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‘I did not,’ he denied shortly, even though it was pointless. Hannah was gazing at him in a cringing mixture of pity and disbelief.
‘Luca—’
‘We need to get back in there.’ He cut her off, and then reached for her hand. Tonight he’d show Andrew Tyson and his damned family just how much he had, how happy he was.
By the time they arrived back on the terrace, everyone was seated and the first course had been served. Luca and Hannah took their places with murmured apologies. Luca saw he was seated next to Stephen Tyson, and he braced himself to talk to the man.
Stephen, he knew, had chosen not to take on the family’s business but was a doctor in New York instead. Now he gave Luca a friendly smile.
‘I’m sorry, but have we met before?’
A hollow laugh echoed through the emptiness inside him and he swallowed it down. ‘No, I’m quite sure we haven’t.’
Luca could feel Hannah’s concern, the tension tautening her slender body. It was strange how attuned they’d become to each other and their moods, but perhaps that was simply an effect of the parts they had to play.
‘Really?’ Stephen shrugged, still smiling. ‘Strange, but you look familiar.’
‘Perhaps you’ve seen his photograph in one of the industry magazines?’ Hannah suggested with a smile of her own. ‘Luca is quite famous in his own right.’ She placed a hand over his, squeezing his fingers, and Luca felt his heart twist inside him. He’d never had someone fight his corner before, even in the smallest way. He’d always been alone, had gone through childhood with his fists up and his nose bloody. Seeing Tyson made him feel like that battered boy again, and yet having Hannah hold his hand reminded him that he wasn’t.
‘Of course you are,’ Stephen acknowledged. ‘I know you developed the cancer centre in Ohio. It was really a masterwork of art and functionality. Utterly brilliant.’
‘Thank you,’ Luca said gruffly. He hadn’t expected Stephen Tyson to be so friendly and sincere. It made it hard to hate him.
Somehow he managed to get through three courses, making small talk, smiling when necessary. He’d brought Hannah’s hand underneath the table after the first course to rest on his thigh and he wrapped his fingers around hers, clinging to her, craving her warmth. She didn’t let go.
As the coffee and petits fours were being served, Andrew Tyson rose to make a toast.
‘It’s such a pleasure to have three dedicated family men here,’ he began with a genial smile for all of them. ‘As someone who has always determined to put family first, it is of course important to me that the man who takes on Tyson Resorts share my values.’ He paused, his smiling gaze moving to his wife and then to his children. ‘While I am saddened that my own children have not chosen this task, I understand completely why they’ve decided to pursue their own dreams—as I of course wish them to. My children are my pride and my joy, the touchstone of my life, along with my wife. The happiness I’ve experienced with my family is what I wish for each of you, and for every family who visits a Tyson resort.’
Luca couldn’t bear to hear any more. He shifted in his seat, and Hannah squeezed his hand in warning. He couldn’t leave now, but he could at least tune out Tyson’s words.
Finally Tyson raised his glass and everyone else did as well, murmuring ‘Hear, hear...’ dutifully. Luca drained his glass of wine and then pulled away from Hannah.
‘Luca,’ she began, but he just shook his head.
‘Later,’ he managed, and then strode down the terrace steps, out into the darkness.
* * *
Hannah dabbed her mouth with her napkin, trying to cover the worry that she was sure was visible on her face. What kind of terrible history could Luca possibly have with Andrew Tyson? She glanced at the man who was now chatting with Simon and Rose Tucker, and decided she would make her excuses as well. If Luca left without her, it might look as if they were having a lovers’ tiff. If they both left, people might assume it was a romantic tryst instead.
She made her farewells to the Tysons, telling them that Luca had wanted to steal her away for a moonlit walk on the beach.
‘Ah, young love,’ Andrew answered with a genial smile. ‘There’s nothing like it.’
No indeed, Hannah thought grimly as she held handfuls of her dress to keep from tripping down the stone steps that led directly to the beach.
Away from the candlelit terrace, the beach was awash in darkness, the white sand lit only by a pale sickle of moon. Hannah couldn’t see Luca anywhere. Impatiently she kicked off the silver stiletto heels that made walking in sand impossible, and gathered a big handful of gauzy dress around her knees so she could walk unimpeded. Then she set off in search of her erstwhile fiancé.
CHAPTER NINE (#u4f4978b9-1712-5358-b80f-d37e100db43a)
HANNAH FOUND LUCA about half a mile down the beach, away from the villa, with nothing but a few palm trees for company. He sat with his elbows resting on his knees, his head cradled in his hands. Hannah had never seen such an abject pose; every powerful line of Luca’s body seemed to radiate despair.
She hesitated, not wanting to intrude on his moment of sorrowful solitude, but not wanting to leave him alone either. He looked too lonely.
‘I’m not going to bite your head off,’ Luca said, his voice low and so very weary. ‘Although you have good reason to think I would.’
She came closer, her dress trailing on the sand that was cool and silky under her bare feet.
‘I wasn’t thinking that,’ she said quietly, and came to sit beside him, drawing her knees up as his were. He didn’t lift his head. She thought about asking him yet again what pain and secrets he was hiding, but she didn’t think there was much point. Luca didn’t want to tell her and, truthfully, she didn’t blame him. She had pain and secrets of her own she didn’t want spilling out. Still, she felt she had to say something.
‘The petits fours weren’t actually that good,’ she ventured after a moment. ‘So you really didn’t miss much.’
Luca let out a soft huff of laughter, and somehow that sounded sad too.
‘I know what it’s like to grieve, Luca,’ Hannah said quietly.
‘Is that what you think I’m doing?’
‘I don’t know, and I won’t ask because I know you don’t want to tell me. But...’ she let out her breath slowly ‘... I know what it’s like to feel angry and cheated and in despair.’
‘Do you?’ Luca lifted his head to gaze at her speculatively; she could only just make out the strong lines and angles of his face in the moonlit darkness. ‘Who do you grieve, Hannah?’
It was such a personal question, and one whose answer she didn’t talk about much. Yet she was the one who had started this conversation, and if Luca wasn’t able to talk about his pain, perhaps she should talk about hers.
‘My father, for one,’ Hannah answered. ‘He died when I was fifteen.’
‘I’m sorry.’ Luca stared straight ahead, his arms braced against his knees. ‘How did it happen?’
‘A heart attack out of the blue. He went to work and dropped dead at his desk. It was a complete shock to everyone.’
‘Which must have made it even harder.’
‘Yes, in a way. My mother wasn’t prepared emotionally, obviously, or financially.’
Luca glanced at her. ‘Your father didn’t leave her provided for?’
‘No, not really. He’d always meant to take out a life insurance policy, but he never got around to it. He was only forty-two years old. And savings were slim... He wasn’t irresponsible,’ she hastened to add. ‘Just not planning for the 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 softly.
He turned, his hands still on her wrists, and for a second she thought he would reject her offer of comfort and push her away, but then his features twisted and with a muttered curse he reached for her instead.
Their mouths met and clashed and the fierce desire to comfort him turned into something far more primal and urgent. His hands were everywhere, clenching in her hair, stroking her back, cupping her breasts, and all the while his mouth didn’t leave hers.
They fell back on the sand in a tangle of limbs, and when Luca’s thumb brushed over the taut peak of her nipple Hannah arched into his hand, craving an even deeper caress.
