The Villa

by Nora Roberts

  mother just now. And you'd do what you have to do faster and easier if you knew I was here with your children."

  "Do you have to be practical?"

  "I don't want to be," she said softly. "I'd love to say yes, to just run away." Feeling young, foolish, ridiculously happy, she turned in a circle. "To make love with you in one of those huge old beds in the castello. To sneak away for an evening to Venice and dance in the piazza, steal kisses in the shadows of the bridges. Ask me again." She spun back to him. "When all this is over, ask me again. I'll go."

  Something was different. Something… more free about her, he realized. That made her only more alluring.

  "Why don't I ask you now? Go with me to Venice when this is over."

  "Yes." She threw out her hands, gripped his. "I love you, David."

  He went very still. "What did you say?"

  "I'm in love with you. I'm sorry, it's too much, too fast, but I can't stop it. I don't want to stop it."

  "I didn't ask for qualifications, just for you to repeat yourself. This is handy. Very handy." He jerked her forward, and when she started to spill into his arms, he lifted her, spun her in a circle. "I had it figured wrong. By my astute calculations, it was going to take at least another two months before I could make you fall in love with me."

  His lips raced over her face. "It was tough on me," he continued. "Because I was already in love with you. I should've known you wouldn't let me suffer for long."

  She pressed her cheek to his. She could love. Her heart glowed with the joy of it. And be loved. "What did you say?"

  "Let me paraphrase." He eased her back again. "I love you, Pilar. One look at you. One look, and I started to believe in second chances." He brought her close again, and this time his lips were tender. "You're mine."

  Chapter Twenty-Two

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  Venice was a woman, la bella donna, elegant in her age, sensual in her watery curves, mysterious in her shadows. The first sight of her, rising over the Grand Canal with her colors tattered and faded like old ballgowns, called to the blood. The light, a white, washing sun, would sweep over her and lose itself like a wanderer in her sinuous veins, her secret turns.

  Here was a city whose heart was sly and female, and whose pulse beat in deep, dark rivers.

  Venice wasn't a city to be wasted on meetings with lawyers and accountants. It wasn't a city where a man could be content shut up in an office, hour by hour, while the sweet seductress of spring sang outside the stone and glass of his prison.

  Reminding himself Venice had been built on commerce didn't help David's mood. Knowing the curvy streets and bridges were even now jammed with tourists burning up their Visa cards in the endless shops where tacky was often mistaken for art didn't stop him from wanting to be among them.

  It didn't stop him from wishing he could stroll those ancient streets with Pilar and buy her some ridiculous trinket they would laugh over for years. He'd have enjoyed that. Enjoyed watching Theo inhale a gelato like water, listening to Maddy interrogate some hapless gondolier over the history and architecture of the canals.

  He missed his family. He missed his lover. And he hadn't been gone fully sixty-eight hours.

  The accountant was droning on in Italian and in a whispery voice difficult enough to understand when full attention was paid. David reminded himself he hadn't been sent to Venice to daydream but to do a job.

  "Scusi." He held up a hand, flipped over another page of a report fully an inch thick. "I wonder if we might go over this area again." He spoke slowly, deliberately stumbling a bit over the Italian. "I want to make sure I understand clearly."

  As he'd hoped, his tactic hit its target with the Italian's manners. The new section of figures was explained, patiently.

  "The numbers," the Italian said, switching out of compassion to English, "do not match."

  "Yes, I see. They don't match in a number of departmental expenditures. Across the board. This perplexes me, signore, but I'm more perplexed by the activities attributed to the Cardianili account. Orders, shipments, breakage, salaries, expenses. All very clearly recorded."

  "Si. In that area there is no… what is it? Discrepancy. The figures are correct."

  "Apparently they are. However, there is no Cardianili account. No Giambelli client or customer by that name. There's no Cardianili warehouse in Rome at the address recorded in the files. If there's no customer, no client, no warehouse, where do you suppose these orders, over the last three years, have been sent?"

  The accountant blinked behind the lenses of wire-framed glasses. "I could not say. There is a mistake, of course."

  "Of course. There's a mistake." And David believed he knew who'd made it.

  He swiveled in his chair and addressed the lawyer. "Signore, have you had the opportunity to study the documents I gave you yesterday?"

  "I have."

  "And the name of the account executive in charge of this account?"

  "Listed as Anthony Avano."

  "And the invoices, the expense chits, the correspondence relating to the account were signed by Anthony Avano?"

  "They were. Until December of last year his signature appears on much of the paperwork. After that time, Margaret Bowers's signature appears in the file."

  "We'll need to have those signatures verified as genuine."

  "I understand."

  "And the signature who approved, and ordered, the shipments, the expenditures and signed off on the payments from the account. Donato Giambelli."

  "Signore Cutter, I will have the signatures verified, will look into this matter from a legal point of view and advise you of your position and your recourse. I will do that," he added, "when I have the permission to do so from Signora Giambelli herself. This is a delicate matter."

  "I realize that, which is why Donato Giambelli was not informed of this meeting. I trust your discretion, signori. The Giambellis won't wish more public scandal, as a company or as a family. If you would give me a moment, please, to contact La Signora in California and relate to her what we've just discussed?"

  It was always tricky for an outsider to question the integrity, the honesty, of one of the core. David was neither Italian nor a Giambelli. Two strikes, he decided. The fact that he'd been brought into the organization barely four months before was the third.

  He was going up against Donato Giambelli with one out already on his slate. There were two ways, in his opinion, to handle the situation. He could be aggressive and swing away. Or he could wait, with the bat on his shoulder, for the perfect pitch.

  Back to sports metaphors, he thought as he stood at the window of his office, hands in his pockets, and watched the water traffic stream by. Apt enough. What was business but another game? Skill, strategy, luck were required.

  Donato would assume he had home-field advantage. But the minute he walked into the office, he would be on David's turf. That David intended to make clear.

  His interoffice phone buzzed.

  "Signore Giambelli is here to see you, Signore Cutter."

  "Thank you. Tell him I'll be right with him."

  Let him sweat just a little, David decided. If the grapevine here climbed as quickly as it did in most companies, Don already knew a meeting had been held. Accountants, lawyers, questions, files. And he would wonder, he would worry.

  He would, if he was smart, have some reasonable explanation in hand. Answers lined up, fall guy in place. Smartest move would be fury, outrage. And he would be counting heavily on family loyalty, on the stream of blood to carry him through the crisis.

  David walked to the door himself, opened it and watched Donato pace the outer office. "Don, thanks for coming in. Sorry to keep you waiting."

  "You made it sound important, so I made time." He stepped into the office, scanned the room quickly. Relaxed a little when he found it empty. "If I'd been informed before you made your travel arrangements, I would have cleared my calendar so that I could have shown you Venice."

  "The
arrangements were made quickly, but I've seen Venice before. I'm looking forward to seeing the castello, though, and the vineyards. Have a seat."

  "If you let me know when you plan to go, I'll arrange to escort you. I go there myself, regularly, to make certain all is as it should be." He sat, folded his hands. "Now, what can I do for you?"

  Swing away, David decided, and took his place behind his desk. "You could explain the Cardianili account."

  Don's face went blank. As his eyes darted from side to side, he worked up a puzzled smile. "I don't understand."

  "Neither do I," David said pleasantly. "That's why I'm asking you to explain it."

  "Ah, well, David. You give my memory too much credit. I can't remember every account, or details of it. If you'll give me time to pull files and information—"

  "Oh, I already have them." David tapped a finger on the file on his desk. Not so smart, he decided, surprised. And not prepared. "Your signature appears on a number of expense chits, correspondence and other paperwork pertaining to this account."

  "My signature appears on many such account papers." Don was beginning to sweat—lightly, visibly. "I can hardly remember all of them."

  "This one should stick out. As it doesn't exist. There is no Cardianili account, Donato. There's considerable paperwork generated for it, a great deal of money involved. Invoices and expenses, but no account. No man by the name of"—he paused, flipped open the file and drew out a sheet of Giambelli letterhead—"Giorgio Cardianili, with whom you appear to have corresponded several times over the last few years. He doesn't exist, nor does the warehouse with an address in Rome to which several shipments of wine are listed to have been shipped. This warehouse, where you, on company expense, traveled to on business twice in the last eight months, isn't there. How would you explain that?"

  "I don't understand." Donato sprang to his feet. But he didn't look outraged. He looked terrified. "What are you accusing me of?"

  "At the moment, nothing. I'm asking you to explain this file."

  "I have no explanation. I don't know of this file, this account."

  "Then how is it your signature appears in it? How is it your expense account was charged more than ten million lire in connection to this account?"

  "A mistake." Donato moistened his lips. He snatched the letterhead from the file. "A forgery. Someone uses me to steal money from La Signora, from my family. Mia famiglia," he said, and his hand shook as he thumped it against his heart. "I'll look into this immediately."

  No, not smart at all, David decided. Not nearly smart enough. "You have forty-eight hours."

  "You would dare? You would dare give me such an ultimatum when someone steals from my family?"

  "The ultimatum, as you call it, comes from La Signora. She requires your explanation within two days. In the meantime, all activity on this account is frozen. Two days from now, all paperwork generated from this matter is to be turned over to the police."

  "The police?" Don went white. His composure in tatters, his hands began to tremble and his voice to hitch. "This is ridiculous. It's obviously an internal problem of some kind. We don't want an outside investigation, the publicity—"

  "La Signora wants results. Whatever the cost."

  Now he paused, struggled to think, to find a rope swinging over the pit he'd so suddenly found himself standing over. "With Tony Avano as account executive, it's easy to see the source of the problem."

  "Indeed. But I didn't identify Avano as the account exec."

  "Naturally I assumed…" Don wiped the back of his hand over his mouth. "A major account."

  "I didn't qualify Cardianili as major. Take your two days," David said quietly. "And take my advice. Think of your wife and children. La Signora will be more likely to show compassion if you stand up for what's been done, and stand up for your family."

  "Don't tell me what to do about my family. About my position. I've been with Giambelli all my life. I am Giambelli. And will be long after you're gone. I want that file."

  "You're welcome to it." David ignored the imperious and outstretched hand, and closed the folder. "In forty-eight hours."

  It puzzled David that Donato Giambelli was so unprepared, so clueless. Not innocent, he thought as he crossed

  St. Mark's Square. Donato had his hand in the muck up to his elbow. But he hadn't put the scam together. He hadn't run the show. Avano, possibly. Quite possibly, though the amount skimmed under his name was petty cash next to what Donato had raked in.

  And Avano had been dead four months.

  The detectives in charge of his homicide investigation would likely be interested in this new information. And how much of that dingy light would land on Pilar?

  Swearing under his breath, he moved toward one of the tables spilling out on the walkway. He sat, and for a time simply watched the flood of tourists pour across the stones, in and out of the cathedral. And in and out of the shops that lined the square.

  Avano had been milking the company, he thought. That was a given, and already known. But what David now carried in his briefcase took things to another level. Donato stepped it all up to fraud.

  And Margaret? There was nothing to indicate she'd had knowledge of or participation in any skimming prior to her promotion. Had she turned so quickly? Or had she learned of the false account and that knowledge had led to her death?

  Whatever the explanation, it didn't answer the thorniest of questions: Who was in charge now? Who was it Donato was surely calling in panic for instructions, for help?

  Would whoever that was believe, as easily as Donato had believed, that La Signora intended to take the matter to the police? Or would they be cool-headed and call the bluff?

  In any case, within two days Donato Giambelli was going to be out on his ass. Which added one more layer to David's headache. Don would have to be replaced, and quickly. The internal investigation would have to continue until all leaks were plugged.

  His own time in Italy would likely be extended, and at a point in his life where he wanted and needed to be home.

  He ordered a glass of wine, checked the time, then took out his cell phone. "Maria? This is David Cutter. Is Pilar available?"

  "One moment, Mr. Cutter."

  He tried to imagine where she was in the house, what she was doing.

  The last night they'd been together, they'd made love in his van on the edge of the vineyard. Like a couple of giddy teenagers, he remembered. So eager for each other, so desperate to touch.

  And remembering brought on a painful longing.

  It was easier, he found, to imagine her sitting across from him, while the light dimming toward dusk struck the dome of the cathedral like an arrow, and the air filled with the flurry of pigeons on the wing.

  When all this is over, he promised himself, he would have that moment with her.

  "David?"

  The fact that she was a little breathless made him smile. She'd hurried. "I was just sitting here, in St. Mark's Square." He picked up the glass of wine the waiter brought him, sipped. "Drinking an interesting little Chianti and thinking of you."

  "Is there music?"

  "A small orchestra across the plaza, playing American show tunes. Sort of spoils the moment."

  "Not at all. Not for me."

  "How are the kids?"

  "They're fine. Actually, I think Maddy and I are cautiously approaching friendship. She came out to the greenhouse yesterday after school. I got a lesson on photosynthesis, most of which was over my head. Theo broke up with the girl he's been seeing."

  "Julie?"

  "Julie was last winter, David. Keep up. Carrie. He and Carrie broke up, and he moped for about ten minutes. He's sworn off girls and intends to dedicate his life to his music."

  "Been there. That should last maybe a day."

  "I'll let you know. How's everything there?"

  "Better now, for talking to you. Will you tell the kids I'll