Reluctantly, he moved his hand to her waist. Helena chewed her lip, her expression growing pensive, and a sudden stab of instinct warned that he wouldn’t like her question.
‘Why do you need to do it?’ Her voice was soft, curious rather than accusatory. ‘Why do you need to ruin my father after all these years?’
The heat of arousal in his veins instantly cooled. It was a candid question, one he had failed completely to anticipate, and had she asked it twenty-four hours earlier he’d have refused to be drawn.
But that had been yesterday. Before she had opened up to him. Before she’d answered a few equally tough questions with the kind of honesty his conscience was telling him he owed her in return.
Hell.
He expelled the air from his lungs. Gently he shifted her from him and climbed out of bed. ‘Wait here.’
He scooped his briefs off the floor and pulled them on. Then he pushed a button on the wall to raise the blinds, padded down the hall to his study and riffled through a drawer till he found what he wanted.
When he returned Helena was sitting cross-legged on the bed, the top sheet tucked around her middle. The morning sun fell across her bare shoulders and created a halo of rich amber in her tousled hair.
Her gaze went to the items in his hand. ‘Photos?’
She took the two six-by-four snapshots he held out and studied the top one, an old shot of a tall, leggy girl messing around on rollerblades.
‘Your sister?’ She glanced up for affirmation, then down again. ‘Taken before her accident, obviously. She’s absolutely stunning.’ She studied the other photo, this one more recent. Her brow furrowed. When she looked up, her eyes were solemn. ‘Still beautiful.’
‘Si. Still beautiful.’
A familiar weight dragged at his insides. Even seated in a wheelchair, the lower half of her body visibly frail, Marietta Vincenti was a striking young woman. Nevertheless, the contrast between the photos was sobering.
Leo sat on the bed. ‘Do you remember the Hetterichs from that charity dinner in London?’
‘Of course.’
‘Sabine mentioned Marietta and you asked me about her afterwards.’ And he’d shut her down—hadn’t wanted to discuss it.
‘I remember.’
‘For the last decade Hans has led the field in experimental stem cell surgery for spinal cord injuries and patients with varying degrees of paralysis.’
‘Oh... I’ve read about that.’ She sat forward, eyes bright with interest. ‘It’s a bit controversial, isn’t it?’
‘It’s very controversial.’ For a time he’d waged his own internal war over the ethics of it, but watching a loved one suffer did wonders for liberalising one’s attitudes. ‘After Marietta’s accident I took an interest in Hans’s work. I followed the early trials and eventually I contacted him. After reviewing Marietta’s case he believed she’d be a good candidate for surgery.’
Helena frowned again. ‘It wasn’t successful?’
He took the photos and placed them on the nightstand. ‘There is a window of time following the initial trauma during which the procedure has a greater chance of success. Marietta was already on the outer cusp of that time period.’
‘So...it was too late?’
‘Si. In the end.’
‘In the end?’
‘The surgery was delayed—by a year.’
Confusion clouded Helena’s face. ‘But...why?’
The old tightness invaded Leo’s chest. Talking about this wasn’t easy. The anger, the guilt, the gut-wrenching disappointment and the dark emotions he’d wrestled with had nearly destroyed him, and he had no desire to bring them to the fore again. Yet for some reason he couldn’t define he felt it was important to make Helena understand.
‘The surgery was only available privately, and it was expensive—beyond the means of most ordinary people. I had taken some aggressive risks to grow my business, tying up most of my assets and capital, but I had investors in the wings who were interested in a project with enormous potential. I knew if I could secure those investors I would be able to free up some of my own funds for the surgery.’
A stillness crept over Helena. ‘How long ago was that?’