He felt her body tense. “A gold digger,” she said without any emotion.
“I introduced her to my father when we bumped into him in a restaurant when we went on our one and only date. We had zero chemistry. I told her I didn’t think it was going to work out between us after our date.” His lips pulled in a derisive smile. “She went after my father.” He had never told anyone in the family.
“It’s not your fault, Luca.”
He glanced at her, amazed at how she had sensed his guilt. He still felt somewhat responsible. He had known at the start that the woman was vain and shallow and was not his type at all, but his pride had puffed at her interest in him and so he had asked her out. He had kept silent about the whole story to spare his family more pain but felt sick to think about the hand, even by chance, he had played in destroying his parents’ marriage.
“It’s funny because he left my mother just a year ago. I’m not a six-year-old boy that he left behind. A lot of my friends’ parents divorced when they were very young. It shouldn’t be a tragedy. It should be easier to understand. He had a mid-life crisis, si?” he said. “I’m supposed to be able to deal with it. I’m an adult.”
“Did it shatter your faith in everything?”
“Not completely. No. It just made me question some things I took for granted.” He felt a small amount of triumph in being able to draw her out. And on the heels of that, relief that he had been able to voice out his resentment and pain about his parents’ divorce. Raphael had been upset at the start, but he had accepted it easier than him. Chiara’s reaction had been to swear off marriage forever.
And Luca, he had become a late bloomer cynic.
“Now I know why she didn’t want to visit me,” she said off-tangent.
“Who?”
“My mother. I was a reminder of what happened to her,” she said quietly. “I thought it was just my eyes. Because they were strange. My mother could never gaze at me for long.” She fiddled with a button on his coat. “They called me ‘Miss Matched’ in school.”
“They bullied you.” Luca knew it with certainty.
“It got better in high school. Someone taught me the art of blending in. I got my contacts.” Her shoulders rose with her deep sigh. “I’m okay, Luca. Really. I just got my answers tonight.”
“And they weren’t what you were expecting at all,” he concluded for her.
“No,” she said slowly. “But they were more than I hoped for.”
Luca frowned. How could she say that, knowing her mother had been raped by her biological father?
“It explained a lot. Growing up, I hadn’t been sure. My mother wasn’t always around. And when she was, she was distant.” Her voice trembled. She swallowed then spoke again, “But she did give birth to me, and she made sure I grew up with someone who’d really care for me. And now, knowing what she went through, I’m just happy because now I know my mother really loved me after all.”
If only I could erase all those times you were in doubt, lonely, or in pain, strega, you’d never have lived a day knowing you weren’t loved.
This girl who expected little deserved more.
Much, much more.
Luca pulled her into his arms and she went into them without hesitation. Then she cried, great racking sobs that he fervently hoped cleansed and healed her.
There was a comfortable silence between them now. An intimacy. The kind forged after baring one’s soul.
He was holding her hand once more. She hoped she hadn’t gotten snot on his shirt. She had a glimpse of her swollen eyes and red nose before the elevator door slid open and they stepped inside.
A woman in a scrub suit carrying a patient’s chart glanced up and did a double take when she saw Luca. Rumpled, he was still a gorgeous devil. And he had been her gorgeous devil for a few days, she thought with a pang.
Tomorrow she would be leaving him. She would be crying again if she didn’t get a hold of herself.
She paused at the corridor leading to the lobby. She wanted to get it off her chest now. “Luca, I’m sorry for not telling you about Markos. I was scared once you knew the real reason I wanted to see him that you weren’t going to take me to the reception.”
“You have no reason to be sorry. We were the ones who had forced you to lie.” He hesitated. “Actually, I have a confession to make, too.”
She frowned.
“I had no intention of bringing you to the wedding at all, even if you had stuck with our bargain.”
“What are you saying?"
Sabrina saw him take a deep breath. “I didn’t want Markos to see you at all. I was afraid you would get together again.”