“So it’s your opinion that she was only using me?”
“Of course. You don’t think she’d actually be interested in someone like you?”
They’d been trading barbs all evening, and Paolo always enjoyed it. But now, he took offense.
When he didn’t answer, she said, “Don’t pout. You know she wouldn’t be. She’s one of them, and we are not. Her contempt for both of us is no different from Deller and the others, but she has contempt for them, as well—or, at least, frustration. She found you useful tonight, whatever her scheme may be. But that is what such people do—use each other. They’re all pieces on a great chess board.”
“I want to change the game.”
“I know you do. Which simply means more games to be played. You’re using them, are you not? And you’re using me.”
Her insight did little to settle his offense. “Are you not using me?”
She stopped and looked up at him frankly. “To what purpose? How does spending time with you do anything to my advantage?”
Again, he felt the sting of offense. “I took you to one of the greatest houses in the city tonight. Would you have had any chance at such a thing without me?”
“I spent the night being sneered at and whispered about, all so I could stand about in an uncomfortable gown and stare at rich people with so little to fill their lives and minds they turned themselves into paintings.” Her mouth quirked with droll humor. “Don’t pretty things up telling yourself you did me a service bringing me here tonight. I’m not dazzled by crystal chandeliers and string quartets and food that looks good and tastes like dust. These people have nothing I want.”
“Is that true? You want none of this?” He gestured toward 5th Avenue, but they were so deep into the park there were only trees.
They’d stopped walking some time ago and had hardly moved. The carriage was still and quiet at a distance behind them. They were alone in the otherwise deserted park. The night seemed to swell around them.
Mirabella’s gaze drifted to Paolo’s chest as she considered his question. She set her hand on his coat and smoothed his lapel. The gesture was innocent, but the lower half of Paolo’s body clenched as if he’d been punched.
“I don’t want a ridiculous house like that,” she said in a voice soft with contemplation. “I don’t want to throw money around like fallen leaves. I don’t want parties like that, where no one truly cares for anyone. I don’t want a place in that society, no. But …”
When she let that swollen word droop unsupported, he prodded, “But …”
“I want what you want, I suppose. Power.”
“You want power,” he repeated, letting his incredulity show.
Her brows slashed dangerously. “You think that’s silly?”
“I said no such thing. But I wonder how you think to find a way to claim power, or use it. This is a man’s world. No doors will open for you.”
“Hmpf.” She turned and began to walk again.
He picked up his stride and returned to his place beside her, taking her arm again. “Do you think I’m wrong?”
“I think I could say the same to you—I wonder how you think to find a way to claim power way up here when your address is the Five Points. They call you a dirty guinea—I heard those words tonight, whispered in sneers. They would hold the door against you, as well. But you’ve managed to wedge your foot in.”
“You couldn’t do the things I’ve had to do to make that happen.”
Abruptly, she stopped again and faced him. “You’ve no idea what I can do, or what I’m willing to do to get what I want.”
Paolo had controlling financial interest in a few bordellos, including one of the most exclusive in the city. He had sampled many of its offerings, and preferred the most experienced of the whores, in particular the madam, Carmela, who had an impressive array of specialized skills.
He had seen peepshows and books of artfully raunchy photographs. He’d even seen a moving picture once of an orgy, with three men and five women. There had been nothing artful in that production.
Despite all that experience, all that knowledge, Paolo had never in his life been as aroused as he was now, as Mirabella’s bold assertion rang in the air between them.
The breeze was toying at her hair, pulling curls from their pins here and there. His hand came up without his instruction and caught one as it blew across her face. He tucked it behind her ear, let the weight of the jet dangle rest for a moment on his fingers … and then his hand was cupping her face.
She didn’t move away. Instead, she set her hand on his chest again and looked up. The tip of her pink tongue slipped out and moistened her lips.
A bank of clouds must have been rushing across the sky just then, because the moonlight stuttered over her face, flashing bright and dim. But her eyes gleamed steadily, looking up at him, waiting for him to respond.
Paolo swallowed past the need that had filled him all the way to his throat.
He knew what was about to happen. He shouldn’t allow it. Precisely because he was so fascinated by her, he should not allow this. If he gave in to this urge, he wouldn’t be satisfied until he had all of her. He would tear her apart. How could he not?
But God, he wanted. Not a mere physical need, but something deeper.
“I want everything, too, Paolo,” Mirabella murmured.
“You don’t know what that means.” His voice was rough and strained. “You don’t know what the world will take of you in trade. What it will demand of you. You don’t know.”
“Don’t I?”
“No, you don’t.”
“Then show me.”
His thumb brushed over her cheek, felt the sharp jut of her cheekbone. “Bella …”
Her hand eased up from his lapel, over his collar, and then her thumb in its satin glove traced the scar through his mouth. Feeling that light caress, Paolo realized for the first time that no one but he himself had ever touched his scar, except with a fist.
He hadn’t kissed a woman since Sicily; neither he nor the whores he retained had any interest in the intimacy of a kiss—or that kind of caress, for that matter.
“I am not afraid, Paolo. Not of you, and not of this demanding world.”
He cupped her other cheek. For a moment, he only held her there, reaching deep inside to find the will to let her go.
All he could find was want.
He bent to her and claimed what he wanted.
He’d known her mouth would be soft, but he groaned at the lushness of her lips. He’d known her scent, but now it filled his head. He’d known the lithe warmth of her body at his side, but in his arms she was fire. Her mouth was open beneath his, and when he let his tongue out, she sighed and leaned back, pulling him with her until she was nearly lying in his arms. Her tongue touched his, searching. He’d never kissed a woman who kissed like this.
When a serious consideration rose in his mind about dragging her off into the trees to have his way with her, Paolo reclaimed a thread of practical sense and pulled back. He was not yet so far gone that he’d turn into Mr. Hyde so quickly.
They were on a path in Central Park, completely exposed. Had it been almost any other time of day, this path near the zoo would have been crowded with people, and every one of them would have been scandalized at their conduct. Police might have been called; they might have been arrested for public indecency.
Each and every one of those thoughts fired him more.
As it was, however, the path was nearly empty, their only audience Cosimo, who knew when to see and when to be blind.
Mirabella reclined in his arms, smiling up at him. “You’re good at that,” she said.
“In English,” he teased.
The wattage of her smile increased. In English, she said, “I have had better.”
Paolo chuckled, and her smile lost its puckish edge.
“When you laugh, is good. Good sound.”
He stood straight and helped her to do the same. “Bella …
”
“Do you hear that?” Back to Italian, of course.
“What?”
“The way you say my name. Bella. No one calls me that, has ever called me that. Only you, as of tonight.”
He hadn’t realized. He’d thought once or twice about his moniker, Il Bestione, The Beast, and that the people had gotten it wrong when they’d given him that name to pair with their name for his sister, La Bellezza, The Beauty. He’d thought that Mirabella was the more appropriate match in that way—he’d taken her hostage, after all, and her name already meant beautiful. Also, she wasn’t his sister.
But he hadn’t realized he had made those thoughts real in any way.
He felt he should apologize, but that was not an act that came readily. In the space it belonged, there was only silence while they gazed at each other.
“I like it,” she finally said. “I like that you’ve named me.”
His want was growing teeth and claws. “You should think before you speak,” he rasped. “Don’t toy.”
“I’m not toying with you, Paolo.” She took his lapel again and gave it a tug. “I’m inviting you.”
“To what?”
“To ask for what you want.”
He shook his head. “You don’t—”
She cut him off. “Do you think I’m a naïve little girl who doesn’t know the door I’m opening? I’m not a virgin. I haven’t been since I was seventeen.”
His brain simply stopped. All he could do was stare. It had never occurred to him that she was experienced. Her father was still her guardian—he should have kept such men from her. Men like him.
God, could he have had her weeks ago?
“Does that shock you?”
“Nothing shocks me,” he managed to say with a veneer of calm. “But I am surprised.”
Her gaze narrowed into suspicion. “Does it appall you?”
“No. Only surprise.”
“I’m not free with my body. I’m choosy. But I’m telling you, if you ask, I will choose you.”
Love was a judgment, and he was unworthy.
This wasn’t love. They’d made no talk of such a thing.
A tiny thought fluttered at the back of his mind—Wasn’t that the source of his caution, the worry that his fascination would grow into something deeper? The alarming thought he could fall in love with her?—but his need crushed that thought before it could take hold.
Still, he threw out a final warning for her. “Be careful, Bella. I’m in earnest. If I take you, I won’t let you go.”
She smiled and let her body rest against his. Through her clothes and his, he could feel every contour of her shape.
“Take me well, and maybe I won’t want you to let me go.”
XIV
In front of the Little Italy Community Society, Paolo turned to help Mirabella from the carriage. For all the quiet uptown, the Five Points continued to bustle at this late, dark hour. This was a part of the city, and the neighborhood, that never truly slept. The moon didn’t bring rest to the Five Points; it merely brought a different kind of life out from the sun’s shadows.
As she took his hand, Paolo paused, considering the people moving about along the street. “You’ll be seen coming in so late.”
She gave him her wry smirk. “For weeks, they’ve all been whispering that I gave you my virtue. Their torrid talk means nothing.”
“You are an unusual woman,” Paolo mused as he helped her to the street.
“Thank you,” she answered. “If you meant it as a compliment.”
“I did.”
In the carriage on the way down from Central Park, Mirabella had begun to show him what she’d gained in exchange for the virtue she’d given up long before she’d met him. She’d matched him one for one in passion and intensity, and they were still both fully clothed.
With his hand at the small of her back, he led her to the door. When Cosimo opened it, Mirabella pulled up short. “My father—he’ll be worried.”
Paolo turned to his driver. “Wake one of the boys and send him with word to Luciano Montanari. His daughter is safe and will see him tomorrow.”
Cosimo nodded, and Paolo led Mirabella into his home.
The house was dark. Paolo hadn’t yet come to trust electric lights and wouldn’t leave them on in an empty house. Now, he found the switch and turned on the lights on the wall at either side of the front door. As always, he winced as their glare filled the entry.
For reasons not fully in his mind’s grasp, Paolo felt reluctant to lead her directly upstairs to his private rooms. His blood still pounded from their wild clench in the carriage, he’d brought her into his home tonight for one purpose, yet now that they were alone and it was time, he hesitated.
He’d had plenty of women in his bed, but none he hadn’t paid to be there—or who hadn’t owed him something.
Mirabella owed him. But not this.
He didn’t want her to go up with him because she owed him.
The thought set him on his heels. For all the years he’d been in America, Paolo had thought of anything and everything he had or wanted as a transaction—what was owed, what was paid, what could be traded, what could be gained, how to position himself to have the advantage every time. He liked whores because the transaction was the first and most important part of the encounter.
He’d understood Mirabella’s attempt to kill him as a move in a transaction she didn’t fully understand—what she’d thought he’d owed her.
He’d freed her on the basis of a deal—what she owed him.
He knew his place in a world in which every act served a material purpose. That was the world he could master. Emotional connections were mercurial and unreliable, based on factors too malleable to quantify or predict.
But he wanted Mirabella to come up with him, give herself to him, not as payment or part of any deal but because she wanted him. Because she liked him.
He’d been concerned that he was too dangerous for her, but perhaps he had that wrong. She was dangerous to him.
As his hesitation stretched on, she turned and gave him a quizzical look. “Paolo?”
Their ardor in the carriage had loosened her hair, and a long curl slipped from its last pin and floated to rest on her shoulder. He picked it up and let the curl take his finger.
“You don’t owe me this,” he said.
She caught his hand. “I know. I owe you dull evenings with dull people. I’m here now because I want this.”
“Why?”
Her head tipped to one side, and she studied his eyes. “You look at me when I talk. You listen to what I say. Sometimes you smile, and it’s like a gift.”
“Bella, I—”
“Because you call me Bella. Take me upstairs, Paolo.”
His misgivings remained; emotion twined around them like choking vines. But he’d ignored all the warning signs about this woman so far, why stop now? He wanted her, and that want was his strongest impulse. So he took her hand and led her upstairs.
In his rooms, he lifted the velvet wrap from her shoulders and laid it over the back of one of the damask armchairs facing his fireplace. The fireplace was empty, and the coal stove in the corner of the room had been banked, so the night’s chill had seeped into the room. After he laid his gloves and hat on the seat of the chair, he went to the stove and stirred it to life, adding more fuel.
When he turned, Mirabella was working the buttons at the wrist of a glove, but her gloved fingers struggled. He went to her and took over, easing each button from its slit. When the creamy, delicate flesh of her wrist was exposed, he bent and put his mouth there, breathing in the scent of her, letting his tongue catch her taste. Her pulse fluttered beneath his lips, and a tiny moan escaped her, quivering in the air at his ear.
His body felt hard and heavy, turned to steel from his shoulders to his feet. Never had he known a want like this. Even his want of revenge and comeuppance, against Don Cuccia, against Don Fausto, against Martin Deller and his ilk, a want s
o keen and deep it drove him from bed some nights to pace, paled against his want for this young woman.
Standing straight, he found her eyes and held them as he eased the glove from her slim arm. A hint of a smile played at her cheeks as she held up her other hand, offering it to him for the same treatment. He obliged.
When both her gloves lay over her stole, Paolo brushed his hands down her arms. She was so slight, one might think her fragile. But her heart was robust as a stevedore’s.
That thread of hesitation pulled tight again as a spasm clenched within his ribs. “Would you like a drink?” he asked, and went to the chest where he kept the liquor. “Brandy?”
As he stood with his back to the room, pouring brandy from a decanter into two snifters, the floor creaked. Mirabella was standing behind him.
She didn’t speak, but put her hands on his back, easing them up. Her fingers slid into the collar of his tailcoat, and she pulled, taking the coat from his shoulders.
He set the decanter down and let her remove his coat. Then she moved away, and he filled the glasses.
Before he could turn, she was behind him again, her hands on his shirt now, brushing slowly up from his waist, over his shoulders, down his arms, to his back again.
Paolo closed his eyes, forgot the drinks, felt only that touch, like none other he’d experienced. Chaste and erotic all at once. Her hands were small but strong. Purposeful but gentle.
Then they slipped down his sides to his hips, swept in across his ass, and Paolo let impulse have him. He spun and grabbed her arms, yanked her body tightly to his and dropped his mouth onto hers like a collision, forcing her mouth wide, as if he could dive into her and claim her heart and soul for his own.
Another woman might have been frightened or at least stunned by his sudden force, but Mirabella flung her arms around his neck, her tongue surged up to tangle with his, and when he thrust his hips against her, she thrust hers right back.
Il Bestione (The Golden Door Duet Book 2) Page 16
