The Bride's Awakening. Кейт Хьюит

      Why on earth had he approached her with that asinine flattery? Had he been attempting some sort of misguided chivalry, or worse, had he been mocking her? And why had he sought her out so directly in the first place?

      He was the Count of Cazlevara—he could have any woman he wanted—and yet he’d entered the party and made straight for her. She only knew that because she’d seen him enter the castle, and felt her heart skip and then completely turn over. Even from afar, he was magnificent; well over six feet, he walked with a lithe grace, his suit of navy silk worn with careless elegance. His eyes—as black as polished onyx—had narrowed and his assessing gaze had swept the hall as if he were looking for someone.

      That was all she’d seen before she’d been pulled into another conversation, and now Anamaria wondered if he’d actually been looking for her.

      Stupid. Fanciful. Wishful thinking, even. Vittorio could have anyone he wanted. Why on earth would he bother with her for a moment?

      And yet, for some reason, he had.

      Anamaria’s cheeks burned and she took a hasty sip of wine, barely tasting the superb vintage—she was, ironically, drinking one of Cazlevara’s own. It seemed, she acknowledged bleakly, far more likely that he’d been mocking her. Amusing himself with a little easy flattery of a woman who would surely only lap it up gratefully. She knew the type. She’d dealt before with men who treated her with condescending affection, and acted surprised when they were rebuffed. Yet Vittorio hadn’t been surprised by her rebuff—he’d been furious.

      Anamaria’s lips curved into a smile. Good.

      She knew very little about Vittorio. She knew the facts, of course. He was the richest man in Veneto, as well as a Count. His winery—the region’s best—had been run by the Cazlevaras for hundreds of years. In comparison, her own family’s three hundred year heritage seemed paltry.

      His father had died when he was a teenager; she, along with several thousand others, had been at the memorial service at San Marco in Venice. The funeral had been a quiet family affair at the Cazlevara estate. As soon as he reached his majority, he’d gone travelling—drumming up more business for the winery—and hardly ever came home. He’d been more or less absent—gone—for nearly fifteen years. Anamaria could only imagine that a man like Vittorio needed more entertainment than the rolling hills and ancient vineyards Veneto could provide.

      She pictured him now, remembering how he’d looked at her from those gleaming onyx eyes. He was a beautiful man, but in a hard way. Those high, sharp cheekbones seemed almost cruel—at least they did when his eyes were narrowed in such an assessing manner, his mouth pursed in telling disdain before he’d offered her such a false smile.

      Yet, even as she considered how she’d seen him only a few moments ago, another memory rose up and swamped her senses. The only real memory she had of Vittorio Cazlevara. The memory that had made her smile when she’d seen him again—smile with hope and even, pathetically, with joy.

      It had been at her mother’s funeral. November, cold and wet. She’d been thirteen and hadn’t grown into her body yet, all awkward angles, her limbs seeming to fly out of their own accord. She’d stood by the graveside, her hand smeared with the clump of muddy dirt she’d been asked to throw on her mother’s casket. It had landed with a horrible thunk and she’d let out an inadvertent cry, the sound of a wounded animal.

      As the mourners had filed out, Vittorio—he must have been around twenty years old then—had paused near her. It was only later that she’d wondered why he’d come at all; their families were acquaintances, nothing more. She hadn’t registered the tall, dark presence for a moment; she’d been too shrouded in her own pall of grief. Then she’d looked up and those eyes—those beautiful eyes, dark with compassion—had met hers. He’d touched her cheek with his thumb, where a tear still sparkled.

      ‘It’s all right to be sad, rondinella,’—swallow—he’d said, softly enough so only she could hear. ‘It’s all right to cry.’ She’d stared at him dumbly, his thumb still warm against her chilled cheek. He smiled, so sadly. ‘But you know where your mother is now, don’t you?’ She shook her head, not wanting to hear some paltry platitude about how Emily Viale was happy now, watching her daughter from some celestial cloud. He took his thumb, damp with her tears, and touched it to his breastbone. ‘In here. Tua cuore.’ Your heart. And with another sad, fleeting smile, he had moved away.

      She’d known then that he’d lost his father a few years before. Even so, she hadn’t realized another person could understand her so perfectly. How someone—a stranger—had been able to say exactly the right thing. How later, when she wept scalding tears into her pillow, wept until she felt she’d be sick from it and her mind and body and heart all felt wrung, wasted, she’d remember his words.

       It’s all right to cry.

      He’d helped her to grieve. And when the pain had, if not stopped, then at least lessened, she’d wanted to tell him that. She’d wanted to say thank you, and she supposed she’d wanted to see if he still understood her. Understood her more, even, than before. And she’d wanted to discover if she, perhaps, understood him too. A ridiculous notion, when that passing comment was the only conversation they’d ever really shared.

      Over the years, she’d almost—almost—forgotten about Vittorio’s words at her mother’s graveside. Yet in that second when she’d seen him again, every frail, childish hope had leapt to life within her and she’d thought—she’d actually believed—that he remembered. That it had meant something.

      Her pathetic foolishness, even if only for a second, annoyed her. She wasn’t romantic or a dreamer; any dreams of romance—love, even—she’d once entertained as a child had died out years ago, doused by the hard reality of boarding school, when she’d been a picked-on pigeon among swans. Ana’s mouth twisted cynically. Perhaps not a pigeon, but a swallow, a plain and unprepossessing bird, after all.

      They’d flickered briefly back to life in her university days, enough so that she had been willing to take a risk with Roberto.

      That had been a mistake.

      And, just now, the moment Vittorio Ralfino’s mouth had tightened in disdain and then uttered words Anamaria knew to be false…the last faint, frail hope she hadn’t even known she’d still possessed had flickered out completely. Mockery or lies. She didn’t know which. It hardly mattered.

      Anamaria took another sip of wine and turned to smile at another winemaker—Busato, a man in his sixties with hair like cotton wool and a smile as kind as that of Babbo Natale. As one of the few female winemakers in the room, she appreciated his kindness, as well as his respect. And, she told herself firmly, she would dismiss Vittorio Cazlevara completely from her mind, as he had undoubtedly dismissed her from his. A few words exchanged nearly seventeen years ago hardly mattered now. She wouldn’t be surprised if Vittorio didn’t remember them; it certainly shouldn’t hurt. He’d merely been offering her a few pleasantries, scraps tossed from his opulent table, no doubt, and she vowed not to give them a second thought.

      A light gleamed in one of the downstairs windows of Villa Rosso as she headed up the curving drive. Her father was waiting for her, as he always did when she went to these events; just a few years ago he would have gone with her, but now he chose to leave such things entirely to her. He claimed she needed her independence, but Anamaria suspected the socialising tired him. He was, by nature, a quiet and studious man.

      ‘Ana?’ His voice carried from the study as she entered the villa and slipped off her coat.

      ‘Yes, Papà?’

      ‘Tell me about the tasting. Was everyone there?’

      ‘Everyone important,’ she called back, entering the study with a smile, ‘except you.’

      ‘Bah, flattery.’ Her father sat in a deep leather armchair by the fireplace; a fire crackled in the hearth to ward off the night’s chill. A book lay forgotten in his lap and