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The Italian Match
Kay Thorpe


Gina came to Tuscany to discover her roots, not to gain an Italian husband! But then she met Count Lucius Carendente, the most desirable man she had ever seen! Unable to resist their passion for one another, they spent one glorious night together. And the next morning Lucius informed her that they were to be married!Lucius only intended to make Gina his mistress, until the discovery of her virginity. But he had no reluctance about doing the honorable thing, if it meant Gina would now spend every night in his bed!









“We must marry.”


Shock held Gina rigid for several seconds, her mind blank of all rational thought. “That’s quite ridiculous!” she managed at length.

“It is the only way I have of restoring honor.”

“Because of last night? But it was my own choice.”

“It makes no difference. It is my duty to make reparation.”

Lucius was speaking with a clipped quietness more telling than any amount of ranting and raving. “Arrangements will be made immediately.”


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The Italian Match

Kay Thorpe










www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)




Contents


CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

EPILOGUE




CHAPTER ONE


STRANGE to think that this could have been her homeland, Gina reflected, viewing the lush Tuscany landscape spread before her as the car breasted the rise. Beautiful as it was, she felt no particular draw to the place.

Pulling into the roadside, she took a look at the map laid open across the passenger seat. If her calculations were correct, the collection of red-slate roofs and single-bell tower some mile or so distant had to be Vernici. Smaller than she had imagined, though big enough to offer some kind of accommodation for the short time she was likely to be spending in the vicinity. This close to her destination, she still had doubts as to the wisdom of what she was planning to do. Twenty-five years was a long time. It could be that the Carandentes no longer even resided in the area.

If that turned out to be the case, she would put the whole thing behind her once and for all, she vowed. If nothing else, she would have seen parts of Europe she had never seen before.

Surrounded by olive groves, the little town had an almost medieval air about it, its narrow streets radiating from a central piazza. The car that burst from one of the narrow streets at breakneck speed would have hit Gina’s car head-on if she hadn’t taken instant evading action. There was only one way to go, and that was straight through a flimsy barrier protecting some kind of road works, finishing up tilted at a crazy angle with her offside front wheel firmly lodged in the deep hole.

Held by the safety belt, she had suffered no more than a severe shaking up, but the shock alone was enough to keep her sitting there like a dummy for the few moments it took people attracted by the screeching of brakes to put in an appearance.

Her scanty Italian could make neither head nor tail of the voluble comment. All she could do was make helpless gestures. Eventually one man got the passenger door open and helped her clamber out of the vehicle, all the time attempting to make himself understood.

The only word Gina recognised was garage. ‘Si, grazie, signor!’ she responded thankfully, trusting to luck that he would take her meaning and call someone out for her. That the car would be in no fit state to be driven when it was pulled out of the hole, she didn’t doubt. She simply had to hope that repairs could be effected without too much trouble.

Her helpmate disappeared up a side street, leaving her to lean weakly against the nearest support and wait for succour. It was gone two, the heat scarcely diminished from its midday high; her sleeveless cotton blouse was sticking to her back. An elderly woman addressed her in tones of sympathy. Assuming that she was being asked if she was feeling all right. Gina conjured a smile and another ‘Si, grazie. Inglese,’ she tagged on before any further questions could be put to her.

It might have been an idea to learn at least enough of the language to get by on before setting out on this quest of hers, she thought wryly, but it was a little late for if onlys. She was in Vernici, and quite likely going to be stuck here for however long it might take to get her car back on the road.

Straightening, she walked round the vehicle to view the uptilted front end, in no way reassured by what she saw. The wheel had been crushed inwards by the impact, the whole wing and a corner of the bonnet badly crumpled. It was some small consolation that the car itself was Italian. If new parts were needed that surely had to help.

Hindered more than aided by the all-too-ready helping hands and eager advice, it took the two men who eventually arrived in a battered tow truck almost half an hour to drag the car free. It was, Gina saw with sinking heart, in an even worse state of disrepair than she had thought. The wheel was buckled, the wing a total write-off, the bonnet probably salvageable but unlikely to look pristine again without a lot of expert hammering and filling.

The happy-go-lucky manner employed by both mechanics gave little rise to confidence. One of them, who spoke some English, indicated that it would be necessary to send to Siena, or perhaps even to Florence for a new wheel and wing. When asked how long that might take, he spread his hands in a gesture only too easily recognisable. Perhaps a week, perhaps even longer. Who could tell? And then, of course, there would be the work. Perhaps another week. The possible cost? Once more the hands were spread. The cost would be what the cost would be, Gina gathered, by then in no fit state to press the issue any further.

Declining an offer to squeeze her into a seat between the two of them, she followed the truck on foot to a small backstreet garage, to see her only means of transport tucked away in a corner to await attention. The parts would be ordered at once, the younger man assured her. In the meantime, he could supply a good place for her to stay.

Faced with his overt appraisement of her body, Gina gave the suggestion scant consideration. For the first time she turned her mind to the car that had caused the accident. The driver had been female not male, and young, the car itself big and blue.

With faint hope, she described both car and occupant to her mechanic friend, to be rewarded with a grinning acknowledgement. ‘Cotone,’ he said. ‘You go to San Cotone. Three kilometres,’ he added helpfully, and drew a map in the dust. ‘Very rich. You make them pay!’

Gina had every intention of trying. She was covered by insurance, of course, but claims for accidents abroad were notoriously difficult to get settled. The more she thought about it the angrier she became, her object in coming to Vernici in the first place temporarily pushed to the back of her mind. She was stuck out here in the back of beyond because of some spoiled teenager with nothing better to do than tear around the roads without regard for life or limb. Recklessness didn’t even begin to cover it!

The question was how to reach the place. ‘Taxi?’ she queried. ‘Bus?’

He shook his head. ‘You take car.’

‘How the devil can I—?’ she began, breaking off abruptly when she saw where he was pointing. With almost as much rust as paint on the bodywork, and tyres that looked distinctly worn, the little Fiat’s better days were obviously a long way in the past. Beggars, however, couldn’t afford to be choosers. If that was the only vehicle available that was the one she would take.

‘How much?’ she asked.

The shrug was eloquent, the smile even more so. ‘You pay later.’

In cash, not kind, she thought drily, reading him only too well. Her bags were locked in the boot of her own car. After a momentary hesitation she decided they would have to stay there for the present. She had to get this other matter settled while the anger still burned good and bright. The question of accommodation could wait.

Despite its appearance, the Fiat started without too much trouble. Gina headed out along the route by which she had approached the town, to take the turning her adviser’s drawing had indicated through the gently rolling landscape.

Olive groves gave way to immense vineyards tended by what appeared to be a regular army of workers. Only then did Gina make the connection with the label she had seen on Chianti wines back home. A rich family indeed, she thought, well able to pay for the damage to her car, for certain.

A pair of wide wrought-iron gates gave open access to a drive that curved through trees to reach a stone-built villa of stunning size and architecture. Gina drew to a stop on the gravelled circle fronting the place, refusing to allow the grandeur to deflect her from her aim. A member of this household had driven her off the road; the onus was on them to reimburse her.

Set into the stone wall beside imposing double doors, the bell was of the old-fashioned pull-type. It emitted a deep, repeated note, clearly audible from where she stood. The elderly man who answered the summons was dressed in dark trousers and matching waistcoat along with a sparkling white shirt. A member of staff rather than family, Gina judged. His appraisement was rapid, taking in her simple cotton skirt and blouse. The disdain increased as his glance went beyond her to the battered vehicle standing on the gravelled forecourt.

‘I’m here to see the owner,’ she stated before he could speak, wishing she had thought to get a name from her mechanic friend. ‘Padrone,’ she tagged on, dredging the depths of her scanty vocabulary.

The man shook his head emphatically, loosed a single, terse sentence, and began to close the door again. Gina stopped the movement by placing her hands flat against the wood and shoving.

‘Padrone!’ she insisted.

From the look on the man’s face, she wasn’t getting through. Which left her with only one choice. She slipped past him before he could make any further move, heading for one of the doors leading off the wide, marble-floored hall with no clear idea in mind other than to block any immediate attempt to remove her from the premises.

There was a key in the far side lock. She slammed the heavy dark-wood door to and secured it, leaning her forehead against a panel to regain both her breath and her wits. That had been a really crazy thing to do, she admitted. A move hardly likely to impress the owner of the establishment, whoever he or she was.

A knock on the door was followed by what sounded like a question. Gina froze where she stood as another male voice answered, this time from behind her. She spun round, gaining a hazy impression of a large, book-lined room as her gaze came to rest on the man seated at a vast desk on the far side of it.

Slanting through the window behind him, the sun picked out highlights in the thick sweep of black hair. Dark eyes viewed her from beneath quizzically raised brows, the lack of anger or even annoyance on his leanly sculptured features something of a reassurance.

‘Buon pomeriggeo,’ he said.

‘Parla inglese?’ Gina asked hopefully.

‘Of course,’ he answered in fluent English. ‘I apologise for my lack of perception. I was deceived by the blackness of your hair into believing you of the same blood as myself for a moment, but no Italian woman I ever met had so vividly blue a pair of eyes, so wonderfully fair a skin!’

A fairness that right now was more of a curse than an asset, Gina could have told him, dismayed to feel warmth rising in her cheeks at the sheer extravagance of the observation. She was unaccustomed to such flowery language from a man. But then, how many Latins had she actually met before this?

‘It should be me apologising for breaking in on you like this,’ she said, taking a firm grip on herself, ‘but it was the only way to get past the door guard.’

A smile touched the strongly carved mouth. ‘As Guido speaks little English, whilst you obviously speak even less Italian, misunderstandings were certain to arise. Perhaps you might explain to me what it is that you are here for?’

Feeling like a stag at bay with her back braced against the door, Gina eased herself away, conscious of a sudden frisson down her spine as the man rose from his seat. No more than the early thirties, he had a lithe, athletic build beneath the cream silk shirt and deeper-toned trousers. Rolled shirt sleeves revealed muscular forearms, while the casually opened collar laid the strong brown column of his throat open to inspection.

‘I need to see the head of the household,’ she said, blanking out the involuntary response.

He inclined his head. ‘I am Lucius Carandente.’

Shock robbed her of both speech and clarity of thought for a moment or two. She gazed at him with widened eyes. There had to be more than one Carandente family, she told herself confusedly. This couldn’t possibly be them!

Yet why not? asked another part of her mind. She knew nothing of the family other than the name. Why assume it more likely that they be of proletarian rather than patrician stock?

The dark brows lifted again, a certain amused speculation in his gaze. ‘You appear surprised.’

Gina pulled herself together. ‘I was expecting someone older,’ she prevaricated, in no way ready to plumb any further depths as yet. ‘The father, perhaps, of a girl who drives a blue tourer.’

Speculation gave way to sudden comprehension, all trace of amusement vanished. ‘Donata,’ he said flatly. ‘My younger sister. What did she do?’

‘She caused me to crash my car an hour or so ago. Down in Vernici. It’s going to need new parts. The garage down there tells me they’ll have to be ordered from Florence, and it’s going to take a lot of time—to say nothing of the cost!’

‘You carry no insurance?’

‘Of course I carry insurance!’ she returned with asperity, sensing an attempt to wriggle off the hook. ‘Waiting for the go-ahead from my company would take even more time. In any case, it’s your sister’s insurance that should be responsible for the damage—always providing she carries some!’

She paused there, seeing his lips take on a slightly thinner line and aware of allowing her tongue to run away with her. ‘I’m sorry,’ she tagged on impulsively. ‘That was very rude of me.’

‘Yes, it was,’ he agreed. ‘Though perhaps not entirely unmerited. If you will kindly unlock the door behind you and allow Guido entrance, I will take the necessary steps.’

Gina obeyed with some faint reluctance, not at all certain that he wouldn’t order Guido to toss her out on her ear. The manservant entered the room without haste, his glance going directly to his master as if she didn’t even exist.

Lucius Carandente spoke in rapid Italian, despatching the older man with a final ‘Subito!’

‘Please take a seat,’ he told Gina, indicating the nearest of the deep club chairs.

He didn’t sit down himself, but leaned against the desk edge as she complied, placing her at a distinct and probably intentional disadvantage. No matter, she thought resolutely; she could always stand up again if she felt the need.

‘You have yet to give me your name,’ he said.

‘I’m sorry,’ she proffered once more. ‘I’m Gina Redman.’

‘You are here on vacation?’

It was easier at the moment to say yes, Gina decided, not yet convinced that the name wasn’t just a coincidence. Other than the obvious characteristics, this man bore no great resemblance to the photograph in her handbag.

‘I’m touring,’ she acknowledged. ‘I’ve driven all the way through France and Switzerland without a single mishap. If your sister hadn’t been going so fast…’

Lucius held up a hand. ‘It would be better that we wait until she is available to speak for herself, I think. She arrived home, I know, so it should not be long before she joins us. Until then,’ he added in the same courteous tones, ‘we will talk of other matters. The colour of your hair does not suggest the English rose. Is it possible, perhaps, that you have mixed parentage?’

Short of telling him to mind his own business, Gina was left with no choice but to answer. ‘My father was Italian.’

‘Was?’

‘He died before I was born.’ She forestalled the next question, hoping he would leave it at that until she had time to consider just how she was going to find out if he was indeed one of the Carandentes she had come so far to find. ‘I was adopted by my English stepfather.’

‘I see.’

To her relief he refrained from asking the name discarded for Redman. He probably assumed that her mother had never held title to it to start with.

The opening of the door heralded the entry of a girl whose appearance was totally at odds with her surroundings. Multilayered and finger-raked into a rough tumble about her tempestuous young face, her hair looked more like a bird’s nest than the crowning glory it must once have been. She was clad in black leather, the trousers skin-tight about rounded hips, the jacket outlining a well-endowed figure.

It was apparent at once that she recognised Gina, though she gave no sign of discomfiture. She addressed her brother in Italian, switching to English with no more effort than he had displayed himself when told to do so—and with even greater fluency.

‘The blame wasn’t mine,’ she declared flatly, without glancing in Gina’s direction. ‘There’s no damage to my car.’

‘Only because I managed to avoid what would have been a head-on crash!’ Gina asserted before Lucius could respond. ‘You were going too fast to stop. You didn’t even attempt to stop! Even to see if I was all right!’ She was sitting bolt upright in the chair, not about to let the girl get away with her denials. ‘Leaving the scene of an accident is against the law where I come from—especially where there are possible injuries to either party.’

‘If you’d been injured you wouldn’t be sitting here,’ Donata returned.

Gina kept a tight rein on her temper. ‘That’s not the point. I’m going to be stuck in Vernici until my car can be repaired—with a hefty bill at the end of it. At the very least, I need your insurance details to pass on to mine.’

‘But what you really want is for Lucius to give you money now!’ flashed the younger girl.

Her brother said something short and sharp in Italian, increasing the mutinous set of her jaw. When she spoke again it was with sullen intonation. ‘I’m sorry.’

Lucius made no attempt to stop her from leaving the room. His mouth tautened as the door slammed in her wake.

‘I add my apologies for the way Donata spoke to you,’ he said. ‘I also apologise for her appearance. She returned last week from her school in Switzerland…’ He broke off, shaking his head as if in acknowledgement that whatever he had been about to say was irrelevant to the present matter. ‘I believe it best that I take responsibility for the financial affairs,’ he said instead. ‘You have accommodation already arranged?’

Gina shook her head, the wind taken completely out of her sails.

‘So where is your luggage?’

‘I left it locked in the boot of the car,’ she said. ‘My car, not the one I came here in. I hired that from the garage.’

‘It will be returned, and your luggage brought here. If you give me your car keys I will make the necessary arrangements.’

‘Here?’ Gina looked at him in some confusion. ‘I don’t—’

‘You will naturally stay at Cotone until your car is repaired,’ he stated. ‘That will be done in Siena.’

‘I can’t let you…’ she began again, voice petering out as he lifted a staying hand.

‘You must allow me to make what reparation I can for my sister’s lack of care. It would be most discourteous of you to reject my hospitality.’

‘Then I must of course accept,’ she said after a moment. ‘Thank you, signor.’

His smile sent a further quiver down her spine. ‘You will please call me Lucius. And I may address you by your first name?’

‘Of course,’ she said, bemused by the totally unexpected turn of events. ‘You’re very kind.’

The dark eyes roved the face upturned to him, coming to rest on the curve of her mouth. ‘I find it difficult to be otherwise with a beautiful woman. A weakness, I know.’

Gina gave a laugh, doing her best to ignore the curling stomach muscles. ‘I doubt you’d allow anyone, male or female, to get the better of you!’

‘I said difficult, not impossible,’ came the smooth return.

His gaze shifted from her as the door opened again to admit a young maidservant. He must, Gina surmised, have summoned her via some hidden bell press.

‘Crispina will show you to your room,’ he said, having spoken to the girl. ‘Your bags will be brought to you. Until then, you would be advised to rest. An ordeal such as the one you experienced can produce delayed shock.’

Gina didn’t doubt it; she felt in the grip of it right now. She got to her feet, vitally aware of his eyes following her as she crossed to the door. Crispina answered her greeting smile with a somewhat tentative one of her own. She shook her head when Gina asked if she spoke English, which left the pair of them with very little to say as they climbed the grand staircase to the upper storey.

The bedroom to which she was shown was every bit as grand as the rest of the house, with glass doors opening onto a balcony that overlooked the magnificent view. The spacious en suite bathroom had fittings Gina was pretty sure were solid gold, the walls lined in mirror glass. She eyed her multireflection in wry acknowledgement of a less than pristine appearance. Clambering from a car halfway down a hole in the ground had left its mark in more ways then the one.

Back in the bedroom, she extracted the long envelope from her bag, and sat down on the bed edge to study the photograph afresh. Arms about each other, the young couple portrayed looked so blissfully happy, the girl’s fair skin and pale gold hair a total contrast to her partner’s Latin looks—both of them scarcely out of their teen years.

Gina had come across the photograph while browsing in the attic one rainy afternoon when she was fifteen. The accompanying marriage licence had tilted her world on its axis, the explanations reluctantly furnished by her mother when confronted with the evidence even more so.

Her mother and Giovanni Carandente had met as students at Oxford and had fallen madly in love. Knowing neither family would approve the match, they had married in secret, planning on taking their degrees before telling them. Her pregnancy had changed everything. Giovanni had set out to face his family with the news in person, only to meet his death in a road accident on the way to the airport. Two months later, with her parents still unaware of the truth, Beth had married her former boyfriend, John Redman, the two of them allowing everyone to believe that the baby was his.

Sitting here now, Gina went over the scene in her mind once again, recalling the anguish. Although she bore no facial resemblance, John Redman’s colouring had always lent credence to hers. She would never in a thousand years have suspected the truth.

Asked why she hadn’t attempted to contact the Carandentes herself, her mother had made a wry gesture. She knew nothing about them, she admitted, except that they lived in the town of Vernici in Tuscany. They had been the ones informed of Giovanni’s death not her. She had found out only on reading about the accident in the following day’s newspaper.

‘It was a terrible time,’ she acknowledged. ‘I hardly knew which way to turn. If it hadn’t been for your father—’

‘But he isn’t my father, is he?’ Gina said hollowly.

‘In every other way he is. He gave you his name—provided us both with a home and a good life. He’s a good man. The very best.’ Beth’s voice was tender. ‘I love him dearly.’

‘But not the way you loved Giovanni?’

Beth shook her head, her smile wry again. ‘No two loves are the same, darling. What Giovanni and I had was wonderful, but whether it would have lasted—well, who can tell?’ She hesitated before continuing. ‘I know it’s a lot to ask, but can we keep it just between ourselves? John regards you as his own child. He’d be terribly upset if he knew that you knew you weren’t.’

Loving him the way she did herself, she’d had no inclination to tell him what she knew, either then or since, Gina reflected, but the knowledge couldn’t be wiped out. For years she had toyed with the idea of some day coming out here and searching for her forebears, only an idea was all it had been until now. She had three more weeks before she started the new job she hoped would rekindle the interest and ambition so lacking this last year or so. Once into that, her free time would be severely restricted.

It was coming up to six o’clock, she saw, glancing at her watch. She’d been sitting here for more than half an hour thinking about it all. The question of whether these Carandentes were of the same family line as her father still remained to be answered. The most direct way was to ask outright, of course, but she was somehow reluctant to do that.

A knock on the door signalled the arrival of her bags. Dinner, she was advised by Guido in fragmentary English, would be served at nine-thirty in the salon. The master requested that she join the family for prior refreshment on the terrace at nine.

Gina thanked the man, receiving a bare nod by way of return. It was obvious that her presence was not looked on with favour. As an old family retainer, he would naturally take Donata Carandente’s side in the matter of who was to blame for the accident, she supposed. It was possible that the rest of the staff would take the same attitude—although Crispina had shown no sign of it.

Whether through the delayed shock Lucius had spoken of, or simply the effects of a long day behind the wheel, the weariness overtaking her was not to be denied. It was doubtful if she’d sleep, but a couple of hours just resting would revive her for the evening to come. She would hate to nod off over the dinner table.

She took off her outer clothing before lying down on the silk bedspread, stretching out luxuriously beneath the spinning fan. So much nicer than functional air-conditioning, she thought, watching the moving blades. The soft, whirring sound was soporific in itself.

Lucius had said Donata was his younger sister. Were there other siblings? For him to be padrone, his father must be dead too, but perhaps there was still a mother alive. If these people really did turn out to be her father’s kith and kin, then she and Lucius could be cousins. She found the idea oddly displeasing.



Daylight had faded to a dim glimmer when she awoke. It was a relief to see there was still half an hour to go before she was expected to join the family on the terrace.

The sleep had refreshed her, the shower did an even better job, but no amount of revitalisation could make what was to come any easier. At some point this evening she had to bring up her father’s name and learn the truth. For peace of mind alone she needed to know her origins.

Having planned on staying at good hotels throughout her journey, she had packed clothes to suit most circumstances. Cut on the bias in deep blue silk jersey, the dress she picked out to wear to dinner skimmed her figure to finish on the knee. Teamed with a pair of high-heeled sandals, it should fit the bill, Gina reckoned.

A stroke or two of mascara along her lashes, a dash of lipstick, and she was ready to go. There hadn’t been time to put her hair up into the French pleat she would have preferred, but it would have to do. Thick and glossy, it fell in soft waves to her shoulders—the bane of her life when it came to drying after washing, but she could never bring herself to have it cut short.

Night was fast encroaching when she reached the wide, stone-balustered terrace, the lamps already lit. Of the five people gathered there, three were female, the family resemblance pronounced.

Lucius came forward to greet her as she hesitated on the threshold of the room through which she had emerged, the look in his eyes as he scanned her shapely length tensing muscle and sinew. He was making no secret of the fact that he found her as much of a draw as she had to admit she found him. A man who might well be her cousin, she reminded herself forcibly. A first cousin, even.

The prospect of a family relationship was hardly enhanced by Donata’s open hostility. Her sister, Ottavia, was around twenty-seven or eight and married to a man some few years older named Marcello Brizzi. Their response to the introduction was courteous enough on the surface, but it was apparent that they too regarded her presence as an intrusion.

It was left to the matriarch of the family to show any warmth in her welcome. Skin almost as smooth as Gina’s own, the still luxuriant hair untouched by grey, she scarcely looked old enough to have a son Lucius’s age.

‘My son tells me you are half Italian yourself,’ she said. ‘I believe you never knew your father?’

Seated in one of the comfortable lounging chairs, the gin and tonic she had asked for to hand, Gina shook her head. ‘He died before I was born.’

Signora Carandente expressed her sympathy in a long, drawn sigh. ‘Such a terrible thing!’ She was silent for a moment, contemplating the girl before her. ‘You have older siblings, perhaps?’

Gina shook her head again, eliciting another sigh.

‘For a man to die without a son to carry on his name is a sad matter indeed! Should anything happen to Lucius before he produces a son, our own lineage will be finished too. You would think, would you not, that he would recognise such a responsibility?’

‘I am not about to die,’ he declared calmly.

‘Who can tell?’ his mother returned. ‘You must marry soon. You have a duty. And who better than Livia Marucchi!’

His shrug made light of the moment, but Gina sensed an underlying displeasure that such matters should be discussed in the presence of a stranger. She’d found the episode discomfiting enough herself. From what little she had seen of him, she judged him a man who would make his own decision about whom and when he should marry anyway. His choices, she was sure, would in no way be limited to one woman.

‘What was your father’s name?’ asked Ottavia, jerking her out of her thoughts and into sudden flaring panic. She wasn’t ready! Not yet!

‘Barsini,’ she said, plucking the name out of some distant memory without pause for consideration. ‘Alexander Barsini.’

She regretted the impulse the moment the words left her lips, but it was too late to retract.

‘Barsini,’ Ottavia repeated. ‘Which part of Italy did he come from?’

Having begun it, she was left with no option but to continue, Gina acknowledged ruefully. ‘Naples,’ she said off the top of her head.

‘He has family still living?’

This time Gina opted for at least a partial truth. ‘I don’t know. I came to Italy to try and find out.’

Ottavia’s brows lifted in a manner reminiscent of her brother, though minus any humour. ‘Your mother failed to maintain contact?’

Gina returned her gaze with a steadiness she was far from feeling. ‘My mother never met his family. They knew nothing of the marriage.’

‘I think that enough,’ Lucius cut in before his sister could continue the catechism. ‘Let the matter rest.’

Ottavia looked as if she found the command unpalatable, but she made no demur. Gina doubted, however, that her curiosity would remain contained. Catching Donata’s eye, she tried a smile, receiving a glare in return. There would be no softening of attitude there for certain. She was well and truly in the doghouse!



Dinner proved less of a banquet than anticipated, with no more than four courses. Gina drank sparingly of the free-flowing wines. She loved the reds, but they didn’t always love her. The last thing she needed was to waken with a hangover in the morning.

Lucius insisted that all conversation was conducted in English for her sake, which made her feel even more of an outsider. Marcello, she learned, was the estate comptroller, Ottavia a lady of leisure. The latter confined her questions this time to Gina’s present background, expressing astonishment on hearing she was a qualified accountant.

‘Such an unusual job for a woman!’ she exclaimed. ‘Do you not think so, Lucius?’

‘An admirable achievement for anyone,’ he returned, directing a smile that set every nerve in Gina’s body tingling. ‘Especially at so young an age.’

‘I’m twenty-five,’ she felt moved to respond. ‘Not that much younger than yourself, I imagine.’

The smile came again, accompanied by an unmistakable glint in the dark eyes. ‘Eight years is no obstacle, I agree.’

Obstacle to what, Gina didn’t need to ask. Neither, she was sure, did anyone else. That his interest in her was purely physical she didn’t need telling either. It could hardly be anything more.

Her cool regard served only to increase the glint. Opposition, it appeared, was an enticement in itself. More than ever she regretted the situation she had landed herself with. If she wanted to know the truth, not only was she faced with the prospect of explaining a lie she had no logical reason to have told in the first place, but the possibility of mortifying Lucius with the news that he had been making advances to a relative.

‘And what does your stepfather do for a living?’ Ottavia persisted, claiming her attention once more.

‘He’s in textiles,’ she acknowledged.

‘On his own account?’

‘His own business, yes.’ A highly successful one, Gina could have added, but saw no reason to go into greater detail—especially when said success was dependent on factors she found rather worrying at times.

Ottavia seemed content to leave it at that for the moment, but Gina sensed that the digging was by no means done. Plain nosiness, she assured herself. There was no way the woman could suspect the truth.



Midnight brought no sign of an end to the evening. Hardly able to keep her eyes open, Gina finally gave in.

‘I hope it won’t be taken amiss if I go to bed,’ she said. ‘I was on the road at seven this morning, and didn’t have all that good a night’s sleep before it.’

‘But of course!’ Signora Carandente responded. ‘You must feel free to do whatever you wish while you are our guest. Perhaps you would prefer to have breakfast served in your room?’

‘Not at all,’ Gina assured her. ‘I’ll be fine.’ She added impulsively, ‘Your hospitality is second to none, signora.’

‘Contessa,’ corrected Ottavia with some sharpness of tone.

‘You may call me Cornelia,’ her mother told Gina graciously.

Still grappling with the implications, Gina inclined her head. ‘Thank you.’

She took her leave with a general ‘Goodnight,’ avoiding any clash of glances with Lucius himself. If his mother was a Contessa, his father obviously had to have been a Count, which meant the title must have been handed down. It made the likelihood of her father having any connection seem even more remote. What would a son of such a family have been doing attending an English university as an ordinary student?

On the other hand, it was surely unlikely that either now or in the past another, entirely unconnected, Carandente family resided in Vernici.

She was going around in circles, Gina acknowledged. The only way to be sure was to do what she should have done several hours ago and tell the whole story. Concealing the name had been an idiotic gesture all round. Tomorrow, she promised herself, she would come clean. It was hardly as if she was after feathering her nest in any fashion. All she wanted was to know who her father had really been.




CHAPTER TWO


DESPITE her tiredness, Gina was wide awake at six. The early morning sunlight beckoned her out onto the balcony to view the beautifully landscaped gardens stretching to all sides. The vistas beyond were shrouded in early morning haze.

There was no one about that she could see from here. On impulse, she returned to the bedroom to don a pair of light cotton trousers and a shirt. Half an hour or so’s exploration would still leave her plenty of time to get ready for the day proper.

She could hear the muted sound of voices coming from somewhere towards the rear of the premises as she descended to the lower floor, but no one appeared to question her purpose. Not that any member of staff would do that in any case, Gina supposed. As a guest of the house she was, as Cornelia had assured her, entitled to do as she wished.

All the same she reduced the chances of running into anyone by using the front entrance. The Fiat was gone, the driveway clear of vehicles of any kind. There would be garages around the back somewhere, she assumed.

She headed left, away from the house, dropping down stone steps between white marble pillars to terraces over-hung with luxuriant plant life and strewn with classical statues. Gina revelled in the beauty of it all against the clean, clear blue of the sky.

On one level lay a pond laced with water lilies of every hue, the carved stone bench at its edge positioned to take full advantage of the harmonious view across the valley. She slowed her steps on sight of the man already seated there.

‘I didn’t realise anyone else was up and about yet,’ she said a little awkwardly. ‘I thought I’d take a look around before breakfast.’

‘I saw you from my window,’ Lucius admitted. ‘It seemed probable that you would eventually reach this spot.’ His regard this morning was fathomless. ‘So, how do you find our home?’

‘It’s truly beautiful,’ she acknowledged. ‘A dream of a place! Why didn’t you tell me you were a Count?’ she tagged on.

He gave a brief shrug. ‘I have no use for status symbols.’

‘Ottavia doesn’t appear to share the aversion.’

‘My sister clings to an order long gone.’ He patted the seat at his side. ‘Come sit with me.’

‘I have to get back,’ she said hurriedly. ‘It must be getting on for breakfast time.’

‘Food will be served whenever and wherever required,’ he advised. A hint of amusement in his eyes now, he added, ‘You are afraid of me, perhaps?’

‘Of course not!’ she denied.

‘Then, of what I make you feel?’ he continued imperturbably.

Pretending not to know what he was talking about would be a waste of time and breath, Gina knew. ‘You take a great deal too much for granted,’ she retorted.

The amusement grew. ‘That is your English half speaking. Your Barsini blood responds to mine.’

The time to tell him the truth was now, but the words wouldn’t form themselves.

‘Grateful as I am to you for what you’re doing with my car, I’m not about to become your playmate for the week,’ she said coolly instead.

‘Playmates are for children,’ he returned, not in the least rebuffed. ‘We are neither of us that.’

‘But we are strangers,’ she replied with deliberation. ‘You don’t really know anything about me.’

‘Then, tell me,’ he invited.

The moment was there again, but Gina still couldn’t bring herself to take advantage of it.

‘I should be getting back,’ she repeated.

‘Then, I will come with you,’ he said.

He got to his feet, lean and lithe as a panther in the black trousers and shirt. Gina steeled herself as he moved to where she stood, but he made no attempt to touch her, falling into step at her side as she turned back the way she had come. Catching the faint scent of aftershave, she was supremely conscious of the fact that she had yet to shower, yet to put a brush to her hair.

‘Are you always up this early of a morning?’ she asked.

‘I rise when I awaken,’ he said easily. ‘No later than six, sometimes as much as an hour before that.’

‘Even when you don’t get to bed until the early hours?’

‘A matter of custom. If I tire in the day I may take siesta. It depends on my commitments.’

‘I imagine those are extensive.’

‘Not too much so.’

Doing her best to keep the conversational ball rolling, she said, ‘You speak excellent English.’

‘But somewhat structured compared with the way you speak, yes?’

Gina cast a glance at the chiselled profile, responding to the curve of his lips. ‘My old English teacher would approve every word. It’s usually tourists who introduce bad habits.’

‘Few tourists find Vernici,’ he said. ‘It is off the regular routes.’

‘I know. I had some difficulty finding it myself.’

It was Lucius’s turn to slant a glance, expression curious. ‘Why were you looking for Vernici at all if your father came from Naples.’

Do it now! an inner voice urged her, even as she mentally cursed the slip-up. ‘Latterly,’ she heard herself saying regardless. ‘But he was apparently born in Vernici, so I thought it worth taking a look there too.’

‘I see.’ From his tone, it was obvious that he was wondering why she hadn’t mentioned that fact last night. ‘The name is unfamiliar to me,’ he went on after a moment, ‘but the older townsfolk will surely recall the family. I will have enquiries made.’

She was getting deeper and deeper into the mire, thought Gina unhappily. What the devil was wrong with her that she kept on fabricating things?

They had reached the front of the house. Lucius preceded her up the steps to open a door for her to pass through, too close by far for comfort as he followed her in. Soles wet from their passage across the grass, her sandals had no purchase on the terrazzo. Lucius shot out an arm as she skidded, hauling her up against him, his hand warm at her waist.

‘You must take more care,’ he said, making no immediate attempt to let her go again.

‘I will,’ Gina assured him. ‘I’m fine now, thanks.’

His laugh was low, the brief pressure of his lips at her nape where the curtain of hair had parted stirring her blood in a manner she deplored.

‘I’d prefer you didn’t do that,’ she got out.

He laughed again, but this time released her. Gina made herself meet the dark eyes. ‘I realise you probably won’t be used to it, but I’m telling you again that I’m not…available.’

‘Do you not think that you might be the one now taking too much for granted?’ Lucius returned with mock gravity.

‘Am I?’ she challenged, and saw the glint return.

‘No. I would be only half a man if I could look at you and not want you in the instant, cara.’ He gave her no time to reply—if she could have come up with a reply at all. ‘I will begin enquiries about the Barsini family this very morning. I would hope to have news of them before the day is over.’

A forlorn hope, Gina reflected ruefully. The longer this charade of hers continued, the harder it became to revoke.

‘There’s something I—’ she began, breaking off as Guido heaved into view.

‘Something you…?’ Lucius prompted.

She shook her head, courage lost. ‘Forget it.’

Leaving him standing there, she ran lightly up the stairs to head for her room. The situation was becoming increasingly difficult. If it weren’t for her lack of transport, she would be tempted to abandon the whole idea and return home. She was vitally attracted to a man who might just be a close blood relation, a man who was making no effort to conceal his objective. Even if there should prove to be no connection, she wasn’t into the kind of casual, ships that pass in the night, relationship that was all Lucius would have in mind.



Despite last night’s refusal, breakfast was brought to her at eight o’clock. Gina ate it out on the balcony, enjoying both the view and the warmth. The sky was so blue, the quality of light a joy in itself. It was possible that her father had viewed the same scene—perhaps even from this very room. Could she really bear, Gina asked herself, not to know for certain?

She went downstairs again with no notion of how she was going to spend the day. Wandering out to the terrace, she found Ottavia stretched out on a lounger beneath an opened umbrella. She was wearing a gold-lamé bikini that barely covered her voluptuous curves, her eyes shielded by designer sunglasses. Her toenails, Gina noted, were painted the same shade of scarlet as her fingernails and lips, the whole effect more reminiscent of the film world, she thought, than Italian aristocracy.

‘Buon giorno,’ she proffered tentatively.

Ottavia pulled down the sunglasses a fraction to run a disparaging eye over the cotton dress Gina had elected to wear. ‘You are quite recovered from your weariness, I trust?’ she enquired, without bothering to respond to the greeting.

‘Quite, thank you,’ Gina confirmed. She felt it necessary to add, ‘The breakfast was very good, but I really don’t expect to be waited on while I’m here.’

‘As you are here at my brother’s invitation, you are entitled to be treated as any other guest,’ came the smooth reply. ‘You realise, of course, how fortunate you are to have gained his support in this affair.’ She didn’t wait for any answer. ‘A word of warning, however. Lucius may pay you some attentions because he is a man and you are attractive to look at, but it means nothing.’

‘In other words, don’t run away with the idea that he might be about to offer marriage,’ Gina returned. ‘I’ll certainly bear it in mind.’

The irony left no visible impression. ‘Good,’ was the only comment.

Her presence wasn’t exactly welcome, Gina gathered, as the glasses were replaced and the head returned to the supporting cushion. She was tempted to stay anyway, just for the hell of it, but there was little to be gained from keeping company with someone who so obviously didn’t want her there.

She had only covered a small part of the immediate grounds earlier. Now would be the right time to take a turn round the other side of the house before the heat became too great for comfort. With several days to fill, and nowhere else to go, she was probably going to be spending a lot of time out of doors. Which in this climate would be no great hardship, she had to admit.

She was crossing the drive when a low-slung sports car came roaring round the bend. Gina leapt instinctively for safety, missed her footing and went down on one knee in the gravel, steeling herself for the impact she was sure was to come. The car screeched to a halt with its front bumper bare inches from her. Spouting Italian at a rate of knots, the driver leapt out without bothering to turn off the engine, a look of concern on his handsome face as he came to lift her to her feet.

‘Inglese,’ Gina said for what seemed like the millionth time in response to what she took to be a spate of solicitous enquiry. ‘Non capisco.’

‘English!’ he exclaimed on a note of surprise.

‘That’s right.’ Gina gave a wry grimace as she eased her knee. ‘Does everybody round here drive like bats out of hell?’

His brows drew together in puzzlement. ‘Bats?’

‘It’s just a saying,’ she explained, regretting the use of it. ‘It means fast, that’s all.’

The frown cleared. ‘Ah, fast!’ Concern leapt once more in his eyes as he caught sight of the trickle of blood running down her leg. ‘You are hurt! Why did you not tell me you were hurt?’

‘I hadn’t realised it was grazed,’ Gina admitted, lifting the edge of her skirt to view the not inconsiderable damage. ‘I thought I’d just knocked it.’

‘It must be cleaned and dressed,’ he declared. ‘Before it becomes infected.’

‘It will be,’ she assured him. ‘Just as soon as I get back to the house. I’m a guest there,’ she added, in case he was in any doubt. ‘Gina Redman.’

‘A friend of the family?’ He sounded intrigued.

‘Not exactly. There was an accident. My car was badly damaged. Lu—Signor Carandente very generously invited me to stay until it’s repaired.’

His lips curved. ‘But of course. Lucius is the most generous of men. I am Cesare Traetta. You must allow me to drive you to the villa.’

‘It’s hardly any distance,’ Gina protested. ‘I might get blood on the upholstery.’

‘If so it will be cleaned.’ He went to open the passenger door. ‘Please to get in.’

Gina wiped away the trickle of blood with her handkerchief before doing so. The soft leather seat cocooned her, its contours designed to hold the body in position. Definitely needed, she thought, as Cesare set the car into motion again with a force that caused the rear wheels to spin. She judged him around Lucius’s age, which made him Donata’s senior by fifteen years, yet the two of them appeared to be on a par when it came to road sense.

They rounded the final bend to come to a further screeching stop outside the house. Switching off the engine, Cesare got swiftly from the car to help Gina from the seat she was struggling to vacate without having her skirt ride up any further than it already had.

‘I think I can manage, thanks,’ she said drily when he made to assist her up the steps. ‘A damp flannel, and I’ll be as good as new!’

‘You are bleeding!’ exclaimed Lucius from the doorway, startling her because she hadn’t seen him arrive. ‘What happened to you?’

‘I slipped and fell on the drive.’ Gina saw no reason to go into greater detail. ‘Signor Traetta was kind enough to give me a lift.’

‘Cesare,’ urged the man at her back. ‘You must call me Cesare.’

She gave him a brief smile. ‘Cesare, then.’ To Lucius she said, ‘I’ll go and clean myself up.’

‘The necessary materials will be brought to you.’ he said. ‘We must be sure no foreign substances remain in the wound.’

‘Of course.’ Gina was fast tiring of the fuss. ‘I can cope.’

‘I am sure of it.’ His tone was dry. ‘Your self-sufficiency does you credit. You will, however, wait for assistance in this matter.’

He took her agreement for granted, indicating that she precede him into the house. Gina battened down her instincts and meekly obeyed. ‘I’m sure you know best,’ she murmured in passing, tongue tucked firmly in cheek.

The dress was not only dirty but torn at the hem, she found on reaching her room. Not beyond repair, she supposed, examining the rip, though she was no expert needle-woman. At any rate, she had plenty of other things to change into, so it could wait until she got home.

Despite instructions, she ran hot water in the bathroom basin and began cleaning off the worst of the mess. The graze was quite extensive, with tiny pieces of gravel embedded in the shredded flesh. Concentrating on extracting them, she was taken unawares when Lucius entered the room bearing a first-aid box.

‘You were to wait until I brought this!’ he exclaimed.

Seated on a padded stool, her foot raised on the bath edge to enable her to see what she was doing, Gina resisted the urge to pull down the skirt she had raised to mid thigh.

‘I hardly expected you to bring it up yourself,’ she said lamely.

Dark brows rose. ‘You think such a task beneath me?’

‘Well, no, not exactly. I just took it…’ She left the sentence unfinished, holding out her hand for the box. ‘It’s very good of you, anyway.’

Lucius made no attempt to hand it over. Placing it on the long marble surface into which the double basins were set, he seized soap from the dish and washed his hands. Gina watched in silence, reminded that she should have done the same before attempting to touch the graze at all.

His presence in the confines of the bathroom—spacious though it was—made her nervous. She found it difficult to control the quivering in her limbs when he took a pair of tweezers from the box and sat down on the bath edge to start work on the gravel.

The hand he slid about the back of her calf to hold her leg still was warm and firm against her skin, his fingers long and supple, the nails smoothly trimmed; she could imagine the way they would feel on her body—the sensual caresses. Her nipples were peaking at the very notion.

Stop it! she told herself harshly, ashamed of the sheer carnality of her thoughts. It might be a long-established fact that women were as capable as men of enjoying sex without love, but she had never followed the trend. From her mid teens she had determined not to settle for anything less than the real thing: the kind of love her mother had known for Giovanni Carandente. The possibility that Lucius could be her father’s nephew was enough on its own to prohibit any notion she might have of relaxing her ideals.

‘I am sorry if I hurt you,’ Lucius apologised as her leg jumped beneath his hands. ‘There are only a few more small pieces to come, and then we are finished but for the antiseptic.’

‘No problem,’ she assured him. ‘You’re being very gentle. It’s quite a mess, isn’t it? I didn’t realise how deep some of the bits had gone.’

‘Thankfully, there should be no lasting scars,’ he said without looking up from his task. ‘It would be a pity to mar such a lovely leg.’

‘Don’t you ever stop?’ she asked with a sharpness she hadn’t intended.

This time he did look up, expression quizzical. ‘You find my admiration irksome?’

Gina drew a steadying breath. ‘I find it a little too…practised, that’s all.’

‘Ah, I see. You think I express the same sentiments to all women.’ The dancing light was in his eyes again. ‘Not so.’

He was hardly going to admit it, Gina told herself as he turned his attention once more to her knee. Not that it made any difference.

The antiseptic stung like crazy, but Lucius made no concessions. He finished the dressing with an expertly applied bandage.

‘You may remove the dressing tomorrow to allow the healing tissue to form,’ he said, relinquishing his hold on her at last.

Gina got to her feet to try a somewhat stiff-legged step, pulling a face at her reflection in the mirrored wall. ‘I haven’t had a bandaged knee since I was eight!’

‘Long skirts, or the trousers women everywhere appear to have adopted, will cover your embarrassment.’

The dry tone drew her eyes to the olive-skinned face reflected in the mirror. ‘You disapprove of the trend?’ she asked lightly.

‘I prefer a woman to dress as a woman,’ he confirmed. ‘As most men would say if asked.’

‘Donata wears them,’ Gina felt bound to point out, stung a little by the implied criticism. ‘With that attitude, I’m surprised you allow it—to say nothing of the rest!’

‘I said preference not outright rule,’ came the steady response. ‘Assuming that by the “rest” you refer to the state of my sister’s hair, no amount of castigation can hasten the regrowth.’

Gina turned impulsively to face him, ashamed of the dig. ‘I spoke out of turn. You said yesterday that she’d recently returned from school?’

The smile was brief and lacking in humour. ‘She was despatched from her school for behaviour no reputable establishment could tolerate.’

‘Not just for a haircut, surely!’

‘A minor transgression compared with breaking out of the school in order to attend a nightclub in the nearby town. Not for the first time it appears. This time she was caught by the police when they raided the place in search of drugs.’

Gina gazed at him in dismay. ‘You’re not saying Donata was actually taking them?’

‘She assures me not.’

‘You do believe her?’

Lucius lifted his shoulders, mouth wry. ‘I hardly know what to believe. I bitterly regret allowing her to persuade me into sending her to Switzerland at all. Her education was complete enough without this “finishing” she was so anxious to acquire.’

‘She can’t have been the only one to kick over the traces,’ Gina ventured.

‘If by that you mean was she alone on the night in question, the answer is no. There were two others caught with her. One American girl, one English. They too were despatched to their respective homes.’

‘I see.’ Silly as it seemed, Gina felt like apologising for the part the English girl had played. ‘I don’t suppose it helps much.’

‘No,’ Lucius agreed. ‘I am still left with the problem of a sister turned insurgent. While she resides here at Cotone I can demand that she obeys certain rules of conduct, but there are limits to the penalties I can impose should she choose to defy me.’

‘I can appreciate that,’ Gina said carefully. ‘It isn’t as if she’s a child any more.’

‘She is eighteen years of age,’ he advised on a harder note. ‘By now she should be looking towards marriage and children of her own!’

‘Marriage isn’t the be all and end all of every woman’s ambition.’ Gina felt moved to protest, turning a deaf ear to the faint, dissenting voice at the back of her mind.

The dark eyes regarded her with a certain scepticism in their depths. ‘You intend to stay single all your life?’

‘I didn’t say that. It depends whether I meet a man I want to marry.’

‘And whom, of course, also wishes to marry you.’

‘Well, obviously.’ The mockery, mild though it was, stirred her to like response. ‘Two hearts entwined for all eternity! Worth waiting for, wouldn’t you say?’

‘The heart has only a part to play,’ he said. ‘The body and mind also have need of sustenance. The woman I myself marry must be capable of satisfying every part of me.’

‘Typical male arrogance!’ She exploded, driven beyond endurance by the sheer complacency of the statement. ‘It would serve you right if…’ She broke off, seeing the sparkle of laughter dawn and realising she’d been deliberately goaded. ‘Serve you right if you were left high and dry!’ she finished ruefully. ‘Not that it’s likely, I admit.’

The sparkle grew. ‘You acknowledge me a man difficult for any woman to resist?’

‘I acknowledge you a man with a lot more than just looks going for him, Count Carandente,’ she said with delicate emphasis.

If she had been aiming to fetch him down a peg or two, she failed dismally. His shrug made light of the dig. ‘Despite Ottavia’s claim, the woman I marry will not carry the title of Contessa because she will be no more entitled to do so in reality than anyone in the last few hundred years. As I told you this morning, it is simply a status symbol. One for which I have little use myself.

‘Which leaves me,’ he went on with a wicked gleam, ‘with just the looks you spoke of going for me. The looks that warm both your English and your Italian blood to a point where the differences no longer have bearing. Or would you still try to deny what lies between us, cara?’

The pithy response that trembled on her lips as he moved purposefully towards her was rejected as more likely to inflame than defuse the situation. What was she doing indulging in the kind of repartee scheduled to bring this very situation about to start with? she asked herself.

‘Whatever you have in mind, you can forget it!’ she said with what certainty she could muster, resisting any urge to try fighting him off physically as he drew her to him. ‘I already told you, I’m not playing!’

‘Words! Just words!’ He put a forefinger beneath her chin to lift it, bending his head to touch his lips to hers with a delicacy that robbed her of any will to resist.

She was conscious of nothing but sensation as he kissed her: the pounding of her blood in her ears, the warmth spreading from the very centre of her body, the growing weakness in her lower limbs urging her to give way to the need rising so suddenly and fiercely in her. He drew her closer, moulding her to the contours of his masculine shape—making her aware of his own arousal in a manner that inflamed her even further. The words he murmured against her lips transcended all language barriers.

This man might be a close relative, came the desperate reminder, pulling her up as nothing else could have done right then.

‘That’s enough,’ she got out, jerking away from him. ‘In fact, it’s more than enough!’

Anticipating at the very least a show of frustrated anger at her withdrawal from what must have appeared a near foregone conclusion, she was taken totally aback when Lucius simply laughed and shook his head.

‘I think not, for either of us, but there is no haste. You will find Cesare and myself on the terrace should you care to join us for refreshment. He will be anxious to know that you suffered no long-lasting injury.’

He gathered the items he had taken from the first-aid box, and departed, leaving Gina standing there feeling all kinds of an idiot. Aroused he might have been, but he was obviously more than capable of controlling it. He certainly wouldn’t demean himself by insisting on satisfaction, however encouraged to believe it forthcoming.

Telling him the truth now, and discovering that there was indeed a close blood relationship, could only prove embarrassing for them both. Probably the best thing she could do was forget the whole affair and head for home as soon as her car was repaired.

And spend the rest of her life wondering, came the thought. She was Giovanni Carandente’s daughter. Having finally started on the quest, she had to see it through to the end, no matter what. There must be some way of finding out if this really was his place of origin that didn’t involve giving herself away.

Her inclination was to spend the rest of the morning right here in her room, but that was no way for a guest to behave. With the bandage in mind, she donned a long, sarong-type skirt along with a silky vest, and slid her feet into a pair of thonged sandals. Not exactly haute couture, but it served the purpose.

Hair loose about her shoulders, face free of make-up apart from a dash of lipstick, she hid behind a pair of tortoiseshell sunglasses on going out to the terrace. Not just Lucius and Cesare to face, she saw, but Ottavia and Donata into the bargain, the former now fully and beautifully dressed.

Wearing a pair of deck trousers and a T-shirt, her hair raked through with a careless hand, Donata looked hardly less of the teenage rebel than she had in the leather outfit yesterday. She viewed Gina’s arrival with a marked lack of enthusiasm.

Not so, Cesare, who leapt to see her seated with a solicitude that went down like a lead balloon with both sisters.

‘Your leg must be supported,’ he urged, raising the chair’s built-in foot rest for her. ‘You are in much pain?’

‘None at all,’ Gina assured him, submitting to his ministrations only because it was marginally less awkward than asking him to desist.

‘I ordered fresh orange juice for you,’ said Lucius as one of the younger male staff members came from the house bearing a loaded tray. ‘It can, of course, be replaced by something stronger if you prefer.’

‘Thanks, but this is just what I need,’ Gina assured him as the tall, ice-cool glass was set before her. She seized on it gratefully, sending a good quarter of the contents down her throat in one gulp.

‘Iced drinks should be sipped so that the stomach suffers no sudden shock,’ commented Donata with a certain malice. ‘Isn’t that so, Lucius?’

‘Advisable, perhaps,’ he agreed easily. ‘If you are finding the heat overpowering we can move to a cooler part of the terrace,’ he said to Gina herself.

The only heat she found overpowering was the kind he generated, came the fleeting thought. ‘I find it no problem at all,’ she assured him. ‘I always did enjoy the sun.’

‘What little you see of it in England.’

‘Oh, we have our good days,’ she returned lightly. ‘Sometimes several together. You’ve visited my country?’

‘Never for any length of time.’

‘Tomorrow is the Palio,’ Cesare put in with an air of being left too long on the sidelines. ‘I have grandstand seats long-reserved should anyone care to share them.’

‘Si!’ declared Donata before anyone else could speak. ‘Vorrei andare!’

Lucius said something in the same language, wiping the sudden animation from her face. Pushing back her chair, she got jerkily to her feet and stalked off, mutiny in every line of her body.

‘What exactly is the Palio?’ asked Gina in the following pause, feeling a need for someone to say something.

It was Cesare who answered. ‘A horse race run twice a year between Siena’s contrade. Riders must circuit the Piazza del Campo three times without the benefit of saddles.’

‘A bareback race!’ Gina did her best to sound enthused.

‘A little more than just that,’ said Lucius. ‘The city’s seventeen districts compete for a silk banner in honour of the Virgin. A tradition begun many centuries ago. The race itself lasts no more than a minute or two, but the pageantry is day long. You might enjoy it.’

‘You were only there the one time yourself that I recall,’ said Cesare. ‘Why do we not all of us attend together?’

‘It has become a tourist spectacle,’ declared Ottavia disdainfully. ‘I have no desire to be part of it. Nor, I am sure, will Marcello.’

‘Then, perhaps the three of us,’ he suggested, undeterred. ‘Gina cannot be allowed to miss such an event.’

If Lucius refused too, it would be down to the two of them next, Gina surmised, not at all sure she would want to spend a whole day in Cesare’s company. Equal though he appeared to be in age to her host, he lacked the maturity that was an intrinsic part of Lucius’s appeal.

‘The three of us, then,’ Lucius agreed, to her relief. ‘Providing that I drive us there. I would prefer that we arrive without mishap.’

Cesare laughed, not in the least put out. ‘You have so little faith in me, amico, but I accept your offer.’

It had been an ultimatum not an offer, but Lucius obviously wasn’t about to start splitting hairs. Gina found herself wishing it was just going to be the two of them taking the trip. Safer this way though, she acknowledged ruefully. With Cesare around to act as chaperon, there would be no repeat of this morning’s assault on her senses. Whichever way things might turn out, she was in no position to risk that kind of involvement.




CHAPTER THREE


CESARE took his departure shortly afterwards, accompanied by Lucius who wished to discuss some obviously private matter with him. Left alone with Ottavia, Gina made an effort to open a conversation, but soon gave up when her overtures failed to draw more than the briefest of replies.

‘I think I’ll go and find that cooler spot Lucius mentioned,’ she said at length, getting to her feet. ‘It’s too hot to even think straight out here.’

The older woman made no reply at all to that; Gina hadn’t really expected one. She could understand Donata’s attitude regarding her presence in the house, but what axe did Ottavia have to grind?

There had been neither sight nor mention of Cornelia so far this morning. Either she was a late riser, or had gone out, Gina surmised. It still needed half an hour or so to noon. Lunch, she imagined, wouldn’t be served much before one-thirty or even two. Not that she was hungry yet, but there was a lot of day still to get through.

The coolest place at this hour was going to be indoors. She went in via the glass doors to the salotto, welcoming the immediate flow of cooler air from the overhead fans. Reaching the hall, she stood for a moment wondering in which direction to head. Of the rooms that opened off it, she had so far only seen the one she had just come through and the library where she had first run into Lucius.

Feeling a bit of an intruder still, she opened a door under the right wing of the staircase, looking in on a small room that appeared at first glance to be something of a depository for unwanted items of furniture, with little in the way of style about it.

About to close the door again, she paused as her eye caught a reflection in the mirror almost directly opposite. Eyes closed, Donata was seated in a high-backed chair that concealed her from casual observation. From the look of her, she had been crying.

It was likely that her company would be far from welcome, Gina reckoned, but she found herself stepping quietly into the room and easing the door to again regardless. What she was going to say or do she had no clear idea.

The floor in here was laid in parquetry, the design largely obscured by the heavy pieces of furniture. Donata opened her eyes at the sound of footsteps, coming jerkily to her feet as she registered the identity of the intruder.

‘Leave me alone!’ she urged. ‘You have no right to be here!’

Still not at all certain just what it was she hoped to achieve, Gina halted a short distance away. ‘I know I haven’t’ she said, ‘but, as I am, supposing we bury the hatchet?’

Distracted by the unfamiliar phrase, Donata drew her brows together. ‘Bury the hatchet?’

‘It means we forget about the accident and start again. I’d rather be your friend than your enemy.’

A variety of expressions chased across the younger girl’s face as she gazed in silence for a moment or two. When she did finally speak, the belligerence seemed almost forced. ‘Why should you wish to be my friend?’

Why indeed? Gina asked herself, answering the question in the same breath: because in all probability they shared the same genes—or some of them, at any rate.

‘I suppose I just don’t like being disliked by anyone,’ she said on a semi-jocular note. ‘Not that I’m having much success where your sister’s concerned either.’

‘Ottavia has little concern for anyone but herself,’ declared Donata with unconcealed animosity. ‘What she would most like is to be in Lucius’s place.’

Gina could imagine. As padrone, Lucius would have total control of all Carandente affairs. Playing second fiddle wouldn’t come easy to a woman of Ottavia’s temperament. She wondered fleetingly what had prompted her to marry a man who appeared to be little more than an employee of the estate. It could hardly have been for lack of any other choice.

‘You must miss your father,’ she said softly, changing tack. ‘How long is it since you lost him?’




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