Lost to us, p.1
Lost to Us, page 1
LOST TO US
The President’s Daughters
Book 5
Kathryn Shay
After twenty-years of happily-ever-after, a couple must deal with issues that would break up most marriages.
Set in Italy, on a romantic island of lush landscape surrounded by the sparkling Mediterranean Sea, Bianca and Joe Lucchese’s life together has been as sturdy and beautiful as the country where they live. Except for their interfering mothers.
Joe fears that his relationship with his wife is on the brink of failure. Both their mothers interfere in their lives and cause a wedge between him and his wife. Thinking they need a break from their arguing, he leaves for Africa to work at Vet’s Abroad.
Already devastated by her beloved husband Joe’s abandonment, Bianca Lucchese suffers from a series of events that level her. Her mother dies. And from a letter left with her will, Bianca discovers that she’s the daughter of a U.S. president. Then, tragedy strikes their veterinarian practice. While she loves Joe, she turns to a colleague for solace.
When Joe returns home broken and battered, he and Bianca experience a loving reunion, until he discovers her betrayal.
The ups-and-down of a marriage rocked by infidelity extend to every area of their lives. But as they try to work their way through this, other people, especially their colleague, complicate that.
Will their second chance at marriage crumble under the weight of all that has happened?
Learn how this plot-twisting novel unfolds and how the Manwarings’ family saga ends.
Lost to Us
Copyright © 2022 by Kathryn Shay
All Rights Reserved
Smashwords Edition
Published by Ocean View Books
Cover Design by Shelley Kay at Web Crafters
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Table of Contents
Cast of Characters
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Epilogue
Author’s Note
Don’t Miss All of The President’s Daughters Stories
ABOVE AND BEYOND Excerpt
About the Author
Cast of Characters
Main Characters
Bianca Lucchese-married to Joe, part owner of Luchesse Veterinarians
Joe Lucchese-- married to Bianca, part owner of Luchesse Veterinarians
Masters Manwaring Family
Annalise Masters Manwaring—twin of Andraya, member of the House of Representatives,
married to Luke Branson, son Andy
Andraya Masters Manwaring—twin of Annalise, teacher at the Marcello Schools in Italy,
married to Ben Moretti, children Meli and Matt
Hannah Masters Manwaring—lives a self-sustaining lifestyle in Rockford, NY, engaged to
Zeke Carter, former Secret Service Agent, old boy friend
Sasha Masters Manwaring—youngest daughter and sister, married to Dan West
James Manwaring—president of the United States for eight years, retired
Karen Masters Manwaring—mother of the girls, former first lady, former attorney
Joe’s Family
Bella Lucchese—daughter to Joe and Bianca
Nicky Lucchese--son to Joe and Bianca
Rosalina Lucchese—Joe’s mother
Nicoli Lucchese—Joe’s father, deceased
Costanza Russo—Joe’s sister
Viviana Colombo—Joe’s sister
Raina Lucchese—Joe’s sister
Friends and acquaintances of Joe
Tommaso Galati
Friends and acquaintances of Bianca
Izzy Garnier
Raina Lucchese
King and Queen Gentileschi
Dr. Daniella Cassini
Michael Clemento—Bianca’s lawyer
Employed by Lucchese Veterinarian
Christopher Messina
Lucia
Mable
Donna
Doc Evans
Lupo and Dolce—Lucchese dogs
Prologue
End of August
“We have to talk.” Joe made the statement in the office of their veterinarian practice before their workday began. It was a light, airy space, with carefully chosen wooden desks, file cabinets and a long couch on the far wall. She’d brought in fresh flowers so the scent of calla lilies surrounded them.
Bianca’s eyes narrowed in feigned anger. “Is it about those secret meetings and phone calls you’ve been having? I swear Giuseppe Nicoli Lucchese, if you have a woman on the side, I’ll castrate you.”
“As if, Tesoro.” For a moment, his dark eyes danced. “I haven’t looked at another woman since you fell into my arms coming down the steps of the administration building at college.”
Bianca knew that was true. The same thing happened to her. Love at first sight. And lots of lust, too. They couldn’t keep their hands off each other and were together every minute they could manage. “All right. Tell me.”
He got that shadowed expression on his face that usually meant he had bad news. “I accepted a request from Veterinari All’estero to inoculate wildlife in Africa.”
“What?”
“I’m going to work with the vets over there.”
She frowned. “We were planning to do that together, sometime later, when the kids were older.”
“I have to go now. Running our home and practice throws us together too much.”
Merda, this was so unlike the past where they skipped classes to make love and he moved out of the dorm and rented an apartment for privacy and convenience.
She stared at him. She loved him. But… “So you’re going to run away from our problems?”
He stood, came around his desk, leaned against the edge and jammed his hands into his jeans pockets. Damn him for looking so good. “You’re not listening, amore mio. We need a break from each other. I know I need a break from the pressure our Mammas put on us. We fight all the time about them.”
It was painful to hear what he was saying. There had been a lot of pressure and it had affected their relationship. Her voice was hoarse when she answered, “So I get to stay here and deal with them all by myself?”
Joe’s brows knitted. “Mamma will leave you alone if I’m not here. Maybe me being gone will make her listen to me about interfering in our lives. But, yes, you’ll have to deal with your mother.”
Carlotta Ricci was a force to be reckoned with. Since Bianca’s papà was never in the picture, she and her mother had been close. Very close. Too close. And Carlotta never liked Joe, but down deep Bianca knew she wouldn’t approve of any man her daughter had chosen.
She made herself sound strong. “I’ll handle Mamma. What about the practice?”
“Christopher will take on more responsibility.” The fresh-faced, sweet man, Christopher Messina was just out of vet school when they asked him to join their team and had been a joy to work with.
“We hired him so we could open a second office.”
“That can wait.”
Her eyes filled. “I can’t believe you’d do this to me, Joey.”
“Bianca, cara, we need time away from each other!”
“At least you do.”
“You do, too. And this way, we won’t have to explain a separation to the kids.”
“And you won’t look bad.” She stilled as another awful truth came to her. “You were thinking of a separation?”
“No, no, that came out wrong.” He took in a deep breath. Stared at her with midnight eyes that made her weak in the knees. “I’m going, for three months, starting in September.”
She tried to calm herself. “Not with my support.”
“Cazzo! You don’t give an inch anymore. What happened to the girl I married?”
“She was deliriously happy when she met you. You promised life would stay that way for us. We opened a successful practice, had two kids we raised together. Then you got distant.”
“Things change, Bianca.”
“Apparently.”
“Please do this for me. I need it.”
She loved this man above all else. She often consented to what he wanted to do in their life together. But she was mad! “All right, Joey, go ahead. Leave the three of us alone.” Even to her own ears, she sounded totally rejected. In the past that would have killed him.
“Will you give me your blessing?”
“What do you think?”
* * *
Joe couldn’t concentrate all day. Even though he’d had several wellness checks, two sick puppies and a consultation about surgery, he was distracted. Not only had he hurt the only woman he ever loved, he’d sounded like a selfish bastard.
I need to get away…I want to go…
But deep inside he knew that his marriage was heading for disaster if he didn’t shake things up. And he wasn’t sure he could live without Bianca in his life.
&
First Carlotta…
“You are subservient to him, figlia mia. I warned you against this.” Still tall, imposing and statuesque at sixty-plus, her silvery gaze was cold.
“I am not, Mamma. We compromise.”
“He always gets what he wants.”
“Because I want it too.”
Her mother stared her down. Bianca knew an ace in the hole was coming. “Did you want another child?”
“I wanted to talk about it.” And Joe didn’t. So the idea got dismissed.
“Not that I thought having another was the right thing for you, but you had no choice when he objected. He takes that away from you.”
“Joe likes our life as it is.”
“I do.” His comment came from the doorway. “And Carlotta, I don’t appreciate how you hound your daughter. I’ve told you this before.”
“Do not speak to me like that.”
“This is my home. I’ll speak however I want in order to keep you from hurting your daughter.”
Bianca said, “Joe, I can stand up for myself.”
Angry, he’d whirled on her. His eyes burned. “Then why don’t you?”
Then there was his mother, Rosalina…
“You work too hard, Joey, and afterward, you run around with i figli. Your wife should stay home and take care of them and the house.”
He’d crossed to the woman who’d raised him. Who he loved dearly. “Mamma, I know that’s how you did things in your marriage, but that’s not us. Not most people in Italy these days.”
She touched his face and he could see the veins of age in her hand. Small in stature, a bit overweight, she had the same dark eyes and hair as Joe, though hers was graying. “You need more sleep. More relaxation. If she quit, you’d have peace.”
It was as if he hadn’t spoken. “Santa Maria, you don’t listen to me. Bianca’s not going to give up her career. I don’t want her to. Now, I won’t talk about this again.”
But they had. And more than once he’d found her pressuring Bianca. His wife didn’t cower in front of his mother, but Rosalina triggered something in Bianca that made her not fight back very hard. That probably had to do with her own mother’s strong personality. He and his wife became more and more estranged.
A breaking point came for him the night before he was leaving…
They were getting ready for sleep. He noticed lately she’d been changing in the bathroom. He was stretched out on the bed, with his hands linked behind his head, wearing only his boxers, watching the overhead fan whir around. She came out in a nightgown buttoned up to her neck.
He said simply, “I want to make love.”
“I don’t feel like it.”
“You haven’t felt like it in weeks.” Even now after nearly twenty years of marriage, sex had been frequent and imaginative.
“I know I haven’t.” She walked to a dressing table, sat down and began to brush her blond hair. She saw him in the mirror when he came up behind her. Put his hands on her shoulders. “You won’t make love with me because I’m going to work with Veterinari All’estero.”
She held his gaze in the glass. “That’s right, Joe. This chasm between us opened up when you said you were abandoning us.”
Fury rose inside him. “You always said you hated when women used sex to manipulate men.”
She turned around forcing him to step back. Her gaze narrowed on him. “I know. And I never thought I’d feel this way about you.”
“What are you saying, that I killed our sex life?”
“Harsh, but probably true.” She stood and didn’t meet his height by six inches. “It’s not my fault that I no longer want you. It’s yours.”
He was so angry he didn’t know what he’d do if he stayed. He stalked to the hamper, redressed in his clothes from the day, and stormed out of the room. He walked over to the street where his childhood friend, Tommaso Galati, lived and slept on his couch on the porch. He left the next day when he and his wife weren’t speaking to each other.
* * *
Twenty years ago
Bianca Ricci exited the Administration Building at Medici Sculo Veterinarina in Rome. She breathed in the warm, fall air and relished the breeze that ruffled her hair. Turning her face up, she let the sun beat down on her.
After a bit, she took a step down…Oh, my God. The world tilted. She hurled forward. Dio Mio, aiuto!
Strong arms caught her halfway down. Stunned, she held onto them.
“It’s okay now,” a soothing voice said, gathering her to his chest. “You didn’t hit the ground.”
She nuzzled into the stranger, the material of his T-shirt soft against her cheek. He smelled good. His hand went to her hair. “Pretty, I like the blond.”
Her thanks were muffled. Finally, she drew back. And what she saw, how she felt, was akin to falling again. Longish, dark brown hair and dark eyes and sculpted features. He had muscles all over the place. Her body tingled all over. She’d never met a boy who made her react this way.
He smiled and the world tilted again. “Hi, there, beautiful. I’m Joe Lucchese.”
“I…” she cleared her throat. “Bianca Ricci.” She glanced behind her. “Thank you for catching me. I-If you hadn’t been there…” She shivered.
“But I was.” He still held her by the arms. His grip was tight but tender. He grinned. “I’d better walk you somewhere.”
“Sure. I’ve got a class at St. Blaise Center.”
His dark brows rose. “Hey, that’s where my class is.”
“Then you’ll be on time.”
They traveled over the concrete courtyard. Bianca loved this part of the campus. It sported tall statuary, plenty of benches and even a little waterfall. When they reached their building, a stone version of a bearded man with a pope-like headdress, a flowing robe and a staff in one hand stood before the steps up. “That’s St. Blaise,” Joe said easily. “The patron saint of vets.”
Ah, a contest. “Sí. It’s said that he could heal the wounded and sick animals. And he was un pacificatore. He taught all the beasts of the forest to be friends.”
Joe smirked. “And in the time of Christian persecution, they couldn’t put him in an arena with beasts, which was what they did to enemies then. The animals wouldn’t hurt him. So he was beaten and beheaded.”
“And all the animals in the forest bemoaned his death.”
Now he laughed out loud. Which sent little shocks waves through her system. “I don’t know any other girl who knows all that.”
“I’m not like any girl.” She was flirting but she adored smart boys. And he was a un uomo stupendo. The Americans would call him a dreamboat.
He gave her a sideways glance. “I’ll bet that’s true. You’re going to be a handful for me.”
“I am? Pretty presumptuous.”
“So, you don’t want to go out tonight?”
She bumped his arm. “Of course I do.”
Chapter 1
Present Day
“In nominee Patrius et Filii et Spiritus Sancti.”
Under an overcast sky, Bianca grasped on to her children as she watched the coffin that held her mother lifted and carried into the mausoleum made of stone. She couldn’t believe Carlotta Ricci was dead.
“Mamma, it hurts,” Bella said, burying her face in Bianca’s black dress.
Nicky turned his into Bianca’s other shoulder
“Sí, figli miei. I know how hard this is for you.”
Christopher, who’d gone with them in the limo on the drive from the church to here, put his hand on her shoulder.
It should have been Joe comforting her.
