Wounds of Passion

Out of the corner of her eye she saw Patrick’s face stiffen, his mouth a white, angry line.

Neither Cy nor Alex noticed his expression; they weren’t looking at him, either directly or secretly, like Antonia. Alex was smiling indulgently at her. Without even glancing at Patrick, Alex said, ‘Come on, Patrick, let’s go back inside and see how the party’s going on, and leave the love-birds to bill and coo out here alone.’

Antonia flinched at that and felt Patrick watching her, his face hostile, picking up the vibration of h

er reaction, his eyes coldly probing to work out what she felt.

‘See you later, Cy,’ Alex said, grinning at him. ‘Don’t expect to have the garden to yourself for much longer, though. I warn you, people always come out here to dance, so if you want to kiss the girl properly get on with it before you get interrupted! I’ll keep them inside for as long as I can, but I can’t promise anything!’

Patrick grimly strode away towards the house, his lean, dark figure tense as a drawn sword. She quivered as he passed her, her nerves jumping, but he didn’t look in her direction, and was gone a second later, followed at once by Alex.

She sank down nervelessly on the bench under the fig tree and Cy came and sat beside her, taking her hand, stroking her fingers gently.

‘Glad to see me, Antonia?’

She stared up at him, finding his face oddly unfamiliar, remote. He wasn’t far off forty, a tall, spare, austere man with dusty-coloured hair slipping back off his forehead, dark eyes and a thin, pale face. Work occupied most of his time; although he was wealthy he took even his pleasures seriously, but then Cy was a serious man with a strong sense of responsibility and duty. That was why Antonia had felt safe whenever she was with him.

She didn’t feel safe now. She felt as if she were walking a slippery edge over a cliff fall. She wished Cy had not come back to Venice now.

‘I’m always glad to see you, Cy,’ she lied, huskily, and he smiled at her.

‘I was very concerned after we talked last night, Tonia. Thinking over what you had said, I realised it was vital that we talked, face to face, so I moved heaven and earth to rearrange my appointments for today and tomorrow, flew down to New York from Boston, managed to get a seat on Concorde at the very last minute, arrived in London at midnight last night...’

‘You can’t have got there that soon! We only talked at around nine o’clock that evening.’

‘You’re forgetting the time difference.’ He smiled indulgently. ‘It was nine in the evening for you, but mid-afternoon for me. I booked into an airport hotel, and slept quite late, because I knew I’d have to wait until the afternoon for a seat on a plane to Venice. I flew in three hours ago.’

‘You must be exhausted! You shouldn’t have rushed all this way just to see me! If I’d known you were thinking of doing this I’d have told you not to!’

‘I suspected as much; that’s why I didn’t warn anyone I was coming.’

‘Not even Patsy? I wondered. I saw her this morning and she didn’t say a word about you coming.’

‘She had no idea. She was amazed when I arrived.’

‘So you have been to the palazzo? Pasty must have been overjoyed to see you.’

He smiled again, his eyes warm, as they always were when he talked about his aunt.

‘Yes, she was as welcoming as ever. I went to the palazzo straight from the airport, expecting to find you there, and Patsy told me you were having this party tonight and were helping your uncle and aunt organise everything, and wouldn’t be working today, so I didn’t come straight round to see you. I talked to Patsy for a while and had a peaceful hour in my room, bathed, changed, then rang your uncle, who promptly invited me to the party. I told him not to tell you I was coming; I wanted to surprise you.’

‘You did,’ she said, her smile quivering. ‘You shouldn’t have come all this way, Cy. I was going to write to you, explain...’

He gave a wry little smile. ‘That was what I didn’t want you to do. I don’t think letters are ever very satisfactory. I wanted to talk to you face to face.’

She sighed. ‘It would have been much easier for both of us, though, if you had let me explain in a letter. I find it hard to talk about, Cy.’

‘I realise that; that’s why I’ve been so careful all these months not to talk about what happened to you. I realised you weren’t over it yet, and might not be for a long time. You mustn’t be afraid I’m getting impatient, Antonia.’

‘It isn’t that!’ she burst out. ‘I mean, that isn’t why, not really. It’s just that I’ve realised that...’ She stopped, biting her lip, then plunged on, ‘That although I like you, I don’t love you, Cy, not...not that way...not enough for marriage, and it wouldn’t be fair for me to marry you when I know I never could.’

His face had changed while she was speaking, his pale brows meeting. ‘I’m not asking you to fall in love with me,’ he said with a touch of impatience, even irritation. ‘I thought you understood that. I’m not a romantic teenager, looking for the girl of my dreams; I’m not going to expect too much from you and I hoped you wouldn’t expect too much from me. I thought we suited each other. I’m fond of you; I like you very much. You fit in with my lifestyle, with Patsy, with the palazzo. I think you would be a comfortable wife, in spite of the fact that you’re so much younger. As I’m so much older than you, that could have been a problem, but in your case I felt it was an asset.’

She gazed at him dumbly through her mask. He had never talked like this before. As what he had said sank in, she realised that she had made false assumptions about Cy.

‘After your experience two years ago I realised you had been put off sex, maybe for life,’ he coolly went on. ‘That was partly why I proposed in the first place.’

Antonia’s mouth parted on a silent gasp, but her feather mask hid from Cy her look of incredulity.