The Rinucci Brothers: Wife and Mother Forever / Her Italian Boss's Agenda / The Wedding Arrangement

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‘What else do you know about this man?’ he asked.

‘He comes from Naples and he’s flying over here to meet you. I’ve provisionally set it up for the day after tomorrow.’

‘I’ve got a meeting—’

‘Change it.’

‘Where do we go?’

‘You want me to come with you?’

‘I can’t do it without you. Sometimes I don’t think I can do anything without you. It’s as though you’re what links me to life. If that link were broken I’d just—’ he fought for the words ‘—sink into a black hole and never come out again.’

It dawned on her that he was making what, in any other man, she would have called a declaration of love. But this man did nothing like the others.

He saw the understanding in her face and spoke in self-mockery.

‘I’m making a pig’s ear of it, aren’t I?’

‘Not really,’ she said, smiling. ‘I’m getting the message.’

‘I’m glad, because there are some things—I can’t do the “three little words” stuff.’ He sounded desperate.

He might never say that he loved her, she realised. But her life had been full of men who could do the ‘three little words stuff’ easily, and she had wanted none of them. What she wanted was this clumsy bear of a man with his tortured, painfully expressed need.

‘Do you remember the evening we collected Mark from the cemetery and you came home for supper?’ he asked. ‘The dogs were there, and their carry-on made you laugh.’

‘Yes, I remember.’

‘I’d never heard anyone laugh like that—such a sound—rich and warm—as though you’d found the secret of life. It seemed to—I had to follow—’ he grimaced ‘—whether you wanted me or not.’

‘A takeover bid,’ she said, smiling fondly.

‘Are you making fun of me?’ He said it, not aggressively, but almost meekly, like someone who was trying to learn.

‘Maybe just a bit,’ she said, touching his face.

‘You’re being unfair. I do know that women are different from stocks and shares—’

‘If only you could work out exactly how,’ she teased.

He weaved his fingers through hers, drawing her hand to his lips, then resting it against his cheek.

‘Laugh at me if you like,’ he said, ‘as long as you don’t leave me.’

The meeting was set up in neutral territory. David hired a room in a London hotel and the four of them met for lunch, Evie carrying the file with all the paperwork.

Primo Rinucci turned out to be a tall man with slightly shaggy mid-brown hair, in his early thirties. Despite his name he spoke perfect English, with no trace of an accent.

Evie was prepared for anything, but in fact the truth was clear almost at once. When Primo first set eyes on Justin a stillness came over him and he drew a long breath. After that she knew.

She couldn’t tell whether Justin had seen and understood. His manner was stiff and awkward and he scowled more than he smiled. David, with blessed tact, departed almost as soon as the introductions were made.

‘Give me a call later,’ he whispered to Evie.

When he’d gone the two men regarded each other warily.

‘You are wondering what I can have to do with you,’ Primo said. ‘Let me tell you a little about myself. I was born in England and lived here for the first few years of my life. My father’s name was Jack Cayman. He was English. My mother was Italian, and her maiden name was Rinucci.

‘She died while I was a baby and my father married again, a young English girl called Hope Martin. She was a wonderful person, more a mother to me than a stepmother. Sadly, the marriage didn’t last. When they divorced, my father insisted that I remain with him. Later he died. I went to Italy to live with my mother’s parents, and took their name.

‘But then Hope, my stepmother, learned where I was and came to see me. My family welcomed her, and my Uncle Toni fell in love with her. I was very happy when they married, especially as I was able to live with them. I felt I had regained my mother.

‘It was years later, when I had grown up, that I learned that she’d had a child before her marriage to my father. She was only fifteen and her parents wanted her to give up her baby for adoption. They were furious when she refused.

‘In the event she never even saw her child. They told her it had been born dead, which was a lie. It was a home birth and the midwife was her aunt. She took the boy away to another town, many miles away. Hope knew nothing about it.’

Justin said nothing, only stared hard at Primo. It was Evie who exclaimed in horror at what she’d just heard.

‘Yes, it was wicked,’ Primo said, looking at her warmly. ‘Hope grieved for her “dead” child, but she grieved a thousand times more to think that he was alive and living apart from her, perhaps thinking she had abandoned him.’

Justin gave a small, convulsive jerk, but he didn’t speak.

‘How did she find out?’ Evie asked.

‘The aunt died. At the end she sent for Hope and tried to tell her what had happened, but she was too near the end to make much sense. Hope understood that her child had lived, had been stolen, and nothing else. She didn’t even have the name of the town, because the aunt had gone to a place where she wasn’t known. Apart from that, all she had was the date of his birth. This.’

He pushed a scrap of paper across the table. The date written on it was exactly two weeks before the date on Justin’s official birth certificate.

‘I began looking for him fifteen years ago,’ Primo resumed. ‘It took years to find the place where a baby boy had been abandoned soon after this date. At last my investigators narrowed it down to one possibility. Then I thought the search was over because this boy had been adopted by a couple called Strassne.’

There was silence in the room for a moment. Justin did not speak, but his grip on Evie’s hand became painful.

‘For several years he lived with them as Peter Strassne,’ Primo said. ‘But he assumed a new identity twenty years ago, and that was when the trail went cold. The deed poll said that Peter Strassne had become Frank Davis, but nobody ever heard of Frank Davis after that.’

Because he’d changed his name again, Evie thought sadly. And then again and again. And every time the trail grew a little colder. By the time he became Justin Dane there was nothing left to link him with his earlier identities.

‘Once he’d seemingly vanished into thin air,’ Primo resumed, ‘my only hope was if he too was searching, and I might pick up his search. That is why I am here. I think I already know the answer, but will you tell me if your name was ever Peter Strassne?’

Slowly Justin nodded his head. Then he pushed the file of papers across the table. Primo examined it briefly, and nodded.

‘I am satisfied,’ he said.

‘As easy as that?’ Justin asked hoarsely. ‘What can a few papers prove?’

‘I told you I already knew the answer. I knew as soon as I saw you. Your resemblance to your mother is remarkable. There are tests that can establish your blood tie once and for all, but there is no doubt in my mind that you are Hope Rinucci’s firstborn son.’

Chapter Nine

THE London to Naples flight left early, so the three of them spent the previous night in the airport hotel.

‘Uncle Toni knows why I’m here,’ Primo said as they sat over dinner the night before. ‘But I didn’t say anything to Mamma before I left, for fear of raising her hopes. But now I’ve called him and told him everything, and he’s going to prepare her gently. She’s dreamed of this for so long that the reality is going to come as a shock to her.’