Challenging Dante

by Lynne Graham

  ‘I would like that very much,’ Topsy said warmly, bending down to enable Sofia to kiss her on both cheeks.

  From the back of the room, Topsy watched Dante and Cosima glide round the dance floor while cameras flashed all around them, Cosima occasionally striking a glamorous pose and smiling to display pearly teeth. All the life seemed to be squeezed out of her heart and it was a leaden weight inside her chest, a constant nagging reminder of loss and pain. She wondered then when it had happened, when the fun fling had turned serious for her, serious enough to wound and cause lasting damage.

  Last night she had wakened to find herself wrapped round Dante like a vine and she had shifted away until two arms very firmly retrieved her, welding her back into stirring connection with his hot body, refusing to allow her to keep her distance. And she had looked at him in the moonlight, her attention roaming over his superb bone structure, the twin dark fans of his lashes, his beautiful mouth softer and fuller in repose, and her heart had jumped as if she were on a Big Dipper ride of thrills and spills. Well, she had had the thrill, now she supposed she was in full spill mode and it was time to pay the piper for her idiocy. Few women, after all, would ever be able to claim that they had been seduced to keep them out of another man’s bed. And when she had wanted Dante so badly, did she even have the right to call it seduction?

  She watched Vittore sliding an arm round Sofia, the warmth of his smile for his wife full of the love that Dante evidently couldn’t read. She so desperately wanted to speak to Vittore before she left but she could not speak to him while he was with Sofia. And she might never receive another opportunity. Sofia had said she would invite her back to Italy but people often said such things in passing and it was doubtful that she had really meant it.

  Topsy was on the way back from the kitchens, having sorted out a slight conflict between the caterers and the castle kitchen staff, when she saw the older man crossing the hall and seized her chance.

  ‘Vittore?’ she called. ‘Could I have a word?’

  He came to a halt with a look of surprise. ‘Sofia told me you’re leaving. It’s very sudden.’

  ‘Family crisis, I’m afraid. Could you give me five minutes to chat to you about something?’ Topsy asked apprehensively.

  ‘Of course. I’m sure Dante won’t mind if we make use of his study.’ Dark eyes frankly curious, Vittore pushed open the door.

  ‘I have a request to make of you,’ Topsy confided once they were safe from being overheard. ‘But first I should tell you certain things. My mother’s name is Odette Taylor.’

  Vittore was stunned. He stiffened, that name clearly still familiar to him even after all the time that had passed.

  ‘I suspected she might be the woman you were involved with all those years ago in London.’ Topsy compressed her lips. ‘She’s not a kind or honest person and I won’t pretend otherwise. I have virtually no contact with her.’

  ‘I do not understand how you came to be working here. It cannot surely be a coincidence?’ Vittore prompted, frowning with concern. ‘The world is not that small.’

  ‘It’s not a coincidence.’ And then Topsy got on with what she had to do and told him in as few words as possible about growing up with the belief that her father was Paolo Valdera and then discovering six years earlier that she was not his child.

  ‘And what does...this have to do with me?’ Vittore asked, although she could see he was beginning to suspect by the pleat in his brow and the intent look in his unusually stern gaze.

  ‘My mother lied about my father’s identity because she believed Paolo was a better financial bet. She admitted that to me and a couple of months ago I had to do her a favour before she would finally tell me the name of the man she believes—’

  ‘Odette told you that I was your father,’ Vittore guessed, his astonishment unconcealed. ‘Yes, of course I can see what way this conversation is going but I really don’t think it is very likely.’

  ‘And you could be right. There may be nothing in her claim at all because Odette does tell lies whenever it suits her to do so,’ Topsy conceded, perspiration beading her short upper lip, embarrassment almost threatening to swallow her voice alive as she made that lowering admission yet again. ‘But as you’re the only lead I have I’d be grateful if you would agree to a DNA test so that we can both know for sure. I promise you that I don’t want anything from you but information and that I will not discuss this with anyone else. I also appreciate that this is a particularly stressful time for you and I do not want you to tell Sofia and risk upsetting her in any way.’

  ‘I would not take that risk.’ Vittore shook his dark head slowly as though to clear it from the shock she had given him. ‘I can’t be your father! I understand that you want to know one way or the other but I do wish that you had come to me with this weeks ago.’

  ‘I was trying to build up to it slowly but events have rather taken over instead and now I have to leave,’ Topsy admitted ruefully. ‘I really am sorry to bother you with this, especially if turns out to be another piece of my mother’s nonsense.’

  ‘For a DNA test you will need to give a sample. I suggest that you get that taken care of here before you leave and inform me of what arrangements have been made,’ Vittore pointed out seriously. ‘I will agree to the test to put your mind at rest and because I know that I was with your mother around the time of your conception and it is reasonable for you to ask.’

  ‘Thank you. I really do appreciate it,’ Topsy told him sincerely, her heart beating very up tempo as some of her nervous tension began to leak out of her again.

  ‘And if there is anything in this, we will definitely be seeing you again,’ the older man pointed out with a rueful, utterly charming smile, which was very much Topsy’s smile had either of them but recognised it. ‘One advantage you do have from my point of view, and please don’t take this the wrong way—you bear very little resemblance to your mother in either looks or character.’

  Topsy left him again in better spirits because he had dealt with her belief that he could be her father very kindly and he was willing to help, which was almost more than she had hoped for because she had feared he would angrily refuse her request. She went back to supervising the ball, chasing after first a mislaid purse and then a fur stole as some older guests began to depart while the younger ones made the most of the more contemporary music now being played and got up to throw themselves round the dance floor. It was an exhausting evening. Sofia and Vittore went upstairs about one in the morning and Dante took over as host with Cosima still by his side, at which point Topsy decided that she had done her duty and could retreat to her room to pack and check out the Internet for somewhere local where she could have a DNA sample taken.

  When she entered her room, she turned the key in the lock. She doubted very much that Dante would approach her with Cosima staying under the same roof but she wasn’t prepared to take the risk. She had nothing polite to say to him and screaming at him, revealing how very hurt she was, would only mortify what remained of her pride. She was grateful for the distraction of wondering what the crisis was in London that required her return and was much inclined to think it would prove to be a storm in a teacup.

  She found a firm doing DNA testing on the outskirts of Florence and noted down the address, emailing Vittore with the details. She would call in on the way to the airport tomorrow. That achieved, she dragged out her cases and began to pack, wishing she hadn’t brought so much with her. After a quick shower she got into bed, rolled over and stuck her nose in the pillow next to hers, scenting the faint elusive aroma of Dante’s citrusy aftershave and the husky smell that was purely him. Was he right this very minute making love to Cosima? Were women interchangeable to him? Had Topsy merely been a useful outlet for his high-voltage libido when Cosima was unavailable? Did Cosima take other lovers as well?

  Topsy tossed and turned, unable to find the bl
essed oblivion that sleep would have given her. Her thoughts were all over the place but one thing she did know now: she had fallen hard for Dante, fallen madly in love for the first time in her life. That was why she was hurting so much, why the simple image of Dante in bed with Cosima literally tore her to shreds inside herself. Engulfed by pain, she closed her eyes tight, willing herself to calm down and be sensible. It was over and right from the beginning she had known it couldn’t last, so what had changed? Loving him only meant that she had accidentally become more attached to him than she should have done, she reasoned feverishly. She would soon get over him again surely common sense would see to that? He had deceived her, betrayed her, used her, hurt her. He could never really have wanted her the way she wanted him and that knowledge cut the deepest of all.

  * * *

  ‘So what’s the big emergency?’ Topsy demanded as her sister Kat, a tall slender redhead, greeted her in the hall of her London home with outstretched arms as if she had been abroad for months rather than weeks.

  A herd of little boys were dragging a dainty little girl out of the cloakroom where she had clearly been hiding with a teddy clutched to her chest. A sense of warmth and of coming home to where she was safe enclosed Topsy.

  ‘If you give it to me, I won’t tear its arm off!’ Karim told his cousin Appollonia.

  ‘If you hurt Rags I’ll scream,’ Emmie’s daughter warned him, screwing up her face in challenge. ‘And then you’ll be in so much trouble.’

  ‘If you touch her teddy, I’ll shout,’ Karim’s father, Zahir, announced witheringly from a doorway, turning to say to the other man at his shoulder, ‘I think it’s time we packed them all off to bed.’

  ‘It’s too early for bed,’ Karim protested vigorously, his little brother, Hamid, sucking his thumb sleepily to one side of him.

  ‘Yes, it is, it is!’ carolled his twin cousins, Dmitri and Stavros.

  ‘I’m not going yet,’ Kat’s elder twin, Petyr, announced, looking very like his father as he folded his arms and took on an aggressive stance while his sister, Olga, played on the stairs.

  Kat rounded on her children. ‘When I say bed, you go without an argument!’ she told Petyr and Olga firmly.

  ‘Or I have to say it,’ Mikhail breathed very quietly from the doorway.

  ‘Come on now, children,’ the resident nanny spoke from the top of the stairs.

  Within the space of a minute all Topsy’s little nephews and nieces had vanished and silence had fallen. In the interim her cell phone rang and she pulled it out, her heart thudding at an insane rate when she realised it was Dante. Part of her wanted to disconnect the call as she had been doing every time he tried to speak to her throughout the day she had spent travelling. He must have rung her a dozen times already and her nerves were worn down and this time it seemed easier just to answer it.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Why the hell have you gone back to London?’ Dante thundered angrily down the line. ‘Without even speaking to me? Without even giving me a chance? That has to be the craziest, most irrational thing you’ve ever done!’

  ‘Dante? Why would I give you a chance after what you’ve done to me? I’ll give you crazy, I’ll give you irrational!’ Topsy slammed back furiously, forgetting that she had an audience. ‘I don’t ever want to see you again. So, leave me alone and don’t phone again!’

  The awful silence around her finally pierced the shell of her utter misery. For the first time she wanted to cry and sob with the sheer frustration of the many emotions attacking her all at once but the combined power of her siblings’ questioning stares stifled that desire.

  ‘Petyr’s getting very cheeky,’ Mikhail complained with unexpected tact to his wife.

  ‘He’s a real chip off the old block, then,’ Kat told her husband without sympathy.

  ‘Karim started it,’ Zahir’s wife, Saffy, pointed out wryly.

  ‘But we both know that my daughter loves getting your son worked up,’ Saffy’s twin, Emmie, countered uncomfortably. ‘She deliberately teases him.’

  ‘No matter. Royalty has to learn self-discipline,’ Zahir spelled out wryly. ‘And Karim is too inclined to get bossy with little girls.’

  Topsy gave her twin sisters an awkward hug, avoiding the looks that told her they now had lots of questions to ask, and said, ‘Does anyone care to tell me why I had to come home so suddenly?’

  Every pair of eyes in the room seemed to meet in mute discomfiture and a heavy silence fell in response to her question.

  ‘It’s Odette,’ Saffy advanced reluctantly.

  ‘She’s been arrested,’ Emmie chimed in behind her twin.

  ‘Arrested?’ Topsy exclaimed in horror.

  ‘Accused of living off immoral earnings from her escort agency,’ her brother-in-law Zahir supplied grimly.

  Topsy sank down shakily into a seat, appalled by the news, well aware of how much embarrassment such a case being taken to court could cause her relatives. As the ruling King and Queen of a conservative Gulf state, possibly Zahir and his family had the most to fear from being publicly linked to Saffy’s mother.

  ‘I couldn’t care less what happens to her,’ Emmie’s husband, Bastian Christou, admitted with unnerving cool. ‘After what she did to my wife, it’s past time she got her comeuppance and if it takes the law to do it, so be it.’

  ‘But in the meantime we don’t want our families or our reputations smeared by her dodgy lifestyle,’ Mikhail pronounced in direct disagreement.

  Topsy said nothing while the three men in the room began to argue about how best to deal with Odette’s arrest. Her sisters clumped together exchanging grimaces until finally the broad terms of a reluctant agreement were thrashed out between the men. They would hire a good legal team to represent Odette in court but in no other way would any of them get more closely involved.

  Topsy tried to imagine how Dante would have reacted to the news that her mother was going to be hauled up in court to answer a charge of living off the proceeds of prostitution and she shuddered sickly, grateful he would never know. Her sisters weren’t saying anything and neither was she and, sadly, she understood why: they were one and all ashamed to death of Odette and the dubious way in which she made her living. Several attempts had already been made to persuade her mother to sell her business but Odette had demanded so much money in compensation that even her wealthy sons-in-law had baulked, believing that she would continue trying to blackmail them.

  ‘Dante?’ Mikhail queried softly to one side of Topsy, his approach having gone unnoticed by her in the state she was in. ‘Was that Dante Leonetti phoning you?’

  Topsy wrapped her arms round herself, suddenly cold, suddenly exhausted by the mental and physical stress of the past forty-eight hours. In silence she nodded.

  ‘But I warned you about him,’ her Russian brother-in-law reminded her.

  ‘It was too late by then,’ she muttered, wondering at what exact hour her fate had been cast. The first time she rested her eyes on that lean, devastatingly good-looking face of Dante’s? The first kiss? The first time he held her hand?

  ‘But by the sound of it, it’s over now,’ Kat commented, crossing the room to close a supportive arm round her youngest sister. ‘What did he do to you?’

  Saffy was the next to move closer. ‘Spill,’ she urged.

  But Topsy couldn’t spill, couldn’t bring herself to admit that Dante had had another woman all along. Blanking out her sisters’ frustration over her refusal to talk about Dante, she confessed to suspecting that Vittore was her father instead and told her sisters about the DNA testing to take place. That provided a comfortable alternative to discussing Dante, and after dinner when Odette was the main topic of conversation, Topsy took refuge in her bedroom. She needed her own place, she really did need a corner of her own, she conceded ruefully, and she texted Saffy to ask if the
couple’s town house was free or if they were staying there on this visit. Generally when there was a family conclave, everyone stayed with Mikhail and Kat because they lived in an enormous house. Saffy confirmed that their house would be free but urged her to stay on with the family for company for a few more days.

  * * *

  Three days later, when Topsy was convinced that she was dying from the inside out in the slowest and most painful of ways, Dante showed up at Kat and Mikhail’s on an evening when they were entertaining. She had tried so hard not to think about Dante, not to keep on going over the same old pointless ground inside her head. It was done and dusted, finished with no need of a post-mortem to drag her spirits down further. That constant mantra kept her together until above the sound of the jazz pianist playing she heard the sound of raised voices from the hall and then the noisy crash of breaking china. Taken aback, she followed Kat and Mikhail to the doorway.

  Four men were engaged in a physical fight in the hall, two of them Mikhail’s security guards and the other two she recognised from Italy as working for Dante.

  ‘Dante...’ she whispered in astonishment, seeing his tall, powerful figure poised by the front door, which still stood wide open on the night air. And every feeling and sensation she had tried to deny and suppress came flooding back to her in a violent shameful wave. In his charcoal-grey suit, he looked amazing: cool, sophisticated, wonderfully handsome, all the gifts that she had told herself all her adult life were superficial and unimportant. But that awareness did not prevent her from responding to Dante’s pure physical charisma.

  In a thunderous burst of Russian, Mikhail intervened in the free-for-all of angry men and told his bodyguards to take the fight outside before saying in English to Dante, ‘Topsy doesn’t want to see you.’

  But Topsy did want to see Dante; she wanted to see him and speak to him so badly that the prospect of him leaving again hurt and that sudden burst of lowering self-knowledge slashed her pride to ribbons.