LITMIR.BIZ

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disaster that happened.’ And she’d decided long ago not to be bitter about that. She’d simply chosen to make different choices.

      ‘So what did your mother do?’

      ‘Got a job. She’d been a housewife for sixteen years, since before I was born, and she’d been a part-time preschool teacher before that. It was tough to find work that earned more than a pittance.’

      ‘And what about you?’

      ‘I worked too, after school. We sold our house and rented a small flat. That helped with expenses.’ But it had been hard, so hard, to go from the simple, smiling suburban life she’d had as a child to working all hours and living in a small, shabby flat.

      ‘I’m sorry,’ Luca said again. ‘I never knew.’

      ‘I never told you.’ She paused, waiting for him to volunteer something of his own situation, but he didn’t. ‘What about you?’ she asked at last. ‘What happened to your parents?’

      Luca was silent for a long moment. ‘My mother died when I was fourteen.’

      ‘I’m sorry.’

      His cynical smile gleamed in the darkness. ‘We’re both so sorry, aren’t we? But it doesn’t change anything.’

      ‘No, but sometimes it can make you feel less alone.’

      ‘How do you know I feel alone?’

      She took a deep breath. ‘Because I do, sometimes.’ Another breath. ‘Do you?’

      Luca didn’t answer for a long moment. ‘Yes,’ he said finally. ‘Yes, all the time.’ He let out a hollow laugh. ‘And no more so than when I was looking at Andrew Tyson and his damn kids.’ His voice broke on the words and he averted his head from her, hiding his face, shielding his emotion.

      ‘Oh, Luca.’ Hannah’s voice broke too, for her heart ached to see this proud, powerful man brought to such sadness.

      ‘Don’t.’ His voice was muffled, his head still turned away from her. ‘Don’t pity me, Hannah. I couldn’t bear it.’

      ‘I don’t—’

      ‘I’d rather someone attacked me than pitied me. It’s the worst kind of violence, cloaked as something kind or virtuous.’ He spoke scathingly, the words spat out, making her wonder.

      ‘Who pitied you, Luca?’ she asked quietly. ‘Because you seem the least likely person for anyone ever to feel sorry for.’

      ‘I wasn’t always.’

      ‘When you were a child? When you lost your mother?’

      He nodded tersely. ‘Yes. Then.’

      But she felt he wasn’t telling her the whole truth. ‘What happened to you after your mother’s death? Did you live with your father?’

      ‘No, he wasn’t around.’ Luca expelled a low breath. ‘I went into foster care, and managed to secure a scholarship to a boarding school in Rome. It saved me, lifted me up from the gutter, but not everyone liked that fact. I stayed on my own.’

      It sounded like a terribly lonely childhood. Even though she’d lost her father, Hannah was grateful for the fifteen years of happy memories that he’d given her. ‘How did your mother die?’ she asked.

      He let out a long, weary sigh and tilted his head towards the sky. ‘She killed herself.’

      Startled, Hannah stared at him in horror. ‘Oh, but that’s terrible—’

      ‘Yes, but I could understand why she did it. Life had become unendurable.’

      ‘But you were only fourteen—’

      ‘I think,’ Luca said slowly, still staring at the starlit sky, ‘when you feel that trapped and desperate and sad, you stop thinking about anything else. You can’t reason your way out of it. You can only try to end the sadness.’

      Tears stung Hannah’s eyes at the thought. ‘You have great compassion and understanding, to be able to think that.’

      ‘I’ve never been angry with her,’ Luca answered flatly. He lowered his head to gaze out at the sea, washed in darkness. ‘She was a victim.’

      ‘And were you a victim?’ Hannah asked. She felt as if she were feeling her way through the dark, groping with her words, trying to shape an understanding out of his reluctant half-answers.

      ‘No, I’ve never wanted to think of myself as victim. That ends only in defeat.’

      ‘I suppose I felt the same,’ Hannah offered cautiously. ‘My father’s death left my mother in a difficult situation, and I wanted to make sure I never ended up that way as an adult.’

      He gave her a swift, searching glance. ‘Is that why you agreed with me that relationships aren’t worth it?’

      ‘I only said maybe,’ Hannah reminded him. ‘But yes, that has something to do with it.’ She thought of Jamie’s father and felt a lump form in her throat. She’d moved on from her grief years ago, but opening those old wounds still hurt, still made her wonder and regret. If she’d done something differently...if she’d handled their last argument better... ‘When you lose someone,’ she said, ‘you don’t feel like taking the chance again.’

      ‘But he was your father, not a boyfriend or husband.’

      ‘I lost one of those too,’ Hannah admitted. ‘A boyfriend, not a husband.’ They’d never got that far. They’d never had the chance. And she had to believe that they would have, if Ben hadn’t died. That he would have changed his mind, she would have had a second chance.

      ‘When?’

      ‘Almost six years ago.’

      Luca turned to her, the moonlight washing half his face in lambent silver. ‘You bear your sorrows so well. You don’t look like someone haunted by grief.’

      ‘I’m not,’ Hannah answered staunchly. ‘I choose not to be.’ Even if it was hard, a choice she had to make every day not to wallow in grief and regret.

      ‘That’s a strong choice to make.’

      ‘It hasn’t always been easy,’ Hannah allowed. ‘And I can’t say I haven’t had my moments of self-pity or evenings alone with a tub of mint-chocolate-chip ice cream,’ she added. ‘But I try not to wallow.’

      His mouth twisted wryly. ‘Is that what you think I’m doing? Wallowing?’

      Horrified, Hannah clapped a hand to her mouth. ‘Luca, no—’

      ‘No, it is.’ He cut her off. ‘And I despise myself for it. I thought I could come here and stare Andrew Tyson in the face. I thought I could smile and shake the man’s hand and feel nothing, because I’d schooled myself to feel nothing for so long. But I can’t. I can’t.’ His voice broke on a ragged gasp and he dropped his head in his hands. ‘I don’t want to feel this,’ he muttered. ‘I don’t want to be enslaved by something that happened so long ago. I wanted this to be a clean slate, a second chance—’ He drew in a ragged breath, his head in his hands, and Hannah did the only thing she could, the only thing she felt she could do in that moment. She hugged him.

      She wrapped her arms around him, pressing her cheek into his back, trying to imbue him with her comfort. ‘Oh, Luca,’ she whispered. ‘Luca.’

      He went rigid underneath her touch but she hung on anyway. Luca could be as strong and stoic as he liked, but he still needed comfort, and in that moment she was determined to give it to him.

      He reached up to grip her wrists that were locked across his chest as if he’d force her away from him, but he didn’t.

      ‘Why are you so kind?’ he demanded in a raw mutter.

      ‘Why are you so afraid of kindness?’ Hannah returned

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