Russell.’
‘No, I suppose not.’
‘Poor Cassidy. I never thought I’d see the day when this bird was quiet,’ Melinda said, looking at the parrot. ‘I really want to keep an eye on him for a while.’
‘Do you want to stay here tonight?’ he asked. With her flat being just above the surgery, it made sense.
‘If you don’t mind sharing a single bed.’
‘Now, I’m the one who’s meant to be Spartan,’ he teased. ‘Of course I don’t mind. I’ll go and get us some fish and chips, shall I, while you call Violet and let her know how Cassidy has settled in?’
She kissed him. ‘Most men would not be this understanding, Dragan. You are…’ she smiled ‘…meraviglioso.’
‘Tell me that when I’m on call and the phone goes at two a.m. and I have to go out to a patient,’ he said dryly.
‘That, I won’t mind. But then you’ll come back and warm your feet on me.’
‘When you’re all warm and soft and irresistible.’ Dragan kissed her. ‘I’ll be back in ten minutes, piccola.’
Melinda had just finished reassuring Violet when her mobile phone rang. She glanced at the screen and grimaced. Her mother. Please, don’t let this be another call about duty and how she really ought to stop playing at being a country vet and come home. Because it wasn’t going to happen: she was staying right here where she belonged. Melinda Lovak, country vet and doctor’s wife.
Which was something else she needed to tell her parents. Though she’d need to choose her words very carefully—which meant maybe not tonight. If she made the call rather than took it, she’d feel more in control and not so much on the defensive.
She pressed the answer button. ‘Buona sera, Mamma.’
‘Buona sera, Melinda. I am sorry to call you so late. But I have some bad news.’
CHAPTER FOUR
MELINDA went cold. ‘Papà?’
‘No, he is fine.’ Her mother sighed. ‘It’s Raffi.’
Here we go again, Melinda thought. Her older brother Raphael had done something stupid and she was expected to come to the rescue—because it seemed she was the only one who could ever get through to him. Raffi ignored whatever Serena said because she was the baby; though most of the time he didn’t listen to Melinda either. ‘What is it this time? He was caught in flagrante delicto with someone and she’s sold her story to the press? He’s in debt at Monte Carlo? He raced his new boat against someone and lost it in a bet?’ Raphael had done all three over the last two years, and he never seemed to learn from his mistakes. Sometimes Melinda thought he actually enjoyed repeating them. He’d talked about sailing over to see her, but she’d been quick to give him the impression that Penhally was a complete backwater and he’d be bored, bored, bored within two seconds—the last thing she wanted was for him to cut a swathe through the female population of Penhally and leave her to pick up the pieces afterwards.
‘No.’
There was a pause in which Melinda thought she detected a sob—then again, Viviana Fortesque would never lose that much control. Melinda must’ve imagined it.
‘He’s dead.’
Dead? The word seemed to be coming from the far end of a long, long tunnel. She couldn’t take it in. Raffi, her brother who was much larger than life and more than lived every minute to the full, dead? ‘No. There must be some mistake. He can’t be.’
‘He died yesterday afternoon.’
‘What?’ She dragged in a breath. ‘What happened?’
‘He was driving.’
Too fast, the way Raffi always did. She didn’t need to be told that. Even losing his licence for three months hadn’t stopped him speeding the second he’d got his licence back.
‘He spun off the road and hit a tree.’
‘Oh, Dio. Was anyone else hurt?’
‘He was on his own in the car.’
Which was a good thing, in one sense: at least no other family was going to have to go through this aching loss, this misery at losing a loved one too soon. But all the same, her heart ached for him. There had been nobody to hold his hand at the end, nobody to tell him they loved him. And even though he’d been a selfish, spoiled brat and sometimes she’d wanted to throttle him, nobody deserved an end like that. ‘Poor Raffi. So he died all alone,’ she said softly.
‘No, your father and I were with him at the end.’
‘But…’ Melinda frowned, not understanding. ‘You said he was alone in the car.’
‘He was.’ Viviana’s voice was dry. ‘It’s been touch and go for the last couple of days whether he would pull through.’
It took a moment to sink in. And when it did, Melinda was furious. ‘Hang on, it happened a couple of days ago? My brother was in hospital—in Intensive Care—and you didn’t call me?’
‘There was no point. You wouldn’t have come.’
Oh, this was outrageous. Not only had her family kept the news of Raffi’s accident from her, now they were trying to make her feel guilty about it. Thinking for her instead of letting her make her own decisions. Just the way it had always been.
And they’d taken away her chance to say goodbye.
She’d never forgive them for this.
And how come she hadn’t read about in the papers? Unless her parents had hushed it up. Come to some agreement with the press so Raffi wouldn’t be hounded in hospital by the paparazzi.
‘Of course I would have come,’ she said through gritted teeth. ‘He’s my brother.’
‘Apart from the fact you two barely speak when you do see each other,’ Viviana pointed out, ‘you’re still playing at being an English country vet.’
‘I am not playing.’ She twisted the end of her hair round her fingers. ‘This is my life now, Mamma, my career, and—’ The twisted hair started to hurt, and the pain brought her back to her senses. What was she doing, letting her mother get to her like this? ‘I am not going to argue with you. Not with Raffi dead. It’s the wrong time.’ And surely even her mother would see that. ‘When is the funeral?’ She just about managed to bite back, Or weren’t you going to tell me about that either?
‘Two days’ time.’
‘Then I will come back to Contarini.’
‘Bene. I will send the jet tonight to your nearest airport. Which is…?’
‘I can’t fly out tonight. Mamma, I have responsibilities here.’
‘You have responsibilities to your family, Melinda,’ Viviana said, her voice like cut glass.
‘I can’t just drop everything and leave George to sort out my patients and my surgery tomorrow. It’s not fair. We need time to sort out a locum for me.’
‘Locum?’ There was a shocked pause. ‘You mean, you are actually planning to go back again?’
‘Of course. It’s my job. My vocation, Mamma.’ Not to mention the fact the man she loved and was going to marry lived here in Cornwall. Though now was most definitely not the time to tell her mother about that.
‘While you were the middle child, we were prepared to let you play.’
Play? A degree in veterinary sciences meant long hours and hard work. Years and years of study and exams. She twisted her hair again, and the sharp pain made her pause instead