Rome's Revenge

Although she could never really be free of it for long, she acknowledged with a smothered sigh.

But she used her home computer mainly to follow share dealings on the Internet—an interest she’d acquired during her time with Rob, and the only one to survive their traumatic break-up. A hobby, she thought, that she could pursue alone.

It had never been her parents’ intention for her to be an only child. Cory had been born two years after their marriage, and it had been expected that other babies would follow in due course.

But there had seemed no real hurry. Ian and Sonia Grant had liked to live in the fast lane, and their partying had been legendary. Sonia had been a professional tennis player in her single days, and Ian’s passion, apart from his wife and baby, had been rally driving.

Sonia had been playing in an invitation tournament in California when a burst tyre had caused Ian’s car to spin off a forest road and crash, killing him instantly.

Sonia had tried to assuage her grief by re-embarking on the tennis circuit, and for a few years Cory had travelled with her mother in a regime of constantly changing nannies and hotel suites.

Arnold Grant had finally intervened, insisting that the little girl come back to Britain to be educated and live a more settled life, and Cory’s childhood had then been divided between her grandparents’ large house in Chelsea and their Suffolk home, which she’d much preferred.

Sonia had eventually remarried, her second husband being American industrialist Morton Traske, and after his death from a heart attack she’d taken up permanent residence in Florida.

Cory had an open invitation to join her, but her mother’s country-club lifestyle had never held any appeal for her. And she suspected that Sonia, who was determinedly keeping the years at bay, found her a secret embarrassment anyway.

Their relationship was affectionate, but detached, and Cory found herself regarding Sonia very much as a wayward older sister. Most of the mothering in her life had been supplied by her grandmother.

Beth Grant had been a serenely beautiful woman, confident in the love of her husband and family. The loss of her son had clouded her hazel eyes and added lines of sadness to the corners of her mouth, but she had given herself whole-heartedly to the rearing of his small daughter, and Cory had worshipped her.

However, it hadn’t taken long for Cory to realise there was another shadow over her grandmother’s happiness, or to understand its nature.

The feud, she thought wearily. The damn feud. Still alive even after all these years.

It had been the only time she’d known her grandparents to quarrel. Seen tears of anger in Beth Grant’s eyes and heard her voice raised in protest.

‘This can’t go on,’ she’d railed. ‘It’s monstrous—farcical. You’re like children, scoring off each other. Except it’s more dangerous than that. For God’s sake, stop it—stop it now…’

Her grandfather’s answering rumble had been fierce. ‘He started it, Bethy, and you know it. So tell him to give it up. Tell him to stop trying to destroy me. To undermine my business—overthrow my companies.’

Arnold Grant had smiled grimly. ‘Because it hasn’t worked, and it never will. Because I won’t allow it. Anything he does to me will be done back to him. And he’ll be the one to call a truce in the end—not me.’

‘The end?’ his wife had echoed bitterly. ‘What kind of truce can there be when you’re trying to annihilate each other?’

She’d suddenly seen Cory, standing in the doorway, and had hustled her away, chiding gently.

‘Gran,’ Cory had asked that night, when Beth had come to tuck her into bed, ‘who’s Matt Sansom?’

‘Someone who doesn’t matter,’ Beth had said firmly. ‘Not to me, and, I hope, never to you. Now, go to sleep, and forget all about it.’

Wise counsel, Cory thought, grimacing, but sadly impossible to follow. And, since her grandmother’s death six years before, the enmity between the two men seemed even more entrenched and relentless.

Only last week her grandfather had been gloating because he’d been able to filch a prime piece of real estate which Sansom Industries had been negotiating for from under their very noses.

‘But you don’t even want that site,’ Cory had protested. ‘What will you do with it?’

‘Sell it back to the bastards,’ Arnold had returned with a grim smile. ‘Through some intermediary. And at a fat profit. And there isn’t a damned thing that old devil can do about it. Because he needs it. He’s already deeply committed to the project.’

‘So he’ll be looking for revenge?’ Cory had asked drily.

Arnold had sat back in his chair. ‘He can try,’ he’d said with satisfaction. ‘But I’ll be waiting for him.’

And so it went on, Cory thought wearily. Move and counter-move. One dirty trick answered by another. And who could say what damage was being done to their respective multi-million empires while these two ruthless old men pursued their endless, pointless vendetta? It was a chilling thought, but maybe they wouldn’t be content until one of them had been the death of the other.

And then there wouldn’t be anyone to carry on this senseless feuding.

Cory herself had always steadfastly refused to get involved, and Matt Sansom’s only heir was the unmarried daughter who kept house for him. There’d been a younger daughter, too, but she’d walked out over thirty years ago and completely disappeared. Rumour said that Matt Sansom had never allowed her name to be mentioned again, and in this case, Cory thought wryly, rumour was probably right.

Her grandfather’s enemy was a powerful hater.

She shivered suddenly, and got up from her chair.

In her bedroom, she tossed her robe on to a chair and unhooked her bra. And paused as she glimpsed herself in the mirror, half naked in the shadows of the lamplit room.

She thought with amazement, But that’s what he was doing—the man on the balcony—undressing me with his eyes. Looking at me as if I was bare…

And felt, with shock, her nipples harden, and her body clench in a swift excitement that she could neither control nor pardon…

For a moment she stood motionless, then with a little cry she snatched up her white cotton nightdress and dragged it over her head.

She said aloud, her voice firm and cool, ‘He’s a stranger, Cory. You’ll never see him again. And, anyway, didn’t you learn your lesson with Rob—you pathetic, gullible idiot? Now, go to bed and sleep.’

But that was easier said than done. Because when she closed her eyes, the dark stranger was there waiting for her, pursuing her through one brief disturbing dream to the next.

And when she woke in the early dawn there were tears on her face.

CHAPTER TWO

ROME walked into his suite and slammed the door behind him.

For a moment he leaned back against its solid panels, eyes closed, while he silently called himself every bad name he knew in English, before switching to Italian and starting again.

But the word that cropped up most often was ‘fool’.

The whisky he’d ordered earlier had been sent up, he noted with grim pleasure. He crossed to the side table, pouring a generous measure into a cut-glass tumbler and adding a splash of spring water.

He opened the big sliding doors and moved out on to the narrow terrace, staring with unseeing eyes over the city as he swallowed some of the excellent single malt in his glass. He put up a hand to his throat, impatiently tugging his black tie loose, ignoring the dank autumnal chill in the air.

He said quietly, almost conversationally, ‘I should never have come here.’

But then what choice did he have, when the Italian banks, once so helpful, had shrugged regretful shoulders and declined to loan him the money he needed to revitalise his vines and restore the crumbling house that overlooked them?

And for that, he thought bitterly, he had Graziella to thank. She’d sworn she’d make him sorry, and she’d succeeded beyond her wildest dreams.

He’d intended his trip to London to be a flying visit, and totally private. He’d planned to stay just long enough to negotiate the loan he needed, then leave immediately, without advertising his presence.

But he’d underestimated his grandfather, and the effectiveness of his information network, he realised, his mouth twisting wryly.

He’d barely checked in to his hotel before the summons had come. And couched in terms he hadn’t been able to refuse.

But he couldn’t say he hadn’t been warned. His mother had been quite explicit.

‘Sooner or later he’ll want to meet you, and you should go to him because you’re his only grandchild. But don’t accept any favours from him, caro, because there’s always a payback. Always.’

Yet he still hadn’t seen the trap that had been baited for him.

He’d been caught off guard, of course. Because Matthew Sansom had come to him first. Had simply appeared one day at Montedoro right out of the blue.

Rome had been shaken to find himself staring at an older version of himself. The mane of hair was white, and the blue eyes were faded, but the likeness was undeniable, and not lost on Matt Sansom either.

The shaggy brows had drawn together in a swift glare of disbelief, then he’d recovered. ‘So—you’re Sarah’s bastard.’

Rome inclined his head. ‘And you’re the man who tried to stop me being born,’ he countered.

There was a smouldering silence, then a short bark of laughter. ‘Yes,’ said Matt Sansom. ‘But perhaps that was a mistake.’

He swung round and looked down over the terraces of vines. ‘So this is where my daughter spent her last years.’ He sounded angry, almost contemptuous, but there was a note of something like regret there, too.

He stayed two nights at Montedoro, touring the vigneto and asking shrewd questions about its operation, and paying a visit to the local churchyard where Sarah was buried beside her husband, Steve d’Angelo.

‘You have his name,’ Matt said abruptly as they drove back to the villa. ‘Was he your father?’

‘No, he adopted me.’

The pale eyes glittered at Rome. ‘Card-sharp, wasn’t he?’

‘He was a professional gambler.’ Rome was becoming accustomed to his grandfather’s abrasive style of questioning. ‘He was also a brilliant, instinctive card player, who competed for high stakes and usually won.’

‘And you followed in his footsteps for a while?’

Rome shrugged. ‘I’d watched him since I was a boy. He taught me a lot. But my heart was never in it, as his was.’

‘But you won?’

‘Yes.’

Matt peered through the window of the limousine with a critical air. ‘Your stepfather didn’t invest much of his own winnings in the family estate.’

‘It came to Steve on the death of his cousin. He’d never expected to inherit, and it was already run down.’

‘And now you’ve taken it on.’ That bark of laughter again. ‘Maybe you’re more of a gambler than you think, boy.’ He paused. ‘Did your mother ever speak about your real father?’

‘No,’ Rome said levelly. ‘Never. I got the impression it wasn’t important to her.’

‘Not important?’ The growl was like distant thunder. ‘She brings disgrace on herself and her family, and it doesn’t matter?’

Just for a moment Rome caught a glimpse of the harsh, unforgiving tyrant his mother had run away from.

‘She was young,’ he said, his own voice steely. ‘She made a mistake. She didn’t have to do penance for the rest of her life.’

Matt grunted, and relapsed into a brooding silence.

That was the only real conversation they’d had on personal subjects, Rome recalled. They’d seemed to tacitly agree there were too many no-go areas.

His grandfather had sampled the wine from Rome’s first few vintages with the appreciation of a connoisseur, drawing him out on the subject, getting him to talk about his plans for the vigneto, his need to buy new vats for the cantina and replace the elderly oaken casks with stainless steel.

Looking back, Rome could see how much he’d given away, in his own enthusiasm. Understood how Matt Sansom had deliberately relaxed the tension between them, revealing an interested, even sympathetic side to his nature.

The offer of a low-cost loan to finance these improvements had been made almost casually. And the fact that it wasn’t a gift—that it was a serious deal, one businessman to another, with a realistic repayment programme—had lured Rome into the trap.

It had only been later, after the deal had been agreed and his grandfather had departed, that he’d begun to have doubts.

But it was finance he needed, and repayments he could afford, he’d thought. And it would be a definite one-off. Once the last instalment had been paid, he would look for future loans from more conventional sources.

He remembered a night in Paris when both Steve and himself had emerged heavy winners from a private poker game which had been scheduled to last a week. The other players had been quietly spoken and beautifully dressed, and the air of power round the table had been almost tangible, and definitely menacing.

‘Are we going back?’ he’d asked eagerly, but Steve had shaken his head.

‘Never return to a pool where tigers come to drink,’ he’d told him, and they’d caught the next plane back to Italy.

It was a piece of advice that had lingered. But Rome had told himself that his grandfather’s loan was a justifiable risk. The first and last visit to the tigers’ pool.

Over the past two years communication between them had been brief, and usually by letter.

Rome had assumed that it would remain that way.

So the curt demand for his presence had been an unwelcome surprise.

Matt Sansom lived just outside London, in a house hidden behind a high stone wall and masked by clustering trees.

‘Disney meets Frankenstein’ had been Sarah d’Angelo’s description of her childhood home, and, recovering from his first glimpse of the greystone, creeper-hung mansion, its bulk increased by the crenellated turrets at each end, Rome had found the description apt.

A quiet grey-haired woman in an anonymous navy dress had answered the door to him.

‘Rome,’ she said, a warm, sweet smile lighting her tired eyes. ‘Sarah’s son. How wonderful. I didn’t believe we’d ever meet.’ She reached up and kissed his cheek. ‘I’m your aunt Kit.’

Rome returned her embrace, guiltily aware he’d assume she was the housekeeper.

He said, ‘I didn’t believe I’d ever be invited here either. I thought my existence was too much of a blot on the family honour.’

He was waiting for her to tell him that his grandfather’s bark was worse than his bite, but the expected reassurance didn’t come.

Instead, she said, ‘He’s waiting for you. I’ll take you up to him.

‘He’s resting,’ she added over her shoulder, as she led the way up the wide Turkey-carpeted staircase and turned left on to a galleried landing. ‘He’s been unwell. I was afraid it was his heart, but the doctor’s diagnosed stress.’

If the house looked like a film set, then Matt Sansom’s bedroom emphasised the impression. It was stiflingly hot and airless. The carpet was crimson, and so were the drapes, while the vast bed was built on a raised dais. And in the centre of it, propped up by pillows, was Matt himself.

Like some damned levee at eighteenth-century Versailles, Rome thought, amused, then met the full force of his grandfather’s glare and realised this was no laughing matter.

He said, ‘Good evening, Grandfather. I hope you’re feeling better.’

Matt grunted and looked past him. ‘Go downstairs, Kit,’ he directed abruptly. ‘You’re not needed here.’

Rome swung around. ‘Aunt Kit,’ he said pleasantly, ‘I hope you can make time for a talk before I leave.’

She nodded, darting an apprehensive glance at her father, then slipped from the room.

‘You can bring us some coffee in half an hour,’ Matt called after her as she closed the door.

Rome’s brows lifted. ‘Is that my aunt’s job?’

‘It is tonight. I’ve given the staff the evening off.’ Matt gave him a measuring look. ‘And you’re very quick to claim family relationships.’

‘Are you saying we’re not related?’ Rome asked levelly.

‘No. I’ve decided to acknowledge your existence. But in my own time, and in my own way.’

‘Am I supposed to be grateful?’

‘No,’ said Matt. ‘You’re expected to do as you’re told.’ He gestured at the carafe and glass on his night table. ‘Pour me some water, boy.’

‘As we’re dispensing with common courtesy, may I tell you to go to hell, before I walk out?’ Rome, tight-lipped, filled the glass and handed it to the old man.

‘No,’ Matt said. ‘Because you can’t afford to.’ He allowed Rome to assimilate that, then nodded. ‘Now, pull up that chair and listen to what I have to say.’ He drank some water, pulling a peevish face. ‘What do you know of Arnold Grant?’

Rome paused. ‘I know that you’ve been lifelong business rivals and personal enemies,’ he said quietly. ‘My mother said that the feuding between you had poisoned life in this house for years. That’s one of the reasons she—left.’

‘Then she was a fool. She should have stayed—helped me fight him instead of disgracing herself.’ He reached under his pillows and pulled out a folder. He extracted a magazine clipping and thrust it at Rome. ‘Here he is.’

Rome gave the photograph an expressionless look. He saw a tall thin man with iron-grey hair, flanked by two prominent politicians.

He said, ‘What of it?’

‘I’ll tell you precisely what.’ Matt thumped the bed with his fist. ‘He came at me again recently. I was negotiating for some land for a shopping development. I’d had plans drawn up, paid for test drilling and consultancy fees—and he did a secret deal—stole it from under my nose. Cost me hundreds of thousands of pounds, and not for the first time either. But, by God, it will be the last. Because I’m going for him, and this time it’s personal.’

Rome was alarmed at the passion vibrating in the older man’s voice. At the veins standing out on his forehead.

He said quietly, ‘Someone once said the best revenge was to live well. Have you thought of that?’

‘I intend to live well.’ Matt’s eyes glittered. ‘After I’ve dealt Arnold Grant a blow he’ll never recover from. And this is where you come in.’ He paused. ‘He has two weak spots—and one of them’s in that photo. See the girl standing on the end?’

Rome gave the cutting a frowning glance. ‘Yes.’

‘That’s his only granddaughter. She’s not much in the way of looks but he thinks the sun shines out of her, and it’s through her that I’m going to bring him down.’ He paused. ‘With your help.’

Rome put the cutting down, and rose. He said, grimly, ‘Let’s hold it right there. I don’t know what you’re contemplating, and I don’t want to.’

‘Always supposing you have a choice.’ Matt leaned back against his pillows. ‘Now, stay where you are and listen. You’re going to meet this girl, and you’re going to persuade her to marry you. I don’t care how.’

For a moment Rome stared at him, then he said quietly and coldly, ‘I’m not sure if this is a serious proposition, or a sick joke. If it’s the first, the answer’s no, and if the second, I’m not even marginally amused.’

‘Oh, I mean it,’ Matt said. ‘And you’ll do it. If you know what’s good for you. Now sit down.’

The threat was unequivocal, and Rome felt tension grating across every nerve.

He thought, This is crazy. I have to reason with him…

Resuming his seat, he looked back steadily at his grandfather. ‘I make wine. I don’t take part in feuds. And I’m not interested in involvement with some unknown girl. There are plenty of tame studs for hire out there who’ll fulfil your requirements. They might even enjoy it. I wouldn’t.’

‘You make wine,’ Matt Sansom said softly, ‘only while you still have a vineyard. If I called in my loan, you’d have to sell up. And believe that I’ll do exactly what I need to.’

‘But you can’t.’ Rome stared at him, horrified. ‘I’ve made every payment…’

‘But I’m having a cash-flow problem—I’ve just lost out on a big deal and have to recoup my losses.’ Matt allowed himself a thin smile of satisfaction. ‘And think of the consequences,’ he added. ‘Your workers will be out of jobs, your house will crumble into ruins, and you’ll be picking a living from the casinos again. Is that what you want?’

Rome said, between his teeth, ‘No.’

‘Then be sensible. You’ll have no problem with the Grant girl. There’s no regular man in her life. She’ll fall into your hand like a ripe apple from a tree.’ He laughed hoarsely. ‘She was engaged at one point, but threw her unfortunate fiancé, over a fortnight before the wedding. Nearly broke him up, I gather. You’ll understand that, I dare say,’ he added, darting Rome a lightning glance.

Rome was suddenly rigid. He said icily, ‘You have done your homework.’

‘Knowledge is power. And Arnie Grant doesn’t know I have a grandson—which is his second weakness.’

Rome shook his head in disbelief. He said, ‘You actually expect me to marry this girl—whatever her name is?’

‘She’s called Cory,’ Matt said. Something flickered in his eyes, then vanished. ‘It’s a family name. But she’s known as the Ice Maiden, because she freezes men off. And you won’t marry her,’ he added with a wheezing laugh. ‘Because when Arnie Grant discovers your real identity—that you’re my grandson and illegitimate at that—he’ll move heaven and earth to stop it. To get rid of you from her life.

‘That’s why a hired stud won’t do. It has to be you. Because Arnie Grant will want you to go away—to disappear before the truth comes out and turns him into a laughing stock, together with his precious child. And he’ll pay you to do just that.

‘But he’ll know that I know,’ he added gloatingly. ‘That I set him up—and he’ll have to live with that humiliation for the rest of his life. It will finish him.’

He nodded. ‘You’ll be able to name your own price, and whatever he offers you, I’ll match. And you can consider the loan paid off, too.’

‘I could do that anyway,’ Rome flashed. ‘I came over here looking for finance. I can repay you from my new borrowing. I don’t need your dirty bargain.’

‘Ah,’ Matt said softly. ‘But you may find that money’s not as readily available to you as you thought. That you’re not considered a good risk. In fact, I’d offer generous odds that your luck—and your credit—have run out.’

Rome rose and walked out to the window. Afternoon was fading into evening, and a breeze was stirring the rain-soaked shrubs in the garden below.

He thought of the thick autumn sunlight falling on Montedoro, the rich gleam of the earth and the pungent scents of the cantina, and felt a bleakness invade his very soul.

The vineyard had become his life. Its workers were his people. He was not prepared to let them go to the wall.

He said without looking around, ‘So, you’ve poisoned the wells for me. Did you do the same in Italy?’

‘I didn’t have to. A man called Paolo Cresti did it for me. He thinks you’re having an affair with his wife.’

Rome swung back to face him. ‘That’s a lie,’ he said coldly. ‘I haven’t set eyes on her since her marriage.’

Matt’s smile was thin. ‘That’s not what she’s let her husband believe. You should have remembered the old saying—hell have no fury like a woman scorned.’

Rome stared at him bitterly. ‘I should have remembered much more than that,’ he said. He walked back to the bed and picked up the cutting. ‘Has it occurred to you that this girl may not find me attractive?’

‘Plenty of women have, by all accounts. Why should she be an exception?’

‘And I may not fancy her,’ Rome reminded him levelly.

‘But you’ll fancy the money you’ll get from old Grant.’ Matt leered at him. ‘Just keep thinking of that. And keep your eyes shut, if you have to.’

Rome’s mouth twisted in disgust. He looked down at the photograph. ‘This tells me nothing. I need to see her properly before I decide.’