by Wendy Holden
"Just enjoy yourself, baby!" Christian shouted, grinning, as they raced along in the Ferrari. "You English chicks, you're so uptight!" His white teeth flashed in the sunshine almost as brightly as the car's chrome fittings.
He made her feel fast and reckless. The air rushing at her was exhilarating; she felt like a plane taking off. The speed was such that she felt they might.
"Where are we going?" she shouted excitedly.
"My place," he yelled back over the air screaming past them.
Darcy pushed caution firmly aside. She wanted some fun, after what seemed in retrospect years of deprivation. She had an alter ego now, a reckless, pleasure-seeking, beautiful young film star. And going to bed with your co-stars—especially if they looked like Christian—was the sort of thing film stars did.
He zoomed up a hill and skidded to a halt in front of a pair of huge gates.
A wide, gravelled path led through the middle of a garden to a large villa whose central door was surrounded by grandiose carving. There must, Darcy thought, be hundreds of bedrooms.
"You're staying here?" she asked Christian, in awe. "On your own? It's incredible."
Christian shrugged. Incredible was one way of describing it. Huge and creepy was another, and he didn't like the way the place was so old. Secondhand was bad enough; this place was probably hundredth-hand. Not for the first time, Christian rather regretted his insistence that the film company book him the biggest villa in the area, all for himself.
"You're so beautiful," he murmured, folding her into his arms.
Darcy felt her whole body thrum with anticipation. She traced his face, her eyes hungrily devouring his features. They had been together a mere few hours, but really, Darcy felt, her mind all excited in a alcohol-fused, pleasure-hungry whirl, they had known each other for ages. Ever since their eyes had met across a crowded, neck-craning restaurant in L.A., a defining moment. Maybe even the turning point of her life.
"We're gonna set that screen alight," he whispered to her, his eyes wide with excitement. "You an' me, we're gonna be the new Burton and Taylor."
She pressed herself against him. As he dipped his mouth to hers, she felt a stab of joy between her legs.
"The bedroom's up here," he muttered thickly, pulling her gently but firmly up the stairs.
It was a huge, high-ceilinged room with enormous shuttered windows. In the muted light, a tall bed with white curtains rose like a ship in full sail.
On the bed, in the cool shadows cast by the canopy, he pushed her gently back, his mouth locking hers down. Pushing up her dress to reveal her breasts, he kissed them reverently, flicking the tips with his tongue. She shuddered with delight.
He looked up, his eyes soft with surprise. "Hey. They're real!"
"What did you expect them to be?" Darcy asked laughing.
"Oh. You know. The usual silicon valleys," Christian grinned.
Afterwards she rose from the bed, flung open the shuttered windows so that the dazzling light poured in, and looked out over the sunny garden. It stood still in the singing heat. As she stood there, a gentle breeze sprang up and hurled soft balls of scent from the earth against her bare skin: rosemary, sage, pine. Darcy closed her eyes and breathed slowly, luxuriously in.
Chapter Thirty-seven
Emma stood at the gate. The name chiselled in gold on the neat, white marble nameplate—"Villa Rosa"—was that of the address Belle had given her.
She felt relieved but exhausted. It was dazzlingly hot, and Morning, whose weight seemed to be doubling daily—he'd soon be out of the baby carrier altogether—hung like lead around her neck. Fortunately, he was quiet and content under his little white sun hat, looking about him with interest as he had throughout the journey on the bus from the airport. A taxi would have been better, but Emma's funds, as yet unswelled by Belle, did not stretch to one.
Would Belle be here, Emma wondered as she pressed the buzzer on the thick, stone gatepost. She had not seen her employer since Belle disappeared into the VIP area at Gatwick. And while travelling alone with the baby had had its hair-raising moments, being in charge had been enjoyable. Emma realised, with a clutch of regret, that her feeling of autonomy was about to end.
"Benvenuto!" someone called from the other side of the gate.
Emma peered through the wrought iron to see a middle-aged, beaming woman of wiry build and wiry cropped black hair that was tinged with grey. She wore a black skirt and white blouse.
"I'm Mara," the woman smiled as she punched a code into somewhere unseen on the other side of the gatepost and swung open the wrought-iron screen. "The housekeeper. I do housework, laundry, cooking…ah. Bello bambino!" She tickled Morning under the chin and beamed at Emma. "You have had a good journey, Signorina Murphy?"
"Actually, I'm not Signorina Murphy."
"Not Signorina Murphy?" For a moment, the housekeeper looked suspicious. Then she smiled again. "Ah. You Signorina Prince then."
"No."
"I am told," the housekeeper said, rather crossly, "that Signorina Prince and Signorina Murphy, they both arrive at lunchtime. I cook my special beef lasagne."
At the thought of Mara's special big lasagne, Emma's stomach growled. She was here. She was hungry. She hastened to explain herself. "I'm Signora Murphy's nanny. Signora Murphy's son's nanny, rather…"
Could it possibly be true that Belle had not given any advance warning? Had not told the housekeeper that her son and his nanny were expected?
"Ah. Si. I see." There was a flash of black eyes, a smile, and friendliness was restored. "I carry the baby?" Her voice was as much command as it was suggestion. Gratefully, Emma unbuckled the heavy child and handed him over. Morning's reaction was to open one eye and survey Mara sleepily before closing it again.
"Bello!" Mara deposited a loud and smacking kiss on the top of his head. "I am frustrated grandmother!" she explained, shaking her head and grinning ruefully. "I have no children, only nephew. And he never find right girl!"
"Oh dear," Emma muttered. She wasn't sure she was terribly interested. The full weight of the afternoon sun seemed to be pressing hard on her head. She longed to be somewhere cool.
The villa before her looked, she longingly noted, very cool. It was an attractive, mellow building, a long oblong of pale-yellow stone with a red tiled roof. There were windows everywhere, at all heights, of all periods, of all sizes, and in all places. It looked as if someone had picked them up in a fistful and just thrown them at the wall.
"He very nice. Very funny, very 'ardworking. He chef."
Mara, Emma realised, was evidently still talking about her nephew. "But Marco, 'e work too 'ard. No time to meet right girls."
She looked Emma up and down. Her lips pursed, and one black eyebrow raised speculatively.
Emma felt indignant as well as hot. Mara seemed very nice, but she'd only met the woman five minutes ago. What made her think she would be interested in her nephew? Besides…
An image of a handsome, blond boy rose and fell in her mind's eye. Briefly, Emma let herself dream, yet knowing there was no point. Orlando was in Italy, certainly, but it was a big place.
Mara was leading her down the middle of a sunny green lawn with a leaping, foaming, scented, gloriously colourful border of roses.
"What beautiful roses," Emma said in delight. "Do you do the garden?"
"Gino! Yes! He has been gardener here for long time. More than thirty years. He love just roses. He say they are the queen of the flowers. He no want to plant anything else."
Emma felt she could see Gino's point. There were brilliant roses of all colours, of pink, yellow, white, apricot, and red, and endless variations, rippling pink through purple, yellow through red. Some were classic Valentine's blooms, huge dark and velvety, each curl-edged petal distinct. Others were tumbling, old-fashioned, pink floribunda, petals tightly squished and gathered like the skirt of a ballgown. Still others, smaller and more businesslike, scurried along the ground. Others clambered the weathered stone walls, wrest
ling with honeysuckle. The scent, even in this hot part of the day, was powerful. Emma could imagine, in the cool of the evening, that it would be almost overwhelming.
The rose garden gave way to a big, flat, sunny terrace in which an enormous oblong of water sat like a bright blue jewel. There were chocolate-brown recliners beside the pool, trimmed with white, each with its own matching shade. It was, Emma thought, disbelievingly, like something from a magazine.
They had reached the villa now. Mara led the way into a big white-painted entrance hall hung with tapestries and large black paintings whose subjects were obscured by age. A flight of wide, shallow wooden steps led to a fatly railed upper landing.
"I take you to your room," Mara said. She paused and looked puzzled. "You share with baby, no?"
Emma nodded. "Is there a cot?"
Mara shook her head apologetically. "No one tell me about bambino." She brightened. "But you can get one from Florence tomorrow."
Emma swallowed. After the long trip she had just endured, a next-day journey to an unknown city for a large piece of furniture was all she needed. What the hell was the Italian for travel cot anyway?
A couple of fields away from the Villa Rosa, Richard Fitzmaurice was trying hard to enjoy his holiday. He sat beneath the big green parasol, his spare frame in its white, short-sleeved shirt and old blue trousers hunched over the dining table, a bottle of Nastro Azzuro next to him, ostensibly buried in the Daily Telegraph.
His surroundings were gracious. Behind Richard was the farmhouse, the aubergo as Georgie preferred to call it, with its glamorous succession of double bedrooms decorated in the best contemporary rustic-luxe manner and with adjoining bathrooms featuring powershowers. Plus the impressive lounge with denim-blue suede furniture, satellite telly, and bright contemporary paintings.
The kitchen's highlights included a lifestyle-statement six-ring cooker, a butcher's-block-cum-champagne-bar. and a leatherbound Visitor's Handbook with recommendations of local eateries.
In front of him spread the patio, clean and brilliant in the sun. At its far end was a large, round-ended swimming pool whose blue water, enlivened by gushing pumps, danced and sparkled and sent spiky reflections over the white recliners at its edge. Around the patio was a garden that went as far as the wall bordering the main road. The intense green of the lawn had surprised Richard at first, until he had spotted the twisting sprinkler that jerked back and forth like a whirling dervish.
Yes, Richard reminded himself. He was in a beautiful house, in a beautiful country, with his wife and son, whom he loved. Even if Orlando had disappeared into his room immediately on arrival and had not emerged even for lunch. And now, thanks to the combined efforts of the Faugh males, nothing remained of the big spaghetti carbonara that Georgie, with her usual skill and resourcefulness, had whisked up. Richard tried not to give in to the sense of bitterness that swept him whenever he thought about how Hugh and Laura Faugh had hijacked his holiday.
If Richard raised his head a fraction and looked over to the pool, he could see a darkly sunglassed Hugh, big hair glossy in the sun, stretched out in a pair of well-packed electric blue trunks on a recliner. His sons lay next to him, one reading, Richard saw, a glossy called FHM and the other one called Nuts.
They had lost no time in making themselves comfortable; they had only been in the damned place an hour.
Hugh's big, long, trunk-like legs were slightly apart, and, like his huge, fleshy chest, covered with sun oil and black hair. He watched the shadow of Hugh's big, long arm, raised slightly in the air, juddering over the patio stone as he keyed into his BlackBerry. He was obsessed with the thing. He claimed it was full of messages from constituents, as well as, of course, those from the centre of Shadow power.
This Richard found puzzling. Hugh's constituency was quite similar to his own. His own comprised the tenants of an impoverished Gloucestershire housing estate as well as their near neighbours in one of the Cotswolds' wealthiest villages. Only very few of either group—uneducated and poor on the one hand, elderly and conservative on the other—had the faintest idea how to send an email. Certainly not enough to keep him as busy as Hugh seemed to be, his thumbs and forefingers in a blur of almost constant movement.
But perhaps such keenness had got Hugh where he was. If his constituents wanted to get in touch with Richard, they rang him on the telephone. Or on the mobile, as he was on holiday, but only in dire emergency would he expect any such calls now. In twenty-five years of representing his constituency, Richard could count on the finger of one hand the number of times he had been disturbed by a constituency emergency on summer holiday.
Hugh grunted, sat up, looked around, and waved at Richard. He ambled over to where he sat, stared at his Nastro Azzuro, and boomed, "Any chance of one of those beers you've got there, old boy?"
Richard's reply was drowned in the sudden chug-a-chug-a of a helicopter overhead. This was just as well.
Emma had just put Morning to sleep in her own bed. There was nowhere else for him to go until she could get to Florence tomorrow. Lightening her burden slightly was the fact that Mara had offered to look after Morning while she made the journey. He, at least, would be spared a long stretch in a hot bus.
"You're sure you don't mind?" Emma had asked the housekeeper.
"I'll only mind if you come back early," was the twinkling reply.
Emma looked out of the window of her room. It had a view of the rose garden…
The colours of the flowers blazed in the rich evening light beneath the still-azure sky, and the scent was as heady as a boudoir. It was a beautiful, blue and gold end to what had been a beautiful, blue and gold day. The air rang with competing birdsong, some of it surprisingly loud.
Chuga-chuga-chuga-chuga.
Very loud indeed. There was a thudding noise—a helicopter, Emma now realised as, suddenly and without warning, everything was plunged into sudden shadow and the black underside of some huge airborne beast suddenly appeared above the villa.
Emma shot down the stairs and dived out of the rose garden onto the pool patio and peered up at the menace roaring above, dark and heavy, slashing violently at the air. Surely—surely—it wasn't trying to land in the garden?
Mara appeared. She stared up at the approaching aircraft with an expression of utter incomprehension.
The helicopter was lower now. It filled the sky; Emma could no longer see the sun for it. Where there had been birdsong and an expanse of warm blue, there was now earsplitting noise and blackness.
Who was this idiot, who'd so spectacularly lost his way? She must stop this enormous, destructive, noisy thing from landing. She ran back on to the lawn of the rose garden, her arms waving wildly.
"It's not a helipad!" Emma screamed, leaping up and down, trying to spot a pilot, a passenger, someone behind the expanse of impassive black plastic covering the front of the helicopter. She couldn't see anyone; could they see her? Could they see anything?
"The rose garden!" Mara yelled, as the scented air was smashed and sliced by the deadly whipping blades. Emma ducked and ran towards the villa, not just her ears but her entire body full of the hideous screaming of the engine.
It was incredible, but it actually was happening. The helicopter really was landing in the rose garden. Right in the middle of the path. The heads of the blooms were being pulled into the air, sucked into the blades, mashed by slashing lengths of metal. And now the blades were slowing down, the machine subsiding—and not a single rosehead remained.
The silence that now flooded Emma's ears was as violent and absolute as the noise had been. Not a bird could be heard.
As for the garden, that beautiful rose garden, full of colour and scent and movement…
Shattered petals plastered the front of the helicopter. The grass beneath it was gouged and black: churned, torn, and crushed as the beast had juddered in landing. All that love, Emma thought, all that care and time, all the planting, weeding, spraying, watering, all the pride, joy, and knowledge that the un
known Gino had put into creating this beautiful garden. All destroyed in an instant.
Emma rarely got angry, but a terrible rage filled her now. Whoever was in that helicopter, whoever it was who had done this horrible thing, they were going to hear exactly what she thought of them.
The helicopter door now slid back. A woman emerged. Emma started forward, her anger hot on her lips, but then she fell back.
The woman was blonde and held a small dog. Her platinum mane blazed white in the sun as she shook it out. Shadowy caves shifted beneath her cheekbones. She wore a tight, short black dress, bright red lipstick, and huge black glasses.
