Chapter Twelve
A few weeks later . . .
Achille
I heard the music coming from the mansion as I put Nico and Rosa back in their stables. Even through the thick trees that blocked my view of the house, I could see the Christmas lights sparkling against the evening sky. I could see every window in the house was lit, and I could hear the music blaring from within.
It was the first day of December, and the day of the annual Bella Collina Christmas masked ball. Every aristocrat from Italy had come to the prince’s home for the event. A tradition that had been upheld by the Savonas for over three hundred years. A night where the lords and ladies of Italy gathered in Renaissance dress and Venetian masks to dance and drink and remember that they are someone.
Caresa had not been able to get away for the past four days. So I had waited for her in her bed every night, a single white rose on her pillow.
The past month had carried on much the same as normal for me. My wine was almost ready to bottle, and then . . . then I didn’t know.
But for Caresa, things had only grown busier. Every day she had to discuss wedding plans, go to lunches and attend dinners with Zeno . . . and every day she grew sadder and sadder. She clung to me every night, made love to me as though she would lose me. And it killed me.
But I had to get this year’s wine made. And if I was being honest, the thought of her declaring to her family and friends that she was choosing me over the prince scared me to death. I didn’t want to lose this life, but I didn’t want to lose her.
The thought made me feel sick.
As did the thought of Caresa now in the mansion, dressed in a beautiful period gown, on the arm of the prince. I wanted nothing more but for her to be on mine—she should have been on mine—but I had no place in a party such as that.
An hour later, as I sat at home trying to read, the music and my curiosity got the better of me. Throwing on my boots and a shirt, I took a single white rose from the always-stocked vase I kept at the cottage and stepped out onto the path. Gently falling snow landed on my face as I trudged up the hill toward the mansion.
When I reached the highest point, I stopped and looked down at the bustling estate. Christmas lights hung everywhere. The gardens were scattered with lights, illuminating their perfect landscaping. Then my eyes fell on what I knew was the great room. Inside, I saw people dancing, swirling reds and golds and greens.
I made myself move again, wanting a closer look. I ducked past large shrubs to avoid the attention of the increased security that had been brought in to protect the exclusive guests. I came to a large window and peeked inside, making sure to stay in the shadows.
And my eyes widened. The ballroom was a mass of color. Venetian masks of all colors and shapes and sizes were spinning around as the guests waltzed to a live orchestra. Laughter rang out over the music. I had never seen anything like it. It was as though I had been transported back in time. In this moment, the royal family was very much alive and well . . . and I was a winemaker looking in at a life that wasn’t his.
And then I saw her.
And I saw him.
The crowd moved to the sides of the ballroom and clapped as a couple walked down the stairs. Zeno was dressed in royal blue with an elaborate silver mask. And Caresa . . . my Caresa, wore a deep-red sleeveless ball gown, a corset squeezing in her small waist. Her dark hair was curled and pinned up off her face. She wore long golden earrings and a pretty golden Venetian mask with golden feathers bordering the sides. Her full lips were bright red . . . she was a vision.
Then my stomach fell. Because this was Caresa, the Duchessa di Parma. This was the woman she had been raised to be. Music began, and like the most perfect couple, she and Zeno began to waltz, their movements as perfect as they looked. The watching crowd clapped and stood in awe of the royals as they danced, as they whirled across the floor.
A part of my soul died.
It had been a fantasy. All of it. Seeing Caresa like this, I . . . I couldn’t disgrace her. Because I would. If she chose me over Zeno, she stood not only to lose her family, but her title and her honor. Caresa laughed and smiled as she danced, and even though my heart was breaking, I found myself smiling slightly too.
No one would ever own my heart like Caresa. But that did not mean that we, us as a couple, were right for her. My feet backed away from the window, and I forced myself to turn from the sight of the woman I loved in another man’s arms. I wandered listlessly to the stairs that led to the balcony. I climbed each step, knowing the door to her bedroom would be open. She always left it open for me now, so I could climb into her bed at night, if she didn’t make it into mine.
I slipped inside, and like I did the first night I was here, I drank in the room. The incredible room that suited Caresa’s birthright perfectly. It was almost, almost, as beautiful as her.
Sitting on the side of the bed—the side where she slept—I ran my hand over the copy of Plato’s Symposium on her nightstand, then the pillow on which she slept. I laid the rose on her pillow and stared at the delicate flower on the pristine pillowcase.
I wasn’t sure how long I sat there for, but I eventually made myself move and leave her rooms. This time I wasn’t steady in my walk back to my home; I ran. I ran, needing to feel the biting cold pinching at my face and the ice-cold wind filling my gasping lungs. The surrounding vineyards were white from the newly fallen snow, and the dark sky above was cloudless, the stars like diamonds up above.
In that moment, they appeared just glittering as the masked ball. As unreachable too. Too far out of grasp, unattainable in their beauty . . . just as far out of my world as Caresa’s was from mine.
I ran all the way home, the heavy soles of my boots crunching on the icy mix of soil and grass. I darted into my cottage, needing its familiar comforts to calm me down. But it offered none. For months, my father’s ghost had haunted these rooms—his seat by the fire, his calming voice in the night. But now, as I looked at the fire, as I thought of my bed, he had been replaced by Caresa. Day by day she had consumed every part of my life just as sure as she had consumed my soul.
And it hurt. It hurt because no matter the plans we had made, no matter the love we shared and the needs of our hearts, it couldn’t work. None of this could ever work.
We had been fools to think so. Struck from our senses by love.
And it hurt. It hurt so much I couldn’t breathe.
I staggered into my bedroom and slumped onto the edge of my bed. My elbows landed on my knees, and I ran my hands through my hair. As I looked up, my eyes fell to the nightstand . . . and the letter inside called my name.
I needed my father right now. I needed to hear his voice. I needed his help . . . I had nowhere else to turn. My reading had improved so much over the last month. And I . . . I knew I could do this.
I had to do this.
My fingers trembled as I opened the drawer and took out the envelope. I took in a long, deep breath, but it took me four more inhales and exhales before I could open the back and pull the four pages from their home.
A wave of emotion overwhelmed me, and I had to glance away. I closed my eyes and imagined my father’s face. Smiling at me as he tried to teach me to read and write. Telling me that I could do it. Telling me that I could do anything if I only tried.
With that image in my head, I steadied my hand and let my eyes meet the page. And so I read, trying to make his memory proud . . .
My dearest son,
If you are reading this, then know one thing: I loved you. Most fathers love their children, but you have always been special to me. You were a gift I never expected to be given. But better than that, you exceeded anything I could ever dream.
You may have wondered why I would write you a letter. You may have wondered, why, with the challenges you face, I would be so cruel. But if you are reading this letter, I know it is because you have sought out the help you always should have been given. The help I should have moved heaven and earth to get you.
And know that as your eyes read these words, I am bursting with pride. You are the best winemaker I have ever known, one of the greatest people—with your kind heart and soul—but your reading always held you back. I failed in not taking you into the world more, instead staying close to our vineyard. I know, that even when you read this, what your every day will entail. You are a man who will live a simple life. You will always get by because you always have done. You order your life in a way that you don’t have to read or write. You will live off the land or rely on Eliza and Sebastian like we always did, so that your trips into town are limited and you don’t have to worry about appearing slow or strange to strangers.
And I confess that I had a hand in that. Not because I didn’t want you to better yourself, I did, but because I was so out of my depth with your challenges. But I was also protecting you. Making sure we stayed at the vineyard, just me and my son.
And that was for a good reason too.
You may be wondering what that reason was. And I will get to that, Achille, I promise. But first, there are some things you do not know about your mother, about your mother and me. Things that I kept from you to protect you. To protect your mother’s memory.
Your mother was everything to me. Abrielle was the very reason I breathed. She was the dawn and the dusk and all the hours in between. We were soul mates, split-aparts, but we were not without our problems.
You see, Achille, when I met your mother, we were young. The moment I laid my eyes on her, time stopped. When I met her in Orvieto, singing Christmas hymns around the tree on Christmas Eve, with the snow falling around her beautiful face, I knew I had found home. Abrielle glanced up from her hymnbook and looked across the tree, and I knew she had found her home in me too. People like to say that love at first sight is a myth, that instant love is for the pages of a fantasy book.
But it isn’t. I lived it. Your mother and I were proof of that fact.
We were married two months later, and she moved into my home at the vineyard. Your mother was a dressage champion, and she quickly became the standout rider in King Santo’s dressage and show jumping team.
She loved her life, playing out her passion, and I loved mine. It wasn’t long before we wanted a child of our own. We wanted a child to complete our family . . .
But that wasn’t meant to be. We tried, Achille. For years we tried, and despite the love we had for one another, the fact that we were not producing a child became a plague between us. The depression your mother sank into took her to a lonely and desperate place. A place to which I could not follow.
We sought out help, answers to what the problem was. And the findings were straightforward. The problem was me. I couldn’t have children, Achille. I, the man who loved your mother with everything that I was, could not give my soul mate the one thing she desired most.
I couldn’t give her you.
I know you, son. I know as you read this you will question if you have understood my words correctly. And you have. I couldn’t have children, and my heart broke as I helplessly watched your mother drift further and further away from me, drowning in waves of sadness.
We lost our way. We lived together, slept beside each other every night, but we weren’t okay, we weren’t us. We were lost in the heavy rain . . . and that’s when your mother was taken on a championship tour with the king.
I couldn’t leave the vineyard because of the harvest. And she didn’t want to stay. So she went. She went and won every competition she entered, becoming renowned in the equine community and acclaimed in her sport. But her victories, her beauty and her spirit also managed to win the king’s affection. In that year, King Santo barely came home, instead choosing to travel with the team. The queen stayed behind with the young prince.
King Santo never came home because of your mother, Achille. King Santo became infatuated with my Abrielle, and, it still pains me to say, she became affectionate toward him too.
I do not blame your mother, Achille. She was young and sad and far from home. And although he never held her heart as I did, I knew that she loved him too. When your mother came home she told me everything at once. Her tears were thick and full as she confessed her infidelity.
It took me a while, but I forgave her. I loved her. She was my split-apart. And I was hers. And despite the crack in my heart her affair caused, it brought your mother back to me. Gone was the pain, and gone was the sadness. I had my Abrielle back. I chose to forgive her. Many wouldn’t, but it was my heart and my pain, and I chose the heavy route of forgiveness.
She won her final championship, then came home for good. She told the king they were over, and I finally had her back.
Then a month later we discovered she was pregnant. It wasn’t a medical miracle. We both knew how she was with child, and it wasn’t my doing. We knew whose baby she carried. I struggled at first, son. It was a dagger to my heart. But when you were born, all of that pain became filled with the greatest of light. When I held you in my arms and you looked into my eyes, I knew I was your papa. You were my son.
And then my Abrielle died. Right in front of me, she died with tears of sadness in her eyes. But not before she told you she loved you and that I was your father. She knew I would love you. She knew you would be safe. She believed her death, the reason we were being torn apart, was because she was being punished. She thought death and not getting to know her son was the punishment for straying.
I never believed that. And I still don’t. Because nothing, not even death, could take her from me. She stayed with me through you. You looked so much like her, son. Your mannerisms, your shyness, your kindness were all your mother. Though you carried your father’s eyes. His height and his broadness. The older you got, the more I saw him within you.
And then you befriended Zeno. You became best friends with your brother, as if the fates had pushed you together, a winemaker’s son and the prince— as if destiny had always known you should have been close. And you loved Zeno like a brother. My shy little boy had found someone he could be himself with. You cherished his visits as you played out on the track.
Then one day the king turned up to my vineyard and saw you both playing in the field beyond. It was the first time I had seen him since your mother died. One look into my eyes and he knew I knew about their affair. He knew we had had a son. And when you came running toward the vineyard, with Zeno in tow, I saw the moment he knew you were his. You and Zeno, laughing side by side. Similar in both hair color and eyes. Same height, same build, same smile.
Both Santo’s.
He pulled me aside and demanded the truth. So I told him. It was the scariest day of my life. I feared he would take you from me. I saw in his eyes that he still loved your mother, still grieved for her. We shared in that pain. And then here you were, their perfect mix. A piece of Abrielle living on his land, with his blood running through your veins.
King Santo returned to the mansion with Zeno. Days later, Zeno was sent back to Florence, and a week after that, the queen returned to Austria. She never came back.
Because King Santo had told her of you and how you were a rightful prince. He told his wife that he wanted to publicly declare you as his. He wanted Zeno to have his brother in his life. He . . . he was happy you were his, son. He wanted to know you. He wanted to love you.
But his brother Roberto and his advisers warned him against it. His reputation would be ruined. His wife would be humiliated. I was so angry at him when he chose to listen to them and deny you. But then he never left the estate. He began to visit you frequently. And every time he came, he fell more and more in love with you. And I could see you liked him too.
When your schooling became difficult for you, I asked him for his help. Rumors of how you looked like him had already begun to spread throughout the school you attended when he tried to intervene. He pulled you out, and I trusted him when he said it was because he wanted what was best for you. It quickly became clear that he was hiding you. My beautiful boy was being kept away, a secret, so his affair wouldn’t be exposed. And I am ashamed that I allowed it. I know now that I gave in to your request to not return to school because I also wanted to protect your mother. But I was wrong to do so. The king loved you, yet he could not rise against the blue-blood world he ruled to accept you.
Then you became indispensable to him because you were my heir. You would follow me in making the Bella Collina merlot. And you were better than me. I believed the king loved you like a son, but he knew keeping you from reading and writing would encourage you to stay at the vineyard. I could see you wanted that too. But I failed you. I liked you working by my side; I cherished each day. So I let it happen. I will regret that forever. Sometimes I wonder if I was as selfish as the king, keeping you sheltered so I could keep you as my son.
I will always be your father, Achille. You were mine and I raised you the best I could, but you have a right to know the truth. I never told you when I was alive as I knew you weren’t ready. You lived in the small world the king and I had created for you, and I knew you wouldn’t be ready to hear this truth until you took it upon yourself to seek out more. I knew someday the boy I raised would conquer his demons. I didn’t know how or when, but I knew he would. And when that day came, I knew you would finally be ready to hear the truth.
To accept your birthright.
Achille, my son, you are a Savona. For all intents and purposes, you are an ancestral prince of Italy. You were always better than me—sweeter, kinder, and more talented. You are not merely a son of a common winemaker, but a bearer of blue blood from centuries’ breeding of kings and queens.
To me, you will always be my son. But you need to know the truth.
I love you.
Your mother loved you
As did the king.
Be great, my son. Be the prince you were born to be.
Your proud father.
As I read the last word, with my heart torn into shreds, I realized I couldn’t move. So I sat there on the bed, with shaking hands and tears streaming down my cheeks. Because everything I had ever known was a lie.
For the first time in weeks, I wished I had never met Caresa. Because Caresa had brought me the gift of words and books. But she had also brought me this truth, this truth I didn’t want.
So I’d just sit here some more . . . and at some point, when I could muster the courage, I would move . . .
. . . and do what?
I had absolutely no clue.