CHAPTER EIGHT
She dreamed of him again that night.
Her heart raced in her chest; the dream coated her mouth with the bitter taste of metal. Adrenalin spiked in her blood, making her limbs heavy and her mind alert.
Her eyes flew open and she stared up at the ceiling without recognizing it. She flicked her gaze to one side, taking in the tasteful, modern furnishings cast in a soft glow. Then, she looked to the other side of the room.
Benedetto.
He was standing on his balcony, wearing only cotton boxers despite the coolness of the night.
But he was there.
And she was with him.
In his home.
She was safe.
Augustine was years in her past and thousands of miles from her person.
She sucked in a deep breath, waiting for her pulse to return to normal.
As if sensing a disturbance somehow, Benedetto turned, his eyes lancing her instantly.
“Kate?” He quickly took in her brow that was beaded with sweat, her skittish eyes and alert expression. He paced towards her like some kind of game cat; a leopard or panther. “What is it?”
She swallowed and angled herself away from him, reaching for her water glass. “A stupid nightmare,” she said simply, sipping the cold liquid with relief. Her body was warm. “Did I say something?”
His eyes narrowed almost imperceptibly. His weight depressed the edge of the bed as he sat.
“What is it that causes your eyes to look like that?” He murmured, staring into her soul as though he could see all of the pieces that formed her person.
The glass was cold in her hands. She held it for something to do, trapping the condensation in her palms. “What do my eyes look like?” It was an evasive response and they both knew it.
“You look like a tiny mouse about to be swiped at by a large cat.” A frown tugged at his lips. “And you look very young.”
She rolled her eyes. “Not that again. I’m twenty-two.”
He discarded her assertion. “I mean you look … vulnerable. Afraid. Why?”
She wasn’t vulnerable. Nor afraid. She was strong and independent.
She was free.
Her smile was reassuring, though it was ghosted by memories she didn’t like to focus on.
“I’m neither, I promise. I just have an overactive imagination, that’s all, and my dreams have always been realistic.
As a child I used to sleep walk, sleep talk.
You name it, I was a weird kid.” She shuddered, to show that time was long gone.
Kate couldn’t have known, of course, that her childhood was of particular interest to him, for it was a marker to the past she shared with Augustine.
“Did you have therapy to stop this?”
Ten lashes if you dare get out of bed tonight, Katherine. Her expression was inscrutable. “Of a sort.”
If you make a single noise, you will not eat for two days. Understand?
“What does this mean? Of a sort?”
“It means I learned not to sleep walk. Nor to sleep talk. I learned to sleep normally, and if I couldn’t, to stay quietly in bed as though I were.”
He nodded slowly, though it seemed a strange way to have dealt with the poor sleep habits. “How did you learn?” He prodded.
“A torturous process,” she winked as though it were a joke. And because she couldn’t help herself, she reached out and ran her fingers over his hand. His skin was so dark, like burnt sugar. She knew his tan was all over, as well. How had he spent the summer? On a yacht somewhere?
That didn’t seem right. Though he was virile and active, she knew how hard Benedetto worked. His tan was more likely gathered by moving from his constructions sites around the globe rather than any vanity sun bathing.
“Why are you still awake?” She asked, shy suddenly.
Because he hadn’t been sure he could sleep beside her. Because he was literally climbing in bed with the enemy, and it felt foolish, cynical, cruel and wrong. And in the midst of that, it felt so excruciatingly right.
“It is still early, for me.”
She frowned. “It’s after midnight.”
“Si.” His eyes were drawn to her face as if by a magnetic force. “What was your dream?”
She dropped her gaze instantly and ran her thumb up the side of the glass. “I don’t remember,” she said after a beat-too-long.
“Why do you not tell me?”
Her sigh was barely a sound. “Have you ever noticed that some things gain power from speech?” She blinked her enormous blue eyes to his face and he startled for the sense that Augustine was looking back at him.
With a noise of frustration, he stood from the bed and prowled to the balustrade on the balcony beyond.
The night air was a cool rush over his half-naked body.
He inhaled the evening deep in his lungs, waiting for calm to return to him.
But it didn’t.
This woman, this beautiful, young woman he had brought to his home was a window to the man he hated.
That was all. He padded back into his bedroom, his expression thunderous. “Such as?” He prompted, continuing their conversation as though he hadn’t physically left it only moments earlier.
She licked the outline of her full, lower lip, her eyes faraway. “The past.”
His sense that something with her was in pain grew stronger.
He’d had so many warning signs, and he’d chosen to ignore them.
Now, he stared across the moonlit floor at her, his mind pushing all the little statements she’d made together like a freight train to the truth.
“What in your past, cara, are you running from?”
But he knew.
Realisation slammed into him like a bullet.
“Someone hurt you.” And he’d put money on knowing who.
The man’s temper had been obvious. His vitriolic rage had simmered behind his eyes.
Staring now at Kate he saw that their eyes were as different as they were alike.
For hers had no anger. Hers showed gentleness and vulnerability, humour and kindness.
“You are hiding here, in Rome, from someone. Or something.” A frown pushed across his face. Kate was stricken. Her face was pale. Her eyes, somehow, even bigger than usual.
“I … I didn’t have you pegged as a fantasist.”
It was a lame, weak demurral. He discarded it instantly.
He was all ruthless businessman now, intent on extracting the information he sought.
“I should have understood sooner. Why else would you be here, living like this?” Her life in England had been one of luxury and comfort.
At least, it had appeared that way. Only a sinister undercurrent could have forced her to this life, surely.
“You told me you haven’t seen your father in years. You haven’t been home in years.” He nodded, to himself, as everything began to unfold into a crisp piece of knowledge. “Is it him you’re running from?”
The dream was still clogged in her brain. Fear and adrenalin were impossible to quickly wish away, and they coursed through her blood and her bones. She pushed the duvet from her body and stood, but her knees were weak. “You’re crazy,” she muttered. “You don’t know anything about my father.”
His sneer should have told her the opposite was true, but her eyes weren’t focused on him. Her flight instinct had been invoked. It was taking every ounce of her will-power to stop from pulling clothes on and walking away from him.
“I know enough,” he muttered, dragging a hand through his thick hair.
“What?” Her breath snagged in her throat. Had she misunderstood.
Benedetto opened his mouth as if to say something and then shook his head. “You have told me, time and time again, only I have not listened. You have let many little things slip. You have told me without telling me, and now I am asking you to confide in me.”
Kate’s mouth worked overtime, swallowing convulsively, but she couldn’t bring liquid back to her throat. She sat down on the edge of the bed, her naked back curled like a conch shell.
The silver of the moon glistened across her smooth flesh. Smooth, but for the scar that marred her perfection.
“He did this,” Benedetto demanded, pressing his finger lightly into the mark.
A sob tore through Kate. She’d never told another soul about her father. Never. Not a single person. Even here, far from Augustine’s power, she lived in complete fear that he might hurt her somehow.
“Just let it go.”
Benedetto lifted his fingers infinitesimally, so that his touch was as light as spider’s webbing. He traced a circle around the mark, his mind slamming with this new truth. What did it mean? Did it change anything?
And if true, what the hell had he done in exposing her to this man?
His desperation to avenge the past could very well have put Kate’s present in jeopardy.
Oh, he didn’t fear Augustine. Physically, the man was no match for Benedetto; unlikely for Kate, for that matter.
But he apparently occupied a powerful place in her life, in her memories, and perhaps her heart, and that could continue to wound her now.
“I want to make this better for you.” He squeezed his eyes shut. He had made it so much worse; what she would never know was that it was now his responsibility to fix it.
“It is better,” she murmured. Her shoulders were shaking. “It’s better if I don’t talk about it,” she repeated, her words coming to him as if from a long way away.
“Did he hurt you often?” Benedetto continued, unwilling to be thrown off topic.
“No,” she lied.
God, had he done more than hit her? Had he raped her? Nausea perforated his gut. “Did he … was he … did he molest you?”
Her head whipped up. Her eyes were brimming with pain. “No. Never. He’s my father. Don’t be disgusting.”
He believed her. Not about the abuse, but about the molestation. That, at least, was something. “But he did hurt you?”
Kate stood once more, and forced her jelly-like legs to take her across the room. “He’s a good man,” she said stonily. “And he loves me more than anything else on earth.”
Benedetto cursed inwardly. This was not the direction he’d expected the conversation to take. Hearing her defend her father like this was making his heart pound and his blood boil.
“Oh, yes?” He pushed, his words dangerously silky.