Chapter 58

"Rome...what did you do?" Eliza whispered in shock. "You can't do this."

"I can... and I have." Romano shrugged, still watching her reflection in the glass. "It's yours."

Romano had given her the vineyard. His father's vineyard.

"But it's your father's."

"And when he died, it became mine. I suppose technically your father could snatch it back at any moment, but it's a gesture, Liz."

"Why?" Eliza asked helplessly.

"I didn't want you to doubt my reasons for wanting to be with you. I didn't want it hanging between us anymore."

"But your mother and sisters..."

"They know about it, and for the most part approve of my decision. Not that it would have mattered if they didn't. This isn't about them; this is about us. It's about fixing what I broke." 

Romano turned around to face her and stalked back to the bed.

"The vineyard is yours, cara, and if you don't want it, you can burn it to the ground or transfer the deed to Lisa. You can hand it back to your father on a platter. It doesn't matter to me. The only thing that matters to me is you. You're the sun I revolve around, and without you..." 

Romano shook his head as his voice broke.

"I think it's time you told me about Luisa," Eliza said, and Romano inhaled deeply before sitting down next to her. 

Eliza reached over and took the baby from him. Thankfully their daughter continued to sleep peacefully.

"Luisa..." Romano shut his eyes as he tried to gather his thoughts. 

"She is the kind of woman I always pictured myself marrying. Poised, sophisticated, beautiful...She keeps all her emotions locked up tight, which suited me fine because I never appreciated messy emotional scenes. We dated and got along pretty well when we were in college. I fancied myself in love with her. It was a very neat, clinical, and uncomplicated version of love. I thought that we were perfectly suited, before things got difficult and we broke up during our last year in college"

Eliza tried to keep her expression neutral, but it hurt so much listening to her husband talk about the other woman in such terms.

"Then I came here to meet your father and saw you for the first time. Your quiet beauty drew me immediately. I don't think I ever told you this. I couldn't keep my eyes off you the first time I saw you, and I wanted you with a violence that shocked the ever-loving hell out of me. If your stupid father had left things alone, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have been able to keep my hands off you either. But when he forced the issue, he did the one thing that guaranteed I would keep my distance from you. I don't like being told what to do, cara. And even though you were exactly what I wanted, I very perversely kept you at a distance."

"I resented you and I resented your father for messing up my life and my future plans. I went into our marriage determined to grab that damned divorce with both hands as soon as you had a son. But things got messy...and emotional. I tried so hard to keep you at a distance. I refused to kiss you, I pretended to want other women, and all the time I couldn't stay away from you. I could see how much I was hurting you and..."

Eliza watched him struggle to find the right words before Romano shook his head and broke eye contact. 

"At first I didn't care. I rationalized that it was nothing more than you deserved. But the more distant and closed off you became, the more frustrated I became with you. I told myself that it was because I wanted to see you suffer, but when I gave it any serious thought, I knew it went deeper than that. I hated not having your attention. When we first married, you showered me with attention. You knew something was wrong, but you were always so determinedly affectionate and loving. Seeing that affection and that trust fade from your eyes...it was so much harder than I had ever anticipated or imagined."

Romano got up and started to pace again. Eliza watched him prowl aggressively around the room and felt the ice around her heart melting with every word Romano uttered. 

He was being so brutally honest with her, some of his words were ugly and hurtful, while others sent her heart soaring.

"Every time I returned to Italy I spent time with Luisa," he confessed roughly, stopping his pacing abruptly to pin Eliza with his intense gaze.