Jane Porter - The Latin Lover's Secret Child

“Yes.” There was relief in the doctor’s voice. “We have. She’s awake, fairly alert.”

“So why are you calling?” Lucio couldn’t hide his bitterness, or the depth of his pain. Once an outsider, always an outsider. To Ana’s family he’d always be the gaucho. The peasant. The Indian native. “Am I to send flowers? Pick up the hospital tab? What’s my job now?”

“Help her regain her memory.”

Lucio tensed. It took him a moment to process this. “You said she’s recovered.”

“Recovering,” the doctor corrected. “Her body is stronger, but her mind—” he hesitated, picking his words with care, “—her consciousness is altered, has been altered for quite a while—”

“How long?”

“Three weeks.”

Jesus! Lucio rubbed at his temple, his head pounding. He needed sleep. He needed to feel like himself again. “She’s been seriously ill for three weeks?”

“Four, actually. Ever since her return from China. But the first week everyone thought it was just the flu. There were headaches, vomiting, the usual.”

And then seizures, altered consciousness, coma and loss of memory. Lucio grimly clamped his teeth together to keep from saying something he’d regret.

“She is better now,” the doctor reassured. “But she’s confused. I think…we all think…she needs you.”

She needed him?

Lucio nearly laughed out loud. The good doctor didn’t know what he was saying. Anabella most certainly did not need him. She’d made that perfectly clear over and over in the past year.

Lucio reached up to pull the black leather tie from his hair. His heavy black hair fell to his shoulders and with a weary hand he rubbed his temple and his scalp. He was tired. Physically, mentally, emotionally.

He couldn’t continue like this. Couldn’t continue fighting battles he didn’t care about. The grapes, the economy, the Argentina export business—these did not move him. They were a duty, an obligation, but were they truly his?

And Ana. She wasn’t his anymore, either.

“Not to mince words, but her family hired the divorce attorney. I never thought I’d see them asking me to return.”

“I can’t speak for Marquita,” the doctor replied, referring to Anabella’s beautifully preserved mother who had a taste for hard liquor, “but the Count has offered to send his plane.”

Lucio almost growled his dislike. “I don’t need the Count to send a plane for me. I have transportation of my own, thank you.” It was impossible to hide his bitterness. He and Dante were not friends. Would never be friends. He couldn’t even bear to be in the same room with Anabella’s brother.

The doctor hesitated. “What shall I tell the Count?”

“That I’m packing my things.” Lucio drew a deep breath, forcing himself to suppress his anger towards the Galváns. His marriage might be over, but it didn’t change his feelings. Married or divorced, in his mind, Anabella would always be his wife. To death do us part, and he’d meant it. “I’ll be home tomorrow morning.”

But on the plane that night, stretched out in the leather lounge chair in the first class cabin, Lucio’s thoughts were tangled. His emotions even more jangled.

He tried to picture Anabella ill. He couldn’t. His Ana was tough. Physically, mentally, emotionally. She was as spirited and independent as they came. Nothing touched her. Nothing fazed her.

Ironically, it was her strength that had allowed the divorce to happen in the first place.

She’d been the one who pushed. He’d fought the divorce, fought her, for months, refusing to let go. But his refusal only pushed her further away. Her anger gave way to tears, and then the tears gave way to silence.

They stopped speaking. Stopped being in the same room at the same time. Stopped all communication.

He remembered asking her what she wanted for her birthday and she faced him across the long dinner table, he at one end, she at the other, and she very politely said, “A divorce, please.”

And in that calm voice, and that quiet moment, he agreed.

Later when they sat down to sign the papers, he’d hesitated. But tears welled up in her eyes, and she stretched a hand out across the table, entreating, Let me go, Lucio. We’re both so miserable. Please just let me go.

He caught her hands in his and saw the tears in her beautiful eyes, the quiver of her full passionate mouth and felt hell close round him.

It was over.

Silently he signed his name, dated the document and walked away without another word.

But he hadn’t really walked away, he thought now, leaning his head back against the wide leather seat. He’d been ignoring the truth, denying the truth, unable to handle the fact that Ana could so easily dispose of him, of them.

Eyes burning, Lucio swallowed the rush of hurt.

You were wrong, Anabella, he thought, eyes closed, chest livid with pain. I might have been miserable at times, but I never wanted out. Your love might have died. But I will always love you.

The commercial jet landed in Chile early the next morning, where Lucio took a connecting flight, arriving in Mendoza just after ten. A car was waiting for him, and the driver—one of Lucio’s own—didn’t offer any information and Lucio didn’t ask.

Mendoza had only been home for four years. Lucio had bought the vineyard, villa and business with one cashier’s check. He’d known nothing about the winery business at the time. He just knew it was respectable and respectable was what Ana’s family demanded.

But now as the chauffeur wove on and off the highway towards the villa nestled in the foothills, Lucio couldn’t help reflecting that Ana had loved the gaucho, not the vintner.

The black town car drove through ornate iron gates tipped in gold, and turned down a long private lane leading to an elegant two-story villa, the smooth plaster walls a wash of soft apricot paint. It might be wine country Argentina, but the house was all Tuscany. The original owners had been Italian. The wood beams, hardwood floor, roof tiles all imported from Italy.

With the morning sun casting a warm rosy glow across the front of the one-hundred-year-old villa with the tall cypress trees and the plaster arch flanking the front door, the house looked magical.

Lucio felt a pang of loss. This is the place he’d brought Ana as his new bride. This is the place he’d thought they’d finally make their home.

Nothing ever worked out as one hoped, did it?

“Shall I bring your bags in, Senor?” The chauffeur’s respectful voice interrupted Lucio’s painful thoughts.

Lucio shook off his dark mood, stepped from the car, and adjusted the collar on his black leather traveling coat. He’d do what he’d have to do. “No, Renaldo. I’ll be staying at my apartment downtown.”

Suddenly there was a shout from upstairs. He heard his name called. Once, twice, and Lucio turned to look up at the second floor of the villa. The windows were open to welcome the freshness of the morning. He searched the windows for a glimpse of Anabella but saw nothing.

Seconds later the front door burst open and suddenly she was there, on the doorstep, breathless from the dash down the stairs.

“Lucio,” Anabella cried, green eyes bright. “You’re home!”

FOR a long moment Lucio could think of nothing to say. It felt as if his brain had stopped functioning altogether and he simply stared at Anabella, amazed to see her downstairs, at the door.

The doctor had made her sound ill—fragile—but she practically glowed, her skin luminous and her green eyes bright like Colombian emeralds. “Are you all right?” he asked.

She was barefoot and wearing snug jeans, a crisp white blouse, and her long glossy black hair hung loose. “Now that you’re here.”