‘But that would be a lie, Sergio darling. The last couple of weeks I’ve spent here have worked wonders. I’m sleeping like a log every night and have more energy than I know what to do with, so I have no legitimate excuse not to get back to work. Trust me when I say when an excellent opportunity like this comes along, you don’t make waves. If a top agent like Josh says jump, you say how high.’
Sergio just stared at her, unable to find the right words. Never in his life had he experienced such confusion. He’d always known what to say when things got tricky, or sticky. Always had a clear head under pressure.
Bella’s imminent departure, however, had thrown him for six.
‘I’ve booked Luigi to pick me up very early in the morning,’ she went on. ‘My flight goes around nine so I have to be on the road by six.’
‘You didn’t have to do that,’ Sergio said more sharply than he’d intended. ‘I would have driven you to the airport.’
‘That’s sweet of you, Sergio, but I thought you might like to spend some extra time with Jeremy, since he’s gone to the trouble of coming all this way. No, I think it’s best that I go with Luigi, but thank you for the offer.’
Her smile, he thought, was oddly false, pricking a memory of a feeling he’d had when he’d first arrived home and she’d been overly vivacious with him. He’d wondered at the time if it was because of Jeremy’s presence, the way she’d thrown her arms around him and kissed him before wishing him a happy birthday and apologising profusely for having forgotten.
‘Thank God for Maria telling me this morning,’ she’d fairly gushed. ‘It gave me the opportunity to buy you a present.’ Which she’d pressed upon him, smiling when he’d opened it and seen that the cologne she’d bought him was called Seduction. ‘An appropriate name, don’t you think?’ she’d added flirtatiously.
Sergio recalled being taken aback at the time, because it wasn’t like Bella to be either gushy or overly flirtatious.
Neither was it like her eyes to go cold when she looked at him. As they were doing now.
Something was wrong. He could feel it.
‘If you’ll excuse me, I must go and pack,’ she said before he could work out what was going on. ‘Then I might turn in. I’m sure you two boys have lots to talk about, and some more of that fabulous wine to drink. So I’ll love you and leave you. I dare say I might not see you in the morning, Sergio, so I’ll say my goodbyes now.’ He struggled not to shrink back when she came over to give him a very platonic peck on the cheek.
‘You’ve been a wonderful host,’ she continued as he just stared up at her. ‘I haven’t had a holiday this relaxing in years. I’ll send you a text once I’m in New York, let you know I arrived safe and sound. Lovely to have met you, Jeremy,’ she tossed off as she headed for the doorway. ‘Ciao.’
She was gone before Sergio could jump up and stop her. Though what he could possibly say at that juncture he had no idea. He was totally flummoxed by Bella’s total change of character. This wasn’t the warm, wonderful woman he’d come to know and love. None of this was making any sense to him.
He whirled towards Jeremy, who was sitting with legs outstretched at the kitchen table, a glass of red in one hand and a half-eaten slice of pizza in the other.
‘What in hell did you say to Bella after I rang you?’ Sergio demanded angrily.
‘Absolutely nothing,’ Jeremy said, indignation in his voice. ‘I didn’t even see her again till you came home. After we spoke, I had a shower, then lay down and fell asleep. For pity’s sake, Sergio, what kind of blithering idiot do you take me for?’
Sergio’s shoulders sagged as he slumped back in his chair. He still could not believe that she was leaving him like this; that she was leaving him at all! He’d been so sure this last weekend that she loved him, convinced that only a woman in love would trust him with her body the way she’d trusted him. He’d almost told her he loved her a dozen times. He wished now that he had. Because then he would at least know the truth. As it was, he was now left floundering with a whole host of conflicting thoughts and emotions.
‘If you want my honest opinion,’ Jeremy said, ‘then I think her leaving could be all for the best. It’s perfectly obvious that she doesn’t have the same intense feelings for you that you have for her. If she did, she wouldn’t be bolting off back to New York like this. Bella’s one priority in life is her work. That’s why she’s never married. Because she’s married to her career.’
Sergio winced at Jeremy’s brutally honest assessment. There had to be some truth in what he said. Bella had never married, yet surely at least one of her past lovers would have proposed. At the same time, he still could not accept this sudden decision of hers to leave tomorrow, some inner instinct telling him that something was very wrong.
‘You could be right,’ Sergio ground out, ‘but I’m not going to let her go without telling her how I feel about her.’
‘Not a good idea,’ Jeremy warned when Sergio stood up.
‘Possibly not,’ Sergio bit out. ‘But it has to be done.’
Jeremy sighed. ‘Be it on your head, then.’
* * *
Bella was slowly packing and trying not to cry when the inevitable knock came on the bedroom door. She’d known he would come; known he wouldn’t let her get away as easily as that. Frankly, she’d been bargaining on it.
Taking a deep breath, she walked over to the door and only half opened it, standing there so that he couldn’t come into the room itself. The sight of the obvious distress in his eyes almost undid her determination to be as ruthless as he had been. She’d expected him to be upset with her. Just not this upset. Till she reminded herself that he was obsessively in lust with her. Of course he wouldn’t want to let her go just yet. He obviously hadn’t had enough. Maybe after yesterday he’d been planning on even more kinky fun and games.
This was exactly the train of thought she needed to steel her spine and harden her heart.
‘Yes, Sergio?’ she asked crisply. ‘What is it?’
His dark brows drew together in a frustrated frown.
‘What is it?’ he threw at her, his head shaking from side to side in seeming disbelief. ‘You ask me that after what we’ve shared this last couple of weeks? I thought what we had was special, Bella. Clearly, I was wrong,’ he snapped.
She found a smile from somewhere. ‘Oh, no, Sergio, you were quite right. What we shared was very special and I will be eternally grateful to you. If it wasn’t for you, I’d foolishly keep believing that I could only enjoy sex with the sort of man I even more foolishly keep falling in love with. Now I know that all I need is a gorgeous-looking male friend like you. Admittedly, I doubt I’ll find too many male friends in future who are built as impressively as you are, darling, but that’s the way it goes. Look, I know I said I wanted you to come visit me in New York once in a while,’ she rattled on, ‘but I honestly think we should leave things as they are...’
The icy coldness in his eyes sent tiny shards of glass stabbing into her already broken heart.
‘I see,’ he bit out. ‘There’s no more to be said, then. Goodbye, Bella. Good luck with the movie.’
And he was gone, striding off down the corridor without a backward glance. With a strangled sob, she closed the door, then put her head in her hands and wept.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
‘OH!’ MARIA EXCLAIMED when she walked into the kitchen just after seven the following morning. ‘You are already up. And dressed.’
Her eyes narrowed at this last remark, noting perhaps that her boss looked as if he’d slept in his clothes. Which he had. After that last soul-destroying encounter with Bella, he’d returned downstairs where he’d polished off two more bottles of wine all by himself, at which point Jeremy had told him he’d had enough, then helped him up to bed. He’d woken when he’d heard Luigi’s car on the gravel around six, not rising till Bella was safely gone, at which point he’d come downstairs where he’d proceeded to have two mugs of strong coffee in a vain attempt to make a dent in his hangover. He was now on his third.
Maria’s frown deepened. ‘Something is wrong,’ she said. ‘Where is Bella?’
‘Gone,’ Sergio growled, then gulped down some more coffee. He didn’t want to talk about Bella. Or even think about her. He should have known what she’d be like all along. She was Dolores’s daughter, after all.
‘Gone where?’ Maria persisted.
‘Back to New York. To make a stupid movie.’
‘But...but she is coming back, is she not?’
‘No, she is not!’ he snapped.
‘But she loves you,’ Maria exclaimed, sounding truly horrified. ‘And you love her.’
Sergio laughed. ‘Well, you got that half right, Maria. I do love her. At least I did. But she doesn’t love me back. She told me so.’
‘Oh, pah, that is rubbish! She told me she love you very much. But like you, she is not sure you love her. She said she die if you don’t. She want to marry you. Be your wife. Have your bambinos.’