Cinderella will go to the ball...

And be seduced by the prince

Prince Vittorio’s spontaneous invitation to shy hotel maid Rosa is supposed to end at Venice’s most exclusive Carnival ball. Yet their instant chemistry soon leads to a scorching encounter! It’s meant to be Vittorio’s last taste of pleasure before duty demands he marry and provide an heir. But will one night with unexpected virgin Rosa be enough to slake his desire for her?

Escape to Italy with this royal romance

USA TODAY bestselling author TRISH MOREY just loves happy endings. Now that her four daughters are—mostly—grown and off her hands, having left the nest, Trish is rapidly working out that a real happy ending is when you downsize, end up alone with the guy you married and realise you still love him. There’s a happy-ever-after right there. Or a happy new beginning! Trish loves to hear from her readers—you can email her at trish@trishmorey.com.

Also by Trish Morey

His Prisoner in Paradise

The Heir from Nowhere

Bartering Her Innocence

A Price Worth Paying?

Consequence of the Greek’s Revenge

21st Century Bosses collection

Fiancée for One Night

Bound by His Ring collection

Secrets of Castillo del Arco

Desert Brothers miniseries

Duty and the Beast

The Sheikh’s Last Gamble

Captive of Kadar

Shackled to the Sheikh

Discover more at millsandboon.co.uk.

Prince’s Virgin in Venice

Trish Morey

www.millsandboon.co.uk

ISBN: 978-1-474-08808-4

PRINCE’S VIRGIN IN VENICE

© 2019 Trish Morey

Published in Great Britain 2019

by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF

All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.

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To magical Venezia,

floating city of love and romance.

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

About the Author

Booklist

Title Page

Copyright

Note to Readers

Dedication

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

CHAPTER TWENTY

EPILOGUE

Extract

About the Publisher

CHAPTER ONE

PRINCE VITTORIO D’MARBURG of Andachstein was fed up. Bored. Even in Venice at the height of carnival season, even on his way to the most exclusive party of the festival, still the Playboy Prince couldn’t ignore the overwhelming sense of frustration that permeated his skin and drilled straight down into his bones.

Or maybe it was just the icy pricks from the February pea soup fog needling his skin that were turning his thoughts from carnival to cynical. It was a fog that turned the magical city invisible, precisely when the calles and narrow bridges were more crowded than ever with waves of costumed partygoers surging to and fro, competing for the available space—brightly garbed men and women for whom the fog failed to dampen the air of excitement and the energy that accompanied Carnevale.

It was if the floating city had been let off a leash and, fog or no, it was going to party.

Vittorio cut a swathe through the endless tide of carnival-goers, his cloak swirling in his wake, his mood blackening with every step.

The thronging crowds somehow parted and made way for him. He didn’t think too much about it. Maybe it was his warrior costume—a coat of mail and blue leather dressed with chain and gold braid—or maybe it was his battle-ready demeanour. Either way, it was as if they could read the hostility in his eyes as he headed towards the most exclusive party of the night.

And they could all see his eyes. Vittorio had given up playing with disguises when he was a child. There’d been no point. Everyone had always known it was him behind the mask.

Before the ancient well in the square that housed the Palazzo de Marigaldi, Vittorio’s long strides slowed. Ordinarily he would have been relieved to reach his destination and escape the exuberant crowds—should have been relieved—except for the fact that his father had all too gleefully shared the news in his latest call, just minutes earlier, that the Contessa Sirena Della Corte, daughter of one of his oldest friends, was opportunely going to be in attendance.

Vittorio snorted—just as he’d done when his father had told him.

Opportunely.

He doubted it.

Opportunistically would no doubt be a better word. The woman was a human viper draped in designer artistry, lying in wait for a royal title—which marriage to him would bestow upon her. And his father, despite Vittorio’s blanket protests, had encouraged her to pursue her desperate ambition.

Little wonder Vittorio was in no hurry to get there.

Little wonder that, despite the assurances he’d made to his old friend Marcello that nothing would stop him attending his party tonight, Vittorio’s enthusiasm had been on the wane ever since his father’s call had come through.

Dio.

He’d come to Venice thinking the famous carnival would offer an escape from the stultifying atmosphere of the palace and the endless demands of the aging Prince Guglielmo, but it seemed they had stalked him here—along with the Contessa Sirena.

His father’s choice for his next bride.

But after the experience of his first doomed marriage Vittorio wasn’t about to be dictated to again—not when it came to the woman who would share his marriage bed.

The crowds were thickening, party deadlines were calling, and their excitement was at odds with his own dark thoughts. He was a man out of place, out of time. He was a man who had the world at his feet, and destiny snapping at his heels. He was a man who wanted to be able to make his own choices, but he was cursed with the heritage of his birth and his need to satisfy others before he could entertain his own needs.

He all but turned to walk away—from his destiny as much as from the party. He wasn’t in the mood for going another few rounds with Sirena—wasn’t in the mood for her blatant attempts at seduction, the pouting, and the affected hurt when her all too obvious charms went ignored.

Except there was no question of his not going. Marcello was his oldest friend and Vittorio had promised him he would be there. Sirena would just have to keep on pouting.

But curse his father for encouraging the woman.

Something caught his eye. A flash of colour amongst the crowd, a static burst of vermilion amidst the moving parade of costumes and finery, a glimpse of a knee, down low, and a hint of an upturned angular jaw up high—like snatches of a portrait in oils when all around were hazy watercolours.

His eyes narrowed as he willed the surging crowd to part. Catching a glance of a dark waterfall of wavy hair over one shoulder when the crowd obliged, he saw the woman turn her masked face up to the bridge, moving her head frantically with every passing costume, scanning, searching through the short veil of black lace that masked the top half of her face.

She looked lost. Alone. A tourist, most likely, fallen victim to Venice’s tangle of streets and canals.

He looked away. It wasn’t his problem. He had somewhere to be, after all. And yet still his eyes scoured the square. Nobody looked as if they had lost someone and were searching for her. Nobody looked anywhere close to claiming her.

He glanced back, seeking her between richly decorated masks topped with elaborate wigs and feathers, their wearers resplendent in costumes that spoke of centuries long past, when men wore fitted breeches and women wore gowns with tight bodices spilling their plump white breasts. For a moment he couldn’t find her, and thought her gone, until a group of Harlequins with jester hats ringing with bells passed. And then he saw her raise one hand to her painted mouth before seeming to sag before him.

He watched as she thumbed off the mask and shook her hair back on a sigh—the long hair that curled over one shoulder. She swept it back with one hand, and her cloak slipped down to reveal one bare shoulder and a satin gown riding low over one breast, before she shivered and hurriedly tucked herself back under the cover of the cloak.

She was lost.

Alone.

With the kind of innocent beauty and vulnerability that tugged at him.

And suddenly Vittorio didn’t feel so bored any more.

CHAPTER TWO

LOST IN VENICE. Panic pumped loud and hard through Rosa Ciavarro’s veins as she squeezed herself out of the flow of costumed crowds pouring over the bridge and found a rare patch of space by the side of the canal, trying to catch her breath and calm her racing heart. But nothing could calm her desperate eyes.

She peered through the lace of her veil, searching for a sign that would tell her where she was, but when she managed to make out the name of the square it meant nothing and offered no clue as to where she was. Scanning the passing crowds for any hint of recognition proved just as useless. It was pointless. Impossible to tell who was who when everyone was in costume.

Meanwhile the crowds continued to surge over the bridge: Harlequins and Columbinas, vampires and zombies. And why not zombies, when in the space of a few minutes her highly anticipated night had teetered over the edge from magical into nightmarish?

Panic settled into glum resignation as she turned her head up to the inky sky swirling with fog and clutched her own arms, sighing out a long breath of frustration that merely added more mist to the swirling fog. It was futile, and it was time she gave up searching and faced the truth.

She’d crossed too many bridges and turned too many corners in a vain attempt to catch up with her friends, and there was no chance they’d ever find each other now.

It was the last night of Carnevale, and the only party she’d been able to afford to go to, and instead she was lost and alone at the base of a fog-bound bridge somewhere in Venice.

Pointless.

Rosa pulled her thin cloak more tightly around her shoulders. Dio, it was cold. She stamped her feet against the stones of the pavement to warm her legs, wishing she’d had the sense to make herself something warmer than this flimsy gown with its bare shoulders and high-low hem. Something that better suited the season. Preferably something worn over thermals and lined with fur.

‘You’ll be dancing all night,’ Chiara had protested when Rosa had suggested she dress for the winter weather. ‘Take it from me, you’ll roast if you wear anything more.’

But Rosa wasn’t roasting now. The damp air wound cold fingers around her ankles and up her shins, seeking and sucking out what body warmth it could find. She was so very cold! And for the first time in too many years to remember she felt tears prick at the corners of her eyes.

She sniffed. She wasn’t the type to cry. She’d grown up with three older brothers who would mercilessly tease her if she did. As a child, she’d stoically endured any number of bumps and scratches, skinned knees and grazed elbows when she’d insisted on accompanying them on their adventures.

She hadn’t cried when her brothers had taught her to ride a bike that was too large for her, letting her go fast on a rocky road until she’d crashed into an ancient fig tree. She hadn’t cried when they’d helped her climb that same tree and then all clambered down and run away, leaving her to pick her own tentative way down. She’d fallen the last few feet to the dusty ground, collecting more scratches and bumps. All wounds she’d endured without a whimper.

But she’d never before been separated from her friends and lost in the labyrinthine calles of Venice on the biggest party night of the year, without her ticket or any way to contact them. Surely even her brothers would understand if she shed a tear or two of frustration now?

Especially if they knew the hideous amount she’d spent on her ticket!

She closed her eyes and pulled her cloak tighter around her, feeling the icy bite of winter working its way into her bones as resignation gave way to remorse. She’d had such high hopes for tonight. A rare night off in the midst of Carnevale. A chance to pretend she wasn’t just another hotel worker, cleaning up after the holidaymakers who poured into the city. A chance to be part of the celebrations instead of merely watching from the sidelines.

But so much money!

Such a waste!

Laughter rang out from the bridge, echoing in the foggy air above the lapping canal—laughter that could well be directed at her. Because there was nobody to blame for being in this predicament but herself.

It had seemed such a good idea when Chiara had offered to carry her phone and her ticket. After all, they were going to the same party. And it had been a good idea—right up until a host of angels sprouting ridiculously fat white wings had surged towards them across a narrow bridge and she’d been separated from her friends and forced backwards. By the time she’d managed to shoulder her way between the feathered wings and get back to the bridge Chiara and her friends had been swallowed up in the fog and the crowds and were nowhere in sight.

She’d raced across the bridge and along the crowded paths as best she could, trying to catch up, colliding with people wearing headdresses constructed from shells, or jester hats strung with bells, or ball gowns nearly the width of the narrow streets. But she was relatively new to Venice, and unsure of the way, and she’d crossed so many bridges—too many—that even if Chiara turned back how would she even know where to find her? She could have taken any number of wrong turns.

Useless.

She might as well go home to the tiny basement apartment she shared with Chiara—wherever that was. Surely even if it took her all night she would stumble across it eventually. With a final sigh, she reefed the mask from her face. She didn’t need a lace veil over her eyes to make her job any more difficult. She didn’t need a mask tonight, period. There would be no party for her tonight.

Her cloak slipped as she pushed her hair back, inadvertently exposing one shoulder to the frigid air. She shivered as she grappled with the slippery cloth and tucked herself back under what flimsy protection it offered against the cold.

She was bracing herself to fight her way back over the bridge and retrace her steps when she saw him. A man standing by the well in the centre of the square. A man in a costume of blue trimmed with gold. A tall man, broad-shouldered, with the bearing of a warrior.

A man who was staring right at her.

Electricity zapped a jagged line down her spine.

No. Not possible. She darted a look over her shoulder—because why should he be looking at her? But there was nothing behind her but the canal and a crumbling wall beyond.

She swallowed as she turned back, raising her eyes just enough to see that he was now walking purposefully towards her, and the crowd was almost scattering around him. Even across the gloom of the lamp-lit square the intent in his eyes sent adrenaline spiking in her blood.

Fight versus flight? There was no question of her response. She knew that whoever he was, and whatever he was thinking, she’d stayed there too long. And he was still moving, long strides bridging the distance between them, and still her feet refused to budge. She was anchored to the spot, when instead she should be pushing bodily into the bottleneck of people at the bridge and letting the crowd swallow her up and carry her away.

Much too soon he was before her, a man mountain of leather tunic and braid and chain, his shoulder-length hair loose around a face that spoke of power. A high brow above a broad nose and a jawline framed with steel and rendered in concrete, all hard lines and planes. And eyes of the most startling blue. Cobalt. No, he was no mere warrior. He must be a warlord. A god. He could be either.

Her mouth went dry as she looked up at him, but maybe that was just the heat that seemed to radiate from his body on this cold, foggy evening.

‘Can I help you?’ he said, in a voice as deep as he was tall.

He spoke in English, although with an accent that suggested he was not. Her heart was hammering in her chest, and her tongue seemed to have lost the ability to form words in any language.

He angled his head, his dark eyes narrowing. ‘Vous-êtes perdu?’ he tried, speaking in French this time.

Her French was patchier than her English, so she didn’t bother trying to respond in either. ‘No parlo Francese,’ she said, sounding breathless even to her own ears—but how could she not sound breathless, standing before a man whose very presence seemed to suck the oxygen out of the misty air?

‘You’re Italian?’ he said, in her own language this time.

‘Si.’ She swallowed, the action kicking up her chin. She tried to pretend it was a show of confidence, just like the challenge she did her best to infuse into her voice. ‘Why were you watching me?’

‘I was curious.’

She swallowed. She’d seen those women standing alone and waiting on the side of the road, and she had one idea why he might be curious about a woman standing by herself in a square.

She looked down at her gown, at the stockinged legs visible beneath the hem of her skirt. She knew she was supposed to look like a courtesan, but... ‘This is a costume. I’m not—you know.’

One side of his mouth lifted—the slightest rearrangement of the hard angles and planes of his face that turned his lips into an almost-smile, a change so dramatic that it took her completely by surprise.

‘This is Carnevale. Nobody is who they seem tonight.’

‘And who are you?’

‘My name is Vittorio. And you are...?’

‘Rosa.’

‘Rosa,’ he said, with the slightest inclination of his head.

It was all she could do not to sway at the way her name sounded in his rich, deep voice. It was the cold, she told herself, the slap of water against the side of the canal and the whisper of the fog against her skin, nothing more.

‘It is a pleasure to meet you.’

He held out one hand and she regarded it warily. It was a big hand, with buckles cuffing sleeves that looked as if they would burst open if he clenched so much as a muscle.

‘I promise it doesn’t bite,’ he said.

She looked up to see that the curve of his lips had moved up a notch and there was a glimmer of warmth in his impossibly blue eyes. And she didn’t mind that he seemed to be laughing at her, because the action had worked some kind of miracle on his face, giving a glimpse of the man beneath the warrior. So he was mortal after all...not some god conjured up by the shifting fog.

Almost reluctantly she put her hand in his, then felt his fingers curl around her hers and heat bloom in her hand. It was a delicious heat that curled seductively into her bloodstream and stirred a response low down in her belly, a feeling so unexpected, so unfamiliar, that it sent alarm bells clanging in her brain.

‘I have to go,’ she said, pulling her hand from his, feeling the loss of his body heat as if it had been suctioned from her flesh.

‘Where do you have to go?’

She looked over her shoulder at the bridge. The crowds were thinning now, most people having arrived at their destinations, and only latecomers were still rushing. If she set off now, at least she’d have a chance of getting herself warm.

‘I’m supposed to be somewhere. A party.’

‘Do you know where this party is?’

‘I’ll find it,’ she said, with a conviction she didn’t feel.

Because she had no idea where she was or where the party was, and because even if she did by some miracle manage to find the party there was the slight matter of an entry ticket no longer in her possession.

‘You haven’t a clue where it is or how to get there.’

She looked back at him, ready to snap a denial, but his eyes had joined with his lips and there was no mistaking that he’d know she was lying.

She pulled her cloak tighter around her and kicked up her chin. ‘What’s it to you?’

‘Nothing. It’s not a crime. Some would say that in Venice getting lost is compulsory.’

She bit her tongue as she shivered under her cloak.

Maybe if you hadn’t dropped more money than you could spare on a ticket, and maybe if you had a phone with working GPS, you wouldn’t mind getting lost in Venice.

‘You’re cold,’ he said, and before she could deny it or protest he had undone the chain at his neck and swung his cloak around her shoulders.

Her first instinct was to protest. New to city life she might be, but in spite of what he’d said she wasn’t naïve enough to believe that this man’s offer of help came without strings. But his cloak was heavy and deliciously warm, the leather supple and infused with a masculine scent. The scent of him. She breathed it in, relishing the blend of leather and man, rich and spiced, and her protest died on her lips. It was so good to feel snug.

‘Grazie,’ she said, warmth enveloping her, spreading to legs that felt as if they’d been chilled for ever. Just for a minute she would take this warmth, use it to defrost her blood and re-energise her deflated body and soul, and then she’d insist she was fine, give his cloak back and try to find her way home.

‘Is there someone you can call?’

‘I don’t have my phone.’ She looked down at the mask in her hands, feeling stupid.

‘Can I call someone for you?’ he asked, pulling a phone from a pouch on his belt.

For a moment Rosa felt a glimmer of hope. But only for a moment. Because Chiara’s phone number was logged in her phone’s memory, but not in her own. She shook her head, the tiny faint hope snuffed out. Her Carnevale was over before it had even begun.

‘I don’t know the number. It’s programmed into my phone, but...’

He dropped the phone back in its pouch. ‘You don’t know where this party is?’

Suddenly she was tired. Worn out by the rollercoaster of emotions, weary of questions that exposed how unprepared and foolish she’d been. This stranger might be trying to help, and he might be right when he assumed she didn’t know where the party was—he was right—but she didn’t need a post-mortem. She just wanted to go back to her apartment and her bed, pull the covers over her head and forget this night had ever happened.

‘Look, thanks for your help. But don’t you have somewhere to be?’

‘I do.’

She cocked an eyebrow at him in challenge. ‘Well, then?’

* * *

A gondola slipped almost silently along the canal behind her. Fog swirled around and between them. The woman must be freezing, the way she was so inadequately dressed. Her arms tightly bunched the paper-thin wrap around her quaking shoulders, but still she wanted to pretend that everything was all right and that she didn’t need help.

‘Come with me,’ he said.

It was impulse that had him uttering the words, but once they were out he realised they made all kinds of sense. She was lost, all alone in Venice, and she was beautiful—even more beautiful than he’d first thought when she’d peeled off her mask. Her brandy-coloured eyes were large and cat-like in her high-cheekboned face, her painted curved lips like an invitation. He remembered the sight of her naked shoulder under the cloak, the cheap satin of the bodice cupping her breast, and a random thought amused him.

Sirena would hate her.

And wasn’t that sufficient reason by itself?

Those cat-like eyes opened wide. ‘Scusa?’

‘Come with me,’ he said again. The seeds of a plan were already germinating—a plan that would benefit them both.

‘You don’t have to say that. You’ve already been too kind.’

‘It’s not about being kind. You would be doing me a favour.’

‘How is that possible? We’d never met until a few moments ago. How can I possibly do you any favour?’

He held out his forearm to her, the leather of his sleeve creaking. ‘Call it serendipity, if you prefer. Because I too have a costume ball to attend and I don’t have a partner for the evening. So if you would do me the honour of accompanying me?’

She laughed a little, then shook her head. ‘I’ve already told you—this is a costume. I wasn’t waiting to be picked up.’

‘I’m not trying to pick you up. I’m asking you to be my guest for the evening. But it is up to you, Rosa. Clearly you planned on going to a party tonight.’

He eased the mask from where she held it between the fingers clutching his cloak over her breasts and turned it slowly in his hands. She had no choice but to let it go. It was either let him take it or let go of the cloak.

‘Why should you miss out on the biggest night of Carnevale,’ he said, watching the way her eyes followed his hands as he thumbed the lace of her veil, ‘just because you became separated from your friends?’

He could tell she was tempted—could all but taste her excitement at being handed a lifeline to an evening she’d all but given up on, even while questions and misgivings swirled in the depths of her eyes.

He smiled. He might have started this evening in a foul mood, and he knew that would have been reflected in his features, but he knew how to smile when it got him something he wanted. Knew how to turn on the charm when the need arose—whether he was involved in negotiations with an antagonistic foreign diplomat or romancing a woman he desired in his bed.

‘Serendipity,’ he repeated. ‘A happy chance—for both of us. And the bonus is you’ll get to wear my cloak a while longer.’

Her eyes lifted to meet his—long-lashed eyes, shy eyes, filled with uncertainty and nerves. Again, he was struck by her air of vulnerability. She was a very different animal from the women he usually met. An image of Sirena floated unbidden into his mind’s eye—self-assured, self-centred Sirena, who wouldn’t look vulnerable if she was alone in six feet of water and staring down a hungry shark. A very different animal indeed.

‘It is very warm,’ she said, ‘thank you.’

‘Is that a yes?’

She took a deep breath, her teeth troubling her bottom lip while a battle went on inside her, then gave a decisive nod, adding her own tentative smile in response. ‘Why not?’

‘Why not indeed?’

He didn’t waste any time ushering her across the bridge and through the twisted calles towards the private entrance of the palazzo gardens, his mood considerably lighter than it had been earlier in the evening.

Because suddenly a night he hadn’t been looking forward to had taken on an entirely different sheen. Not just because he was going to give Sirena a surprise and pay her back for the one she had orchestrated for him. But because he had a beautiful woman on his arm in one of the most beautiful cities in the world and the night was young.

And who knew where it would end?

CHAPTER THREE

ROSA’S HEART WAS tripping over itself as the gorgeous man placed her hand around the leather of his sleeve and cut a path through the crowds, and her feet struggled to keep up with his long strides.

Vittorio, he’d told her his name was, but that didn’t make him any less a stranger. And he was leading her to a costume ball somewhere, or so he’d said. But she had no more detail than that. And she had nobody and nothing to blame for being here but a spark of impulse that had made her abandon every cautionary lesson she’d grown up with and provoked her into doing something so far out of her comfort zone she wondered if she’d ever find a way back.

‘Why not?’ she’d said in response to his invitation, in spite of the fact she could think of any number of reasons.

She’d never in her twenty-four years done anything as impetuous—or as reckless. Her brothers would no doubt add stupid to the description.

And yet, uncertainty and even stupidity aside, her night had turned another corner. One that had tiny bubbles of excitement fizzing in her blood.

Anticipation.

‘It’s not far,’ he said, ‘Are you still cold?’

‘No.’

Quite the contrary. His cloak was like a shield against the weather, and his arm under hers felt solid and real. If anything, she was exhilarated, as though she’d embarked upon a mystery tour, or an adventure with an unknown destination. So many unknowns, and this man was at the top of the list.

She glanced up at him as he forged on with long strides through the narrow calle. He seemed eager to get where he was going now, almost as if he’d wasted too much time talking to her in the square and was making up for lost time. They passed a lamp that cast light and shadow on his profile, turning it into a moving feast of features—the strong lines of his jaw and nose, his high brow and dark eyes, and all surrounded by a thick mane of black hair.

‘It’s not far now,’ he said, looking down at her.

For a moment—a second—his cobalt eyes met hers and snagged, and the bubbles in her blood spun and fizzed some more, and a warm glow stirred deep in her belly.

She stumbled and he caught her, not letting her fall, and the moment was gone, but even as she whispered her breathless thanks she resolved not to spend too much time staring into this man’s eyes. At least not while she was walking.

‘This way,’ he said, steering her left down a narrow path away from the busy calle. Here, the ancient wall of a palazzo disappeared into the fog on one side, a high brick wall on the other, and with each step deeper along the dark path the sounds of the city behind became more and more muffled by the fog, until every cautionary tale she’d ever heard came back to mock her and the only sound she could hear was her own thudding heartbeat.

No, not the only sound, because their footsteps echoed in the narrow side alley and there also came the slap of water, the reflection of pale light on the shifting surface of the path ahead. But, no, that would mean—

And that was when she realised that the path ended in a dark recess with only the canal beyond.

A dead end.

Adrenaline spiked in her blood as anticipation morphed into fear. She’d come down this dark path willingly, with a man of whom she knew nothing apart from his name. If it even was his name.

‘Vittorio,’ she said, her steps dragging as she tried to pull her hand from where he had tucked it into his elbow. ‘I think maybe I’ve changed my mind...’

‘Scusi?’

He stopped and spun towards her, and in the gloomy light his shadowed face and flashing eyes took on a frightening dimension. In this moment he could be a demon. A monster.

Her mouth went dry. She didn’t want to stay to find out which. ‘I should go home.’

She was struggling with the fastening of his cloak, even as she backed away, her fingers tangling with the clasp to free herself and give it back before she fled.

Already she could hear her brothers berating her, asking her why she’d agreed to go with someone she didn’t know in the first place, telling her what a fool she’d been—and they’d be right. She would never live down the shame. She would regret for ever her one attempt at impetuosity.

‘Rosa?’

A door swung open in the recess behind Vittorio, opening up to a fantasy world beyond. Lights twinkled in trees. A doorman looked to see who was outside and bowed his head when he spotted them waiting.

‘Rosa?’ Vittorio said again. ‘We’re here—at the palazzo.’

She blinked. Beyond the doorman there was a path between some trees and at the end of it a fountain, where water rose and fell to some unseen beat. ‘At the ball?’

‘Yes,’ he said, and in the low light she could see the curve of his lips, as if he’d worked out why she’d suddenly felt the urge to flee. ‘Or do you feel the need to remind me once again that you are just wearing a costume?’

Rosa had never been more grateful for the fog as she swallowed back a tide of embarrassment.

Dio, what must he think of me? First he finds me lost and helpless, and then I panic like I’m expecting him to attack me.

Chiara was right—she needed to toughen up. She wasn’t in the village any more. She didn’t have her father or her brothers to protect her. She needed to wise up and look after herself.

She attempted a smile in return. ‘No. I’m so sorry—’

‘No,’ he said, offering her his arm again. ‘I’m sorry. Most people take a motorboat to the front entrance. I needed the exercise but walking made me late, so I was rushing. I should have warned you that we would be taking the side entrance.’

Her latest burst of adrenaline leeched out of her and she found an answering smile as she took his arm and let him lead her into a garden lit with tiny lights that magically turned a line of trees into carriages pulled by horses towards the palazzo beyond.

And as they entered this magical world she wondered... She’d been told to expect heavy security and bag searches at the ball, but this doorman had ushered them in without so much as blinking.

‘What kind of ball is this?’ she asked. ‘Why are there no tickets and no bag searches?’

‘A private function, by invitation only.’

She looked up at him. ‘Are you sure it’s all right for me to come, in that case?’

‘I invited you, didn’t I?’

They stopped just shy of the fountain, halfway across the garden by the soaring side wall of the palazzo, so she could take in the gardens and their magical lighting. To the left, a low wall topped with an ornate railing bordered the garden. The canal lay beyond, she guessed, though it was near impossible to make out anything through the fog, and the buildings opposite were no more than shifting apparitions in the mist.

The mist blurred the tops of the trees and turned the lights of those distant buildings into mere smudges, giving the garden a mystical air. To Rosa, it was almost as if Venice had shrunk to this one fairy-tale garden. The damp air was cold against her face, but she was deliciously warm under Vittorio’s cloak and in no hurry to go inside. For inside there would be more guests—more strangers—and doubtless there would be friendships and connections between them and she would be the outsider. For now it was enough to deal with this one stranger.

More than enough when she thought about the way he looked at her—as if he was seeing inside her, reaching into a place where lurked her deepest fears and desires. For they both existed with this man. He seemed to scrape the surface of her nerve-endings away so everything she felt was raw. Primal. Exciting.

‘What is this place?’ she asked, watching the play of water spouting from the fat fish at the base of the three-tiered fountain. ‘Who owns it?’

‘It belongs to a friend of mine. Marcello’s ancestors were doges of Venice and very rich. The palazzo dates back to the sixteenth century.’

‘His family were rulers of Venice?’

‘Some. Yes.’

‘How do you even know someone like that?’

He paused, gave a shrug of his shoulders. ‘My father and his go back a long way.’

‘Why? Did your father work for him?’

He took a little time before he dipped his head to the side. ‘Something like that.’

She nodded, understanding. ‘I get that. My father services the mayor’s cars in Zecce—the village in Puglia where I come from. He gets invited to the Christmas party every year. We used to get invited too, when we were children.’

‘We?’

‘My three older brothers and me. They’re all married now, with their own families.’

She looked around at the gardens strung with lights and thought about the new nephew or niece who would be welcomed into the world in the next few weeks, and the money she’d wasted on her ticket for the ball tonight—money she could have used to pay for a visit home, along with a special gift for the new baby, and still have had change left over. She sighed at the waste.

‘I paid one hundred euros for my ticket to the ball. That’s one hundred euros down the drain.’

One eyebrow arched. ‘That much?’

‘I know. It’s ridiculously expensive, and ours was one of the cheapest balls, so you’re lucky to get invited to parties in a place like this for free. You can pay a lot more than I did, though. Hundreds more.’

She swallowed. She was babbling. She knew she was babbling. But something about this man’s looming presence in the fog made her want to put more of herself into it and even up the score. He was so tall, so broad across the shoulders, his features so powerful. Everything about him spoke of power.

Because he hadn’t said a word in the space she’d left, she felt compelled to continue. ‘And then you have to have a costume, of course.’

‘Of course.’

‘Although I made my costume myself, I still had to buy the material.’

‘Is that what you do, Rosa?’ he asked as they resumed their walk towards the palazzo. ‘Are you a designer?’

She laughed. ‘Hardly. I’m not even a proper seamstress. I clean rooms at the Palazzo d’Velatte, a small hotel in the Dorsoduro sestiere. Do you know it?’

He shook his head.

‘It’s much smaller than this, but very grand.’

Steps led up to a pair of ancient wooden doors that swung open before them, as if whoever was inside had been anticipating their arrival.

She looked up at him. ‘Do you ever get used to visiting your friend in such a grand place?’

He just smiled and said, ‘Venice is quite special. It takes a little getting used to.’

Rosa looked up at the massive doors, at the light spilling from the interior, and took a deep breath. ‘It’s taking me a lot of getting used to.’

And then they entered the palazzo’s reception room and Rosa’s eyes really popped. She’d thought the hotel where she worked was grand! Marketed as a one-time palazzo, and now a so-called boutique hotel, she’d thought it the epitome of style, capturing the faded elegance of times gone by.

It was true that the rooms were more spacious than she’d ever encountered, and the ceilings impossibly high—not to mention a pain to clean. But the building seemed to have an air of neglect about it, as if it was sinking in on itself. The doors caught and snagged on the tiled floors, never quite fitting into the doorframes, and there were complaints from guests every other day that things didn’t quite work right.

Elegant decay, she’d put it down to—until the day she’d taken out the rubbish to the waiting boat and witnessed a chunk of wall falling into the canal. She figured there was not much that was elegant about a wall crumbling piece by piece into the canal.

But here, in this place, she was confronted by a real palazzo—lavishly decorated from floor to soaring ceiling with rich frescoes and gilded reliefs, and impeccably furnished with what must be priceless antiques. From somewhere high above came the sounds of a string quartet, drifting down the spectacular staircase. And now she could see the hotel where she worked for what it really was. Faded...tired. A mere whisper of what it had been trying to emulate.

Another doorman stepped forward with a nod, and relieved Rosa of both Vittorio’s leather cloak and her own wrap underneath.

‘It’s so beautiful,’ she said, wide-eyed as she took it all in, rubbing her bare arms under the light of a Murano glass chandelier high above that was lit with at least one hundred globes.

‘Are you cold?’ he asked, watching her, his eyes raking over her, taking in her fitted bodice and the skirt with the weather-inappropriate hem.

‘No.’

Not cold. Her goosebumps had nothing to do with the temperature. Rather, without her cloak and the gloom outside to keep her hidden from his gaze, she felt suddenly exposed. Crazy. She’d been so delighted with the way the design of the gown had turned out, so proud of her efforts after all the late nights she’d spent sewing, and she’d been eager to wear it tonight.

‘You look so sexy,’ Chiara had said, clapping her hands as Rosa performed a twirl for her. ‘You’ll have every man at the ball lining up to dance with you.’

She had felt sexy, and a little bit more wicked than she was used to—or at least she had felt that way then. But right now she had to resist the urge to tug up the bodice of her gown, where it hugged the curve of her breasts, and tug down the front of the skirt.

In a place such as this, where elegance and class oozed from the frescoes and antique glass chandeliers, bouncing light off myriad marble and gilded surfaces, she felt like a cheap bauble. Tacky. Like the fake glass trinkets that some of the shops passed off as Venetian glass when it had been made in some rip-off factory half a world away.

She wondered if Vittorio was suddenly regretting his rash impulse to invite her. Could he see how out of place she was?

Yes, she was supposed to be dressed as a courtesan, but she wished right now that she’d chosen a more expensive fabric or a subtler colour. Something with class that wasn’t so brash and obvious. Something that contained at least a modicum of decency. Surely he had to see that she didn’t belong here in the midst of all this luxury and opulence?

Except he wasn’t looking at her with derision. Didn’t look at her as if she was out of place. Instead she saw something else in his eyes. A spark. A flame. Heat.

And whatever it was low down in her belly that had flickered into life this night suddenly squeezed tight.

‘You say you made your costume yourself?’ he asked.

If she wasn’t wrong, his voice had gone down an octave.

‘Yes.’

‘Very talented. There is just one thing missing.’

‘What do you mean?’

But he already had his hands at her head. Her mask, she realised. She’d forgotten all about it. And now he smoothed it down over her hair, adjusting the crown so that it was centred before straightening the lace of her veil over her eyes.

She didn’t move a muscle to try to stop him and do it herself. She didn’t want to stop him. Because all the while the gentle brush of his fingers against her skin and the smoothing of his hands on her hair set off a chain reaction of tingles under her scalp and skin, hypnotising her into inaction.

‘There,’ he said, removing his hands from her head. She had to stop herself from swaying after them. ‘Perfection.’

‘Vittorio!’

A masculine voice rang out from the top of the stairs, saving her from having to find a response when she had none.

‘You’re here!’

‘Marcello!’ Vittorio answered, his voice booming in the space. ‘I promised you I’d be here, did I not?’

‘With you,’ the man said, jogging down the wide marble steps two by two, ‘who can tell?’

He was dressed as a Harlequin, in colours of black and gold, and the leather of his shoes slapped on the marble stairs as he descended. He and Vittorio embraced—a man hug, a back-slap—before drawing apart.

‘Vittorio,’ the Harlequin said, ‘it is good to see you.’

‘And you,’ Vittorio replied.

‘And you’ve brought someone, I see,’ he said, whipping off the mask over his eyes, his mouth curving into a smile as he held out one hand and bowed generously. ‘Welcome, fair stranger. My name is Marcello Donato.’

The man was impossibly handsome. Impossibly. Olive-skinned, with dark eyes and brows, a sexy slash of a mouth and high cheekbones over which any number of supermodels would go to war with each other. But it was the warmth of his smile that made Rosa instinctively like the man.

‘My name is Rosa.’

She took his hand and he drew her close and kissed both her cheeks.

‘I’m right in thinking we’ve never met, aren’t I?’ he said as he released her. ‘I’d be sure to remember if we had.’

‘I’ve only just met Rosa myself,’ Vittorio said, before she could answer. ‘She lost her party in the fog. I thought it unfair that she missed out on the biggest night of Carnevale.’

Marcello nodded. ‘That would be an injustice of massive proportions. Welcome, Rosa, I’m glad you found Vittorio.’ He stepped back and regarded them critically. ‘You make a good couple—the mad warrior protecting the runaway Princess.’

Vittorio snorted beside her.

‘What’s so funny?’ she said.

‘Marcello is known for his flights of fancy.’

‘What can I say?’ He beamed. ‘I’m a romantic. Unlike this hard-hearted creature beside me, whom you managed to stumble upon.’

She filed the information away for future reference. The words had been said in jest, but she wondered if there wasn’t an element of truth in them. ‘So, tell me,’ she said, ‘what is this Princess hiding from?’

‘That’s easy,’ he said. ‘An evil serpent. But don’t worry. Vittorio will protect you. There’s not a serpent in the land that’s a match for Vittorio.’

Something passed between the two men’s eyes. A look. An understanding.

‘What am I missing?’ she asked, her eyes darting from one to the other.

‘The fun,’ Marcello said, pulling his mask back on. ‘Everyone is upstairs on the second piano nobile. Come.’

Marcello was warm and welcoming, and nobody seemed to have any issues with the way she was dressed. Rosa began to relax. She’d been worrying about nothing.

Together they ascended the staircase to the piano nobile, where the principal reception rooms of the palazzo were housed one level above the waters of the canal. With its soaring ceilings, and rock crystal chandelier, Rosa could see that this level was even more breath-taking, more opulent, than the last. And the pièce de résistance was the impossibly ornate windows that spread generously across one wall.

‘Is there a view?’ she asked, tempted to look anyway. ‘I mean, when it isn’t foggy?’

‘You’ll have to come back,’ Marcello said, ignoring the crowded reception rooms either side, filled with partygoers, and the music of Vivaldi coming from the string quartet, and walking to the windows before them. ‘On a clear day you can see the Rialto Bridge to the right.’

Rosa peered through the fog, trying to make sense of the smudges of light. But if the Rialto Bridge was to the right... ‘You’re on the Grand Canal!’

Marcello shrugged and smiled. ‘Not that you can tell today. But Venice wearing its shroud of fog is still a sight to behold, so enjoy. And now please excuse me while I find you some drinks.’

‘We’re in San Polo,’ she said to Vittorio.

The hotel where she worked was in the Dorsoduro sestiere, the ball she was supposed to be attending was in the northern district of Cannaregio. Somehow she’d ended up lost between them and within a whisker of the sinuous Grand Canal, which would have hinted at her location if only she’d found it.

A smudge of light passed slowly by—a vaporetto or a motorboat carefully navigating the fog-shrouded waterway—and Rosa’s thoughts chugged with it. Vittorio had been kind, asking her to accompany him, but strictly speaking she wasn’t lost any more.

She turned to him. ‘I know where I am now.’

‘Does that matter?’

‘I mean, I’m not lost. At least, I can find my way home from here.’

He turned to her, putting his big hands on her shoulders as he looked down at her. ‘Are you looking for yet another reason to escape?’

A wry smile kicked up one side of his mouth. He was laughing at her again, and she found she didn’t mind—not when seeing his smile made her feel as if she was capturing something rare and true.

‘I’m not—’

He cocked an eyebrow. ‘Why are you so desperate to run away from me?’

He was wrong. She wasn’t desperate to run away from him. Oh, sure, there’d been that moment when she’d panicked, at the end of the path outside the side gate, but she knew better now. Vittorio was no warrior or warlord, no demon or monster. He was a man, warm and real and powerful...a man who made her blood zing.

Except the warm weight of his hands on her shoulders and the probing questions in his eyes vanquished reasoned argument. There was only strength and heat and fear that it would be Vittorio who might change his mind. And then he’d take his hands away. And then she’d miss that contact and the heat and the zing and the pure exhilaration of being in his company.

A tiny worm of a thought squeezed its way through the connections in her brain. Wasn’t that reason enough to run?

She was out of her depth with a man like him—a man who was clearly older and more worldly-wise, who moved in circles with people who owned entire palazzos and whose ancestors were amongst the doges of Venice. A man who made her feel stirrings in her belly, fizzing in her blood—things she wasn’t used to feeling.

Nothing in the village—not a teenage crush on her maths teacher nor a dalliance with Antonio from the next village, who’d worked a few months in her father’s workshop, had prepared her for meeting someone like Vittorio. She felt inadequate. Underdone.

She was dressed as a courtesan, a seductress, a temptress. But that was such a lie. She swallowed. She could hardly admit that, though.

‘You invited me to this party tonight because I was lost and you felt sorry for me, because I was upset and was going to miss my own party.’

He snorted. ‘I don’t do things because I feel sorry for people. I do things because I want to. I invited you to this party because I wanted to. And because I wanted you to be with me.’ His hands squeezed her shoulders. ‘So now, instead of trying to find all the reasons you shouldn’t be here, how about you enjoy all the reasons you should?’

What could she say to that? ‘In that case, it very much seems that I am stuck with you.’

‘You are,’ he said, with a smile that warmed her to her bones. ‘At least for as long as this night lasts.’

‘A toast.’ Marcello said, arriving back with three glasses of Aperol spritz. He handed them each a glass. ‘To Carnevale,’ he said, raising his glass in a toast.

‘To Carnevale,’ said Rosa.

‘To Carnevale,’ echoed Vittorio, lifting his glass in Rosa’s direction, ‘And to the Venetian fog that delivered us Rosa.’

And if the words he uttered in his deep voice were not enough, the way Vittorio’s piercing blue eyes looked at her above his glass made her blush all the way down to her toes. In that moment Rosa knew that this night would never last long enough, and that whatever else happened she would remember this night for ever.

* * *

She was skittish—so skittish. She was like a colt, untrained and unrehearsed, or a kitten, jumping at shadows and imaginary enemies. And it wasn’t an act. He was good at spotting an ingénue, a pretender. He was used to women who played games and who made themselves out to be something they were not.

Just for a moment Vittorio wondered if he was doing the right thing, pitting her against Sirena. Maybe he should release her from her obvious unease and awkwardness and let her go back to her own world, if that was what she really wanted, back to what was, no doubt, the drudgery of her work and the worry of losing the paltry sum of one hundred euros.

Except Vittorio was selfish enough not to want to let her go.

He saw the way her eyes widened at every new discovery, at every exquisite Murano glass lamp, every frescoed wall or gilded mirror that stretched almost to the ceiling.

She was like a breath of fresh air in Vittorio’s life. Unsophisticated and not pretending otherwise. She was a refreshing change when he had been feeling so jaded.

And she was a beautiful woman in a gown that fitted like a glove and make him ache to peel it off.

Why should he let her go?

CHAPTER FOUR

IT WASN’T A party or even a ball. It was like being part of a fairy-tale.

Rosa ascended the wide staircase to the second level above the water—yet another floor with soaring ceilings and exquisite antiques and furnishings. The music from the string quartet was louder here, richer, its sweet notes filling the gaps between the sound of laughter and high-spirited conversation coming from the party rooms either side of the staircase.

And the costumes! A brightly coloured peacock strutted by as they reached the top, all feathers and flashes of brilliant colour, and Rosa couldn’t help but laugh in sheer wonderment as a couple with ice-white masks wearing elaborate gowns and suits of the deepest purple nodded regally as they strolled past arm in arm.

Rosa felt herself swept away into a different world of riches and costumes—a sumptuous world of fantasy—and only half wished that the man who had rescued her from the foggy calles wasn’t quite so popular, because then she could keep him all to herself.

Everyone seemed to recognise Vittorio and to want to throw out an exchange or a greeting. He was like a magnet to both men and women alike, but he always introduced her to them, including her in the conversation.

And, while her presence at his side wasn’t questioned, she wondered what she might see if everyone wasn’t wearing masks. Would the women’s eyes be following Vittorio’s every move because he was so compelling? Would they be looking at her in envy?

If she were in their place she would.

And suddenly the music and the costumes and the amazing sumptuousness of the palazzo bled into a heady mix that made her head spin. She was part of a Venice she’d never seen and had only ever imagined.

Suddenly there was a shriek of delight from the other wing, and a commotion as someone made their way through the crowds into the room.

‘Vittorio!’ a woman cried, bursting through the partygoers. ‘I just heard you were here. Where have you been hiding all this time?’

But not just any woman.

Cleopatra.

Her sleek black bob was adorned with golden beads, the circlet at her forehead topped with an asp. Like Vittorio, she hadn’t bothered with a mask. Her eyes were kohled, their lids painted turquoise-blue, and her dress was simply amazing. Cut low—really low—over the smooth globes of her breasts, it was constructed entirely of beads in gold and bronze and silver, its short skirt just strings of the shiny beads that shifted and flashed skin with her every movement.

It wasn’t so much a dress, Rosa thought as she took a step back to make room for the woman to reach up and kiss Vittorio on both cheeks, as an invitation. It showed the wearer’s body off to perfection.

Cleopatra left her face close to his. ‘Everyone has been waiting hours for you,’ she chided, before she stood back to take in what he was wearing.

Or maybe to give him another chance to see her spectacular costume.

She held her hands out wide. ‘But must you always look so dramatic? It’s supposed to be a costume party.’

‘I’m wearing a costume.’

‘If you say so—but can’t you for once dress out of character?’

‘Sirena,’ he said, ignoring her question as he reached for Rosa’s hand, pulling her back into his orbit. ‘I’d like you to meet a friend of mine. Rosa, this is Sirena, the daughter of one of my father’s oldest friends.’

‘Oh,’ she said, with a knowing laugh, ‘I’m far more than that.’

And then, for the first time, Sirena seemed to notice that there was someone standing next to Vittorio. She turned her head and looked Rosa up and down, letting her eyes tell Rosa what she thought about his ‘friend’.

‘Ciao,’ she said, her voice deadpan, and Rosa couldn’t be certain that she was saying hello as opposed to giving her a dismissal.

She immediately turned back to Vittorio, angling her back towards Rosa.

Definitely a dismissal.

‘Vittorio, come with me—all our friends are in the other room.’

‘I’m here with Rosa.’

‘With who? Oh...’

She gave Rosa another look up and down, her eyes evaluating her as if she was a rival for Vittorio’s affections. Ridiculous. She’d only just met the man tonight. But she wasn’t mistaken. There was clear animosity in the woman’s eyes.

‘And what do you think of Vittorio’s outfit...? What was your name again?’

‘Rosa,’ Vittorio growled. ‘Her name is Rosa. It’s not that difficult.’

‘Of course it’s not.’ Sirena gave a lilting laugh as she turned to the woman whose name she couldn’t remember and smiled. ‘What do you think of Vittorio’s outfit? Don’t you think it’s a bit over the top?’

‘I like it,’ she said. ‘I like the blue of the leather. It matches his eyes.’

‘It’s not just blue, though, is it?’ Sirena said dismissively. ‘It’s more like royal blue—isn’t it, Vittorio?’

‘That’s enough, Sirena.’

‘Well, I would have said it was royal blue.’

‘Enough, I said.’

The woman pouted and stretched herself catlike along the brocade chaise longue behind her, the beads of her skirt falling in a liquid slide to reveal the tops of her long, slender legs—legs that ended in sandals with straps that wound their way enticingly around her ankles.

The woman made an exquisite Cleopatra. But then, she was so exquisitely beautiful the real Cleopatra would no doubt have wanted to scratch out her eyes.

‘It’s all right, Vittorio, despite our difference in opinion Rosa and I are going to be good friends.’ She smiled regally at Rosa. ‘I like your costume,’ she said.

For the space of one millisecond Rosa thought the woman was warming to her, wanted so much to believe she meant what she’d said. Rosa had spent many midnight hours perched over her mother’s old sewing machine, battling with the slippery material and trying to get the seams and the fit just right. But then she saw the snigger barely contained beneath the smile and realised the woman hadn’t been handing out a compliment.

‘Rosa made it herself—didn’t you, Rosa?’

‘I did.’

Cleopatra’s perfectly threaded eyebrows shot up. ‘How...enterprising.’

Vittorio’s presence beside her lent Rosa a strength she hadn’t known she had, reminding her of what her brothers had always told her—not to be cowed by bullies but to stand up to them.

Her brothers were right, but it was a lot easier to take their advice when she had a man like Vittorio standing beside her.

Rosa simply smiled, not wanting to show what she really thought. ‘Thank you. Your costume is lovely too. Did you make it yourself?’

The other woman stared at her as if she had three heads. ‘Of course I didn’t make it myself.’

‘A shame,’ Rosa said. ‘If you had you might have noticed that there’s a loose thread...’

She reached a hand out to the imaginary thread and the woman bolted upright and onto her sandalled feet, a whole lot less elegantly than she had reclined, no doubt imagining one tug of Rosa’s hand unleashing a waterfall of glass beads across the Persian carpet.

‘This gown is an Emilio Ferraro creation. Of course there’s no loose thread.’

‘Oh, I’m sorry. I must have been mistaken.’

Sirena sniffed, jerked her eyes from Rosa’s and placed a possessive hand on Vittorio’s chest. ‘Come and see our friends when you’re free. You won’t believe what they’re wearing. I’ll be waiting for you.’

And with a swish of her beaded hair and skirt she was gone.

‘That,’ said Vittorio, ‘was Sirena.’

‘Cyclone Sirena, you mean,’ Rosa said, watching the woman spinning out of the room as quickly as she’d come in, leaving a trail of devastation in her wake.

She heard a snort and looked up to see Vittorio smiling down at her. It was a real smile that warmed her bone-deep, so different from one of Sirena’s ice-cold glares.

‘You handled that very well.’

‘And you thought I wouldn’t?’ she said. ‘My brothers taught me to stand up to bullies.’ She didn’t mention that it was Vittorio’s presence that had given her the courage to heed her brothers’ advice.

‘Good advice,’ he said, nodding. ‘If she finds that thread you saw she’ll bust the balls of her precious Emilio.’

Rosa returned his smile with one of her own. ‘There was no thread.’

And Vittorio laughed—a rich bellow that was laced with approval and that made a tide of happiness well up inside her.

‘Thank you,’ he said, his arm going around her shoulders as he leaned down to kiss her cheek. ‘For the best belly laugh I’ve had in a long time.’

It wasn’t really a kiss. Mouth to cheek...a brush of a whiskered jaw...a momentary meeting of lips and skin—probably the same kind of kiss he might bestow upon a great-aunt. Even his arm was gone from her shoulder in an instant. Yet to Rosa it felt far more momentous.

It was the single most exciting moment in her life since she’d arrived in Venice.

Chiara had told her that magical things could happen at Carnevale. She’d told her a whole lot of things and Rosa hadn’t believed her. She’d suspected it was just part of Chiara’s sales technique, in order to persuade Rosa to part with so much money and go along to the ball with her.

But maybe her friend had been right. Rosa had been kissed by a man. She couldn’t wait to tell her friend.

‘You’re blushing,’ said Vittorio, his head at an angle as he looked down at her.

She felt her blush deepen and dropped her head. ‘Yes, it’s silly, I know.’

He put his hand to her chin and lifted her face to his. ‘No,’ he said. ‘It’s delightful. It’s been a long time since I saw a woman blush.’

She blinked up at him, her skin tingling where his fingers lingered.

Oh, boy.

Talk about a distraction... She’d wanted to ask him more about Sirena, but the woman had faded into insignificance. Now all she could think about was Vittorio and the way he made her feel.

‘Come, come!’ said Marcello, clapping his hands as he walked into the room to gather everyone. ‘The entertainment downstairs is about to begin. You don’t want to miss it.’

Downstairs, the entire level of the piano nobile had been divided into performance areas, with stages and dramatic velvet drapes, and they spent the next hour wandering between the rooms to see the spectacle of gymnasts and jugglers and opera singers, and aerobatic performers who spun on ropes in the air. Then it was the turn of the clowns, and Rosa was soon almost doubled up with laughter at their antics.

She found herself thinking about Chiara and wondering how her night was going. They’d treated themselves to the cheapest tickets to the cheapest Carnevale ball they could find—and that only gave admission to the dancing segment of the evening. They hadn’t been able to afford the price for the dinner and entertainment that came first. But surely even that entertainment would be no match for this.

And then Vittorio took her hand in his and she stopped thinking about Chiara, because her heart gave a little lurch that switched off her brain.

She looked sideways up at him to find him watching her, the cobalt of his eyes a shade deeper, his sensual slash of mouth curled up at the ends.

He gave the slightest squeeze of her hand before he let her go, and she turned her eyes back to the entertainment. But suddenly she wasn’t laughing any more. Her chest felt too tight, her blood was buzzing, and she was imagining all kinds of impossible things.

Unimaginable things.

Chiara had said that magical things could happen at Carnevale.

Rosa had been a fool not to believe her.

She could feel the magic. It was in the air all around her. It was in the gilded frames and lush silks and crystal chandeliers. It was in the exquisite trompe l’oeils that adorned the walls with views of gardens that had only ever existed in the artist’s eyes. And magic was pulsing alongside her, in leather of blue and gold, in a man with a presence she couldn’t ignore—a man who had the ability to shake the very foundations of her world with just one look from his cobalt blue eyes.

Chiara had said she might meet the man of her dreams tonight. A man who had the power to tempt her to give up her most cherished possession.

She hadn’t believed that either.

It would have to be a special kind of man for her to want to take such a momentous step. A very special kind of man.

Vittorio?

Her heart squeezed so tightly that she had to suck in a breath to ease the constriction.

Impossible. Life didn’t work that way.

But what if Chiara had been right?

And what if Vittorio was the one?

She glanced up to sneak another look at him and found him already gazing down at her, his midnight hair framing the quizzical expression on his strong face.

His heart-stoppingly beautiful, strong face.

And she thought it would be madness not to find out.

* * *

Sirena either had spies everywhere, or she had a knack for knowing when Rosa had left his side for five minutes. The entertainment was finished but, while the party wouldn’t wind down until dawn, Vittorio had other plans. Plans that didn’t include Sirena, no matter how hard she tried to join in.

‘This is supposed to be a party,’ Sirena sulked conspiratorially to Marcello when she cornered him standing at the top of the stairs, where Vittorio was waiting for Rosa so they could say their goodbyes. ‘A party for friends. An exclusive party. But did you see that woman Vittorio dragged along?’

‘Her name is Rosa.’

Sirena took no notice. ‘Did you see what she was wearing, Marcello? It was appalling.’

‘Nobody’s listening, Sirena,’ Vittorio said dismissively.

‘Rosa seems very nice,’ said Marcello. ‘And I like her costume.’

Vittorio nodded. ‘She is nice. Very nice.’ He thought about the way she’d pulled that ruse with the loose thread and smiled. ‘Clever, too.’

Sirena pouted, her hand on Marcello’s arm, pleading. ‘She wasn’t even invited.’

‘I invited her.’

‘You know what I mean. Someone like her wouldn’t normally be allowed anywhere near here.’

‘Sirena, give it up.’ Vittorio turned away, searching for Rosa. The sooner he got her away from here—away from Sirena—the better.

‘That’s our Vittorio for you,’ Marcello said, trying to hose down the antagonism between his guests, playing his life-long role of peacemaker to perfection. ‘Always bringing home the strays. Birds fallen from their nests. Abandoned puppies. It made no difference. Vittorio, do you remember that bag of kittens we found snagged on the side of the river that day? Dio, how long ago was that? Twenty years?’

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