The Medici Lover

In spite of the turmoil of her thoughts, nothing could spoil her delight in the view that confronted her. Stretching above the walls of the villa, the hillside was thick with larch and pine trees, a cloak of foliage reaching towards the snow-capped peaks beyond. Nearer at hand, she could see a waterfall cascading over an outcrop of rock to reappear as a stream further down the valley, and meadows bright with the yellow heads of dandelions.

But it was the villa itself which really enchanted her, its stone walls honey-tinged in the sunlight. She could hear the fountain playing and longed to dip her fingers in its depths, its coolness like a trail of ice across her skin. She raised her shoulders in a gesture of supplication, encompassing the whole beauty of her surroundings. Then she turned determinedly back to the room.

It was a relatively plain apartment, but as with the other rooms of the villa, the pattern of architecture was repeated. The bed was comparatively modern, although its head-board was intricately carved, and the silk sheets disguised a mattress which owed its comfort to modern technology. There were tall arched doors leading into an adjoining bathroom, which had to have been a new innovation, but the green-veined marble tiles blended into their surroundings.

Suzanne took a shower in the sunken bath, deliberately cooling the water so that her skin tingled pleasurably and then she tackled the contents of her suitcases. The night before she had done little more than drape the crushable items over the back of a chair, and take out her nightgown and toiletries. Now she hung her clothes away in the capacious depths of a massively carved cabinet with a long oval mirror giving her back her reflection.

It was difficult deciding what to wear. In the normal way, jeans and a shirt would have sufficed, but somehow the Villa Falcone demanded a less casual approach. Or was it just Signora Vitale? she wondered shrewdly. Certainly, the old lady had not approved of her slacks suit.

With a frown, she buttoned a green shirt across her pointed breasts and stepped into a printed cotton skirt, that swung in pleats against bare slender legs. She refused to wear tights when it was so warm, and stepping into cork-soled sandals, she brushed vigorously at her straight hair. It swung in bleached strands about her shoulders, and as an added adornment, she looped a heavy gold medallion on its chain around her neck. She wore little make-up during the day. Just a light foundation to prevent her skin from shining, and mascara to add lustre to her already dark lashes.

Before leaving the room, she approached the bed again and looked down at the rose still lying on the tray. She stretched out her hand towards it and then withdrew it again, quickly. Whatever game Mazzaro di Falcone was playing, she wanted no part of it, and the rose could be returned to its owner without her being involved. Even so, it troubled her that by his action, Mazzaro had disrupted the even composure she had always maintained, even in the face of Abdul Fezik’s pursuit, and made her more aware of him as a man than anyone else she had ever met. But it was ridiculous, she told herself severely, drawing in a jerky breath. She was making far too much of what to him had probably been nothing more than a mocking gesture to the romanticism of his race. If she hadn’t glimpsed him walking in the courtyard hours before she might not have thought anything about it.

But she left the rose on the tray when she went downstairs.

There was a curving marble staircase leading down into the main body of the hall, its ornate handrail an example of baroque ironwork. The night before, Suzanne had been able to see little of the beauty of this part of the villa, shrouded in darkness as it had been, but now she could see the domed ceiling overhead, and the round windows casting prisms of light in many colours over the mosaic tiling of the floor. The acoustics in the hall were such that she could even hear the sound of her cork-soled feet on the stair, and the rustle of her skirt against her legs.

The magnificent doors at the front of the villa were closed at present, but she guessed that when the building was opened to the public, visitors would come in that way and get the full benefit from their first glimpse of that nave-like entrance.

Tempted to linger and study the building in more detail, Suzanne walked determinedly across the hall and turned into the wing of the building occupied by the family. Perhaps later, she could ask Pietro if she might explore, but for the present she was a guest in the house and not a tourist.

The doors to the small salon were closed, and she was hesitating about opening them, when she heard the sound of steel against marble and the dragging sound of feet being propelled with effort. She knew at once who it was, and her head jerked round nervously as Mazzaro di Falcone approached her along the gallery. This morning, the sombreness of his attire was relieved somewhat by a dark red shirt, but his pants were still uncompromisingly black.

Seen in broad daylight, the scars on the right side of his face were a network of dry tissue, unhealthily white against the deeply tanned pigment of his skin. Suzanne’s eyes were drawn to them almost against her will, and she had to force herself to look away.

‘Good morning, Miss Hunt,’ he greeted her in English, inclining his head forward. ‘I trust you slept well.’

Suzanne had to look at him then, but the bland green eyes revealed no trace of its being a barbed question. ‘I—it was very hot,’ she compromised. ‘But I was very comfortable, thank you, Count.’

‘That is good.’ Without removing his hands from the sticks, he gestured towards the doors of the room he had first emerged from the night before. ‘Perhaps you will join me for coffee? If you would open the doors …’

It was a command, more than a request, and as Suzanne did not know her way about well enough to demur, she moved forward automatically and taking hold of the iron handles, swung the doors inward.

The room beyond was booklined and comfortable, as she had seen in passing the night before, but with a square mahogany desk, presently untidy with files and papers, and leather chairs in keeping with its use as a study. Of all the rooms in the villa she had entered so far, it was the least aggressively impressive, and possessed a charm and intimacy lacking in those larger apartments.

Mazzaro propelled himself into the room, and indicated that she should close the doors behind them. She did so reluctantly, impatient with herself unjustifiably for getting into such a position. Perhaps she should have stayed in her room until Pietro returned and came looking for her. But how could she have known that Mazzaro di Falcone would feel obliged to entertain her in Pietro’s absence?

She closed the doors and leaned back against them for a moment, her eyes moving to the long windows which gave an uninterrupted view of the fountain in the courtyard. But as yet these glass doors were closed, and there was no escape that way.

Mazzaro was regarding her with a disturbing scrutiny that increased her own feelings of unease, and she realised she had never encountered this kind of situation before. The conviction grew in her that she was to blame, that she was reading more into his behaviour because of her own peculiar reactions to him, which was ridiculous when she seriously thought about it. In the course of her work, she had met dozens of men, and many of them had shown her friendliness and admiration. She had met handsome men, rich men, charming men—men of all ages and nationalities; and it was positively ludicrous for her to feel this way about a middle-aged Italian count, who dragged himself around on two sticks and whose face would terrify small children.

‘Does my disfiguration repel you, Miss Hunt?’ Mazzaro asked now, and she guessed he had misread the emotions that played so revealingly across her face.

‘No,’ she said at once, colouring like a schoolgirl speaking to a superior. ‘Not at all.’

‘No?’ He sounded sceptical. ‘Yet you are reluctant to be alone with me, Miss Hunt.’

His candour disconcerted her further. ‘No. I—why I was just wondering when Pietro would be back …’

Mazzaro’s dark brows ascended. ‘Indeed.’ He gestured towards one of the leather chairs set beside the desk. ‘Well, not yet, at any rate, so won’t you sit down, Miss Hunt? Or would you rather remain poised for flight? I promise you, in any race between us, you would win.’

Her face flushed, Suzanne moved away from the door and took the chair he offered, crossing her legs and then uncrossing them again when she realised that by so doing she was exposing the smooth skin of her thigh. If Mazzaro noticed this small charade, he made no comment upon it, moving round his desk to take the chair opposite her. He seated himself slowly, setting the sticks aside, immediately assuming that air of command he had possessed at dinner the evening before.

For a few moments he seemed content to relax, his hands resting loosely over the arms of the chair. His hands were brown, and long-fingered, a jewelled signet ring on his left hand catching the light as it moved. Suzanne fixed her gaze no higher than his desk. As well as the mass of papers upon it, there was an onyx paperweight, and a gold inkstand, and a bronze statuette of a bull, which must surely be very old. Her hands itched to hold the statuette. The metal looked very smooth, burnished to a dull shine, cool to the touch. She wanted to hold it between her palms and feel the metal expand beneath the probing caress of her fingers …

‘Have you known my cousin long, Miss Hunt?’

Mazzaro’s question interrupted her train of thought, and her head came up jerkily. His eyes were narrowed as they watched her, cat-like between the thick short lashes. For a moment, she almost believed he had known what she was thinking and deliberately broken the thread.

‘Wh-what?’ she stammered. ‘Oh, no—no. Not long.’

‘How long?’

‘I’m not sure exactly. About two months, I suppose.’

‘Not long, as you say.’ He brought his elbow to rest on the arm of his chair, supporting his chin with the knuckles of one hand. ‘How well would you say you know Pietro?’

‘How well?’ Suzanne shifted awkwardly under his gaze. ‘As well as anyone knows anyone else after such a short space of time, I imagine.’

‘You think time is relative to how well one knows another person?’

‘Well—of course.’ Suzanne hesitated. ‘Don’t you?’

He did not answer, for at that moment there came a knock at the study door, and Suzanne looked round in relief. But at his command, it was Lucia who entered with the coffee he must have ordered earlier. There was only one cup, however, and in swift Italian he requested that she fetch another.

Suzanne was uncomfortably aware that Lucia had given her a swift appraisal as she came into the room, and no doubt she was speculating on the relationship between Pietro’s English friend and the lord of Castelfalcone.

While the old servant went to get a second cup, Mazzaro poured coffee for one, raising the cream jug in silent interrogation. But Suzanne mutely shook her head, adding two spoons of sugar when he pushed the cup towards her. She lifted the cup and saucer into her hands, stirring it vigorously, and then stopping herself from doing so when she found mocking green eyes upon her.

Lucia returned a few moments later, and Mazzaro thanked her warmly. ‘It was my pleasure, signore,’ she responded, with a knowing smile. ‘If there is anything else …’

‘We will let you know, Lucia. Thank you.’

Mazzaro inclined his head and Lucia made her departure, the smile still on her lips.

Suzanne looked down into her coffee cup. This was the moment she should ask him why he had put the rose on her tray, she thought fiercely. He must know he was giving Lucia a deliberately false impression of their association, and heaven knew what she might make of it. Summoning all her determination, she looked up and found his eyes upon her.

‘Signore—’ she was beginning, when he said abruptly: ‘I saw you admiring my statuette. Do you know anything about such objects, Miss Hunt?’

Suzanne’s momentary resolution fled. ‘It—it’s bronze, isn’t it?’ she ventured, and despised herself for her weakness. ‘Is it Italian?’

His smile was wry. ‘I am afraid not, Miss Hunt.’ He picked up the small statuette, and smoothed it between his fingers as she had wanted to do. ‘This little fellow was made in Egypt many, many centuries ago. It is bronze, as you say, but many of these antiquities were imported from Greece or North Africa. The Romans themselves, I regret to say, did not appear to have had an innate capacity for art. Nevertheless, they were sufficiently well educated to recognise and appreciate articles of artistic merit.’

Suzanne found herself leaning forward. ‘It—it must be very valuable,’ she murmured.

‘It is without price,’ he stated, without conceit. ‘To a collector like myself, such objects defy valuation.’ He extended his hand across the desk. ‘Would you like to examine it?’

Suzanne stared at him aghast. ‘But I—I’d be afraid—I might drop it!’

Mazzaro’s full lower lip curved almost sensuously. ‘I trust you not to do that,’ he remarked, gesturing with the bronze. ‘Go ahead. Take it.’

Once more his words were in the nature of a command, and setting down her cup and saucer, she took the statuette from his hand. The exchange was executed without their fingers touching, but the bronze was still warm from his flesh.

It was a solid little article, standing squarely on an inch-thick base, probably used to decorate some wealthy Egyptian’s home thousands of years before. The animal’s head was lowered slightly, as if ready to charge, its horns projecting wickedly.

‘Aren’t you afraid someone might steal it?’ she exclaimed, looking up at him, forcing herself to return his stare.

Mazzaro shrugged. ‘I should be sorry if he disappeared, naturally,’ he said. ‘But sometimes I wonder whether I am right to hold on to such an object. Why should I be permitted to possess something which is, in fact, no more mine than anyone else’s?’

‘But your family must have owned it—’

‘—for many years. Yes, I know,’ he agreed dryly. ‘But that does not alter the situation. No doubt my ancestors were no better than profiteers, taking advantage of those less knowledgeable than themselves.’

Suzanne looked down at the statuette, stroking the arc of its tail. ‘Not everyone appreciates such things.’

‘Are you defending my ancestors—or my honour, Miss Hunt?’

Suzanne moved her shoulders impatiently. ‘I’m sure that whatever you say, you would not like to think of him in the hands of some unfeeling dealer,’ she persisted. She looked up. ‘Would you?’

Mazzaro’s eyes shifted to her hands, moving lovingly over the heavy object. ‘It would seem that already my selfishness has been rewarded,’ he commented. ‘Will you be as sympathetic to everything that is mine, Miss Hunt?’

His words had a dual edge, and she leant forward quickly and replaced the small bull on his desk. She wished he would not say such things to her. She wished she was not affected by them as she was. Of what possible interest could her approval be to him?

‘Now what is wrong, Miss Hunt?’ he inquired, as her eyes sought the open spaces of the courtyard. ‘If it is of any consolation to you, the insurance company demands that I seal the gates electrically at night. Then we have installed an ultrasonic sound-wave transmitter. Any movement by an intruder distorts the waves coming to the receiver, and triggers an alarm system on the premises.’

Suzanne frowned. ‘A sort of—neonic beam?’

‘No. This is a more sophisticated system. Beams can be avoided. Sound-waves cannot.’

‘I see.’

Suzanne was impressed. All the same, she had opened her balcony doors the night before without experiencing any difficulty. Couldn’t an intruder enter that way? She shivered involuntarily. She would make sure she closed the doors in future.

‘You are frowning, Miss Hunt.’ Mazzaro reached for his sticks and got to his feet again, and Suzanne had to steel herself to remain where she was. ‘Are you perhaps concerned about something?’

Suzanne bit her lip. Here was her chance again. Was she to let it slip a second time. ‘I—I was wondering what—what would happen if some member of the—household happened to forget about the alarm system and—and stepped outside?’

Mazzaro came round the desk towards her, his eyes disturbingly intent. ‘You mean, as you did last night, Miss Hunt?’ he queried softly, and she gazed up at him in dismay, the initiative taken out of her grasp.

‘You—you know?’ she stammered.

‘That you were walking on your balcony at two o’clock this morning? Yes, I know, Miss Hunt.’

Suzanne could feel the back of her neck growing damp. ‘But then—you must know that I—that I—’

‘—saw me walking without these?’ He lifted one of the sticks from the floor. ‘Yes, Miss Hunt.’

Suzanne wished she could get up, but to do so would bring her that much closer to Mazzaro di Falcone, and right now he was quite close enough. ‘I’m afraid I don’t understand,’ she murmured faintly.

‘No.’ He inclined his head. ‘How could you?’

‘Don’t you need those sticks at all?’ she cried.

‘Not now. Not really. Although there are occasions when I am tired and walking is an effort.’

Suzanne pressed her lips together for a moment. ‘But—don’t you care that I know? Why did you let me see?’

He shrugged. ‘It wasn’t deliberate. The alarm sounded on the panel beside my bed. I had stepped into the courtyard before I realised what it must be. After that, I had to reassure myself.’

‘But if it had been burglars!’ she protested, and he half smiled.

‘Your concern is touching, Miss Hunt, but I was armed.’

Her skin prickled. ‘You don’t want me to—to tell Pietro?’

‘I can’t stop you from doing so.’

‘But why haven’t you done so yourself? Surely your wife would be delight—’

But something in his sudden stiffening made her realise she had gone too far. ‘My wife’s feelings need not concern you, Miss Hunt,’ he stated harshly, moving away from her again. He had not straightened or attempted to walk without the aid of the sticks, and the ridiculous notion came to her that whatever he said she had imagined the whole thing.

‘Would—would you rather I kept this knowledge to myself, then?’ she probed, as he halted by the long windows, his back towards her.

He was silent for so long, she had begun to think he could not have heard her, when he said quietly: ‘Let us say I have my reasons for remaining silent at this time, Miss Hunt. However, if you feel you cannot keep my secret, I will not reproach you for it.’

Suzanne pushed back her chair and got to her feet, linking her fingers tightly together. ‘Why did you send me the rose, signore?’ she ventured, finding the question easier than she had expected.

He turned then, more lithely than he could have done had the sticks been needed, and surveyed her with a wryly mocking amusement. ‘Of course. It was presumptuous of me, was it not?’ he conceded. ‘That a man like myself should overstep the bounds of his limitations and show himself vulnerable to admiration for a beautiful woman!’

Suzanne took a deep breath. ‘I don’t know what you mean.’

‘I may be disabled, Miss Hunt, but I am not blind. And besides, I wanted us to have this talk, which has proved most satisfactory, I think.’

‘But …’ Suzanne hesitated. ‘What has your—appearance to do with whether or not you sent me a rose?’

Mazzaro’s expression hardened. ‘Please do not insult me by pretending naïveté,’ he retorted stiffly.

Suzanne sighed. ‘I’m sorry if you think I was being insulting. I just don’t happen to see the connection between the two.’ She paused. ‘I don’t believe that a person’s appearance has a great deal of bearing on their personality.’

‘Your inexperience is showing, Miss Hunt,’ he returned cynically, but his features were less severe. ‘You will find that appearances count for a lot. A beautiful woman has the confidence that a less favoured contemporary has not. Looks frequently determine an individual’s course in life, and those less fortunate often become morose and bitter.’ He shrugged eloquently. ‘Like roses, we are judged on our overall composition, no?’

‘No!’ Suzanne was vehement. ‘You are not morose and bitter!’

‘And you think I should be?’

‘No!’ Too late, she had realised what she was saying. ‘I—I should feel sorry for someone who—who deserved—’

‘Pity?’ He inserted, as she hesitated once more. ‘But you don’t think I deserve pity, is that it?’

Suzanne looked across at him uncertainly, aware of the cleft stick into which he had steered her. ‘No,’ she said at last, slowly and distinctly. ‘I don’t feel sorry for you, Count di Falcone.’

There was a moment’s silence, and her conscience pricked her. Had she been unnecessarily harsh? Had he taken offence at her clumsily-worded beliefs?

‘Very well, Miss Hunt,’ he said finally, moving to prop himself against the side of his desk. He shifted both sticks into one hand and raked long fingers through the thick vitality of his hair. The action parted the collar of his shirt, revealing more of the savage scarring. ‘So now we know where we stand, do we not?’

Suzanne’s tangled emotions made it difficult for her to reply. She had the feeling that something was happening to her here, over which she had no control. It was as if she was seeing herself through a glass screen, aware of the dangers of becoming involved with this man, but unable to reach out and prevent the inevitable happening …

CHAPTER THREE

THE SUDDEN OPENING of the door was both a relief and an intrusion.

Suzanne turned away from the man as his daughter came into the room, pale and foreign-looking in her neat silk dress, a wide-brimmed bonnet dangling by its ribbons from her hand.

‘Papà—’ she was beginning, only to halt uncertainly at the sight of Suzanne standing uncomfortably in the middle of the floor.

Mazzaro transferred the sticks to his hands, and straightened away from the desk, achieving his usual posture as Lucia followed the child into the room.

‘Elena!’ she scolded in Italian, ‘how many times have I told you not to enter your father’s study without first knocking? Signore—’

‘That is all right, Lucia.’ Mazzaro shook his head at the elderly servant. ‘You may leave us. I gather my aunt is home from church.’

‘Yes, signore.’ Lucia nodded, flicking a quick glance at Suzanne and away again. ‘You would like more coffee?’

‘Thank you, no, Lucia,’ Mazzaro declined, and with a reluctant bob, she left them.

Elena stood just inside the doorway, twisting the brim of her bonnet round and round in her hands, and Suzanne wished she could think of something to say to the child. It was obvious she was ill at ease, but whether that was wholly to do with Suzanne’s presence, or in part due to her father’s expected censure, she could not be sure.

‘Have you been introduced to Miss Hunt, Elena?’ Mazzaro spoke in English as the door closed, and the child stole a dark-eyed glance at Suzanne. But she did not reply.

‘Elena and I introduced ourselves yesterday evening.’ Suzanne felt obliged to speak. ‘Didn’t we, Elena?’

Still the child remained silent, swinging her hat against the full skirt of her dress, scuffing her toes against each other.

‘Elena!’

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