Chapter 13
Several hours later, not long after they’d fallen into an exhausted sleep, Nat woke to a strange noise. Her eyelids flicked open and despite the pull of slumber she was suddenly instantly alert. Her heartbeat boomed in her ears as she strained into the apparent silence.
The she heard it again. A cry.
Julian!
Careful not to disturb Alessandro, she eased off the bed and grabbed her discarded clothes, throwing them on, and headed to Julian’s room. The muted glow from the illuminated fish tank by the window silhouetted Julian’s tiny frame as he sat up in bed.
‘What is it, matey?’ she crooned.
‘I’ve been sick,’ he sobbed.
Nat, her brain still cloaked in slumber and her bones still heavy from sexual malaise, reached for the nightlight and snapped it on. Julian’s hair was mussy from sleep, his face flushed. She could smell the acidic aroma of vomit and noticed the soiled bed linen.
Sitting on the bed beside him, she put her arms around his shoulders. He didn’t feel warm any more but he’d obviously had something in his system. ‘It’s okay, matey. Let’s get you cleaned up and give you some more medicine.’
She groped in his drawer for clean pyjamas then picked him up and carried him into her en suite, where she helped him change. Wetting a flannel, she wiped his flushed face, then got him to gargle some mouth rinse.
‘Better now?’
He nodded but he seemed listless as she carried him back to his room and she didn’t feel comfortable leaving him all alone in his bed when he was obviously miserable.
Glancing at the open doorway at the end of the hallway, a memory from her childhood assailed her.
She’d been seven and ill from something she couldn’t remember now.
But she could remember her mother bringing her into her parents’ bed and how she had snuggled into her father.
He had patted her back and curled his big arm around her and she had felt so safe and secure and loved.
It had been just before he’d left them and Nat cherished that memory like it was gold. Sure, her mum had always showered her with TLC when she was sick, but without her dad and his big old arm there, she’d always felt a little less loved.
Nat didn’t give it another thought. Everyone wanted to feel they were loved when they were sick.
It was just… human. She crept into the room and on to the bed and laid Julian next to his father.
Alessandro stirred and reached for her before he realised the situation, levering himself up on to his elbow.
‘Julian?’ He glanced down at his son then up at her. ‘What’s wrong?’
‘He vomited and he still seems out of sorts.’
Nat could see the indecision on Alessandro’s face, like children in bed had been a no-no in their marriage, but screw that. ‘He needs you,’ she said gently. ‘There’s no better place than Papa’s bed when you’re sick.’
Alessandro looked at Julian and she watched as his hesitation dissipated. ‘Certo, ragazzo mio, vieni da papà.’
Her Italian may have been rusty but Nat knew enough to know Alessandro had consented, and by the look on Julian’s face, he knew it too.
Alessandro lay down on his side, pulling Julian into him, playing the big spoon to his son’s little one.
‘Thank you,’ he mouthed at her as his chin rested on his son’s head and his eyes drifted shut.
Nat watched as Julian’s eyes followed suit but not before he’d tucked his hand in his father’s.
They looked like a family. Alessandro, the big protective patriarch, dwarfing his son, holding him close.
Julian looked how she must have looked all those years ago, safe in her father’s embrace – content, secure, loved.
And her heart filled with an emotion she didn’t want to investigate too closely.
Easing herself off the bed, she took one last lingering look at them before creeping out of the room. Even as she yearned to join them.
It was amazing the difference a few weeks could make, Nat thought as she sat at a distance and watched Alessandro and Julian build a sandcastle together down close to the shoreline.
They’d spent the day at Noosa, swimming and playing beach cricket and eating fish and chips at one of the trendy little cafés that lined the boardwalk.
There’d been a real shift ever since Julian had shared his father’s bed that night he’d been unwell. They’d come out of it much closer, like a bond had been forged – newer and stronger.
And they’d blossomed under it, opening to each other a little more each day. Chatter and laughter filled the house now instead of stilted conversation and the loud buzz of longing.
Julian smiled at his father. Sat next to him on the sofa. Sought him out to tell him things. He looked for hugs and went eagerly into his father’s embrace. He’d lost that taut little set to his shoulders. The wary, defeated look that had haunted his features.
And Alessandro stopped looking a hundred years old.
It was heartening to witness and Nat just knew, as the sun beat down on her shoulders, that they were going to be okay.
Sure, there would be moments when their grief and sadness would come upon them again, blindside them, but at least now they looked like they’d turn to each other for comfort and support.
At least they’d stopped looking to her for guidance.
‘Nat! Nat!’ Julian yelled, popping his head up from his all-fours position, waving an arm at her. ‘Come and look at what Papa and I built!’
Nat smiled and rose. She’d deliberately taken a back seat over the weeks, pushing the two of them together at every opportunity. It made her heart glad to see father and son doing things together. To see Julian acting like a normal four-year-old. To see Alessandro looking less and less haggard.
But as she walked towards them, their dark, downcast heads together again, beavering away on their creation, she couldn’t deny the tug at her heartstrings and the deep-seated yearning that rose in her chest. She knew it was good, as it should be, but she suddenly felt on the outside.
Lonely.
‘Isn’t it great, Nat?’ Julian enthused as she drew level with them.
Hot stupid tears pricked her eyes and she was glad of her sunglasses. It was great on many, many levels. ‘It’s totally awesome,’ she agreed, ruffling his hair.
Alessandro smiled up at her and winked. He was in a sun-shirt that clung to his torso like a glove and boardies that hugged his butt and thighs like a second skin.
‘Have I said that’s a great bikini yet?’ he asked.
Nat gave a half-laugh despite her heavy heart. ‘Once or twice.’
His lusty eyes laughed at her and stole her breath. They looked like the smoothed, flattened black pebbles on the beach, warmed by the sun and utterly inviting. She wanted to push him back against the sand and have her way with him.
‘Papa and I are going to collect some shells. Can you make sure no one knocks the castle down?’
Nat dragged her shaded gaze away from temptation.
She took a breath and tried not to let the well of disappointment rise too high as she was excluded from their plans.
It was a good thing. So good that they were doing stuff together.
That Julian wanted to spend time with his father, looked to his father first. A few weeks ago, he would have wanted her.
It was good.
She swallowed. ‘Absolutely, I shall guard it with my life.’
‘Come on, Papa,’ Julian said as he picked up the bright blue bucket and marched towards the lapping ocean.
Alessandro vaulted upwards, his gaze tracking his son’s meandering path. ‘You’d better wear that bikini to bed tonight,’ he murmured, before moving off to follow Julian.
The next day they were all making popcorn in preparation for a movie afternoon. Julian had chosen a Disney classic to start with and was excited to get started.
‘Ah, I think that’s enough butter, don’t you?’ Nat laughed as Julian drenched the popcorn.
‘Spoilsport,’ Alessandro teased, and then gave his son a wink. ‘Come on, matey, let’s go watch the movie.’
They brushed past Nat, who was momentarily paralysed by the teasing note in Alessandro’s voice and the way his sex appeal boosted into the stratosphere when the smile went all the way to his eyes. The fact that he seemed to have adopted the endearment ‘matey’ for his son was also rather… touching.
The doorbell rang, momentarily distracting her from her ponderings, and she absently called out, ‘I’ll get it.’
Quite who would be calling on a Sunday afternoon she wasn’t sure. Maybe it was the little boy next door? He and Julian were the same age and she had told his mother that he was welcome any day for a play.
The entrance hall was warm and welcoming now with a large colourful rug breaking up the glare of the all-white tiles. Two large paintings decorated the walls on opposite sides and a hall mirror that had come from the ceramic ovens of the Amalfi coast hung by the door.
Last night Julian had helped his father hang a wind chime they’d bought in Noosa. He had passed tools to his father like a scrub nurse would to a surgeon and afterwards they’d stood, necks craned, Alessandro’s hand on Julian’s shoulder, admiring their handiwork.
The beautiful baby-pink mother-of-pearl discs, brittle and fragile, had cost a small fortune. But Julian had loved how they cascaded like a chandelier. And they certainly gave the entranceway a touch of mystique.
Nat opened the door. The person standing there was far removed from a little boy and very definitely Italian.
He was tall and bronzed and so like Alessandro in his looks – a relative perhaps?
– with an easy grin that emphasised killer dimples and a wicked glint to brown eyes that would have put a pirate to shame.
The grin didn’t last long, fading quickly as he stared at Nat with a developing frown.
‘Can I help you?’
As if he knew he’d been caught staring he recovered quite well and shot her a dazzling smile. ‘Er… hi? I think I might have the wrong house. I’m looking for Alessandro Lombardi.’