"Do you?"
"Si. Comparino is merely a piece of property to you. No wonder you ignored its existence for so long."
Ignored? Ignored? Oh, did he just say the wrong thing. Louisa's vision flashed red. "Don't you dare," she snarled. "I didn't ignore anything. From the moment I opened the lawyer's letter, I wanted to be here." He had no idea how badly. How many nights she'd lain awake wishing she could board a plane and escape.
"Of course you did. Your desire to be here was obvious from all those months you left the place to ruin."
"I was testifying against my husband!"
Her shout sounded across the vineyard. If the field workers didn't know her business before, they certainly knew it now. Let them. By this point, the damn trial was public knowledge anyway. What was another mention? Taking a deep breath, she added in a lower voice. "I couldn't leave the country for an entire year."
The explanation might have been enough for some, but not Nico. Crossing his arms, he positioned himself in front of her, his broad shoulders blocking the path. "You ignored us for over two years, Louisa, not one," he reminded her. "Or did the authorities refuse to let you leave the country before the arrest, as well?"
Not the authorities. Damn it all. How had she ever let the conversation turn in this direction? To the one secret she hoped to never have to say aloud.
"It's complicated," she replied. It would be too much to ask for Nico to continue accepting her terse answers at face value. Not this time. He was angry; he would want answers.
Sure enough, his eyes burned dark and intense as he stood, arms folded, waiting for her to continue. Louisa's skin burned from the intensity. She thought about lying, but she'd never been very good at it. Pretending, masking her emotions, sure, but out-and-out lies? Not so much. Looking back, it was a wonder she'd managed to keep Comparino a secret at all.
"I didn't have a choice-I had to stay in Boston. If Steven had known I had property in my name-property of my own-he would have..." Angry tears threatened. She looked down so he wouldn't see them.
"He would have what?" Nico asked.
"Taken it," she replied, choking on the words. "He would have taken the palazzo the same way he took everything else I had."
At last, the ugly truth was out in the open and Nico would never look at her the same way again. How could he? She was a stupid, gullible fool who let a master manipulator ruin her life. Shame rose like bile, sour and thick in her mouth. She didn't dare raise her eyes to look into his face. She couldn't bear to see pity where there'd once been admiration. There was only one thing she could do.
Spinning around, she took off down the path.
* * *
What the-? Nico stared at Louisa's retreating figure before sprinting after her. "Louisa, hold up!"
"Leave me alone," she said. "I have to get to the winery." She sounded as though-was she crying?
It didn't take long for him to close the distance between them. When he did, he touched her shoulder hoping to slow her pace, only to have her tear free of his grip so fiercely you'd think he was physically restraining her. She turned and snarled, "I said leave me alone."
She was crying. Tears streaked her cheeks. Their tracks might as well have been scratches on his skin, they hurt that much to see. This was about more than her thief of a husband stealing property. "What did that bastard do to you?"
"Nothing. It doesn't matter. Forget I said anything."
She tried to surge ahead again but he had height to his advantage. It was nothing for him to step ahead and block her path. Not unexpectedly, she shoved at his shoulder trying to make him move. "I said forget it."
"I can't," he said, standing firm. Not after seeing those tears. "Talk to me."
"Why? So you can laugh at what a stupid idiot I am?"
Idiot? Nico shook his head. "I could never think that of you."
"Then you're a bigger fool than I am," she said, jaw trembling. "And I'm... I'm..."
Her face started to crumble. "I'm a damn big one."
CHAPTER SEVEN
LOUISA BURIED HER face in her hands. Nico stood frozen by the sight of her shaking shoulders, wanting to comfort her but afraid his touch might make her run again. Eventually his need to hold her won out, and he wrapped her in his arms. She sagged into him, fists twisting into his shirt. His poor sweet Louisa. Steven Clark should be glad he was in prison because otherwise Nico would... Heaven knows what he would do. He pressed his lips to the top of her head and let her cry.
After a while, the shaking eased. "I'm sorry," she said, lifting her head. "I didn't mean to lose it like that. It's just sometimes I think, no matter how hard I try, Steven will always be there, taunting me. That I'll never completely escape him."
Suddenly all her comments about needing to be on her own took on new meaning. She was running from more than scandal and a failed marriage, wasn't she? He could kick himself for not realizing it sooner. He risked another brush of his lips against her hair before asking, "Did he hurt you badly?"
"You mean physically?" She shook her head. "He never laid a hand on me."
Thank God. Not all abuse was physical, however. Emotional abuse was insidious and painful in its own way. His parents played mind games all the time, driving one another to madness out of revenge or jealousy. "But he hurt you all the same, didn't he?"
"Yeah, he did," she said, giving a long sigh. Backing out of his embrace, she stumbled just far enough to be out of reach, wiping her tears as she walked. "It's my fault, really. The signs were all there from the very beginning, but I chose to ignore them. Love makes you stupid."
"He was also an accomplished liar," he reminded her, his nerves bristling when she mentioned the word love. From everything he'd heard of the man so far, Steven Clark didn't deserve Louisa's affection, and he certainly didn't deserve her self-recrimination.
If his underlying message made it through, it wasn't evident in Louisa's answering sigh. "He certainly was. But he was also incredibly charming and romantic, and I was twenty-one years old."
"Barely an adult."
"True, but I was certain I knew everything."
"What twenty-one-year-old isn't?" he replied.
His attempt to lighten the moment failed. Tired of standing, and suspecting getting the entire story would take some time, Nico motioned for her to follow him a few feet ahead, to a small gap between plants. He sat down beneath the branches, the dirt cool and damp through his jeans, and patted the space beside him. Louisa hesitated for a moment before joining him.
"How did you meet him?" he asked when she finally settled herself. He told himself he was asking because he wanted to understand what happened, and not because of the burning sensation the man's name caused in his chest.
"At work. My first job out of college. I was so psyched when I got the job, too," she said, in a voice that still held lingering pride. "Clark Investments was the hottest business in the city at the time. Steven was a rock star in Boston financial circles."
A rock star with twenty years on his starry-eyed employee, Nico thought, gritting his teeth. "You must have been very good to get the job."
"I was."
There was such gratitude in her smile, as if it had been a long time since someone had acknowledged her abilities. Nico laid the blame at the feet of her ex-husband. "Anyway, I met Steven a couple months after I started-on the elevator of all places-and all I could think was Steven Clark is talking to me. Later, he told me he was so impressed he had to ask me out."
That, thought Nico, might have been the most honest thing Steven Clark had ever said. What man with two eyes wouldn't be impressed by her?
"I felt like Cinderella. Here I was, a girl from a single-parent family in a blue-collar town while Steven was sophisticated and had experienced things I'd never dreamed of doing. Things like skiing in the Alps and diving with sharks." She scooped a handful of dirt and let it sift through her fingers. "I should have known then, the stories were too outrageous to be true, but like I said, love-"
"Makes you blind," he finished for her. Why that phrase bothered him so much, he didn't know. Of course she'd loved the man; he was her husband.
"He flew us to Chicago once because I said I liked deep dish pizza. Who wouldn't fall for a gesture like that?" she asked. "I thought I'd met Prince Charming.