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‘You have to face this, Lucia. You’re never going to get past this, I’m never going to get past this, if we can’t talk together.’
Logan. Her handsome, strong Logan. She’d always hoped he would have married and had kids. He deserved to be a father. He deserved to spend his summer evenings playing in a garden, with his arms wrapped around the woman that he loved.
Twelve years ago she’d hoped that might be her.
* * *
He still wanted to save her. Even after all these years he wanted to patch her up and put her together again. But he couldn’t do it then. And he couldn’t do it now.
But things were different now. He’d realised how much he still hurt.
It didn’t matter if Lucia wrapped her arms around his neck right now and told him she wanted to try and make things work again. It didn’t matter that she might want a future with them together.
Now he’d realised exactly what he needed. For him. And for her.
He lifted his hand then ran his fingers through her hair at the side of her head. ‘I loved Ariella Rose. I loved it that her eyes were so dark blue, though they probably would have turned brown—just like yours. I loved the fine downy hair we could see on her head. I loved that her fingers and toes were perfect. I dream about the person she could have become. And I wonder about the type of personality she would have had.’
He moved his fingers down her cheek. ‘I wonder if she would have been like me, or if she would have been like you.’
He brought his hand down next to his other, clasping both of her hands in his. ‘I love it that we made a little person. But I watch the calendar every year. Every year when it’s her birthday I think about another year that we’ve lost. I think about the little girl who would have grown up and laughed and played and gone to school. I think she would be at an age right now where she would hate her overprotective dad. She would hate the fact I didn’t want her to speak to boys or to wear clothes that made her look like a teenager. I would want to keep her all buttoned up in pink dresses and sandals.’
Lucia was shaking. And not just her hands. Every part of her body was shaking. It was as if his words were starting to penetrate her fortress-like exterior.
He could see the waiter casting anxious glances in their direction. But he didn’t want to do anything that might distract her.
‘Tell me how much you miss her, Lucia. Tell me what your hopes and dreams were for our daughter.’
He couldn’t do anything to stop the shaking. He knew it was just her body’s natural response. He just kept her ice-cold hands in his, hoping and praying she would finally start to open up.
Her voice was tight. Her fingers started to grip his hand more tightly. Almost as if she were clinging on for her life.
‘I miss her every day.’ The words came out in a rush. Then there was silence. Silence he was determined not to fill. It was the first time she’d ever said anything about their daughter.
Lucia finally started to talk again. ‘I get so angry because I don’t know whether she would have had dark hair, or blond hair like your sisters. I don’t know whether she would have had curls or straight hair. I don’t know whether she would have been a tomboy or a ballet dancer. Whether she would have wanted red shoes or pink or white.’ She shook her head. ‘There’s so many things about my daughter that I don’t know. Will never know. And I feel cheated, completely and utterly cheated.’
His chest was tight. But tiny little parts of the tightness were giving away to relief. She was finally, finally starting to talk. Starting to talk about the life they had lost.
‘Then I think about things that would never, ever have mattered. Not in the scale of things.’ She looked upwards to the sky.
‘What do you mean?’ he prompted gently.
‘I mean, would she have liked cats or dogs? Would she have been artistic? Would she have liked staying in Florence? How would she have got on at school? All the things that—if our daughter was actually here—we probably would have argued about and fussed over. But in the end, it doesn’t mean anything.’ Her eyes lowered and fixed on the canal next to the café. A few boats were puttering past. People going about their daily business.
No one else could know or imagine what was at stake at this table.
Logan took a deep breath. He had so much more to say. Even though he’d been much more able to talk about his grief than Lucia, there was something about it just being the two of them here that made it different.
