'I wasn't expecting anything more.'
'You say that now.'
And now Raul sulked.
He had heard it so many times before.
Raul didn't do virgins, and with good reason-because even the most seasoned of his lovers tended to ask for more than he was prepared to give.
'I mean it,' Lydia insisted.
'Do you know what, Lydia? If you've waited till you're twenty-four I'm guessing there's a reason.'
There was-she'd hardly had men beating down the door.
But a small voice was telling her that Raul, as arrogant as his words were, was actually right-making love would change things for her.
Then again, since she had met Raul everything had already changed.
'Go to sleep,' he said.
'I can't.'
'Yes, Lydia, you can.'
His voice was sulky, and she didn't know what he meant, but as she lay there Lydia started to understand.
She felt a little as if she was floating.
All the events of the night were dancing before her eyes, and she could watch them unfold without feeling-except for one.
'What happened to your back?'
Her voice came from that place just before she fell asleep. Raul knew that.
Yet he wished she had not asked.
Lydia had not asked about one scar but about his whole back.
He did not want to think about that.
But now he was starting to.
CHAPTER SIX
'IT'S YOUR MOTHER'S FUNERAL,' the priest admonished, but only once Raul had been safely cuffed and led away.
Raul and Bastiano, the police decided, should not be in the same building, so Raul was taken to the jailhouse to cool down and Bastiano was cuffed to a stretcher and taken to the valley's small hospital.
A towel covered Raul's injury, and he sat in a cell until a doctor came to check on him.
Raul loathed anyone seeing his back, due to the scars his father had put there, but thankfully the doctor didn't comment on them. He took one look at the gaping wound and shook his head.
'This is too big to repair under a local,' the doctor informed him. 'I'll tell the guards to arrange your transfer to the hospital.'
'Is Bastiano still there?' Raul asked, and the doctor nodded. 'Then you'll do it here.'
The thought of being in the same building as Bastiano tonight was not one he relished, and a hospital was no place for his current mood.
'It's going to hurt,' the doctor warned.
But Raul already did.
The closure of the wound took ages.
He felt the fizz and sear of the peroxide as it bubbled its way through raw flesh, and then came the jab of the doctor's fingers as he explored it.
'I really think...' the doctor started, but Raul did not change his stance.
'Just close it.'
Deep catgut sutures closed the muscles and then thick silk finally drew together the skin.
He was written up for some painkillers to be taken throughout the night when required, but he did not bother to ask the guards for them.
Nothing could dim the pain.
It was not the wounds of the flesh that caused agony, more the memories and regret.
He should have known what was going on.
His mother's more cheerful disposition on his last visit was because she'd had a lover. Raul knew that now.
And there was guilt too-tangible guilt-because she had called him on the morning she had died and Raul had not picked up.
Instead he had been deep in oblivion with some no-name woman and had chosen not to take the call.
Raul lay on the hard, narrow bed and stared at the ceiling through the longest night of his life.
There would be many more to come.
Light came in through the barred windows and he heard a drunk who had sung the night through being processed and released.
And then another.
Raul was in no rush for his turn.
'Hey.'
The heavy door opened and a police officer brought him coffee. He was familiar.
Marco.
They had been at school together.
'For what it's worth, I'm on your side,' Marco told Raul as he handed him a coffee. 'Bastiano's a snake. I wish they had let you finish the job.'
Raul said nothing-just accepted the coffee.
God, but he hated the valley. There was corruption at every turn. If memory served him correctly, and it usually did, Bastiano had slept with the young woman who was now Marco's fiancée.
Just after nine Raul signed the papers for his release and Marco handed him his tie and belt, which Raul pocketed.
'Smarten up,' Marco warned him. 'You are to be at the courthouse by ten.'
Raul put on his belt and tucked in his shirt somewhat but gave up by the time he got to his tie. One look in the small washroom mirror and he knew it was pointless. His eyes were bruised purple, his lips swollen, his hair matted with blood and he needed to shave.
Groggy, his head pounding, Raul stepped out onto the street into a cruelly bright day and walked the short distance to the courthouse. Raul assumed he was there to be formally charged, but instead he found out it was for the reading of Maria Di Savo's last will and testament.
His father, Gino, was there for that, of course. And he sat gloating, because he knew that apart from the very few trinkets he had given her in earlier years everything Maria had had was his.
Raul just wanted it over and done with, and then he would get the hell out.
He was done with Casta for good.
But then, for the second time in less than twenty-four hours, the man he hated most in the world appeared-again at the most inappropriate time.
'What the hell is he doing here?'
It was Gino who rose in angry response as an equally battered Bastiano took a seat on a bench. His face had been sutured and a jagged scar ran the length of his now purple cheek. Clearly he had just come from the hospital, for he was still wearing yesterday's suit.
And then the judge commenced the reading of the will.
This was a mere formality, and Raul simply hoped he might get the crucifix Maria had always worn.
That wish came true, for he was handed a slim envelope and the simple cross and chain fell onto his palm.
But then out slid a ring.
It was exquisite-far more elaborate than anything his mother had owned-rose gold with an emerald stone, it was dotted with tiny seed pearls and it felt heavy in his palm. Raul picked it up between finger and thumb and tried to place it, yet he could not remember his mother wearing it.
He was distracted from examining the ring when the judge spoke again.
'Testamona Segreto.'
Even the rather bored court personnel stood to attention, as suddenly there was an unexpected turn in the formalities.
Raul stopped looking at the ring and Gino frowned and leant forward as all present learnt that his mother had made a secret will.
More intriguing was the news that it been amended just a few short weeks ago.
A considerable sum had been left to Maria on the death of her brother, Luigi, on condition that it did not in any way benefit Maria's husband.
Luigi had loathed Gino.
But Luigi had died some ten years ago.
Most shocking for Raul was the realisation that his mother had had the means to leave.
Raul had been working his butt off, trying to save to provide for her, when she could have walked away at any time.
It made no sense.
Nothing in his life made sense any more.
And then Raul felt a pulse beat a tattoo in his temples as the judge read out his mother's directions.
'The sum is to be divided equally between my son Raul Di Savo and Bastiano Conti. My hope is that they use it wisely. My prayer is that they have a wonderful life.'
Raul sat silent as pandemonium broke out in the courthouse. Money was Gino's god, and this betrayal hit harder than the other. He started cursing, and as he moved to finish off Raul's work on Bastiano, Security were called.
'He gets nothing!' Gino sneered, and jabbed his finger towards Bastiano. 'Maria was sick in the head-she would not have known what she was doing when she made that will.'
'The testimonial is clear,' the judge responded calmly as Gino was led out.
'Bastiano used her. Tell him that we will fight...' Gino roared over his shoulder.
Raul said nothing in response-just sat silent as his mother's final wishes sank in.
She had chosen Bastiano as the second benefactor and had asked that her money be divided equally...
Oh, that stung.
He looked over at Bastiano, who stared ahead and refused to meet his gaze.
Why the hell had she left it to him? Had Bastiano known about the money and engineered the entire thing? Had he sweet-talked her into changing her will and then deliberately exposed their affair, knowing that the fragile Maria could never survive the fallout?
Gino was still shouting from the corridor. 'I stood by her all these years!'
Raul sat thinking. He knew he could contest this in court-or he could wait till he and Bastiano were outside and fight. This time to the bloody end.
He chose the latter.
Outside, the sun seemed to chip at his skull and he felt like throwing up-and then Bastiano stepped out, also wincing at the bright afternoon sun.
'So,' Raul said by way of greeting, 'the gossip in the valley was wrong.' He watched as Bastiano's brow creased in confusion, and then he better explained. 'As it turns out-you were the whore.'
The court attendees spilled out onto the street, the guards hovered, and a police vehicle drove slowly past. Raul saw that Marco was at the wheel.
As it slid out of sight Raul knew that if Marco was summoned to a fight outside the courthouse the response time would be slow.