The Billionaires' Club: Return of Her Italian Duke (The Billionaire’s Club) / Bound to Her Greek Billionaire (The Billionaire’s Club) / Whisked Away by Her Sicilian Boss (The Billionaire’s Club)

Stunned by what he’d just said, Gemma clung to the back of the chair. The true reason?

“On the strength of the years you and I spent together as children and teenagers who fell in love, isn’t learning the whole truth worth something to you?”

“I thought you said you left to make your own fortune and name.”

“That was a by-product of the real reason I left, but I didn’t tell you the truth in order to spare you more grief. I can see now that I’ve been wrong to do that.”

Along with everything he was saying, his confession that he’d been in love with her a long time ago was almost too much to bear. Gemma couldn’t talk, couldn’t think.

“I don’t ever remember you running out of words before, so I’m following you home.” He put some bills on the table. “We need privacy because we’re not finished talking, but we can’t do it here. People are watching.”

“You made a promise.”

“I would have kept it, but you’ve just told me another lie. If you don’t want to work at the castello then I’ll have to live with it, but I need the truth from you first. Let’s go.”

With her heart in her mouth, Gemma left the restaurant and walked to the end of the street to reach her car. She started the engine and pulled into traffic. Soon she was headed for Sopri.

Through the rearview mirror she could see the Maserati following closely behind. Adrenaline gushed through her veins. Finally she would know what had happened all those years ago. It didn’t take long to reach the pensione. Vincenzo pulled up behind her and parked his car.

Without looking at him, she went inside, leaving the door open. He followed, closing it behind him.

“Come in and sit down. Take your pick of one of the chairs or the love seat.”

* * *

Vincenzo did neither. First he looked around at the small, well-furnished flat. From the living room he could see part of the bedroom. Then he walked into the kitchen, where she was clinging to the counter.

This evening, the fear that he was losing his grip on Gemma had made him realize he had to tell her the painful truth about his disappearance if he ever hoped to have a chance of keeping her in his life. All the guilt and the shame would have to come out. He’d wanted to protect her, but it was too late for that now.

But first he needed to hear what had happened to her after he’d left. He sucked in his breath. “The truth, Gemma. All of it! How soon after I disappeared did you and your mother leave the castello?”

She was trembling. “The second your father learned you were missing, he came with the chief of police and guards to our rooms at six that morning, demanding to know where you were. I told him I knew nothing. They searched our rooms before the police chief said he believed me.

“Your father told my mother to get out and take her baggage with her—meaning me, of course. Your father’s outrage was frightening. The idea that his son, who would one day become the Duca di Lombardi, was enjoying life below the stairs with one of the cooks’ daughters put him into a frenzy.

“He vowed to make certain she never got a job anywhere else. He threw Bianca and her mother out that same morning before he left with the police to start searching the countryside for you. That’s why Mamma made me use the Bonucci name, so he couldn’t find us.”

Vincenzo’s pain bordered on fury. He fought to stay in control. “What he did was inhuman. You should never have been forced to live through such a nightmare, and all because of me. I can never hope to make this up to you.”

“It’s over, and he was a sick man.”

His jaw hardened. “More than sick. You don’t know what a frenzy is until you’ve seen him raging drunk. My uncle was the same. Dimi had to get away, too.”

She swallowed hard. “You said he lives in Milan with his mother.”

He nodded. “They left the same day as you and your mother did, while my father was out with the police hunting for me.”

“When I first met your aunt Consolata, she was in a wheelchair. I always worried about her.”

“I know you did. She always spoke of you with fondness, but she isn’t well and has lost her memory.”

“That’s so sad.”

This was the girl he’d remembered and dreamed about. She’d always had a sweetness and kindness that made her stand out from any woman he’d ever known.

“Did you ever hear how she ended up in her wheelchair?”

“Mamma told me she had a disease.”

“No, Gemma,” he ground out. “That was a story the family made up to cover the truth. My father and my uncle Alonzo were the ones with the disease.”

“What do you mean?”

“They are alcoholics. Alonzo drove Dimi’s mother home from a party when he was drunk out of his mind. She begged for someone else to drive her, but he became enraged and dragged her to the car. En route home, there was a terrible crash. The man in the other car was killed and Dimi’s mother was paralyzed from the waist down, unable to walk again. But as usual, my father had it hushed up to protect the family honor.”

Tears splashed down her cheeks.

“Just know that since my uncle has been imprisoned, Dimi and my aunt have been able to live in peace. But there’s a lot more you need to hear in order for you to understand my sudden disappearance.”

“A lot more?”

His fear for what his father might have done to her triggered other thoughts. “The night we almost made love, you thought I’d been recovering from a fall after I’d been out horseback riding.”

She nodded. “That’s what they had been gossiping about down in the kitchen. I snuck upstairs that night to see how bad your injuries were.”

“My bruises and welts weren’t because of an accident, Gemma.”

A cry escaped her lips. She looked ill. “Your father was responsible?”

“Si. He beat me almost to a pulp.” Gemma winced. “But he did worse to my mamma, and she died because of it.”

“Oh, Vincenzo—no—” Hot tears spurted from her eyes. “Why would he do that? She was a wonderful person.”

“My parents’ marriage was a political arrangement with a lot of money and land entailed. But my grandfather Count Nistri, the one who lived in Padua, didn’t trust his new son-in-law. Even back then my father had a reputation for drinking and gambling. But he came from a family of great wealth and was a business wizard.

“To make certain his daughter, Arianna, my mother, always had security, he’d put a fortune in a Swiss bank account for her alone.”

“He sounds like a loving man and father.”

“He was, but my father resented me having any association with him. Still, he couldn’t stop me from visiting him from time to time. My grandfather had the foresight and the means to help me get away when the time came.”

“How did he do it?”

“Through a secret source, he learned my father had been badgering my mother for her money. At that point he gave her the information to access it and passports for both of us so we could escape.”

Another gasp flew out of her.

“During the last year before she died, my father started hitting her when he couldn’t get at her money. She couldn’t withstand all those beatings.” His eyes stung with tears. “Do you have any idea what I went through, hearing her cries while I was held back by the guards so I couldn’t help her?”