childhood. Ava who was faking a relationship. Anger with James combined with a sharp and unexpected desire to offer comfort.
What the heck? This was a Casseveti.
Ava pushed her empty plate to one side, leant forward, reached a hand out and then pulled it back. ‘I know my dad was far from perfect and I know he did wrong. But he was my dad and I loved him.’
Hell. Those were words that could have fallen from his own lips.
‘But I do believe he felt genuine regret. I wish...’
‘That you could ask him. Talk to him.’ He could see the grief in her eyes, recognised the shell-shock look of the finality of loss, the creeping realisation that the person was gone. The meaning of for ever took on new dimensions. And suddenly his anger disappeared. Ava had lost her father. However flawed he had been Ava had loved him. Just as Liam had loved his own dad. James Casseveti had done wrong but Ava hadn’t and it was time to lay the past to rest. In order to make this work, but also because that was the right thing to do.
‘Yes.’ For a second her voice registered surprise and then understanding dawned in her amber eyes. ‘You understand because you’ve been through it. Does it get easier? All I want is to somehow bring him back and ask him what I should do. Why he did some of the things he did.’
‘I used to go Dad’s grave. I’d sit there and ask him questions, try to imagine the answers. It gave me a level of peace. Still does sometimes.’ Surprise touched him that he was sharing this, but how could he ignore a grief he recognised all too well? ‘Although he’s gone he is still part of you. For better or worse he helped shape your life. Nothing can change that or erase the good memories. As for the grief, it doesn’t go but it compacts, becomes a small part of you that you carry, a mark of respect and love for the person who is gone.’ He rubbed the back of his neck to mitigate the prickle of embarrassment. ‘That’s my two pennyworth.’
‘It’s worth a lot more than that.’ He looked across and saw that tears glistened in her beautiful amber eyes. ‘That has helped more than you can know. It’s been hard—I don’t have any siblings, or at least not any who will share this grief. My mother is devastated so it feels wrong to burden her. So thank you—it means a lot to talk to someone who gets it.’ Now she did reach out to cover his hand with hers. ‘Especially when I know your feelings about my dad.’