Isabella closed her eyes and leaned her forehead against Orlando’s shoulder as she tried to catch her breath. As she waited for the world to stop tilting around her. She could hear his heart beat in her ears as if it was her own, its pattern swift as the drums in the distance.
At least he felt it, too, she thought with a smile as she heard him drag in a deep, unsteady breath. At least she was not alone in these sudden, wild yearnings.
Could it be—was it...that she was falling in love with him?
The thought struck her like a sudden cold, stinging rain shower on a summer’s day. Nay! She could not be falling in love, not just like that with a man she had just met. Not after the pain she knew always came after love. She didn’t live in a sonnet. Such loves were not for mere mortals, especially not for people who thought themselves dull and sensible as she did. It was just...
What was it?
She stared up at him in complete bewilderment. How very handsome he was, not like a human at all, with his hair tousled over his brow and a half smile on his lips. His eyes were narrowed as he looked down at her.
‘Isabella,’ he said softly, her name rich and sweet in his deep, roughened voice. She’d never heard it said quite like that before. He reached up and gently touched her cheek, a whisper of a caress. His fingers were warm on her skin and she wanted to lean into him. To hold on to him and never let go.
Such longings frightened her. She stepped back away from the touch that so confused her. His hand fell to his side and he frowned.
‘Isabella, what is amiss?’ he asked.
She shook her head. ‘I—nothing is amiss. I just realized I have been away from my cousin too long. She will be looking for me.’
‘She will be busy with all her suitors,’ he said and she could tell he tried to tease her, to bring back some of the lightness of that perfect day, the laughter of their dance. ‘We have time.’
Isabella wanted their dance back, too. In those few moments she’d felt so glorious, so perfectly happy. But, like so much in Florence, it was surely an illusion. She didn’t want to be lost in it.
‘I should go,’ she whispered. She whirled around, but he reached out and caught her hand before she could flee. His clasp was gentle, yet she feared she couldn’t break free.
‘Forgive me, Isabella,’ he said and she heard the most solemn truth in his voice, just as she had when she had so briefly glimpsed his sadness at the cathedral. ‘I never meant insult to you. I forgot myself for a moment. I have never met anyone quite like you before.’
She glanced back at him over her shoulder and he gave her a rakish smile. His eyes were so brilliant, like emeralds in the sunlight. ‘I am not insulted, I promise you. And I have never met anyone like you, either.’
His smile turned hopeful. ‘Then may I see you again?’
She did want that; she longed for it too much. She nodded.
‘When?’ he said.
‘I don’t know,’ she answered, growing more desperate to back away from his touch. Or she wouldn’t be able to leave at all. ‘I don’t know what will happen next any longer. Once, I knew so well what every day would bring. Now...’
Now, she knew less and less with every moment that passed.
He nodded and let her go. ‘I will watch, to make sure you reach your cousin safely,’ he said. ‘We will meet again soon, Isabella.’
She spun around and hurried back down the hill towards the noisy crowds, the cluster of pavilions. Only once did she look back, but she couldn’t see Orlando any longer. He had vanished, just as he had in the cathedral. Yet she was sure she felt the heavy heat of his gaze.
She moved more slowly into the party, past ladies playing with their lapdogs and giggling together, dancers spinning in ever more wild circles, a priest lurching past drunkenly.
She could see Caterina’s pavilion in the distance and glimpsed a flash of her cousin’s purple gown. Caterina was watching a cluster of men play at bocce on the grass, including Giuliano de Medici. He had stripped to his fine white lawn shirt to toss the ball towards the pins, surely only to impress Caterina.
As she made her way past a cluster of men around one of the wine fountains, Isabella heard someone mutter a low curse and something about the Medici. How they should be wary.
Startled, she slowed her steps, trying to hear more. Who were those men who muttered so darkly about the Medici? Some of those hidden enemies Caterina spoke of?
Isabella glanced at the embroidered badges on their blue-and-gold doublets. The twin dolphins of the Pazzi family.
‘Ah, now here is a pretty maid, come to relieve us of hearing of the perfidious Medici again!’ One of the younger men suddenly reached out towards Isabella as she edged past him. She managed to twirl away and his grasp slid off her silk sleeve.
She rushed away, his drunken laughter following her. When she was at a safe distance, she looked back. They still leaned against each other, glaring at Giuliano and his friends.
She wasted no more time in making her way back to Caterina. She found she was shaking and was most grateful to sink down on to a cushion and take a goblet of wine from one of the pages.
Caterina smiled at her. Her cheeks were pink from laughing at Giuliano’s antics and luckily she didn’t seem to have noticed how long Isabella was gone.
‘Is anything amiss, cousin?’ Caterina said. ‘You look a bit flustered.’
‘Do you know those men there?’ Isabella asked. She gestured to the group near the fountain. The young man who had tried to grab her hand had found a more willing lady, who giggled up at him. A cardinal had joined them, an even younger man who seemed too small for his heavy red robes, or for the overflowing golden goblet in his hand.
A frown whispered over Caterina’s lips. ‘The Pazzi? They are one of the wealthiest families in Florence. Another banking family.’
Isabella remembered hearing about the Pazzi family, an old, wealthy family with many connections across Italy. ‘Bankers to the pope himself?’
‘Aye. The papal account was rightfully that of the Medici bank, until this new pope decided he felt otherwise. That small blond man is Francesco Pazzi, while the cardinal is the pope’s nephew, Signor Riario.’
‘I see,’ Isabella said slowly. Now their muttered words about Giuliano made sense.
‘Did they bother you, Isabella?’ Caterina said, her voice concerned.
Isabella shook her head. ‘Nay. One of them tried to flirt with me when I walked past, but I think he was merely ale-shot.’
Giuliano gave a shout as he overshot his aim with the bocce ball and nearly toppled over. Caterina smiled indulgently. ‘Many are today, I fear. If you were hurt...’
Isabella shook her head. The last thing she wanted was to mar this day with a brawl. ‘I can look after myself.’ Usually, anyway. She was not quite so sure any longer.
Caterina turned back to the game and Isabella surveyed the crowd as she sipped her wine. Orlando was nowhere to be seen. She hadn’t expected he would, but still...
Still, she had foolishly hoped.
Chapter Nine
The palazzo was silent as Isabella slipped out of her chamber into the corridor. It was deep into the night, but candles were lit in the sconces, casting their glow into the mysterious darkness. Their hiss and flicker seemed to be the only life in the perfect stillness of the house.
Caterina had retired after the party, her face white and strained with fatigue, and the servants disappeared after bringing Isabella her supper. Matteo had never come home at all. The last Isabella saw of him was when he reeled away from the Prato with his equally wine-besotted friends, singing a bawdy song.
Isabella knew she should sleep as well. It had been such a long day, filled with sunshine and wine and such a wild swirl of emotions. She hadn’t seen Orlando again, even though she had sear
ched for him through the dancers and the games. Even though she could not forget his kiss, the way it made her feel, so wild and exultant, so full of longing.
As if she had been searching and searching for so long, looking for that one perfect moment, and then it was upon her. It had been so right. But now it was gone, leaving her confused and alone once again.
So, aye, she should be sleeping. Forgetting everything in dreams. But she couldn’t lie still, couldn’t quiet her thoughts. The spring night was warm and her chamber felt too close. She remembered Mena telling her about a large terrace on the top floor of the palazzo. A large, shaded landing where the family could watch processions on the street below, or where the servants could hide for a bit of purloined wine. Isabella thought maybe she could sit there for a time, find some fresh air and watch the city that had so beguiled her.
She had quickly tugged on one of her simple dresses from home and left her hair loose, freed from its elaborate braids and curls. The fine silks and jewels from the party were left behind. She wrapped a thin shawl around her shoulders as she made her way up the narrow back staircase. She encountered no one. It felt as if the house was indeed deserted.
She found the landing off a small antechamber at the top of the house. Her shoes clicked on the flagstone floor as she tiptoed over to lean on the railing and study the street below. Unlike the palazzo, Florence was not completely silent for the night. In the distance, she could hear the echo of music and light once again flickered in the house across the square.
Isabella leaned down to rest her chin on her palm, closing her eyes as she let the night wash over her. She thought of Orlando, the way his hands felt as she danced with him, his kiss. She had never imagined a kiss could feel like that...
A sudden, sharp crack made her eyes fly open, startled. She stood up straight just in time to see a flare of fireworks shoot over the tiled roofs of the city. Red, white, green, sparkling and shimmering before it disappeared into the night sky.
Astonished by the sudden burst of beauty, she laughed when a plume of silver shot into the sky amid the drifts of smoke. It was like so many things that had happened to her since she came to Florence—unexpected, unlooked for and entirely amazing. A whole new world of possibilities opening up where anything could happen.
Overcome by the flash of joy, Isabella spun around in a wide circle, her arms outflung as if she would dance. Her shawl fell to the floor and the wind brushed over her shoulders, catching at her hair.
She whirled to a stop, gasping for breath as she found herself looking down at the street again. Only now it was not deserted. A man in a hooded cloak stood across the way, his shadowed face turned up to watch her balcony.
Isabella’s sudden wild burst of joy turned to cold fear. She remembered all Caterina’s warnings of the hidden dangers of Florence and felt foolish for letting herself forget again. She fell back a step, intending to flee, but something stopped her. Something about that man, about his tall figure, the way he stood...
He reached up to push back the hood and the torchlight from the street flickered over his face. It was Orlando who watched her, Orlando who had come there. To find her?
Isabella could hardly dare hope he had come for her. Perhaps he was merely passing, pausing to watch some hoydenish girl leap about. And yet—she did remember that kiss. The way he was so gentle, so sweet, until everything caught fire. The way his heart pounded, just as hers did.
She edged back carefully to the railing to stare down at him, unable to leave. ‘Orlando?’ she called.
‘Don’t be frightened, Isabella, please,’ he answered. He stepped closer, his face turned up to her perch. He gave her the smile that always made her heart beat faster.
‘What are you doing here?’ she said, holding her breath as she wondered what his answer would be.
‘It was foolish of me, I know,’ he said. He smiled, a rakish, white grin that gleamed in the torchlight and made her smile too. ‘But I wanted to see if I could catch a glimpse of you. The gods have smiled on me tonight.’
Isabella laughed, delighted beyond measure that he wanted to see her. ‘How did you know I lived here?’
‘I know much about Florence, Isabella, and I would share it with you if you would let me.’
Share it with her—and then vanish again? Yet Isabella found she was so happy, almost giddy, to see him that his mysteriousness mattered not at all. Not now. He seemed such a part of her joyous mood.
‘I suppose you even ordered the fireworks, just so I could see the city by night,’ she teased.
‘’Twas the Medici, I am sure. They like to display their wealth at every opportunity. But I will take the credit, if it pleases you.’
‘Your being here pleases me,’ Isabella admitted, forgetting all caution.
‘Shall I come up, then?’ he said. ‘Or shall I shout here in the street until your neighbours are all roused and there is a great scandal?’
‘You cannot come up here,’ she said with a laugh. ‘I doubt you can fly.’ He was Hades after all, not Icarus. Yet tonight he looked too young and teasing to be god of the Underworld. How quickly he changed with every moment. How much he intrigued her.
‘I don’t have to build wings,’ he said. He suddenly leaped up, grabbing a skein of looping ivy that hung from the stone wall.
Isabella watched in astonishment as he used the ivy as a rope to pull himself upwards. ‘Nay!’ she cried with a jolt of fear. ‘You will fall.’
‘How little faith you have in me, fair Isabella,’ he said lightly. He reached a lower, smaller balcony, and leaped on to its railing.
‘I have faith you are not a bird,’ she said. She couldn’t quite breathe as he continued to make his way upwards.
‘Nor am I the soft city-bred fool you seem to think me,’ he said. He wasn’t out of breath at all. ‘I grew up at my father’s country villa, swimming, rowing...’
‘Climbing?’
‘Aye, that, too. I also practised swordplay, wrote poetry. I am a man of many talents.’
‘So I am beginning to see,’ Isabella said. She thought she could be fascinated by every aspect of him for a very long time. That was the very thing she feared most.
At last, he caught the railing of her own balcony and swung himself up and over. He landed lightly, almost soundlessly, like a cat, and grinned at her as he stood up straight.
‘Do I get a reward for my brave exploits?’ he said.
He held out his arms and Isabella couldn’t help herself. She ran into them, laughing. His arms slid around her, drawing her tight against him just as she had wanted ever since their sunlit dance.
‘Is a kiss enough reward?’ she whispered.
In answer, he pulled her even closer, his mouth came down over hers and his tongue slid against hers. She opened for him, letting him in, meeting him eagerly. She loved when he kissed her and this happened, when everything else disappeared and there was only the magic of how he made her feel. He tasted of wine and mint, of the dark richness of the night.
His hand slid down her back as the kiss grew deeper. The night wind was chilly, but she could only feel his heat. His hard hand cupped her backside through her thin gown, shockingly, wonderfully, and he pulled her up into his body. She moaned against his mouth.
He lifted her up high against him and swung her around until she was braced against the stone wall of the palazzo. She felt free suddenly, as if she flew free, and she dared to wrap her legs around his waist, holding him close to her. She could feel the hardness of his desire through his doublet and tights, and it sent a primal thrill through her. He wanted her just as she wanted him. She tilted back her head and laughed out of sheer joy.
His lips slid down her arched neck, the tip of his tongue dipping into the hollow at the base of her throat. Her pulse pounded there, frantic with need. Something deep inside of her, someth
ing dark and primitive, called out for him.
He caressed the softness of her breast through her gown, his thumb brushing over her aching nipple. ‘Isabella, cara. I need...’
‘I know,’ she gasped. She threaded her fingers through his tousled hair and drew his mouth back to her skin. She shivered as he kissed her throat, his breath warm against her, and cried out as his hand touched her.
‘You are so beautiful,’ he said. ‘I’ve never known anyone like you.’
He kissed her again and she heard the mingling of their harsh breath, his incoherent words. The city far below was forgotten, there was only him. Only his kiss.
His hand slid lower, over her hip, her bent thigh, until he grasped her skirt in his fist. He drew it up, his palm smoothing over her bare skin. His touch on her naked flesh was wondrous. She held on to him blindly, wrapping herself closer around him.
‘I want you so much, bella,’ he said. ‘But I can’t...not here. Like this...’
A cold disappointment flooded over her, yet she knew he was right. This wasn’t the place, the time. Surely he felt something for her, something like what she felt for him? Surely this was not all there would be for them. It couldn’t be. Not when her whole world had changed because he had appeared in it.
She opened her eyes and studied his handsome face as she caught her breath. He stared down at her, a strange blend of pleasure and pain in his eyes. Regret?
Nay, there could be no regret. Not for something like this.
‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I will see you soon enough, Orlando. But that you came here tonight...’
He smiled, that flash of darkness vanishing, and he bent his head to kiss her again, quickly. Softly. ‘We will see each other again, cara. I vow it.’
* * *
Orlando stood concealed just beyond the corner of the house across from the Strozzi palazzo, watching the light glowing from the window of the chamber he knew was Isabella’s. He knew he should go. That he should turn his back on that cursed house and never look back. Never see Isabella again.
Betrayed by His Kiss Page 12
