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“I wonder if…” He kissed her again.
“No.” She propped herself up on her elbows.
“Are you certain?” His cock twitched again, more insistently.
“Am I certain? Of course I am certain!” She sat up crossly.
He stared at her in puzzlement. “But I thought… Did you not enjoy yourself?”
She slid off the billiard table, snatched up the banyan and wrapped it tightly around herself without meeting his eyes. “Oh, I suppose so. Although I do not see why we could not have… done it in a proper bed.”
“If you felt discomfort, that is quite natural for a woman when…” He trailed off. She was giving him what he could only describe as a withering stare. “Well. You will not have to endure that the next time.”
“Next time?” Her eyes narrowed. “I do not know where you got that idea. There will not be a next time.”
Chapter Seven
VENICE, ITALY
Six weeks later
“Where is she?” The hoarse voice of Sir Aloysius sounded scarcely a length away.
Violetta could see the moonlight gleam upon his fair hair above his gleaming breastplate. Yes, fair he appeared… but foul was his soul! She shrank back into the shadows of the colonnade and covered her mouth with her hand, lest a sob of fear escape her.
“The treacherous little minx cannot have got far! Captain!”
The sound of metal shod feet sounded upon the pavement as the soldiers arrived. “She must not be permitted to escape again! Search every inch of every street! Station your men at all the docks. Check every boat that leaves the city!”
“But sir”—
“Silence, you fool! I will brook no further excuses! You and your men have already let her slip past you twice! She must be brought before me by morning—clapped in chains, if necessary! And when the bells of St. Marks strike the fateful hour of noon, she shall be my bride, whether she will or no!”
As though to confirm the dreadful words, just then all the bells of the great city began to toll. Violetta felt behind her with one desperate hand. She had only moments to escape. If she stayed here they would find her and all would be lost. She would be forced to marry her odious uncle and then, when he had secured the fortune, the castle, the lands and the jewels that came with her hand, he would doubtless murder her. Ah, the cruel fate that had led her to this grievous pass! Was there no end to his wickedness and ambition? Would he never cease to pursue her?
Her hand met the cold iron of a door handle. She pressed down upon it as slowly as she dared, her heart beating in a rhythm of dread. It turned, and she pushed the door inward, uttering a silent prayer in her heart that the hinges would not creak and betray her.
She slipped inside, not knowing precisely where she was or what building she had entered. The air was cold as cold as the air of a tomb. She closed the door silently behind her. In the dim light she could just discern scaffolding rising toward the ceiling.
Pomona set down her quill. Next, Violetta would hear the sound of someone rattling the door handle, and flee down a set of icy stone steps into the crypt under the church, where a terrifying apparition would frighten her so badly that she would almost give herself away by screaming.
She knew this. It was all planned out in her mind. So… why could she barely force herself to write the words—or to keep her focus on her work?
She turned back to the pages that she’d just written and read them over. She’d used “gleam” and “gleaming” in the same sentence. After a moment’s thought she crossed out “gleaming” and wrote in “polished” instead.
How was it possible that she was actually here, in Venice, but her book still felt so… false, and hollow? It was nothing but a pale imitation of The Prisoner of San Severino. The only character who seemed like a real human being was Sir Aloysius—and even that was only because he'd begun to resemble... Townley. She’d tried to force him back into his original form—a villain with a weasel-like face and dark goatee—but here he was again, smirking and boasting and sporting fair hair and a smug, shiny face. She sighed heavily and tried to think how to begin the next paragraph.
Outside the shuttered window there was a sudden commotion. “Il duca! Il duca arriva!”
She set her quill down again. The duke was arriving? Had West gone out at this hour? She pushed the shutters open a crack, and for a moment she was nearly blinded by the glare of the morning sun off the turquoise water of the canal below. She squinted. Venice was by far the sunniest and most colorful place that she’d ever seen. Not that she’d seen much of it. She’d been seasick for a good deal of the journey here, and now she had to make up for the time she’d lost by trying to get more work done.
A small boat with terracotta-colored sails nudged the stone quay in front of their rented palazzo. A moment later, West leaped out. She stared at the top of his head. He wasn’t wearing a hat. It was hard to be completely certain from this angle… but she would swear that the dark waves of his hair were wet.
Where had he been? And what had he been doing before breakfast?
Before she could get a better look, the footmen had bowed him into the house. A few moments later she heard the distant sound of the front door shutting.
She shoved the wooden shutter closed again and sat frowning. They’d been here less than a week. And yet West had already slipped into a routine—a routine that didn’t usually involve her. Had he even been here last night? The palazzo was so large, and his rooms were so far removed from hers, that she couldn’t be certain.
