‘There is someone I do not want to lose,’ Anton said.
‘Anton...’ Emily looked at him, saw the tenderness unhidden. ‘I don’t know.’
‘Fattispecie,’ Anton said as he confessed to her his lie by omission. ‘Louanna was pregnant. She had told me just that morning.’
Ah, fattispecie, Emily thought. Such a sad word.
‘I swore revenge that day and I vowed it again at their graves, but I am letting it go.’
‘For now.’
‘For good,’ Anton said, and then he said it again but with different meaning. ‘For good. A good that I do not want to lose.’ He did not want to crowd her. He did not want her to leave. He did not want another decade of bitterness. ‘Come back, not for the Corretti Cup. Come back, or I come and visit you. We can take it slow if you need to.’
‘I need to take this.’ It was her phone ringing hot now and she had to answer because it wasn’t Adam. Instead it was the chief of the newspaper, calling on a Sunday morning, no less. ‘I need a moment,’ Emily said to Anton.
‘Of course.’
Her career was not quite so obsolete, Emily realised as she struggled to keep the nerves from her voice as she took the call.
‘Congratulations.’
‘Thank you.’
‘Have you got more?’
‘Alessandro Corretti was arrested last night.’
‘That’s already broken.’
‘Taylor Carmichael—’
‘I saw that she was back.’
‘And deliciously misbehaving,’ Emily said.
‘Anything else?’
‘Plenty,’ Emily said, ‘and it’s not going away anytime soon.’ She told him about the docklands and about Carlo’s illegitimate son, Angelo, who looked set to make a move against the family that had disowned him. They spoke for a few moments, then she turned off her phone and looked over to Anton. Then, taking a deep breath, she wheeled her case over to him.
‘That was my boss,’ Emily said. ‘Not Adam—the big one. He said my two favourite words.’
‘Which are?’
‘Clothing allowance.’ Emily smiled. ‘They want me to stay on and find out more. I’m going to be busy....’
‘You won’t need to lift a finger. I can tell you anything you need to know.’
‘Which means I’m going to be busy.’ Emily grinned. ‘Hello, research.’ He pulled her into his arms and buried his face in her hair, not in grief, just to inhale her scent.
It was a kiss at the airport but neither a hello nor a goodbye; it was a kiss of life and taking chances and staying around long enough to feel your heart again. And as he loaded her case into his car, as she climbed in to set off on another adventure, there was no need for sirens or flashing lights.
They had time.
Time before they heard their three favourite words.
But both already knew what they were.
* * * * *
Carol Marinelli
Business & Pleasure: What the Corretti playboy wants…
Personal assistant Ella is never without her “Santo Bag”—not the latest designer “must have,” but emergency supplies to handle whatever the devilish Santo Corretti throws at her. But no pair of sunglasses will cover the darkness in her boss’s eyes this morning.
Scandal is circling. Santo’s family is in tatters. His brother is languishing in a jail cell and his latest film’s on the rocks. All Santo wants is a little TLC. Except, Ella’s heart is not part of the playboy fix-it kit.
But what Santo Corretti wants he gets!
‘PLEASE.’
Ella wasn’t sure how many times that word had been said to her in the past, but she knew that she would forever recall this time.
‘Please, Ella, don’t go.’
She stood at the departure terminal of the busy Sydney International Airport, passport and boarding pass in hand, and looked into her mother’s pleading eyes—the same amber eyes as her own—and she almost relented. How could she possibly leave her to deal with her father alone?
But, given all that had happened, how could she stay?
‘You have a beautiful home....’
‘No!’ Ella would not be swayed. ‘I have a flat that I bought in the hope that you would move in with me. I thought that you’d finally decide to leave him, and yet you won’t.’
‘I can’t.’
‘You can.’ Ella stood firm. ‘I have done everything to help you leave and yet you still refuse.’
‘He’s my husband.’
‘And I’m your daughter.’ Ella’s eyes flashed with suppressed anger. ‘He beat me, Mum!’
‘Because you upset him. Because you try to get me to leave...’ Her mother had been in Australia for more than thirty years, was married to an Australian, and yet her English was still poor. Ella knew that she could stand here and argue her point some more, but there wasn’t time for that. Instead she said the words she had planned to say and gave her mother one final chance to leave. ‘Come with me.’
Then Ella handed her mother the ticket she had secretly purchased.
‘How?’
‘I’ve brought your passport with me.’ Ella pulled it out of her bag and handed it to her mother to show that she was serious and that she really had thought this through. ‘You can walk away now, Mum. You can go back to Sicily and be with your sisters. You can have a life....’ She saw her mother wrestle with the decision. She missed her country so much, spoke about her sisters all the time, and if she would just have the courage to walk away then Ella would help her in any way that she could.
‘I can’t.’
There was simply no point, but Ella did her best to persuade her mum. Right up to check-in, right up to the departure gate, Ella tried to convince her mother to leave, but she had decided now that the subject was closed.
‘Have a nice trip, Ella.’
‘I’m not going for a holiday, Mum,’ Ella said. She wanted her mother to realise how serious this was, that she wasn’t just going to be away for a few weeks. ‘I’m going there to look for work.’
‘But you said you will visit Sicily.’
‘I might.’ Ella honestly didn’t know. ‘I don’t know if I can, Mum. I’d hoped to go there with you. I think I’ll stay in Rome.’
‘Well,