‘Sì.’ Geneva rose too, but made no attempt to shake hands or offer an embrace, as if assuming it wouldn’t be welcome.
Just as when she’d left Leo late last night, Jade again felt astonished at what she’d done. But life wasn’t always about neat solutions and everyone living happily ever after. It could be messy and incomplete.
Chapter Seventeen
It was well before 7 a.m. on Tuesday when Leo strode along the lakeside, enjoying the fresh summer morning when there were few boats moving so the lake was smooth and reflected the mountains. A red seaplane circled above, buzzing like a wasp. The pilot managed the flying OK, but the plane landed like a drunken goose. More tuition was plainly needed.
He quickened his step, keen to be with Jade when her birth mother turned up. Last night, she’d told him on the phone about her temporary employment of her mother. Listening to Jade’s sweet, smooth voice, speaking English with the Scottish lilt a bit like his own but slipping into Italian when quoting anything her mother had said, he’d lain on his bed, somehow managing to concentrate despite disturbing memories of Jade in that very spot, rocking on top of him, convulsing around him, her hair loose and wild, the air charged with lust as they reacquainted themselves with each other’s burning bodies. It had been like a fever.
Cradling her afterwards, her softness snuggled against his side... His disappointment had shocked him when she’d called a taxi to leave, refusing to let him ride with her. Her arched brown brows had lifted incredulously. ‘Then you’d have to pay to be driven back. That’s crazy.’
So, he’d walked her around the hotel to the front gate, his fingers linked through hers, to see her safely into the cab with a lame, ‘Text me when you’re safely home.’ If he was staying, he’d buy his own car and find somewhere to keep it. If he ever got his money back. Torn between sick with worry and incandescent with rage, he was telephoning the bank daily now, requesting updates, demanding answers. They treated him with a maddening distance, their only reassurance that they’d give him information when they could.
On the promenade, tourists were already queuing for ferry tickets with sunny smiles, despite the office not yet being open. As he approached a crossing, his phone vibrated with a call from Isabella. ‘Any news?’ she asked, her voice thin and anxious. It wasn’t even 6 a.m. in the UK, an indication of how worried and scared she must feel about her empty bank accounts.
‘Not really,’ he said, looking both ways before crossing near the Palace Hotel. ‘Unless you consider “investigation ongoing” an update.’
Isabella sounded calmer and sadder than when they’d last spoken, as if not reeling quite so madly from the shock of losing huge sums of money. ‘Same here. What a mess.’ And then, wistfully, ‘How’s Italy?’
‘Great.’ He looked around at the sunlight on the muted colours of the beautiful buildings with their wrought-iron balconies. ‘I’m happy to be here again. How’s Norfolk?’
‘Grey. The school summer holidays are passing fast. We have a wedding reception tomorrow so the hotel’s busy. It’s good people don’t only get married on Saturdays now. More bookings.’
He struggled to find something else to say to this woman he’d once shared his life with. ‘Let’s stay in touch. Fingers crossed we both get our money back.’
‘Yes. Bye.’ Isabella sounded exactly as she was – in a dark place of the soul, confronted by the stinky clay feet of her idol, Daddy, as well as an empty bank account.
He turned into Piazza Cavour, where tables and chairs were already being set out at cafés that would buzz with customers all day. Helping Jade would give him something to think about other than his money worries – enormous though those worries were. The thought that it might lead to snatched moments alone with her quickened his stride. They’d be the best moments of the day.
He arrived at the pensione and followed a couple of guests across Reception and into the breakfast room, welcomed by clean tablecloths, shining cutlery and the delicious aroma of coffee. It was cosy to see as few as six guests at breakfast. Villa Panorama could have ten or fifteen times that. In the kitchen, he found Jade already bustling. The crease tucked between her eyebrows vanished when she saw him.
‘Ciao.’ In the morning light, the golden flecks in her eyes were like sparks and he found her plain black stretchy dress incredibly sexy. Resisting the urge to drag her into his arms, he contented himself with dropping a kiss on her sweet-smelling cheek. ‘OK?’
She grimaced as she slid brioche from a tray onto a pink napkin on a white plate. ‘Yes. No. Feel sick. Wish she’d never returned to Como. She’s supposed to be here any time.’ She didn’t have to say ‘Geneva’ for him to know who she meant, because when she glanced at the kitchen clock she almost vibrated with nerves. He could best help her in practical ways. He picked up a stack of clean plates.
Carlotta arrived, gave Jade a big, silent hug, then went to sweep floors.
If hugs were OK in the privacy of the kitchen... he waited until the door had swung behind Carlotta and then pulled Jadeinto an embrace of his own. She clung for an instant, before lifting her soft mouth to his, hot and luscious.
Pleasure rolled down his spine like treacle. ‘Missed me?’ he murmured, when he could bring himself to pull back.
‘Yes,’ she whispered. ‘I need you . . .’
‘Mm?’ He lifted a suggestive eyebrow.
She grinned. ‘To refresh the buffet.’
He chuckled, glad to see a flash of humour as she freed herself and turned her attention to a blue bowl of whisked eggs. Despite his own worries, he noted that Jade met every challenge with resolve. She added another centimetre of steel to her spine and got on with whatever needed her attention next.The hits she’s taken, he thought, as he carried his stack of plates into the breakfast room.
That was when he saw a woman in a loose black dress hovering anxiously beside the reception desk, as if unsure whether to ding the bell. Her streaky grey hair was pulled back in a bun like a scouring pad, and the tendrils escaping around her hairline formed little springs. The eyes she turned on him were smaller and darker, but her resemblance to Jade stopped him in his tracks. Seeing she’d caught his attention, the woman gave him a tentative nod and approached the breakfast room threshold. ‘Buongiorno. Is Jade Beretta here?’
‘Solo un momento,’ he answered, and returned to the kitchen. ‘She’s arrived,’ he said briefly. ‘Shall I bring her through?’
Jade’s eyes widened as she paused in the act of popping bread into the toaster. Her shoulders rose and fell, and then she came to join him in the open doorway to check the tables, where people munched contentedly on cornetti or sweet rolls with jam. ‘There aren’t many guests yet. Can you manage while I deal with her?’ Her voice was steady, but he could guess what that cost her.
‘Of course. Coffee machines and toasters hold no terrors for me.’ He ran the back of his fingers up her bare arm, earning him the flicker of a smile.
‘Thanks.’ Discarding her apron, she strode out, and he followed, curious to observe her with the woman who’d given her life. He watched her greeting Geneva calmly, ushering her back into Reception. ‘Buongiorno. It might seem an odd question in the circumstances, but do you have identification?’
