All at once, belatedly, she realized that he was furiously angry.
His reaction reminded her of a near accident that she’d witnessed earlier in the year.
A little boy had let go of his mother’s hand and darted into the road almost under the wheels of a passing car. The driver had managed to do an emergency stop; then, getting out, he’d bundled the child back on to the pavement and into his mother’s arms, before driving off.
Instead of comforting the boy, who’d been howling at the top of his voice, the distraught mother—having experienced the kind of fear that could only find an expression in anger—had shouted at him and shaken him, before starting to cry with relief.
Feeling the prick of tears behind her eyes, Sophia left her chair and, kneeling by Stephen’s side, put her hand on his knee.
‘I’m sorry…it didn’t occur to me that you might be worried.’
His expression bleak, he said, ‘It didn’t occur to you that I might be worried! Do you seriously believe I think so little of you that I wouldn’t care if harm came to you?’
She caught her breath. So he did care.
But the fact that he cared what happened to her didn’t mean he loved her, she reminded herself sternly.
Even so, for the moment it was enough.
Worn out, physically and emotionally, she laid her head on his knee and felt his hand stroke her hair.
Then he was getting up and lifting her with him. ‘Bed,’ he said firmly. ‘We’ll sort out this mess in the morning.’
When, practically out on her feet, she swayed, he picked her up in his arms and carried her into the bedroom. Setting her down by the bed, he stripped off her robe and helped her in.
His own robe discarded, he stretched out beside her and gathered her close. Warm and safe in his arms, her head pillowed on his shoulder, she was asleep within seconds.
At first she slept the deep sleep of complete exhaustion, then, towards dawn, as her unconscious mind became enveloped in a miasma of intangible problems and disembodied terrors, her slumbers became disturbed and restless.
She found herself alone in the darkness. But she wasn’t alone…She was being stalked by something malignant, something that meant to harm her.
Panic-stricken, she broke into a run, trying to outstrip it, but, in spite of all her effort, it was gaining on her, getting closer…
She awoke with a jolt, her heart racing and sobbing for breath. Though she was lying close by Stephen’s side, his grip had relaxed with sleep and he was no longer holding her.
Needing the comforting warmth and reassurance his touch offered, she snuggled against him.
He was instantly awake and his arms closed around her, cradling her to him.
Feeling the tension in her slender body, he asked, ‘What’s wrong? Bad dreams?’
Her face buried against his neck, she nodded.
‘Would you like a warm drink to help you relax? Milk? Hot chocolate?’
‘No…Don’t leave me.’
‘I won’t leave you.’ Then, gently, ‘It’s still very early. Try to relax and get some more sleep.’
But it was impossible. Her brain had stirred into life and was active now, thoughts and images racing through her mind.
She recalled the Marquise’s face as she’d said, ‘Stefano is mine…I am the one he loves, the one he intends to marry…if a cheap little slut chooses to throw herself at him, who can blame him for accepting what is offered…?’
Well, he might have looked on what happened the night before as simply taking a willing woman to bed, but he wasn’t totally heartless. At least he’d cared enough to be concerned about her, to be angry and afraid when she had vanished.
But that didn’t alter the fact that he intended to make another woman his wife.
Well, as soon as they had talked, had ‘sorted out the mess’ she would go back to London and leave him to marry the woman he was committed to.
But just for the moment she was here in his bed, lying in his arms. Just for the moment he was hers. If she was brave enough to bury her inhibitions, brave enough to risk a rebuff, she could maybe have just one more memory to take with her. One more precious memory to last her for the rest of her life.
‘Stephen…’
He lifted a hand and brushed a tendril of hair away from her cheek. ‘What is it?’
Summoning all her courage, she whispered, ‘Will you make love to me?’
‘Why?’
Floored by the question, she stammered, ‘B-because I-I want you to.’
His voice cool, he said, ‘You didn’t seem to want that earlier.’
When she stayed silent, he asked, ‘Or were you just playing games? Saying no because you enjoy using your power, enjoy keeping a man on a string?’
Aghast, she pulled free and, moving away, cried, ‘How can you think that?’
Propping himself on one elbow so he could look down at her in the soft, pearly light of dawn, he demanded, ‘What else am I to think? At dinner you showed every sign of being willing, not to say eager, to sleep with me. Then, by the time we’d had coffee you’d changed your mind. You didn’t even want to share my bed…’
‘I did want to, but—’
He laughed harshly. ‘Oh, yes, so much so that you referred to making love with me as being used…’
‘I only said that because I was upset. I didn’t—’
‘Don’t try to tell me you didn’t mean it. The mere thought was enough to send you running off into the night to escape such a fate…’
Seared by his bitterness, she said quietly, ‘I’m sorry…Only you see when the Marquise told me that you loved her and that you and she were going to be married, I-I’m afraid I didn’t altogether believe her. I thought it might be just wishful thinking on her part…’ Sophia swiped a tear away, determined not to cry. ‘Then, when you told me yourself that you were hoping to be married and that you had someone special in mind, well, I…I didn’t want to sleep with another woman’s man…’
‘So that was all it was.’
‘All?’ she cried.
He looked amused by her indignation.
Flushing a little, she said, ‘I’m sorry I’m not the kind of worldly, sophisticated woman who wouldn’t care a jot—’
‘I’m not,’ he broke in crisply.
Then, his voice growing warmer, more intimate, he said softly, ‘But we’re wasting time. Do you still want me to make love to you?’
She half shook her head. ‘I’m sorry; I shouldn’t have asked you.’
‘Why did you?’
After a moment’s hesitation, she spoke the exact truth. ‘I’ve decided to go back to London as soon as possible and I just wanted a final memory to take away with me.’
‘I see.’ His voice silky, he added, ‘Then allow me to supply it.’
‘No, really…As I said, I shouldn’t have asked.’
‘Of course you should have asked. I’m entirely at your service…’
There was something in his voice, a hint of hidden anger, that sent a little quiver running through her.
She desperately wanted him, wanted him to make love to her, but did she want it like this? She was so confused. She quivered. As he ran a hand down her slender body, she could feel herself give away to his caress. She couldn’t help herself.
His palm lying warm at the base of her stomach, he smiled selfishly. ‘This will drive the bad dreams away.’
‘Please, Stephen…’ Her voice trembled. How could she want him so much when she knew he didn’t love her, was angry with her?
‘Just relax and enjoy what I’m going to do to you.’ He watched her face while his long fingers explored the smooth skin of her inner thighs and the silky nest of curls, before moving on to probe with delicate precision.
Feeling her shudder in response, he bent his head and took a pink nipple in his mouth…
For the next few minutes it was like riding a roller coaster, both frightening and exhilarating, as sensation followed sensation
thick and fast.
Each time, when she thought she could feel no more, he wrung new sensations from her. Only when she was totally limp, a quivering mass of nerve-endings, did he show any mercy.
She couldn’t deny that he had given her intense and prolonged pleasure, but it wasn’t how she had wanted it to be.
Rather than this skill, this ability to rule her body and make it respond to his touch, she had wanted the warmth of shared love, wanted to feel his weight, wanted to take with her the memory of them reaching the heights together…
Tears squeezed themselves from beneath her closed lids and began to trickle down her cheeks.
He made a little inarticulate sound, then, whispering, ‘Don’t cry, my love, please, don’t cry…’ he began to kiss them away. ‘I’m sorry, I’ve been such a brute to you.’
His tenderness only made her cry harder.
After a moment he gathered her close and held her, murmuring words of comfort while he stroked her hair.
When the tears finally stopped flowing, he said, ‘I promise I won’t touch you again.’
Her damp face against his throat, she muttered despairingly, ‘But I want you to. I want you to make love to me properly.’
‘You’re sure about that?’
Knowing this was her last chance, and throwing pride to the winds, she said, ‘Yes, I’m quite sure.’
Sated, she hadn’t expected to feel anything other than the comfort and warmth of his body, but within a short space of time he had effortlessly rekindled her desire.
A desire that, with a combination of gentleness and passion, he then appeased, leaving her limp and quivering and, for the moment at least, utterly content.
With his fair head lying heavy on her breast, his breathing and the beat of his heart at one with hers, she was asleep within seconds.
She slept deeply, dreamlessly, and only awakened when the sun had scaled the wall and was slanting obliquely through the windows. Her watch showed it was almost eleven o’clock, and once again she was alone in the big bed.
Feeling oddly calm, tranquil, her mind in limbo, empty of thoughts, she got out of bed, and like an automaton, pulled on the discarded robe and went through to the adjoining bedroom.
Heading for the bathroom mechanically, she made the same mistake she had made the previous night and found herself in the dressing-room.
This time it was lit by sunshine, and she paused to glance around her. It was a pretty little room with a small blue-tiled fireplace, a chaise longue covered in rose-coloured velvet and a matching armchair.
Above the fireplace hung an oil painting. It was a portrait of a young woman with soft dark hair taken up into a mass of curls, dark eyes and a lovely heart-shaped face.
She wore a blue silk seventeenth century ball gown and a double rope of beautifully matched pearls which seemed to glow with an inner radiance—pearls that Sophia now recognized as the Padova Pearls. In her hand was a silver carnival mask.
For what seemed an age, Sophia stood staring up at it, completely stunned. It was undoubtedly the original from which her father had copied his miniature.
The miniature the Marquise had asked so many questions about and been so very eager to buy…
But Stephen had seen the miniature too, and if he had known this portrait was here, as surely he did, why hadn’t he said something?
At length, having decided that the only way she would get an answer to the riddle was by asking him, she tore herself away and went to shower and put on some clothes.
When she was dressed in a cotton skirt and top, she took her hair up into a knot, pulled on a pair of flat sandals and, fascinated by the portrait, went to have another look at it.
She was still standing gazing up at it when Stephen’s voice made her jump. ‘So there you are! I was wondering where you’d got to.’
His tone held such relief that she knew he must have been afraid that she had walked out once more, without waiting to talk to him.
She turned to see him standing in the open doorway dressed in olive-green trousers and a matching silk shirt open at the neck.
His handsome face looked a little tense, a little strained, as though it had become an effort to stay on top, and her heart went out to him.
‘How are you feeling this morning?’ he enquired, every inch the polite host.
With equal politeness, she answered, ‘Very well, thank you.’
Then, returning her gaze to the picture, she asked flatly, ‘When you saw the miniature at the gallery, why didn’t you tell me about this portrait?’
‘I wasn’t sure whether you already knew of its existence and, if you didn’t, it would have been too complicated to try and explain.
‘You see, I didn’t know about the miniature, and I was completely wrong-footed when Gina spotted it and made such a fuss about buying it.’
‘But if you didn’t know about the miniature, why did you come into the gallery?’
‘To see you.’
‘Oh…’ Then, gathering herself, she asked, ‘When the full-sized portrait was already here at the Palazzo, why was the Marquise so keen to have the miniature?’
‘She wasn’t aware that the full-sized portrait was still at the Palazzo.
‘Because Paolo had taken a strong dislike to it, and in one of his drunken rages had threatened to destroy it, Aunt Fran asked Roberto to take it down and hide it.
‘Then, though it went against the grain to lie, she told Paolo that it had been sold. It was only after his death that she had it moved into here.’
Puzzled, Sophia remarked, ‘It seems strange that he should have taken such a strong dislike to a lovely old painting like this.’
‘It isn’t old. The dress and the hairstyle are misleading. If you were to examine it more closely you would see that it was painted about the same time as the miniature…’
As she glanced at him sharply, he added quietly, ‘And by the same person.’
‘You think Dad painted them both?’
‘Undoubtedly.’
‘Then how did it come to be here?’
‘This was where it was painted. It’s a portrait of Aunt Fran when she was young…She had held a fancy dress ball at the Palazzo for that year’s Carnevale and she was wearing the dress she had had specially made for her…’
So her father had known that beautiful woman and hidden the fact, as Stephen had tried to hide it. Aloud, she began, ‘But if you knew that your aunt and my father had known each other, why didn’t you—?’
She broke off abruptly as another realization struck her. ‘Our meeting wasn’t an accident,’ she said with certainty.
‘No.’
‘You were following me.’
‘Yes.’
‘Why?’
He sighed. ‘It’s a long and complicated story which, in any case, I’d intended to tell you before you went back to London.
‘However, as you must be feeling hungry, I suggest we have lunch first. Afterwards I’ll tell you everything I know.’
It was another beautiful day and they ate their lunch—a seafood platter and a mixed salad, followed by fresh fruit and cheese—in the garden beneath the sun-dappled shade of a cool green canopy of leaves.
They ate in silence, a tension between them that had—Sophia realized—as much to do with her decision to go back to London as with the story he had promised to tell her.
When they had finished the simple but delicious meal, Rosa cleared away and brought them coffee.
Settled in one of the comfortable loungers, Sophia watched Stephen fill two cups, before she prompted, ‘You said that after lunch you’d tell me everything.’
He glanced up, his brilliant eyes narrowed against a shaft of sunlight. ‘And so I will.’
Having handed her a cup, he sat down in the lounger alongside hers and added, ‘I was just wondering where to start.’
‘Start by telling me why the Marquise wanted the miniature so badly, when it was a portrait of a woman she frankly hated.’
‘Gina wanted the miniature because Aunt Fran had been wearing the Padova Pearls.
‘Shortly after that portrait was painted the pearls disappeared. My mother and father presumed they’d been transferred to the bank to prevent Paolo getting his hands on them.
‘To the best of my, and the rest of the family’s, knowledge they were never seen again.
‘During her final illness, Aunt Fran had been in touch with her solicitor and made her last wishes known, but she failed to lodge her will with him, and it couldn’t immediately be found.
‘However, at her funeral, and following her precise instructions, her solicitor advised the family of her last wishes. Apart from a substantial legacy for Rosa and Roberto, the Palazzo and everything in it had been left to me, while the Padova Pearls she had bequeathed to her daughter.
‘As she and Gina had never liked each other, that bequest came as both a surprise and a shock to the rest of the family.
‘Gina was cock-a-hoop until it emerged that the pearls weren’t with the bank and couldn’t be found. It was almost as if they had never existed.
‘Rosa and Roberto, the two people closest to Fran, denied all knowledge of them, and that portrait was the only tangible proof that she had ever had them.
‘Gina practically accused Rosa and Roberto of stealing them, but they both stoutly denied knowing anything about their disappearance.
‘My parents were of the opinion that if the pearls had been stolen the most likely person would have been Paolo.
‘However, as he had remained here until his death, and Aunt Fran had never said anything about them being missing, I was inclined to believe that she herself had put them somewhere safe.’
‘But they didn’t come to light?’ Sophia asked.
Stephen shook his head. ‘Gina, having given up the idea that Rosa and Roberto had stolen them, began to think along the same lines as myself…
‘To try and solve the mystery, I set about looking, but of course the Palazzo’s a big place to search…’
When he fell silent, Sophia said, ‘Speaking of the Palazzo, you were going to tell me how my father came to be here.’
Chapter 10
The Padova Perals Page 15
