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‘Believe me, it’s not just the dress,’ Rafe said, and he realised he was more relaxed than he had been in a very long while.
It was a gorgeous restaurant, but the atmosphere was peaceful. And Antonietta was right: it was nice not to have his minders so close. Nice to tear bread and dip it in oil and to just...be.
Here, she was no longer his chambermaid. Which meant he could ask, ‘What happened with your parents?’ And she could choose whether or not she answered.
Antonietta looked at this delectable man and, though she would love his take on things, she did not want to bring the mood down. ‘I don’t want to bore you with it, Rafe.’
‘So, give me the short version, then.’
He made her laugh. Oh, there was noha-ha-ha, but his brusque humour teased a single note from her closed throat and stretched her lips to a smile.
He relaxed her. Even while she was nervous and out of her depth, still Rafe’s presence somehow eased her soul.
‘I was to be married,’ Antonietta said. ‘I have a very big family, across all the villages, and my father is very well connected...’ She stopped herself. ‘Sorry, you want the short version.’
‘Take as long as you like.’
Her eyes widened, for he sounded as if he meant it. ‘I’ve never really told anyone the whole thing. Then again, I’ve never had to—everyone already knows...’
‘Ah, but do they knowyourversion of events?’
‘No.’ She shook her head and thought for a moment.‘No,’she said again, for even Aurora had not heard the news from her first-hand.
‘It will go no further,’ he assured her, ‘and I would love to hear it.’
‘The day I turned twenty-one I was told that I was to marry my second cousin, Sylvester.’
Antonietta had found that there were generally two reactions to this revelation—a slight grimace of discomfort or a nod of acceptance that said ofcourseshe should marry into the family, because that was where the money had to stay.
She looked at Rafe to gauge his reaction. There was no grimace and there was no nod. There was just patience.
She looked down. ‘At the last minute I decided I couldn’t go through with it. I jilted him.’
She dared not look up, but then his hand came across the table and closed around hers.
‘Antonietta, can I have the slightly longer version, please?’
She gave a soft laugh, but it was laced with unshed tears—not just because of the subject matter, it was more the bliss of contact, the touch of his skin on hers that somehow cooled her endless scalding shame.
‘I should have told him. I know that. Instead I left him standing at the altar. I ran away.’
‘In your wedding dress?’
Still he held her hand.
‘No. I pulled on some jeans and climbed out of the bedroom window. My father was waiting to take me to the church. By the time he worked out what I had done I was already on the train.’
To Rafe, the waiter coming over with their meals felt like an intrusion, and he wanted to wave him away.
For Antonietta, though, it felt like a reprieve, and her only reluctance at this break in conversation was that their hands had to part.
Then there were flurries of pepper and cheese, and their glasses were topped up, and Rafe could sense her relief not to be talking about herself any more.
He was not used to reticence.
The women he dated—for want of a better word—were only too happy to spendhourstalking about themselves. Their upcoming photoshoot, their latest role, their clean and green diet, their blah-blah-blah.
And then they would casually ask if he knew so-and-so, which meant could he possibly have a word with them? Not that they wanted favours or anything, they would hastily add.
