It was not true to say she could see no way round this. She could. But to drag a declaration of love out of a man in circumstances such as these would be a recipe for disaster and was certainly not a strategy she would consider. If there was any excuse to be made for her behaviour, it was that the situation had been initiated by Santo himself last night when he had taken her in his arms. She had not made it too hard for him, but nor had she thrown herself under his feet. She had revealed her desire, but no more than he, and for all he knew, her heart was still her own.
‘And it matters to you, does it, that there is silly gossip? Do you not think they’ll all get over it?’
‘Signor, you must understand,’ she said, heatedly. ‘Of course it matters to me. I would have thought it would matter to you, too. But then, you can simply walk away and return to Italy, never to be heard of again. Unfortunately, I have to see and work with these people and earn their trust and friendship. I need their support if I’m to carry on my uncle’s work here, supplying herbs. Which I’m not going to get if they disapprove of me. Am I?’
‘Walk away? Return to Italy? Is that what you want me to do, Aphra?’
The argument was going nowhere and Aphra had no reply for him for he must have known, she thought, that her needs had suddenly become unreasonable. He waited only a moment before taking her arm, drawing her gently off the path to the outer wall of the whitewashed stillroom. It was now deserted, hidden by a wicker tunnel of roses sprouting from a bed of lavender. Against the wall, she was turned by the shoulders only a bare moment before his body pressed her against its warmth, his lips taking hers in the only reply either of them could think of, hungry for physical contact rather than words. Breathless, she slid her mouth to his lean cheek. ‘This will not do,’ she said, breathlessly.
‘No, it won’t do for me, either,’ he said. ‘I want you, Aphra. I cannot simply walk away from you.’
‘That is what you must do, signor. But...oh...if only...’
‘If only what? This?’ Tenderly, knowingly, his hand slipped down the front of her bodice where her breasts were lifted by the boned corset, but not bound. She felt his warm fingers find the fullness, cupping it while his mouth took in her cry of ecstasy, playing over her lips as his hand kneaded and pressed, trapping the tender nipple to send waves of weakness deep into the caverns of her body. Dizzy with sensation, with the thudding rhythm of her heart, with the pressure of his legs against hers, holding her captive, her need of him was almost too great to bear. With a cry of pure desire, she held his head as it bent to kiss her breast, then her throat, tasting his thick hair as it passed close to her lips, delighting in his sensuous male warmth. Her body melted under his hands. Her eyes opened as he brought his caresses to an end and adjusted her bodice. Her arms dropped away, her trembling hands holding his wrists.
‘I shall come back to you, Aphra,’ he whispered. ‘I cannot leave things like this, with so much unfinished business.’
Tears gathered in her eyes as the words found an echo in her memory, causing a surge of months-old cynicism to spill out before she could stop it. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘That’s what your brother said, too.’
‘Must you bring him into it?’ he said, frowning. ‘May we not have a moment to ourselves without Leon or Ben? Must they dictate to us, still?’
Turning her head away, something inside her urged on the perverse direction of her reasoning. ‘But they do, don’t they? Both of them are why we’re here. You must return his notes and I must find out more about my uncle. I owe it to him. He left me this place, didn’t he?’ She waved a hand towards the garden. ‘The least I can do is to put his soul to rest.’
‘Your curiosity, you mean,’ he replied, releasing her from the closeness of his body. ‘It’s more likely to be your prying into his affairs that’s keeping his soul from resting, Aphra. Is it not time you let him go now? What’s to be gained by all this?’
Like lightning, her hand flew up to strike at his face, but his reflexes were faster and her wrist was caught and held away, countering all her efforts to continue the assault. ‘Prying?’ she growled, struggling in his grasp. ‘Let him go? What are you talking about? He has gone. Or hadn’t you noticed?’
‘No, I had not!’ he said. ‘Far from it! He inhabits every damn thing you do. And as long as you pursue these ridiculous theories of yours, woman, you’ll never be free to give your heart, will you? At least half of it will be out there, in that grave.’ He tipped his head in the direction of the graveyard, his pitiless words striking at her heart as no physical blow could have done, forcing her to see herself through his eyes, now coldly angry.
Hot scalding tears rolled down her cheeks as she watched him stride away along the path, his long legs covering the ground as if to put as much distance between them as possible, brushing against the bushy sage and creeping thyme. Now he would go, she said to herself, seeing a sea of swimming greens through her tears. That would be the last she would see of him. And was it indeed Ben who had come between them? No, she knew it was not, although that was how it looked to Santo.
Leaning against the wall, she allowed her hand to comfort the breast he had taunted so tenderly, where still the imprint of his caress lingered on her skin. ‘Damn you! Damn you!’ she growled. ‘And damn your feckless brother, too!’ Bending down to retrieve the feverfew she had dropped, she studied it before discarding it again, muttering its common name. ‘Bachelor’s buttons,’ she said. ‘How fitting!’
* * *
That particular Sunday morning continued to be no more like a day of rest than any weekday when her steward, Master Fletcher, interrupted her duties at midday to relate some serious news concerning the mill. ‘Oh, not again!’ she said. ‘What is it this time?’ She saw from his flushed face that he had been running. ‘Will you be seated, Master Fletcher?’
‘Thank you, mistress. I came to tell you that Master Pearce has been beaten up by his own men. He’s in a bad way, they say.’
‘Start at the beginning, if you will. What has that to do with the mill?’
‘Earlier this morning,’ he said, wondering how far back to go, ‘he’d sent two of his men to wreck the mill while Miller was at church, mistress.’
‘But Master Miller was not at church, was he?’
‘No, as it happens, he didn’t go because his two sons were visiting. So they were there when these two turned up and started to hack at the mill wheel. Miller and his lads ran out to stop them and there was a bust-up, mistress, and it turned out that Miller and his lads threw them into the millpond and nearly drowned ’em. They managed to climb out, then went off to Pearce’s house.’
‘Where they failed to find him.’
‘Aye, he was at church, so they waited for him and when he came home and heard what had happened, he was roaring mad at them. He refused to pay them what he’d promised, so they beat him up instead of Miller, then they wrecked his house and took his gold, and went off.’
‘But that’s very serious. You say he’s badly hurt?’
‘Aye, he certainly is. He was not too fit to start with, was he, but now it looks as if he’s got what he deserves, after all his bullying.’
Aphra had never wished any harm to befall Master Pearce. ‘Does he have any help?’ she said. ‘I wonder if I should go to see what I can do.’
‘Nay, mistress,’ Fletcher said. ‘Best to stay away. The quack is with him at the moment, but I heard from his housekeeper that there’s little anyone can do. She’s not too sorry, either. She tells me she’s not been paid for months. She was there at the house to see it all happen.’
‘Don’t repeat that to anyone, if you please, Master Fletcher. Not to feel some sympathy for a badly injured man is unworthy of us.’
Fletcher looked suitably contrite and she thought he would have answered, but at that moment the barking of hounds and the clatter of hooves outside made them both peer through the window t
o see what was the cause of the commotion.
‘Where is Signor Datini?’ she said, unable to identify anyone through the wobbly green glass.
‘Over in his lodging, mistress. Packing his bags, I believe. Again,’ he added.
Aphra sent him a sharp glance, then was obliged to smile at the comment. ‘Run over and ask him to come, Master Fletcher. We have guests. Again.’
The unexpected visit that day was one Aphra could not have wished for more, being exactly the kind of understanding and support for which she had been longing during the trials of the last week. The homes of Lord and Lady Somerville at Mortlake and London’s Cheapside were not close enough to Sandrock Priory to make visits easy, so their last meeting had been at Ben’s funeral earlier that year. Lady Henrietta Somerville had married only last year after a stormy courtship during which Aphra, her stepcousin, had stayed with her as chaperon. Aphra was two years her senior and had virtually grown up with Etta, who now came towards her with an enchanting smile and arms open wide to engulf her in brocade and velvet of violet blue, pale fur, cream silk, lace and a soft flowery perfume brought in, Aphra guessed, on one of Baron Somerville’s merchant ships.
‘Aphie!’ said Etta, favouring her dear friend with a look of mock reproach. ‘Did you really send them away... Uncle Paul and Aunt Venetia? You won’t send Nic and me away, will you?’
Aphra hugged her, laughing and shamefaced. ‘It wasn’t like that,’ she said. ‘So they told you, then? Is that why you’ve come?’
‘No, I persuaded Nic you needed us,’ Etta said, linking her arm through Aphra’s, ‘so you must convince him you do. You do, don’t you? Say you do.’
‘As a matter of fact, I do,’ Aphra said. ‘Your timing is perfect.’
‘Good. Excellent. So where is this great handsome Italian that Aunt Venetia fancies? Oh... Aphie! Is that him?’ she whispered, looking across to where Santo and Lord Somerville were talking together like old friends. ‘Well, look at that! Merchants can recognise each other from a mile away, can’t they? You’d think they’d known each other for years. Now they’ll be talking business all evening.’
‘If Signor Datini stays as long as that,’ Aphra said. ‘I believe he’s already packing his bags.’
‘Why, Aphie? You’ve not quarrelled again, have you? Aunt Venetia said she thought...well...never mind that.’
‘What did she think? That I was not keen on him being here?’
‘No-oo!’ Etta drawled, fumbling for an appropriate expression. ‘Uncertain, more like. She seemed to think you’d make a fine pair, except for the fact that he’s Leon’s big brother.’
‘That, and a few more facts that Aunt Venetia knows nothing of,’ said Aphra, tartly. ‘Look, I’ll tell you more later, dearest. Let me go and welcome Nic. It was good of him to come all this way with you. Will you stay a while?’
When she had hugged her cousin’s husband with a genuine warmth, she asked the same question of him, although it was a formality for already their trunks and bags were being unloaded from a train of packhorses by a retinue of liveried servants. Etta and her wealthy merchant husband always travelled in style. As an important member of the Mercers’ Guild, he had an image to maintain, of which his lovely wife played her part to the full. ‘Of course we’ll stay,’ the tall, good-looking mercer said. ‘Signor Datini and I have some talking to do.’ Being a very perceptive man, however, he noticed the look of doubt that passed between the Italian and their hostess. He was also an experienced diplomat. ‘But we haven’t come here to organise you, Aphie. Let’s go inside and talk over a glass of Ben’s finest claret.’
If Santo had expected to leave Sandrock Priory that day, he showed no sign of it as he was introduced to Queen Elizabeth’s half-sister whose likeness to the young Queen was quite remarkable, though Etta was the lovelier of the two. Nor did Aphra indicate that she wanted Santo to go when the timely arrival of her cousin seemed to offer a chance to discuss matters and perhaps to resolve them. Not that she could disregard what was being said in the village, or what Santo had said to her in the garden, but somehow the presence of those whose opinions mattered to her was a consolation she badly needed. As they entered the house, she managed to ask him if he’d heard about Master Pearce’s predicament.
‘The news is all over the village,’ he said. ‘I hope the two men responsible have got well away by now. They’ll be in deep trouble if Pearce doesn’t recover.’
‘I don’t suppose that’s what they intended.’
‘We can all say that, madonna,’ he whispered as they moved away.
Quite what he meant by that enigmatic remark Aphra was unable to decide, wondering if he referred to himself, or her. In the absence of even the smallest show of warmth, however, she could only contemplate the near future in which she might be expected to offer him some form of encouragement, some way out of the impasse in which they found themselves. Perhaps, she thought, Etta and her sensible husband might suggest something, for it was clear that Uncle Paul and Aunt Venetia had discussed the situation with them. They would also have discussed their brief visit to Aphra’s parents in London, which put a certain pressure on her to do the right thing, whatever the right thing was.
* * *
While Lord and Lady Somerville were being shown to their room, last occupied by Uncle Paul and Aunt Venetia, Aphra took the chance to speak again to Santo, if only to offer him the chance to explain his intentions.
‘Signor,’ she said, stopping him before he could leave. ‘Santo. A moment?’ She quailed at the sadness in his dark eyes and how sad it was, she thought, that his warmth could cool so fast after his passion only a few hours earlier.
‘Madonna?’
‘You were preparing to leave?’
‘That seemed the obvious thing to do. My mission has failed. You are not ready to move on. I expected too much. Why would I stay?’
She felt the ache of despair well up inside her at his reading of the situation, yet there was no dignified way to remove the barriers between them. In so many ways he was right, but how was she to move on inside a cloud of mystery? ‘I just...just wondered,’ she said, looking beyond him to the wilting bluebells on the windowsill, ‘if you might stay just long enough to discuss things with my...with Etta and Nic. Perhaps overnight? I trust them. I helped them when they needed similar advice, so I would not mind if they offered me...us...some.’
‘You mean you would take it? Even if it was not what you hoped for?’
‘Yes. I would. Oh... Santo!’ Her voice shook at the image of how the years ahead would feel without him. She thought how the loss of his brother had brought unbearable pain, but now saw that it was anger and humiliation at his rejection rather than the awful emptiness of unfulfilled desire she felt for his brother, his great, handsome sibling who had taken over every waking thought since his appearance, despite all her protests. But this time, it was she who moved forward into his arms, fearing that this might be the last time she would feel his warm strength and be pressed against his body. ‘Hold me,’ she whispered.
He needed no persuading. Carefully removing the black-velvet cap she wore over her hair, he nuzzled her cheek and sought her mouth for the mutual comfort they so desperately needed. Lifting his face from hers, he held her chin with his tender fingers, speaking softly. ‘Yes, I will stay for one more night, Aphra, but you must be realistic about this. Your cousin and her husband will not persuade me to stay longer, for now you know the reason for my journey and I must return to Padua.’
‘With or without the notes?’ she said, taking his hand away to hold it.
‘With or without them. But I am hoping that your advisors will persuade you that there is no point in you keeping them merely to revenge yourself on Leon. That would serve no good purpose. Besides that, my presence here is causing problems, as you said it might.’
‘Then you’ll be here this evening when we discuss what to do
?’
‘I already know what to do. But, yes, we’ll talk about it, if that will make matters easier for you.’
‘Nothing will make things easier for me. Not until I’ve found some answers. But at least we both know what must be done and that we appear to be moving in different directions.’
Unable to hear any compromise in her tone, Santo held her away with gentle hands on her shoulders. ‘And now I think I should go and prepare for my journey tomorrow. You will have duties to perform. Their visit is timely, is it not?’
She nodded. ‘I have you to thank for that. Had you not been here, they’d not have come.’
‘And if I do come back to you, Aphra, will your uncle still come between us? Will he still claim half your heart? Because if that is to be the case, our farewells must be for ever. I am not a man to be satisfied with anything less than all of you. A smaller portion will not do for me. There. I’ve said it. Now you know how I feel.’
It was not the way she wanted to hear it without the one word that mattered most to her. ‘No, I don’t know how you feel, signor,’ she said. ‘I know no more about your heart than you know about mine. Lovemaking is not about a man’s heart, is it? It’s about desire. See, I’ve learnt that much from your brother. And not only that, signor. I’ve learnt not to commit myself too soon, for that way leads to trouble. It’s been only a matter of days. Hardly time enough for me to know what I feel for you, whether half of my heart or indeed any of it at all.’ Her voice wavered as she forced out the lies, the cold, uncaring, dignified deceptions. ‘Perhaps I shall allow you to take your brother’s research after all,’ she continued, struggling for control. ‘As a gesture. I cannot do more than that. See, here is the key.’ She pulled up the thong that held her bunch of household keys, snapped one off the ring and handed it to him. ‘There, take it. Take the notes. That’s what you came for. Now your journey has not been wasted and your brother will be able to continue his fine career and earn a good living.’ She would have turned away, but Santo placed an arm across her, turning her to him. She stiffened, refusing to soften into him.
The Mistress and the Merchant Page 13
