Once a Ferrara Wife... (4 page)

Cristiano released her. ‘I wasn’t protecting you. I was protecting my family. This is Dani’s night and we don’t need a scene.’

‘I had no intention of creating a scene. You’re the ones who can’t hang onto your emotions. I’m perfectly in control.’

And that was the problem. It had always been the problem.

Cristiano bit back the comment he wanted to make. ‘We’re not going to do this, Laurel. Not here. Not now.’

‘I don’t want to do it at all.’

‘Laurie?’ Daniela’s voice came from behind them and then there was a flash of vivid green and a soft swish of silk as she pushed past Santo and flung her arms around Laurel. ‘You’re here! I have so much to tell you. I need to sneak you away for just five minutes so that I can show you something.’ Without giving Laurel the chance to respond, she took her hand and drew her away from Cristiano and towards the villa.

And Cristiano watched her go, wondering how his sister had managed to penetrate that protective shell while he’d been locked out.

Having dispatched the latest arrivals to the terrace with a glass of champagne, Santo joined him, his face like a storm cloud.

‘Why did you agree to this?’ ‘It was what Dani wanted.’

‘But the last thing you need. Tell me that you’re not, even for a moment, thinking of taking her back.’

Cristiano watched Laurel from the terrace, arm in arm with his sister. She moved with the grace of a dancer and the strength of an athlete, the subtle sway of her hips unconsciously sensual. Her knowledge of sports physiology was encyclopaedic and as for how she was in bed—

He clenched his jaw. ‘I’m not thinking of taking her back.’

‘No?’ Santo’s eyes followed a pretty blonde as she walked past and waved at him. ‘Some men wouldn’t blame you if you did. Laurel is undeniably hot.’

‘If you don’t want to give our sister away with a black eye,’ Cristiano growled, ‘don’t describe my wife as “hot”.’

‘She isn’t your wife. She’s your soon-to-be ex-wife. The sooner the better.’

‘I thought you liked Laurel?’

‘That was before she left you.’ Santo was still looking at the blonde. ‘My advice? She isn’t worth the effort. Let some other man have her.’

A red mist rose up from nowhere and the next minute Cristiano had smashed his fist into his brother’s jaw and had him pinned against the wall.

It took Santo a moment to recover from the shock and then he hurled his weight against his brother and switched positions. This time it was Cristiano who found himself slammed against the wall. Hard stone pressed through the thin silk of his shirt and he felt the iron strength in his brother’s hands holding him trapped. Trapped, along with all that anger.

‘Basta!
Stop, the pair of you.’ It was Carlo, a lifelong friend of Cristiano’s who was also the family lawyer handling the divorce. He wrenched the two men apart and stood between them as Santo touched his fingers to his bruised jaw, his eyes on Cristiano.

Slowly, Carlo released his grip on Santo’s shoulder.
‘Calma.

Calm down. I haven’t seen the two of you fight since you were sixteen. What is going on here?’

Santo’s eyes were fixed on his brother. ‘I suggested he should let another man have Laurel.’

Cristiano stepped forward again but Carlo’s hand planted itself in the centre of his chest.

Surprisingly calm, Santo stepped back and adjusted his bow tie. ‘Help yourself to champagne, Carlo. We’re good.’

The lawyer glanced towards the terrace but mercifully no one seemed to have noticed the disturbance. ‘Are you sure? A moment ago you were out of control.’

‘I was never out of control—’ Santo licked his split lip ‘—but I wanted an answer to a question and now I have it.’ As Carlo reluctantly left them alone, Santo gave Cristiano a long, steady look. ‘If this is love I’m glad I’ve managed to avoid it for so long because it looks like hell from where I’m standing.’

Cristiano felt the back of his neck tingle. ‘It isn’t love.’

‘No?’ Blotting blood from his mouth with the back of his hand, Santo lifted an eyebrow. ‘If it’s not, you might want to ask yourself why you knocked me in the dirt for the first time in almost two decades.’

‘You suggested—’ He couldn’t even bring himself to say the words and Santo gave an unapologetic shrug.

‘It was a test of how far you’ve come in the last two years. The answer is not far.’ He grabbed two glasses of champagne from a waitress and handed one to his brother. ‘Drink. You’re going to need it. I thought you were in trouble before, but you’re in bigger trouble than even I imagined.’

‘Cristiano just punched Santo. Which is a nightmare actually because now he’ll have a bruised jaw in my wedding photos.’ Hitching up her dress so that she wouldn’t crease it, Dani knelt on the window seat so that she could get a better look at the
courtyard below. ‘And now Santo’s got him pinned against the wall. I haven’t seen them fight since they were teenagers. My money’s on Cristiano but it could be a close run thing.’

Imagining Cristiano still and lifeless, Laurel flew to the window in a panic. ‘Is he hurt? Oh, God, someone should pull Santo off—’

‘Cristiano is fine. He’s still the stronger of the two.’ Dani shot her a look. ‘I thought you didn’t care about him any more?’

‘Just because I don’t love him any more doesn’t mean I want to see him hurt.’ Laurel licked her lips. ‘What do you think they’re fighting about?’

‘You, of course. What else?’ Dani glanced enviously at Laurel’s waist. ‘You look good for someone in the middle of a relationship trauma. I’d do anything for your abs.’

‘Anything except exercise,’ Laurel said drily and Dani grinned.

‘You know me so well. I lift my wine glass. Doesn’t that count?’

Laurel turned her head to look out of the window again. ‘I don’t want them fighting over me.’ The thought of Cristiano injured made her feel physically sick. Telling herself that was a perfectly normal reaction, she sank down onto the window seat next to Dani. ‘Go down there and stop them.’

‘No way. I might get blood on my dress. Do you like it? It’s by that Italian designer that everyone is wearing.’ Dani smoothed the fabric. ‘It’s traditional to wear green the night before the wedding. But you know that, of course, because you wore that gorgeous green dress the night before you married Cristiano.’

Laurel’s chest felt ominously tight. The feeling had grown gradually worse since that awful car journey from the airport. Nothing she did could calm it down.

Recognising the warning signs of an impending asthma
attack, she discreetly opened her bag and checked that she had her inhaler. For her the trigger had always been stress and her stress levels had been steadily rising since she’d arrived in Sicily. ‘I don’t want to talk about my wedding.’

‘You chose a better shade of green than me. In the end I went for emerald but I’m wondering if forest would have been better. Because my hair is so dark, I decided I needed the brightness of colour.’

‘How can you even think about clothes when your brothers are fighting?’

‘I grew up watching my brothers fight so it’s not a big deal, although I must admit it’s much more fun now they’re both more muscular. You only need to worry when their shirts come off.’ Dani craned her neck to take another look. ‘You should be flattered. It’s pretty cool having men fighting over you. Romantic.’

‘It isn’t cool and there’s nothing romantic about two men who can’t control their tempers.’ Laurel wished she could just stay here. Hide away for the whole evening. ‘I don’t want them fighting.’

‘Physically they’re evenly matched, but a man defending the woman he loves is probably stronger, which is why Cristiano has the advantage. I
love
those shoes you’re wearing. Did you get those in London?’

Laurel sprang from the window seat and walked the shoes to the far side of the room where she couldn’t be tempted to look down into the courtyard. ‘Cristiano doesn’t love me. We barely tolerate each other.’

‘Right. Which is why you’re pacing and he’s pounding Santo. You’re both
so
indifferent to each other.’ Exasperated, Dani dragged her gaze from Laurel’s feet to her face. ‘Do you know how many women have chased after Cristiano since he hit his teens?’

Laurel was horrified by how much that thought bothered her. ‘Why is that relevant?’

‘He picked
you.
That means a lot. I know he isn’t always easy, but he
does
love you.’

‘He picked me because I said no to him. Your brother isn’t good with the word
no.
I was a challenge.’

‘He picked you because he fell in love with you. And that is a huge thing for him.’

Amongst his family and colleagues, Cristiano held a godlike status, Laurel acknowledged numbly. He walked on water. His word was law. ‘We should be talking about you. Are you excited about tomorrow?’

‘Of course I am! I’m as excited about my wedding as you were about yours.’

‘That was completely different.’

‘How?’

‘You’ve been planning this wedding for over a year.’

‘And you were married in a hurry in the family chapel because neither of you could wait any longer. I happen to think that’s more romantic.’

The conversation was like treading on a pine cone in bare feet. It was prickly and uncomfortable. ‘It was impulsive, not romantic.’ Laurel rubbed her hands down her bare arms to warm them. ‘If we’d spent a year planning it we wouldn’t be in this mess now.’

‘My brother has always been decisive. He doesn’t take ages to think about something.’

‘You mean he ploughs his way over people. He doesn’t believe anyone else can have an opinion worth hearing.’

‘No, I mean he knows what he wants.’ Dani gave her a long look. ‘Ouch. Things obviously became pretty rough between you. Do you want to talk about this?’

‘Absolutely not.’

‘Before he met you, he never mentioned marriage,’ Dani
said softly, clearly torn between her loyalty towards her friend and her brother. ‘For a man like Cristiano that was the ultimate declaration of love.’

The ultimate declaration of love.

It was unfortunate he’d thought his responsibility ended there.

He’d put the ring on her finger. The ultimate gesture to go with the ultimate declaration. And that was his part of it done. All she had to do was fall into place and treat him with the same unquestioning deference as everyone else.

He’d hurt her and she was supposed to forgive.

Instead of which he’d hurt her and she’d hurt him right back. And now she was back here and they were hurting each other again and she wanted it to stop as quickly as humanely possible. ‘I should never have come and you shouldn’t have put us all in this position. Why on earth did you insist on having me as maid of honour?’

‘Because you’re my best friend. We’ve been best friends since we bonded over the grim accommodation at college. Your room was bigger than mine. I needed access to the space.’

Best friends forever.

‘You choose the oddest moments to be soppy.’ Laurel stood stiff. Just because her friendship with Dani meant everything to her didn’t mean she could articulate her feelings.

‘You don’t give your love easily but when you do it’s forever. I know how much you loved Cristiano.’ Like an interrogator, Dani advanced on her. ‘Every time we’ve seen each other over the past two years you’ve dodged this issue, but I’m not letting you dodge it now. I want to know what went wrong. Give me details.’

Somehow Laurel made her lips move. ‘I left.’

‘Yes, but
why?’
Dani took her hands and hesitated. ‘Cristiano told me that you had a miscarriage. Don’t be mad
at him for telling me. I
made
him tell me what had happened. I just wish you’d called me.’

‘There was nothing you could have done.’

‘I could have listened. You must have been devastated.’

Devastated. Did that word begin to describe what she’d felt that day?

Dani’s hands tightened on hers. ‘You must have felt dreadful. But I can’t believe you walked out because of that. I just can’t. Did he say something? Do something?’

He’d done nothing. Absolutely nothing.

Not even interrupted his meeting.

It was typical of sweet, sensitive Dani to guess that her brother wasn’t blameless but the last thing Laurel needed or wanted was reconciliation.

She wasn’t punishing him or sulking. She was protecting herself.

And she’d carry on protecting herself because that was what she had always done.

‘I know what men are like.’ Dani refused to give up, as stubborn as her brother in many ways. ‘Mostly insensitive, with a huge streak of ego. They invariably say the wrong thing and if we get upset about it they accuse us of overreacting or being hormonal. Sometimes I could strangle Raimondo.’

‘You’re marrying him tomorrow.’

‘Because I love him and I’m training him to not be an insufferable jerk. Cristiano is my brother but that doesn’t make me blind to his faults. Maybe we’re all to blame because we depend on him so much.’ Dani let go of Laurel’s hands. ‘When Dad died it was a hideous time. Mum was a mess—I was just eleven, Santo was still at school. Cristiano flew home from the States and took charge. And we all leaned on him—’ she pulled a face ‘—and we’ve been doing it ever since. Because he turned Dad’s dream into reality, this hugely successful global business employing thousands, everyone thinks he
walks on water, but I do see how stubborn and arrogant he can be. Tell me what he did to you, Laurie. Was it the whole “taking charge” thing? That always drives me mad.’

Laurel’s heart was hammering. ‘I appreciate what you’re trying to do here, Dani, but it isn’t going to change anything. It’s finished. We can’t go back. And I wouldn’t want to.’

‘You were perfect together. So perfect it was actually a bit sickening to watch, to be honest. But it gave the rest of us faith that love really does exist. Even cynical Santo was shocked by the change in Cristiano. We’d never heard him laugh so much.’

Feeling like a fish on a hook, Laurel glared at her friend. ‘We barely knew each other when we got married.’ But she’d taken that chance. Allowed herself to live for the moment. ‘It’s no good you trying to turn this into a fairy tale, Dani. There is no fairy tale. I can’t help that you want it to be something different. Not every episode of hot sex ends in a happy ever after.’