There were two more chances to get near to Bruno and she made the most of them both. When the bowls of fruit were passed around she selected a particularly fine apricot and handed it to him on a small silver salver. He took it with a grin and beckoned her close. She bent her ear to his lips and he whispered, ‘You’ve chosen well. The bloom on this fruit is like the bloom on your cheeks, and it bears the same rosy blush. I shall make you blush even more, Carla, before the night is out. Will you then find me a ripe strawberry?’
She giggled, feeling the heat rise in her cheeks again which made him laugh out loud and sink his white teeth into the succulent flesh of the fruit. The juice ran down his chin and he licked all around his mouth with his pink tongue, his black eyes twinkling at her, then wiped off the rest with his napkin which he gave to her.
‘Fetch me a clean one, Carla. And another finger bowl.’
She did as she was told, and watched as he dabbled the fingers in the scented water. He was so near that she could feel the sensual heat emanating from him and smell the spicy perfume mixed with his own musk. Her senses reeling, she returned to the kitchen before she did or said something that would get her into trouble.
‘Carla, you look like a bitch on heat. What have you been up to?’ Lisa asked at once. ‘Was it something that Bruno said to you? Go on, you can tell me!’
‘He is such a flirt, Lisa! It’s not so much what he says as how he looks at you. As if his eyes could burn holes in your clothes and see what’s underneath.’
‘It’s his hands you want to watch. They’ll grope and wander wherever they like if you give them half a chance.’
‘Has he done anything to you?’
Lisa looked sly. ‘Maybe.’
‘You will tell me, won’t you? Tonight, when we’re in bed.’
‘Maybe.’
Lisa’s green eyes were dancing teasingly at her, but Carla knew she would tell her all about Bruno soon. She was the sort who never could keep a secret, but she enjoyed teasing anyone who was as full of curiosity as Carla was, especially where men were concerned.
It was disappointing to hear the footmen clearing the tables for dancing and the musicians striking up with their loud, rhythmic strains whilst she and Lisa had to do the washing up. Carla longed to catch a glimpse of Bruno dancing. She was sure he would look really elegant and sophisticated as he steered one or other of the beautiful ladies around the polished floor. It wasn’t long before she was in a dream, her hands slowing as her concentration wavered, and only the sharp reproof of old Marta brought her back to earth with a thud.
The night seemed endless, the sounds of music and laughter wafting down to the kitchen while piles of dishes, cutlery and saucepans had to be washed, dried and polished. By the time the two girls were allowed to go up to their bedroom Carla was afraid Lisa would be too exhausted to talk. But as soon as they scrambled into their shared bed, dressed only in their shifts, Lisa put her arm around her and pulled her close.
‘You wanted to know about Bruno,’ she began. ‘Let me tell you quickly, before the others come up to bed.’
‘Yes, please!’ Carla cuddled up to her friend’s warm body with a sigh. ‘I want to know everything!’
‘I’ll tell you all I know. When I first came here Bruno started behaving towards me exactly as he is now acting towards you, flirting and teasing, staring at me wherever I went.’
‘And how did you respond?’ Carla asked eagerly.
‘Oh, I played hard to get! I’m not the sort to throw myself at any man, you know. Besides, I have a sweetheart. His name is Federico and he’s a condottiere, fighting for the Duke of Milan. When he comes back from his campaign he’s going to marry me. He promised.’
‘Oh Lisa, you never said!’
‘Well you never asked. Anyway, I’ll tell you about Federico another time. It’s Bruno who interests you most, isn’t it?’
‘Yes. So you resisted his advances?’
‘I led him on a bit first. It was fun. Once he kissed me in the orchard and I slapped his face. You should have seen his expression! I fancy not many girls refuse him. He’s far too handsome for his own good. I know for a fact that he’s got at least three girls in the family way.’
‘Three? All servant girls like us, were they?’
‘By no means! One was a servant, a pretty Neapolitan girl. He tupped her one afternoon in the pantry – she told me herself, and I saw her belly swell a few months later. As soon as old Giorgio noticed she was dismissed.’
‘What happened to her?’
Lisa shrugged. ‘I don’t know, we lost touch. Another of his lovers was the wife of a nobleman, with whom he carried on an affair for almost a year. She bore a son and passed it off as her husband’s even though the poor old sod was past it.’
‘How did they manage to keep the affair secret?’
‘They first met at a banquet at her husband’s villa. She told her husband the doctor had ordered her to take walks in the countryside three times a week, and she used to meet Bruno at an old barn. We all knew about it. Sometimes some of us would go and spy on them.’
‘Did you go?’
‘A couple of times. I saw her on all fours like a dog, with Bruno taking her from behind. He went on and on for ages before he came, and I think she came two or three times as well. They were horny as goats for it.’
Carla felt a ridiculous stab of jealousy. She knew it made no sense. Bruno should mean nothing to her and she didn’t even know the anonymous noblewoman. But the thought of her enjoying him with such abandon made her horribly envious. She had never really enjoyed a man completely like that, and the more she heard about what pleasure some women experienced the more she wanted it for herself.
‘You said there was a third,’ she reminded Lisa, quietly.
‘Ah yes. That was a wench from the village. He found her when he was out hunting and got detached from the other men. She showed him where he could water his horse and, while his horse was drinking, he seduced her.’
‘There and then?’
‘Yes, it was just the once. Nobody would have known about it if the girl hadn’t come to the door with a belly you could carve meat on. Of course he denied it and the girl was sent away, poor thing. But I’m pretty sure it was him. She’d never have dared to come here if she wasn’t sure of the identity of her lover.’
‘How terrible! Left to fend for herself, with no help?’
‘Not exactly. I have a cousin who lives near the girl and she said that a mysterious bundle of florins was left at her door a few weeks later.’
Carla sniffed. ‘He has a conscience, then.’
‘To a degree. But you see it’s as well to give him a wide berth. Not only is he the sort who can’t help following his cock, but he also seems to be extremely virile. Some of the girls here believe they can get pregnant just by looking him in the eye!’
‘Well he is extremely good-looking . . .’
Carla sounded more wistful than she had intended. To her surprise, Lisa propped herself up on her elbow and stared at her in earnest. ‘Now look here, don’t you start getting any ideas about that man, will you? I like you too much to see you come to harm.’
‘I’ll only flirt with him a little.’
‘That’s too dangerous. If you give him the least encouragement he’ll take advantage. Mind you, if you can get him to make mouth music for you he’ll take you to seventh heaven.’
‘You mean, to sing for me?’
Lisa giggled. ‘No, silly! Mouth music is what we call pussy-licking. You know, when a man kisses your privates. He’s expert at that, so they say. I saw him do it to his lady-friend for ages once and she had three paroxysms, each stronger than the last.’
Carla wanted to tell her that she had never been brought to orgasm that way, but she was still shy of discussing such matters. Her longings were secret and she was half ashamed of them, believing them to be a weakness that she should hide rather than give into. Yet they were growing stronger every day, and these stor
ies about Bruno made it even harder to resist his allure.
When she settled for sleep, with Lisa’s back turned against her, Carla was still thinking of the handsome nobleman, remembering how his eyes had pierced hers with bold assurance and how gentle his fingers had been when they touched her wrist. ‘I must avoid him whenever I can,’ she told herself primly.
But another voice inside her said, ‘What if he seeks you out, what then?’
Chapter Twelve
BRUNO DID SEEK Carla out, not long after the birthday feast. She was sitting on a stone bench in the garden in the cool of the evening, resting her legs after a hard day in the kitchen, when she saw him coming towards her through the maze of low hedges. Blushing, she took up her sewing again and pretended she hadn’t seen him, but he came straight up and boldly asked if he could sit beside her.
‘Whatever pleases you, sir,’ she replied, unable to look him in the eye. Her fingers trembled as she tried in vain to continue with her task.
‘I’ll tell you what pleases me,’ he said in a low seductive voice as he sat down beside her, too close for comfort. ‘The sight of your pretty face and figure. It’s a long time since such a beauty has joined our household.’
Carla knew false flattery when she heard it. She regarded him archly. ‘I am no beauty, sir, and you know it.’
He was undaunted. ‘Perhaps not in the classical sense, but you certainly have charm. Besides, you know what they say about beauty. Tell me, Carla, where did you work before you came here?’
‘In Florence.’
‘Which household? I probably know the family.’
‘I doubt it, sir. I worked for a painter and his apprentices, keeping their house in order.’
Bruno’s dark brows arched in surprise but he said nothing, which disconcerted her. The silence that fell between them was broken only by the distant bustle of the kitchen and the trilling of birds. Carla continued with her sewing, aware of the devastating effect the man was having on her. Although her eyes were downcast she could see the taut strength of his thigh in the black hose, smell the evocative scent of his perfume which failed to mask completely his masculine body odours. She could feel the sexual heat emanating from him and, although she dared not look too closely, she was sure that he was aroused by sitting so close to her.
At last he said, ‘You look so demure, sitting there with your sewing, but I have a feeling that a wanton heart beats beneath those delightful breasts. And I mean to discover it, soon.’
To her astonishment he rose abruptly and strode off, leaving her confused and embarrassed. He had declared his intention in so bold a manner that it left no doubt in her mind that he intended to seduce her whenever the opportunity presented itself. His arrogance amazed her. Presumably he had done it so many times that he thought nothing of it. She had never felt so helpless, even at Piero’s. What disturbed her most was the irresistible attraction that such an obvious lecher had for her.
Bruno had made it plain that he knew about her previous experience, that somehow he sensed she was not a virgin. That probably meant he would make love to her without preliminaries if he caught her alone. The prospect both excited and alarmed her. It was a situation she could either submit to or manage to her advantage, and she was determined to take the latter course. ‘Mouth music’, that was the key. She might show him that she could give as good as she got in that department!
After that she was always on her guard. A kind of sixth sense told her when Bruno was near, and then she felt herself becoming keyed up, her pulse racing and a flush rising in her cheeks. Even Lisa noticed it.
‘You’ve got the hots for him, haven’t you?’ she commented, dryly. ‘Well, don’t say I didn’t warn you!’
When they met in company he would sometimes wink at her, or find some legitimate way of making fleeting contact. Their fingers would touch if he asked her to hand him something, or if they met each other on the stairs when no one was looking he would pinch her bottom or even steal a brief kiss. His advances grew bolder with every passing day so that Carla found herself in a state of almost constant arousal. He was the first person she thought about when she awoke, and the last before she slept at night.
But beneath all the excitement of this new attraction lay an old hurt, the pain of deprivation. Carla missed her art. She sometimes took out her crayons and tried to sketch the view from her bedroom window on a piece of old sheet stretched tight or some board she had rescued from the yard, but it was not the same as the old days when she had the finest materials at her disposal.
One day Lisa came into the room while she was drawing and looked over her shoulder.
‘That’s really good, you know. I wish I had a talent like that.’
‘Much good would it do you!’ Carla replied gloomily. ‘You could only amuse yourself and maybe your friends with it.’
‘What’s wrong with that? You know how we often sing while we work to keep our spirits up, and tell stories for the fun of it. You could do portraits of me and the others too, just for our entertainment.’
‘Entertainment!’ Carla scoffed. She continued, passionately, ‘Why is it that men are allowed to make a living from their talents, while women are only expected to go into service or else have babies? It’s so unfair!’
Lisa stared at her blankly. ‘But if both men and women were allowed into the professions everything would break down! There’s men’s work and women’s work, everyone knows that!’
‘Only because the Guilds have ordained it. Take painting, for instance. There’s nothing an artist has to do that a woman can’t manage. I know, I’ve watched them at work. If you can draw and colour as well as a man, why should you be banned from earning money at it just because you’re a woman?’
Lisa shrugged. ‘Why can’t men have babies? It’s how the Good Lord arranged things.’
‘It’s not the same and you know it. I can see that women wouldn’t be strong enough to do some jobs, but painting is not hard physically. It’s just that men don’t want women to invade their territory, and that’s the truth.’
Lisa giggled. ‘They’re probably afraid we’d turn out to be better at it than they are!’
‘Ah, now you’re talking!’
‘They’re happy enough to have us wash and cook and clean and mend for them. Which reminds me, you’re wanted down below.’
With a sigh, Carla put away her drawing and smoothed down her apron. She didn’t mind working in the kitchen too much, but it came a poor second after her work as a painter. When she remembered how she had worked on the fresco with Piero a tear came into her eye and she brushed it away impatiently. She could not afford to be harbouring false hopes of being able to paint properly again. The best thing was to forget all about the past. Perhaps she should not even use her chalks again. Although it gave her pleasure for a few minutes, it would only make her miserable and discontented in the long run.
It proved impossible to stop drawing altogether, however. One fine autumn day the garden was looking so mellow and lovely in the late afternoon sun that during her break Carla hurried to find her chalks and some waste paper she had scrounged from the kindling pile in the kitchen. She then went downstairs to the stone seat. She began to sketch the statue of Venus and Cupid that stood surrounded by myrtle bushes, and she soon became so absorbed in her work that she failed to hear footsteps approaching.
‘Ah, the budding artist!’ came Bruno’s ironic tone. She tried to hide her work but he pulled her arm away and gave a low whistle. ‘Whew – not so budding! Where the devil did you learn to draw like this?’
‘I – I have always done a little drawing, sir.’
He took the paper off her and sat down on the bench, scrutinising it. ‘I can’t believe this wasn’t done by a trained hand. Someone must have shown you. Come clean, little one, who was it? Your father, perhaps, or a brother?’
‘No, really, I learnt by myself. I just draw what I see, for my own amusement, that’s all.’
‘May I keep this?�
��
Carla didn’t really want him to, but she couldn’t refuse. He folded it up and put it in his purse, then took her hand and raised it to his lips. With his eyes surveying her face closely he kissed each of her fingertips in turn. ‘The hand of a genius,’ he smiled afterwards. ‘I wonder what else this little hand can do, my dear. Shall we find out?’
He pulled Carla to her feet and almost dragged her over to the myrtle grove. There was a hollow centre to the thicket where grass grew, and he drew her down beside him. She knew that they were completely concealed from the path, since the place was filled with shadow at that time of day, and her heart began thudding painfully in her chest as she realised he might do whatever he liked to her there.
‘I told you I would find out just how experienced you were!’ he said with a grin, placing her hand on his bulging hose. ‘See how ready for you I am. You may bring him out into the open if you wish, and have a good look at him.’
Carla hesitated. A part of her hated the thought of more rough-and-ready sex with a man she scarcely knew. Especially when her heart still belonged to Marco. Yet another part of her found it exhilarating – and that part was winning. She glanced shyly into Bruno’s darkly handsome face, saw the devilish glint in his eye and knew she could not resist. Slowly she reached into the steamy depths of his hose and felt warm rampant flesh.
‘Ah! Such cool fingers!’ he sighed when she took firm hold of his thick shaft.
Carla extricated his member and stroked it gently, watching it expand and flush like a creature emerging from a chrysalis. Soon his erection was strong, the purplish glans shiny and rearing up in proud defiance. Cupping his balls with her other hand Carla began to caress the glans with her thumb, feeling the sticky liquid emerge in oozing drops from its single eye. Bruno groaned voluptuously and reached down the neck of her dress for her breasts, which he caressed with frantic fingers. They fastened on her nipples and proceeded to pinch and pull them into shape, making Carla cry out as hot desire streamed through her like lava, overcoming all resistance.
Artistic Licence Page 18
