Chapter Fifteen
‘I—I HAVE TO talk to everyone, tell them they’re losing their j-jobs,’ Tali murmured, her voice jerking through the gulping sobs she hadn’t been able to contain since her mother had arrived at the cottage ten minutes ago.
‘Honey, don’t worry about any of that yet…’ her mum said, her voice soothing, her arms tightening around her as Tali knelt by the old armchair and hugged her mum’s knees, trying to gather the strength to stop crying and start planning. ‘You’re distraught, Tali. There’s no need to…’
‘There’s e-every need, M-Mum.’ She raised her head, forced herself to stop burying her face in her mother’s lap like a child instead of a grown woman.
‘Don’t you see, it’s all my f-fault. I’ve lost everyone their jobs, and you your home, because I c-couldn’t get it into my stupid head that this relationship was always fake. ’
Her lungs tightened with panic.
‘I don’t even know if he’ll give them severance pay,’ she said, starting to feel nauseous again. ‘He was so angry with…’
‘Stop!’ Her mother’s voice became firm, and less sympathetic. ‘If it comes to that, it’s out of your hands. We are all adults, and you’ve always taken far too much responsibility onto your shoulders for everyone here, not to mention for this estate.’
‘But Mum, you’ll lose this p-place and…’
‘And I’ll be okay. I’ll find somewhere else to live, we both will,’ she interrupted again.
Then pressed warm hands—roughened by years of hard work—to Tali’s cheeks.
‘You have to stop worrying about me, sweetheart, I’m not fragile the way I was that summer.
Let me look after you now, okay? Because that’s my job, not yours. ’
Tali nodded, feeling even worse. ‘Okay, Mum, you’re… Y-you’re right. And I’m sorry.’
Why had she tried to hold everything together so tightly? Wasn’t this just another example of how she had let her tendency to want to fix everyone but herself become a weakness instead of a strength?
‘You have nothing to be sorry for, Tali,’ her mum continued, her tone softening as she wiped away the tears still streaking down Tali’s face.
‘That little girl was so fierce, and so determined to make me happy again. And it worked, you know. Because I finally realised, that even though he walked away from us, he left me with you.’
Tali bowed her head, blindsided by her overwrought emotions again.
‘But you know, Tali, I’m not sure all this guilt over Westwick is even warranted anyway.’
‘How so?’ Tali asked.
‘From the look on Mr Lorenti’s face before he realised who you were, I don’t think it was fake for him either…’
‘Please don’t, Mum.’ Tali stood up to get away from her mum’s misguided attempts to make her feel better.
She swiped the last of the tears off her raw cheeks as she walked to the window that looked out on the woods.
The thunderous rainstorm, which had begun not long after she’d got to the cottage two hours ago, was somehow a perfect refection of her misery.
Her ribs started to ache, alongside her heart, because that blasted bubble of hope hadn’t entirely died and she needed it to now.
Whatever her mum had thought she’d seen in Dario’s expression, she’d been wrong. Just like Tali had.
God, what was it about them both that they still had the ability to romanticise a man’s reaction after they’d both been so comprehensively slam-dunked by love?
‘I expect he’s halfway back to London by now,’ she said, trying not to imagine him in the limo alone, with that blank look on his face—which had been worse than his fury.
‘Busy ordering his real estate division to find a buyer…’ she added.
Or figuring out if he can have Westwick demolished, she thought miserably, the sickening feeling—of how badly she’d messed things up by falling in love with her fake husband—working its way up her chest again to strangle her.
She didn’t try to swallow it down this time, though, because she needed to feel the pain if she was ever going to get over him.
‘He didn’t leave, you know. He was still in the library looking morose. I found him there twenty minutes ago after searching the place for you both.’
Tali swung around, shocked at the news. It had been nearly two hours since she’d left the Hall…
And she knew he hated to spend any time here—it had been obvious as soon as he’d agreed to accompany her here that he hadn’t wanted to come back.
Just another reason why she’d started to convince herself he might actually care for her…
But then she forced herself to breathe through her latest delusion.
It was pissing down outside. He had probably just decided to stay put until the weather cleared. Knowing he was still so close, though, was a whole new form of torture.
She was about to say as much to her mother when a loud rap on the front door made them both jump.
‘Who could that be in this weather?’ her mother asked, heading past her to the front door.
But when she flung it open, and Tali saw Dario standing on the doorstep, his designer suit soaked through, his eyes as dark as the storm clouds outside, her heart went into free fall…
As it plunged to earth, about to crash and burn all over again, he stepped over the threshold, dripping onto the doormat and asked her mother, in a low voice, ‘Signora Parker, please may I speak with your daughter alone?’
Before Tali could detach her gaze long enough to tell her mum she couldn’t speak to Dario, not again, because she wasn’t sure she could keep hold of the few morsels of pride she had left and not throw herself at him this time—when he looked so sad, so tortured, so alone—her mum closed the door behind him and said, ‘I’ll go and fold the laundry upstairs and leave you two, but you need to understand one thing, Mr Lorenti. ’
He blinked as if he were trying to wake himself from a coma, his gaze raking over Tali with an intensity that was making her skin heat despite the pain.
But then he turned, to address her mother. ‘Sì, Signora Parker.’
‘If you hurt her again, I’ll have to murder you, even if it means Westwick is lost forever.’
He nodded, slowly. ‘Understood.’
And then her mother was gone. Tali’s heart was in pieces, but she wasn’t sure anymore whether it was still broken or about to mend. Because Dario didn’t look furious with her anymore, and he didn’t look indifferent either… He looked shattered, too.
Was it possible that by finally standing her ground, finally telling him what she needed, he’d realised that he needed it, too?
Dario limped across the small room, his head nearly butting the exposed beams, towards Tallulah.
His leg was killing him, the vicious spring storm and the trudge through the muddy fields as he’d searched for the cottage having cramped the ruined muscles—but something about the pain and the grim weather suited his mood perfectly.
He deserved to be in agony. He deserved to be punished. After the things he’d said, the things he’d threatened to do. All simply to protect himself, from this woman who…as soon as she had stood up to him and called him out on all his bullshit, he had finally understood he couldn’t live without.
How had he managed to lie to himself for weeks?
She stepped away from him as he got closer, tearing his heart right out of his chest.
He had done this. He had hurt her so badly she did not love him anymore.
But maybe he could still salvage this situation.
Maybe he could still keep her, make her love him again…
if he begged. Funny to think that begging someone to care for him—letting them see all his weaknesses and vulnerabilities—had always been the thing he had been most terrified of, but it wasn’t anymore…
Because not doing so would mean losing Tallulah.
‘Dario, why are you here?’ she finally whispered, her face a picture of…what? Was that panic, disgust, shock? Why could he not read her expression anymore?
She stared at him, those luminous blue eyes making the regret and guilt slice through him like a knife, because he could see no hate in her eyes when there should have been—only compassion. Was this good? Or was she just too kind a person to hate anyone—even him?
He clung to the thought, though, desperate to believe he hadn’t destroyed his chance completely.
‘I came to say I’m sorry,’ he said, his voice breaking on the inadequate word. ‘I want another chance.’
‘A ch-chance for what?’ she said, but then her eyes grew round, and the hurt shadowing them had the knife twisting in his gut.
‘If you need this marriage to get ownership of your palazzo, y-you don’t have to divorce me yet, but I can’t be with you, not anymore, you must understand that… It’s too painful for me.’
Hope swelled against his ribs, hope he didn’t deserve but would grab with both hands.
He brushed his thumb over the reddened skin of her cheek, disgusted with himself when she flinched.
‘I already own the palazzo,’ he said. ‘The legal transfer of ownership was completed yesterday.’
‘You…wh-what?’ she asked, the transparent expression—confusion and concern—almost as beautiful as she was to him.
‘I didn’t tell you because I did not want you to leave me.’
‘But…’
He cupped her cheeks in his palms, grateful that she did not flinch again.
Pressing his fingers into her silky curls, he drew her into his body.
He held her, stroking the soft skin, needing to breath in her ragged breaths, needing to share this connection, which had always felt so visceral, so right, so perfect, even though he had tried so hard never to acknowledge how much it meant to him.
He must confess everything now and place himself at her mercy.
‘I see now, what I should have realised the first time we made love…’ He swore softly when she shuddered.
He was doing this wrong. ‘No, the first time I kissed you.’ He lifted his forehead from hers, stared into those bright, luminous, honest eyes and forced himself to be honest, too.
‘No, the first time I touched you… That I wanted more from you, too.’
Her brow furrowed, but her hands flattened against his waist, her fingers curling into his wet shirt. ‘Do you really mean that, Dario? Please don’t lie to me again.’
‘I have been so lonely, for so long. I thought…’ He swallowed, controlling the familiar panic, forcing himself to tell her the truth.
‘I thought if I owned the palazzo, it would be enough. But I don’t want to be there without you,’ he replied, without hesitation this time, without anger, without cowardice.
‘I know now, it was never my safe place, that was always you. Even when you were Tali, and not Tallulah, you were the only person who ever made me feel unbroken. I’m sorry it took me so long to admit the truth to myself as well as you. ’
‘Dario…’ she whispered, but the sadness remained in her eyes when she pressed a trembling palm to his scarred cheek. ‘I want to believe that so much. But I’m scared… You shut me out. And that hurt. I want to be with you too, to see if we can make this a real relationship but I can’t…’
‘Shhh…’ He held her face up to his. Pressed his lips to hers. ‘It is already real, Tallulah.’ Taking her palm from his cheek, he pressed it against his wet shirt. ‘Do you feel how hard my heart is beating?’
She nodded, her eyes widening, the love in them so transparent he felt humbled.
‘That is because I am scared, too,’ he said, finally forced to admit his greatest fear. ‘In fact, I am terrified, that I have messed this up so badly—by not trusting you, by accusing you of things you did not do to protect myself—you will decide you do not love me after all.’
‘Don’t be scared, because I do,’ she said with such courage it humbled him even more.
How could it be so easy? he thought. All he had had to do was trust his feelings, to trust her love, and she’d let him back in.
The pain in his heart lifted as he clasped her head and covered her mouth with his, devouring her sweet lips, feeding the surge of desire and letting himself be swept away on the wave of love.
When they were finally forced to break apart, to breathe, she whispered, ‘Does this mean we’re really married?’
‘Absolutamente,’ he said, and then sealed their deal with another kiss.