Count Valieri's Prisoner

by Sara Craven

  ‘That can’t have made him very popular.’

  ‘It did not. But to the local people he was the padrone and the Valieri have always been good landlords who did not ill-treat or exploit their tenants, so they grumbled but respected his wishes.’

  He smiled reminiscently. ‘And when people argued with him, he told them never to forget that the Roman empire owed its existence to the she-wolf who suckled Romulus and Remus.’

  ‘And did they accept that?’ Maddie found she was smiling too.

  ‘Not for a moment,’ he admitted. ‘But it usually ended the debate. He was a very determined man.’

  ‘A trait he has obviously handed down.’ Maddie spoke lightly, and, to her surprise, saw his face change, harden.

  ‘It may seem so,’ he said, after a pause.

  ‘Ah,’ she said, hiding her surprise at his response. ‘Could that mean that, even now, you might be open to persuasion? After all, you’ve made it clear you don’t need the ransom money.’

  ‘But it is not a question of money,’ he said quietly. ‘And never has been.’

  She stared at him. ‘What then?’

  ‘I could tell you,’ he said. ‘But at present you are too hostile, too suspicious, Maddalena, to believe anything I might say. So explanations must wait for a more favourable time. As you must also wait for the Sylvesters’ response. I wonder which will come first.

  ‘And no persuasion you can muster, however tempting, will cause me to change my mind,’ he added softly. ‘So do not try.’ He paused. ‘Unless, of course, you are looking for an excuse to share my bed. Although that is not necessary,’ he added musingly. ‘I promise that “Andrea, I want you” is all you need say.’

  They were several feet apart, but the atmosphere between them was suddenly charged—electric with tension.

  Maddie’s breathing quickened. She said unsteadily, ‘How dare you insult me like this. It’s disgusting.’

  ‘Let me ask in return how you dare be such a hypocrite, mia bella,’ he retorted, his mouth twisting cynically. ‘I am simply acknowledging that the desire between us is mutual. Which you know as well as I do.

  ‘Besides,’ he added. ‘The choice will always be yours.’

  ‘Then I choose not to be alone with you again!’ Her voice was stormy.

  ‘You will have your wish,’ he said calmly. ‘At least for the next few days. I have business elsewhere.’

  ‘More helpless people to kidnap?’

  ‘I hope,’ he said, the amber eyes glinting in that disturbing way, ‘that you are not describing yourself in those terms, Maddalena.’

  ‘But supposing there’s a message from Jeremy and his father, offering terms. You won’t be here to get it.’

  ‘Have no fear,’ he said. ‘If there is any breakthrough, which I doubt, I shall be informed.’

  ‘But I shan’t be,’ Maddie protested furiously. ‘I’ll have to stay locked up here in total ignorance when anything could be happening.’

  ‘You are still hoping perhaps that your future father-in-law will pull strings in Whitehall and have the British SAS parachute in to rescue you?’ He sighed. ‘A vain hope.’

  ‘But there’s another factor in all this that you’ve overlooked,’ Maddie said tautly. ‘The television company I work for, who sent me here. They’re expecting regular reports on my progress with the Bartrando research. If they don’t hear from me, they’ll become concerned and start making enquiries.’

  ‘But they have received several texts from your mobile phone assuring them that all is going well,’ he said gently. ‘They will be disappointed if you eventually return empty-handed, but that is all.’ He paused. ‘Now that I have set your mind at rest, let us have dinner.’

  ‘No thank you,’ she said, putting down her half-empty glass. ‘I’m going to eat in my room. Perhaps you’d arrange for someone to bring a tray. Some pasta and dessert will be fine. I’m not hungry.’

  He shook his head. ‘That is a banal reaction and not worthy of you, carissima,’ he commented. ‘But if that is indeed what you want, I will give the necessary orders. I shall also summon Domenica to escort you back.’

  He went to the fireplace and tugged at the embroidered bell pull. ‘However,’ he continued, ‘I hope you will continue to dine down here during my absence.’

  She was already on her way to the stairs, but she turned looking at him almost blankly, as she recalled there were at least two exits from the room. ‘You trust me that far?’

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘But Eustacio will be here, and I trust him to look after you on my behalf.’ He watched her bite her lip and added silkily, ‘Besides, it will give me pleasure while I am away to think of your beauty gracing my table. And to imagine a time when we shall not part for the night once the meal is over.’

  Sudden, helpless warmth flooded her face, and was echoed by the slow torment of the heat slowly uncurling inside her. The betraying sensuality of that deep inner ache, telling her unequivocally that all her protests were lies and how it would be all too easy to say ‘Andrea—I want you’, instead of the biting riposte which would silence him now and forever.

  Her nails scored the palms of her hands, as, to her eternal shame, the words of angry dismissal failed to materialise.

  And as she climbed the stairs towards Domenica’s solid bulk in the shadows, she could feel the Count’s gaze following her as if he were walking with her, his hand on her waist, and his lips grazing her hair.

  And heard his voice, faintly mocking. ‘Until we meet again, Maddalena. Believe me, carissima, I shall count the hours.’

  And found herself praying silently that she would not do the same.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  MADDIE READ THE last page of her book, sighed, and tossed it away from her. She swung herself off the bed and began to walk up and down the room in the mid-afternoon sun.

  Andrea Valieri had been gone for two days now, and when she’d forced herself to ask Domenica when he was expected back, the other woman had shrugged with sour malice before informing her that the business which detained him was a girl in Viareggio. ‘His amante,’ she’d added unnecessarily. ‘And very beautiful, so who knows when he will return.’

  All the same, Maddie knew, with every hour that passed, that her chances of escape, already slim, were becoming positively skeletal.

  Of course, he hadn’t been serious about counting the hours until he saw her again. He’d simply been winding her up, and she knew that. Told herself so continually.

  Nevertheless, the news about the girl in Viareggio had shaken her to the core, and she’d had to work damned hard to conceal her inner turmoil from Domenica’s sly scrutiny.

  She found herself wondering just how much the maid had heard and understood of the exchanges between her master and his prisoner while she was on escort duty and what deductions she might have made.

  Another good reason for getting out of here, Maddie thought biting her lip with unnecessary savagery.

  Because, if she’d been frightened before, she was now in a completely different kind of danger. And she was petrified.

  She had spent the last forty-eight hours striving to convince everyone at the house that she was resigned to her fate, at the same time sticking resolutely to her decision not to dine or eat any other meal downstairs.

  Eustacio had visited her that morning, looking anxious, to tell her His Excellency would be distressed to hear she had not left her room, even to pay another visit to his library.

  ‘And I’m equally distressed at being made to stay here,’ she’d returned quietly and he had retired, shaking his head.

  She’d hoped, in Andrea Valieri’s absence, that there might have been a more relaxed attitude to her detention, but it hadn’t worked out like that. Wherever he might be—and whoever he might be with, she thought, biting her lip hard, the Count’s presence still loomed over the Casa Lupo, and she seemed to be watched more closely than ever.

  Today’s bright spot was that Domenica, the prison wardr
ess, had so far not put in an appearance. No doubt busy making herself a new broomstick, Maddie thought bitterly. Though she was probably being unfair to a woman simply doing her job.

  It was just the manner of it that was bewildering. Maddie was at a loss to understand why she was so unremittingly hostile. After all, the other staff weren’t like that. Luisa and the girl from the kitchen, whose name was Jolanda, were always smiling and pleasant in spite of the language barrier, while Eustacio was courteous in the extreme.

  Just a clash of personalities, I suppose, she told herself with another sigh. And while nothing could make her enforced stay agreeable, it would be easier if she was able to have a normal conversation sometimes with the person she saw most often.

  And with that she heard the rattle of the key in the lock.

  But it was again Luisa who led the way into the room, carrying clean towels over her arm, followed by Jolanda who’d come, albeit belatedly, to collect the lunch tray, Maddie having finished her meal more than an hour before. She surveyed them in faint surprise. ‘Domenica?’ she queried.

  The girls exchanged glances, then Luisa performed a brisk and realistic imitation of someone being violently sick.

  ‘Oh,’ Maddie said slowly. ‘What a shame.’ Then, remembering the scanty Italian derived from her phrase book, ‘Che peccato.’

  The girls nodded then Luisa headed for the bathroom, while Jolanda picked up the tray and left the room with it, leaving the door open.

  Maddie stared at it, swallowing. This was the first time it had ever happened. Domenica invariably locked the door as soon as she was inside it. But it might be the nearest thing to a chance she would get and she had to take it.

  She took one uncertain step then halted as a shattering crash and a shriek of pain came from the passage.

  Without further hesitation, Maddie ran out and found a sobbing Jolanda picking herself up from the floor amid a welter of broken glass and crockery.

  She was nursing one hand in the other, a deep cut across the palm oozing blood.

  Groaning inwardly, Maddie helped the girl to her feet, and examined the wound, which was clearly a nasty one. She heard a horrified squeak and turned to find Luisa standing behind her, mouth open.

  ‘Get a towel,’ she directed, and as the maid stared at her in bewilderment, she pantomimed drying herself.

  When Luisa returned with one of the small linen towels, Maddie wrapped it tightly round the injured hand.

  ‘Now take her downstairs to the kitchen. La cucina,’ she added as she received another uncomprehending stare. ‘She needs to go to hospital. Ospedale,’ she reiterated. ‘Presto. Her hand may need a stitch.’ She demonstrated the action of sewing which drew agonised yelps and cries of ‘Santa Madonna’ from both girls and renewed sobbing from Jolanda.

  ‘And I’ll see to that,’ Maddie went on crisply, seeing Luisa gazing in consternation at the mess on the floor. ‘You take care of her. Attenzione, Jolanda.’

  Luisa nodded distractedly and led the other girl away, an arm protectively round her shoulders.

  As they disappeared from sight, Maddie released her indrawn breath. Luisa would ultimately remember that the room had been left open with the prisoner free to roam, and she could only pray it would be later rather than sooner.

  The keys were in the door, and to buy a few extra minutes, she locked the door from the outside. Picking up her skirts, she jumped across the debris of her lunch tray and ran to the store room. She picked out a white overall that approximated to her size, grabbed one of the elasticated mob caps and a pair of low-heeled black shoes. She stripped off her robe and nightgown, thrusting them, with the keys, into a hamper for soiled linen at the side of the room, then dressed swiftly.

  The overall’s starched linen felt coarse and uncomfortable against her skin, making her feel even more naked than usual. Something else that Andrea Valieri would eventually pay for, she told herself, struggling to fasten the buttons.

  But at least she was covered, and beggars could not be choosers, she thought as she crammed her hair into the cap and pulled it down so that, hopefully, not a blonde wisp was showing.

  Then, slipping her feet into the clumpy shoes, she set off along the passage, rehearsing the route in her mind, and listening all the time for the alarm to be sounded. She tiptoed along the gallery, through the arch and made her way to the false wall, feeling for the door handle.

  When she reached the foot of the steps and the spot where the passage divided, she turned towards the kitchens, keeping close to the wall, head bent, not hurrying too much. Just another girl getting through the working day, anonymous in her uniform.

  As she got nearer, she could hear the hubbub of excited voices, and, rising above them, the sound of Jolanda protesting tearfully. The volume doubled momentarily as a door opened and a man emerged, carrying a box of bottles and jars. He sent Maddie a brief, incurious look and went on down the passage.

  My disguise works, she thought, her heart thudding. He must be going to the garbage bins, and all I have to do is follow him.

  She maintained a discreet distance, watching as he rounded a corner, and was rewarded by the screech of hinges and a sudden influx of sunlight up ahead.

  Not ideal when compared with the dimness of the passage. But her luck was holding, because when she reached the open doorway, he was nowhere to be seen.

  Maddie stepped out into a walled courtyard lined with outbuildings. There was a gate in the far wall—or was this just more trompe l’oeil—designed to trap her in another part of the house?

  But there was no imitating sunshine and fresh air, she thought with relief as she sprinted across the yard. And the gate was real, its heavy bolts sliding open, and the heavy ring handle turning with well-oiled ease.

  She squeezed through the gap, then closed the heavy timbers carefully behind her. No need to leave clues to her chosen exit.

  For a moment she stayed still, controlling her flurried breathing as she attempted to get her bearings.

  The mountain that she’d seen every day from her window was over to her left, grey, monstrous and impenetrable as it loomed over the valley at its foot. Straining her eyes, Maddie could see far below the gleam of water and the pale line of a road that followed it—leading where?

  Well, to civilisation, presumably, by the most direct route. The obvious choice for someone who needed to get away fast. But too obvious. She would be spotted miles away on that long curving descent. And even more easily by anyone returning...

  The alternative route lay straight ahead of her. A rough track rising steeply into dense woodland which seemed to be composed mainly of chestnut trees. Not very appealing, dressed as she was, but at least the canopy of foliage would hide her as she travelled, and the thick trunks offer cover if necessary.

  She started up the slope, pulling off the cap and stuffing it into her overall pocket. As she shook her hair loose, she silently cursed her unsuitable footwear. Better than going barefoot, she told herself, but only just.

  Once safely in the shade of the trees, she paused again briefly to look back at her erstwhile prison. It was even larger than she’d supposed, not so much a house as a palazzo, with an imposing square tower at its centre, and she wondered if there were already faces at some of those innumerable windows scanning the countryside for a glimpse of her.

  A great block of immutable stone, she thought, taking a last look over her shoulder, totally in keeping with its remote landscape, and certainly not her idea of a casa d’estate—a summer house. Its latter name, the House of the Wolf, suited it much better—as well as matching the character of its owner, she added with something of a snap, and plunged into the forest.

  The path was narrow and heavily overgrown in places, but still reasonably discernible, indicating it had once been in regular use. So it could lead eventually to a hamlet or at least another house where there might be a telephone.

  She tried to maintain a steady pace but it wasn’t easy with all the fallen branches and f
oliage underfoot, or with the ill-fitting shoes she was wearing. She could almost feel the blisters springing up.

  In spite of the shade, it was hot, and she was already growing thirsty. Pity there’d been no bottled water in the storeroom, she mused, wondering how soon she’d find some sign of human habitation. She seemed to have been walking for at least an hour or more, but without her watch, how could she tell? Yet surely the sun was considerably lower than it had been when she set out?

  But she’d find water soon, she assured herself. There were bound to be streams feeding the river she’d seen in the valley, and she’d just have to risk their purity.

  She couldn’t, however, estimate her progress. She was no great judge of area, and these woods could well spread for acres.

  There’d been plenty of woodland walks near her home when she was a child, but none of them like this. The trunks of the trees were thick and twisted, like something from an Arthur Rackham illustration. She could almost imagine gnarled arms emerging to seize her as they’d done in a scary Disney version of ‘Snow White’ she’d watched when she was little.

  Shut down the imagination and stick to practicalities, she adjured herself. They’re just trees. The real nightmare is behind you. And you can’t be caught and taken back—for every kind of reason.

  The forest was full of noises too: the whisper of leaves above her in the faint breeze, the rustling sounds in the bushes that flanked her path indicating the unseen presence of what she hoped were very small and friendly animals, and the shrill calling of birds which ceased abruptly at her approach.

  Like a tracking device, she thought, with a faint grimace, easing her shoulders inside the stiff constriction of the linen.

  And then she heard another noise, louder and more alien than anything else around her. The sound of an approaching helicopter.