Chapter 25: Dangerous Deception: Chapter 25

“You’ll be unrecognizable when you go home,” jokes Caterina from where she lounges next to me beside the pool.

“How do you mean?” I crack open one eye and peer at her over the top of my sunglasses.

“Well, when I met you, you were understandably timid. You’d been through hell, and I’m not faulting for that. But look at you now. It’s what, July? And you’ve turned into this gorgeous, bronzed goddess.”

“What can I say?” I smirk. “I was born for holidaying in the sun.”

“Clearly. You want some?” Caterina sits up and offers me her platter of crackers and mixed cheeses.

While I’m a fan, something about the scent of the cheese makes my stomach turn and I shake my head, closing my eyes one more time. “I’m good.”

“You sure?” Caterina’s lounger creaks as she shifts about. “You didn’t eat dinner last night.”

“Yeah. Maybe I’ve had too much sun, actually, been feeling a little…” I open my eyes and stare up at the glorious blue sky above me. “I don’t know. A little off balance, I think.”

“Bad seafood,” Caterina says confidently. “It’s always bad seafood.”

“You think?”

“Just don’t tell the chef I said that or she might serve me up for dinner.”

“I’m going to tell her right this second.” I grin, letting my eyes slip closed. “After some more sunbathing.”

I’m in a dream. I have to be. We’ve been here so long that the thought of life back home is distant and almost alien. This is where I want to spend the rest of my days.

I wonder if Raffaele can get me some art supplies. Painting the scenery around here would be amazing to send back to the hospital.

Then it hits me.

Raffaele has been kind, attentive, and loving since we arrived. There’s no way he’d stop me from resuming my hospital trips when we head back home, right? I mull over how best to approach the subject, but I no longer feel like I need to dance around issues. Asking him straight should get me the answer I desire.

Leaning over my lounger, I scoop up my phone from where it rests in the shade underneath the table and tap the screen. Just as I swipe to Raffaele’s number, though, a call flashes onto the screen and derails my thoughts.

I sit upright immediately.

“You good?” Caterina, mirroring my movements, is also on alert as she sits up.

“It’s my dad.”

“Oh. You need me to…?” Caterina clicks her tongue and indicates over her shoulder, suggesting she can leave.

“No, no, it’s alright.” I tap the screen and press the phone to my ear. “Hello?”

“Addie!”

My heart squeezes at the old nickname, and suddenly, I’m a child again. “Papà?”

He coughs harshly, a ragged sound that ends in waspish, weak breathing.

“Papà? Are you alright?”

“No, Addie.” My father coughs again, loudly and painfully. “I’m not. You need to come home. You need to come home now.”

The flight home is tense.

Nothing like a cryptic call from my sick father to bring a slap of reality to my life. As soon as I told Raffaele the problem, he had us packed up and on the jet back to the States within two hours. Never have I been more grateful for his money or his influence. I threw up several times before the plane, and even more times during the flight, from the stress of receiving such a terrible call.

My father told me nothing. He coughed more than he spoke, and each time I tried to get answers out of him, he sounded like he was at death’s door.

Nothing made me feel better. Raffaele spoke about doctors and hospitals, swore that whatever was wrong, it would be dealt with and I shouldn’t worry. Caterina offered her own advice along the same path pipeline, but their words meant nothing to me.

All I could think of was my father, alone in that manor.

Falling ill and wasting away while I overstayed my welcome in Italy. I never should have left him behind.

I should have called more.

Texted more.

He’d been so clear the last time we spoke properly. He wanted me to be Raffaele’s wife and he didn’t have time for me anymore. Did he do that to make it easier on me? Was he sick back then as well?

It’s difficult to separate what happened to my mother from how terrible my father sounded when begging me to come home. I felt like I was right back in my childhood shoes, listening to her wasting coughs and haggard breaths.

“It will be okay,” Raffaele says as we climb out of the limo in front of my father’s home.

“Will it?” I’m barely able to look at him as I slam the door, then I turn and sprint up the steps toward the front door.

The doorman answers after the third knock and I hurry inside, heading straight for my father’s study where he usually spends his time this late at night. Assuming he’s even able to keep up his old routine. My heart leaps into my throat when I shove open the door and find the room empty and cold, not a single hint of life.

“Papà?” I call, moving to the next room and the next.

I’m about to break into a run and sprint through the entire house when I finally come across him in the kitchen. He’s wrapped up in a thick robe, huddled on one of the chairs with a steaming mug of tea clasped between his hands.

“Papà!”

He jolts in surprise and turns, his eyes wide, then he breaks down into a rough coughing fit. Only, it doesn’t sound as deathly or as waspish as it did over the phone all those hours ago.

“Addie! Oh, God, I can’t believe you’re actually here.”

I hurry next to him and clutch his arm, looking over his face for the signs of illness that have twisted me with worry since the end of our phone call. “Tell me, what’s wrong? How is your health? Do I need to get you anything? Raffaele can help get you into the best hospital, okay? I’m here and I’m going to take care of you.”

“Oh, that’s my Addie,” he croaks softly, but his voice isn’t as cracked as it had been on the phone.

Slowly, I sit down next to him. “Papà, tell me what’s wrong.”

“I just got a little bit sick, that’s all.” He smiles warmly and clasps my hand in his. “It is so good to see you.”

“But you…” I scan his face, unable to fathom how all in all, he looks fine. A little under the weather, but nowhere near at death’s door like I’d been envisioning on the plane home. “You sounded terrible on the phone.”

“It’s nothing,” he continues. “I just grew very sick, but oh, my daughter. Seeing you again is the best medicine. Look at you!” He leans back and frowns. “You’ve had far too much sun.”

“Papà,” I insist. “Tell me the truth. You sounded awful, and I was so scared. I thought something terrible had happened, so we rushed straight here. Raffaele was lucky he could get us flights so quickly.”

Something flickers across my father’s face, something dark that’s immediately swallowed by a sudden coughing fit. I tighten my grip on his hand. My brow dips painfully with worry.

“A cough, the sniffles. Weakness and the like,” my father explains quickly. “The doctor says I’m fine.”

“The flu,” comes Raffaele’s voice from the doorway. “You have a summer flu?”

My father’s eyes narrow slightly. “If you want to call it that, sure.”

I retract my hand, studying my father as he shoots a sharp look at Raffaele. “You… you just have a cold?”

“No, my dear.” My father’s attention is back on me. “It’s much worse than that and I was scared too. I feared the worst, and never seeing you again would break my heart, Addie.”

Confusion mingles with the worry in my chest, and a warm curl of nausea makes the back of my neck tingle.

I’m tired.

We’ve been non-stop since getting the call. In less than twenty-four hours, Raffaele got us on a plane halfway around the world and we drove straight here, all because I thought my father was dying. He’s not.

He just has the flu.

“Papà, you scared me,” I say tiredly. “I thought… after Mama, I thought⁠—”

“It could have been,” my father assures me quickly. “You did the right thing in coming here. Seeing you is better medicine than anything the doctors can give me. Please, Addie. Stay with me for a while?”

It’s tempting, but my worry quickly turns into irritation. My father seems infinitely less worse than he sounded on the phone, and all those hours of worrying are quickly catching up to me. And I’m not sure I even want to be around him right now since he doesn’t seem concerned that he made me worry myself sick.

“I’d love to,” I say with a small smile. “But I’m exhausted. I want to go home and unpack. It was a long flight.”

“Addie…”

“I’m glad you’re okay, Papà. I can come by tomorrow and I can tell you all about my holiday?”

“I can arrange that,” says Raffaele from where he continues to linger in the doorway. He doesn’t even try to hide the bite of annoyance in his tone. “Let’s get you home.”

As I stand, my father suddenly reaches sharply for my hand and grips tightly at my wrist. “You should stay,” he says urgently, his voice low. He looks up at me with wide eyes. “I’m poorly. I need you.”

If I weren’t suddenly crashing so hard from the false worry, I may have been more sympathetic to his illness, but my annoyance wins out and I pull my hand away.

“No, Papà. I’m going home. I’ll see you tomorrow.”