The Shadowed Heart
The Shadowed Heart
Nina Beaumont
Luca Zeani Had The Face Of A Fallen Angel… . It was a face Chiara had never forgotten, for it belonged to the man who had ruined her sister - the man she had vowed to destroy. But though she burned with vengeance, Luca's passionate kisses ignited a hotter flame that made her his captive in body and soul.Could the whisperings of her wayward heart lead her to the light of truth, or was she forever destined to love a man of darkness?
“I’m afraid.” (#ued75312b-ac4a-5c58-aa4d-9bf7258fac41)Letter to Reader (#u302ff5a6-89a3-585d-9476-fe7131c3e35d)Title Page (#u730debb1-6021-5d6c-85d9-5723e24c1e5b)Dedication (#uc20d119f-c75f-53f1-8002-2964388cf4e3)About the Author (#u4b302386-6cae-5f85-853c-ec725d6020d3)ACKNOWLEDGMENTS (#uf6f5e45d-8bc2-555c-8fac-753682d8bdc8)Chapter One (#u4084c82f-7e6a-5354-89a7-3421c83b3786)Chapter Two (#u1a414e3c-d2e9-5ae8-90a2-135073eacdbc)Chapter Three (#u4cf36c4d-7fa7-595e-964b-b915a3eb54cb)Chapter Four (#u460deb55-d9d3-541b-826b-7da02d51786a)Chapter Five (#u8c543cf5-69db-5f92-a0a8-c4efc7c15873)Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Twelve (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Thirteen (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Fourteen (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Fifteen (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Sixteen (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Seventeen (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Eighteen (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Nineteen (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Twenty (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Twenty-One (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Twenty-Two (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Twenty-Three (#litres_trial_promo)Epilogue (#litres_trial_promo)Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
“I’m afraid.”
Even as Chiara spoke, she wondered that the words slipped off her tongue so easily. Never in her life had she opened herself this way to another. Never in her life had she confessed a weakness to another.
“Of me?” Luca asked.
“Of you. Of myself. Of the confusion in my mind.” She lowered her head into her hands. “Everything used to be so clear. I knew my path. I knew what I had to do.” She pulled in an unsteady breath. “Now nothing is clear. Nothing.”
That wasn’t quite true, she thought. It was clear that there was something between them. Something deep and real, far beyond her fears, her visions.
Something she was afraid to look at more closely....
Dear Reader,
Next month, Harlequin Historicals
turns ten years old! But we have such a terrific lineup this month, we thought we’d start celebrating early. To begin, longtime historical author Nina Beaumont returns this month with The Shadowed Heart, set in eighteenth-century Europe. In this suspenseful story, our beautiful gypsy heroine seeks revenge against the man she believes harmed her sister. She finds him, only she senses that he can’t be the one, especially when she finds herself falling in love with him....
Also out for revenge is Jesse Kincaid, of MONTANA MAVERICKS: RETURN TO WHITEHORN fame, when he kidnaps his enemy’s mail-order bride in Wild West Wife, by bestselling Silhouette
author Susan Mallery. In A Warrior’s Honor, the next medieval in Margaret Moore’s popular WARRIOR SERIES, a knight is tricked by a fellow nobleman into abducting a beautiful lady, but, guided by honor—and love—vows to rescue her from his former friend.
Laurie Grant, who is known for her stirring Medievals and gritty Westerns, returns with a delightful new story. The Duchess and the Desperado. Here, a rancher turned fugitive inadvertently becomes a bodyguard to the very visible Duchess of Malvern when her life is threatened during a goodwill tour of the American West.
Whatever your tastes in reading, you’ll be sure to find a romantic journey back to the past between the covers of a Harlequin Historical
.
Sincerely,
Tracy Farrell
Senior Editor
Please address questions and book requests to:
Harlequin Reader Service
U.S.: 3010 Walden Ave., P.O. Box 1325, Buffalo, NY 14269
Canadian: P.O. Box 609, Fort Erie, Ont. L2A 5X3
The Shadowed Heart
Nina Beaumont
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
To Kathy Ketonen Clark, my “Dearest Roommate.”
Thanks for making life in Room 423 easy
and for all the years of friendship since.
NINA BEAUMONT
is of Russian parentage and has a family tree that includes Count Stroganoff and a Mongolian Khan. A real cosmopolitan, she was born in Salzburg and grew up in Massachusetts before moving to Austria, where she lived for twenty-five years.
Although she has relocated to the Seattle area, her European ties are still strong, so she plans to stick with the exotic settings she has had the opportunity to get to know firsthand.
Books and music are her first loves, but she also enjoys painting watercolors and making pottery.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
My thanks to Karen David of Cleveland, OH,
Maria Lujan de Peralta and Phoenix of Seattle, WA, and
Rita Louise of Everett, WA, for the information they
shared with me regarding clairvoyance.
Chapter One
Venice, October 1767, the first day of Carnival
Chiara’s hand stole toward the slim dagger concealed at her waist as the man who held her arm tightly turned her away from the brightly lit Piazza San Marco. Her breath quickened shghtly as he steered her down a shadowy passageway, which was just wide enough for three people to walk abreast, but the handle of the weapon dug comfortingly into the palm of her hand and kept panic at bay.
If he noticed her apprehension, the man ignored it as he hurried her along. Finally he stopped in front of a door, the wood faded and cracked with age and moisture. Raising his hand, he knocked twice with his fist.
“We’re here,” he announced, giving her a fleeing look.
“You told me that you would take me to the house of a great lady.” Chiara wrenched her arm out of his grasp and shifted away, prepared to run or to use her dagger, whichever seemed more expedient. “I do not believe that a great lady would go near such a miserable place.”
The man looked down at the girl. The flickering light of the single lantern that hung above the door gave her skin a sallow cast, but he had seen it in daylight and knew that it had the golden color of a ripe apricot. The eyes of a startling blue were wary but held no fear.
She had spirit, he thought. He would keep her for a while and she would make him a nice sum. And when he was done with her, there were plenty of back-alley pimps who would take her off his hands. He felt a small flash of guilt, but it was easy to suppress it with the image of his daughter, who lay still in her bed no matter what new and expensive treatments the doctor invented for her.
“It is as I told you. This is the casino of Signora Giulietta Baldini, the widow of Ser Luigi Baldini.” He had no trouble injecting a smooth confidence into his voice, for—this time—he happened to be telling the truth.
“If you were from Venice,” he continued, “you would know that he was a very rich man. And you would know that Venetian ladies receive guests in their homes only on formal occasions. They have little houses like this one where their guests can enjoy themselves as they please in more intimate surroundings.” His fleshy mouth curved in a mocking grin. “But isn’t that something you should know? If you truly have the sight, that is?” He reached for her arm.
“I see what is given to me to see. Sometimes it is a great deal and sometimes it is nothing at all.” Chiara evaded his grasp. “Having the sight does not make me all-knowing.”
The man laughed, the sound echoing a little between the high buildings. “You don’t have to be all-knowing, little one.”
In fact, he thought, it was better for her that she was not. He leaned down toward her, his movement distracting her from the hand that snaked out from beneath his voluminous black cloak to curl tightly around her arm.
“All you have to do is tell a few fortunes like you did in the piazza this afternoon.” She had wrapped a shabby black shawl tightly around her, but an expanse of pale skin remained visible above the small gathered ruffle of her blouse and his gaze skimmed approvingly over her. “And be pleasant to Signora Giulietta’s guests.”
The door opened with a creak and Chiara turned to see a footman in costly green-and-gold livery holding a large candelabra.
“You are late, Manelli. Signora Giulietta is getting impatient.” The footman turned sharply and moved toward the narrow staircase.
Her fingers on the hilt of her dagger, Chiara allowed herself to be pulled into the small entry.
A small table with curved legs, chairs upholstered in rich, wine red velvet and expensive candles in gilt sconces on the walls gave some small reassurance that this house was indeed that of a great lady. Laughter and the sound of a mandolin drifted down the stairs, together with the scent of coffee, perfume and warm candle wax.
She thought of the coins she had earned today and tucked into the shabby purse she wore around her waist. She thought of the coins she had been promised for the evening’s work and how they would enable her to pay for her sister’s care at the small farm she had found near Padua. But, most of all, she thought of how it brought her one step closer to finding her father and getting the revenge that had been the focus of her life for more than two years.
She lifted her eyes to the florid face of the man the footman had called Manelli. “Let go of my arm,” she said softly.
As Manelli looked into the girl’s eyes, they lost all expression until they became as blank as glass.
She sensed greed and an almost casual brutishness, but the anxiety she sensed was stronger than either one so she looked at that more closely. An image rose of a young woman lying in a bed. She saw the woman sit up and hold out her hand. “Babbo, ” the woman said and smiled.
Chiara blinked and focused on Manelli’s face. He had grown a little pale beneath the ruddiness and she gave a satisfied little nod.
Manelli watched the strange light fade from the girl’s eyes. He felt an icy chill along his back and told himself that it was only the October wind blowing in from the still-open door. “Don’t worry. Your daughter will be healthy again.” Manelli was staring at her. Then she saw a desperate hope seep into his eyes and she smiled. “It is so,” she said. “I have seen it.”
Turning, she moved to follow the footman up the stairs toward the blazing lights.
Irritated by Giulietta’s inane chatter, Luca Zeani turned away and slung one leg carelessly over the arm of his chair. Picking up a mandolin, he plucked its strings absently. He heard the tinkle of coins in the next room and briefly considered joining one of the games. Perhaps a few hands of faraone at high stakes would speed his pulse a bit and burn off the indolence that had crept into his blood since his return to Venice.
But the languor that seemed to infect all of Venice kept him in his chair, his long, slender fingers idly strumming the mandolin. His half-open eyes were fixed on a gilded stucco border near the ceiling, but what he saw was the sunlit blue of the open sea.
The ache of longing for the sharp, clean air of the sea drifted through him, but even that did not rouse him from the languidness. It was so easy to give oneself to pleasure in this city where no one seemed to think of anything else.
The atmosphere of temptation and sensuality gripped you like a fever, he mused, making the pleasures offered the only reality. More real than the fact that he was in Venice to speak to the Great Council in the name of Admiral Angelo Emo, demanding more men and ships to fight the Barbary pirates. More real than the masked man who had approached him to speak seductively of freedom and renewed vigor for the sickly Venetian Republic.
Luca saw Giulietta rise from her seat beside him, and he gave a small sigh of relief. She was very beautiful and in bed she was as accomplished as a high-priced courtesan, but she was a tiresome woman. The showy necklace of rubies and diamonds that he had thought to give her as a parting gift had been in a cabinet in his apartments for weeks, but somehow it always seemed simpler to allow things to go on as they were.
When he felt the touch on his shoulder, Luca looked up in surprise, not having heard anyone approach him. But there was no one beside him.
Sitting up straight, he looked around him to see who could have touched him. Across from him, an elderly man dozed in his chair and, on his other side, a masked couple was engaged in such fervid flirtation that they seemed in imminent danger of forgetting that they were in public.
He looked across the room to where Giulietta stood speaking to a heavyset man and a tall young woman who was wearing a multicolored skirt that molded her hips—and again felt a touch. But this time he would have sworn that he felt the touch of a woman’s hand against his skin just above his heart.
Putting the mandolin aside, he leaned forward, his hands propped on his ivory-colored silk breeches. Deliberately he met the young woman’s gaze. She was staring at him with such undisguised animosity that he stiffened, his own eyes narrowing.
Intrigued, he rose and sauntered to where Giulietta stood, cupping his hand around her neck more by habit than desire.
“What have we here?” he asked, never taking his gaze away from the girl’s eyes, which were the color of the Adriatic when the midday sun was upon it. Eyes that held hatred, more relentless and cold than he had ever encountered.
“A Gypsy fortune-teller. She will look into our guests’ future and then—” she paused and gave a malicious little laugh “—entertain them. An amusing little diversion, don’t you think, caro?” She looked up at Luca, leaning back to press her neck still more firmly against his fingers.
Giulietta’s words passed Luca by unheard as he stared into the girl’s eyes. He had made his share of enemies in his twenty-seven years, but he had never seen such loathing, not even over the point of a sword.
For the first time in weeks he felt the prickle of real excitement. A riddle to solve, he thought. A riddle involving a woman whose face would have done justice to one of Titian’s portraits. As he tore his gaze away from her eyes to allow it to drift over her, he felt an absurd pleasure in her lack of artifice.
Her curls fell beyond her shoulders in a tangled black mass and had obviously never seen the creams and lotions Venetian women used to bleach their hair to a fashionable blond color. Her lips, the color of strawberries, needed no rouge. Her golden skin was untouched by powder and, instead of a beauty patch, there was a smudge of dirt on her cheek.
He felt his body tighten with that first, pure, sweet rush of arousal, untainted by skillful tricks or stimulants. His gaze returned to her eyes.
They were still trained on him, but they were strangely unfocused now as if she were looking far beyond his face. Baffled by the sudden change, he found his interest piqued still further. This was definitely a puzzle he wanted to solve.
It was him. Chiara stared over the lady’s shoulder, not quite believing what she was seeing. That hair the color of ripe wheat, unpowdered and uncurled in defiance of fashion, merely tied back carelessly with a dark ribbon. That chiseled, perfect profile.
No, she thought, shaking her head to clear it. She must be mistaken. She could not possibly have the good fortune to stumble across the man she hated so fiercely. Perhaps even more than she hated her father.
Then he turned to face her and she knew that she had not been mistaken. There could not be another mouth like that in the whole world, its sensuality promising both pleasure and cruelty. This is what Lucifer must have looked like, she thought. The fallen angel who had chosen to rule in hell rather than serve in heaven.
She watched him rise and come toward her and, despite her hatred, which was so real its bitter taste lay on her tongue, she found herself much too aware of the man’s beauty.
He stood in front of her, close enough that she could have reached out and touched him. Beneath the cover of her shawl, her hand moved to the dagger hidden in the folds of her clothes and touched the hilt. This dagger had spilled his blood once before and it would spill his blood again.
She drew her hand away from the metal with an effort. Not today, she told herself. She would have her revenge, she swore, but not today.
As she stared at him, the hatred inside her was suddenly pushed aside as if by an invisible hand and she heard a voice within her. The voice of the spirit that sometimes called to her, telling her to dip down to that shadowy region of impressions and images and look inside the man who stood before her.
She saw light. A clear, pure light like the rays of the rising sun. She searched for the darkness, for the evil that she was certain would be there. But all she saw was the light. Surely this was some kind of trick, a clever ruse to blind her. It was then that she saw it.
Behind the figure wreathed in light, she saw the dark apparition. She recognized his perfect features, his fine form. Recognized, too, the evil aura that surrounded the dark figure. The aura that was almost palpable.
So he was versed in the secrets of the occult, she thought. He had wanted to blind her with his light so that she would not see his darkness. But he would not succeed, she thought triumphantly, for she had seen the evil.
She pulled herself back to reality and saw that he was still looking at her. There was more than curiosity in his eyes. He was looking at her in the way that men looked at women.
But it was not the devilish, naked lust that she had seen that night in the Gypsy camp on the outskirts of a small town in Tuscany. The lust that had been glittering in his dark eyes even after he had slaked it on the unwilling body of her sister.
This time it appeared in a different guise. It was a desire that was far more subtle and seductive. For a fraction of a moment it reached out to touch her before she was able to draw back and protect herself against it
“Well, get on with it”
Giulietta’s sharp voice intruded into Luca’s sensual reverie. He watched the odd glow fade from the young Gypsy’s eyes. For a fraction of a moment before the hatred returned, he saw a softening, as if he had touched a string within her that had resonated with a harmonious sound.
“But get rid of that ugly black shawl of hers.”
The petulant tone of his mistress’s voice had Luca looking at her with irritation. It occurred to him that this was the strongest emotion that he had felt toward her in days. Perhaps it really was time to finally give her the ruby necklace and send her on her way.
“And you really could have cleaned her up a bit, Manelli.” The ivory sticks of her fan of fine painted parchment clattered as she waved it in front of Chiara’s face. “But I suppose some might find that wild, crude look appealing.” She shrugged. “Oh, well, just make sure my guests are well pleased, Manelli. I’m counting on you.”
Obediently Manelli plucked the shawl from Chiara’s shoulders and pulled her toward the first group of guests, who were already tittering expectantly.
Giulietta hooked her hand through Luca’s arm to take him away from the clutch of people who had drawn close together to hear what the young Gypsy had to say, but he resisted.
“You seem inordinately interested in her, caro.” Her rouged mouth pursed in a pout and she leaned close, inviting his caress.
“Wasn’t that what you wanted?” Luca raised an eyebrow. “To pique your guests’ interest?”
“But you’re not a guest, you are—”
He lifted a finger to her mouth to silence her and, extracting his arm from her grasp, shifted so that he could watch the young Gypsy’s face.
The guests crowded around her, thrusting their palms toward her, their voices raised in a babble of questions.
“I do not read palms.”
Luca straightened at the sound of her voice. It was low and husky for a girl so young. A voice that would go well with Gypsy fires.
“I cannot look at your whole life. You can ask me a question and if I am allowed to see the answer, I can tell you.”
Murmurs greeted her statement, which had been made in a clear voice that carried no apology.
“What a sham,” Giulietta hissed. “Manelli will not see a lira from me.”
Absently Luca shushed her as someone wearing a bautta, a kind of domino that was the simplest and most popular carnival disguise, stepped forward. The molded white mask covered the upper two thirds of the face and a black lace hood fell to the shoulders, making it impossible to say if the person beneath the disguise was a man or a woman.
The figure brieny lifted the black tricorn hat in a mocking salute and sketched a bow, revealing the dark silk breeches beneath the floor-length black cloak.
“Tell me, will the woman I love finally surrender?” The question was asked in a scratchy whisper.
Luca watched the young Gypsy’s eyes again grow unfocused, glassy. She went so completely still that she did not even seem to be breathing.
Minutes passed. Then Luca saw her chest move with a deep breath, saw her eyes lose that odd, empty expression.
“The woman you love will surrender many times,” she said. “But she will never surrender her heart.”
“Why not?” The scratchy whisper asked.
“Because her heart belongs only to herself.”
The figure made a gesture of disbelief with a gloved hand.
Chiara looked directly into the eyes visible through the slits of the mask. “No man will ever love you better than you love yourself, signora.”
Gasps of surprise and flustered giggles greeted her words.
Manelli gripped her arm and leaned close to her ear. “In Venice, the mask is to be respected above all things.”
Chiara wrenched her arm away and stepped away from the man’s smell of onions and cheap wine. “Those who do not want to know the truth should not ask me questions.”
“Leave the poor girl alone,” the masked figure said, the voice undisguised now and obviously female. “She spoke only the truth.”
The woman laughed, reached into a pocket and handed Chiara a gold coin. Then she turned sharply, her cloak belling out for a moment before it settled around her again, and strode toward the door.
There was a moment of stillness, for everyone had recognized the voice, although no one was impolite enough to acknowledge that openly. It was the fabulously wealthy and eccentric Signora Laura Paradini. Laura Paradini, who had broken every rule in an already permissive society. Laura Paradini, who had outlived three husbands while half the patrician women in Venice took the veil for lack of marriage-minded men.
Everyone in the room seemed to start talking simultaneously at this sign of approval and began to press closer to the Gypsy. Suddenly everyone was eager to have the Gypsy answer their questions.
But Chiara pushed her way past the people milling around her. She had to talk to the woman. For the few moments that she had looked inside this woman, she had felt the presence of her father. She had not seen him, but he had been there just the same.
She had to know if the woman knew him. Perhaps she was the key to finding him. Perhaps she was the key to her revenge.
“Signora!” Chiara reached the door to see that the woman was already halfway down the stairs. “Wait, please.”
The woman turned, her mask ghostly in the dim light. “I must hasten to find that surrender you promised me.” She raised her hand in a wave. “Perhaps we will meet again.” She waved again and ran down the stairs, her cloak floating behind her.
“What do you think you’re doing? Are you mad?” Manelli grabbed her, afraid that she would flee. He had already seen that Signora Giulietta was not pleased with him.
Chiara shook off his hands. She would find the woman, she swore to herself, and through her she would find her father—after she had wrought the vengeance that a kind fate had placed in her path. Her eyes searched out the blond man in the crowd.
Yes, she thought as she returned to where the crowd stood waiting for her. Today had brought her good fortune, and vengeance—more vengeance than she had ever hoped for—would be hers.
His arms folded across his chest, Luca leaned against the wall that was covered with fine leather stamped with a delicate gold pattern. He had not taken his eyes off the girl for the past hour. He had watched her as she had seemed to descend time after time into some secret place, her eyes becoming unfocused and blank, her body growing as still as if she were dead. And when she moved again, she had every time said something that impressed the questioner with its accuracy.
He had always considered himself an enlightened, pragmatic man. A man who did not believe in the supernatural—not in Gypsy fortune-tellers, not in divine deities—so he was certain that this had to be some kind of a trick. And he was determined to find out just what her trick was.
And why did she look at him with such hatred in her eyes? Perhaps he could change the hatred to something softer. He acknowledged the excitement she aroused in him. Acknowledged it and relished it. It had been a long time since he had felt anything so strong or real.
“No! That is untrue what you say there!” The voice rose hysterically over the hum of conversation. “I will have you turned over to the Inquisitors—”
Giulietta moved quickly toward the shouting man, her hooped skirts of oyster-shell colored satin making her look like a caravel in full sail.
“But, my dear Savini, how can you get so worked up about the words of a silly little Gypsy.” She wound her arm around his and tugged him away, at the same time signaling Manelli with her eyes. “Would you expect her to speak Gospel?” She smiled up at him. “Now I have a little proposal for you on how we shall resolve this.” Leaning closer, she began to whisper in his ear.
Luca watched how Giulietta skillfully soothed the disturbance. Within moments, she had poor Savini under her spell. The guests had dispersed around the room and were drinking coffee and brandy again, gossiping desultorily as if nothing unusual had happened. And Manelli had bundled the Gypsy girl off to one of the small side rooms.
Luca pushed away from the wall and followed them.
Chapter Two
“Are you insane?” Manelli shouted. “How can you speak of such things as alchemy?”
Luca stepped into the room and closed the door behind him so softly that neither Manelli nor the girl heard him.
“I know nothing of al-alchemy.” Chiara stumbled over the unfamiliar word. “I only said what I saw. And I saw the man putting a black stone in a bowl of liquid and waiting for it to turn into gold.”
“Dio, stop it.” He pressed his hands to his ears. “Just listening to you would make me guilty in the eyes of the Inquisitors.”
“Why did you bring me here, if you did not wish me to speak the truth?” Chiara demanded. She wanted to run, but something kept her standing there, as if her feet had been planted in the ground. “Now I want the coins you promised me.” She held out her hand.
“Sei pazza! You’re crazy!” Manelli tapped his hand against his forehead. “You may have called down the Inquisitors upon my head.” He began to pace. “The bravest man trembles at the mere thought of the dungeons in the Doge’s palace. And now you—” he pointed a meaty finger at her “—you dare to ask for money?”
“You promised you would pay me to use the sight.” There was no petulance, no whining in her voice, only a resolute tenaciousness.
“Listen to me!” He stopped in front of her. “Be grateful if all I do is not pay you.”
Chiara stared up at him. Rage had lived within her since she was a child, watching her father treat her mother worse than he would treat a servant. Now it sprang to life, just as a smoldering fire springs into flame at a breath of air. Her arm brushed against the dagger at her waist, but it did not even occur to her to reach for it. She had a better weapon for this toad of a man.
“It would not go well for you to cheat me.” Her voice lowering, she shifted closer to him. “Do you know what Gypsies do to those who cheat them?”
Paling, Manelli retreated from her, making the sign against il malocchio, the evil eye, with forefinger and little finger of his right hand. “I—if you promise to do what you are told, I will pay you.” His gaze shifted away from her face.
Chiara’s eyes narrowed. If he thought to cheat her, she thought, she would—
“Leave us, Manelli. I wish to speak to the girl.”
Like matching puppets, both whirled to face Luca.
“B-but, signore, Signora Giulietta—”
“Leave Signora Giulietta to me.” Although he was not aware of it, Luca’s chiseled features grew as cold as if they were carved from ice at the unaccustomed contradiction. “Out.” He tipped his head toward the door.
Manelli felt sweat begin to dribble down his back at the icy anger in Signor Luca Zeani’s black eyes. But still he hesitated to obey, for he knew well what cruelties Signora Giulietta was capable of.
Luca heard the door behind him open and turned to see Giulietta with Savini in tow.
“What are you doing here, Luca?” Giulietta demanded.
“I could ask you the same question, cara.” Even as he addressed her, his eyes skimmed over Savini. The man was staring at the Gypsy girl with undisguised lecherousness and Luca’s eyes narrowed as he returned his gaze to his mistress. “Or have you brought Savini here to take his pound of flesh from the girl for telling the truth?”
Chiara’s eyes widened as the terrible understanding of what was happening penetrated her mind, why she had been brought to this room. She understood that this scarecrow of a man with his protuberant eyes intended to take her body. And all these people standing around her intended to let him.
She suppressed the cry of protest and fear that rose in her throat. Like a wild animal circled by hunters, she remained perfectly still for one moment, her eyes darting from one to the other. Then she ran.
Luca had his back to the girl, but by some instinct he was aware of her intention before she ever moved. Spinning on his heel to face her, he blocked her way so that she slammed fully into his body. Capturing her in his arms, he held her relentlessly as she began to fight like a wild thing, twisting and turning within his harsh embrace.
Confident of his muscular body, toughened from years of seafaring life, Luca curbed his strength, not wishing to hurt her.
Grimly determined, Chiara fought on. He was a soft fop, she assured herself, with his silks and brocades and lace. He was evil and brutal, but he was a coward. He had run from her once before, after all.
Twisting her body around its axis, she raised her bent arm as high as she could and then drove it back, plowing her elbow into his middle.
Luca swore as the girl’s elbow struck his midriff, but he only tightened his grip. Still she fought him. Suddenly she bent like a poplar sapling in the wind and, before he realized what she intended, she had sunk her teeth into his wrist.
Dropping all pretense of civility, he grabbed a handful of her hair and jerked her head back. “Be still, damn it,” he growled into her ear. “I mean you no harm.”
“No!” Her voice rose. The memory of how his eyes had glittered so demonically that night almost two years ago enabled her to fight on even though her strength was flagging. “Let me go!” She managed to free one hand and, forming her fingers into claws, gouged deep scratches into his cheek before he captured her hand again.
His patience snapped and, unleashing his full power, Luca manacled her hands with his and twisted them behind her back, ignoring her cry of pain. Holding her wrists with one hand, he pressed his other arm against her throat, drawing her flush against him.
As he pinned her against him, Chiara stilled, the strength flowing out of her abruptly, as if he had severed some lifeline by pressing her against his body. The light surrounded her again. And warmth. She shook her head in disbelief, as she looked for the dark apparition, but this time it eluded her.
As she surfaced, she found herself staring directly into his eyes. They were the color of the night sky at its darkest hour, but there were tiny specks of gold strewn throughout the blackness, like points of light. She waited for the malevolent glitter, but it did not come. Then she realized that the eyes were smiling at her.
“Well?” he asked, his smile coloring his voice. “Have you decided to surrender?”
Because her life had taught her that it was sometimes wise to give up to be able to fight another time, she lowered her eyes in a gesture that could be taken for assent.
“I do not surrender,” she said softly. “But I cannot fight against your strength.”
“A wise decision. Now if I release you, will you remain still and not try to maim me?”
She gave a jerky nod.
“Look at me.”
Hesitating for a long moment, Chiara felt him push her chin upward with his arm. Reluctantly she lifted her lids. As their eyes met and held, she felt the hatred within her pall. Panicking, she tried to hold it, but all she could see was the light that rose from the recesses of her mind to surround the man who held her, until he seemed enclosed in a bubble of light.
Luca saw the panic in her eyes and felt something within himself soften.
“I won’t hurt you.” He lowered his arm slightly so that it lay just above her breasts. Cautiously he loosened the fingers that shackled her wrists.
When Chiara immediately tried to move away from him, his hands tightened again.
“Stay close until I’m sure that you’re not going to run.” His tone was mild, but the command there was unmistakable.
“You said you would release me.” Her voice was low, furious.
“And so I will.” He smiled. “Just humor me for a bit and stay close.” He lowered his arm. It brushed her breasts and he felt his body stir. He curved his hand over her hip, to make certain that she did not run and because it pleased him to touch her.
“What a touching scene.” Giulietta raised her hands and tapped her fingers against one another in a parody of applause. “If I had known you had a taste for violence, caro, I would have obliged you earlier. Now—” she struck her closed fan sharply against her palm “—I suggest that we return to business.”
“And I suggest that it is time for Signor Savini to retire,” Luca said smoothly. “I am told that the Great Council meets early in the morning.”
“But you promised—” Savini began, his voice rising to a whine.
“I’m sure you misunderstood.” Luca’s mouth curved in a smile that would not have looked out of place on a wolf. “Signora Giulietta only meant she shall endeavor that nothing that transpired here tonight shall become common knowledge.”
“The damage has been done and people will talk. You know that. Gossip is the favorite pastime in Venice.” Savini’s voice rose. “The least you can do is to—”
Luca felt the girl stiffen and he gave her a reassuring squeeze. “Buona notte, signore.”
Savini opened his mouth to speak, but then he closed it with a snap. With a glare in Luca’s direction, he whirled to leave. Giulietta reached out to stop him, but he shook off her hand and swept out of the room, slamming the door behind him.
“Now look at what you’ve done.” Giulietta turned on Luca, her dark eyes snapping with displeasure. “What kind of game are you playing?”
“I dislike seeing those who cannot defend themselves coerced.” Suddenly conscious of the warmth of the girl’s body beneath his hand, the irony of his words occurred to him and he released her.
Chiara looked up sharply at him. What unspeakable gall, she thought, to speak like that when he was so good at coercion himself. She remembered only too well how she had come upon him holding her sister’s hands pinned above her head much as he had held her own behind her back. And she remembered Donata’s terrified eyes. The memory brought a comforting return of the hatred just as she felt his hand lift away from her hip, the tips of his fingers lingering for a moment before he released her completely.
“You’ve been reading too many philosophical treatises from France, caro. You seem to have begun to believe all that tripe about the purity of the savage and the rights of humanity.” The melodiousness of Giulietta’s voice could not hide the vibration of anger. “Now I suggest we let Manelli take her back to wherever it was he found her.”
Taking his cue, Manelli hurried forward. “Thank you, signora, signore.” He grabbed Chiara’s arm so violently that a seam tore, leaving one sleeve of her linen blouse barely hanging on by a few threads. “Come, now. Come.”
“Let me go.” She tried to escape his grip, but his meaty fingers dug into her flesh unmercifully.
As she twisted from side to side to escape Manelli, her gaze met the night eyes. She hated Luca. Someday she would kill him. But he had been kind to her a few moments ago. He had touched her briefly with gentleness. All these thoughts came together in a twisted kind of logic. And her eyes asked for his help.
“Didn’t you hear what she said, Manelli? Let her go.”
Manelli’s fleshy mouth fell open as he stared at Luca. “But, signore, she belongs to me.”
“Are you saying she is your slave?”
“No!” Chiara cried, horrified at the word. “I am no man’s slave.”
Manalli’s eyes darted to Signora Giulietta and he saw her almost imperceptible nod. “Yes, signore, my slave.”
Chiara struggled against Manelli’s hands. This couldn’t be happening to her, she thought. Surely she would wake up and discover it was all a bad dream.
“Good,” Luca said. “Then I will buy her from you.”
Chiara spun her head to look at him. Going still with shock and disbelief, she watched him dip his hand into a pocket of his brocade waistcoat.
“That would appear to be too little for a good female slave,” he said matter-of-factly, looking at the coins in his palm. “You will not deny me a loan, my dear, will you?”
“Wh-what?” Giulietta sputtered as he turned toward her.
As if she had graciously consented, he reached out and undid the clasp of her necklace of large squarecut amethysts surrounded by small pearls. He jiggled the necklace in his hand as if testing its weight and then, without warning, tossed it in Manelli’s direction.
Manelli let Chiara go and grabbed the necklace in both hands. Terror warred with greed in his eyes as his gaze swept around the room. Then, like a rat scurrying for cover when faced by two dangerous cats, he ran out of the room.
For a long moment, all three remained perfectly still, as if they were part of a tableau vivant, a living portrayal of a painting. Then, while Luca remained still, the women moved, Giulietta sweeping forward, all unsheathed claws and fury, Chiara stepping back.
“How dare you insult me like that.” Giulietta’s voice was high and ill-tempered. “Just what are you doing?”
“I will never be your slave. Never.”
The Gypsy’s voice was low and throaty. Luca found it as arousing as a caress, but he ignored her as if she hadn’t spoken, and continued to look at his mistress.
“You have eyes and ears, my dear. I would think it was perfectly obvious what I am doing.” His mouth curved in the glib smile of a man well skilled in pacifying troublesome women. “I’ve just bought myself a slave.”
“Do what you wish in private, but how can you do this to my face?” Giulietta demanded.
“I have done nothing but purchase a slave.” He emphasized his shrug by raising his hands slightly palm upward. “Do moderate your histrionics, my dear.”
“Don’t tell me you do not intend to take her to your bed.” Her lips trembled. “You’re my lover. How can you betray me thus?”
“Your lover, perhaps, but not your cavaliere servente, sworn to serve you in all ways.” Luca expelled a sharp breath, no longer trying to hide his irritation. “You were eager enough to welcome me to your bed without any promises. And, I would remind you, I have never made you any.”
Giulietta’s mouth thinned as she fought for composure. “We will speak later. I must see to my guests now.”
“We will speak another time, my dear.” It was definitely time to send Giulietta on her way, Luca thought. He would send her the rubies tomorrow. “I find that I am not in the mood for more talk tonight.”
Giulietta looked from Luca to the Gypsy, then back to her lover. “I see.” Fisting her hands in the folds of her skirt, she managed to keep her tone light. “Amuse yourself well, caro. Just make sure you wash off her smell before you come to my bed again.”
Sending a glance that was both contemptuous and furious in Chiara’s direction, she flounced out of the room.
The room was so silent that all Chiara heard was her own breathing. He stood perfectly still, looking at her, his eyes intent.
She concentrated, trying to see what was inside his mind. She knew there was evil within him. Why could she not see it? Why could she not even feel its presence? Yes, there was a darkness within him, but it was like the darkness of a shadow where there is much light.
“Come closer.”
“No.” She threw up her chin. “I am not your slave.”
“Come closer, I said.” A fine edge of steel crept into his mild voice. “If you knew me better, you would know that I am not known for my patience.”
She could not feel his evil, but she felt his power And still she defied him. It was her only chance.
“I am a free woman and I have no wish to know you better.”
His face changed, so subtly that she could not have described it. It was Lucifer, she thought again, and he was displeased with what he saw in his kingdom. Fear rose so suddenly that she had no time to control it before her breath seemed to congeal in her throat.
“I’m free,” she repeated. “You cannot force me to do anything.” Her voice sounded winded and she took a moment to draw a deep breath. “Except by your superior strength.”
“But you’re wrong. I bought you from Manelli.” Tucking the tips of his fingers into the pockets of his waistcoat, he spoke as lightly as if it were a matter of a basket of fruit. “And slavery is still quite legal in Venice, you know.”
“I do not believe that it is legal to sell what you do not own.” The brave words could not mask the sick feeling in her stomach. “Manelli did not own me.”
“No? Why should I believe you?” Even as he spoke the words, Luca asked himself if he had gone mad. Why was he tormenting her when it had been his intention to purchase her freedom and let her go? By all the saints, he had never owned a slave in his life. The thought alone was repugnant to him. Yet, within moments, the need to keep her had become an obsession.
“I do not lie.” She straightened.
She was afraid. He could see the wild pulse fluttering at the base of her throat. But she stood there, defying him with a courage that few men would muster. He felt a flash of respect, but it was obscured by yet another flicker of arousal, stronger this time. More urgent.
“No? Are you not a woman?”
“A woman, yes. But you will hear no lies from my lips.”
He began to move slowly toward her, the high heels of his buckled shoes clicking on the terrazzo floor.
The closer he came, the harder her heart began to beat. Chiara took a step back and found herself against the wall. Because she had no place to run, she met his eyes fully.
She was beautiful in an untamed, earthy way, Luca thought as he walked toward her. But there was more there besides her entrancing face, her seductive body. There was something about her—something heady and powerful. He felt a pull and, had he been honest with himself, he might have correctly identified it as need.
He stopped an arm’s reach away from her, not because he did not want to frighten her further, but because he found himself wanting to touch her. And he knew just how dangerous it was to want anything so badly.
Crossing his arms across his chest, he leaned against the marble mantelpiece. “So,” he said, helpless to stop himself from continuing this game of cat and mouse, “you are a woman without lies.”
Chiara gave a choppy nod.
“What is your name?”
“Chiara.”
Luca’s tawny eyebrows rose. “How convenient.”
“What do you mean?”
“You claim to have the sight, to be a clairvoyant. and your name signifies ‘clear.’” He chuckled. “It’s just too perfect.”
“I cannot help the truth. And I cannot invent lies to please you.” She tossed her hair over her shoulder. “That is the name my mother gave me.”
“So, Chiara.” He drew the name out so that it rolled off his tongue like a caress. “What do I do with you now?” Unable to resist, he stepped away from the mantel and reached out to touch her.
“Don’t touch me.” She pressed herself against the wall, as if she could make herself disappear into it. Just the thought of his hands on her filled her with panic so vast and absolute that it left no place for anything else. Her mind went blank but for the terror of being touched by this man.
Luca stilled, his hand hovering a palm’s breadth away from her face.
“I don’t want to hurt you.” His voice was gentle.
Chiara fought back the terror that was rising within her like black, noxious smoke, but still it came. And came. Until she was choking with it.
Wanting to soothe the unreasonable fear in her eyes, Luca cupped her cheek.
She cried out and spun away from his touch.
Something snapped within him at her strangled cry. At the new wave of abject terror in her eyes. At the way she recoiled from him as she might have recoiled from a man repulsive with the French pox. The dark violence that he had worked so hard to control all his life burst forth as blood spurts from a deep wound.
Forgetting that he did not want to hurt or frighten her, forgetting everything but that he wanted her, a low sound of fury built in his throat.
Moving forward, he slapped his hands against the wall on either side of her head, effectively imprisoning her.
Chapter Three
Chiara shuddered as she heard the hideous slap of his palms against the wall on either side of her head.
For a moment she almost gave in to the terror. Almost gave in to the desire to close her eyes, slide down the wall and curl up like an animal playing dead. God, she prayed, don’t let him touch me. Please don’t let him touch me.
A breath away from surrender, hatred and pride, those old twin friends that had been with her for so long, came to her aid, slowly pushing back the terror. She turned her head and met his eyes.
The soothing darkness of a star-studded night, which she had seen there before, had disappeared. Instead, the opaque blackness of a sky roiling with storm clouds stared back at her. But the very violence in his eyes gave her something to focus on and she felt the fear recede further.
Luca saw that fear was still lurking in the depths of her eyes, but the hatred that he had seen there before was back in full force now. Hatred that, had it been a knife, would have been sharp enough to kill. Strangely enough it was that hatred, so real and basic, that soothed the wild fury riding him to a controllable anger. And when he spoke, his voice carried more puzzlement than anything else.
“Why do you hate me so?”
“You know,” she spat. “Or, if you do not, you should.”
Baffled, Luca stared at her, digging into the recesses of his mind. Had they met before? Had he done something to cause her enmity? He shook his head. What could he have done to inspire hatred so deep? He could not imagine it. Besides, he knew that if he had ever seen this woman before, he would not have forgotten her.
“For a woman with the sight, you have remarkably poor judgment.”
She said nothing but stared back at him, her eyes like blue flames, provoking him with their fire.
“Manelli would have sold your body to the first comer,” he snapped. “Don’t you understand that?”
She had known that she was taking a risk, Chiara thought. But she had thought she could protect herself. And she had needed the money to pay for her sister’s care.
“He did sell me to the first comer,” she said tonelessly. She let her head fall back to the side so that her cheek lay against the wall, and she closed her eyes.
Luca’s fingers curled as he fought the need to touch her, to cup her head and make her look at him again.
“I paid him, with every intention of letting you go.” He had the uncomfortable feeling that he was apologizing. “I have never owned a slave in my life.”
Slowly she turned back to face him fully. “But now you own one,” she said. “And you have no intention of letting me go, do you?”
Some of the fire had returned to her low, smoky voice. The fire drew him, aroused him, and Luca shifted forward until his body was pressed against hers.
Chiara sucked in her breath as he pressed against her, pushing herself back further against the wall, but he moved closer still—so close that it seemed as if their bodies were one. He was pressed against her so tightly that she could feel the rise of his aroused sex against her belly. He was crushing her. She wanted to cry out, but she knew there would be no help for her here. And she had never been one to waste her energy on useless gestures.
He would move any second now, she though Every muscle turned to ice as she stiffened in expectation of his rough touch. He would push up her skirt. He would penetrate her body with his.
But he did none of those things. Instead he remained still, his eyes on hers, as if he thought to find her secrets there.
The dagger! How could she have forgotten it? Relief rushed through her. Chiara lifted her hand, but she could not reach for it without alerting him. Her mind raced. Before he tried to rape her, he would have to step away from her to free his body. Then she would be able to reach the dagger, she thought. Then she would kill him.
She felt a little flicker of regret that she would have to do it quickly, and not be able to tell him why she was planting her knife in his heart. But perhaps it was better to do it swiftly, before she had time to think about the light she had seen when she had looked inside him. Before she had time to question why her sight was showing her what her eyes knew was false.
The decision made, a small part of the tension seeped out of her even as she braced for his attack.
Luca felt the slight relaxing of her body against his and smiled. She had been hurt by some rough, careless man, he thought. He would show her what it could be like.
His hands still propped against the wall framing her head, he lowered his head toward her.
Chiara stilled when he touched his mouth to hers. Because she’d been expecting a brutal assault, the light, gentle touch took her breath away. She found herself incapable of movement as he rubbed his mouth back and forth over hers. When he slid the tip of his tongue along the seam of her lips, she trembled but still could not move.
With infinite patience he traced her lips again and again. When they parted, his mouth curved against hers.
“Sì,” he murmured, “così. Yes, like this.”
Desire was urgent in his blood, but even now he did not take what she offered. Instead, he leisurely dipped his tongue inside.
Chiara could see them together. They lay on a couch, surrounded by bright-colored cushions. Her shoulders were bare and pale against the coverlet of crimson silk. Somewhere there was the sound of water lapping against wood. The smell of sweet incense drifted through the room and mingled with the scent of arousal—his and hers. Then he moved over her so that she could see only her eyes—wide-open, smiling with welcome.
“No.” The single word was directed at the vision, not at the kiss.
Luca withdrew far enough so that he could see her face. “No?” He smiled, his anger forgotten in the sensual pleasure of the moment. “Are you sure? That certainly felt like a yes.” Without giving her time to reply, he took her mouth again.
Chiara wanted to fight him, but she found herself unable to move, as if her limbs had suddenly turned to water. He filled her mouth with his tongue, tasting her.
There was an answering heat within her, but she told herself that it was the heat of hatred. Desperate, she tried to hold on to that, but the heat merged and melded with the light, blinding her as if she were standing in the full sunlight.
His taste filled her. In a reflexive curiosity, she touched her tongue to his.
Luca felt that first tentative touch of her tongue go through him as if it were a bolt of lightning. Grasping her head, he gave in to the consuming need to plunder.
As he plunged into her mouth, possessing her with all the fever of a virile man’s passion, Chiara jolted, as if shaken awake from a dream. Rational thought returned, reminding her of just who this man was. She began to struggle to free herself from his voracious kiss, just as she struggled against that unfamiliar ache in her belly.
Luca felt her move against him. Pleased, he slid his hands into her hair and delved more deeply into the pleasures of her mouth. Only gradually did he realize that her movements had nothing to do with passion.
Luca pulled back, trying to ignore the desire that was making his blood race, his body throb. The moment he freed her mouth, she went still.
Realizing that he had twisted his hands in her hair, Luca loosened his fingers and began to rub her scalp lightly.
“I did not mean to hurt you.” He let his hands drift down slowly, caressingly until they lay on her shoulders. He brushed his mouth against hers and felt her stiffen.
“What’s the matter?” Leaving his hands on her shoulders, he took a step away.
She waited for the malevolence to come into his eyes, but it did not. Traces of passion were there and questions, but none of the evil she had been waiting to see there ever since she had first laid eyes on him an hour ago. How long could he pretend? How long could he keep up this facade? Where did he get his power? Why could she not see? It was the last question that frightened her most of all.
“Did I frighten you?” He slid his thumbs beyond the neckline of her coarse linen blouse to stroke her skin. “Was I too rough?”
“I am not easily frightened.” She swallowed and fought—unsuccessfully—to suppress the involuntary shiver of pleasure.
“Perhaps not.” He smiled at both her evasive answer and the shudder of response that went through her. “Have you ever lain with a man before?”
His words reminded her of who he was. Reminded her of what she needed to do.
“What difference does it make to you?” As she spoke, her hand crept upward, then across her middle. Her fingers closed around the hilt of the dagger, and she slid it out of the sheath.
Strike! Strike! The command thundered through her head, but her hand remained still, as if she could not force it to do her bidding.
“None.” He laughed softly. “None at all.” His fingers continued to stroke her skin. “I want you. That is all that matters.”
The soft, lightly mocking laughter struck a chord in her memory and she lifted her hand and plunged it down toward his heart.
Ensnared in his arousal, Luca did not give heed to her movement. By the time the realization hit him that what she held was a weapon and he had flung his hand upward to ward off the blow, the momentum of her downward stroke was too strong, too fast to stop completely.
He felt—and ignored—the hot flash of pain as the tip of the dagger pierced his skin and sliced through his flesh a moment before he struck her hand.
The dagger clattered to the floor. His hands captured hers. For a moment, they remained still, as if frozen in a dance of violent beauty.
Luca’s fury exploded like a volcano spewing forth hot lava. His fingers tightened around her wrists and he bore her back so brutally that her head hit the wall with a sharp crack.
“Damn you. I have killed men for less.”
“I’m not afraid to die.”
“Perhaps not.” He ground his hips against hers. “But you are afraid of this.”
Chiara could feel the cry growing in her throat, but she battled the weakness, clamping her mouth shut until her teeth ground against each other.
Luca saw her fear, saw how she fought it, saw how she still defied him. And her desperate courage seemed to feed his fury.
“Why did you try to kill me?” he demanded. “Is it such a terrible fate to lie with me?” He gave a short laugh. “Some women might even envy you.”
Chiara thought of her sister’s blank eyes. She thought of the pitiful whimpering sounds Donata sometimes made in her sleep, and felt the fear recede before the hatred of this man.
“I hate you. And I despise you.”
“Why?”
“I told you. If you do not know it, you should.”
“My patience with your riddles is at an end,” he snarled. “Tell me.”
For a moment Chiara was tempted to tell him who she was. But only for a moment. He would find a way to use that knowledge against her. The less he knew about her the better it was. She would bide her time and someday she would tell him, right before she killed him.
She shook her head.
“Tell me.” He tightened his grip on her wrist.
“No,” she whispered.
“Do you know how easy it is to make someone talk?” The wildness was roiling within him like a storm-swept sea. He grappled for control, but it slipped away like water. “With just a small movement I could snap your wrist.”
She could feel his hot breath on her face. “What good would a slave with a broken wrist be?”
His mouth curved in a hard smile. “You don’t need your hands for what I want from you.”
“And you will take what you want no matter what I do or say.”
“Perhaps.” He shifted his fingers a fraction of an inch to increase the pressure on her wrist. “Try me.”
Chiara understood then that she had exhausted all her possibilities.
“You are a Venetian patrician,” she said, trying desperately to keep her voice steady. “That is why I hate you.”
It was surprise more than anything else that had him easing his hold on her wrist. The wildness within him eased as well, as if it had been a seizure that was now passing.
“Why?”
She hesitated, but feeling his hand tighten again, she decided to give him part of the truth. “Because my father is one.”
“Your father?” His eyes narrowed, but he did not dismiss her words. “What is his name?”
“I don’t know,” she lied. “I came to Venice to find out.”
Luca caught the tiny flicker in her eyes that told him she was lying, but he kept the knowledge to himself.
“So...” His voice held a touch of humor. “Did you come here planning to kill all Venetian aristocrats?”
Chiara gave a shake of her head. Understanding that the greatest danger had passed for the moment, she allowed disdain to color her words. “Only those who try to rape me.”
“I don’t intend to rape you.”
She said nothing, but the contempt that darkened her eyes made it quite clear to Luca that she thought he was lying.
“You don’t believe me, I see.” He did not release her hands, but he moved a step back.
Chiara flinched at his movement and despised herself for it. When she saw that he was stepping back, relief and a new wave of bravado flowed through her.
“I have no reason to lie,” he said.
“And I have no reason to believe you.”
He stared at her for a moment. Then he laughed richly. “It’s a pity that you’re not a man. With audacity like yours we could whip the Barbary pirates in a few weeks.” He paused. “And then again—” his gaze drifted down to her breasts “—I’m very glad that you are not a man.”
A whisper of hope drifted through her. “If it is true that you do not intend to rape me, will you let me go then?”
His smile died and his gaze returned to her face. “No.”
Hope grew cold. “Why not?”
“I want you. But then I told you that, didn’t I?”
The accusation returned to her eyes, stronger than before. “So, rape after all.”
“No, not rape.” His grip loosened and his thumbs began to rub the inside of her wrists. “I trust that I shall be able to persuade you that it is not such an ugly fate to lie with me.”
“Persuade a slave?” She made a sound that might have been a harsh laugh. “Do you really expect me to believe that?”
“Believe what you wish. But you can believe me when I tell you that I do not find the thought of rape arousing. I, for my part, have always preferred persuasion.”
Chiara’s eyes narrowed at his lie, yet just the fact that he had gone to the trouble to tell it had her relaxing a little.
“And when you have persuaded me,” she asked, “will you let me go then?”
“Let you go?” He shrugged. “I don’t know. I think that is a question for another day.”
Chiara was used to taking risks. After all, she had been living on the edge for so long that she had almost forgotten what it was like to know what the next hour would bring. Perhaps, she calculated quickly, perhaps it would be worth it to give him her body. He would be careless in the throes of passion and then she would k—
“Enough talk now.” He released one of her hands but, keeping the other firmly in his, he turned. “Come.”
“Where are you taking me?”
“Home.” He moved toward the door.
Tears, unexpected, unwanted, shot into Chiara’s eyes as the single word struck a long-forgotten chord deep within her soul. Once, long ago, she had thought to have a home. She almost lost her balance as he pulled her along. Swallowing the tears, she stumbled after him.
Chapter Four
Downstairs in the entry Luca barked an order that had the lackey scurrying to get his things.
Emotions—anger, horror, disgust at the violence he had displayed—rushed through him like a roaring river. A candle flickered on the opposite wall and he concentrated on that point of light as he fought to deal with them.
He had always believed that uncontrolled violence was his brother’s province. From the time when they had been small boys he had seen it. He had seen Matteo strike out at servants and torment playmates. He had stopped it when he could, knowing all too well that Matteo would again do the same thing. And he’d done it because, despite everything, he had loved Matteo. He’d done it because he had always known that some of the same violence, the same cruelty lived within him.
But Luca had always believed that he had the violence under control, like a dangerous criminal locked in a secure dungeon. Instead, he had found tonight that all it took was the right moment—and the right woman—for it to escape its cage and spread its poison.
Was this urgency that drove him like a whip when he looked at the Gypsy girl the same madness that had overtaken Matteo when he had raped and killed Antonia? Had Matteo merely taken the same passion, the same compulsion that he himself felt for this black-haired seductress one step further? Oh, God, he thought as he scrubbed his hands over his face, was he like his twin brother after all?
Luca remembered how he had found Matteo, standing over Antonia’s bruised and broken body. He had sworn then that he would never give in to the evil that lived within him. Not even to avenge the girl he had loved so tenderly. But, he thought, he had given in to the evil now. And the bitter knowledge shamed him.
He had put his hands on this girl until she had cried out in pain. He had been within a breath of taking her where they had stood, with no care, no tenderness. Cursing silently, he told himself that he had to let her go. He could not force an unwilling woman to go with him just because he found himself wanting her beyond all reason.
Had he gone mad? he asked himself. And if he had, would the madness pass? Was it only the madness of an instant, born of his violent fury, or would it stay with him like a witch’s curse?
Even as his blood grew calm, he found that the venom had unfurled within him like a pernicious flower. He was unable to forswear his own wickedness. Unable to undo what madness had wrought Unable to follow his conscience and let Chiara go.
It did not occur to him that he had thought of her by name for the first time.
Chiara watched him. He had released her hand and he was ignoring her as they waited in the small entry for the footman to return. Perhaps, she thought, he was already losing interest. A small shoot of hope burgeoned within her. Perhaps he was already regretting the trouble he was putting himself to.
She eyed the door. There was no key in the lock and the bolt was open. If she was quick enough, she could slip past him and out the door before he noticed her. Or should she wait and try to escape once they were outside in the narrow, dark alley?
Carefully Chiara took a small step. He was staring at the candle in the gilt sconce on the opposite wall and gave no sign of having observed her movement. Slowly, her gaze never leaving his scowling face, she began to edge toward the door.
The sound of footsteps jolted her. The footman! She gauged the distance to the door. Three steps, perhaps four. Taking a deep breath, she prepared to run.
Luca knew the moment she took the first step. He would let her go, he told himself. Perhaps then he would be able to look himself in the eye again. She was almost behind him when she paused. If she stayed now, he bargained with himself with shameless sophistry, it meant that she was staying of her own free will. If she tried to escape, he would let her go.
As she leaped toward the door, he swung around, blocking her way, forswearing the promise he had made to himself.
“Going somewhere?”
Chiara dragged in a breath that was almost a sob. He would never let her go now, she thought. She was his property and this was a man who guarded his possessions. She looked up at him.
“I was going to let you escape.” He lifted his hand to her face, but when she flinched, he let it fall back to his side. “But I find that I can’t.”
“Won’t.”
“Can’t.” He shrugged. “And won’t.”
“Your tabarro, Don Luca.”
Not taking his eyes off Chiara, Luca let the long, black cloak settle on his shoulders and clapped the black tricorn hat on his head. Letting the molded white mask, which the footman handed him, dangle from his fingers by its laces, he took her arm and stepped out into the alley.
As they turned onto the Piazza San Marco, the blast of wind met them head-on. Chiara shivered in her torn blouse but said nothing.
Even at this late hour, the piazza was full of life. The cafes and even some of the shops were brightly lit. A violin began to play a melody from a popular opera and was joined by the high, pure voice of a castrato tenor. A couple had linked arms and was whirling in a dizzying dance that needed no music, save that in their heads.
Chiara glanced at the groups of people that dotted the square, wondering if there was someone among them who would help her. Some were garbed in colorful costumes as Moors or harlequins or Chinamen, but most looked like ghosts in their long, black cloaks, their heads covered with the black bautta topped by tricorn hats, their faces disguised with white, beaked masks. Laughter and chattering voices drifted over and she understood just how alone she was.
Luca hurried them past the cathedral, with its Byzantine facade that seemed to glow even at night, past the Doge’s palace, to the quay, where the black gondolas bobbed on the dark water silvered by moonlight.
“Olà, Tommaso,” he called out toward the group of gondoliers who were huddled together at the base of one of the Egyptian columns. Immediately one of the men detached himself from the group and came toward them.
“You are early tonight, Don Luca.” He slid a sly glance toward the girl at his master’s side. “Do you wish to go—”
“Home, Tommaso.”
The gondolier acknowledged the command with a small bow, but his eyebrows shot up in surprise. In silence he herded his passengers around the column, in obeisance to the long-standing superstition that to pass between the columns, where on occasion the scaffold or a gibbet stood, would bring misfortune.
Luca stepped down from the dock onto the stern of the gondola, balancing his body against the gentle pitching of the craft with the ease of long practice. He turned and held out his arms.
“Come, I will lift you down.”
Her gaze darting around, hoping to find yet another way to escape, Chiara shrank back and bumped into the gondolier’s stocky body.
“Don’t be timid,” the gondolier whispered on a laugh. “He’s generous and, from what I hear, well skilled.” He gave her a push.
She stumbled forward. Before she could brace herself against his touch, he had lifted her into the gondola and released her.
“Sit down in the felze.” Luca pointed to the cabin in the center of the gondola.
When she hesitated, he jerked the door open. “Get in,” he growled. When she still did not move, he grasped her arm to maneuver her inside.
“Dio, you’re freezing.” Her gaze skittered up to his as he stroked his hand up her arm. He wanted to put his arms around her and warm her. Giving in to the desire, he pulled her closer only to see her eyes widen with alarm. Swearing, he pushed her away and toward the cabin so that she tumbled onto the cushioned bench.
Unhooking the clasp of his cloak, he shrugged it off and tossed it at her. Damn her, he thought, as he leaned his elbows on the roof of the felze. When she looked at him like that, her huge eyes full of loathing, she made him feel like a beast. Glancing up, he caught Tommaso’s cheeky grin. Swearing again, he ducked into the cabin and sat down beside her.
Although he could feel her shivering, she had not touched the cloak, but sat staring at it. With an impatient sound, he picked it up and slung it quickly around her, forcing himself not to allow his hands to linger. Then he leaned back into the corner and closed his eyes.
Gradually Chiara stopped shivering beneath the soft woolen fabric of the cloak. Letting her head fall back against the cushioned back of the bench, she closed her eyes. Why did this evil, cruel man show her compassion, generosity? Those small flashes of kindness made her doubt what her eyes told her was true.
Again she gathered all her power and probed. But it was as if a black curtain had descended before her sight. She was exhausted, she comforted herself. She had exhausted herself in body and spirit tonight. Surely when she had rested, her sight would be clear and true again.
Since her sight could not help her, she opened her eyes and slanted a look toward him. A thin band of light from the lantern on the stern crept in through the narrow window on the back of the cabin, illuminating his profile.
Again her heart jolted against her rib cage. She had not been mistaken. It was him. It could be no other. Maybe his hair was longer now and the cruelty in his eyes hidden under his charm, but the face was the same. The horror, the revulsion flooded over her anew, almost obliterating the pull of his beauty.
Luca felt her eyes on his as he might have felt a touch of her hand. Turning his head, he looked at her.
“Why do you look at me as if I were the very devil?” It hurt him, he realized with surprise and displeasure. Deep inside him was a place she could touch at will. A place she could ease as effortlessly as she could hurt it. But she said nothing and only stared back at him.
“Ah, yes. You’ve told me that I am supposed to know why.” He laughed mirthlessly. “Well, perhaps I will learn it by and by.”
The gondola bumped gently against wood and Chiara started.
“We’re here.”
There was the scrape of a key in a lock and the grating sound of rusty hinges. The gondola slid into a vaulted, shadowy entry, lit by a single torch, the smell of burning pitch mingling with the smells of dampness and decay.
Within moments Chiara was standing on the slippery stones, watching the gondola glide back out onto the dark canal. A silent servant closed the water gate, the hollow clank of metal on metal sounding like a final judgment.
It was done, she thought, as she looked through the gate’s intricate wrought iron design that allowed a teasing glimpse of the dark canal and freedom. Now she was truly his prisoner.
Despair welled up within her, but she fought it. It was fate, she told herself, and for a purpose that this man had been put in her path. She could not believe that she was here only to be used by him. Perhaps it was a bounty given her by fate. An opportunity for a revenge she had not hoped for.
Yes, she thought. She would defer the revenge she would take upon her father. But this revenge that fate was putting into her hands would be hers. And soon.
“Welcome to the Ca’ Zeani, Chiara.”
She stiffened at the soft, mocking words but refused to look at him. Even as he took her arm and led her up a stone staircase, she kept her eyes stubbornly averted from his face.
Luca closed the door to his apartments and leaned back against it.
“Don Luca!” The servant who had looked after his needs since he was a boy, jumped up from the chair where he had been dozing and came running up to him.
“Santa Madonna! What has happened to you?” he demanded. “Were you set upon?” His gaze slid over to the girl who stood next to his master then back to Luca.
“A minor scuffle.” He pushed away from the door. “Now listen.”
Chiara watched him give his orders to his servant. Watched him give the man a familiar, friendly clap on the shoulder. It occurred to her that he treated his servant with more courtesy than her father had accorded her mother.
“Signore, let me care for your wounds.”
“Later, Rico. Go now.”
When the door had closed behind the servant, Luca walked to a round table inlaid with alabaster and serpentine that he had brought back from Constantinople and poured himself a glass of wine. As he raised it to his lips, he felt Chiara’s gaze upon him and remembered how cold her skin had been to his touch.
Turning around he walked to where she stood, still wrapped awkwardly in his cloak.
“Here.” He thrust the goblet at her.
She reached for it before she remembered that she wanted no more kindnesses from this man. Pulling her hand back, she shook her head.
“Have it your way.” Lifting the wineglass, Luca drank deeply without taking his eyes off her face.
Chiara felt herself grow warm under his gaze. She wanted to look away, but pride would not allow it.
“Where do you come from?”
“Gypsies come from everywhere.” She shrugged. “And nowhere.”
He acknowledged the evasion with a nod. “But you’re only half a Gypsy.”
“In my heart I am pure Gypsy.” Even as she spoke the words, she knew she was lying. She remembered too well how it had been for the short time they had traveled with the Gypsy caravan. She had been almost as much an outsider as the gadjé, the pale-skinned men and women, who had come to have their fortunes told. It galled her to see the faint amusement in his eyes that told her he knew it, too.
“But your eyes are not Gypsy eyes,” he said softly. “They are the color of the sea when the sun is upon it.” He tipped his glass toward her. “To your eyes, Chiara.”
His words, the mellow sound of his voice touched her, no matter how she tried to deny it. She watched him put the goblet of cobalt blue glass to his lips again, watched his throat move as he swallowed the wine and she felt something flicker to life within her. She had never felt it before, but she knew instinctively that this was the heat a woman felt for a man.
As the horror washed over her, she spun her head away from him. How could she feel this for him? What kind of monster was she? No wonder her sight had deserted her.
Luca saw the spark and, eager to see it again, he lifted a hand to her face to turn it back toward him. Just as he was about to touch her, the door opened to admit a procession of servants carrying buckets of water and bed linens.
Luca stepped back from her and gestured his manservant over. “Rico will take you to your room now.”
She turned to look at him then, but her gaze was as cold as yesterday’s ashes. He wondered if he had imagined that one flare of heat.
“Rico, this is Chiara. She’s my—”
She looked at the manservant, her chin lifted in defiance of the hated word.
“My guest.”
Her eyes widened in surprise. She looked back at Luca, but he had turned away. Silently she followed the servant.
Luca stood in front of the mirror in its ornate gilt frame that stretched from the mantel of the fireplace almost to the ceiling, watching her progress until the door had closed behind her. As he turned away, he caught sight of his reflection. Dio, she had managed to carve him up nicely, he thought. He touched the scratches on his face, then the sticky, scarlet stain on the shredded silver lace at his throat. He laughed with something like admiration. He need feel no guilt, he assured himself. She would be a worthy adversary.
“I left the women with her,” Rico said. “May I tend to your wounds now?”
Luca nodded and began to shrug out of his coat.
A fire burned brightly in the fireplace that was edged with pale yellow marble, but a chilly edge still remained in the room. Chiara pulled a coverlet of sapphire-colored silk off the bed and, hugging it around her, walked over to the window.
Below her the canal wound like a wide black ribbon. Moonlight and the flickering torches that were fastened to the walls of some of the houses made reflections of gold and silver on its surface. She tried the bar that closed the window. To her surprise it opened easily and she pulled the casements open and leaned out.
Somewhere there was the echo of music and voices and faint laughter. She looked down to where the water was lapping gently against stone and wood. The water came flush up to the foundations so that the house seemed to be growing out of the canal. A narrow wooden dock surrounded by striped mooring posts was built out over the water. Tied to one of the posts, a lone gondola, coffin like under its cover of dark canvas, rocked gently.
“It’s a long way down. If you’re contemplating jumping, I wouldn’t advise it.”
Chiara started at the sound of his voice. Slowly she straightened and turned to face him.
They stared at each other in silence as his manservant placed a tray on the table and unloaded platters of food and dishes before scurrying out of the room.
Without taking his eyes off her, Luca reached behind him and turned the key in the lock. Then he tucked it into the pocket of his robe of dark blue silk.
Understanding the message well, Chiara stiffened as she waited for him to come toward her, but he remained where he was and merely looked at her.
“Well?” she finally demanded, unnerved by his stillness, his silence. “Am I clean enough for you now?” When he gave her no answer, she tilted up her chin. “I would not have thought that a thing like that mattered for a man like you.”
He still did not speak, but he began to walk toward her then. When he stopped in front of her, he looked at her for a long moment before he spoke.
“And how is a man like me?”
His face was calm, his eyes seeming to carry only a faint interest in whatever she had to say, but she could feel the edgy anger within him.
She shrugged. “As I have seen him this evening.”
“Seen with your sight?”
Her eyes narrowed a little as she wondered if he somehow knew that what her sight told her was in discord with what she saw with her eyes.
“My sight? No.” She shook her head. “I need only my eyes to know what manner of man would mark a woman’s skin like this.” She pulled back the sleeves of her nightgown and held out her hands.
The bruises that marred the skin at her wrists had Luca’s stomach turning over in disgust with himself. Perhaps he was not a murderer like Matteo, but the same mad, wicked blood flowed in his veins. Slowly he reached up and cradled her hands in his.
“I’m sorry,” he said softly as he raised his gaze. Then, his eyes on hers, he lifted her hand and pressed his lips against the marks he had made.
A treacherous pleasure drifted through her. She jerked her hands, but to her annoyance found herself too weak to pull them out of his grasp.
“Stop it.” Her breath hitched. “What are you doing?”
“Soothing a hurt. Apologizing. Making amends. Doing penance.” He shifted his head and stroked his lips over her other wrist. “Take your pick.”
“Stop touching me.”
He smiled. “That wasn’t one of the choices.” His eyes still on hers, he touched his tongue to her skin.
“Don’t.”
“Don’t what? Touch you? Kiss you? Taste you?”
His warm breath flowed over her skin like a caress. Her body was betraying her, she thought. How could she feel pleasure and excitement from this man’s touch when it was horror and revulsion that he roused within her?
“Don’t do anything,” she said. “Let me go.”
“I’m touching you, but I’m not holding you.” He pressed his mouth against the pulse point of her wrist and was rewarded by the pounding of her blood against his lips. “All you have to do is step away.”
She wasn’t held captive, Chiara realized. She was captivated. Captivated by his touch, by the warmth in his eyes that promised every earthly delight. She felt the pleasure race through her in tandem with the loathing as if they were two halves of the same whole. Panic licked at her as flames lick at parchment.
He must be truly evil, she thought. He must have sold his soul to the devil to be given this power to enchant, to seduce, although she knew him to be capable of the vilest abomination.
She closed her eyes, gathered all her strength and lifted her hands from his.
Luca watched her, felt her tremble as she might under a heavy weight. And he smiled, although his own desire was so sharp that it slashed at him as fiercely as her dagger had slashed at him an hour before. It would not be easy, he thought. But it would be worth it.
He took a step back from her and then another.
“Come,” he said softly. “Rico has brought us some food.”
Chiara felt the warmth from his body recede and she opened her eyes, hating herself for her own weakness.
“Come,” he repeated. “You must be hungry.” He smiled. “I know I am.”
The merest hint of sensual suggestion tinged his smile. Forcing herself to look away from him, she crossed the room toward the table.
Luca picked up the silk coverlet that had slipped from her shoulders and followed her.
Chapter Five
As the delicious scents rose toward Chiara, she twisted her hands in the folds of her nightgown to prevent herself from rushing toward the table and stuffing handfuls of food into her mouth. She’d eaten nothing for the past three days but some bread and cheese the man on the burchiello, the barge that had brought her to Venice, had given her and an apple she had stolen that afternoon from a street vendor’s basket
Because the enormity of her hunger was like a beast within her, she sat down and took a deep breath before she reached for a piece of bread. She began to eat, forcing herself to break off small pieces of the bread.
Luca watched her eat with a steadiness that indicated both extreme hunger and extreme control.
“Here.” He stopped behind her and slid the coverlet around her shoulders. This time he allowed his hands to linger for a moment. “It’s still chilly in here. This room hasn’t been used for a long time.”
Chiara pulled it around her closely and tied it in a loose, large knot.
“You mean, you don’t bring women here every night?” She glanced at him over her shoulder.
“No.” He sat down and, in an attempt to keep his hands to himself, picked up a slice of cheese. “But if you truly had the sight, you would not need to ask that.”
Her hand paused an inch from her mouth. “I do not waste my sight on what has no importance.”
“I see.” He leaned back with a mocking smile. “And I suppose it was important for you to use your sight to peer into the lives of a few indolent patricians?”
“I needed the money,” she said simply.
“What for?”
For my sister. For Donata, whom you raped and turned into a lunatic. The words were on the tip of her tongue, but she swallowed them and merely shrugged.
“So tell me,” he drawled. “What else do you do for money?”
Chiara heard the mocking insinuation in his voice and her fingers tightened on her fork. Resolutely she kept her eyes on her plate, knowing that if she looked at him now, she would not be able to control herself.
“I do what I must,” she said quietly. “But I have never lain with a man for money.”
“There’s always the first time.”
She raised her eyes now and met his. “But that time is not going to be with you.”
The moment the words were said, she stilled, remembering that snatch of a vision she had had when he had kissed her. If the vision was true, she thought with horror, it would not be for money that she lay with him. Nor for revenge.
Fighting against the memory of the vision and her own words, she sent him a cool look and returned to her food.
Damn her, Luca thought. Damn her pride and the way she cleverly mimicked aloofness when he knew she was anything but indifferent to him. He had felt her respond to him, damn it. He had felt it.
He splashed wine into two goblets of indigo-colored glass, lifted one, emptied it and filled it again.
“I will have you, money or no. And you will be willing,” he said, his voice soft and urgent. “Here.” He pushed a goblet toward her. “Let us drink to that.”
“No, thank you.”
“Drink.”
His voice had hardened and Chiara looked up at him. Traces of the fury she had seen earlier were in his eyes. Even as she took stock of it, she sensed the struggle within him. Sensed how he fought to harness the wildness within himself that was flaring like fire in a forest of dry pines.
Slowly she picked up the goblet. Not because he had ordered her to do so, but because she needed the time to come to terms with what she had sensed.
She took a stingy sip and then another one before she set down the goblet.
“Is the wine not to your taste?”
“It’s fine.”
“Then why do you not drink as much as you would like?” he demanded. “Are you trying to keep your head clear?” As if in defiance, he lifted his goblet to his lips and drank deeply.
“Yes,” she said cautiously, and edged her chair back. “Yes, I am.”
“Why?” He leaned a little closer and picked up the ends of the coverlet around her shoulders to toy with the silk fringe. “Do you think you can escape?”
She would not even try to escape, she thought. Fate had put her here. And fate would give her her revenge. And the price? What will be the price of revenge? a voice within her whispered. But she knew that whatever the price, she would pay it.
“No, I know I cannot escape.” she said.
“That’s very wise of you.” He wound a length of blue silk around his hand. “Then why do you want to keep a clear head?” He gave the coverlet a tug, bringing her to the edge of her chair. “Are you afraid the wine will make you willing?”
“Wine can make me weak, but it can never make me willing.” She closed her hands over the soft linen of her nightgown. “Nothing can make me willing.”
“You’re wrong. I can make you willing and we both know it.”
He had leaned close enough so that she could feel the warmth of his breath on her lips. Already she could feel her body softening. He could do it, she thought desperately. He could make her body willing. But surely never her spirit. Never her mind. Never her soul.
As if he could read her mind, he smiled. “And you do feel. No matter how you lie about it, I make you feel.” Rising, he twisted yet another length of silk around his hand, pulling her onto her feet so that she stood flush against him.
As her body made contact with his, Chiara felt a jolt of fear so strong that for a moment she lost all awareness, as if she had slipped into a faint or a trance. But as the fear faded, she felt the waves of Luca’s emotions breaking against her like waves break upon the beach.
It did not occur to her that she had thought of him by name for the first time.
The violence she had felt earlier was still there, but it only hovered at the edge like a banished spectator. Desire was there, strong and hot, and need, deep and powerful. The need of a man for a woman. The need of one human being for another.
Confused, she shook her head. How could he hide his evil so smoothly? She had no doubt that he could feel desire, but how could there be such true, deep need within a man such as this?
Against the back of his hand, Luca felt the soft give of her breasts, the pounding of her heart. He saw how fear flashed into her eyes, but only for a moment. Then he saw confusion there and surprise. And something softer that was gone before he could identify it.
Dio, he wanted her. Desire swept through him. Had he ever wanted, had he ever needed a woman so badly? Unable to resist, he lowered his mouth to hers.
He was holding her so close, so tightly that she could not move away. Unable to do more, Chiara turned her head aside so that his mouth missed her lips and brushed her cheek instead. She felt his fingers cup her chin and she tensed.
But his fingers did not tighten. Nor did he try to turn her mouth back to his. Instead, his thumb stroked her skin while his lips drifted to her ear. Nudging her still-damp hair aside, he kissed his way along the contours of her ear. Chiara heard herself sigh.
Again he traced the contours of her ear, this time with his tongue. When Chiara heard herself make a sound like a hungry kitten, she remembered where she was. And just who it was that was touching her.
How could she respond to him like this? She knew what brutality, what cruelty he was capable of committing. She had heard his mocking laughter as Donata had screamed m terror. She had seen the gleam of evil in his eyes. No matter how well he hid it now behind a mask of gentleness, she knew what manner of man he was.
“Let me go.”
He let her go so swiftly that her legs gave way. Biting back a cry, she managed to grasp the edge of the table for support. Relief and surprise warred with anger. Anger at him. But most of all, anger at herself and at her own weakness.
“As you wish, my dear.”
Chiara straightened, hoping that her legs would hold her up. The fact that they did had some of her audacity returning. “I thank you for your generosity.” She inclined her head in a mocking little bow.
“And so you should. Believe me, it would have been quite easy to ignore your plea—” he laughed “—and concentrate instead on those tempting female noises you made.”
His eyebrows lifted in a mocking curve, giving him the aspect of a fallen angel. Chiara said nothing, but she could feel heat flooding into her face. Heat from the way his closeness stirred her senses. Heat from his soft laugh that seemed to make tender promises. Heat from the shame that filled her because he could make her feel this way.
“You see it as a weakness. Perhaps I should not tell you this, but it is a great strength.” His voice softened, lowered. “Do you know how much power it gives you over a man, when you respond to him like that? Even when it is against your will. Especially when it is against your will.”
Reaching out, he drew a single finger down her throat and let it rest in the hollow at its base. “Do you have any idea how it makes a man feel to know he can make your pulse beat like a drum, even though you would rather take a knife to him.”
His last words had Chiara’s gaze skittering down to his chest where the deep V-shaped neck of his robe exposed the wound she had made with her knife.
“You should put a poultice on that so it doesn’t become inflamed.” The words were out before she could stop them and she bit her lip.
“I’m touched by your care.”
She tried to counteract her incautious words with an insolent shrug. Her movement had his finger shifting in the hollow of her throat and she tensed against her involuntary shiver of pleasure.
Luca felt her tremble. Because he wanted badly to cup her neck and draw her toward him, he let his hand fall to his side and took a step back.
“Ah, Chiara, what am I going to do with you?” He looked at her for a long moment. “No suggestions? No requests?”
Chiara met his gaze. There was a sort of tired amusement in his eyes and a kindness that she found herself responding to, even as she had responded to his touch, his kiss. God help her, she thought. How could she fight against him, when he could make her forget who he was so easily?
“Well?”
She shook her head. “No suggestions.”
“Then I will wish you a good-night.” He paused. “Don’t get any ideas about making a ladder of your sheets. Your window will be guarded.”
“Don’t worry. I will not try to escape.” The minute the words were out of her mouth, she saw his eyes narrow with suspicion and knew she had made a mistake.
“At least not tonight,” she corrected quickly, looking away from his sharp gaze.
“What plan are you hatching in that sly Gypsy head of yours?” he demanded. “Look at me.”
Sullenly she obeyed him but said nothing.
“I’ll find out by and by.”
Yes, Chiara swore silently, you will find out. No matter how you can make me feel, you will find out and you will pay.
His eyes still on hers, he picked up her hand and pressed his mouth against the bruises he had left on her wrist.
“It is not my way to touch a woman’s skin with so heavy a hand as to mark it.” Pleased, he felt her pulse jump. “This you will find out by and by.”
Chiara stood very still and watched him leave the room without once looking back.
He had to be in league with the Supreme Evil to be so powerful, she thought. Her body still warm, her blood still pounding, she sank down where she stood and prayed incoherently, desperately for the strength to resist him.
She awoke to the clatter of dishes and the sinfully tempting fragrance of rich chocolate. Remembering where she was, she sat up quickly.
“Good morning.”
“Good morning.” Chiara returned the serving girl’s smile.
“Come and eat your breakfast. The dressmaker is coming in an hour.”
“The dressmaker?” Chiara slid down from the bed and padded over to the table. “Whatever for?” Greedily she broke off a piece of the fresh, crusty bread.
“Don Luca has ordered that a dressmaker come to fit you with new clothes.”
“I don’t want any new clothes. I have my own clothes.” She looked around the room. “Where are they?”
“They’re gone. Don Luca said they should be burned.” She made a vague gesture toward the door.
Chiara jumped up, ready to storm, but then she saw the girl take a step back. There was no sense in raging at this poor girl, she thought, and there was no sense bewailing something she could not do anything about.
Slowly she sat back down and picked up the bread she had tossed down onto the plate.
“Do you need anything else?” the girl asked in a cautious voice.
She shook her head and, when the girl turned to leave, she grasped her arm. “What is your name?”
“Zanetta.”
“Sit down, Zanetta, and tell me about—” her tongue almost tripped over the polite address “—Don Luca.”
The girl darted a glance over to the door and sat down on the very edge of a chair. “Don’t you know him?” she asked, her eyes curious. “The whole house is talking about you,” she added.
“I can imagine.” Chiara took another bite of bread spread with butter and honey and almost closed her eyes with the sheer pleasure of it.
“Rico, Don Luca’s manservant, says you are his guest. Some whisper you must be his mistress. One of the footmen heard Don Luca arguing with Don Alvise and Signora Emilia.” The words came out in a rush.
“Who are they?”
“Don Luca’s older brother and his wife. He is a good master, but strict.” She paused, as if considering her next words. “He said he would not allow a loose woman under his roof.”
Chiara felt a flash of pain as she remembered how her father had cast her mother out into the street with those same words.
“And you, Zanetta?” she asked. “What do you think?”
“I don’t know.” The girl twisted her fingers nervously at her waist. “But if you are his mistress—” Her mouth curved in a mischievous smile “—then you have chosen a beautiful man. Not like—”
There was the sound of footsteps outside the door and the girl jumped up.
“I must go now.” Curtsying quickly, she moved toward a door that Chiara had not noticed the night before. As the girl opened the door, Chiara caught a glimpse of a corridor. Thinking to explore, she rose, but immediately heard the key turn in the lock.
So everyone was locking her in, she thought, even the servants.
She had barely finished breakfast when the corridor door opened and Zanetta returned, followed by a plain woman wearing a severe brown gown. Several maids carrying gowns, hoops and bolts of fabric trailed after them.
The woman immediately marched up to Chiara, briefly mustered her up and said, “Take off your nightgown so that we can measure you.”
She snapped her fingers and one of the maids came running up carrying a shift. “Put this on.” She fluttered her fingers, first at the flimsy undergarment, then at Chiara. “Quickly now. I don’t have all day.”
Chiara began to protest but thought better of it. After all, if her own clothes had really been burned, she would need something to wear. She quickly exchanged the nightgown for the thin shift and the maids swarmed around her to take her measurements.
“The yellow gown.” The dressmaker gestured at the maids behind her and they came running like well-trained soldiers, carrying the gown and the necessary accoutrements.
Chiara took one look at the gown of yellow silk, the hoop and corset and stepped back. “No.”
“You’re right.” The dressmaker gave her an approving nod. “Yellow makes you look sallow. The blue one.”
The yellow silk was exchanged for pale blue satin.
Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.
Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».
Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию (https://www.litres.ru/nina-beaumont/the-shadowed-heart/) на ЛитРес.
Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.
Nina Beaumont
Luca Zeani Had The Face Of A Fallen Angel… . It was a face Chiara had never forgotten, for it belonged to the man who had ruined her sister - the man she had vowed to destroy. But though she burned with vengeance, Luca's passionate kisses ignited a hotter flame that made her his captive in body and soul.Could the whisperings of her wayward heart lead her to the light of truth, or was she forever destined to love a man of darkness?
“I’m afraid.” (#ued75312b-ac4a-5c58-aa4d-9bf7258fac41)Letter to Reader (#u302ff5a6-89a3-585d-9476-fe7131c3e35d)Title Page (#u730debb1-6021-5d6c-85d9-5723e24c1e5b)Dedication (#uc20d119f-c75f-53f1-8002-2964388cf4e3)About the Author (#u4b302386-6cae-5f85-853c-ec725d6020d3)ACKNOWLEDGMENTS (#uf6f5e45d-8bc2-555c-8fac-753682d8bdc8)Chapter One (#u4084c82f-7e6a-5354-89a7-3421c83b3786)Chapter Two (#u1a414e3c-d2e9-5ae8-90a2-135073eacdbc)Chapter Three (#u4cf36c4d-7fa7-595e-964b-b915a3eb54cb)Chapter Four (#u460deb55-d9d3-541b-826b-7da02d51786a)Chapter Five (#u8c543cf5-69db-5f92-a0a8-c4efc7c15873)Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Twelve (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Thirteen (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Fourteen (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Fifteen (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Sixteen (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Seventeen (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Eighteen (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Nineteen (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Twenty (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Twenty-One (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Twenty-Two (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Twenty-Three (#litres_trial_promo)Epilogue (#litres_trial_promo)Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
“I’m afraid.”
Even as Chiara spoke, she wondered that the words slipped off her tongue so easily. Never in her life had she opened herself this way to another. Never in her life had she confessed a weakness to another.
“Of me?” Luca asked.
“Of you. Of myself. Of the confusion in my mind.” She lowered her head into her hands. “Everything used to be so clear. I knew my path. I knew what I had to do.” She pulled in an unsteady breath. “Now nothing is clear. Nothing.”
That wasn’t quite true, she thought. It was clear that there was something between them. Something deep and real, far beyond her fears, her visions.
Something she was afraid to look at more closely....
Dear Reader,
Next month, Harlequin Historicals
turns ten years old! But we have such a terrific lineup this month, we thought we’d start celebrating early. To begin, longtime historical author Nina Beaumont returns this month with The Shadowed Heart, set in eighteenth-century Europe. In this suspenseful story, our beautiful gypsy heroine seeks revenge against the man she believes harmed her sister. She finds him, only she senses that he can’t be the one, especially when she finds herself falling in love with him....
Also out for revenge is Jesse Kincaid, of MONTANA MAVERICKS: RETURN TO WHITEHORN fame, when he kidnaps his enemy’s mail-order bride in Wild West Wife, by bestselling Silhouette
author Susan Mallery. In A Warrior’s Honor, the next medieval in Margaret Moore’s popular WARRIOR SERIES, a knight is tricked by a fellow nobleman into abducting a beautiful lady, but, guided by honor—and love—vows to rescue her from his former friend.
Laurie Grant, who is known for her stirring Medievals and gritty Westerns, returns with a delightful new story. The Duchess and the Desperado. Here, a rancher turned fugitive inadvertently becomes a bodyguard to the very visible Duchess of Malvern when her life is threatened during a goodwill tour of the American West.
Whatever your tastes in reading, you’ll be sure to find a romantic journey back to the past between the covers of a Harlequin Historical
.
Sincerely,
Tracy Farrell
Senior Editor
Please address questions and book requests to:
Harlequin Reader Service
U.S.: 3010 Walden Ave., P.O. Box 1325, Buffalo, NY 14269
Canadian: P.O. Box 609, Fort Erie, Ont. L2A 5X3
The Shadowed Heart
Nina Beaumont
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
To Kathy Ketonen Clark, my “Dearest Roommate.”
Thanks for making life in Room 423 easy
and for all the years of friendship since.
NINA BEAUMONT
is of Russian parentage and has a family tree that includes Count Stroganoff and a Mongolian Khan. A real cosmopolitan, she was born in Salzburg and grew up in Massachusetts before moving to Austria, where she lived for twenty-five years.
Although she has relocated to the Seattle area, her European ties are still strong, so she plans to stick with the exotic settings she has had the opportunity to get to know firsthand.
Books and music are her first loves, but she also enjoys painting watercolors and making pottery.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
My thanks to Karen David of Cleveland, OH,
Maria Lujan de Peralta and Phoenix of Seattle, WA, and
Rita Louise of Everett, WA, for the information they
shared with me regarding clairvoyance.
Chapter One
Venice, October 1767, the first day of Carnival
Chiara’s hand stole toward the slim dagger concealed at her waist as the man who held her arm tightly turned her away from the brightly lit Piazza San Marco. Her breath quickened shghtly as he steered her down a shadowy passageway, which was just wide enough for three people to walk abreast, but the handle of the weapon dug comfortingly into the palm of her hand and kept panic at bay.
If he noticed her apprehension, the man ignored it as he hurried her along. Finally he stopped in front of a door, the wood faded and cracked with age and moisture. Raising his hand, he knocked twice with his fist.
“We’re here,” he announced, giving her a fleeing look.
“You told me that you would take me to the house of a great lady.” Chiara wrenched her arm out of his grasp and shifted away, prepared to run or to use her dagger, whichever seemed more expedient. “I do not believe that a great lady would go near such a miserable place.”
The man looked down at the girl. The flickering light of the single lantern that hung above the door gave her skin a sallow cast, but he had seen it in daylight and knew that it had the golden color of a ripe apricot. The eyes of a startling blue were wary but held no fear.
She had spirit, he thought. He would keep her for a while and she would make him a nice sum. And when he was done with her, there were plenty of back-alley pimps who would take her off his hands. He felt a small flash of guilt, but it was easy to suppress it with the image of his daughter, who lay still in her bed no matter what new and expensive treatments the doctor invented for her.
“It is as I told you. This is the casino of Signora Giulietta Baldini, the widow of Ser Luigi Baldini.” He had no trouble injecting a smooth confidence into his voice, for—this time—he happened to be telling the truth.
“If you were from Venice,” he continued, “you would know that he was a very rich man. And you would know that Venetian ladies receive guests in their homes only on formal occasions. They have little houses like this one where their guests can enjoy themselves as they please in more intimate surroundings.” His fleshy mouth curved in a mocking grin. “But isn’t that something you should know? If you truly have the sight, that is?” He reached for her arm.
“I see what is given to me to see. Sometimes it is a great deal and sometimes it is nothing at all.” Chiara evaded his grasp. “Having the sight does not make me all-knowing.”
The man laughed, the sound echoing a little between the high buildings. “You don’t have to be all-knowing, little one.”
In fact, he thought, it was better for her that she was not. He leaned down toward her, his movement distracting her from the hand that snaked out from beneath his voluminous black cloak to curl tightly around her arm.
“All you have to do is tell a few fortunes like you did in the piazza this afternoon.” She had wrapped a shabby black shawl tightly around her, but an expanse of pale skin remained visible above the small gathered ruffle of her blouse and his gaze skimmed approvingly over her. “And be pleasant to Signora Giulietta’s guests.”
The door opened with a creak and Chiara turned to see a footman in costly green-and-gold livery holding a large candelabra.
“You are late, Manelli. Signora Giulietta is getting impatient.” The footman turned sharply and moved toward the narrow staircase.
Her fingers on the hilt of her dagger, Chiara allowed herself to be pulled into the small entry.
A small table with curved legs, chairs upholstered in rich, wine red velvet and expensive candles in gilt sconces on the walls gave some small reassurance that this house was indeed that of a great lady. Laughter and the sound of a mandolin drifted down the stairs, together with the scent of coffee, perfume and warm candle wax.
She thought of the coins she had earned today and tucked into the shabby purse she wore around her waist. She thought of the coins she had been promised for the evening’s work and how they would enable her to pay for her sister’s care at the small farm she had found near Padua. But, most of all, she thought of how it brought her one step closer to finding her father and getting the revenge that had been the focus of her life for more than two years.
She lifted her eyes to the florid face of the man the footman had called Manelli. “Let go of my arm,” she said softly.
As Manelli looked into the girl’s eyes, they lost all expression until they became as blank as glass.
She sensed greed and an almost casual brutishness, but the anxiety she sensed was stronger than either one so she looked at that more closely. An image rose of a young woman lying in a bed. She saw the woman sit up and hold out her hand. “Babbo, ” the woman said and smiled.
Chiara blinked and focused on Manelli’s face. He had grown a little pale beneath the ruddiness and she gave a satisfied little nod.
Manelli watched the strange light fade from the girl’s eyes. He felt an icy chill along his back and told himself that it was only the October wind blowing in from the still-open door. “Don’t worry. Your daughter will be healthy again.” Manelli was staring at her. Then she saw a desperate hope seep into his eyes and she smiled. “It is so,” she said. “I have seen it.”
Turning, she moved to follow the footman up the stairs toward the blazing lights.
Irritated by Giulietta’s inane chatter, Luca Zeani turned away and slung one leg carelessly over the arm of his chair. Picking up a mandolin, he plucked its strings absently. He heard the tinkle of coins in the next room and briefly considered joining one of the games. Perhaps a few hands of faraone at high stakes would speed his pulse a bit and burn off the indolence that had crept into his blood since his return to Venice.
But the languor that seemed to infect all of Venice kept him in his chair, his long, slender fingers idly strumming the mandolin. His half-open eyes were fixed on a gilded stucco border near the ceiling, but what he saw was the sunlit blue of the open sea.
The ache of longing for the sharp, clean air of the sea drifted through him, but even that did not rouse him from the languidness. It was so easy to give oneself to pleasure in this city where no one seemed to think of anything else.
The atmosphere of temptation and sensuality gripped you like a fever, he mused, making the pleasures offered the only reality. More real than the fact that he was in Venice to speak to the Great Council in the name of Admiral Angelo Emo, demanding more men and ships to fight the Barbary pirates. More real than the masked man who had approached him to speak seductively of freedom and renewed vigor for the sickly Venetian Republic.
Luca saw Giulietta rise from her seat beside him, and he gave a small sigh of relief. She was very beautiful and in bed she was as accomplished as a high-priced courtesan, but she was a tiresome woman. The showy necklace of rubies and diamonds that he had thought to give her as a parting gift had been in a cabinet in his apartments for weeks, but somehow it always seemed simpler to allow things to go on as they were.
When he felt the touch on his shoulder, Luca looked up in surprise, not having heard anyone approach him. But there was no one beside him.
Sitting up straight, he looked around him to see who could have touched him. Across from him, an elderly man dozed in his chair and, on his other side, a masked couple was engaged in such fervid flirtation that they seemed in imminent danger of forgetting that they were in public.
He looked across the room to where Giulietta stood speaking to a heavyset man and a tall young woman who was wearing a multicolored skirt that molded her hips—and again felt a touch. But this time he would have sworn that he felt the touch of a woman’s hand against his skin just above his heart.
Putting the mandolin aside, he leaned forward, his hands propped on his ivory-colored silk breeches. Deliberately he met the young woman’s gaze. She was staring at him with such undisguised animosity that he stiffened, his own eyes narrowing.
Intrigued, he rose and sauntered to where Giulietta stood, cupping his hand around her neck more by habit than desire.
“What have we here?” he asked, never taking his gaze away from the girl’s eyes, which were the color of the Adriatic when the midday sun was upon it. Eyes that held hatred, more relentless and cold than he had ever encountered.
“A Gypsy fortune-teller. She will look into our guests’ future and then—” she paused and gave a malicious little laugh “—entertain them. An amusing little diversion, don’t you think, caro?” She looked up at Luca, leaning back to press her neck still more firmly against his fingers.
Giulietta’s words passed Luca by unheard as he stared into the girl’s eyes. He had made his share of enemies in his twenty-seven years, but he had never seen such loathing, not even over the point of a sword.
For the first time in weeks he felt the prickle of real excitement. A riddle to solve, he thought. A riddle involving a woman whose face would have done justice to one of Titian’s portraits. As he tore his gaze away from her eyes to allow it to drift over her, he felt an absurd pleasure in her lack of artifice.
Her curls fell beyond her shoulders in a tangled black mass and had obviously never seen the creams and lotions Venetian women used to bleach their hair to a fashionable blond color. Her lips, the color of strawberries, needed no rouge. Her golden skin was untouched by powder and, instead of a beauty patch, there was a smudge of dirt on her cheek.
He felt his body tighten with that first, pure, sweet rush of arousal, untainted by skillful tricks or stimulants. His gaze returned to her eyes.
They were still trained on him, but they were strangely unfocused now as if she were looking far beyond his face. Baffled by the sudden change, he found his interest piqued still further. This was definitely a puzzle he wanted to solve.
It was him. Chiara stared over the lady’s shoulder, not quite believing what she was seeing. That hair the color of ripe wheat, unpowdered and uncurled in defiance of fashion, merely tied back carelessly with a dark ribbon. That chiseled, perfect profile.
No, she thought, shaking her head to clear it. She must be mistaken. She could not possibly have the good fortune to stumble across the man she hated so fiercely. Perhaps even more than she hated her father.
Then he turned to face her and she knew that she had not been mistaken. There could not be another mouth like that in the whole world, its sensuality promising both pleasure and cruelty. This is what Lucifer must have looked like, she thought. The fallen angel who had chosen to rule in hell rather than serve in heaven.
She watched him rise and come toward her and, despite her hatred, which was so real its bitter taste lay on her tongue, she found herself much too aware of the man’s beauty.
He stood in front of her, close enough that she could have reached out and touched him. Beneath the cover of her shawl, her hand moved to the dagger hidden in the folds of her clothes and touched the hilt. This dagger had spilled his blood once before and it would spill his blood again.
She drew her hand away from the metal with an effort. Not today, she told herself. She would have her revenge, she swore, but not today.
As she stared at him, the hatred inside her was suddenly pushed aside as if by an invisible hand and she heard a voice within her. The voice of the spirit that sometimes called to her, telling her to dip down to that shadowy region of impressions and images and look inside the man who stood before her.
She saw light. A clear, pure light like the rays of the rising sun. She searched for the darkness, for the evil that she was certain would be there. But all she saw was the light. Surely this was some kind of trick, a clever ruse to blind her. It was then that she saw it.
Behind the figure wreathed in light, she saw the dark apparition. She recognized his perfect features, his fine form. Recognized, too, the evil aura that surrounded the dark figure. The aura that was almost palpable.
So he was versed in the secrets of the occult, she thought. He had wanted to blind her with his light so that she would not see his darkness. But he would not succeed, she thought triumphantly, for she had seen the evil.
She pulled herself back to reality and saw that he was still looking at her. There was more than curiosity in his eyes. He was looking at her in the way that men looked at women.
But it was not the devilish, naked lust that she had seen that night in the Gypsy camp on the outskirts of a small town in Tuscany. The lust that had been glittering in his dark eyes even after he had slaked it on the unwilling body of her sister.
This time it appeared in a different guise. It was a desire that was far more subtle and seductive. For a fraction of a moment it reached out to touch her before she was able to draw back and protect herself against it
“Well, get on with it”
Giulietta’s sharp voice intruded into Luca’s sensual reverie. He watched the odd glow fade from the young Gypsy’s eyes. For a fraction of a moment before the hatred returned, he saw a softening, as if he had touched a string within her that had resonated with a harmonious sound.
“But get rid of that ugly black shawl of hers.”
The petulant tone of his mistress’s voice had Luca looking at her with irritation. It occurred to him that this was the strongest emotion that he had felt toward her in days. Perhaps it really was time to finally give her the ruby necklace and send her on her way.
“And you really could have cleaned her up a bit, Manelli.” The ivory sticks of her fan of fine painted parchment clattered as she waved it in front of Chiara’s face. “But I suppose some might find that wild, crude look appealing.” She shrugged. “Oh, well, just make sure my guests are well pleased, Manelli. I’m counting on you.”
Obediently Manelli plucked the shawl from Chiara’s shoulders and pulled her toward the first group of guests, who were already tittering expectantly.
Giulietta hooked her hand through Luca’s arm to take him away from the clutch of people who had drawn close together to hear what the young Gypsy had to say, but he resisted.
“You seem inordinately interested in her, caro.” Her rouged mouth pursed in a pout and she leaned close, inviting his caress.
“Wasn’t that what you wanted?” Luca raised an eyebrow. “To pique your guests’ interest?”
“But you’re not a guest, you are—”
He lifted a finger to her mouth to silence her and, extracting his arm from her grasp, shifted so that he could watch the young Gypsy’s face.
The guests crowded around her, thrusting their palms toward her, their voices raised in a babble of questions.
“I do not read palms.”
Luca straightened at the sound of her voice. It was low and husky for a girl so young. A voice that would go well with Gypsy fires.
“I cannot look at your whole life. You can ask me a question and if I am allowed to see the answer, I can tell you.”
Murmurs greeted her statement, which had been made in a clear voice that carried no apology.
“What a sham,” Giulietta hissed. “Manelli will not see a lira from me.”
Absently Luca shushed her as someone wearing a bautta, a kind of domino that was the simplest and most popular carnival disguise, stepped forward. The molded white mask covered the upper two thirds of the face and a black lace hood fell to the shoulders, making it impossible to say if the person beneath the disguise was a man or a woman.
The figure brieny lifted the black tricorn hat in a mocking salute and sketched a bow, revealing the dark silk breeches beneath the floor-length black cloak.
“Tell me, will the woman I love finally surrender?” The question was asked in a scratchy whisper.
Luca watched the young Gypsy’s eyes again grow unfocused, glassy. She went so completely still that she did not even seem to be breathing.
Minutes passed. Then Luca saw her chest move with a deep breath, saw her eyes lose that odd, empty expression.
“The woman you love will surrender many times,” she said. “But she will never surrender her heart.”
“Why not?” The scratchy whisper asked.
“Because her heart belongs only to herself.”
The figure made a gesture of disbelief with a gloved hand.
Chiara looked directly into the eyes visible through the slits of the mask. “No man will ever love you better than you love yourself, signora.”
Gasps of surprise and flustered giggles greeted her words.
Manelli gripped her arm and leaned close to her ear. “In Venice, the mask is to be respected above all things.”
Chiara wrenched her arm away and stepped away from the man’s smell of onions and cheap wine. “Those who do not want to know the truth should not ask me questions.”
“Leave the poor girl alone,” the masked figure said, the voice undisguised now and obviously female. “She spoke only the truth.”
The woman laughed, reached into a pocket and handed Chiara a gold coin. Then she turned sharply, her cloak belling out for a moment before it settled around her again, and strode toward the door.
There was a moment of stillness, for everyone had recognized the voice, although no one was impolite enough to acknowledge that openly. It was the fabulously wealthy and eccentric Signora Laura Paradini. Laura Paradini, who had broken every rule in an already permissive society. Laura Paradini, who had outlived three husbands while half the patrician women in Venice took the veil for lack of marriage-minded men.
Everyone in the room seemed to start talking simultaneously at this sign of approval and began to press closer to the Gypsy. Suddenly everyone was eager to have the Gypsy answer their questions.
But Chiara pushed her way past the people milling around her. She had to talk to the woman. For the few moments that she had looked inside this woman, she had felt the presence of her father. She had not seen him, but he had been there just the same.
She had to know if the woman knew him. Perhaps she was the key to finding him. Perhaps she was the key to her revenge.
“Signora!” Chiara reached the door to see that the woman was already halfway down the stairs. “Wait, please.”
The woman turned, her mask ghostly in the dim light. “I must hasten to find that surrender you promised me.” She raised her hand in a wave. “Perhaps we will meet again.” She waved again and ran down the stairs, her cloak floating behind her.
“What do you think you’re doing? Are you mad?” Manelli grabbed her, afraid that she would flee. He had already seen that Signora Giulietta was not pleased with him.
Chiara shook off his hands. She would find the woman, she swore to herself, and through her she would find her father—after she had wrought the vengeance that a kind fate had placed in her path. Her eyes searched out the blond man in the crowd.
Yes, she thought as she returned to where the crowd stood waiting for her. Today had brought her good fortune, and vengeance—more vengeance than she had ever hoped for—would be hers.
His arms folded across his chest, Luca leaned against the wall that was covered with fine leather stamped with a delicate gold pattern. He had not taken his eyes off the girl for the past hour. He had watched her as she had seemed to descend time after time into some secret place, her eyes becoming unfocused and blank, her body growing as still as if she were dead. And when she moved again, she had every time said something that impressed the questioner with its accuracy.
He had always considered himself an enlightened, pragmatic man. A man who did not believe in the supernatural—not in Gypsy fortune-tellers, not in divine deities—so he was certain that this had to be some kind of a trick. And he was determined to find out just what her trick was.
And why did she look at him with such hatred in her eyes? Perhaps he could change the hatred to something softer. He acknowledged the excitement she aroused in him. Acknowledged it and relished it. It had been a long time since he had felt anything so strong or real.
“No! That is untrue what you say there!” The voice rose hysterically over the hum of conversation. “I will have you turned over to the Inquisitors—”
Giulietta moved quickly toward the shouting man, her hooped skirts of oyster-shell colored satin making her look like a caravel in full sail.
“But, my dear Savini, how can you get so worked up about the words of a silly little Gypsy.” She wound her arm around his and tugged him away, at the same time signaling Manelli with her eyes. “Would you expect her to speak Gospel?” She smiled up at him. “Now I have a little proposal for you on how we shall resolve this.” Leaning closer, she began to whisper in his ear.
Luca watched how Giulietta skillfully soothed the disturbance. Within moments, she had poor Savini under her spell. The guests had dispersed around the room and were drinking coffee and brandy again, gossiping desultorily as if nothing unusual had happened. And Manelli had bundled the Gypsy girl off to one of the small side rooms.
Luca pushed away from the wall and followed them.
Chapter Two
“Are you insane?” Manelli shouted. “How can you speak of such things as alchemy?”
Luca stepped into the room and closed the door behind him so softly that neither Manelli nor the girl heard him.
“I know nothing of al-alchemy.” Chiara stumbled over the unfamiliar word. “I only said what I saw. And I saw the man putting a black stone in a bowl of liquid and waiting for it to turn into gold.”
“Dio, stop it.” He pressed his hands to his ears. “Just listening to you would make me guilty in the eyes of the Inquisitors.”
“Why did you bring me here, if you did not wish me to speak the truth?” Chiara demanded. She wanted to run, but something kept her standing there, as if her feet had been planted in the ground. “Now I want the coins you promised me.” She held out her hand.
“Sei pazza! You’re crazy!” Manelli tapped his hand against his forehead. “You may have called down the Inquisitors upon my head.” He began to pace. “The bravest man trembles at the mere thought of the dungeons in the Doge’s palace. And now you—” he pointed a meaty finger at her “—you dare to ask for money?”
“You promised you would pay me to use the sight.” There was no petulance, no whining in her voice, only a resolute tenaciousness.
“Listen to me!” He stopped in front of her. “Be grateful if all I do is not pay you.”
Chiara stared up at him. Rage had lived within her since she was a child, watching her father treat her mother worse than he would treat a servant. Now it sprang to life, just as a smoldering fire springs into flame at a breath of air. Her arm brushed against the dagger at her waist, but it did not even occur to her to reach for it. She had a better weapon for this toad of a man.
“It would not go well for you to cheat me.” Her voice lowering, she shifted closer to him. “Do you know what Gypsies do to those who cheat them?”
Paling, Manelli retreated from her, making the sign against il malocchio, the evil eye, with forefinger and little finger of his right hand. “I—if you promise to do what you are told, I will pay you.” His gaze shifted away from her face.
Chiara’s eyes narrowed. If he thought to cheat her, she thought, she would—
“Leave us, Manelli. I wish to speak to the girl.”
Like matching puppets, both whirled to face Luca.
“B-but, signore, Signora Giulietta—”
“Leave Signora Giulietta to me.” Although he was not aware of it, Luca’s chiseled features grew as cold as if they were carved from ice at the unaccustomed contradiction. “Out.” He tipped his head toward the door.
Manelli felt sweat begin to dribble down his back at the icy anger in Signor Luca Zeani’s black eyes. But still he hesitated to obey, for he knew well what cruelties Signora Giulietta was capable of.
Luca heard the door behind him open and turned to see Giulietta with Savini in tow.
“What are you doing here, Luca?” Giulietta demanded.
“I could ask you the same question, cara.” Even as he addressed her, his eyes skimmed over Savini. The man was staring at the Gypsy girl with undisguised lecherousness and Luca’s eyes narrowed as he returned his gaze to his mistress. “Or have you brought Savini here to take his pound of flesh from the girl for telling the truth?”
Chiara’s eyes widened as the terrible understanding of what was happening penetrated her mind, why she had been brought to this room. She understood that this scarecrow of a man with his protuberant eyes intended to take her body. And all these people standing around her intended to let him.
She suppressed the cry of protest and fear that rose in her throat. Like a wild animal circled by hunters, she remained perfectly still for one moment, her eyes darting from one to the other. Then she ran.
Luca had his back to the girl, but by some instinct he was aware of her intention before she ever moved. Spinning on his heel to face her, he blocked her way so that she slammed fully into his body. Capturing her in his arms, he held her relentlessly as she began to fight like a wild thing, twisting and turning within his harsh embrace.
Confident of his muscular body, toughened from years of seafaring life, Luca curbed his strength, not wishing to hurt her.
Grimly determined, Chiara fought on. He was a soft fop, she assured herself, with his silks and brocades and lace. He was evil and brutal, but he was a coward. He had run from her once before, after all.
Twisting her body around its axis, she raised her bent arm as high as she could and then drove it back, plowing her elbow into his middle.
Luca swore as the girl’s elbow struck his midriff, but he only tightened his grip. Still she fought him. Suddenly she bent like a poplar sapling in the wind and, before he realized what she intended, she had sunk her teeth into his wrist.
Dropping all pretense of civility, he grabbed a handful of her hair and jerked her head back. “Be still, damn it,” he growled into her ear. “I mean you no harm.”
“No!” Her voice rose. The memory of how his eyes had glittered so demonically that night almost two years ago enabled her to fight on even though her strength was flagging. “Let me go!” She managed to free one hand and, forming her fingers into claws, gouged deep scratches into his cheek before he captured her hand again.
His patience snapped and, unleashing his full power, Luca manacled her hands with his and twisted them behind her back, ignoring her cry of pain. Holding her wrists with one hand, he pressed his other arm against her throat, drawing her flush against him.
As he pinned her against him, Chiara stilled, the strength flowing out of her abruptly, as if he had severed some lifeline by pressing her against his body. The light surrounded her again. And warmth. She shook her head in disbelief, as she looked for the dark apparition, but this time it eluded her.
As she surfaced, she found herself staring directly into his eyes. They were the color of the night sky at its darkest hour, but there were tiny specks of gold strewn throughout the blackness, like points of light. She waited for the malevolent glitter, but it did not come. Then she realized that the eyes were smiling at her.
“Well?” he asked, his smile coloring his voice. “Have you decided to surrender?”
Because her life had taught her that it was sometimes wise to give up to be able to fight another time, she lowered her eyes in a gesture that could be taken for assent.
“I do not surrender,” she said softly. “But I cannot fight against your strength.”
“A wise decision. Now if I release you, will you remain still and not try to maim me?”
She gave a jerky nod.
“Look at me.”
Hesitating for a long moment, Chiara felt him push her chin upward with his arm. Reluctantly she lifted her lids. As their eyes met and held, she felt the hatred within her pall. Panicking, she tried to hold it, but all she could see was the light that rose from the recesses of her mind to surround the man who held her, until he seemed enclosed in a bubble of light.
Luca saw the panic in her eyes and felt something within himself soften.
“I won’t hurt you.” He lowered his arm slightly so that it lay just above her breasts. Cautiously he loosened the fingers that shackled her wrists.
When Chiara immediately tried to move away from him, his hands tightened again.
“Stay close until I’m sure that you’re not going to run.” His tone was mild, but the command there was unmistakable.
“You said you would release me.” Her voice was low, furious.
“And so I will.” He smiled. “Just humor me for a bit and stay close.” He lowered his arm. It brushed her breasts and he felt his body stir. He curved his hand over her hip, to make certain that she did not run and because it pleased him to touch her.
“What a touching scene.” Giulietta raised her hands and tapped her fingers against one another in a parody of applause. “If I had known you had a taste for violence, caro, I would have obliged you earlier. Now—” she struck her closed fan sharply against her palm “—I suggest that we return to business.”
“And I suggest that it is time for Signor Savini to retire,” Luca said smoothly. “I am told that the Great Council meets early in the morning.”
“But you promised—” Savini began, his voice rising to a whine.
“I’m sure you misunderstood.” Luca’s mouth curved in a smile that would not have looked out of place on a wolf. “Signora Giulietta only meant she shall endeavor that nothing that transpired here tonight shall become common knowledge.”
“The damage has been done and people will talk. You know that. Gossip is the favorite pastime in Venice.” Savini’s voice rose. “The least you can do is to—”
Luca felt the girl stiffen and he gave her a reassuring squeeze. “Buona notte, signore.”
Savini opened his mouth to speak, but then he closed it with a snap. With a glare in Luca’s direction, he whirled to leave. Giulietta reached out to stop him, but he shook off her hand and swept out of the room, slamming the door behind him.
“Now look at what you’ve done.” Giulietta turned on Luca, her dark eyes snapping with displeasure. “What kind of game are you playing?”
“I dislike seeing those who cannot defend themselves coerced.” Suddenly conscious of the warmth of the girl’s body beneath his hand, the irony of his words occurred to him and he released her.
Chiara looked up sharply at him. What unspeakable gall, she thought, to speak like that when he was so good at coercion himself. She remembered only too well how she had come upon him holding her sister’s hands pinned above her head much as he had held her own behind her back. And she remembered Donata’s terrified eyes. The memory brought a comforting return of the hatred just as she felt his hand lift away from her hip, the tips of his fingers lingering for a moment before he released her completely.
“You’ve been reading too many philosophical treatises from France, caro. You seem to have begun to believe all that tripe about the purity of the savage and the rights of humanity.” The melodiousness of Giulietta’s voice could not hide the vibration of anger. “Now I suggest we let Manelli take her back to wherever it was he found her.”
Taking his cue, Manelli hurried forward. “Thank you, signora, signore.” He grabbed Chiara’s arm so violently that a seam tore, leaving one sleeve of her linen blouse barely hanging on by a few threads. “Come, now. Come.”
“Let me go.” She tried to escape his grip, but his meaty fingers dug into her flesh unmercifully.
As she twisted from side to side to escape Manelli, her gaze met the night eyes. She hated Luca. Someday she would kill him. But he had been kind to her a few moments ago. He had touched her briefly with gentleness. All these thoughts came together in a twisted kind of logic. And her eyes asked for his help.
“Didn’t you hear what she said, Manelli? Let her go.”
Manelli’s fleshy mouth fell open as he stared at Luca. “But, signore, she belongs to me.”
“Are you saying she is your slave?”
“No!” Chiara cried, horrified at the word. “I am no man’s slave.”
Manalli’s eyes darted to Signora Giulietta and he saw her almost imperceptible nod. “Yes, signore, my slave.”
Chiara struggled against Manelli’s hands. This couldn’t be happening to her, she thought. Surely she would wake up and discover it was all a bad dream.
“Good,” Luca said. “Then I will buy her from you.”
Chiara spun her head to look at him. Going still with shock and disbelief, she watched him dip his hand into a pocket of his brocade waistcoat.
“That would appear to be too little for a good female slave,” he said matter-of-factly, looking at the coins in his palm. “You will not deny me a loan, my dear, will you?”
“Wh-what?” Giulietta sputtered as he turned toward her.
As if she had graciously consented, he reached out and undid the clasp of her necklace of large squarecut amethysts surrounded by small pearls. He jiggled the necklace in his hand as if testing its weight and then, without warning, tossed it in Manelli’s direction.
Manelli let Chiara go and grabbed the necklace in both hands. Terror warred with greed in his eyes as his gaze swept around the room. Then, like a rat scurrying for cover when faced by two dangerous cats, he ran out of the room.
For a long moment, all three remained perfectly still, as if they were part of a tableau vivant, a living portrayal of a painting. Then, while Luca remained still, the women moved, Giulietta sweeping forward, all unsheathed claws and fury, Chiara stepping back.
“How dare you insult me like that.” Giulietta’s voice was high and ill-tempered. “Just what are you doing?”
“I will never be your slave. Never.”
The Gypsy’s voice was low and throaty. Luca found it as arousing as a caress, but he ignored her as if she hadn’t spoken, and continued to look at his mistress.
“You have eyes and ears, my dear. I would think it was perfectly obvious what I am doing.” His mouth curved in the glib smile of a man well skilled in pacifying troublesome women. “I’ve just bought myself a slave.”
“Do what you wish in private, but how can you do this to my face?” Giulietta demanded.
“I have done nothing but purchase a slave.” He emphasized his shrug by raising his hands slightly palm upward. “Do moderate your histrionics, my dear.”
“Don’t tell me you do not intend to take her to your bed.” Her lips trembled. “You’re my lover. How can you betray me thus?”
“Your lover, perhaps, but not your cavaliere servente, sworn to serve you in all ways.” Luca expelled a sharp breath, no longer trying to hide his irritation. “You were eager enough to welcome me to your bed without any promises. And, I would remind you, I have never made you any.”
Giulietta’s mouth thinned as she fought for composure. “We will speak later. I must see to my guests now.”
“We will speak another time, my dear.” It was definitely time to send Giulietta on her way, Luca thought. He would send her the rubies tomorrow. “I find that I am not in the mood for more talk tonight.”
Giulietta looked from Luca to the Gypsy, then back to her lover. “I see.” Fisting her hands in the folds of her skirt, she managed to keep her tone light. “Amuse yourself well, caro. Just make sure you wash off her smell before you come to my bed again.”
Sending a glance that was both contemptuous and furious in Chiara’s direction, she flounced out of the room.
The room was so silent that all Chiara heard was her own breathing. He stood perfectly still, looking at her, his eyes intent.
She concentrated, trying to see what was inside his mind. She knew there was evil within him. Why could she not see it? Why could she not even feel its presence? Yes, there was a darkness within him, but it was like the darkness of a shadow where there is much light.
“Come closer.”
“No.” She threw up her chin. “I am not your slave.”
“Come closer, I said.” A fine edge of steel crept into his mild voice. “If you knew me better, you would know that I am not known for my patience.”
She could not feel his evil, but she felt his power And still she defied him. It was her only chance.
“I am a free woman and I have no wish to know you better.”
His face changed, so subtly that she could not have described it. It was Lucifer, she thought again, and he was displeased with what he saw in his kingdom. Fear rose so suddenly that she had no time to control it before her breath seemed to congeal in her throat.
“I’m free,” she repeated. “You cannot force me to do anything.” Her voice sounded winded and she took a moment to draw a deep breath. “Except by your superior strength.”
“But you’re wrong. I bought you from Manelli.” Tucking the tips of his fingers into the pockets of his waistcoat, he spoke as lightly as if it were a matter of a basket of fruit. “And slavery is still quite legal in Venice, you know.”
“I do not believe that it is legal to sell what you do not own.” The brave words could not mask the sick feeling in her stomach. “Manelli did not own me.”
“No? Why should I believe you?” Even as he spoke the words, Luca asked himself if he had gone mad. Why was he tormenting her when it had been his intention to purchase her freedom and let her go? By all the saints, he had never owned a slave in his life. The thought alone was repugnant to him. Yet, within moments, the need to keep her had become an obsession.
“I do not lie.” She straightened.
She was afraid. He could see the wild pulse fluttering at the base of her throat. But she stood there, defying him with a courage that few men would muster. He felt a flash of respect, but it was obscured by yet another flicker of arousal, stronger this time. More urgent.
“No? Are you not a woman?”
“A woman, yes. But you will hear no lies from my lips.”
He began to move slowly toward her, the high heels of his buckled shoes clicking on the terrazzo floor.
The closer he came, the harder her heart began to beat. Chiara took a step back and found herself against the wall. Because she had no place to run, she met his eyes fully.
She was beautiful in an untamed, earthy way, Luca thought as he walked toward her. But there was more there besides her entrancing face, her seductive body. There was something about her—something heady and powerful. He felt a pull and, had he been honest with himself, he might have correctly identified it as need.
He stopped an arm’s reach away from her, not because he did not want to frighten her further, but because he found himself wanting to touch her. And he knew just how dangerous it was to want anything so badly.
Crossing his arms across his chest, he leaned against the marble mantelpiece. “So,” he said, helpless to stop himself from continuing this game of cat and mouse, “you are a woman without lies.”
Chiara gave a choppy nod.
“What is your name?”
“Chiara.”
Luca’s tawny eyebrows rose. “How convenient.”
“What do you mean?”
“You claim to have the sight, to be a clairvoyant. and your name signifies ‘clear.’” He chuckled. “It’s just too perfect.”
“I cannot help the truth. And I cannot invent lies to please you.” She tossed her hair over her shoulder. “That is the name my mother gave me.”
“So, Chiara.” He drew the name out so that it rolled off his tongue like a caress. “What do I do with you now?” Unable to resist, he stepped away from the mantel and reached out to touch her.
“Don’t touch me.” She pressed herself against the wall, as if she could make herself disappear into it. Just the thought of his hands on her filled her with panic so vast and absolute that it left no place for anything else. Her mind went blank but for the terror of being touched by this man.
Luca stilled, his hand hovering a palm’s breadth away from her face.
“I don’t want to hurt you.” His voice was gentle.
Chiara fought back the terror that was rising within her like black, noxious smoke, but still it came. And came. Until she was choking with it.
Wanting to soothe the unreasonable fear in her eyes, Luca cupped her cheek.
She cried out and spun away from his touch.
Something snapped within him at her strangled cry. At the new wave of abject terror in her eyes. At the way she recoiled from him as she might have recoiled from a man repulsive with the French pox. The dark violence that he had worked so hard to control all his life burst forth as blood spurts from a deep wound.
Forgetting that he did not want to hurt or frighten her, forgetting everything but that he wanted her, a low sound of fury built in his throat.
Moving forward, he slapped his hands against the wall on either side of her head, effectively imprisoning her.
Chapter Three
Chiara shuddered as she heard the hideous slap of his palms against the wall on either side of her head.
For a moment she almost gave in to the terror. Almost gave in to the desire to close her eyes, slide down the wall and curl up like an animal playing dead. God, she prayed, don’t let him touch me. Please don’t let him touch me.
A breath away from surrender, hatred and pride, those old twin friends that had been with her for so long, came to her aid, slowly pushing back the terror. She turned her head and met his eyes.
The soothing darkness of a star-studded night, which she had seen there before, had disappeared. Instead, the opaque blackness of a sky roiling with storm clouds stared back at her. But the very violence in his eyes gave her something to focus on and she felt the fear recede further.
Luca saw that fear was still lurking in the depths of her eyes, but the hatred that he had seen there before was back in full force now. Hatred that, had it been a knife, would have been sharp enough to kill. Strangely enough it was that hatred, so real and basic, that soothed the wild fury riding him to a controllable anger. And when he spoke, his voice carried more puzzlement than anything else.
“Why do you hate me so?”
“You know,” she spat. “Or, if you do not, you should.”
Baffled, Luca stared at her, digging into the recesses of his mind. Had they met before? Had he done something to cause her enmity? He shook his head. What could he have done to inspire hatred so deep? He could not imagine it. Besides, he knew that if he had ever seen this woman before, he would not have forgotten her.
“For a woman with the sight, you have remarkably poor judgment.”
She said nothing but stared back at him, her eyes like blue flames, provoking him with their fire.
“Manelli would have sold your body to the first comer,” he snapped. “Don’t you understand that?”
She had known that she was taking a risk, Chiara thought. But she had thought she could protect herself. And she had needed the money to pay for her sister’s care.
“He did sell me to the first comer,” she said tonelessly. She let her head fall back to the side so that her cheek lay against the wall, and she closed her eyes.
Luca’s fingers curled as he fought the need to touch her, to cup her head and make her look at him again.
“I paid him, with every intention of letting you go.” He had the uncomfortable feeling that he was apologizing. “I have never owned a slave in my life.”
Slowly she turned back to face him fully. “But now you own one,” she said. “And you have no intention of letting me go, do you?”
Some of the fire had returned to her low, smoky voice. The fire drew him, aroused him, and Luca shifted forward until his body was pressed against hers.
Chiara sucked in her breath as he pressed against her, pushing herself back further against the wall, but he moved closer still—so close that it seemed as if their bodies were one. He was pressed against her so tightly that she could feel the rise of his aroused sex against her belly. He was crushing her. She wanted to cry out, but she knew there would be no help for her here. And she had never been one to waste her energy on useless gestures.
He would move any second now, she though Every muscle turned to ice as she stiffened in expectation of his rough touch. He would push up her skirt. He would penetrate her body with his.
But he did none of those things. Instead he remained still, his eyes on hers, as if he thought to find her secrets there.
The dagger! How could she have forgotten it? Relief rushed through her. Chiara lifted her hand, but she could not reach for it without alerting him. Her mind raced. Before he tried to rape her, he would have to step away from her to free his body. Then she would be able to reach the dagger, she thought. Then she would kill him.
She felt a little flicker of regret that she would have to do it quickly, and not be able to tell him why she was planting her knife in his heart. But perhaps it was better to do it swiftly, before she had time to think about the light she had seen when she had looked inside him. Before she had time to question why her sight was showing her what her eyes knew was false.
The decision made, a small part of the tension seeped out of her even as she braced for his attack.
Luca felt the slight relaxing of her body against his and smiled. She had been hurt by some rough, careless man, he thought. He would show her what it could be like.
His hands still propped against the wall framing her head, he lowered his head toward her.
Chiara stilled when he touched his mouth to hers. Because she’d been expecting a brutal assault, the light, gentle touch took her breath away. She found herself incapable of movement as he rubbed his mouth back and forth over hers. When he slid the tip of his tongue along the seam of her lips, she trembled but still could not move.
With infinite patience he traced her lips again and again. When they parted, his mouth curved against hers.
“Sì,” he murmured, “così. Yes, like this.”
Desire was urgent in his blood, but even now he did not take what she offered. Instead, he leisurely dipped his tongue inside.
Chiara could see them together. They lay on a couch, surrounded by bright-colored cushions. Her shoulders were bare and pale against the coverlet of crimson silk. Somewhere there was the sound of water lapping against wood. The smell of sweet incense drifted through the room and mingled with the scent of arousal—his and hers. Then he moved over her so that she could see only her eyes—wide-open, smiling with welcome.
“No.” The single word was directed at the vision, not at the kiss.
Luca withdrew far enough so that he could see her face. “No?” He smiled, his anger forgotten in the sensual pleasure of the moment. “Are you sure? That certainly felt like a yes.” Without giving her time to reply, he took her mouth again.
Chiara wanted to fight him, but she found herself unable to move, as if her limbs had suddenly turned to water. He filled her mouth with his tongue, tasting her.
There was an answering heat within her, but she told herself that it was the heat of hatred. Desperate, she tried to hold on to that, but the heat merged and melded with the light, blinding her as if she were standing in the full sunlight.
His taste filled her. In a reflexive curiosity, she touched her tongue to his.
Luca felt that first tentative touch of her tongue go through him as if it were a bolt of lightning. Grasping her head, he gave in to the consuming need to plunder.
As he plunged into her mouth, possessing her with all the fever of a virile man’s passion, Chiara jolted, as if shaken awake from a dream. Rational thought returned, reminding her of just who this man was. She began to struggle to free herself from his voracious kiss, just as she struggled against that unfamiliar ache in her belly.
Luca felt her move against him. Pleased, he slid his hands into her hair and delved more deeply into the pleasures of her mouth. Only gradually did he realize that her movements had nothing to do with passion.
Luca pulled back, trying to ignore the desire that was making his blood race, his body throb. The moment he freed her mouth, she went still.
Realizing that he had twisted his hands in her hair, Luca loosened his fingers and began to rub her scalp lightly.
“I did not mean to hurt you.” He let his hands drift down slowly, caressingly until they lay on her shoulders. He brushed his mouth against hers and felt her stiffen.
“What’s the matter?” Leaving his hands on her shoulders, he took a step away.
She waited for the malevolence to come into his eyes, but it did not. Traces of passion were there and questions, but none of the evil she had been waiting to see there ever since she had first laid eyes on him an hour ago. How long could he pretend? How long could he keep up this facade? Where did he get his power? Why could she not see? It was the last question that frightened her most of all.
“Did I frighten you?” He slid his thumbs beyond the neckline of her coarse linen blouse to stroke her skin. “Was I too rough?”
“I am not easily frightened.” She swallowed and fought—unsuccessfully—to suppress the involuntary shiver of pleasure.
“Perhaps not.” He smiled at both her evasive answer and the shudder of response that went through her. “Have you ever lain with a man before?”
His words reminded her of who he was. Reminded her of what she needed to do.
“What difference does it make to you?” As she spoke, her hand crept upward, then across her middle. Her fingers closed around the hilt of the dagger, and she slid it out of the sheath.
Strike! Strike! The command thundered through her head, but her hand remained still, as if she could not force it to do her bidding.
“None.” He laughed softly. “None at all.” His fingers continued to stroke her skin. “I want you. That is all that matters.”
The soft, lightly mocking laughter struck a chord in her memory and she lifted her hand and plunged it down toward his heart.
Ensnared in his arousal, Luca did not give heed to her movement. By the time the realization hit him that what she held was a weapon and he had flung his hand upward to ward off the blow, the momentum of her downward stroke was too strong, too fast to stop completely.
He felt—and ignored—the hot flash of pain as the tip of the dagger pierced his skin and sliced through his flesh a moment before he struck her hand.
The dagger clattered to the floor. His hands captured hers. For a moment, they remained still, as if frozen in a dance of violent beauty.
Luca’s fury exploded like a volcano spewing forth hot lava. His fingers tightened around her wrists and he bore her back so brutally that her head hit the wall with a sharp crack.
“Damn you. I have killed men for less.”
“I’m not afraid to die.”
“Perhaps not.” He ground his hips against hers. “But you are afraid of this.”
Chiara could feel the cry growing in her throat, but she battled the weakness, clamping her mouth shut until her teeth ground against each other.
Luca saw her fear, saw how she fought it, saw how she still defied him. And her desperate courage seemed to feed his fury.
“Why did you try to kill me?” he demanded. “Is it such a terrible fate to lie with me?” He gave a short laugh. “Some women might even envy you.”
Chiara thought of her sister’s blank eyes. She thought of the pitiful whimpering sounds Donata sometimes made in her sleep, and felt the fear recede before the hatred of this man.
“I hate you. And I despise you.”
“Why?”
“I told you. If you do not know it, you should.”
“My patience with your riddles is at an end,” he snarled. “Tell me.”
For a moment Chiara was tempted to tell him who she was. But only for a moment. He would find a way to use that knowledge against her. The less he knew about her the better it was. She would bide her time and someday she would tell him, right before she killed him.
She shook her head.
“Tell me.” He tightened his grip on her wrist.
“No,” she whispered.
“Do you know how easy it is to make someone talk?” The wildness was roiling within him like a storm-swept sea. He grappled for control, but it slipped away like water. “With just a small movement I could snap your wrist.”
She could feel his hot breath on her face. “What good would a slave with a broken wrist be?”
His mouth curved in a hard smile. “You don’t need your hands for what I want from you.”
“And you will take what you want no matter what I do or say.”
“Perhaps.” He shifted his fingers a fraction of an inch to increase the pressure on her wrist. “Try me.”
Chiara understood then that she had exhausted all her possibilities.
“You are a Venetian patrician,” she said, trying desperately to keep her voice steady. “That is why I hate you.”
It was surprise more than anything else that had him easing his hold on her wrist. The wildness within him eased as well, as if it had been a seizure that was now passing.
“Why?”
She hesitated, but feeling his hand tighten again, she decided to give him part of the truth. “Because my father is one.”
“Your father?” His eyes narrowed, but he did not dismiss her words. “What is his name?”
“I don’t know,” she lied. “I came to Venice to find out.”
Luca caught the tiny flicker in her eyes that told him she was lying, but he kept the knowledge to himself.
“So...” His voice held a touch of humor. “Did you come here planning to kill all Venetian aristocrats?”
Chiara gave a shake of her head. Understanding that the greatest danger had passed for the moment, she allowed disdain to color her words. “Only those who try to rape me.”
“I don’t intend to rape you.”
She said nothing, but the contempt that darkened her eyes made it quite clear to Luca that she thought he was lying.
“You don’t believe me, I see.” He did not release her hands, but he moved a step back.
Chiara flinched at his movement and despised herself for it. When she saw that he was stepping back, relief and a new wave of bravado flowed through her.
“I have no reason to lie,” he said.
“And I have no reason to believe you.”
He stared at her for a moment. Then he laughed richly. “It’s a pity that you’re not a man. With audacity like yours we could whip the Barbary pirates in a few weeks.” He paused. “And then again—” his gaze drifted down to her breasts “—I’m very glad that you are not a man.”
A whisper of hope drifted through her. “If it is true that you do not intend to rape me, will you let me go then?”
His smile died and his gaze returned to her face. “No.”
Hope grew cold. “Why not?”
“I want you. But then I told you that, didn’t I?”
The accusation returned to her eyes, stronger than before. “So, rape after all.”
“No, not rape.” His grip loosened and his thumbs began to rub the inside of her wrists. “I trust that I shall be able to persuade you that it is not such an ugly fate to lie with me.”
“Persuade a slave?” She made a sound that might have been a harsh laugh. “Do you really expect me to believe that?”
“Believe what you wish. But you can believe me when I tell you that I do not find the thought of rape arousing. I, for my part, have always preferred persuasion.”
Chiara’s eyes narrowed at his lie, yet just the fact that he had gone to the trouble to tell it had her relaxing a little.
“And when you have persuaded me,” she asked, “will you let me go then?”
“Let you go?” He shrugged. “I don’t know. I think that is a question for another day.”
Chiara was used to taking risks. After all, she had been living on the edge for so long that she had almost forgotten what it was like to know what the next hour would bring. Perhaps, she calculated quickly, perhaps it would be worth it to give him her body. He would be careless in the throes of passion and then she would k—
“Enough talk now.” He released one of her hands but, keeping the other firmly in his, he turned. “Come.”
“Where are you taking me?”
“Home.” He moved toward the door.
Tears, unexpected, unwanted, shot into Chiara’s eyes as the single word struck a long-forgotten chord deep within her soul. Once, long ago, she had thought to have a home. She almost lost her balance as he pulled her along. Swallowing the tears, she stumbled after him.
Chapter Four
Downstairs in the entry Luca barked an order that had the lackey scurrying to get his things.
Emotions—anger, horror, disgust at the violence he had displayed—rushed through him like a roaring river. A candle flickered on the opposite wall and he concentrated on that point of light as he fought to deal with them.
He had always believed that uncontrolled violence was his brother’s province. From the time when they had been small boys he had seen it. He had seen Matteo strike out at servants and torment playmates. He had stopped it when he could, knowing all too well that Matteo would again do the same thing. And he’d done it because, despite everything, he had loved Matteo. He’d done it because he had always known that some of the same violence, the same cruelty lived within him.
But Luca had always believed that he had the violence under control, like a dangerous criminal locked in a secure dungeon. Instead, he had found tonight that all it took was the right moment—and the right woman—for it to escape its cage and spread its poison.
Was this urgency that drove him like a whip when he looked at the Gypsy girl the same madness that had overtaken Matteo when he had raped and killed Antonia? Had Matteo merely taken the same passion, the same compulsion that he himself felt for this black-haired seductress one step further? Oh, God, he thought as he scrubbed his hands over his face, was he like his twin brother after all?
Luca remembered how he had found Matteo, standing over Antonia’s bruised and broken body. He had sworn then that he would never give in to the evil that lived within him. Not even to avenge the girl he had loved so tenderly. But, he thought, he had given in to the evil now. And the bitter knowledge shamed him.
He had put his hands on this girl until she had cried out in pain. He had been within a breath of taking her where they had stood, with no care, no tenderness. Cursing silently, he told himself that he had to let her go. He could not force an unwilling woman to go with him just because he found himself wanting her beyond all reason.
Had he gone mad? he asked himself. And if he had, would the madness pass? Was it only the madness of an instant, born of his violent fury, or would it stay with him like a witch’s curse?
Even as his blood grew calm, he found that the venom had unfurled within him like a pernicious flower. He was unable to forswear his own wickedness. Unable to undo what madness had wrought Unable to follow his conscience and let Chiara go.
It did not occur to him that he had thought of her by name for the first time.
Chiara watched him. He had released her hand and he was ignoring her as they waited in the small entry for the footman to return. Perhaps, she thought, he was already losing interest. A small shoot of hope burgeoned within her. Perhaps he was already regretting the trouble he was putting himself to.
She eyed the door. There was no key in the lock and the bolt was open. If she was quick enough, she could slip past him and out the door before he noticed her. Or should she wait and try to escape once they were outside in the narrow, dark alley?
Carefully Chiara took a small step. He was staring at the candle in the gilt sconce on the opposite wall and gave no sign of having observed her movement. Slowly, her gaze never leaving his scowling face, she began to edge toward the door.
The sound of footsteps jolted her. The footman! She gauged the distance to the door. Three steps, perhaps four. Taking a deep breath, she prepared to run.
Luca knew the moment she took the first step. He would let her go, he told himself. Perhaps then he would be able to look himself in the eye again. She was almost behind him when she paused. If she stayed now, he bargained with himself with shameless sophistry, it meant that she was staying of her own free will. If she tried to escape, he would let her go.
As she leaped toward the door, he swung around, blocking her way, forswearing the promise he had made to himself.
“Going somewhere?”
Chiara dragged in a breath that was almost a sob. He would never let her go now, she thought. She was his property and this was a man who guarded his possessions. She looked up at him.
“I was going to let you escape.” He lifted his hand to her face, but when she flinched, he let it fall back to his side. “But I find that I can’t.”
“Won’t.”
“Can’t.” He shrugged. “And won’t.”
“Your tabarro, Don Luca.”
Not taking his eyes off Chiara, Luca let the long, black cloak settle on his shoulders and clapped the black tricorn hat on his head. Letting the molded white mask, which the footman handed him, dangle from his fingers by its laces, he took her arm and stepped out into the alley.
As they turned onto the Piazza San Marco, the blast of wind met them head-on. Chiara shivered in her torn blouse but said nothing.
Even at this late hour, the piazza was full of life. The cafes and even some of the shops were brightly lit. A violin began to play a melody from a popular opera and was joined by the high, pure voice of a castrato tenor. A couple had linked arms and was whirling in a dizzying dance that needed no music, save that in their heads.
Chiara glanced at the groups of people that dotted the square, wondering if there was someone among them who would help her. Some were garbed in colorful costumes as Moors or harlequins or Chinamen, but most looked like ghosts in their long, black cloaks, their heads covered with the black bautta topped by tricorn hats, their faces disguised with white, beaked masks. Laughter and chattering voices drifted over and she understood just how alone she was.
Luca hurried them past the cathedral, with its Byzantine facade that seemed to glow even at night, past the Doge’s palace, to the quay, where the black gondolas bobbed on the dark water silvered by moonlight.
“Olà, Tommaso,” he called out toward the group of gondoliers who were huddled together at the base of one of the Egyptian columns. Immediately one of the men detached himself from the group and came toward them.
“You are early tonight, Don Luca.” He slid a sly glance toward the girl at his master’s side. “Do you wish to go—”
“Home, Tommaso.”
The gondolier acknowledged the command with a small bow, but his eyebrows shot up in surprise. In silence he herded his passengers around the column, in obeisance to the long-standing superstition that to pass between the columns, where on occasion the scaffold or a gibbet stood, would bring misfortune.
Luca stepped down from the dock onto the stern of the gondola, balancing his body against the gentle pitching of the craft with the ease of long practice. He turned and held out his arms.
“Come, I will lift you down.”
Her gaze darting around, hoping to find yet another way to escape, Chiara shrank back and bumped into the gondolier’s stocky body.
“Don’t be timid,” the gondolier whispered on a laugh. “He’s generous and, from what I hear, well skilled.” He gave her a push.
She stumbled forward. Before she could brace herself against his touch, he had lifted her into the gondola and released her.
“Sit down in the felze.” Luca pointed to the cabin in the center of the gondola.
When she hesitated, he jerked the door open. “Get in,” he growled. When she still did not move, he grasped her arm to maneuver her inside.
“Dio, you’re freezing.” Her gaze skittered up to his as he stroked his hand up her arm. He wanted to put his arms around her and warm her. Giving in to the desire, he pulled her closer only to see her eyes widen with alarm. Swearing, he pushed her away and toward the cabin so that she tumbled onto the cushioned bench.
Unhooking the clasp of his cloak, he shrugged it off and tossed it at her. Damn her, he thought, as he leaned his elbows on the roof of the felze. When she looked at him like that, her huge eyes full of loathing, she made him feel like a beast. Glancing up, he caught Tommaso’s cheeky grin. Swearing again, he ducked into the cabin and sat down beside her.
Although he could feel her shivering, she had not touched the cloak, but sat staring at it. With an impatient sound, he picked it up and slung it quickly around her, forcing himself not to allow his hands to linger. Then he leaned back into the corner and closed his eyes.
Gradually Chiara stopped shivering beneath the soft woolen fabric of the cloak. Letting her head fall back against the cushioned back of the bench, she closed her eyes. Why did this evil, cruel man show her compassion, generosity? Those small flashes of kindness made her doubt what her eyes told her was true.
Again she gathered all her power and probed. But it was as if a black curtain had descended before her sight. She was exhausted, she comforted herself. She had exhausted herself in body and spirit tonight. Surely when she had rested, her sight would be clear and true again.
Since her sight could not help her, she opened her eyes and slanted a look toward him. A thin band of light from the lantern on the stern crept in through the narrow window on the back of the cabin, illuminating his profile.
Again her heart jolted against her rib cage. She had not been mistaken. It was him. It could be no other. Maybe his hair was longer now and the cruelty in his eyes hidden under his charm, but the face was the same. The horror, the revulsion flooded over her anew, almost obliterating the pull of his beauty.
Luca felt her eyes on his as he might have felt a touch of her hand. Turning his head, he looked at her.
“Why do you look at me as if I were the very devil?” It hurt him, he realized with surprise and displeasure. Deep inside him was a place she could touch at will. A place she could ease as effortlessly as she could hurt it. But she said nothing and only stared back at him.
“Ah, yes. You’ve told me that I am supposed to know why.” He laughed mirthlessly. “Well, perhaps I will learn it by and by.”
The gondola bumped gently against wood and Chiara started.
“We’re here.”
There was the scrape of a key in a lock and the grating sound of rusty hinges. The gondola slid into a vaulted, shadowy entry, lit by a single torch, the smell of burning pitch mingling with the smells of dampness and decay.
Within moments Chiara was standing on the slippery stones, watching the gondola glide back out onto the dark canal. A silent servant closed the water gate, the hollow clank of metal on metal sounding like a final judgment.
It was done, she thought, as she looked through the gate’s intricate wrought iron design that allowed a teasing glimpse of the dark canal and freedom. Now she was truly his prisoner.
Despair welled up within her, but she fought it. It was fate, she told herself, and for a purpose that this man had been put in her path. She could not believe that she was here only to be used by him. Perhaps it was a bounty given her by fate. An opportunity for a revenge she had not hoped for.
Yes, she thought. She would defer the revenge she would take upon her father. But this revenge that fate was putting into her hands would be hers. And soon.
“Welcome to the Ca’ Zeani, Chiara.”
She stiffened at the soft, mocking words but refused to look at him. Even as he took her arm and led her up a stone staircase, she kept her eyes stubbornly averted from his face.
Luca closed the door to his apartments and leaned back against it.
“Don Luca!” The servant who had looked after his needs since he was a boy, jumped up from the chair where he had been dozing and came running up to him.
“Santa Madonna! What has happened to you?” he demanded. “Were you set upon?” His gaze slid over to the girl who stood next to his master then back to Luca.
“A minor scuffle.” He pushed away from the door. “Now listen.”
Chiara watched him give his orders to his servant. Watched him give the man a familiar, friendly clap on the shoulder. It occurred to her that he treated his servant with more courtesy than her father had accorded her mother.
“Signore, let me care for your wounds.”
“Later, Rico. Go now.”
When the door had closed behind the servant, Luca walked to a round table inlaid with alabaster and serpentine that he had brought back from Constantinople and poured himself a glass of wine. As he raised it to his lips, he felt Chiara’s gaze upon him and remembered how cold her skin had been to his touch.
Turning around he walked to where she stood, still wrapped awkwardly in his cloak.
“Here.” He thrust the goblet at her.
She reached for it before she remembered that she wanted no more kindnesses from this man. Pulling her hand back, she shook her head.
“Have it your way.” Lifting the wineglass, Luca drank deeply without taking his eyes off her face.
Chiara felt herself grow warm under his gaze. She wanted to look away, but pride would not allow it.
“Where do you come from?”
“Gypsies come from everywhere.” She shrugged. “And nowhere.”
He acknowledged the evasion with a nod. “But you’re only half a Gypsy.”
“In my heart I am pure Gypsy.” Even as she spoke the words, she knew she was lying. She remembered too well how it had been for the short time they had traveled with the Gypsy caravan. She had been almost as much an outsider as the gadjé, the pale-skinned men and women, who had come to have their fortunes told. It galled her to see the faint amusement in his eyes that told her he knew it, too.
“But your eyes are not Gypsy eyes,” he said softly. “They are the color of the sea when the sun is upon it.” He tipped his glass toward her. “To your eyes, Chiara.”
His words, the mellow sound of his voice touched her, no matter how she tried to deny it. She watched him put the goblet of cobalt blue glass to his lips again, watched his throat move as he swallowed the wine and she felt something flicker to life within her. She had never felt it before, but she knew instinctively that this was the heat a woman felt for a man.
As the horror washed over her, she spun her head away from him. How could she feel this for him? What kind of monster was she? No wonder her sight had deserted her.
Luca saw the spark and, eager to see it again, he lifted a hand to her face to turn it back toward him. Just as he was about to touch her, the door opened to admit a procession of servants carrying buckets of water and bed linens.
Luca stepped back from her and gestured his manservant over. “Rico will take you to your room now.”
She turned to look at him then, but her gaze was as cold as yesterday’s ashes. He wondered if he had imagined that one flare of heat.
“Rico, this is Chiara. She’s my—”
She looked at the manservant, her chin lifted in defiance of the hated word.
“My guest.”
Her eyes widened in surprise. She looked back at Luca, but he had turned away. Silently she followed the servant.
Luca stood in front of the mirror in its ornate gilt frame that stretched from the mantel of the fireplace almost to the ceiling, watching her progress until the door had closed behind her. As he turned away, he caught sight of his reflection. Dio, she had managed to carve him up nicely, he thought. He touched the scratches on his face, then the sticky, scarlet stain on the shredded silver lace at his throat. He laughed with something like admiration. He need feel no guilt, he assured himself. She would be a worthy adversary.
“I left the women with her,” Rico said. “May I tend to your wounds now?”
Luca nodded and began to shrug out of his coat.
A fire burned brightly in the fireplace that was edged with pale yellow marble, but a chilly edge still remained in the room. Chiara pulled a coverlet of sapphire-colored silk off the bed and, hugging it around her, walked over to the window.
Below her the canal wound like a wide black ribbon. Moonlight and the flickering torches that were fastened to the walls of some of the houses made reflections of gold and silver on its surface. She tried the bar that closed the window. To her surprise it opened easily and she pulled the casements open and leaned out.
Somewhere there was the echo of music and voices and faint laughter. She looked down to where the water was lapping gently against stone and wood. The water came flush up to the foundations so that the house seemed to be growing out of the canal. A narrow wooden dock surrounded by striped mooring posts was built out over the water. Tied to one of the posts, a lone gondola, coffin like under its cover of dark canvas, rocked gently.
“It’s a long way down. If you’re contemplating jumping, I wouldn’t advise it.”
Chiara started at the sound of his voice. Slowly she straightened and turned to face him.
They stared at each other in silence as his manservant placed a tray on the table and unloaded platters of food and dishes before scurrying out of the room.
Without taking his eyes off her, Luca reached behind him and turned the key in the lock. Then he tucked it into the pocket of his robe of dark blue silk.
Understanding the message well, Chiara stiffened as she waited for him to come toward her, but he remained where he was and merely looked at her.
“Well?” she finally demanded, unnerved by his stillness, his silence. “Am I clean enough for you now?” When he gave her no answer, she tilted up her chin. “I would not have thought that a thing like that mattered for a man like you.”
He still did not speak, but he began to walk toward her then. When he stopped in front of her, he looked at her for a long moment before he spoke.
“And how is a man like me?”
His face was calm, his eyes seeming to carry only a faint interest in whatever she had to say, but she could feel the edgy anger within him.
She shrugged. “As I have seen him this evening.”
“Seen with your sight?”
Her eyes narrowed a little as she wondered if he somehow knew that what her sight told her was in discord with what she saw with her eyes.
“My sight? No.” She shook her head. “I need only my eyes to know what manner of man would mark a woman’s skin like this.” She pulled back the sleeves of her nightgown and held out her hands.
The bruises that marred the skin at her wrists had Luca’s stomach turning over in disgust with himself. Perhaps he was not a murderer like Matteo, but the same mad, wicked blood flowed in his veins. Slowly he reached up and cradled her hands in his.
“I’m sorry,” he said softly as he raised his gaze. Then, his eyes on hers, he lifted her hand and pressed his lips against the marks he had made.
A treacherous pleasure drifted through her. She jerked her hands, but to her annoyance found herself too weak to pull them out of his grasp.
“Stop it.” Her breath hitched. “What are you doing?”
“Soothing a hurt. Apologizing. Making amends. Doing penance.” He shifted his head and stroked his lips over her other wrist. “Take your pick.”
“Stop touching me.”
He smiled. “That wasn’t one of the choices.” His eyes still on hers, he touched his tongue to her skin.
“Don’t.”
“Don’t what? Touch you? Kiss you? Taste you?”
His warm breath flowed over her skin like a caress. Her body was betraying her, she thought. How could she feel pleasure and excitement from this man’s touch when it was horror and revulsion that he roused within her?
“Don’t do anything,” she said. “Let me go.”
“I’m touching you, but I’m not holding you.” He pressed his mouth against the pulse point of her wrist and was rewarded by the pounding of her blood against his lips. “All you have to do is step away.”
She wasn’t held captive, Chiara realized. She was captivated. Captivated by his touch, by the warmth in his eyes that promised every earthly delight. She felt the pleasure race through her in tandem with the loathing as if they were two halves of the same whole. Panic licked at her as flames lick at parchment.
He must be truly evil, she thought. He must have sold his soul to the devil to be given this power to enchant, to seduce, although she knew him to be capable of the vilest abomination.
She closed her eyes, gathered all her strength and lifted her hands from his.
Luca watched her, felt her tremble as she might under a heavy weight. And he smiled, although his own desire was so sharp that it slashed at him as fiercely as her dagger had slashed at him an hour before. It would not be easy, he thought. But it would be worth it.
He took a step back from her and then another.
“Come,” he said softly. “Rico has brought us some food.”
Chiara felt the warmth from his body recede and she opened her eyes, hating herself for her own weakness.
“Come,” he repeated. “You must be hungry.” He smiled. “I know I am.”
The merest hint of sensual suggestion tinged his smile. Forcing herself to look away from him, she crossed the room toward the table.
Luca picked up the silk coverlet that had slipped from her shoulders and followed her.
Chapter Five
As the delicious scents rose toward Chiara, she twisted her hands in the folds of her nightgown to prevent herself from rushing toward the table and stuffing handfuls of food into her mouth. She’d eaten nothing for the past three days but some bread and cheese the man on the burchiello, the barge that had brought her to Venice, had given her and an apple she had stolen that afternoon from a street vendor’s basket
Because the enormity of her hunger was like a beast within her, she sat down and took a deep breath before she reached for a piece of bread. She began to eat, forcing herself to break off small pieces of the bread.
Luca watched her eat with a steadiness that indicated both extreme hunger and extreme control.
“Here.” He stopped behind her and slid the coverlet around her shoulders. This time he allowed his hands to linger for a moment. “It’s still chilly in here. This room hasn’t been used for a long time.”
Chiara pulled it around her closely and tied it in a loose, large knot.
“You mean, you don’t bring women here every night?” She glanced at him over her shoulder.
“No.” He sat down and, in an attempt to keep his hands to himself, picked up a slice of cheese. “But if you truly had the sight, you would not need to ask that.”
Her hand paused an inch from her mouth. “I do not waste my sight on what has no importance.”
“I see.” He leaned back with a mocking smile. “And I suppose it was important for you to use your sight to peer into the lives of a few indolent patricians?”
“I needed the money,” she said simply.
“What for?”
For my sister. For Donata, whom you raped and turned into a lunatic. The words were on the tip of her tongue, but she swallowed them and merely shrugged.
“So tell me,” he drawled. “What else do you do for money?”
Chiara heard the mocking insinuation in his voice and her fingers tightened on her fork. Resolutely she kept her eyes on her plate, knowing that if she looked at him now, she would not be able to control herself.
“I do what I must,” she said quietly. “But I have never lain with a man for money.”
“There’s always the first time.”
She raised her eyes now and met his. “But that time is not going to be with you.”
The moment the words were said, she stilled, remembering that snatch of a vision she had had when he had kissed her. If the vision was true, she thought with horror, it would not be for money that she lay with him. Nor for revenge.
Fighting against the memory of the vision and her own words, she sent him a cool look and returned to her food.
Damn her, Luca thought. Damn her pride and the way she cleverly mimicked aloofness when he knew she was anything but indifferent to him. He had felt her respond to him, damn it. He had felt it.
He splashed wine into two goblets of indigo-colored glass, lifted one, emptied it and filled it again.
“I will have you, money or no. And you will be willing,” he said, his voice soft and urgent. “Here.” He pushed a goblet toward her. “Let us drink to that.”
“No, thank you.”
“Drink.”
His voice had hardened and Chiara looked up at him. Traces of the fury she had seen earlier were in his eyes. Even as she took stock of it, she sensed the struggle within him. Sensed how he fought to harness the wildness within himself that was flaring like fire in a forest of dry pines.
Slowly she picked up the goblet. Not because he had ordered her to do so, but because she needed the time to come to terms with what she had sensed.
She took a stingy sip and then another one before she set down the goblet.
“Is the wine not to your taste?”
“It’s fine.”
“Then why do you not drink as much as you would like?” he demanded. “Are you trying to keep your head clear?” As if in defiance, he lifted his goblet to his lips and drank deeply.
“Yes,” she said cautiously, and edged her chair back. “Yes, I am.”
“Why?” He leaned a little closer and picked up the ends of the coverlet around her shoulders to toy with the silk fringe. “Do you think you can escape?”
She would not even try to escape, she thought. Fate had put her here. And fate would give her her revenge. And the price? What will be the price of revenge? a voice within her whispered. But she knew that whatever the price, she would pay it.
“No, I know I cannot escape.” she said.
“That’s very wise of you.” He wound a length of blue silk around his hand. “Then why do you want to keep a clear head?” He gave the coverlet a tug, bringing her to the edge of her chair. “Are you afraid the wine will make you willing?”
“Wine can make me weak, but it can never make me willing.” She closed her hands over the soft linen of her nightgown. “Nothing can make me willing.”
“You’re wrong. I can make you willing and we both know it.”
He had leaned close enough so that she could feel the warmth of his breath on her lips. Already she could feel her body softening. He could do it, she thought desperately. He could make her body willing. But surely never her spirit. Never her mind. Never her soul.
As if he could read her mind, he smiled. “And you do feel. No matter how you lie about it, I make you feel.” Rising, he twisted yet another length of silk around his hand, pulling her onto her feet so that she stood flush against him.
As her body made contact with his, Chiara felt a jolt of fear so strong that for a moment she lost all awareness, as if she had slipped into a faint or a trance. But as the fear faded, she felt the waves of Luca’s emotions breaking against her like waves break upon the beach.
It did not occur to her that she had thought of him by name for the first time.
The violence she had felt earlier was still there, but it only hovered at the edge like a banished spectator. Desire was there, strong and hot, and need, deep and powerful. The need of a man for a woman. The need of one human being for another.
Confused, she shook her head. How could he hide his evil so smoothly? She had no doubt that he could feel desire, but how could there be such true, deep need within a man such as this?
Against the back of his hand, Luca felt the soft give of her breasts, the pounding of her heart. He saw how fear flashed into her eyes, but only for a moment. Then he saw confusion there and surprise. And something softer that was gone before he could identify it.
Dio, he wanted her. Desire swept through him. Had he ever wanted, had he ever needed a woman so badly? Unable to resist, he lowered his mouth to hers.
He was holding her so close, so tightly that she could not move away. Unable to do more, Chiara turned her head aside so that his mouth missed her lips and brushed her cheek instead. She felt his fingers cup her chin and she tensed.
But his fingers did not tighten. Nor did he try to turn her mouth back to his. Instead, his thumb stroked her skin while his lips drifted to her ear. Nudging her still-damp hair aside, he kissed his way along the contours of her ear. Chiara heard herself sigh.
Again he traced the contours of her ear, this time with his tongue. When Chiara heard herself make a sound like a hungry kitten, she remembered where she was. And just who it was that was touching her.
How could she respond to him like this? She knew what brutality, what cruelty he was capable of committing. She had heard his mocking laughter as Donata had screamed m terror. She had seen the gleam of evil in his eyes. No matter how well he hid it now behind a mask of gentleness, she knew what manner of man he was.
“Let me go.”
He let her go so swiftly that her legs gave way. Biting back a cry, she managed to grasp the edge of the table for support. Relief and surprise warred with anger. Anger at him. But most of all, anger at herself and at her own weakness.
“As you wish, my dear.”
Chiara straightened, hoping that her legs would hold her up. The fact that they did had some of her audacity returning. “I thank you for your generosity.” She inclined her head in a mocking little bow.
“And so you should. Believe me, it would have been quite easy to ignore your plea—” he laughed “—and concentrate instead on those tempting female noises you made.”
His eyebrows lifted in a mocking curve, giving him the aspect of a fallen angel. Chiara said nothing, but she could feel heat flooding into her face. Heat from the way his closeness stirred her senses. Heat from his soft laugh that seemed to make tender promises. Heat from the shame that filled her because he could make her feel this way.
“You see it as a weakness. Perhaps I should not tell you this, but it is a great strength.” His voice softened, lowered. “Do you know how much power it gives you over a man, when you respond to him like that? Even when it is against your will. Especially when it is against your will.”
Reaching out, he drew a single finger down her throat and let it rest in the hollow at its base. “Do you have any idea how it makes a man feel to know he can make your pulse beat like a drum, even though you would rather take a knife to him.”
His last words had Chiara’s gaze skittering down to his chest where the deep V-shaped neck of his robe exposed the wound she had made with her knife.
“You should put a poultice on that so it doesn’t become inflamed.” The words were out before she could stop them and she bit her lip.
“I’m touched by your care.”
She tried to counteract her incautious words with an insolent shrug. Her movement had his finger shifting in the hollow of her throat and she tensed against her involuntary shiver of pleasure.
Luca felt her tremble. Because he wanted badly to cup her neck and draw her toward him, he let his hand fall to his side and took a step back.
“Ah, Chiara, what am I going to do with you?” He looked at her for a long moment. “No suggestions? No requests?”
Chiara met his gaze. There was a sort of tired amusement in his eyes and a kindness that she found herself responding to, even as she had responded to his touch, his kiss. God help her, she thought. How could she fight against him, when he could make her forget who he was so easily?
“Well?”
She shook her head. “No suggestions.”
“Then I will wish you a good-night.” He paused. “Don’t get any ideas about making a ladder of your sheets. Your window will be guarded.”
“Don’t worry. I will not try to escape.” The minute the words were out of her mouth, she saw his eyes narrow with suspicion and knew she had made a mistake.
“At least not tonight,” she corrected quickly, looking away from his sharp gaze.
“What plan are you hatching in that sly Gypsy head of yours?” he demanded. “Look at me.”
Sullenly she obeyed him but said nothing.
“I’ll find out by and by.”
Yes, Chiara swore silently, you will find out. No matter how you can make me feel, you will find out and you will pay.
His eyes still on hers, he picked up her hand and pressed his mouth against the bruises he had left on her wrist.
“It is not my way to touch a woman’s skin with so heavy a hand as to mark it.” Pleased, he felt her pulse jump. “This you will find out by and by.”
Chiara stood very still and watched him leave the room without once looking back.
He had to be in league with the Supreme Evil to be so powerful, she thought. Her body still warm, her blood still pounding, she sank down where she stood and prayed incoherently, desperately for the strength to resist him.
She awoke to the clatter of dishes and the sinfully tempting fragrance of rich chocolate. Remembering where she was, she sat up quickly.
“Good morning.”
“Good morning.” Chiara returned the serving girl’s smile.
“Come and eat your breakfast. The dressmaker is coming in an hour.”
“The dressmaker?” Chiara slid down from the bed and padded over to the table. “Whatever for?” Greedily she broke off a piece of the fresh, crusty bread.
“Don Luca has ordered that a dressmaker come to fit you with new clothes.”
“I don’t want any new clothes. I have my own clothes.” She looked around the room. “Where are they?”
“They’re gone. Don Luca said they should be burned.” She made a vague gesture toward the door.
Chiara jumped up, ready to storm, but then she saw the girl take a step back. There was no sense in raging at this poor girl, she thought, and there was no sense bewailing something she could not do anything about.
Slowly she sat back down and picked up the bread she had tossed down onto the plate.
“Do you need anything else?” the girl asked in a cautious voice.
She shook her head and, when the girl turned to leave, she grasped her arm. “What is your name?”
“Zanetta.”
“Sit down, Zanetta, and tell me about—” her tongue almost tripped over the polite address “—Don Luca.”
The girl darted a glance over to the door and sat down on the very edge of a chair. “Don’t you know him?” she asked, her eyes curious. “The whole house is talking about you,” she added.
“I can imagine.” Chiara took another bite of bread spread with butter and honey and almost closed her eyes with the sheer pleasure of it.
“Rico, Don Luca’s manservant, says you are his guest. Some whisper you must be his mistress. One of the footmen heard Don Luca arguing with Don Alvise and Signora Emilia.” The words came out in a rush.
“Who are they?”
“Don Luca’s older brother and his wife. He is a good master, but strict.” She paused, as if considering her next words. “He said he would not allow a loose woman under his roof.”
Chiara felt a flash of pain as she remembered how her father had cast her mother out into the street with those same words.
“And you, Zanetta?” she asked. “What do you think?”
“I don’t know.” The girl twisted her fingers nervously at her waist. “But if you are his mistress—” Her mouth curved in a mischievous smile “—then you have chosen a beautiful man. Not like—”
There was the sound of footsteps outside the door and the girl jumped up.
“I must go now.” Curtsying quickly, she moved toward a door that Chiara had not noticed the night before. As the girl opened the door, Chiara caught a glimpse of a corridor. Thinking to explore, she rose, but immediately heard the key turn in the lock.
So everyone was locking her in, she thought, even the servants.
She had barely finished breakfast when the corridor door opened and Zanetta returned, followed by a plain woman wearing a severe brown gown. Several maids carrying gowns, hoops and bolts of fabric trailed after them.
The woman immediately marched up to Chiara, briefly mustered her up and said, “Take off your nightgown so that we can measure you.”
She snapped her fingers and one of the maids came running up carrying a shift. “Put this on.” She fluttered her fingers, first at the flimsy undergarment, then at Chiara. “Quickly now. I don’t have all day.”
Chiara began to protest but thought better of it. After all, if her own clothes had really been burned, she would need something to wear. She quickly exchanged the nightgown for the thin shift and the maids swarmed around her to take her measurements.
“The yellow gown.” The dressmaker gestured at the maids behind her and they came running like well-trained soldiers, carrying the gown and the necessary accoutrements.
Chiara took one look at the gown of yellow silk, the hoop and corset and stepped back. “No.”
“You’re right.” The dressmaker gave her an approving nod. “Yellow makes you look sallow. The blue one.”
The yellow silk was exchanged for pale blue satin.
Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.
Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».
Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию (https://www.litres.ru/nina-beaumont/the-shadowed-heart/) на ЛитРес.
Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.
Nina Beaumont
Тип: электронная книга
Жанр: Современная зарубежная литература
Язык: на английском языке
Издательство: HarperCollins
Дата публикации: 16.04.2024
Отзывы: Пока нет Добавить отзыв
О книге: Luca Zeani Had The Face Of A Fallen Angel… . It was a face Chiara had never forgotten, for it belonged to the man who had ruined her sister – the man she had vowed to destroy. But though she burned with vengeance, Luca′s passionate kisses ignited a hotter flame that made her his captive in body and soul.Could the whisperings of her wayward heart lead her to the light of truth, or was she forever destined to love a man of darkness?