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Because although it reallycouldn’tbe, the woman standing there—tall, slim, looking as though she had just stepped out of the pages of a fashion magazine, her river-straight waist-length hair with a mirror gloss, her make-up perfectly highlighting her china-blue eyes—was the same woman she had seen in the photo her birth mother had proudly shown her—her half-sister. Maya still had it—it was the only thing her birth mother had ever given her.
‘You’re Mia?’
‘Maya.’
‘Of course, Mummy described you perfectly...but I’d have known you anywhere!’
‘You would?’
‘Absolutely! There’s just thisconnectionbetween us; I can feel it, my little sister. Can’t you?’ As she bent forward to kiss the air either side of Maya’s face, Maya instinctively leaned back, not to avoid contact, but to stop the baby being sandwiched between them. ‘Although you’re older than me, aren’t you? But I’m sure you look lovely with some make-up on.’
Maya blinked rapidly, unnerved by Violetta’s rather Siamese cat stare and too utterly confused to even register the implication that she clearly did not look lovely without it.
‘No...yes, that is, I’m...’ Maya shook her head. ‘You...here...’ She took a deep breath and focused on forming an entire sentence. ‘Just what is happening?’
‘I needed help—’ Maya watched with horror as her half-sister’s slender shoulders began to shake, and her lovely face crumpled as tears began to roll in slow motion down her cheeks.
Maya’s wary antagonism melted into genuine concern. ‘Is there anything I can do?’
‘I shouldn’t be here, really... I’m so sorry. I should have rung you, I know, but I was afraid you’d say no and I had nowhere else to go. You’re ouronlyhope, so please don’t send us away,’ she begged plaintively, hugging the sleepy baby so tight that he gave a little cry of protest.
It jolted Maya free of her shock. ‘Oh, no...no, of course not—’ She broke off at the sound of heavy breathing a moment before a figure carrying luggage under both arms came into view.
‘There’s no lift, and you don’t travel light.’
Maya, who was feeling as though events were getting way ahead of her, took in the numerous bags now filling the doorway and the panting, sweaty-faced new arrival, who did not look happy, though his frown vanished when Violetta looked at him with tears shimmering in her beautiful eyes.
‘Oh, you poor thing! Mia was just about to help you, weren’t you?’ she assured him, an emotional hitch in her voice as she turned to Maya. ‘This man—George, isn’t it?—has been a total angel... Now, where is my purse...? Oh, Mia, would you get it for me? And don’t forget to give George a healthy tip.’
Mia?Ah, well, she’d been called worse, and she had other priorities, like locating her purse, paying the driver and dragging the luggage wedged in the doorway inside. By the time she had accomplished these tasks Violetta and the baby had transferred themselves to the sofa in her living room, and while the baby dribbled and chewed his fist his mother was giving her attention to the interior decor. It was patently obvious from the flare of her nostrils that shabby chic was not her thing.
Maya waited. There were just so many things to say she didn’t know where to start, though it seemed she didn’t need to.
Her visitor whispered a tremulous, ‘I’m sorry.’
‘For what?’
The literal response drew a tiny frown and the intense blue gaze narrowed calculatingly on Maya’s face. ‘Turning up without warning this way...but I was desperate, although I swear I’ve wanted to reach out to you for so long...’
‘You have? But I thought your mother...Oliviasaid that neither of you wanted anything to do with me...’ Maya bit her lip, hating that telltale quivering of her voice.
‘When Mummy met you, I was...vulnerable.It’s a time in my life that I still struggle to talk about. And Mummy always was...isvery protective of me. Later on, I must admit I was afraid that you’d resent me, even though—’ Her lips quivered this time, and her voice cracked. ‘Even though Cristiano said that I should... I’m sorry—’
She looked around helplessly until Maya located a box of tissues on the desk behind her. The practical gesture seemed pretty inadequate given the situation, but it was better than nothing.
‘Cristiano?’
‘My husband.’ Violetta took a tissue and dabbed it gently to her miraculously smooth and unblotchy cheek. Maya couldn’t believe there wasn’t even a smudge to her make-up. ‘But he died without ever seeing our dearest Mattio.’
Maya’s wide, shocked eyes went to the little baby—her nephew!—and her heart ached for him and his mother. How on earth did someone recover from a tragedy like that?
‘I am so sorry to hear that.’
The baby chose that moment to grab a strand of his mother’s dramatically coloured hair in his chubby fist. Violetta let out a squeal, her expression of tragic suffering suddenly morphing into annoyance.
‘Let me.’ Maya leaned forward and unwound the tiny yet tenacious fingers from the glossy strand that started auburn at the root and went through an extraordinary range of shades ending in a deep strawberry blonde at the tip. It was hard, given the artistry, to guess what her natural hair colour was.
‘And now I...I have nothing!’
