LITMIR.BIZ

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it on the table. ‘Go and get ready. I’ve just decided I want to leave as soon as possible.’

      ‘You mean,’ Meghan retorted, ‘you want to stop this conversation.’

      ‘As a matter of fact, yes. Why don’t you pack your things? It won’t take long.’

      Wordlessly Meghan rose from the table. She wasn’t going to waste her energy or emotions on arguing over such petty things. She knew she’d need to save them for later—for the bigger, more important battles that were sure to come.

      She went upstairs. Stuffed her few paltry possessions into the worn haversack.

      ‘What am I doing?’ she muttered, a bubble of hysteria rising inside her, threatening to escape in a wild peal of laughter. ‘What am I doing?’

      She was leaving for Milan to meet the di Agnio family … to be introduced as Alessandro’s fiancée. Bride.

      It was so crazy. It was so real. She didn’t know what to do but continue to move forward, one inch at a time. If she looked further than the next day, the next moment, she would fall into an abyss of fear and doubt.

      ‘I washed your things.’ Ana stood in the doorway, her expression close to a glare. Meghan’s waitressing uniform was folded neatly in her hands.

      ‘Thank you, Ana,’ she replied in Italian.

      Meghan took the clothes hesitantly. Disapproval and dislike rolled from the woman in waves, and she felt compelled to say something.

      ‘You know I am marrying Signor di Agnio?’ she said, and Ana nodded stiffly.

      ‘You will—’ she began, struggling to find the words. ‘You will make him happy?’ It was as much an order as a request.

      Meghan blinked in surprise. ‘He told me you didn’t like him,’ she blurted out.

      ‘I don’t like the man he has become. The boy he was … here … I loved.’ Ana blinked and shrugged, impatient. ‘Goodbye, signorina.’

      She left the room, and Meghan stuffed the clothes into her haversack, her mind whirling.

       The man he has become.

       The man I mean to be.

      What was the difference?

      ‘Ready?’ Alessandro asked from the doorway. He’d shrugged on a beautifully tailored jacket, worn with unselfconscious ease and grace. ‘It takes about two hours to drive to Milan. We’ll go straight to my mother’s house, if you don’t mind.’

      With the sunshine turning the distant green fields to gold, Meghan watched the Villa Tre Querce disappear as they drove down the steep, winding hill and through the wrought-iron gates.

      ‘When will we be back?’ she asked after a moment.

      Alessandro glanced at her. ‘To the villa? Who knows? We can plan a honeymoon, of course. Somewhere different … somewhere neither of us have ever been.’

      Meghan regarded him thoughtfully. It almost sounded as if she were not the only one who was used to running away.

      What are your secrets? she wanted to ask. What are you hiding from me? She could hardly ask for the truth now, when she was hiding so much herself. There was time. There had to be time.

      Neither of them spoke as Alessandro drove past Spoleto into Tuscany. The fields on either side of the motorway were a blur of browns and greens, and Meghan leaned back in her seat and closed her eyes.

      She was, she realised, completely exhausted. She must have dozed, for she woke up as the car began to climb the foothills into Lombardy. Alessandro smiled at her as she sat up, shrugging strands of hair from her eyes.

      ‘We’re about an hour away. I’ve telephoned my mother. She expects us for lunch.’

      ‘Great.’ Meghan swallowed nervously. ‘Maybe you could tell me about your family?’

      He shrugged. ‘There is not much to know. My mother, Gabriella, lives in the house I was born in—in Milan. My father died four years ago of a heart attack. My sister, Chiara, lives in London. She works for Di Agnio Enterprises there.’

      ‘And your brother?’

      He pressed his lips together, shook his head. ‘I told you before. He is dead.’

      ‘Right. I’m sorry.’ Meghan felt as if every word she spoke was prodding a nest of vipers, full of poisonous secrets. ‘When did he die?’

      ‘Two years ago.’

      ‘Was it from a disease?’

      ‘Car accident.’ He spoke so tightly that Meghan almost didn’t hear the bitten-out words.

      ‘And what about his wife…?’

      ‘She lives in Rome. You’ll find Paula will have nothing to do with me. With us. We needn’t consider her at all.’ Alessandro spoke so dispassionately, so coldly, that Meghan knew it was a subject she must drop.

      For now.

      ‘So I’m just meeting your mother today?’ That was easier than a houseful of faceless disapproving di Agnios. One woman she hoped she could handle.

      ‘Yes. Chiara, I hope, will fly to Milan for the wedding.’ He glanced at her enquiringly. ‘That is, if you agree to a wedding in Milan? Naturally I assumed you did not wish to return to Stanton Springs.’

      ‘Naturally.’ Meghan felt the beginnings of a headache. She massaged her temples. ‘A wedding in Milan is fine. Something small.’

      ‘Of course. Small, but tasteful.’ His mouth quirked in a smile. ‘Elegant. Do you wish to notify your family? Perhaps there is someone—a friend—you would like to attend?’

      Meghan thought of her family—her two older sisters, safely married and quick to judge, the disapproval and disappointment of her parents who hadn’t been able to understand how it had come to this. As for friends—Stephen had pushed them all away, and now she was too embarrassed to tell them the truth.

      No one wanted to hear a truth like this. Not in a small town.

      ‘No,’ she said after a moment, her voice a thread of sound. ‘There’s no one.’

      Alessandro’s mouth tightened, but he did not insult her with pity. ‘Just as well. Everything will be easier to arrange.’

      The fields and foothills gave way to houses as they entered Milan. On the horizon Meghan saw a cluster of skyscrapers bearing silent witness to the fact that Milan was one of the most glamorous and cosmopolitan cities in Europe.

      ‘Will … will your mother like me, do you think?’ Meghan asked, trying to keep her voice diffident.

      Alessandro laughed once—a sharp, bitter sound. ‘Don’t waste your time trying to make people like you, Meghan.’

      She blinked. ‘But, Alessandro, this is your mother. Of course I want her to like me.’

      ‘Why? She doesn’t like me.’ He stared straight ahead, his expression grim.

      ‘Is that why you don’t love her?’ Meghan asked after a moment.

      ‘No. I don’t love her because I don’t love anyone.’ Alessandro flexed his hands on the steering wheel as he navigated the increasing city traffic. ‘You’re not thinking you can change me, Meghan, are you?’ he said, his voice pleasant but with the hint of a warning. ‘Because I told you once before—you can’t. Don’t make the mistake of entering this marriage thinking you can change me, save me.’

      Save me. The words echoed through Meghan’s mind. Did she think she could save Alessandro? Make him believe in love?

      No, surely not. Surely she wasn’t that desperately naïve. Besides, Meghan thought, you couldn’t save

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