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‘Of course I remember.’
‘I’d never... I’d never seen you like that before. You’d never had more than a head cold the whole time I’d known you. Even when the rest of us came down with chickenpox that year when I was about ten, you stayed immune.’
‘I’d already had it as a toddler,’ Maria recalled. ‘So I was free to just laugh at your and Noemi’s spots.’
‘Yeah, well. Seeing you like that—sick and weak and emotional—it was kind of scary, I guess. I hated that it was my fault you felt that way, and hated even more that there was nothing I could do to make you feel better.’
Maria looked at him curiously. ‘It was just pregnancy sickness, Seb. Millions of women go through it every day—many of them a lot worse than I did.’
‘I know. But none of those other millions of women were my wife.’
She couldn’t help herself. She reached over and took his gloved hand in hers, holding it on her lap. ‘So that’s why you stopped involving me in the business? Because I was getting sick?’
‘Partly,’ Seb said, and sighed. ‘I suppose I felt like I had to make it up to you. I mean, of course I wasn’t going to bother you with work stuff when you were feeling so lousy. But afterwards... I just wanted you to enjoy the pregnancy and then having Frankie. I didn’t want to bother you with the business or my worries.’
‘But you’re my husband, Seb. Your worries should have been our worries.’ That was what he’d never understood. She wanted a partnership. He wanted a wife and heir to trot out at business social events. ‘And it’s not like becoming a mother rotted my brain. I was still the same person I’d always been—I still cared about the business, too.’
‘I know that now,’ Seb replied. ‘But back then...it felt like Frankie was your whole world, and my job was just to make sure that you and he were safe and secure and wanted for nothing—like my papà had always done for my mother.’
I wanted my husband, Maria thought. I wanted your love. But she didn’t say it. However cosy this romantic sleigh ride might be, she wasn’t ready to admit that yet. That she wanted them to be a team, a partnership—sure, that was what they’d promised each other, privately, when they’d agreed to their fathers’ plans for their marriage.
They’d never promised love, not really.
Yes, there were those pesky wedding vows—to love, honour and cherish. But that was just something they’d had to say. Besides, there were many kinds of love. And she’d never doubted that Seb loved her as an old treasured family friend. One with whom he shared a fantastic sexual chemistry, but that was just sex. She’d had his affection, his friendship, his passion, and even his son.
She’d always known it hadn’t gone any deeper. He hadn’t loved her with his whole heart, in that aching, all-consuming way she’d loved him.
If he had, he could never have let her leave at all.
‘I just wanted what we always promised each other,’ she said instead. ‘I wanted us to be a team. I wanted to feel part of it all.’
All those lonely days with Frankie and then nothing to talk about when Seb came home at night except how long the baby had napped, or how much milk he’d taken. Nothing in her life beyond nappies and sleepsuits.
She’d loved her baby, loved being a mother. But she’d longed for something more, too.
‘I didn’t realise.’ Seb shook his head a little sadly. ‘I thought... I thought you wanted the sort of marriage my parents had—your parents, too, I suppose.’
Maria laughed, a little bitterly, thinking of her parents’ silent, grudging marriage. ‘Trust me. That was the last thing I wanted.’
* * *
Seb squeezed Maria’s hand tightly through two pairs of gloves. ‘I’m sorry.’ He’d been an idiot as usual. Maria hadn’t just felt neglected; she’d felt sidelined. Like her opinion hadn’t mattered.
He’d known well enough from his earliest days in the business, trying to earn his right to be there beyond just being the son and heir, how painful that could be. Every time he’d heard someone whisper behind his back that he wouldn’t have a job if he wasn’t Salvo’s son, or caught a comment about nepotism, he’d doubted himself over again. He’d earned the right to be there in the end, but it had taken time.
Something he didn’t have with Maria.
Okay. So he couldn’t fix the past. But he could try to change the future. And if all she wanted was for them to be a partnership again, he could give her that.
‘I wish I’d known how you felt,’ he said. ‘But now that I do...we can fix this, right? If you want more of a say in the business, that’s easy. I’d love to have your help and advice again.’
She’d never believe him if he told her how much he’d missed that. Even when she’d still been there, when Frankie had been a baby. Of course, she’d been busy looking after him and, quite rightly, Frankie had been her number one concern. But he’d also missed the days when they’d used to talk. About the business, yes, but about other things, too. The future. Their hopes and dreams.
He remembered his parents doing that. While Salvo had been very much the businessman, and Nicole had been content merely to wear the jewellery he’d sold, rather than be involved in the company, that hadn’t been the case at home at all. There they had been a partnership in the truest sense of the word. They had each had their own responsibilities, but they had always worked towards a common goal—keeping their family happy, healthy and together.
He’d lost sight of that goal with Maria, he realised suddenly. She was right. Somewhere along the way they’d stopped being a team. And he wanted more than anything to get that feeling back again.
‘That would be good,’ Maria said, and Seb would have celebrated—except for the cautious tone in her voice that gave him pause.
‘But?’
Maria sighed, turning away to look out at the snow. For a long moment all Seb could hear was the soft fall of horse hooves on newly fallen snow and the crack in the air that told him more snow would be falling soon.
And his own internal monologue, of course, coming up with increasingly awful things that Maria might say next.
But this marriage isn’t enough for me.
But you’re not good enough for me.
But I want to be free to find someone who can give me what I need.
But Frankie needs a better father than you.
Finally, she looked at him again and spoke over his own dark thoughts. ‘But the business has alwa
ys been the easy part for you.’
Seb scoffed. ‘Tell that to my shareholders.’
‘You know what I mean.’ She pulled her hand away from his. ‘Work was always what you ran to when things were difficult. Remember how many hours you put in when I was pregnant?’
‘Yeah, but that was because we were in the middle of launching the new range and starting on the expansion—’
‘And what does it tell you that you can remember exactly what was happening at the office at that time, but it took you twenty minutes to remember how you were feeling, or what was going on in our marriage back then?’
Seb felt heat rushing to his face, despite the chilly air. Of course he could. He could remember every milestone on his journey through the family business—from the first day that his father had taken him to the office and told him that one day he’d be in charge, through his first internship, learning the ropes, right up to the day his father had signed over a portion of the company into Seb’s name and told him he was responsible now.
Cattaneo Jewels had been a part of his life since he hadn’t been much older than Frankie was now. He’d grown up knowing that the company was more than his destiny or even his birthright—it was his responsibility. His burden and his joy.
If he screwed up, it wasn’t just him who lost money. It was his investors, his shareholders, his board. His staff whose jobs would be on the line. His suppliers who could go out of business. His clients who would be let down.
His father, who would be disappointed in him.
Even now Salvo was gone, Seb knew that his dad’s disappointment could transcend the grave. If Seb ran Cattaneo Jewels into the ground, Salvo might actually rise up to berate him for it.
But how could he explain all that to Maria?
‘I guess... I know what I’m doing with the business—at least I should do by now. And it’s easy to measure success or failure. It’s all there in the quarterly reports. But with relationships...it’s harder somehow.’
‘You need a quarterly report on our marriage? Our family?’ Maria arched her dark eyebrows over her sparkling blue eyes.
