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‘I don’t,’ Aurora said. ‘Or I’m trying not to.’
‘Aurora, ask and I’ll tell you—but only you.’
She stood in the rain and itstillfelt like a relationship. She should walk away now, not draw herself in closer to a man who would never want her completely.
She asked, ‘How?’
‘You know when I left here that I went to my grandfather’s?’
Aurora nodded. ‘On your mother’s side?’
‘Sì.They are very modest people, who never cared much for my father. They thought my mother had made a poor choice, but she ran off and married him anyway. My grandfather suggested that I cut all ties with my father, but I could not. I got a job there and I sent half my wage home to him. I knew that he was not well and could no longer work the vines—’
‘He could have,’ Aurora interrupted. ‘He chose not to.’
‘Perhaps,’ Nico conceded. ‘Anyway, I made my own way. I worked in a bar, and then I took a loan, and then I bought a small stake in the bar and put in more hours.’
‘That doesnotbuy you a five-star hotel in Rome and three others.’
‘I don’townfour hotels, Aurora. I have stakes in them.’
She shook her head, disbelieving. No, a Sicilian woman could not be beguiled.
‘What Idoown,’ Nico said, ‘is land.’
He looked to the misty grey waters and the cliffs shining from the rain.
‘This will go no further?’ he checked.
‘Of course.’
‘Even when you sit on the hill drinking wine with Antonietta?’
‘She won’t be hearing about last night, Nico.’
‘This might be a more difficult secret to keep.’
He smiled at her slight eyebrow-raise, and the fact was hewantedto tell her. Nico wanted her take on the decision he was about to make.
‘My father married my mother not for love, but for what he thought he would get.’
‘Which was…?’
He led her out of the temple ruins and they walked towards the old monastery.
‘My grandfather owned the land we stand on—right to the edge of the temple ruins. When my mother died, he said the only good that could come out of it was that my father would never get his hands on it. He left it to me. That is why my father says I stole from him.’
‘Why did he want it?’ Aurora said.
She did not doubt it was beautiful—and, yes, the view was divine—but as far as she could see it was worthless, and she told him so.
‘Houses sit empty here for years. My father goes on about the house he had for—’ She swallowed, not wanting to say ‘us’ when no such thing existed. ‘He could not even give it away.’ She looked around again. Yes, it was her playground and, yes, she loved it, but… ‘There’s just the carcass of the old monastery and those steps down to the beach.’
‘It’sgold, Aurora. And my father would have sold it to developers. We would be standing now in a concrete jungle, with tourists being bussed in from the airport every day.’
Aurora could not picture it, though she tried to. ‘It would be good for the village, though, to have people coming through…’
‘In some ways it would—but that is not what my grandfather wanted and I agreed with him. He thought the monastery should be restored, but that would mean bringing stone up from the quarries…’ He halted. The cost and logistics were appalling. ‘Believe me, I have been tempted to just sell it—’
