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Now, she looked at him, surprise on her features, but only for a moment, before determination and strength were back, implacable and determined.
“You don’t need to say this. It’s okay.”
He nodded, her scepticism understandable.
“When I was at Villa Fortune recently, Fiero told me I should tell you how I feel, even when it made no sense to me. He said that you’re smarter than I am and you’d be able to work it out. I didn’t do that; I should have.”
“You did tell me how you feel,” she said simply. “You don’t love me, and I can’t be married to someone who isn’t capable of returning…my feelings. I was stupid to even attempt this.”
“No, not stupid,” he denied fiercely. “You were brave. So brave, Alessia. Then, and now.”
She shook her head, replacing the photo frame on the table beside her. But he reached for it, looking down at the image for a moment.
“You know our marriage was never about love.”
Her lips tightened but she didn’t otherwise react.
“I have wanted to be clear about that all along. I hate the idea of love. But marriage, and marriage to you, has always seemed to make sense. I could write a list of all the reasons you’re the person I want to build a life with, and every single point is rational and justifiable. You’re smart and kind, you make me laugh, I’ve known you a long time, I respect you –,”
“And you care for my father,” she said quietly.
He couldn’t deny that – it was one of the reasons their first marriage had made sense.
“But none of that explains why I reacted the way I did when I thought you’d cheated.”
“I hurt your pride.”
“No. You hurt more than my pride. You hurt me so deep, in a place I thought closed off forever. You reminded me of how I’d felt when we’d first left our parents. It was a pain I’d long since forgotten, something I swore I’d never allow myself to feel again. I didn’t want to be vulnerable to that kind of hurt…”
He saw her eyes flash with sympathy and ached for her – that even now she could feel that for him!
“Rejection hurts,” she said quietly. “You felt rejected.”
“That’s pride again. Ego. And it was more than that. I’m not an angry person, Alessia, but I wanted to kill him – the man who was kissing you in all those photos. I was furious. I couldn’t look at you. I told myself you were childish and immature, that it was the act of a silly, spoiled girl. I did what I could to hate what you’d done because that was safer than accepting what you’d come to mean to me.”
She was very still, her eyes locked to his but giving nothing away.
“For five years I have thought of you. I’ve been in a kind of stasis. I haven’t been involved with another woman –,”
Alessia stared at him in total shock. “You mean you’ve haven’t…”
“I took our marriage vows seriously.”
“Our marriage was over.”
“Perhaps.” He lifted his shoulders. “When I heard you were engaged, I knew I couldn’t let you get married to anyone else.”
He ran his finger over the edge of the frame, lost in thought. “I didn’t blackmail Sam because I thought he wasn’t right for you. Oh, on some level I told myself I was doing the right thing to test him, but I would have paid him whatever it took – if that was ten million euros, then so be it. I didn’t care. I couldn’t let you marry him.”
Another tear rolled down her cheek. “You’re…possessive.”
“Only of you – only ever of you. And why is that? Why would I feel like this about you?” He waited, his eyes sweeping her face. “Fiero says you are smarter than I am. Can you work it out?”
She looked towards their sleeping child, her face softening a little at the image of their baby.
“I don’t know.”
“It took me far too long to understand myself. You left and I felt an impossible weight pressing down on me, making everything impossible. And then I saw this picture.”
