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But Antonietta caught Aurora’s arm. ‘If Nico is back, then what are you doing here?’
‘He doesn’t want me,’ Aurora said.
But Antonietta, though only newly twenty-one, had an old head on her young shoulders.
‘Go home,’ Antonietta said. ‘Fix what you can, while you still can. I heard my father speaking to his men about the direction of the fire…’
And hearing the solemn note in Antonietta’s voice, and watching the weary firefighters approach, Aurora no longer wanted to be out in the valley tonight.
This… Nico thought as he sat at the table with Aurora’s parents playing cards. This would have been my life.
Hard work out on the vines by day, and a tired body at night.
Except no amount of labour would be enough to tire his mind.
Yet, on the plus side, he would be sitting with Aurora in the now vacant house across the road, rather than looking at Bruno’s hairy arms as he shuffled the cards.
Just because Nico did not want to be married to Aurora, and just because Nico did not want to stay, it did not mean there was not desire. It did not mean he did not care.
And he loathed the thought of her out there tonight.
‘I’m going to check on my father,’ Nico said.
He found Geo deeply asleep, and as he came out Nico felt the hot winds lick his face. He looked at the glowing mountains, and the approaching fire spreading towards them, and in the distance he could see lightning strikes.
They were sitting ducks, Nico thought as he went back into the Messina house.
‘Bruno, can I borrow your car and go and get Aurora? The fire is moving fast…’
But Aurora’s work-shy brother had just taken it, Bruno said. ‘And anyway, Aurora will not thank you if you interfere with her plans for tonight. I’ve told you she is in the safest place. They’re not going to let the chief firefighter’s house burn.’
Dio! Nico wanted to shout. Do you really think the fire will give them a choice?
‘If it gets much closer,’ Bruno continued, ‘Aurora knows to come home and we will head to the beach.’
He wanted to shake Bruno and ask, Is it not better that we all die together? But then, he did not want to worry her mother.
‘Grab a cushion from Aurora’s room,’ Bruno said, ‘You know where it is.’
Oh, he knew.
The scent of Aurora lingered in the air. He looked down and saw her gold cross on the floorboards. He picked it up and held it in his palm for a moment.
He caught sight of the book on her chest of drawers and he was intrigued, because he knew that poetry was not her thing. Even before he opened it Nico almost knew what he would see.
The little packet of pills, half of them gone, had been left for him to see, Nico was sure.
He replaced the book in her top drawer.
Message received, Aurora. Loud and clear.
And tonight it was killing him.
The sofa was soft.
Nico was not.
He heard the taxi drop some people off in the street, followed by some chatter—but not Aurora’s throaty voice.
