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Gabriella would say that. Probably the moment they were alone.
It was a strange thing to him that he felt he could anticipate the sort of thing she might say. He couldn’t recall ever feeling like that about anyone before. Couldn’t recall ever thinking he was certain about the feelings of the person standing beside him. Though something about Gabriella felt ingrained in him, intrinsic to his system. He could guess at her thoughts, emotions and opinions as easily as he could guess at his own. Potentially easier.
“Alex,” Gabriella said, “can we talk?”
It wasn’t exactly what he had anticipated her saying, but she wanted to talk because she was having some kind of reaction to the scene between their grandparents. And that he had figured out. For some reason, he drew comfort in his ability to recognize and anticipate Gabriella’s moods. Which wouldn’t matter at all when she went back to Aceena. Not at all. It wasn’t as though they would keep in touch. Wasn’t as though they would exchange fluffy texts with emoticons like modern-day star-crossed lovers.
“Of course,” he said, placing his hand on the small of her back and leading her from the room, ignoring the questioning gazes of his siblings as they followed their progress.
“Gardens?” she asked.
“Not a gallery?”
“I like gardens. And galleries. And libraries. I contain multitudes.”
He laughed. “Yes, you do. You are large indeed. In a very small way.”
She inclined her head, smiling at him. Her expression was impish, but there was something serious behind her dark eyes, and it filled him with a sense of foreboding. Yet another ridiculous thing, because there was nothing that Gabriella could possibly say to him that was wort
h feeling a sense of foreboding over. He had never felt foreboding in his life.
“This way,” he said, leading her down the long corridor that would take them to the back doors and out to the garden. “I’m not sure it’s as spectacular as the grounds in Aceena. But they’ll have to do.” He pushed the French doors open, then stood like a footman, his hand outstretched, indicating that Gabriella should go ahead of him. She did. And he took great joy in watching her walk out into the sunshine, the rays of the sun shining over the glossy dark waves of her hair. She was a bright, shiny, beautiful thing, a thing that he could not hope to possess. Not with all of the money that he had in his bank account. Not with all the power and influence he wielded. Because it would take something else to hold on to a woman like Gabriella, something he simply didn’t have. Something he couldn’t even identify. And if he couldn’t identify it, how could he hope to obtain it?
This was a foolish line of thinking. He was fine. He had been fine until his grandfather had sent him on the fool’s errand to collect the painting. This was Giovanni’s happy ending, at ninety-eight, and it had nothing at all to do with Alex. Alex would go back to the way things were. Alex would go back to life without Gabby. That was as it should be. And he should want nothing else.
She walked over to a stone bench that was positioned just in front of a manicured hedge and took a seat, drawing one delicate, manicured finger over the hard, cold surface. Then she looked up at him. “It’s a very sad thing that our grandparents had to wait half a century to find each other again.”
“But a very happy thing that they have each other again, yes?”
“Yes. It is very happy.”
“And as they both said, they did not lack for love in their lives.”
“Yes. You’re right. But don’t you think…considering what they said, considering the evidence…that they never forgot each other? That their feelings for each other never lessened? That what they shared was different? They reserved a special place inside of them that was never replaced by anyone else. Not by the people they married, not by their children, not by their grandchildren. I believe that they both had happy lives. But I also believe that what they shared between each other was unique. I believe that it was special in a way that nothing else was. And I believe—”
She swallowed hard, looking up at the sky, curling her fingers around the edge of the bench and planting her feet firmly on the ground.
“I believe that there is such a thing as true love. Real love. The kind that people write sonnets about, the kind that makes people paint. That makes them sing. Like a real ‘I have one half of the magic amulet, and you have the other half and they can only be complete when they’re together’ kind of love. I just saw it in there.”
He felt cold inside. And it had nothing to do with the clear, frostbitten December day, and everything to do with the words that were spilling out of Gabriella’s mouth.
“What is the point to all of this, Gabriella?”
“I think…I think that we might have that. Because it doesn’t make sense, Alex. None of this makes sense. We don’t. We should have nothing in common. Nothing to talk about. Attraction might be one thing, sexual compatibility another. But there’s more than that. I have never felt more like myself than when I’m with you. I thought, all this time, that I needed to find someone who is like me. That I needed to find someone who would keep me safe, the way I had kept myself safe. But that isn’t it at all. I don’t want to be safe. I want to be with you.” She laughed. “I guess it doesn’t really sound right. It isn’t like I think you’re going to put me in danger…”
“No,” he said, the word coming out of his mouth, heart tortured. “You are exactly right. I am going to put you in danger. I already have. It’s evidenced by the fact that we’re having this conversation. You should not feel these things for me, Gabby. I made it very clear that what we had was physical, and only physical.”
“Yes,” she said, her voice sounding hollow, as though he had already eviscerated something essential inside of her. “I know you did. Then things changed for me. I thought it wasn’t entirely impossible that they had changed for you.”
“And that is where our differences are a problem. You are innocent. And for you, all of this is new. So of course things have changed. And I can understand why you might have thought they would change for me. But you have to understand that nothing about this is original to me,” he said, directly combating his earlier thoughts. Because he needed to. For himself, not just for her. “I have conducted more of these relationships than I can count. And there is absolutely nothing unique about you.”
She blinked furiously, tears glittering in her beautiful eyes, and he wanted nothing more than to wipe them away. But he had put them there, so he forfeited the right. “But you didn’t… If I wasn’t different, then you would have had me the moment you wanted me. I don’t think you would have held me on the floor of the library and used your words to—”
“That’s the thing, Gabby, you don’t think, because you don’t have any idea how this works. When a man wants to seduce a woman he appeals to her in any way he can. I’m not above pretending to be a much nicer man than I am. I was seemingly honest with you,” he said, the words cutting his throat on their way out. “I told you about my fearsome reputation, but then I treated you gently. I made you feel like you were different. What better way to seduce a virgin? But I never wanted your love, darling girl. I only wanted your body.”
“Why are you saying this?”
“Because it is time I told the truth. The moment you started spouting poetry I knew this had to be over. It was one thing when I thought you were going to quietly return to your home country the moment the painting was delivered. Clearly, you had other designs. And I don’t have any interest in prolonging this farce.”
