The Devil's Advocate

by Vanessa James

  He broke off, seeing the expression on her face change.

  'You didn't know that? You didn't realise?'

  Silently she shook her head.

  'But you must have done. You can't not have known. It was so strong. I tried to tell you…'

  'I thought then. In Scotland.' She hesitated.

  'But not now? Here, in Venice… Luisa. When we were here together, when we made love…'

  'I knew I loved you. But I thought… you said…' Her control went quite suddenly, and she could say nothing more. Silent tears spilled over on to her cheeks. He clasped her tight in his arms.

  'My darling Luisa! There's never been anyone else for me. There never can be. I had to come back, you see, and… Oh, God, this is all my fault. If I hadn't been so stupid, so blind—and so jealous. Come here.'

  Very gently, his arms around her, he led her across to the small sofa near the windows. There he sat down beside her and wiped the tears away from her eyes. When she was calmer, he took her hands in his and looked into her face.

  'Will you let me try to explain? Please, Luisa. It won't excuse what I did, how I did it. But it may help you understand…'

  'It doesn't matter now.'

  'My darling, it does. I want there to be no more lies, no more misunderstandings between us, ever.'

  He paused, glancing away from her, out of the windows to the sea.

  'In the beginning…' he paused, turning to her with a wry bitter smile. 'In the beginning, it was like a kind of madness. You were the one thing in my life that held any certainty, and I thought that certainty had gone. So I tried to destroy all memory of you. I did the things I suppose people do in that situation—I drank a little too much, I worked a little too long, I went with other women—too many women—and tried to pretend to myself that I could forget you in their arms. It didn't work, of course. It couldn't. It just made the pain, the loss, worse, more unbearable. So I cut myself off. I didn't see my family, not even my father. I couldn't bear to be anywhere I might hear your name spoken…'

  'But, Julius,' gently she pressed his hand, trying to comfort him, to ease the bitterness from his voice, 'there was no need for you to have felt that, whatever had happened. We were both so young. I was just a stupid girl. It was my fault…'

  'There was every need, and you know that's riot true.' He turned to her fiercely. 'Did you imagine I didn't try and explain it all away with those kind of platitudes? They didn't apply! You weren't a girl. You might have been fifteen, but you'd gone through more by that age than some women do in a lifetime. You remember what you said to me, in London, about Claudia? 'She wanted for love,' you said. Did it never occur to you, Luisa, that you might have done too? And I loved you. I'd wanted you to know that. I still did. I wanted to be with you, to protect you, to give you back a little of the things you gave so generously to everybody else—to Claudia, to your pathetic father…' He broke off. 'I'm sorry, I shouldn't say that, but it was what I felt, damn it. And besides, I was so sure you had loved me. I'd seen it in your eyes, in your face, every day we were in that house together. I believed in that as I never believed in anything else in my life. It was my creed, if you like, my religion. If that was not true…' He broke off, pain blazing in his eyes. 'Then there was no truth. Nothing. Just a void.'

  'If you'd seen me then. If you'd told me…' she spoke gently, and he gave a groan.

  'I know. But I couldn't, don't you see? Every time I thought of you, every time I remembered how it had been between us—when it was so clear that we didn't even need words, we just knew—then this other image would come back to me. Of you and Kit, in that bedroom. So…' he drew in his breath as if to steady himself, 'in the end I came to terms with what I felt. I couldn't bear to see you, and yet I had to know where you were, what was happening to you. And I did, through my father. I knew you hadn't married. I knew where you lived, where you worked. I bought that house to be near you. I even went to the gallery once, just to see the place where you spent your days. I bought a picture from Luke.' He smiled. 'And then I put it away. I couldn't bring myself to look at it. If I had one thought, it was that I hoped you were as unhappy as I was, that you were as miserable, as haunted…'

  'Oh, Julius!'

  He gave her a wry look. 'Not very noble, I agree. But how I felt.' He paused. 'Then, quite suddenly, my father was taken ill. It became obvious that the firm was very run­down, it was inefficient. I'd known that for years. But I thought it was no more than that. The worry was making my father ill—perhaps he suspected something, I don't know. But anyway, I agreed to help. I went in, the first time, about two months ago. I started looking at the books, at the transactions the firm made on behalf of clients.' He gave a harsh laugh. 'It's ironic, really. It might have taken me far longer to see what was wrong, but as it was, the first file I took out was yours. Because it was a link, a connection, because even to see your name on a piece of paper was something. And it was all wrong, Luisa.' He turned to her, his eyes dark with anger. 'Your aunt hadn't left you that much money, but what you had was disappearing too quickly. It was being siphoned off somehow. I checked and double-checked. I went through other clients' holdings and saw the same thing.' He paused and sighed. 'I suppose I knew then, really. It could only have been Kit. He was always like that with money, even when he was a child.'

  Luisa stared at him, her eyes wide. 'My money too? It's not possible!'

  'I'm afraid it is.'

  She lowered her eyes. 'He told me he'd been doing something like that—in the boathouse, that night. And that you knew. But he said…' She hesitated. 'He said Claudia had helped him all along. That she'd had an affair with him…'

  His mouth tightened grimly. 'I don't think that's true,' he said. 'Another of Kit's lies. If Claudia had an affair with him, she's a bigger fool than I think she is. And she wasn't involved in much—more or less what she told you. It was easy to see which transactions she'd diverted. She was considerably less expert than Kit. Here…' he put his arms around her, as he saw her tremble, 'you mustn't worry about Claudia. She admitted what she did, and it's over now. She can make a new life…'

  Luisa nodded. 'But…' she hesitated, looking into his eyes, 'that means you knew. Before I even came to the office, before I saw you?'

  He smiled grimly. 'Oh yes, I knew. But I couldn't decide what to do. I was glad, you see, that's the worst part. Glad because it gave me a reason to see you—one I couldn't argue away. And glad because it meant I could break Kit. And then…' he paused, 'I knew I couldn't do that. My own motives—well, they were hardly pure, were they? I'd have been punishing Kit for what had happened with you—it would have been revenge, not justice.' He shrugged. 'And it would have killed my father, destroyed the last happiness he had. He was so proud of Kit, you see. That's the irony in all this. He was always the favourite. But he could never believe it.'

  'So what did you do?'

  'Nothing.' He paused. 'I couldn't decide what was right. And then—well, you know what happened. The door opened one morning, and you were standing there. I couldn't believe it.' He laughed bitterly. 'I couldn't decide who had conjured you up—some god or some devil. Until you mistook me for my brother. Then I knew.'

  'So you decided to pretend to be Kit—to let me go on thinking you were?' Luisa stared at him in bewilderment.

  'I didn't decide! There wasn't time. I didn't think—it just happened. I was so angry, so confused… The one woman I loved, a woman I would have recognised in a million, and you—you mistook me, for him. Don't you see, Luisa, it just confirmed everything, all my worst fears, all my night­mares…'

  'So you tested me?' She looked at him evenly. 'To see if I would… respond. To Kit?'

  'Yes, damn it, I did! But you make it sound so coldblooded, as if I planned it. It wasn't like that. I kept thinking any moment you were going to realise. That if I touched you, and I wanted to touch you so much… Then I thought, no, it's true. She has forgotten me. And I had to find out. Then. There might never have been another chance
.'

  She looked at him, and tried to make her face stern.

  'I passed the test, presumably?' she said drily.

  A smile began to lift the corners of his lips. 'Yes. But you failed the next one.'

  'When I came to your house?'

  'Certainly.'

  'You mean I should have acquiesed to your extremely immoral demands?'

  'You wanted to, I think.'

  'I did not!' she cried in mock indignation.

  'Are you sure?' Very deliberately Julius leaned across and kissed her on the lips, so she trembled. Then he drew back, his eyes dark, burning into hers.

  'Quite sure?'

  'Perhaps a little. No…' she pushed him away, 'you shan't win the argument like that. If you remember, your proposals were strictly dishonourable.'

  'I was waiting for some sign, some hint. Before I expressed them more directly, more honourably.'

  He paused, the pain coming back into his face. 'I couldn't understand, you see. I kept thinking that if only we could talk, about Scotland, about the past, there would suddenly be a way through. A miracle.' He lowered his eyes. 'And there wasn't.'

  'So you decided to change your terms?' She forced herself to keep her voice steady, her eyes never leaving him.

  'Yes, I did.' He pressed her hands. 'I wanted you so much, you see. After so long. To have you in the same room with me, to touch you, to see you. To be so close to the only thing in life I wanted, and yet so far—it was torture, Luisa. I had decided, the night you came to my house, the night you were going to…' He paused. 'I was going to tell you,' he said abruptly, 'the truth—that I loved you, that I wanted to marry you. And then it all went wrong, it went out of control.' He gave her a half smile, a glint of amusement in his eyes. 'You moved a little too fast for me. And then, when you started to take your dress off…'

  Luisa caught her breath at the memory, and their eyes met, sharp with the knowledge of the desire she felt suddenly quicken in her veins. She lowered her eyes.

  'You mean you did perhaps want me a little then—in spite of what you said?'

  'Damn you, you know I did.' Julius reached his hand up, under her hair, caressing the soft skin at the base of her throat, and Luisa felt the old sharp pull of want for him arc through her.

  'Julius…'

  'No, wait, damn it. I don't want to either, but you shall listen.' He smiled. 'If you knew, my darling, just how much control it required then, not to touch you, here—' he moved his hands to her breasts, and she trembled against him. 'Not to kiss you.' He paused, and she saw his eyes darken at the memory. 'But your face—you looked so… so frightened, so scornful. I'd never felt so ashamed in my life. So guilty. I nearly gave up then. I nearly let you go. Except I couldn't. I still believed, you see, even then. Put it down to obstinacy if you like.'

  'And marriage?' Luisa said softly.

  'Ah, marriage!'

  Very gently he took her hand, its fourth finger circled with his ring, lifting it between them, so the gold glanced against the light.

  'Why did you think, Luisa?'

  She hesitated. 'I thought… to punish me perhaps. Or yourself.'

  'Oh no,' he said softly, 'not that, Luisa. There could only be one punishment for us—parting, not marriage.'

  'Why, then?'

  'Because I hoped still. Frailly, but I hoped.'

  'Just that?'

  'No,' Julius said quietly, looking away. 'Not just that.' He hesitated, and then met her eyes. 'I was also involved in all this business here, with Vittoria and her husband.' He shrugged. 'When something like that happens, death seems suddenly very close, very possible. I knew I had to come back here. Something might have gone wrong—for him, maybe even for me. It was possible. If that had happened, I wanted you to be my wife first. Then—well, whatever you felt, at least I knew you would have a safe future. You would be provided for…' He said it roughly, quickly, as if the thought embarrassed him, and Luisa felt her heart stir with love for him, for his goodness, his kindness, that his pride would seek always to disguise.

  'Hence the haste,' he said shortly.

  She raised his hand to her lips and kissed it, and saw his face relax, grow gentle.

  'I'm afraid it wasn't the most romantic of proposals, my darling.'

  'Not exactly, no.' Their eyes met, and Julius laughed softly.

  'I played the devil's advocate. You see, I did think that if I were more straightforward, if I told you the truth, you would say no…'

  'So you thought a little coercion?'

  'I thought the ends would justify the means. Just for once. I…' he corrected himself, 'I hoped they might. Though as I recall you chose that moment to make it quite clear you didn't love me. That you never had…'

  'That wasn't true,' she said quickly.

  'Are you sure, Luisa?' His eyes met hers once again, and for a moment she saw doubt and pain cloud them once more.

  'Oh yes,' she said steadily. 'I knew, you see, Julius. I always knew, it was just that then, after what you'd said, it was too painful to admit it. But when we were in the church…'

  'Yes?'

  'I knew then. At first…' she hesitated, 'at first I was so afraid. It seemed such a sin, to say those things, to make those promises. To lie—because what we had agreed would have made it a lie, wouldn't it, Julius? And I wanted to stop him, the priest, to say it couldn't go on, and then…'

  'I took your hand.'

  'Yes! You took my hand, and suddenly all the fear went away. I felt such joy, I was so at peace. I knew. That it wasn't a lie, do you understand? Oh, Julius, I meant everything I promised, everything I said, with all my heart.'

  'But I did too,' he said drily, and she saw his eyes suddenly lose all their coldness and their doubt, meeting hers joyfully. 'I suppose that didn't occur to you?'

  'Not then,' she said quietly.

  'But now?'

  'Now? Oh yes, Julius.'

  'My darling!' With a low groan like pain he caught her to him, and held her close against his heart. They stayed like that, neither speaking, for a long while, quite silent, locked in each other's arms.

  Then, very gently, he released her, looking at her with mock sternness.

  'So,' he said, 'you'd better tell me. Where have you been this past week? When I was in England, nearly insane with worrying about you. What have you been doing, Luisa— who have you been seeing? I warn you, if you so much as glanced at any other man in that time…'

  She laughed. 'I've been thinking about you. At the Principessa's. And don't pretend. I'm sure you told her to come here and look after me.'

  'I might have done.' He smiled. 'And did she give you, perhaps, the least little hint that in spite of my behaviour it might just be possible that I was wildly in love with my own wife, that I couldn't live without her? She had strict instructions not to, of course!'

  'She did hint… but very discreetly. And she made sure I met Vittoria.'

  'And you have no more stupid doubts on that score? No jealousies? You mustn't have, Luisa. There was no cause. And now, my darling, there never will be.'

  'I know that.' She looked away. 'But I feel ashamed.'

  'No, my sweet love, you mustn't.' Julius drew her to him.

  'Jealousy is the other side of love, it's dark face. You can't pretend it isn't there. And you know I'm equally guilty.'

  She looked at him, her eyes suddenly troubled, the one last question rising up, unbidden in her heart.

  'And Kit?' He took her hand. 'Is that what you want to say?'

  She nodded silently, and Julius sighed.

  'It's arranged. My father still doesn't know—now he never needs to. He's better, but it can't be much longer. Kit will leave the firm. He'll live abroad—I shall make him an allowance, on condition he never tries the same thing again. And never comes near you—or our family. That's all.'

  'A kind of banishment?'

  'If you like. But Kit exiled himself years ago. No one can reach him.' His mouth tightened. 'I imagine he'll end up ver
y like your father. The endless expatriate; he'll drink too much and…' He spread his hands. 'He won't bother us again. He can't touch us now. And he knows that—I told him.'

  'You told him?'

  'Oh yes. In London, when he eventually turned up.'

  'But then… then you didn't know, you thought…'

  'Not entirely.' Luisa saw a glint of amusement come into his eyes. 'The Principessa gave me the odd hint too, you know. I couldn't be certain, but I didn't care any more. I'd decided to fight, you see. I decided the past wouldn't win, no matter what. We would.' He paused, and met her eyes. 'So I came back, to tell you.' He reached for her. 'And to take care of a few other things.'

  'Julius…'

  'No more words.'

  'But…'

  'Come here, woman.' He pulled her into his arms, and bent his head swiftly to her lips. 'Wife.' As their mouths met, and her lips parted at last under his, she heard him catch his breath sharply. 'Dear God, Luisa,' he said against her mouth, 'nearly ten days, ten nights, since I touched you… oh, my darling!'

  His arms tightened around her, and their bodies moved together with such sweet ease. The touch of his skin, the familiar scent of his hair, the strength of his body was like a shock to her, bringing at once release from longing, and the renewal of desire. She drew in her breath shudderingly, arching her neck back so his mouth could kiss the long line of her throat, her breasts lifting to the touch of his hands. Want for him soared through her body, and with a- sudden feverish need, she reached to put her hands under his shirt, to feel the warmth of his skin beneath her fingers. Gently Julius drew her to her feet, so they could stand, wrapped in each other's arms, the hardness of his body pressing against her as he kissed her. With a fierce sigh he caressed her, owning her body again with the frankness of his touch, down from her breasts to her waist, to her thighs, to the small of her back so he could clasp her there, tight against him.