An Inheritance of Shame(47)

It was an impossible conundrum. They were impossible.

Angelo must have sensed some of what she was feeling, for as they left the boutique and strolled down the glamorous Via Liberta, he said, ‘You’re not happy I bought you the dress.’

‘I wouldn’t say that,’ she hedged, and he laughed dryly.

‘You’d rather I hadn’t, then.’

She grimaced. ‘I don’t mean to be ungrateful.’

‘But you are.’ He sounded amused, but underneath the humour she heard hurt.

‘I don’t need you to buy me things, Angelo,’ she said after a moment, and he glanced away.

‘What if I need to buy them for you?’ he asked quietly. ‘I want to buy them, at least. I want to give you things.’

Lucia stopped on the pavement and turned to face him. ‘Why?’ she asked, and he shrugged impatiently. ‘Why not? I think it is a normal thing to want to do.’ His voice was sharp in self-defence. ‘I want to see you wearing beautiful things. I want to be the one to give them to you.’

It was, Lucia suspected, a way for him to show her he cared. Perhaps the only way he knew how. And if so, she should surely accept it, be glad for it. Yet still she resisted.

‘Here’s a question,’ Angelo said as they continued walking down the street. ‘Why don’t you want me to give you things? Because I’m not sure I understand that.’

She didn’t answer for a long moment. ‘I suppose it reminds me of how different we are now,’ she finally said slowly. ‘How different you are, Angelo.’

He gave her a sideways glance, his rueful smile somehow sad. ‘Do you really think I’m that different? Because from the moment I’ve been back in Sicily I’ve felt exactly the same.’ He drew a shaky breath, his voice low. ‘A ragged boy with a bloody nose and broken dreams.’ He shook his head as if to dismiss the admission, and Lucia’s heart twisted inside her. Didn’t he know that was the boy she’d fallen in love with, not the man he seemed determined to be now, wealthy and powerful, striding through life with arrogant determination?

She opened her mouth to tell him as much, but he was already turning into another shop, this one even more exclusive and expensive-looking, with black velvet cases and diamonds winking in the window.

‘Angelo—’ she said, his name a warning, and he shook his head.

‘You need something to go with the dress. If it makes you feel better, you can return to me anything I buy after.’

After? After the Corretti Cup, or after he was finished with her? She knew she shouldn’t be thinking that way, and yet she couldn’t keep the thoughts from slipping into her mind, sly and insidious. As much as she wanted to, she didn’t yet believe this could last. Perhaps that was why she refused his gifts. She was trying to protect herself, paltry attempt that it was, because she didn’t trust him to love her, not to leave her.

‘Try this.’

While her thoughts had been tangling themselves into knots Angelo had spoken to another snooty shop assistant who had brought out a gorgeous diamond necklace, a dozen glittering square-cut diamonds, each one encrusted with a dozen smaller ones. The thing was intricate, ornate and clearly the most expensive item in the shop.

Lucia shook her head.

‘Just try it on,’ Angelo persisted, and silently she allowed him to fasten the piece around her neck. The stones felt cold and sharp against the fragile skin of her throat, heavy on her neck.

Angelo’s mouth curved in a smile of primal possession. ‘Bellissima,’ he said in satisfaction, and she shook her head again.

‘It’s too much, Angelo.’ Wordlessly she unclasped the necklace and handed it back to him. ‘I’d look ridiculous in it.’ Angelo frowned. She was still trying to distance herself, she knew, still acting out of fear and self-protection, yet she wanted to try. Trust could be a choice. Sometimes it had to be.

She took a deep breath and scanned the display cases. ‘How about that?’ She pointed to a whimsical dragonfly hair clip, its wings winking with diamonds and sapphires.

Angelo’s frown deepened. ‘You’d rather have that?’

She’d rather have nothing, rather have Angelo as the boy she knew and loved rather than this autocratic man who insisted on draping her in diamonds, yet she could hardly articulate that to him now. ‘Yes.’

He gestured to the shop assistant, who took it out of the case. Lucia slid it into her hair, and was gratified to see Angelo’s hard features soften into a smile. He nodded to the assistant. ‘We’ll take it.’