From Venice With Love: Secrets of Castillo del Arco. Alison Roberts
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night into day.
And there, at the end of the long passageway, she saw a shadowy figure—Natania?—disappearing into a room.
She called out to her but the sound was lost in the sudden crash of rain on the windows and the doors as the castle descended once again into blackness, only a thin, ghostly glow through a window at the end of the passageway providing any illumination.
She wanted to follow the woman, but right now she was probably already in the arms, if not the bed, of Marco. Did she really need to interrupt them in the act of love-making? Did she really need to remind herself of what she herself would have been doing—should have been doing—if only her husband had not decided to abandon her on their wedding night?
What would they think of her? The lonely bride, still in her wedding gown, searching desperately for her husband.
She had seen the pity in Natania’s eyes. Did she really need to see more?
The rain pelted down on the roof and walls until the pounding itself sounded like thunder. She shivered. It was freezing out here in the dark passageway; her head was thumping and she was tired beyond measure. Bone weary. Across the room the fire crackled in the hearth; the bed looked cosy and inviting. And down the end of the passage the thin, grey light was just a shade lighter. It was later than she thought. It would be dawn soon.
No wonder she was so tired. She would lie down for a while to get warm. And maybe Raoul would come to her when he had finished his work like she had asked him to. She would wait up for him.
And tomorrow—today—things would make more sense. They had to.
He stood at the rain-streaked windows, looking out into the bleak nothingness of the storm, wishing bleak nothingness for his mind to erase all thoughts of the woman lying upstairs waiting for him.
Right now she would be confused and angry. He could deal with those things, he expected them. It was the hurt he could not deal with; the hurt he knew she must be feeling.
But she was tired, she would sleep. And soon she would understand that this was the way it had to be.
‘It is done, Umberto,’ he said, gazing unseeingly into the night through the rain-streaked windows. ‘And I hope you are satisfied.’
HE HADN’T come.
It was after midday when she awakened to the sound of Natania bringing in a tray, and the sickening, hollow feeling that Raoul had not come to her bed.
Natania swished open the long curtains with a flourish to reveal a bright blue sky and turned to watch her through hooded eyes. ‘Raoul asked me to check on you.’
‘That was very considerate of him,’ Gabriella said snippily, her disappointment turning to anger, thinking it might have been just a tad nicer if Raoul had come to check on her himself. ‘And how is my husband today?’
The woman gave a lazy shrug. ‘I have learned not to ask such questions.’
‘Because you don’t like the answers?’
‘Because sometimes it is better not to know.’
Gabriella didn’t agree. She had a few questions she intended to ask, and she wanted to know the answers. She padded to the window while Natania poured the coffee, and her gaze was met by a scene of staggering beauty. The castle was built on some kind of rocky headland with a small sandy cove off to one side. Below them the sea foamed white onto the rocks at the foot of the cliff, a sea lit with sparkling diamonds and so dazzlingly blue, it rivalled the brilliant sky for supremacy. Everything looked bright and calm and perfect.
So different from last night with the fog and the storm; maybe she had been overly tired and feeling melodramatic with it. Already she felt better, brighter, just for feeling the warmth of the day through the glass. She would feel much better again when she had talked to Raoul.
Armed with Natania’s directions to the library, and feeling refreshed after breakfast and a bath, she wandered the passageways of the labyrinthine castle. Even in daylight it was a gloomy place, filled with dark timber furniture, beams and heavy wall-hangings, all seemingly impenetrable to the outside sunshine. She shivered in her sundress and light cardigan—a choice inspired by the sunny view from her window rather than the ambient temperature—and wondered if it ever warmed up inside.
There was hush all around her, no other signs of life, and only the tick of a grandfather clock at the top of the stairs intruded on the silence, jarring her nerves as she wended her way slowly down the long staircase. She treaded lightly, careful not to make any noise herself, feeling like she must comply, and only hesitated when she neared the bottom step, knowing the sound of her low heels on the flagstones would echo in this vast space. So unnaturally quiet it was almost as if the castle, that sleeping giant from last night, was awake and waiting, holding its breath, and she didn’t want to be the one to make it spring into action …
Suddenly there was the creak of a door, a bang. And so lost was she in her quiet world that she jumped and gasped.
‘Gabriella! There you are, at last,’ Raoul said, smiling as he strode towards her. ‘I thought you were going to sleep all day.’
He took both her hands and kissed her cheeks, and she drank in his scent, letting it feed into her soul, letting it comfort her. And here, two steps up, so she could look him in the eyes, she told him, ‘I waited for you.’
He tilted his head, a lock of his black hair falling free from his ponytail and curling around his eyes, his expression truly contrite. ‘I’m sorry, Bella.’ He used his pet name for her again at last, giving her a glimpse of the man she thought she had married. ‘I finished way too late. I didn’t want to disturb you.’
And in the rational light of day her concerns of last night seemed overblown, exaggerated.
‘Come on,’ he said, taking her hand. ‘How about I give you a tour so you can find your way around? And then I suggest lunch down in the cove where the wind will not bother us. Natania has promised to make us a picnic basket.’
It all sounded so wonderful—Raoul sounded so wonderful—that Gabriella just laughed, feeling the weight of last night’s worries float away.
The castle was even larger than she had anticipated, stretching from one length of the headland to the other. One side of the central staircase was given over to a massive feasting room, big-beamed and with a central fireplace on which it would be possible to roast an entire ox. The library where Raoul had his office set up was an incongruous blend of technology atop antique desks and cabinets, its walls stacked so high with books that he had to practically drag Gabriella out of it, in order to show her the rest of the house, with promises she could visit and explore whenever she wanted.
Upstairs he showed her room after room; there must be a dozen bedrooms and just as many bathrooms, so many with their furniture covered in dust covers. She had to concede she had been given the prettiest of them all, which was still no consolation. Which one is yours? she itched to ask; where do you sleep? But she wanted him to surprise her and show her and invite her inside and make her his wife …
‘And this one is Natania’s room?’ she said, wanting to speed up the tour in her quest to find his when they reached the end of the hallway.
‘No. Natania sleeps downstairs. There’s an annexe above the garage she and Marco share.’
‘But I saw her last night during the storm. I called out to her but she didn’t hear me.’
Every hair on the back of his neck stood up. She reached for the handle before he could stop her. ‘It’s locked,’ she said, turning to him. ‘Do you have the key?’
‘It’s nothing but a store room,’ he said coarsely, tugging her away. ‘Nobody uses it. Come, let’s go.