Glittering Promises (31 page)

I wondered if I had screamed when they set the bone in my arm or if I’d slept through it. I wondered if the doctors were as skilled here in Italy as they were at home. I wondered if my arm would heal right or if I’d live forever partially lame, like some I’d known back in Dunnigan. From those I’d known, it all depended on the severity of the break.

I stared out my hospital window, the dome of St. Peter in perfect view, and ran the moment right before my fall through my mind again and again.

The more I considered it, the more I was certain.

I’d almost caught my balance, was leaning backward, righting myself, when I’d felt it. A hand at my back.

Where was Will? I needed him here. To answer some questions as well as comfort me. I’d feel better if he was near. Perhaps it wasn’t visiting hours.

A nurse—or rather a nun—bustled about my room in her habit, straightening my clothes on a small chest, checking the water pitcher’s contents, then eyeing me and speaking to me in rapid Italian. Her tone was friendly, concerned, but I had no idea what she said.

I lifted my hands.
“Mi dispiace. Non parlo Italiano.” I’m sorry, I don’t speak Italian.
Two of the few phrases I knew.

She frowned at me and then grunted, lifting her hands as if asking my permission to touch me. I nodded, and she cradled my cheeks in her rough, fat fingers, tilting my face toward the window. Then she lifted my eyelids upward with her thumbs, looking from one to the other. She grunted again and released me, then went to write something on my chart. With that, she disappeared out the door, where I saw Pascal’s hulking back, clearly guarding my door, and just past him…

Pierre.

Our eyes met right as the nurse pulled the door firmly shut behind her.

But soon he was through, carrying an enormous bouquet of flowers in an exquisite vase. Pascal came through the door behind him and watched us, his eyes wary.

“
Mon ange
,” Pierre said, his brows knitting together in concern, his face full of nothing but devotion. “Is it very bad?”

“I…I don’t know,” I said, automatically lifting my cheek for one kiss, then turning for the second. “I believe my arm is broken, but I am uncertain what happened to my head. It aches quite a bit.”

“I imagine it does,” he said, setting the flowers—a dense combination of tiny red roses and purple iris—atop the chest beside my neat stack of clothes. “Mon Dieu, what you’ve been through.” He pulled a chair close to my bedside and took my hand.

“It’s all right,” I said. “It isn’t all that bad. But is there a doctor nearby? Is Will here?” I asked Pascal. “I’d like to hear my diagnosis.”

Pascal nodded. “I will see,” he said, opening the door and peering outward.

Pierre’s fingers tightened around mine, and I looked at him. He was frowning. “I will find out what they have to say,” he said, brushing a tendril of my hair away from my eyes. He shook his head and stared at me earnestly. “If only I had come to you yesterday. I would have—”

“What?” Will said from the open doorway, a regretful Pascal hovering behind him. “You would have somehow saved her from falling?”

Pierre rose and straightened his jacket. “William. It is good to see you.”

He held out a hand of greeting that Will ignored. “No. Say what you were going to say.”

Pierre’s lips twitched, and he sniffed. “Well, I would certainly not have allowed Cora to wander from my sight in such an unsavory and dangerous place.”

“You’re right,” Will said, stepping forward to stand at the opposite side of my bed. “I made a grave mistake, allowing that to happen.” The muscles in his cheek pulsed, and he looked like he was fighting the urge to toss Pierre from my room.

“It was no one’s fault but my own,” I said. “I’m a woman grown. Capable of making wise decisions when I’m not governed by emotions, as you two are at this very moment.”

Pierre tore his glare from Will and looked down at me. He started to take my hand, thought better of it—with Will so near—and then folded his arms in front of his chest. “What was it,
mon ange
, that set you to wandering yesterday? What in your heart so troubled you?”

“It is nothing, Pierre,” I said, dropping my eyes, remembering the odd separation I’d felt from Will, as well as the need for a little space in which to think…

“It appears I’ve arrived in Rome at an interesting juncture,” Pierre said, his eyes shifting back and forth between us. “You two are…at odds.”

“Who are you kidding?” Will asked, quickly poking out his hand, palm up. “You’ve been in Roma for days, just waiting for such a ‘juncture.’ I half expected you to show up at the Coliseum to see if Cora would run directly into your arms.”

Pierre frowned and lifted his hands and shoulders as if unduly accused. “I have been seeing to my own business here in Roma,” he said, “so that I might enjoy a respite with your group again.”

“Yeah?” Will said, leaning forward across my bed. “Well, you’re not welcome.”

“Will!” I cried, aghast at his rudeness.

He looked down at me, furious. “What? You
want
him here?”

“No!” I inhaled sharply, not wanting to hurt Pierre. “I mean yes, it’s fine that he’s here, but…” I let out a groan of frustration, my head beginning to throb again. “Please. Enough of this. Both of you. Get out.”

They both turned to face me.

“You heard me. Get out!” I cried.

Their anger toward each other turned into contrition with me.

“
Mon ange
—”

“Out!”

“Cora, really, I—”

“Out!”

The nun, hearing my cries, bustled in with a storm brewing behind her wrinkled brow.
“Che cosa stai facendo?”
she cried in Italian.
“Dovresti sapere meglio di disturbare il paziente!”

Though none but Will understood her, her expression and tone were unmistakable. She shooed them out of my room and returned to check my temperature, clucking to me in soothing tones and patting my arm like a doting grandmother. While I regretted reacting so with the men, in her care, I felt my heart settling back into a normal pace.

I sighed and looked out the window, remembering my mother caring for me as I battled a fever. Her thin hands neatly folding a wet towel into thirds, dipping it into a basin of water, fresh and cold from the well, wringing it out, then laying it across my forehead. Her pulling my sheet and blanket back in order, folding it across my chest. Her hand on my cheek.

How I wished Mama and Papa were here, now, with me, so that they could help me figure out what was happening. Another thought made my eyes widen.
Father. I’m missing Father, too…

The nurse continued to mutter in Italian, her tone now calm and soothing. She turned and focused her coal-black eyes on me with a kind expression. I thought she might be telling me to rest, and she pointed to the door and shook her head, as if telling me that the men would not be allowed back in, but I was asleep before I could even try to cobble together a few of the Italian words I knew to respond…

CHAPTER 29

~William~

Pierre and Will set up a path for pacing, each stubbornly refusing to depart the hospital, each wanting to outlast the other, waiting for Cora to call for visitors. Antonio took the rest of the group to see the crypts outside of the city, then out to Ostia Antica, the ancient Roman port, giving them a full day of touring. But they all returned to the hospital that evening on their way to supper.

“How is she?” Vivian asked without preamble, walking directly over to Will.

Will shrugged. “I don’t know,” he admitted with a miserable shrug. “She refuses to see me. Or him.”

Viv’s keen eyes ran to Pierre, who was chatting with Lillian and Nora, then back to Will. “When did he appear?” There was something in her tone that told Will she was inexplicably on his side. It surprised him. He’d figured she’d be like her father, encouraging Cora to take the richest suitor possible. But maybe he’d underestimated her.

“Today,” he said. “Convenient timing, eh? Just after we had our falling out at the party.”

“Hmmm,” she said, tearing her eyes away from the handsome Frenchman. Was she herself interested in him? Perhaps she was daydreaming of the day she could part from the troublesome Andrew and lure in another that Wallace Kensington would’ve approved…

Viv moved off to intercept the doctor, hauling Antonio along with her to translate. Will sighed and rubbed his face.

“Is it all that bad?” Felix asked, clapping him on the shoulder. Hugh came around his other side.

“For me, it seems. Pierre and I began to…bicker, and Cora threw us both out of the room.”

Hugh guffawed at this, and Felix gave him a wry grin. “You should know by now,” Felix said good-naturedly, “that my sister does not suffer fools gladly. It must be something she learned from the Diehls…”

Hugh laughed again at that, and even Will smiled. “I was a fool,” he said, tiredly rubbing his neck. “Think she’ll forgive me?”

“Of that I have no doubt,” Felix said, clapping him again on the shoulder and looking back at his sisters. Viv gave him a nod. “Well, it appears my sister received word on our patient, and we can be off to eat at last.” He patted his stomach. “I’m famished.”

“As am I,” Hugh said. “See you back at the palazzo tonight, William?”

“I imagine, at some point. Tell the others that we’ll leave for Tivoli bright and early in the morning. Either Antonio or I shall lead you.”

Hugh nodded and then left, unspoken questions alight in his eyes. The waiting room quieted as they left, like a hive full of bees all exiting to retrieve their daily nectar quota.

Will’s eyes lifted to meet Pierre’s across the room, and Will raised his hands in a gesture of defeat. “It appears our Cora shall remain stubbornly hidden away,” Pierre said, daring to approach Will. They’d skirted each other all afternoon. He pulled out his pocket watch. “You have beaten me in this round,” he said regretfully, “for I shall be late to a dinner obligation if I do not leave now.”

“Perhaps she simply is asleep versus hiding from us. And she is not ‘ours,’ Pierre,” Will said, folding his arms in front of his chest. “She is mine. I do not intend to share her with you.”

“Hmm,” Pierre said, pursing his lips and tapping them with one finger. “We shall see.” Pierre moved to pass him, and Will reached out to grab his arm. He looked downward, rather than at the Frenchman, his eyes on the busy pattern of the terrazzo floor. “I want you to leave Rome, Pierre,” he said.

“I know,” the Frenchman returned quietly, his arm muscles tense beneath Will’s grip. “But until I’m certain that Cora feels the same, I must stay.”

Will reluctantly released him, despising his trembling hand, hoping Pierre didn’t notice it and believe it a sign of weakness rather than rage. It took several minutes for his breathing to steady, and when he looked up, he saw Cora in the doorway of her room, dressed and looking reasonably well.

“Cora?” he said in a whisper. He coughed. “Are you free to leave?” he asked, walking toward her.

“The nurse doesn’t like it, but I don’t care,” she said with sniff, stepping past Stephen. “I’m fine and will rest as well at the apartment as I would here.” He saw, then, that Anna was right behind her. Had the others known this was the plan? He shifted uncomfortably. Rarely was there forward momentum in his tour groups without him being the first to know. But this wasn’t a tour group. This was…Cora.

Anna and Stephen stepped about ten feet away to give them privacy.

“Look, Cora. I’m sorry about what went on with Pierre this morning. It’s only that the man makes me mad with jealousy.”

“I know.”

“But it’s no excuse,” Will said with a little shake of his head. He reached up to rub his temples. “And it shall not happen again. We both knew he intended to rendezvous with us here in Roma. I leave it to you to tell him to go…or stay,” he forced himself to say.

“Thank you, Will,” Cora said. “Now…might we go home?” She was already walking, and Will fell into step beside her. “I’d like to be there for a while before the others return from their evening jaunt. Perhaps even escape to my quarters before they do. I want to join you tomorrow for your tour of Tivoli.”

Will blinked in surprise. “You believe you’ll have the stamina for such a venture? Perhaps we should stick closer to the city and—”

“No, no. My arm should be fine, now that it’s casted and I have some pain medication. And the doctor doesn’t believe I suffered a concussion—that it was simply another of my troubling fainting spells of late.” She shook her head and looked at him. “I don’t know what’s come over me. I never fainted a day in my life until the last month…”

“Perhaps it’s the combined stress of what you’ve endured.”

“Hmm. Perhaps. In any case, I’ve looked forward to seeing Tivoli. Don’t alter your plans on account of me.”

She turned to chat with Anna, who held firmly to her arm as they exited the hospital.

But all Will could think about was that he’d alter anything, anywhere in order to make things right for Cora. And that she’d never fainted before, up until the last month… What was truly going on? Was there some deeper health concern?

~Cora~

Outside, we made it through a small crowd of reporters and drove back to the palazzo in silence beyond idle chitchat, not because I was angry any longer, but because I wasn’t certain how to delve into anything deeper with Will. But thoughts and questions swirled in my head, and as soon as Anna had settled me in the parlor, I couldn’t stand it any longer.

“How did Pierre know I was in the hospital?” I asked.

Will stiffened and then shrugged as if it were an intentional effort. “He likely read about it in the paper. It was front-page news in
La
Repubblica
.”

“Of course it was,” I said with an embarrassed sigh. Anna brought me a cup of tea and asked me silently, with her eyes, if I needed anything else. I shook my head.

“And now it will be picked up by all the other papers around the globe. ‘Heiress Appears Helpless,’” I said, thinking of headlines. “‘Copper Cora Collides with Coliseum Crater.’”