The Count’s Blackmail Bargain
Sara Craven

ITALIAN HUSBANDS

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

Endpage

COMING NEXT MONTH

CHAPTER ONE

IT WAS a warm, golden morning in Rome, so how in the name of God was the city in the apparent grip of a small earthquake?

The noble Conte Alessio Ramontella lifted his aching head from the pillow, and, groaning faintly from the effort, attempted to focus his eyes. True, the bed looked like a disaster area, but the room was not moving, and the severe pounding, which he’d assumed was the noise of buildings collapsing nearby, seemed to be coming instead from the direction of his bedroom door.

And the agitated shouting he could hear was not emanating from some buried victim either, but could be recognised as the voice of his manservant Giorgio urging him to wake up.

Using small, economical movements that would not disturb the blonde, naked beauty still slumbering beside him, or increase the pressure from his hangover, Alessio got up from the bed, and extracted his robe from the tangle of discarded clothing on the floor, before treading across the marble-tiled floor to the door.

He pulled the garment round him, and opened the door an inch or two.

‘This is not a working day,’ he informed the anxious face outside. ‘Am I to be allowed no peace?’

‘Forgive me, Eccellenza.’ Giorgio wrung his hands. ‘For the world I would not have disturbed you. But it is your aunt, the Signora Vicente.’

There was an ominous pause, then: ‘Here?’ Alessio bit out the word.

‘On her way,’ Giorgio admitted nervously. ‘She telephoned to announce her intention to visit you.’

Alessio swore softly. ‘Didn’t you have enough wit to say I was away?’ he demanded.

‘Of course, Eccellenza.’ Giorgio spoke with real sorrow. ‘But regrettably she did not believe me.’

Alessio swore again more fluently. ‘How long have I got?’

‘That will depend on the traffic, signore, but I think we must count in minutes.’ He added reproachfully, ‘I have been knocking and knocking…’

With another groan, Alessio forced himself into action. ‘Get a cab for my guest,’ he ordered. ‘Tell the driver to come to the rear entrance, and to be quick about it. This is an emergency. Then prepare coffee for the Signora, and some of the little almond biscuits that she likes.’

He shut the door, and went back to the bed, his hangover eclipsed by more pressing concerns. He looked down at all the smooth, tanned loveliness displayed for his delectation, and his mouth tightened.

Dio, what a fool he’d been to break his own cardinal rule, and allow her to stay the night.

I must have been more drunk than I thought, he told himself cynically, then bent over her, giving one rounded shoulder a firm shake.

Impossibly long lashes lifted slowly, and she gave him a sleepy smile. ‘Alessio, tesoro mio, why aren’t you still in bed?’ She reached up, twining coaxing arms round his neck to draw him down to her, but he swiftly detached the clinging hands and stepped back.

‘Vittoria, you have to go, and quickly too.’

She pouted charmingly. ‘But how ungallant of you, caro. I told you, Fabrizio is visiting his witch of a mother, and will not be back until this evening at the earliest. So we have all the time in the world.’

‘An enchanting thought,’ Alessio said levelly. ‘But, sadly, there is no time to pursue it.’

She stretched voluptuously, her smile widening. ‘But how can I leave, mi amore, when I have nothing to wear? You won all my clothes at cards last night, so what am I to do? It was, after all, a debt of honour,’ she added throatily.

Alessio tried to control his growing impatience. ‘Consider it cancelled. I cheated.’

She hunched a shoulder. ‘Then you will have to fetch my clothes for me—from the salotto where I took them off. Unless you wish me to win them back, during another game of cards.’

This, thought Alessio, was not the time to be sultry.

His smile was almost a snarl. ‘And how, precisely, bella mia, will you explain your presence, also your state of undress, to my aunt Lucrezia, who counts Fabrizio’s mother among her closest cronies?’

Vittoria gave a startled cry and sat up, belatedly grabbing at the sheet. ‘Madonna—you cannot mean it. Promise me she is not here?’

‘Not quite, but due imminently,’ Alessio warned, his tone grim.

‘Dio mio.’ Her voice was a wail. ‘Alessio—do something. I must get out of here. You have to save me.’

There was another knock at the door, which opened a crack to admit Giorgio’s discreet arm holding out a handful of female clothing. His voice was urgent. ‘The taxi has arrived, Eccellenza.’

‘Un momento.’ Alessio strode over and took the clothes, tossing them deftly to Vittoria who was already running frantically to the bathroom, her nakedness suddenly ungainly.

He paused, watching her disappear, then gave a mental shrug. Last night she’d been an entertaining and inventive companion, but daylight and danger had dissipated her appeal. There would be no more cards, or any other games with the beautiful Vittoria Montecorvo. In fact, he thought, frowning, it might be wiser, for the future, to avoid discontented wives altogether. The only real advantage of such affairs was not being expected to propose marriage, he told himself cynically.

He retrieved his underwear from the pile of discarded evening clothes beside the bed, then went into his dressing room, finding and shrugging on a pair of cream denim trousers and a black polo shirt. As he emerged, thrusting his bare feet into loafers, Vittoria was waiting, dressed but distraught.

‘Alessio.’ She hurled herself at him. ‘When shall I see you again?’

The honest reply would be, ‘Never,’ but that would also be unkind.

‘Perhaps this narrow escape is a warning to us, cara mia,’ he returned guardedly. ‘We shall have to be very careful.’

‘But I am not sure I can bear it.’ Her voice throbbed a little. ‘Not now that we have found each other, angelo mio.’

Alessio suppressed a cynical smile. He knew who his predecessor had been. Was sure that his successor was already lined up. Vittoria was a rich man’s beautiful daughter married to another rich man, who was all too easy to fool.

She was spoiled, predatory and bored, as, indeed, he was himself.

Maybe that had been the initial attraction between them, he thought, with an inner grimace. Like calling to like.

Suddenly he felt jaded and restless. The heat of Rome, the noise of the traffic seemed to press upon him, stifling him. He found himself thinking of windswept crags where clouds drifted. He longed to breathe the dark, earthy scents of the forests that clothed the lower slopes, and wake in the night to moonlit silence.

He needed, he thought, to distance himself.

And he could have all that, and more. After all, he was overdue for a vacation. Some re-scheduling at the bank, and he could be gone, he told himself as Vittoria pressed herself against him, murmuring seductively.

He wanted her out of the appartamento, too, he thought grimly, and realised he would have felt the same even if he hadn’t been threatened by a visit from his aunt.

Gently but firmly, he edged her out of the bedroom, and along the wide passage to where Giorgio was waiting, his face expressionless, just as the entrance bell jangled discordantly at the other end of the flat.

‘I’ll get that. You take the signora to her cab.’ Alessio freed himself from the clutching, crimson-tipped fingers, murmuring that of course he would think of her, would call her—but only if he felt it was safe.

He paused to watch her leaving, her parting glance both suspicious and disconsolate, then drew a deep breath of thanksgiving, raking the hair she’d so playfully dishevelled back from his face with impatient fingers.

The bell rang again, imperative in its summons, and Alessio knew he could hardly delay his response any longer. Sighing, he went to confront the enemy at the gates.

‘Zia Lucrezia,’ he greeted the tall, grey-haired woman waiting on his doorstep, her elegant shoe beating a tattoo against the stone. ‘What a charming surprise.’

Her glance was minatory as she swept past him. ‘Don’t be a hypocrite, Alessio. It does not become you. I was not expecting to be welcome.’ She paused for a moment, listening to the distant sound of a car starting up, and the rear door closing with a clang. ‘Ah, so your other visitor has safely made her escape,’ she added with a sour smile. ‘I regret spoiling your plans for the day, nephew.’

He said gently, ‘I rarely make plans, my dear aunt. I prefer to wait and see what delights the day offers.’ He escorted her into the salotto, one swift, sweeping glance assuring him that it had been restored to its usual pristine condition. The tell-tale wineglasses had been removed, together with the empty bottles, and the grappa that had followed had also been put away. As had the scattered cards from last night’s impromptu session of strip poker.

And the windows to the balcony stood innocently open to admit the morning sun, and dispel any lingering traces of alcohol fumes, and Vittoria’s rather heavy perfume.

Making a mental note to increase Giorgio’s salary, he conducted the Signora to a sofa, and seated himself in the chair opposite.

‘To what do I owe the pleasure of seeing you, Zia Lucrezia?’

She was silent for a moment, then she said curtly, ‘I wish to speak to you about Paolo.’

He looked across at her in frank surprise. Giorgio’s arrival with the tall silver pot of coffee, and the ensuing ritual of pouring the coffee and handing the tiny sweet biscuits, gave him a chance to gather his thoughts.

When they were alone again, he said softly, ‘You amaze me, cara Zia. I am hardly in a position to offer advice. You have always allowed me to understand that my example to your only son is an abomination.’

‘Don’t pretend to be a fool,’ the Signora said shortly. ‘Of course, I don’t want advice.’ She hesitated again. ‘However, I do find that I need your practical assistance in a small matter.’

Alessio swallowed some coffee. ‘I hope this is not a request to transfer Paolo back to Rome. I gather he is making progress in London.’

‘That,’ said Paolo’s mother glacially, ‘is a matter of opinion. And, anyway, he is returning to Rome quite soon, to spend his vacation with me.’

Alessio’s eyes narrowed slightly. ‘The idea doesn’t appeal to you? Yet I remember you complaining to me when we met at Princess Dorelli’s reception that you didn’t see him often enough.’

There was another, longer silence, then the Signora said, as if the words were being wrung out of her, ‘He is not coming alone.’

Alessio shrugged. ‘Well, why should he?’ he countered. ‘Let me remind you, dear aunt, that my cousin is no longer a boy.’

‘Precisely.’ The Signora poured herself more coffee. ‘He is old enough, in fact, to be a husband. And let me remind you, Alessio, that it has always been the intention of both families that Paolo should marry Beatrice Manzone.’

Alessio’s brows snapped together. ‘I know there was some such plan when they were children,’ he admitted slowly. ‘But now—now they are adults, and—things change. People change.’

She looked back at him stonily. ‘Except for you, it seems, my dear nephew. You remain—unregenerate, with your boats and your fast cars. With your gambling and your womanising.’

He said gently, ‘Mea culpa, Zia Lucrezia, but we are not here to discuss my manifold faults.’ He paused. ‘So, Paolo has a girlfriend. It’s hardly a mortal sin, and, anyway, to my certain knowledge, she is not the first. He will probably have many more before he decides to settle down. So, what is the problem?’

‘Signor Manzone is an old friend,’ said the Signora. ‘Naturally, he wishes his daughter’s future to be settled. And soon.’

‘And is this what Beatrice herself wants?’

‘She and my Paolo grew up together. She has adored him all her life.’

Alessio shrugged again. ‘Then maybe she’ll be prepared to wait until he has finished sowing his wild oats,’ he returned indifferently.

‘Hmm.’ The Signora’s tone was icy. ‘Then it is fortunate she is not waiting for you.’

‘Fortunate for us both,’ Alessio said gently. ‘The Signorina Manzone is infinitely too sweet for my taste.’

‘I am relieved to hear it. I did not know you bothered to discriminate between one foolish young woman and the next.’

As so often when he talked to his aunt, Alessio could feel his jaw clenching. He kept his voice even. ‘Perhaps you should remember, Zia, that my father, your own brother, was far from a saint until he married my mother. Nonna Ramontella often told me she wore out her knees, praying for him.’ And for you, he added silently.

‘What a pity your grandmother is no longer here to perform the same service for you.’ There was a pause, and, when she spoke again, the Signora’s voice was slightly less acerbic. ‘But we should not quarrel, Alessio. Your life is your own, whereas Paolo has—obligations, which he must be made to recognise. Therefore this—relazione amorosa of his must end, quanta prima tanto meglio.’

Alessio frowned again. ‘But sooner may not be better for Paolo,’ he pointed out. ‘They may be genuinely in love. After all, this is the twenty-first century, not the fifteenth.’

The Signora waved a dismissive hand. ‘The girl is completely unsuitable. Some English sciattona that he met in a bar in London,’ she added with distaste. ‘From what I have gleaned from my fool of a son, she has neither family nor money.’

‘Whereas Beatrice Manzone has both, of course,’ Alessio said drily. ‘Especially money.’

‘That may not weigh with you,’ the Signora said with angry energy. ‘But it matters very much to Paolo.’

‘Unless I break my neck playing polo,’ Alessio drawled. ‘Which would make him my heir, of course. My preoccupation with dangerous sports should please you, Zia Lucrezia. It opens up all kinds of possibilities.’

She gave him a fulminating look. ‘Which we need not consider. You will, of course, remember in due course what you owe to your family, and provide yourself with a wife and family.

‘As matters stand, you are the chairman of the Arleschi Bank. He is only an employee. He cannot afford to marry some pretty nobody.’

‘So, she’s pretty,’ Alessio mused. ‘But then she would have to be, if she has no money. And Paolo has Ramontella blood in his veins, so she may even be a beauty—this…?’

‘Laura,’ the Signora articulated coldly. ‘Laura Mason.’

‘Laura.’ He repeated the name softly. ‘The name of the girl that Petrarch saw in church and loved for the rest of his life.’ He grinned at his aunt. ‘I hope that isn’t an omen.’

‘Well,’ the Signora said softly, ‘I depend on you, my dear Alessio, to make certain it is not.’

‘You expect me to preach to my cousin about family duty?’ He laughed. ‘I don’t think he’d listen.’

‘I wish you to do more than talk. I wish you to bring Paolo’s little romance to an end.’

His brows lifted. ‘And how am I supposed to do that?’

‘Quite easily, caro mio.’ She gave him a flat smile. ‘You will seduce her, and make sure he knows of it.’

Alessio came out of his chair in one lithe, angry movement. ‘Are you insane?’

‘I am simply being practical,’ his aunt returned. ‘Requesting that you put your dubious talents with women to some useful purpose.’

‘Useful!’ He was almost choking on his rage. ‘Dio mio, how dare you insult me by suggesting such a thing? Imagine that I would be willing even for one moment…’ He flung away from her. Walked to the window, gazed down into the street below with unseeing eyes, then turned back, his face inimical. ‘No,’ he said. ‘And again—no. Never.’

‘You disappoint me,’ the Signora said almost blandly. ‘I hoped you would regard it as—an interesting challenge.’

‘On the contrary,’ he said. ‘I am disgusted—nauseated by such a proposal.’ He took a deep breath. ‘And from you of all people. You—astound me.’

She regarded him calmly. ‘What exactly are your objections?’

He spread his hands in baffled fury. ‘Where shall I begin? The girl is a complete stranger to me.’

‘But so, at first, are all the women who share your bed.’ She paused. ‘For example, mio caro, how long have you known Vittoria Montecorvo, whose hasty departure just now I almost interrupted?’

Their eyes met, locked in a long taut, silence. Eventually, he said, ‘I did not realise you took such a close interest in my personal life.’

‘Under normal circumstances, I would not, I assure you. But in this instance, I need your—co-operation.’

Alessio said slowly, ‘At any moment, I am going to wake up, and find this is all a bad dream.’ He came back to his chair. Sat. ‘I have other objections. Do you wish to hear them?’

‘As you wish.’

He leaned forward, the dark face intense. ‘This romance of Paolo’s may just be a passing fancy. Why not let it run its course?’

‘Because Federico Manzone wishes my son’s engagement to Beatrice to be made official. Any more delay would displease him.’

‘And would that be such a disaster?’

‘Yes,’ his aunt said. ‘It would. I have entered into certain—accommodations with Signor Manzone, on the strict understanding that this marriage would soon be taking place. Repayment would be—highly inconvenient.’

‘Santa Maria.’ Alessio slammed a clenched fist into the palm of his other hand. Of course, he thought. He should have guessed as much.

The Signora’s late husband had come from an old but relatively impoverished family, but, in spite of that, her spending habits had always been legendary. He could remember stern family conferences on the subject when he was a boy.

And age, it seemed, had not taught her discretion.

Groaning inwardly, he said, ‘Then why not allow me to settle these debts for you, and let Paolo live his life?’

There was a sudden gleam of humour in her still-handsome face. ‘I am not a welcome client at the bank, Alessio, so are you inviting me to become your private pensioner? Your poor father would turn in his grave. Besides, the lawyers would never allow it. And Federico has assured me very discreetly that, once our families are joined, he will make permanent arrangements for me. He is all generosity.’

‘Then why not change the plan?’ Alessio said with sudden inspiration. ‘You’re a widow. He’s a widower. Why don’t you marry him yourself, and let the next generation find their own way to happiness?’

‘As you yourself are doing?’ The acid was back. ‘Perhaps we could have a double wedding, mio caro. I am sure honour will demand you ask the lovely Vittoria to be your wife, when her husband divorces her for adultery. After all, it will make a hideous scandal.’

Their glances met again and clashed, steel against steel.

He said steadily, ‘I was not aware that Fabrizio had any such plans for Vittoria.’

‘Not yet, certainly,’ the Signora said silkily. ‘But if he or my good friend Camilla, his mother, should discover in some unfortunate way that you have planted horns on him, then that might change.’

Eventually, Alessio sighed, lifting a shoulder in a resigned shrug. ‘I have seriously underestimated you, Zia Lucrezia. I did not realise how totally unscrupulous you could be.’

‘A family trait,’ said the Signora. ‘But desperate situations call for desperate measures.’

‘But, you must still consider this,’ Alessio went on. ‘Even if his affair with the English girl is terminated, there is no guarantee that Paolo will marry Beatrice. He may still choose to look elsewhere. He might even find another rich girl. How will you prevent that?’ He gave her a thin smile. ‘Or have you some scheme to blackmail him into co-operation too?’

‘You speak as if he has never cared for Beatrice.’ His aunt spoke calmly. ‘This is not true. And, once his disillusion with his English fancy is complete, I know he will realise where his best interests lie, and turn to her again. And they will be happy together. I am sure of it.’

Alessio sent her a look of pure exasperation. ‘How simple you make it sound. You pull the strings, and the puppets dance. But there are still things you have not taken into account. For one thing, how will I meet this girl?’

‘I have thought of that. I shall tell Paolo that I have workmen at my house in Tuscany putting in a new heating system, so cannot receive guests. Instead, I have accepted a kind invitation from you for us all to stay at the Villa Diana.’

He snorted. ‘And he will believe you?’

She shrugged. ‘He has no choice. And I shall make sure you have the opportunity to be alone with the girl. The rest is up to you.’ She paused. ‘You may not even be called on to make the ultimate sacrifice, caro. It might be enough for Paolo to discover you kissing her.’

He said patiently, ‘Zia Lucrezia, has it occurred to you that this—Laura—may be truly in love with Paolo, and nothing will persuade her to even a marginal betrayal?’

He paused, his mouth twisting. ‘Besides, and more importantly, you have overlooked the fact that she may not find me attractive.’

‘Caro Alessio,’ the Signora purred. ‘Let us have no false modesty. It has been often said that if you had smiled at Juliet, she would have left Romeo. Like your other deluded victims, Laura will find you irresistible.’

‘Davvero?’ Alessio asked ironically. ‘I hope she slaps my face.’ He looked down at his hand, studying the crest on the signet ring he wore. ‘And afterwards—if I succeed in this contemptible ploy? I would not blame Paolo if he refused to speak to me again.’

‘At first, perhaps, he may be resentful. But in time, he will thank you.’ She rose. ‘They will be arriving next week. I hope this will not be a problem for you?’

He got to his feet too, his mouth curling. He walked over to her, took her hand and bowed over it. ‘I shall count the hours.’

‘Sarcasm, mio caro, does not become you.’ She studied him for a moment. ‘Like your father, Alessio, you are formidable when you are angry.’ She patted his cheek. ‘I hope you’re in a better mood when you finally encounter this English girl, or I shall almost feel sorry for her.’

He gave her a hard, unsmiling look. ‘Don’t concern yourself for her, Zia Lucrezia. I will do my best to send her home with a beautiful memory.’

‘Ah,’ she said. ‘Now I really do feel sorry for her.’ And was gone.

Alone, Alessio went to a side table, and poured himself a whisky. He rarely drank in the daytime, but this was like no other day since the beginning of the world.

What the devil was Paolo thinking of—bringing his little ragazza within a hundred miles of his mother? If he gave a damn about her, he would keep them well apart.

And if I had an atom of decency, Alessio thought grimly, I would call him, and say so.

But he couldn’t risk it. Zia Lucrezia had more than her full share of the Ramontella ruthlessness, as he should have remembered, and would not hesitate to carry out her veiled threat about his ill-advised interlude with Vittoria. And the fall-out would, as she’d predicted, be both unpleasant and spectacular.

Laura, he repeated to himself meditatively. Well, at least she had a charming name. If she had a body to match, then his task might not seem so impossible.

He raised his glass. ‘Salute, Laura,’ he said with cynical emphasis. ‘E buona fortuna.’ He added softly, ‘I think you will need it.’

CHAPTER TWO

‘WELL, it all sounds iffy to me,’ said Gaynor. ‘Think about it. You’ve cancelled your South of France holiday with Steve because you didn’t like the sleeping arrangements, yet now you’re off to Italy with someone you hardly know. It doesn’t make any sense.’

Laura sighed. ‘Not when you put it like that, certainly. But it truly isn’t what you think. I’m getting a free trip to Tuscany for two weeks, plus a cash bonus, and all I have to do is look as if I’m madly in love.’

‘It can’t be that simple,’ Gaynor said darkly. ‘Nothing ever is. I mean, have you ever been madly in love? You certainly weren’t with Steve or you wouldn’t have quibbled about sharing a room with him,’ she added candidly.

Laura flushed. ‘I suppose I thought I was—or that I might be, given time. After all, we’ve only been seeing each other for two months. Hardly a basis for that kind of commitment.’

‘Well, not everyone would agree with you there,’ Gaynor said drily.

‘I know.’ Laura paused in her packing to sigh again. ‘I’m a freak—a throwback. I admit it. But if and when I have sex with a man, I want it to be based on love and respect, and a shared future. Not because double rooms are cheaper than singles.’

‘And what kind of room is this Paolo Vicente offering?’

‘All very respectable,’ Laura assured her, tucking her only swimsuit into a corner of her case. ‘We’ll be staying with his mother at her country house, and she’s a total dragon, it seems. Paolo says she’ll probably lock me in at night.’

‘And she has no idea that you’re practically strangers?’

‘No, that’s the whole point. She’s pushing him hard to get engaged to a girl he’s known all his life, and he won’t. He says she’s more like his younger sister than a future wife, and that I’m going to be his declaration of independence. A way of telling his mother that he’s his own man, and quite capable of picking a bride for himself.’

‘Isn’t that like showing a red rag to a bull? Do you want to be caught in the middle of two warring factions?’

‘I won’t be. Paolo says, at worst, she’ll treat me with icy politeness. And he’s promised I won’t see that much of her—that he’ll take me out and about as much as possible.’ Laura paused. ‘It could even be fun,’ she added doubtfully.

‘Ever the optimist,’ muttered Gaynor. ‘How the hell did you ever become part of this gruesome twosome?’

Laura sighed again. ‘He works for the Arleschi Bank. We pitched for their PR work a few weeks ago, and Carl took me along to the presentation. Paolo was there. Then, a fortnight ago, he came into the wine bar, and we recognised each other.’ She wrinkled her nose. ‘I’d just split with Steve, so I was feeling down, and Paolo was clearly fed up too. He stayed on after closing time, and we had a drink together, and started talking.

‘He wanted to know why I was moonlighting in a wine bar when I was working for Harman Grace, so I told him about Mum being a widow, and Toby winning that scholarship to public school, but always needing extra stuff for school, plus this field trip in October.

‘Then Paolo got very bitter about his mother, and the way she was trying to tie him down with this Beatrice. And, somehow, over a few glasses of wine, the whole scheme evolved.’

She shook her head. ‘At first, I thought it was just the wine talking, but when he came back the following night to hammer out the details I discovered he was deadly serious. I also realised that the extra cash he was offering would pay for Toby’s field trip, and compensate Steve for the extra hotel charges he’s been emailing me about incessantly.’

‘Charming,’ said Gaynor.

Laura pulled a face. ‘Well, I did let him down over the holiday, so I suppose he’s entitled to feel sore.

‘However, when push came to shove, I honestly couldn’t afford to turn Paolo down.’ She sounded faintly dispirited, then rallied. ‘And, anyway, I’ve always wanted to go to Italy. Also it may be my last chance of a proper holiday, before I seriously start saving towards the Flat Fund.’

‘I’ve already begun.’ Gaynor gave a disparaging glance around the cramped bedsit, a mirror-image of her own across the landing. ‘There’s an ugly rumour that Ma Hughes is all set to raise the rents again. If we don’t find our own place soon, we won’t be able to afford to move out. And Rachel from work is definitely interested in joining us,’ she added buoyantly. ‘Apparently, living at home is driving her crazy.’

She got up from the bed, collecting up their used coffee-cups. On her way to the communal kitchenette, she paused at the door. ‘Honey, you are sure you can trust this Paolo? He won’t suddenly develop wandering hands when you’re on your own with him?’

Laura laughed. ‘I’m sure he won’t. He likes voluptuous brunettes, so I’m really not his type, and he certainly isn’t mine,’ she added decisively. ‘Although I admit he’s good-looking. Besides, I have his mother as chaperon, don’t forget. And he tells me she strongly disapproves of open displays of affection, so all I really have to do is flutter my eyelashes occasionally.’

Laura gave a brisk nod. ‘No, this is basically a business arrangement, and that’s fine with me.’

Her smile widened. ‘And I get to see Tuscany at last. Who could ask for more?’

But as the plane began its descent towards Rome’s Leonardo da Vinci Airport she did not feel quite so euphoric about the situation, although she could not have fully explained why.

She had met up with Paolo the previous night to talk over final details for the trip.

‘If we’re dating each other, then you need to know something about me, cara, and my family,’ he explained with perfect reason.

She’d already gathered that he occupied a fairly junior position at the bank’s London branch. What she hadn’t expected to hear was that he was related to the Italian aristocrat who was the Arleschi chairman.

‘We are the poor side of the family,’ he explained. He was smiling, but there was a touch of something like peevishness in his voice. ‘Which is why my mother is so eager for me to marry Beatrice, of course. Her father is a very wealthy man, and she is his only child.’

‘Of course,’ Laura echoed. Who are these people? she wondered in frank amazement. And just what planet do they inhabit?

She thought of her mother struggling to make ends meet. Of herself, spending long evenings in the wine bar so that she could help towards her shy, clever brother having the marvellous education he deserved.

When Paolo used the term ‘poor’ so airily, he had no idea what it really meant.

Her throat tightened. She’d treated herself to some new clothes for the abortive French holiday, but they were all chain-store bought, with not a designer label among them.

She was going to stick out like the proverbial sore thumb in this exclusive little world she was about to join, however briefly. So, could she really make anyone believe that she and Paolo were seriously involved?

But perhaps this was precisely why he had chosen her, she thought unhappily. Because she was so screamingly unsuitable. Maybe this would provide exactly the leverage Paolo needed to escape from this enforced marriage.

‘Anyone,’ his mother might say, throwing up her hands in horrified surrender. ‘Anyone but her!’

Well, she could live with that, because Paolo, in spite of his smoothly handsome looks and august connections, held no appeal for her. In fact, Laura decided critically, she wouldn’t have him if he came served on toast with a garnish.

He was arrogant, she thought, and altogether too pleased with himself, and, although no one should be forced to marry someone they didn’t love, on balance her sympathies lay with his would-be fiancée.

‘I must insist on one thing,’ she said. ‘No mention of Harman Grace.’

‘As you wish.’ He shrugged. ‘But why? They are a good company. You have nothing to be ashamed of by working for them.’

‘I know that. But we’re now the bank’s official PR company in London. Your cousin must know that, and he’ll recognise the name if it’s mentioned. He may not appreciate the fact that you’re supposedly dating someone who’s almost an employee.’

‘Don’t disturb yourself, cara. I am nothing more than an employee myself. Besides, the chances of your meeting my cousin Alessio are slim. But Harman Grace shall remain a secret between us, if that’s what you want.’

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I really do. Thank you.’

She was astonished to find that they were flying first class, proving that poverty was only relative, she thought grimly, declining the champagne she was automatically offered.

A couple of glasses of wine had got her into this mess. So, from now on she intended to keep a cool head.

She was also faintly disconcerted by Paolo’s attempts to flirt with her. He kept bending towards her, his voice low and almost intimate as he spoke. And she didn’t like his persistent touching either—her hair, her shoulder, the sleeve of her linen jacket.

Oh, God, she thought uneasily. Don’t tell me Gaynor was right about him all along.

She was aware, with embarrassment, that the cabin staff were watching them, exchanging knowing looks.

‘What are you doing?’ she muttered, pulling her hand away as he tried to kiss each of her fingers.

He shrugged, not in the least discomposed. ‘For every performance, there must be a rehearsal, no?’

‘Definitely no,’ Laura said tartly.

She was also disappointed to hear there’d been a slight change of plan. That instead of hiring a car at the airport and driving straight to Tuscany, they were first to join the Signora Vicente at her Rome apartment.

‘But for how long?’ she queried.

Paolo was unconcerned. ‘Does it matter? It will give you a chance to see my city before we bury ourselves in the countryside,’ he told her. He gave a satisfied smile. ‘Also, my mother employs a driver and a car for her journeys, so we shall travel in comfort.’

Laura felt she had no option but to force a smile of agreement. It’s his trip, she thought resignedly. I’m just the hired help.

The Signora’s residence was in the Aventine district, which Paolo told her was one of the city’s more peaceful locations with many gardens and trees.

She occupied the first floor of a grand mansion, standing in its own grounds, and Laura took a deep, calming breath as they mounted the wide flight of marble stairs.

You’ve got your passport in your bag, she reminded herself silently. Also, your return ticket. All you have to do, if you really can’t hack this, is turn and run.

When they reached the imposing double doors, Paolo rang the bell, and Laura swallowed as he took her hand in his with a reassuring nod.

It’s only a couple of weeks, she thought. Not the rest of my life.

The door was opened by a plump elderly maid, who beamed at Paolo, ignoring Laura completely, then burst into a flood of incomprehensible Italian.

Laura found herself in a windowless hall, its only illumination coming from a central chandelier apparently equipped with low-wattage bulbs. The floor was tiled in dark marble, and a few pieces of heavy antique furniture and some oil paintings in ornate frames did little to lighten the atmosphere.

Then the maid flung open the door to the salotto, and sunlight struggled out, accompanied by a small hairy dog, yapping furiously and snarling round their ankles.

‘Quiet, Caio,’ Paolo ordered, and the dog backed off, although it continued its high-pitched barking, and growling. Laura liked dogs, and usually got on with them, but something told her that Caio was more likely to take a chunk out of her ankle than respond to any overtures she might make.

Paolo led her into the room. ‘Call off your hound, Mamma,’ he said. ‘Or my Laura will think she is not welcome.’

‘But I am always ready to receive your friends, figlio mio.’ The Signora rose from a brocaded sofa, and offered her hand.

She was a tall woman, Laura saw, and had been handsome once rather than a beauty. But time had thinned her face and narrowed her mouth, and this, together with her piercing dark eyes, made her formidable. She wore black, and there were pearls round her neck, and in her ears.

‘Signorina Mason, is it not so?’ Her smile was vinegary as she absorbed Laura’s shy response. ‘You would like some tea, I think. Is that not the English habit?’

Laura lifted her chin. ‘Now that I’m here, signora, perhaps I should learn a few Italian customs instead.’

The elegantly plucked brows lifted. ‘You will hardly be here long enough to make it worthwhile, signorina—but as you wish.’ She rang a bell for the maid, ordered coffee and cakes, then beckoned Paolo to join her on the sofa.

This, thought Laura, taking the seat opposite that she’d been waved towards, is going to be uphill all the way. And she was still inwardly flinching from ‘my Laura’.

It was a beautiful room, high-ceilinged and well proportioned, but massively over-furnished for her taste. There were too many groups of hard-looking chairs, she thought, taking a covert glance around. And far too many spindly-legged tables crowded with knick-knacks. The windows were huge, and she longed to drag open the tall shutters that half-masked them and let in some proper light. But she supposed that would fade the draperies, and the expensive rugs on the parquet floor.

‘I have some news for you, mio caro,’ the Signora announced, after the maid had served coffee and some tiny, but frantically rich chocolate cakes. ‘And also for the signorina, your companion. I regret that I cannot after all entertain you at my country home. It is occupied by workmen—so tedious, but unavoidable.’

Laura froze, her cup halfway to her lips. Were they going to spend the whole two weeks in this apartment? Oh, God, she thought, surely not. It might seem spacious enough, but she suspected that even a few days with the Signora would make it seem totally claustrophobic.

Paolo was looking less than pleased. ‘But you knew we were coming, Mamma. And I promised Laura that she should see Tuscany.’

‘Another time, perhaps,’ the Signora said smoothly. ‘This time she will have to be content with a corner of Umbria.’ Her expression was bland. ‘Your cousin Alessio has offered us the use of the Villa Diana at Besavoro.’

There was an astonished pause, then Paolo said slowly, ‘Why should he do that?’

‘Mio caro.’ The Signora’s voice held a hint of reproof. ‘We are members of his family. His only living relatives.’

Paolo shrugged. ‘Even so, it is not like him to be so obliging,’ he countered. ‘And, anyway, Besavoro is at the end of the world.’ He spread his hands. ‘Also, the Villa Diana is halfway up a mountain on the way to nowhere. It is hardly an adequate substitute.’

‘I think Signorina Mason will find it charming.’ Again the smile that did not reach her eyes. ‘And not overrun by her own countrymen.’ She turned to Laura. ‘I understand that Tuscany has come to be known as Chiantishire. So amusing.’

‘Has it?’ Laura enquired with wooden untruthfulness. ‘I didn’t know.’ Dear God, she thought. I’m going to be staying at a house owned by the chairman of the Arleschi Bank. This can’t be happening.

‘And Umbria is very beautiful,’ the Signora continued. ‘They call it the green heart of Italy, and there are many places to visit—Assisi—Perugia—San Sepulcro, the birthplace of the great Rafael. You will be spoiled for choice, signorina.’

Paolo cast a glance at the decorated ceiling. ‘You call it a choice, Mamma?’ he demanded. ‘To risk our lives up and down that deathtrap of a road every time we want to go anywhere?’

He shook his head. ‘If anything happens to my cousin Alessio, and I inherit, then the Villa Diana will be for sale the next day.’

There was another lengthier pause. Then: ‘You must forgive my son, signorina,’ the Signora said silkily. ‘In the heat of the moment, he does not always speak with wisdom. And, even if it is a little remote, the house is charming.’

‘And Alessio?’ Paolo demanded petulantly, clearly resenting the rebuke. ‘At least he can’t mean to use the house himself, if we are there. Or he never has in the past.’ He snorted. ‘Probably off chasing some skirt.’

‘Dear boy, the offer was made, and I was glad to accept. I did not enquire into his own plans.’

Laura had been listening with a kind of horrified fascination. She thought, I should not be hearing this.

Aloud, she said quietly, ‘Paolo—isn’t there somewhere else we could stay? A hotel, perhaps.’

‘In the height of the tourist season?’ Paolo returned derisively. ‘We would be fortunate to find a cellar. No, it will have to be my cousin’s villa. And at least it will be cooler in the hills,’ he added moodily. ‘When do we leave?’

‘I thought tomorrow,’ said the Signora. She rose. ‘You must be tired after the flight, Signorina Mason. I shall ask Maria to show you your room so that you may rest a little.’

And so you can give your son your unvarnished opinion of his latest acquisition, thought Laura. But then this was only what she’d been led to expect, she reminded herself. She supposed she should be grateful that the Signora hadn’t made a hysterical scene and ordered her out of the apartment.

The bedroom allocated to her was on the small side, and the bed was narrow, and not particularly comfortable. She had been shown the bathroom—a daunting affair in marble the colour of rare beef, but she was glad to find that the still-unsmiling Maria had supplied a jug of hot water and a matching basin for the washstand in her room.

She took off her shoes and dress, and had a refreshing wash. The soap was scented with lavender, and she thought with faint self-derision that it was the first friendly thing she’d discovered so far in Rome.

She dried herself with the rather harsh linen towel, then stretched out on top of the bed with a sigh.

The regrets she’d experienced on the plane were multiplying with every moment that passed. Back in London, Paolo had persuaded her that it would be easy. A spot of acting performed against a backdrop of some of Europe’s most beautiful scenery. Almost a game, he’d argued. And she’d be paid for it.

Well, she was fast coming to the conclusion that no amount of cash was worth the hassle that the next two weeks seemed to promise. Although most of her concerns about Paolo’s future behaviour were largely laid to rest. The Signora, she thought with wry amusement, would prove a more than adequate chaperon. And if she had been in love with him, she’d have been faced with a frustrating time.

Her head was beginning to ache, and she reached down to her bag by the side of the bed for the small pack of painkillers she’d included at the last minute, and the bottle of mineral water she’d bought at the airport. It was lukewarm now, but better than nothing, she thought as she swallowed a couple of the tablets, then turned onto her side, resolutely closing her eyes.

The deed was done. She was in Italy, even if it wasn’t turning out to be a dream come true.

Whatever, she thought wearily. There was no turning back now.

Dinner that night was not an easy occasion. Paolo had announced plans to take Laura out for a meal, but the Signora had pointed out with steely insistence that this would be unwise, as they would be making an early start in the morning to avoid travelling in the full heat of the day.

So they ate in the formal dining room, at a table that would have accommodated three times their number with room to spare. It did not make for a relaxed atmosphere, and conversation was so stilted that Laura wished Paolo and his mother would just speak Italian to each other, and leave her out of the situation.

She realised, of course, that she was being grilled. Remembered too that she and Paolo had agreed to keep her actual personal details to a minimum. As far as the Signora was concerned, she was a girl who shared a flat with several others, and who enjoyed a good time. Someone, she hinted with a touch of coyness, who had not allowed for the sudden entry of Mr Right into her life. And she sent Paolo a languishing look.

And whatever slights and unpleasantness might come her way, Laura knew she would always treasure the memory of the expression on the august lady’s face as she absorbed that.

She had rehearsed the invented story of how and when she and Paolo had met so often that she was word-perfect. After all, she needed to give the impression that theirs was an established relationship of at least two months’ standing, which deserved to be taken seriously, and might be ready to move on to the next stage.

For Steve, she thought with wry regret, substitute Paolo.

She even managed to turn some of the Signora’s more probing queries into her background back on themselves by ingenuously asking what Paolo had been like as a small boy, and whether there were any childhood photographs of him that she could see.

She had to admit the food was delicious, although she’d had little appetite for it. And when dinner was over they returned to the salotto, and listened to music by Monteverdi.

And that, thought Laura, was by far the most pleasant part of the evening, not just because her late father had loved the same composer, but because conversation was kept to a minimum.

She was just beginning to relax when the Signora announced in a tone that did not welcome opposition that it was time to retire for the night.

Paolo wished her a very correct goodnight outside the salotto, but when Laura, dressing-gown clad, returned from the bathroom, she found him waiting in her room.

She checked uneasily. ‘What are you doing here?’

‘I wished to speak to you in private.’ The grin he sent her was triumphant. ‘You are completely brilliant, carissima. Dio mio, you almost convinced me. And Mamma is in such a fury.’ He shook his head. ‘I have just overheard her on the telephone, and she was incandescente. She must be speaking to her old friend Camilla Montecorvo, because she mentioned the name Vittoria several times.’

‘Does that mean something?’ Laura felt suddenly tired, and more than a little bewildered.

‘Vittoria is the nuora—the daughter-in-law—of Signora Montecorvo,’ Paolo explained, his grin widening. ‘She causes big problems, and Mamma has heard all about them. Always, she has been the one to give advice to Camilla. But now it is her turn to complain,’ he added gleefully. ‘And she insists that her friend must listen, and help her.’

He almost hugged himself. ‘It is all going as I hoped.’

‘I wish I could say the same.’ Laura bit her lip.

‘You are regretting Tuscany?’ Paolo shrugged. ‘It was an unwelcome surprise for me also. And Alessio has other houses he could have lent Mamma that are not as remote as Besavoro,’ he added, grimacing. ‘For instance, he has a place near Sorrento where he keeps his boat, but no doubt he will be using that himself. He would not choose to stay anywhere near Mamma, so calm yourself on that point.’

‘You’re not a very close family,’ Laura commented.

‘Alessio likes to go his own way. Mamma tries to interfere.’ He shrugged again. ‘Maybe he is hoping she will stray too far from the house, and be eaten by the wolves.’

Laura stared at him. ‘You mean there are such things..actually running wild?’ Her tone held a hollow note.

‘Yes, and they are on the increase. And there are bears too.’ He laughed at her expression. ‘But they are mainly found in the national parks, and I promise you that they prefer orchards and beehives to humans.’

‘How—reassuring.’ Laura took a deep breath. ‘But it’s not just disappointment over Tuscany, Paolo. Or the thought of moving to some Italian safari park either.’

She gave him a steady look. ‘We shouldn’t have started this. If your mother’s so genuinely upset, it isn’t a game any longer. I feel we should rethink.’

‘For me, it has never been a game.’ Paolo smote himself on the chest. ‘For me—it is my life! I need my mother to know that my future is my own affair, and that I will not be dictated to by her or anyone. And that I am not going to marry Beatrice Manzone.’ He lowered his voice. Made it coaxing. ‘Laura—you promised you would help me. We have an agreement together. And it is going well. Just two weeks—that is all. Then you will be free. You will have had your Italian vacation, and also been paid. This is so easy for you.’

He dropped a hand on her shoulder, making her move restively. ‘After all,’ he went on persuasively, ‘what can possibly happen in two short weeks? Tell me that.’ He smiled at her, then moved to the door. ‘I tell you there is nothing to worry about.’ His voice was warm—reassuring. ‘Nothing in the world.’

CHAPTER THREE

LAURA did not sleep well that night. She was constantly tossing and turning, disturbed by a series of fleeting, uneasy dreams. Or, she wondered as daylight imposed itself at last, was she simply troubled by finding herself under the roof of a woman who cordially detested her—and with no reprieve in sight?

It was no particular surprise to find that the early start to Besavoro did not transpire. The car arrived punctually with Giacomo, its uniformed chauffeur, and there the matter rested while the Signora, after a leisurely breakfast, issued a stream of contradictory orders, made telephone calls, and wrote a number of last minute notes to friends.

Laura had discovered to her dismay that Caio was to accompany them and more time was wasted while Maria hunted the apartment for the special collar and lead he wore on holiday, and the new cushioned basket specially bought for the trip.

By the time the luggage was finally put in the car, Paolo looked as if he was about to become a basket case himself, Laura thought without particular sympathy.

It was one of the most luxurious vehicles she’d ever travelled in, but, seated in the back with the Signora and her dog in the opposite corner, she found it impossible to relax.

She’d expected another barrage of questions, and steeled herself to fend them off, but it didn’t happen. The Signora seemed lost in thought, and, apart from lifting his lip in the occasional silent snarl if Laura glanced at him, Caio seemed equally detached.

There were numerous stops along the way—comfort breaks for Caio featuring frequently. But there were also pauses to buy coffee, chilled mineral water, and, once, some excellent rolls crammed with ham and cheese, at the busy roadside service stations. The Signora did not deign to leave the car on these occasions, but Laura was glad to stretch her legs in spite of the heat outside the air-conditioned car.

Her back was beginning to ache with the tension of trying to remain unobtrusive, she realised wryly.

She’d chosen her thinnest outfit for the journey—a loose-fitting dress in fine cream cotton with cap sleeves and a modestly square neckline. She wore low-heeled tan sandals, and a broad brimmed linen hat that could be rolled up in her bag when she was in the car. Apart from the obligatory sunblock, she’d put nothing on her face but a shading of mascara on her lashes, and a touch of light coral lustre to her mouth.

She tried to comfort herself with the reflection that the Signora might loathe her, but she couldn’t truthfully complain about her appearance. Still it seemed small consolation.

The car didn’t really need air conditioning, she thought ruefully. Paolo’s mother could have lowered the temperature to arctic proportions with one look. And the cost of her brother’s school trip was rising by the minute. He’d better enjoy it, that’s all, she muttered under her breath.

But as they drove into Umbria she found herself succumbing to the sheer beauty of the scenery around her, all other considerations taking second place. Everywhere she looked seemed to be composed of endless shades of green, and every hilltop seemed crowned with its own little town, clinging precariously to its rocky crag.

Half an hour later they reached Besavoro, which seemed to be hardly more than a large village on the bank of a river, which Paolo told her was a tributary of the Tiber. The central point was the square, where houses and shops huddled round a tall, ornate church. There was a market taking place, and the cramped space had to be negotiated with care.

Once free of the village, they began to climb quite steeply, taking a narrow road up the side of the valley. They passed the occasional house, but generally it was rugged terrain with a steep rocky incline leading up to heavy woodland on one side, and, on the other, protected only by a low wall, a stomach-churning drop down to the clustering roofs, and the river, now reduced to a silver thread, below them.

She remembered Paolo’s comment about a death trap, and suppressed a shiver, thankful that Giacomo was such a good driver.

‘We are nearly there, signorina.’ To her surprise, Laura found herself being addressed by the Signora. The older woman was even smiling faintly. ‘No doubt you are eager to see where you will be spending your little vacation. I hope it lives up to your expectations.’

Any overture, however slight, was welcome, and Laura responded. ‘Has the house been in the family long?’ she enquired politely.

‘For generations, although it has been altered and extended over the years. At one time, it is said to have been a hermitage, a solitary place where monks who had sinned were sent to do penance.’

‘I know how they feel,’ Paolo commented over his shoulder. ‘I am astonished that Alessio should waste even an hour in such a place. He has certainly never repented of anything in his life.’

His mother shrugged. ‘He spent much of his childhood here. Perhaps it has happy memories for him.’

‘He was never a child,’ said Paolo. ‘And his past is what happened yesterday—no more.’ He leaned forward. ‘Look, Laura mia. You can see the house now, if you look down a little through the trees.’

She caught a glimpse of pale rose stonework, and faded terracotta tiles, and caught her breath in sudden magic.

It was like an enchanted place, sleeping among the trees, she thought, and she was coming to break the spell. And she smiled to herself, knowing she was being utterly absurd.

Impossible to miss the sound of an approaching car in the clear air, Alessio thought. His unwanted guests were arriving.

Sighing irritably, he swung himself off the sun lounger, and reached for the elderly pair of white tennis shorts lying on the marble tiles beside him, reluctantly dragging them on. For the past few days, he’d revelled in freedom and isolation. Basked in his ability to swim in the pool and sunbathe beside it naked, knowing that Guillermo and Emilia who ran the villa for him would never intrude on his privacy.

Now his solitude had ended.

He thrust his feet into battered espadrilles, and began walking up through the terraced gardens to the house.

Up to the last minute, he’d prayed that this nightmare would never happen. That Paolo and his ragazza would quarrel, or that Zia Lucrezia would love her as a daughter on sight, and withdraw her objections. Anything—anything that would let him off this terrible hook.

But her phone call the previous night had destroyed any such hopes. She’d been almost hysterical, he remembered with distaste, railing that the girl was nothing more than a gold-digging tart, coarse and obvious, a woman of the lowest class. But clever in a crude way because she obviously intended to trap into marriage her poor Paolo, who did not realise the danger he was in.

At the same time, she’d made it very clear that her threat to expose his fleeting affair with Vittoria, if he did not keep his word, was all too real.

‘I want the English girl destroyed,’ she had hissed at him. ‘Nothing less will do.’

Alessio had been tempted to reply that he would prefer to destroy Vittoria, who was proving embarrassingly tenacious, bombarding him with phone calls and little notes, apparently unaware that her voluptuously passionate body in no way compensated for her nuisance value.

If she continued to behave with such indiscretion, Fabrizio and his mother might well smell a rat, without any intervention from Zia Lucrezia, he told himself grimly.

He’d been thankful to escape from Rome, and Vittoria’s constant badgering, to this private hideaway where he could remain incomunicabile. He hoped that, during his absence, she would find some other willing target for her libido, or he might ultimately have to be brutal with her. A thought that gave him no pleasure whatsoever.

And now he was faced with another, worse calamity. This unknown, unwanted girl that he had somehow to entice from Paolo’s bed into his own. Probably, he decided, after he’d deliberately made himself very, very drunk…

If I emerge alive from this mess, I shall take a vow of celibacy, he thought moodily.

Guillermo was already opening the heavy wooden entrance door, and Emilia was hovering anxiously. He knew that his instructions would have been minutely carried out, and that the arrangements and the food would be perfect. But visitors at the villa were still a rarity, and the servants were more accustomed to their employer’s own brand of casual relaxation. Zia Lucrezia’s presence would prove taxing for all of them.

He stepped out of the shadowy hall into the sunlight. The car had halted a few feet away, and the chauffeur was helping the Signora to alight, while Caio yapped crossly from her arms.

But Alessio’s attention was immediately on the girl, standing quietly, a little apart, looking up at the house. His first reaction was that she was not his type—or Paolo’s, for that matter, and he found this faintly bewildering. In fact she fitted none of the preconceived images his aunt’s fulminations had engendered, he thought critically as he observed her. Nearly as tall as Paolo himself, with clear, pale skin, a cloud of russet hair reaching to her shoulders, eyes like smoke, and a sweet, blunt-cornered mouth.

Not a conventional beauty—but curiously beguiling all the same.

Probably too slim, he mused, although the cheap dress she was wearing was singularly unrevealing.

And then, as if in answer to some silent wish, a faint breeze from the hills behind them blew the thin material back against her body, moulding it against the small, high breasts, the slight concavity of her stomach, the faintly rounded thighs, and long, slender legs.

Alessio, astonished, felt the breath catch suddenly in his throat, and, in spite of himself, he found his body stirring with frank and unexpected anticipation.

I’ve changed my mind, he thought in instant self-mockery. I shan’t get drunk after all. On the contrary, I think this ragazza deserves nothing less than my complete and sober attention.

He became aware that the Signora was approaching, her eyes studying him with disfavour.

‘Is this how you dress to receive your visitors, Alessio?’

He took her hand, bowing over it. His smile glinted coldly at her. ‘Ten minutes ago, Zia Lucrezia, I was not dressed at all. This is a concession.’ He eyed Caio grimly. ‘And you have brought your dog, I see. I hope he has learned better manners since our last encounter.’ He looked past her to his cousin. ‘Ah, Paolo, come stai?’

Paolo stared at him suspiciously. ‘What are you doing here?’

Alessio gave him a look of mild surprise. ‘It is my house, which makes me your host. Naturally, I wish to be here to attend to your comfort.’

‘You are not usually so concerned,’ Paolo muttered.

Alessio grinned at him. ‘No? Then perhaps I have seen the error of my ways. And the house has enough rooms for us all. You will not be required to share with me, cousin,’ he added blandly, then looked at the girl as if he had just noticed her. ‘And the name of your charming companion?’ Deliberately, he kept his voice polite rather than enthusiastic, noting the nervousness in the grey eyes under their dark fringe of lashes.

Paolo took her hand defensively. ‘This is Signorina Laura Mason, who has come with me from London. Laura, may I present my cousin, the Count Alessio Ramontella.’

He saw that she did not meet his gaze, but looked down instead at the flagstoned courtyard. ‘How do you do, signore?’ Her voice was quiet and clear.

‘Allow me to welcome you to my home, signorina.’ He inclined his head with formal courtesy, then led the way into the house. ‘Emilia, please show the ladies where they are to sleep. And the dog. Guillermo, will you take my cousin to his room?’

As he was turning away Paolo grabbed his arm. ‘What is this?’ he hissed. ‘Where are you putting Laura?’

‘In the room next to your mother’s—at her request.’ Alessio shrugged. ‘I am sorry if you are disappointed, but you also know that she would never permit you to sleep with your girlfriend under any roof that she was sharing. Besides, if you even approach that part of the house, that little hairy rat of your mamma’s will hear and start yapping.’ His grin was laced with faint malice. ‘Like the old monks, you will have to practise chastity.’

‘A lesson you have yet to learn,’ Paolo returned sourly.

‘In general, perhaps, but I have never brought a woman here,’ Alessio told him softly.

‘Talking of which,’ Paolo said, ‘what do you think of my little English inamorata?’

‘Do you need my opinion?’ Alessio gave him a steady look. ‘If she satisfies you, cousin, that should be enough.’ He paused. ‘Although usually you like them with more…’ He demonstrated with his hands.

‘Sì,’ Paolo agreed lasciviously. ‘But this girl has—hidden depths, if you take my meaning.’ And he laughed.

It occurred to Alessio that he had never particularly liked his cousin, and at this moment it would give him great pleasure to smack him in the mouth.

Instead he invited him to make himself at home, and went off to his own room to shower and change.

Laura felt dazed as she followed Emilia and the Signora along a series of passages. The Villa Diana was a single-storey building, and it seemed to ramble on forever in a leisurely way. But she was in no mood to take real stock of her surroundings. Not yet.

That, she thought with disbelief, that was the Count Ramontella, the august head of the Arleschi Bank? That half-naked individual with the unruly mane of curling black hair, and the five o’clock shadow?

She’d assumed, when she first saw him, that he must be the caretaker, or the gardener.

She’d expected an older, staider version of Paolo, conventionally good-looking with a figure that would incline to plumpness in middle age. But the Count was fully six feet tall, with a lean, muscular golden-skinned body that she’d had every opportunity to admire. The shorts he’d been wearing, slung low on his narrow hips, just erred on the right side of decency, she thought, her face warming slightly at the recollection.

And he was nowhere near middle life—hardly more than in his early thirties, if she was any judge. Not, she supposed, that she was.

As for the rest of him—well, his face was more striking than handsome, with a high-bridged beak of a nose, a frankly cynical mouth, and eyes as dark as midnight that looked at the world with bored indifference from under their heavy lids. Or at least, she amended, that was the way he’d looked at her.

And he wasn’t his aunt’s greatest admirer either, as Paolo had suggested. She hadn’t understood their brief exchange, but she’d detected a certain amount of snip, all the same.

But, if that was how he felt about his visitors, why was he here, when he wasn’t expected and it was clear that he had better places to go? It seemed to make no sense.

Whatever, she could not imagine him being pleased to find he was entertaining a very minor cog from his London branch’s PR machine. All the more reason, she told herself, for her connection with Harman Grace to remain a closely guarded secret. So—she’d continue to be the girl Paulo had met in a bar, and let his noble relative pick the bones out of that.

But her troubled musings ceased when Emilia, a comfortably built woman with a beaming smile, flung open a door with a triumphant, ‘Ecco, signorina,’ indicating that this was her bedroom.

Laura took a step inside, and looked round, her eyes widening with delight. It couldn’t have presented a greater contrast to the opulent and cluttered apartment where she’d stayed yesterday. For one thing, it was double the size of the room she’d occupied there, she realised, with a floor tiled in a soft pink marble, while the white plaster walls still bore traces of ancient frescos, which she would examine at her leisure.

But that was the only suggestion of the villa’s age. For the present day, there was a queen-sized bed, prettily hung with filmy white curtains, which also graced the shuttered windows. A chest of drawers, a clothes cupboard, and a night table comprised the rest of the furniture, and a door led to a compact but luxurious shower room, tiled in the same shade of pink. The only other additions to the bedroom were a lamp beside the bed, and a bowl of roses on the chest.

She turned to Emilia. ‘Perfect,’ she said, smiling. And, managing to ignore Signora Vicente’s disdainful glance, ‘Perfetto.’

When she was alone, she went over to the window, and pulled it wide. It opened, she saw, onto a three-sided courtyard, bordered by a narrow colonnade, like a medieval cloister, and she stepped through, gazing around her. There was a small fountain in the centre of the paved area, with a battered cherub pouring water from a shell into a shallow pool, while beside it stood a stone bench.

Directly ahead of her, Laura saw, the courtyard itself opened out into the sunlit grass and flowers of the garden beyond, and from somewhere not too far away she could hear the cooing of doves.

But it wasn’t all peace and tranquillity, she realised wryly. From even closer at hand, she could hear the raised autocratic tones of the Signora, mingled with Emilia’s quieter replies.

A salutary reminder that this little piece of Eden also had its serpents, not to mention wolves and bears, she thought, gazing up at the thickly forested slopes that brooded above her.

Suddenly, she felt tired, sticky and a little dispirited. She’d seen that there were towels and a range of toiletries waiting in the shower room, so decided she might as well make use of them.

She stood under the powerful jet of warm water, lathering her skin luxuriously with soap that smelt of lilies, feeling as if her anxieties were draining away with the suds and she were being somehow reborn, refreshed and invigorated.

Most of the towels were linen, but there were a couple of fluffy bath sheets as well, and when she was dry she wound herself in one of them, and trailed back into the bedroom.

While she’d been occupied, her case had arrived and was waiting on the bed, so she busied herself with unpacking. She hadn’t brought nearly enough, she thought, viewing the results with disfavour, and very little that was smart or formal enough for someone who found herself staying with a count at his private villa.

The outfit that had survived with the fewest creases was a wrap-around dress in a silver-grey silky material, and she decided to try and create a good impression by wearing it for dinner that night.

She had a solitary credit card, kept for emergencies, and maybe she could persuade Paolo to risk the road from hell on a trip to Perugia, so that she could supplement her wardrobe a little.

Whatever she wore, the Signora would sneer, and she accepted that. But for reasons she could not explain, or even admit to, she did not want Count Ramontella looking at her with equal disdain.

She wanted him to accept the fiction that she and Paolo were an item. Perhaps to acknowledge, in some way she hadn’t worked out yet, that she was an eligible bride for his cousin, and welcome her as such.

And pigs might fly, she thought morosely.

In the meantime, she wasn’t sure what to do next. The whole villa seemed enveloped in sleepy heat. There was even silence from the adjoining room, the only sound being the faint soothing splash of the fountain.

Laura felt she could hardly blunder about exploring her new surroundings, alone and uninvited, in case she committed some kind of social faux pas.

So, she decided, she was probably better off remaining where she was until summoned.

She was just about to stretch out on the bed with her book when there was a knock at the door.

Paolo, she thought instantly, wishing she were wearing something more reliable than a big towel. But when she cautiously opened the door, and peeped round it, she found Emilia waiting with a tray.

Beaming, the older woman informed her in halting English that His Excellency thought the signorina might need some refreshment after her journey, then placed the tray in her hands and departed.

Laura carried the tray over to the bed and set it down with care. It held a teapot, with a dish of lemon slices, a plate of tiny crustless sandwiches containing some kind of pâté, and a bowl of golden cherries faintly flushed with crimson.

It was a kindness she had not anticipated, she thought with faint bewilderment. In fact the Count Ramontella seemed positively full of surprises.

But perhaps she was reading too much into this. Clearly his hospitality was primarily aimed at his aunt, and she’d been included as an afterthought.

Because her host didn’t seem like a man who went in for random acts of kindness, Laura thought, remembering uneasily the faint curl of that beautifully moulded mouth.

So, she might as well make the most of this one, while it was on offer.

She ate every scrap of the delicious sandwiches with two cups of tea, then lay back with a contented sigh, savouring the cherries as she read. Later, she dozed for a while.

When she eventually awoke, the sun was much lower in the sky, and shadows were beginning to creep across the courtyard outside.

She donned a lacy bra and briefs, then sat down to make up her face with rather more care than usual, before giving her glossy fall of russet hair a vigorous brushing and fastening silver hoops in her ears. Finally, she sprayed her skin with the fresh, light scent she used, then slipped into the chosen dress, winding its sash round her slender waist and fastening it in a bow.

She’d brought one pair of flattish evening sandals in a neutral pewter shade—light years away from the glamorous shoes with their dizzyingly high heels that Italy was famous for. But even if she’d possessed such a pair, she wouldn’t have been able to wear them, she conceded regretfully, because that would have made her slightly taller than Paolo, who was sensitive about his height.

Count Ramontella, of course, had no such concerns, she thought. The highest heels in the world would only have raised her to a level with his chin. And God only knew why such a thing had even occurred to her.

It was time she concentrated on Paolo, and the task she’d agreed to perform.

She let herself out of her bedroom, and started down the passage, trying to retrace her earlier steps. She had more time to observe her surroundings now, and she realised that the whole place was a series of courtyards, some completely enclosed, each of them marked by its own fountain, or piece of statuary.

And a good job too, because it’s like a labyrinth, she thought, hesitating, totally at a loss, as the passage she was negotiating crossed another. To her relief, the white-coated manservant who had been at the entrance when they’d arrived appeared from nowhere, and indicated politely that she should follow him.

The room she was shown to was enormous, its focal point a huge stone fireplace surmounted by a coat of arms. It was also empty, and Laura hesitated in the doorway, feeling dwarfed by her surroundings, and a little isolated too.

Obviously, she had left her room much too early. The Italians, she recalled, were apt to dine later than people did in England, but she decided to stay where she was rather than attempt that maze of passages again.

She saw with interest that, in here, some restoration work had been done to the frescoed walls, and wandered round, taking a closer, fascinated look and speculating on their age. There were various hunting scenes, and, more peacefully, an outdoor feast with music and dancing, and the style of dress suggested the sixteenth century.

At the far end of the room, large floor-length windows stood open, leading out to a terrace from which a flight of steps descended, leading down to further gardens below.

Once again, furniture in the salotto had been kept to a minimum—a few massive sofas, their dimensions reduced by the proportions of the room, and a long, heavily carved sideboard were the main features. Also, more unusually, a grand piano.

It was open and, intrigued, Laura crossed to it and sat down on the stool, running her fingers gently over the keys, listening to its lovely, mellow sound.

She gave a small sigh. So many sad things had followed her father’s death, and the loss of her own much-loved piano was only one of them.

She tried a quiet chord or two, then, emboldened by the fact that she was still alone, launched herself into a modern lullaby that she had once studied as an exam piece.

Perhaps because it had always been a favourite of hers, she got through it without too much faltering, and sighed again as she played the final plangent notes, lost in her own nostalgic world.

She started violently as the music died to be replaced with the sound of someone clapping. She turned swiftly and apprehensively towards the doorway.

‘Bravo,’ said the Count Ramontella, and walked slowly across the room towards her.

CHAPTER FOUR

‘OH CHRISTMAS,’ Laura muttered under her breath, aware that she was blushing. ‘I’m so sorry, signore. I didn’t realise…’ She swallowed. ‘I had no right—no right at all…’

‘Nonsenso. That was charming.’ He came to lean against the corner of the piano, the dark eyes watching her coolly. He was totally transformed, she thought, having shaved, and combed his hair neatly back from his face. And he was wearing slim-fitting black trousers, which emphasised his long legs, offset by a snowy shirt, open at the throat, and topped by a crimson brocaded waistcoat, which he had chosen to leave unbuttoned.

He looked, Laura thought, swallowing again, casually magnificent.

‘At last my decision to keep it in tune is justified,’ he went on. ‘It has not been played, I believe, since my mother died.’

‘Oh, God, that makes everything worse.’ She shook her head wretchedly. ‘I must apologise again. This was—is—such an unforgivable intrusion.’

‘But I do not agree,’ he said. ‘I think it delightful. Won’t you play something else?’

‘Oh, no.’ She got up hastily, her embarrassment increasing, and was halted, the hem of her dress snagged on the protruding corner of the piano stool. ‘Damn,’ she added, jerking at the fabric, trying to release herself.

‘Sta’ quieto,’ the Count commanded. ‘Keep still, or you will tear it.’ He dropped gracefully to one knee beside her, and deftly set her free.

She looked down at the floor. ‘Thank you.’

‘It is nothing.’ He rose to his feet, glancing around him. ‘What have you done with Paolo?’

‘I—I haven’t seen him since we arrived.’

‘Davvero?’ His brows lifted. ‘I hope he is not neglecting you.’ He sent her a faint smile. ‘If so, you may be glad of the piano to provide you with entertainment.’

‘Oh, no,’ she said quickly. ‘He isn’t neglectful. Not at all.’ She paused. ‘Perhaps his mother wanted to talk to him.’

‘If so, I think her revolting little dog would have told us all.’ He was silent for a moment. ‘Tell me, did you enjoy your afternoon tea?’

Her eyes flew to his dark face. ‘You—really arranged that? That was very kind.’

He shrugged. ‘We tend to have the evening meal later than you are used to in England. I did not wish you to faint with hunger.’ He smiled at her pleasantly. ‘You will soon become accustomed to Italian time.’

‘I’ll certainly try,’ she said. ‘But you can’t make many adjustments in two weeks.’

His smile widened slightly. ‘On the contrary, I think a great deal can change very quickly.’ He walked over to the sideboard. ‘May I get you a drink? I intend to have a whisky.’

‘I’m fine—really.’ She wasn’t. Her throat felt as dry as a bone, and had done ever since she’d seen him standing there.

‘There is orange juice,’ he went on as if she hadn’t spoken. ‘Have you tried it with campari?’

‘Well—no.’

‘Then do so now.’ He mixed the drink, and brought it to her. Touched his glass to hers. ‘Salute.’

‘Grazie,’ Laura said rather stiffly.

‘Prego.’ This time his smile was a grin. ‘Tell me, signorina, are you always this tense?’

She sipped her drink, liking the way the sweetness of the juice blended with the bitterness of the campari. She said, haltingly, ‘Not always, but this is a difficult situation for me.’ She took a breath. ‘You must be wondering, signore, what I’m doing here.’

‘You came with my cousin,’ he said. ‘It is no secret.’

She took a deep breath. ‘So, you must also know that his mother is not pleased about my presence.’

He drank some whisky, his eyes hooded. ‘I do not concern myself in my aunt’s affairs, signorina.’ He paused, and she saw that slight curl of the mouth again. ‘At least, not unless they are forced upon my notice.’

She said rather forlornly, ‘Just as I have been—haven’t I?’

‘Perhaps,’ he said. ‘But, believe me, signorina, now that we have met, I expect nothing but pleasure from your visit.’ Before she could prevent him, he took her hand and raised it to his lips, kissing it lightly and swiftly.

The dark gaze glinted at her as he released her. ‘Would it help you relax if we were a little less formal with each other? My name is Alessio, and I know that yours is Laura.’

She was aware that the colour had stormed back into her face. She said a little breathlessly, ‘I think your aunt might object.’

His tone was silky. ‘Then let us agree to leave her to her own devices, sì?’

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘If you’re quite sure.’

‘I am certain.’ He paused. ‘Shall we take our drinks onto the terrace? It is pleasant there in the evenings.’

Laura followed reluctantly. She hadn’t bargained for this, she thought uneasily. She’d expected Paolo to be hovering constantly, acting as a barrier between her and his family.

There was a table on the terrace, and comfortable cushioned chairs. Alessio held one for her courteously, then took the adjoining seat. There was a silence, and Laura took a nervous sip of her drink.

‘You and Paolo aren’t very alike—for cousins,’ she ventured at last.

‘No,’ Alessio said, contemplating his whisky. ‘There is very little resemblance between us. Physically, I believe he favours his late father.’

‘I see.’ She hesitated, then said in a small wooden voice, ‘His mother, the Signora, is a very—striking woman.’

‘She has a forceful personality, certainly,’ he said drily. ‘I understand that, when she was young, she was also considered a great beauty.’ He leaned back in his chair. ‘Tell me, Laura, how did you meet my cousin?’

‘I work in a wine bar,’ she said. ‘He was one of the customers.’

‘Ah,’ he said. ‘So you are not always as shy as you are with me.’

‘But then,’ she returned, ‘I wasn’t expecting to meet you, signore.’

‘You have forgotten,’ he said. ‘We agreed it would be Alessio.’

No, she thought. I haven’t forgotten a thing. I’m not ready to be on first-name terms—or any terms at all—with someone like you.

There was a loud sneeze from inside the salotto, and Paolo emerged, flourishing a large handkerchief. ‘Maledizione, I am getting a cold,’ he said peevishly. ‘Some germ on the plane, indubbiamente.’

Laura decided this was her cue. ‘Darling.’ She got up and went to his side, sliding her arm through his. ‘How horrid for you. Summer colds are always the worst.’

For a second, he looked at her as if he’d forgotten who she was, then he pulled himself together, kissing her rather awkwardly on the cheek. ‘Well, I must take care not to pass it on to you, carissima. Che peccato, eh? What a pity.’ He slid an arm round her, his fingers deliberately brushing the underside of her breast.

Laura, nailing on a smile, longed to pull away and kick him where it hurt. Alessio drank some more whisky, his face expressionless.

If she’d hoped that the arrival of his mother a short while later would impose some constraint upon Paolo, Laura was doomed to disappointment. He’d drawn his chair close beside hers at the table, and appeared glued to her side, his hand stroking her arm and shoulder possessively, his lips never far from her ear, her hair, or her cheek, nibbling little caresses that she found positively repellent.

She knew, of course, that the Signora was watching, her mouth drawn into a tight line, because that was the purpose of the exercise. And there was nothing she could do about it. But she was also sharply aware that the Count was sending them the odd meditative glance, and this, for some reason, she found even more disturbing than the older woman’s furious scrutiny.

She found she was silently repeating, ‘Think of the money. Think of the money,’ over and over again like a mantra, but it was not producing the desired calming effect, and she was thankful to her heart when dinner was finally announced, and Paolo reluctantly had to relinquish his hold.

The dining room was a long, low-ceilinged room, with a wonderful painted ceiling depicting some Bacchanalian revel, with people wearing bunches of grapes instead of clothes.

The scene below was much more decorous, the polished table gleaming with silver and crystal in the light of several elaborate candelabra. Alessio sat at the head of the table, with his aunt facing him at its foot, and Laura was seated halfway down, opposite Paolo, the width of the table putting her beyond the reach of any more amorous overtures.

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