‘No!’ The volume of her reply startled both of them. ‘No,’ she repeated more quietly.
‘But…’
Now the tears fell. ‘I didn’t leave because of you, Jackie. I left because I couldn’t live with myself.’ Scarlett hung her head and a plop of salty moisture landed on her foot. ‘When you came back from London you looked so different, so sad…I couldn’t face seeing you like that. So I did what any self-respecting little girl would—I ran away and told myself it wasn’t my fault.’
Jackie hadn’t thought the pain could get any worse. She’d only ever thought about how she’d felt, how she’d been wronged. Emotionally, she’d never matured past fifteen on this issue, too concentrated on her own wounds to see the others hurting around her. It was as if she’d only just woken up from suspended animation, that she could suddenly see things clearly instead of through a sleepy fog of self-absorption.
Romano had a daughter he didn’t even know existed. He’d missed all those years; he’d never be able to get them back.
And Scarlett had carried the scars of this terrible secret round with her all her life. It had affected their relationship, Scarlett’s relationship with their mother…everything.
Jackie’s eyes burned. She closed her lids to hide the evidence and grabbed at the sleeve of Scarlett’s blouse, using it to pull her into a hug. They stayed like that just resting against each other, softening, breathing, for such a long time.
‘I was too proud,’ Jackie whispered. ‘I should have gone to Romano myself, but I took the coward’s way out. I shouldn’t have dragged you into it, Scarlett.’
Scarlett pulled back and looked at her, eyes wide. ‘You mean that? You forgive me?’
Jackie had to stop her bottom lip from wobbling before she could answer. ‘If you can forgive me.’
Scarlett lunged at her, tightening the hug until it hurt. Unfortunately it caught Jackie off guard and she lost her balance. Scarlett let out a high-pitched squeak and it took a few moments for Jackie to register what that meant. Uh-oh. They clung even tighter onto each other as the tree slid away from them and they met the ground with a whomp, leaving them in a tangle of arms and legs.
‘Ow,’ said Scarlett, and then began to laugh softly.
Jackie wasn’t sure whether she was moaning in pain or laughing along with Scarlett. The pathetic noises they were making and their fruitless attempts to separate their limbs and sit up just made them laugh harder.
‘Girls?’
Their mother’s voice sliced through the late-afternoon air.
Scarlett and Jackie held their breath and just looked at each other. Unfortunately this prompted an even more explosive fit of the giggles, and Lisa found them crying and laughing helplessly while trying to wipe the dirt off their bottoms at the foot of the old pine tree.
The boy slowed his Vespa to a halt at the back of the abandoned farmhouse and cut the engine. Everything seemed still. He looked up. The sky was bright cobalt, smeared with thin white clouds so high up they were on the verge of evaporating, and there was the merest hint of moisture in the air, a slight heaviness that he hadn’t noticed while the wind had been buffeting him on his moped. Now he was motionless, he felt it cling to his skin and wrap around him.
Wasn’t she here? Why hadn’t she come running round the side of the farmhouse at the sound of his arrival as she usually did?
Frowning slightly, he jogged round the old building calling her name. No one answered.
He found her sitting on the front step, her back against the rotted door jamb, her long legs folded up in front of her. She didn’t move, didn’t look at him, even though she must have heard him arrive.
‘Jackie? What’s the matter?’
He sat down on the step beside her and she swiftly tucked her legs underneath herself. Her long dark hair was pulled into a high, tight ponytail and combined with the coldness in her hazel eyes it made her look unusually severe.
‘I’m surprised you managed to drag yourself away,’ she said, looking up, her tone light and controlled. ‘I thought you’d be down in the piazza still, letting that Francesca Gambardi make eyes at you.’
Romano turned away. He was getting tired of this. Ever since they’d spent the night together almost three weeks ago Jackie had been acting strangely.
Oh, most of the time she was her normal, fiery, passionate self—a fact he was capitalising on, since they didn’t seem to be able to keep their hands off each other for more than a few seconds at a time—but every now and then she just went all quiet and moody. And then she’d come out with some outrageous statement. Just as she had done a few moments ago. His head hurt with trying to figure it all out.
He sighed. ‘We were just talking.’
Jackie humphed. ‘Well, you seem to do a heck of a lot of talking with Francesca these days!’
He felt unusually tired and old when he answered her. ‘There’s nothing wrong with talking to a friend and, besides, I was only in the piazza because I was waiting for a chance to ask you to meet me here. Which I did. And you came. So I can’t see what the problem is.’
She rolled her eyes and Romano felt his habitually well-buried temper shift and wake. ‘What more do you want me to do?’
Jackie’s answer was so fast it almost grazed his ears. ‘Tell her you’re not interested!’
‘I have told her! She keeps asking me why, wanting a reason. I can’t very well tell her it’s because I’m seeing you. The news would be all over town in a flash and we’d never be able to see each other again. So, until we can convince our parents to take us seriously, I’m just going to have to let Francesca talk and I will pretend to listen.’
‘How very convenient for you. Sounds like you’ve got the perfect excuse to flirt with whomever you want and still have me on the side.’
There was a hint of grit in his voice when he replied. ‘It’s not like that.’
She knew it wasn’t. How could she believe he’d spend every moment he could making love with her, whispering promises, making plans, and the next moment be chasing around after girls like Francesca? Did she really believe him capable of that?
Jackie’s silence, the thin line of her mouth told him all he needed to know.
He stood up and walked away. Only a few paces, but hopefully far enough from her distracting presence to let him think.
‘You’re not being logical,’ he said.
Jackie jumped to her feet. ‘I’m as logical as the next girl!’
That was what he was worried about.
She put her hands on her hips, looked at him as if she wanted to melt the flesh from his bones with just her stare. Jackie always had the oddest effect on him. Instead of making him cower, it made him want to stride over to her and kiss her senseless, persuade her she was everything he wanted.
He was on the verge of doing just that when she shot his plan full of holes by marching over to him and poking him in the chest with one of her fingernails. ‘I don’t need your so-called logic when I’ve got eyes in my head. You like her, don’t you? Francesca?’
He shoved his hands in his pockets and walked swiftly back towards the farmhouse and went inside, hoping the cool air would improve his mood.
Jackie had fooled him.
At best the rest of the world saw him as a financial drain on his famous father, at worst a spoiled brat who knew no limits and respected no authority. He’d always thought that Jackie was the one person who credited him with more depth than that—more than he did himself even. So it stung for her to accuse him