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For a moment she was tempted not to answer, but something deep inside her overruled her innate disinclination to reveal her most private thoughts and feelings, so in a low voice she said hesitantly, 'Someone I could respect and trust as well as desire physically, and who felt the same way about me; a total commitment and involvement of mind and body, a ...'
'Soulmate,' Nico supplied wryly. 'But in the end reality fell very far short of your ideal, or would have done had I not stopped. Oh, come," he drawled when she made no response, 'surely you are not going to tell me that your virginal heart yearned to cast me in the role of perfect lover, a shining white knight, whose perfection was almost divine.'
His mockery stung and she retaliated bitterly, 'Needs must when the devil drives, and faced with...'
'Going to your grave in innocence or taking me as your first lover you chose, the latter,' Nico supplied harshly. 'Am I supposed to be flattered? If so I'm afraid I must disappoint you, and a word of advice—next time you respond so passionately to a man by way of an experiment do him the favour of pandering to his ego and keeping it a secret.'
'Nico!' Olivia emerged from the shadows, calling his name, and Nico turned to help Saffron to her feet. Her skin burned at his touch, but he seemed unaware of anything intimate in the brief contact of flesh on flesh.
'Oh, there you are,' the other girl exclaimed unnecessarily. 'We thought something must have happened, you were so long.'
'Nothing happened,' Nico assured her, and the words were like a pain in Saffron's heart. Nothing might have happened to him, but to her ... Rejection was no easy thing to bear, especially when the one doing the rejecting was a man she had sworn hatred and vengeance against.
Confused and bewildered by her own emotions, she started to walk back to the farmhouse. With the cooling evening breeze blowing over her skin the frenzied desire she had experienced in Nico's arms seemed to have been felt by another person, like a dream incompletely remembered. It seemed impossible to believe that she actually behaved in that way, responded so passionately, and yet deep down inside her there was still a tiny ache of regret, a thought that 'if only' she had not spoken when she had ... Banishing the traitorous thought to the back of her mind, she entered the farmhouse and walked upstairs to her room, the malevolence of Olivia's darkly bitter gaze an almost physical emotion in the small, confined room.
'How much longer
do we have to stay here?' she heard the Italian girl demanding of Nico, when she was secured in her room and Olivia had returned downstairs. 'They must be growing impatient in Rome. We have never taken so long to complete a mission before.'
'No,' Nico agreed, as Saffron strained to catch his deeper, softer voice, 'and you have never been so close to capture as you were last time. That was a foolish thing you did, killing John Hunter when you did. It lost us the ransom, too.'
'The police were on to us.' Saffron could hear Olivia's voice quite clearly. 'He had seen us and could describe us, we couldn't afford to take risks.'
The days had taken on a dreary routine. After breakfast Saffron worked in the fields, always under the keen eye of one of her gaolers. Nico drove most days into the local town; sometimes Olivia went with him, sometimes one of the others, and she had learned to tell herself that the pain she felt when she saw him with Olivia meant nothing. How could she feel anything for him after all? He had humiliated her, betrayed her trust, hurt her physically and mentally, and done them all with a hard determination against which her puny retaliatory blows wounded no one but herself.
Today dull clouds lay heavily on the horizon, threatening rain, and as the day wore on and the light breeze dropped the electric tension presaging the coming storm seemed to infiltrate the farmhouse as well.
Tempers were on edge, Olivia snapping at Guido and Piero over lunch. Piero barely reacted, concentrating on his pasta, but Guido took her toughly by the arm, shaking her almost violently. Olivia pulled away, tension crackling between them, and in the stormy atmosphere Saffron felt her wound ache for the first time. It had healed well, but she suspected there was always be a faint, scar just below the curve of her breast to remind her of what had happened—as though she needed any reminding.
Nico had gone into town, and rather than endure the atmosphere in the farmhouse Saffron walked outside. Piero followed her, leaning against the second Land Rover, cleaning his gun as he watched her, a silent warning that she would be foolish to ignore. How quickly the human mind adapted, she thought wretchedly as she followed the dusty track down to the olive grove. Already she found nothing odd in the sight of guns; in the fact of being a prisoner.
Alone in the grove the thoughts that had been building up all day overwhelmed her. Why hadn't her father been in contact with the gang? Was it simply that he was having trouble raising such a large sum of money, as she had suspected he would, or had Olivia been right, didn't he care if didn't get her back? Tears formed, but she didn't let them fall. Her father loved her, and she would cling to that thought no matter what.
The lack of communication from her father seemed to affect everyone's nerves, not just her own.
'He is just toying with us,' Olivia burst out, eyeing Saffron venomously, 'and you are encouraging him, Nico. With every day that passes there is a greater risk of us being discovered. We must leave here.'
'No!' Guido frowned angrily at Olivia. 'If we leave we draw attention to ourselves. We must see it through now.'
'But we cannot wait here for ever,' Olivia pointed out. 'We must do something. Sir Richard needs something to remind him of the danger to his daughter's existence.'
Saffron shrank visibly under the renewed threat of mutilation. Hearing it once had terrified her into making a hopeless bid for freedom, and since then it had not been mentioned.
'No!' Nico looked and sounded abrupt, his expression grimly withdrawn. Was he angry with Olivia because she kept questioning his orders? 'I have already told you no, once; I do not believe Sir Richard is delaying through any ulterior motive. A million pounds takes some raising even for the wealthy, especially when it must be done with stealth. He has asked for. a little more time, and I am disposed to grant it.'
'While we kick our heels here, running the risk of being discovered with every day that passes!' Olivia spat.
'You are not thinking properly,' Nico criticised, apparently uncaring of the vitriolically angry glare Olivia gave him. 'If we were to take the sort of action you suggest now, personally I am convinced that Sir Richard wouldn't hesitate to call in the police. We are not dealing with a fool, Olivia.'
'And Rome?' she goaded. 'What do they have to say about this? They cannot be pleased with you, Nico.'
'On the contrary, they have a far more realistic view of life than you, cara mia. They are quite content to leave matters in my hands—but you are perfectly welcome to take the matter up with them if you wish.'
The uneasy glances exchanged by Olivia and Guido made Saffron wonder if their attack on Nico's leadership had perhaps been preplanned. There had been a shift in loyalties among the members of the gang, with Olivia and Guido markedly turning to one another.
'I have to go to Rome anyway,' Nico announced, shocking them all. 'While I am gone you will do nothing to prejudice our position. When I return we can discuss the matter again if we have not heard from Sir Richard during that time. If any one of you ignores my orders you will have to face me personally when I return—I hope I make myself clear?'
It was apparent that he did, and not for the first time Saffron marvelled at his control of them. For a moment she longed to beg him to take her with him, not to leave her alone with the others, but what was the point? She knew he would refuse, and anyway, wasn't he as equally to be abhorred as the others? There was no difference between them except that Nico had the greater control over his emotions and reactions.
