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It would be the height of selfish cruelty to choose self-preservation over her family. Because it was a matter of self-preservation. Rafael held a power over her, one she didn’t fully understand. She was attracted to him physically, of course, but she’d felt stirrings of something even deeper. When he held her...when he’d felt the baby kick...if she let herself, she could start to care for him, and that would be a disaster. Because there was every chance Rafael would walk away from her as her father had. But he wouldn’t, she prayed, walk away from their son.
And so she’d told Rafael she would go to Sicily, but she wouldn’t marry him—not yet, anyway. They needed to get to know one another before she made actual vows, agreed to that level of commitment. To her surprise, Rafael had acquiesced. Tersely, but still. She’d been half expecting him to frog-march her down the aisle.
Then yesterday she’d gone to her apartment and packed up what she’d wanted to take, which had been surprisingly little. Looking around the tiny space, she wondered at how she had ever thought she could have managed there with a baby. And yet how she was going to manage in this strange new life in Sicily? So much was unknown.
‘I can’t believe you’re doing this, Allegra.’ Jennifer’s voice rang out in censure. ‘This stranger...running away with him? Have you thought this through at all?’
‘Yes, and it makes sense,’ Allegra answered. ‘Considering the alternatives.’ She felt weary right down to her toes, and tomorrow evening they were leaving for Palermo. She’d already handed in her notice for her job, said goodbye to Anton, who had been her friend and boss for nearly ten years. He’d kissed her on both cheeks with tears in his eyes.
‘Is Vitali being...difficult?’ Jennifer asked after a moment. She looked on edge.
‘Pragmatic,’ Allegra said, even as she wondered why she was being loyal to Rafael. Perhaps because, in his own hard way, he was being loyal to her. And whether she liked it or not, they were a family now. ‘As am I.’
‘You remember what I told you about his father?’ Jennifer said, and now she sounded diffident.
‘He did business with my father and it didn’t work out, you said.’ But it was more than that. Blood on his hands. What had happened? How much did it matter? She couldn’t ask Rafael now; things between them were tense enough.
‘Yes, and your father didn’t trust him.’ Jennifer expelled a breath. ‘I don’t know the details, of course, but there has to be a reason for that. I got the sense that there might have been something...’ She paused, pursing her lips. ‘Criminal involved.’
‘Criminal?’ Allegra stared at her, appalled by this new revelation. ‘What do you mean exactly?’
Jennifer shrugged, her gaze siding away. ‘I don’t really know, but soon after they did business Vitali went broke. He lost everything, and narrowly avoided prison. That’s...that’s all I know. Perhaps it’s better buried in the past.’
It was more than Allegra had ever known, and underscored how little she knew Rafael or his history. How little he’d told her. She’d have to ask sometime, and while she didn’t look forward to that conversation, she needed to know what she was getting into. What their child was getting into. She needed to trust Rafael...yet how could she, when she didn’t know him? When she didn’t like to trust anyone?
‘That might be so,’ Allegra told her mother, ‘but Rafael has his own business and I really don’t think it involves any criminal activities.’ At least she hoped not.
‘But you can’t be sure.’
‘No.’ She couldn’t, Allegra knew with a pang of true fear, be sure about anything.
CHAPTER NINE
ALLEGRA GAZED OUT the window of the passenger jet at the hard blue sky, not a cloud in sight, and tried to bolster her courage as well as calm her seething nerves. They were due to land in Palermo in less than an hour, and after a sleepless night in the first-class cabin she felt exhausted and overwhelmed.
‘Do you need anything?’ Rafael asked as he looked up from his tablet where he’d been scanning the morning news. ‘Herbal tea? A hot compress?’
