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Carlo, the twin barely an hour younger than himself, who’d shared with him all the riotous pleasures of youth, now transformed into a man lit by a powerful inner joy. And the sight had thrown him off balance because it had called up a voice he’d thought he’d silenced long ago.
‘Forget the rest of the world—there’s only our world—what more do we need?’
Memories started to crowd in. She was as he’d first seen her, in a glittering tight red dress, low enough in front to show her exquisite bosom, high enough on the thigh to show off her endless legs. It was the attire of a woman who could attract men without trouble, who enjoyed attracting them and had no scruples about doing so as often as she pleased.
Within a few hours of their meeting he’d held her, naked, in his arms. Everything about her had been breathtaking—her body, the whisper of her voice, her laughter.
Other pictures crowded in: a day out together at the funfair, doing childish things. They’d sat together in a photo booth, arms entwined, heads leaning against each other, while the machine’s lights flashed. A moment later two pictures had appeared in the dish, and they had taken one each.
‘Sapphire,’ he murmured.
It was the only name she had ever told him. She’d kept her last name a secret, and even that had been part of her magic.
Magic. He’d resisted the idea, considering himself a prosaic man and proud of it. But Sapphire had burned with erotic power, dazzling him and luring him into a furnace from which he’d emerged reborn.
She’d been an adventurous lover, who hadn’t tamely waited for him in the bed but had come after him eagerly, appearing in the shower and sliding her arms around him as water laved them. How many times had he seen her shadow outside the frosted glass, then felt her beside him?
The last memory was one from which he still shied away. They’d made love in the afternoon and she’d left him in the evening, promising to return in the morning. He’d lain awake that night, vowing to bring things to a head the next day.
But the next day there had been no sign of her.
He’d waited and waited, but she hadn’t appeared. One day had become two, then three.
He had never seen her again.
Now he stood in the shower, his eyes closed, keeping out the world. But at last he opened them and switched off the water.
Then he tensed.
She was there, just outside the shower, her shadow outlined on the glass. She was waiting for him.
He moved fast, hurling himself against the glass so hard that he nearly broke it, reaching out, trying to find her.
But his hands touched only air. There was nobody there. She had been an illusion as, perhaps, she had always been. He stood there alone, shaking with the ferocity of his memories.
He dried himself mechanically, trying to force himself to be calm. It shamed him to be out of control.
That was the mantra he’d lived by since the day she’d vanished into thin air. Control. Never let anyone suspect the turmoil of joy and misery that had destroyed and remade him.
He’d returned to Italy, apparently the same man as before. If his rambunctious hard living had been a little forced, his manner more emphatic, nobody had seemed to notice. He had kept his memories a secret, sharing them with nobody in the world—until tonight.
With Evie he’d come closer to confiding than with anyone else, ever. But he wasn’t a man who easily discussed feelings, or even knew what his own feelings were much of the time. So he’d gone just so far before retreating into silence.
Today, at his brother’s wedding, he’d sensed that Carlo had found a secret door and gone through it, closing it behind him.
For him the door had stood half-open, but then it had brutally slammed shut in his face, leaving him stranded in a desolate place.
All around him the villa was hushed for the night. It was packed to the rafters with people—many of whom loved each other, some of whom loved him. In the midst of them he felt lonelier than ever before in his life.
The flight from London had been delayed, and by the time Polly landed at Naples she was feeling thoroughly frazzled. The extra time had given her more chance to think about what she was doing and regret that she had ever agreed to do it.
There was a long queue to get through Passport Control, and she yawned, trying to be patient. A large mirror stretched the length of the wall, providing an unwelcome opportunity to anyone who could bear to look at themselves after a flight. For herself, she would gladly have done without it. There was nothing in her appearance that pleased her.
It was wickedly unjust that, equipped with much the same physical attributes as her cousin Freda, she had turned out so differently. Freda had been tall, slender, willowy—a beauty who’d walked with floating grace. Polly was also tall and slender, but her movements suggested efficiency rather than elegance.
‘And just as well,’ she’d tartly remarked once. ‘I’m a nurse. Who wants a nurse drifting beautifully into the ward when they need a bedpan? I run, and then I run somewhere else, because someone’s hit the alarm button. And when I’ve finished I don’t recline gorgeously on a satin couch. I collapse in an exhausted huddle.’
Freda, who’d been listening to this outburst with amusement, had given a lazy chuckle.
‘You describe it so cleverly, darling. I think you’re wonderful. I couldn’t do what you do.’
That had been Freda’s way—always ready with the right words, even if they’d meant nothing to her. Polly, prosaic to her fingertips, had seen that slow, luxurious smile melt strong men, luring them on with the hint of mystery.
To her there had been no mystery. Freda had done and said whatever would soften her audience. It had brought her a multitude of admirers and a rich husband.
Polly had even watched helplessly as a boyfriend of her own had been enticed away from her, without a backward look. Nor had she blamed him. She hadn’t even blamed Freda. It would have been like resenting the sun for shining.
Freda’s heart-shaped face had been beautiful. Polly, with roughly the same shape, just missed beauty by the vital millionth of an inch. Freda’s hair had been luxuriously blonde. Polly was also fair, and could probably have had the same rich shade if she’d worked on it. But life as a senior nurse in a busy hospital left her neither time nor cash to indulge her hair. She kept it clean and wore it long, her one concession to vanity.
Trapped in the slow-moving queue, she had plenty of time to consider the matter and come to the usual depressing conclusions.
‘I look like I’ve been left out in the rain by someone who’s forgotten. But is that so strange, after the way I’ve spent the last year?’
At last she was out, and searching for a taxi to take her to the cheap hotel she’d booked on-line, which was all she could afford. It was basic, but clean and comfortable, with friendly service. Judging it too late now to start her search, she dined in the tiny garden restaurant off the best spaghetti she’d ever tasted. Afterwards she showered and stretched out on the bed, gazing at the snapshot she’d taken from her purse.
It was a small picture, taken in a machine, and it showed Freda, gorgeous as always, sitting with a young man in his late twenties. He had dark hair that curled slightly, a lean face and a stubborn mouth. Freda was leaning against him, and his arm was about her in a gesture of possessiveness. His cheek rested on her head, and although he was half smiling at the camera it was clear that the rest of the world barely existed for him.
Polly studied him, trying to decide why, despite his air of joy, there was a kind of fierceness about him that defied analysis. He seemed to be uttering a silent warning that Freda belonged to him, and he would defend his ownership with his last breath.
But it hadn’t worked out like that. He had lost her for ever. And soon he would know it finally.
For a long time Polly lay looking at the ceiling, musing.
What am I doing here? I don’t really want to see Ruggiero Rinucci, and I’m sure he doesn’t want to see me.
Maybe I should have written to him first? But I don’t have his exact address. Besides, some things are better face to face. Plus, men are such cowards that if he knew why I was coming he’d probably vanish. Oh, heavens, how did I get into this?
On the edge of Naples stood La Pista Grande, a large winding track that was the scene of many motorbike races.
Here, too, the firm of Fantone & Rinucci tested their motorbikes, with Ruggiero insisting on doing all tests personally, and taking every machine to the limit.
‘If it doesn’t half kill him he thinks there’s something wrong with it,’ one of the mechanics had remarked admiringly, and when Ruggiero was on the track as many as possible of the workforce turned out to watch, cheer and take bets on his survival.
He arrived next morning with Evie, gave her some technical paperwork about the bike and showed her to the best place in the stands, just where the track curved three times in a short space, so that briefly he would be riding straight for her before turning into another sharp bend.
‘If I break my neck, it’ll likely be just there,’ he said, indicating the mechanics who were also there. ‘That’s why they gather in this spot—hoping.’
Evie laughed. There was a sprinkling of women among the mechanics, and she doubted if they’d come hoping for an accident. More likely it was connected to the sight of Ruggiero in tight black leather gear that emphasised every taut line of his tall, lean but muscular figure.
He gave a harsh grin and departed, leaving Evie to get to her seat in the front row. As she was settling she became aware of a young woman standing a few feet away. She was slim, with long fair hair and a slightly nervous manner. She gave a brief smile and sat down, looking rather as though she hoped to avoid notice.
‘Are you from the factory?’ Evie asked pleasantly.
‘No—you?’
‘No, I just came to see Ruggiero. He’s my brother-in-law.’
After exchanging a few more words, the stranger smiled absently and seemed disinclined to talk further. Evie took out the paperwork and plunged happily into facts and figures about sequential electronic fuel injection, adjustable preload and eccentric chain adjuster, totally absorbed until the testing was about to begin. Then she looked at the young woman and realised that she sat like stone, motionless, her eyes fixed on the track as though something vital depended on what she saw there.
Ruggiero kept his grin in place as he walked towards the two men who were holding the bike. He used the grin as a kind of visor behind which he could hide. Today the effort was greater than usual, because he’d had little sleep. His thoughts about Sapphire had been destructive. Once conjured up, she’d refused to depart, haunting him all night until he fell into an uneasy sleep and awoke after one hour, not at all refreshed.
The sensible course would have been to delay the test until another day, but he couldn’t bring himself to admit that he didn’t feel up to it. Besides, he refused to give in to fancies. Sapphire could be banished if he were only resolute.
He pulled on the black helmet that enveloped his head completely, blotting out his identity and turning him into a cross between a spider and a spaceman. A kick and the engine roared into life. Another kick and he was turning out onto the track.
He took the first circuit at a mere ninety miles an hour—a moderate speed—leaning into the turn so deeply that his knee nearly touched the ground. Then he shot ahead, going faster and faster, until the machine reached a hundred and fifty—the extreme of its ability. But he knew that beyond the official limit there was always a little extra, and he urged it on, demanding just that bit more, and then more, because if he went fast enough he might outrun the ghost that pursued him.
Yet she was there, just behind him, warning him that flight was impossible. She was there inside his helmet, telling him that she would always be with him.
But she was also ahead of him, on the track, her long fair hair fanned into a halo by the wind—waiting for him.
Suddenly all the pictures ran together, so that he could no longer see ahead. Only half knowing what he did, he turned the front wheel, desperate to avoid the apparition that might or might not be there. The next moment he was flying through the air, to land with a brutal force that knocked the breath out of him and sent the world whirling into chaos.
CHAPTER TWO
FREDA had known little about Ruggiero except that his family lived in the Villa Rinucci, and Polly would have gone there on the morning after her arrival but for the chance of the hotel receptionist leaving open a Naples newspaper with a picture of Ruggiero just visible. Knowing no Italian, she’d asked the man to translate the piece, and found a description of Carlo’s wedding, with some background about the family, including a mention of the motorbike firm. She had decided to go there first, and the receptionist had called a taxi and given the driver the name of the firm.
At the factory the language problem had cropped up again, but after a certain amount of misunderstanding she’d discovered that Signor Rinucci was at the racetrack today. She’d taken the taxi on to the track, glad of the chance to observe him unseen. The place was closed to the public, but she’d arrived just as some employees of the firm were being allowed to enter through a side door, and by mingling with them she’d managed to slip inside.
As soon as she’d reached the stands she had seen him, showing a young woman to a seat in the front row. Polly had held back, wondering what place the woman held in his life. Suddenly he’d grinned, and something cold, almost wolfish about it had made her shiver. Then he’d departed and she’d been able to move down to the front row. The young woman had smiled at her.
‘Are you from the factory?’
‘No,’ Polly said cautiously. ‘You?’
‘No, I just came to see Ruggiero. He’s my brother-in-law.’
‘You mean,’ she asked in alarm, ‘he’s married to your sister?’
‘No, I’m married to his brother.’ She chuckled. ‘I can’t see Ruggiero ever getting married. He enjoys a wide choice of women without tying himself down.’
Polly sighed with relief. A wife or girlfriend would have made her mission much harder. She settled down to watch as Ruggiero, in the distance, mounted the fearsome looking bike, started up, gathered speed, then took off like a rocket.
Lap after lap she watched him with fierce intensity, admiring his ease in the face of danger. The track twisted and turned like a snake, so that he’d no sooner taken a bend, leaning far over to one side, than he had to swiftly straighten up and swing deep in the other direction, then back again, and again. Every move was performed with careless grace and no sense of strain.
In one place the twisting of the track brought him directly ahead, so that for a stunning moment he was heading right for her. Then he leaned deep into a terrifyingly sharp bend and was gone, vanishing into the distance, while the black visor still seemed to hang in the air before her.
Then a strange thing happened.
For no apparent reason she felt a sense of dread begin to invade her. Her brain was on red alert, saying that something was badly wrong. She knew nothing about bikes, but much about troubled minds, and every instinct told her that this man was labouring under a burden and fast reaching his limit.
She stood up, pressing against the rail, frowning as her brain tried to understand what her instincts could sense. He was right ahead again. Coming straight for her until he swung into the bend.
But it was as though he leaned in too deep and couldn’t get out. The next moment the front wheel twisted, jerking the machine into a scissor-like movement that sent him flying through the air.
All around there were shouts of horror, but Polly was galvanised into action. She was first over the barrier, racing across the track, dodging the lethally spinning wheels of the bike, lying on its side, and throwing herself down by Ruggiero.
‘Don’t move,’ she said, unsure whether he could hear her.
‘Hey—’ Piero Fantone had caught up and tried to pull her away.
‘I’m a nurse,’ she said, struggling free. ‘Get an ambulance.’
‘Ambulanza!’ Piero bawled, and turned back to her.
Ruggiero gasped and made a movement. Through the dark plastic of the visor Polly saw him open his eyes, saw the stunned look in them before they closed again.
‘Did he break anything?’ Piero demanded.
She ran her hands lightly over Ruggiero.
‘I don’t think so. But I’ll know better when some of this leather is removed. We need to get him inside.’
‘We keep a stretcher here. It’s on its way.’
From behind the visor a voice growled words she didn’t understand, but the gist of them was clear to Piero, from his urgent voice and attempts to restrain him. His reward was a stream of Neapolitan words that Polly rightly guessed to be curses.
‘He’s all right,’ Piero said.
‘It’s certainly reassuring,’ she agreed.
Ruggiero began to fight his way up, swinging his arms wildly so that Polly, kneeling beside him, was knocked off balance. He managed to get onto one knee before keeling over and landing on her as she raised herself. She reached out quickly, supporting him as he collapsed against her, his head thrown back. For a moment she thought his eyes opened and closed again, but it was hard to be sure.
‘We should take off his helmet,’ she said, laying him gently back onto the ground.
Piero gently eased the helmet off, and now she could see Ruggiero clearly for the first time. It was the face in the photograph with Freda, but older, thinner, his hair disordered and damp with sweat, making him look vulnerable—something she guessed was rare for him. His eyes remained closed, but she saw his lips move.
‘What’s he saying?’ Piero asked.
‘I can’t tell.’ Polly leaned forward, putting her ear close. She felt the warmth of his breath against her cheek and heard a whispered name that made her tense and look at him sharply.
‘Sapphire!’
‘What did he say?’ Piero asked.
‘I—I didn’t catch it. Oh, good—there’s the stretcher. Let’s get him inside.’
She backed away as several men lifted him and began the journey back across the track. Polly stood watching, frozen with shock, until Evie put an arm around her.
