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“I am really quite thirsty, Marrina. Now, if you please.” She walked around the rigidly silent housekeeper. “Mille grazie.” She drew up after several steps, a bit of devilment burgeoning, and asked in the blandest of voices, “Voglia scusarmi, Marrina, but are you a signora or a signorina?”
“Signora,” Marrina snapped. She turned on her heel and disappeared through a door on the far side of the entrance hall.
Cassie was still smiling at her minor triumph when she reached the great oak doors of the library. She held the griffen-shaped knob and cocked her ears. Either the earl was talking to himself or there was someone with him. She stood quietly for a few more moments before chiding herself not to be a timorous fool. Whoever was with the earl could not be more disapproving than Marrina.
She opened the doors.
She had had only a cursory glimpse of the library that morning, for she had been anxious to continue exploring the gardens. She had initially disliked the dark-paneled room. Its heavy leather chairs and prepossessing mahogany desk were too stark and masculine for her taste.
The earl stood against the desk, dressed as he had been earlier in black breeches, loose white shirt, and black boots, his right hand cupped beneath his slinged elbow. He looked up, a welcoming smile softening his features. Cassie looked upon a young gentleman who was lounging negligently against the mantlepiece of a black and white marble fireplace, his hands plunged into his waistcoat pockets. His black hair was powdered, and tied at the back of his neck with a dark blue velvet ribbon. He was slight of build, but finely proportioned, not much taller than was she. His black brows were arched above his olive complexion, flaring upward toward his temples, and his dark eyes seemed somehow familiar to Cassie. He looked every inch an elegant Italian gentleman. He parted his full lips slowly and smiled at her, bending slightly in a bow of recognition at the waist. He was also very graceful, she thought to herself, smiling back at him.
“Cassandra, my dear,” the earl said to her. “I have a surprise for you. This is my half-brother, Caesare Bellini.”
He moved forward to stand at the earl’s side, and she recognized him as the earl’s half-brother. He had the same high cheekbones and the same straight Roman nose. She saw that the young man’s dark eyes were twinkling attractively and at the same time taking in every aspect of her appearance. He said slowly, as if fearing that she would not understand him, “I am honored, signorina. The Villa Parese has never housed such beauty.”
Housed, she thought. He makes it sound as if I were a horse or a painting. Still, she nodded her head and made him a slight curtsy.
“I only discovered recently that the earl was blessed with any relatives, signore.”
“You must ask him if he believes me a blessing, signorina. My brother tells me that you are English.”
She wondered silently what else the earl had told his half-brother. “Si, signore, I am English.” She shot the earl a challenging look. “Although I find your country very interesting, I must confess that I miss my homeland immensely.” She would have said more, but Marrina entered, a silver tray in her hands. Without even looking at Cassie, she walked to the earl.
“The signorina’s lemonade, il signore.”
So you have engaged my housekeeper in battle, have you, cara, he thought. “Most kind of you, Marrina. You may set the tray on the table. La signorina is most fond of lemonade.”
The housekeeper curtsied deeply and walked stiffly from the room, her lips so pursed that she looked as if she had been sucking a lemon.
After Marrina left the library, the earl said lightly to Caesare, “As you see, brother, Marrina has not yet taken to the idea that she now has a mistress to obey.”
“That is not exactly true, signore,” Cassie said sweetly. “If it were the contessa and not the mistress, I am certain that she would be all compliance.”
“You have but to name the day, cara,” the earl said, his dark eyes gleaming.
Cassie opened her mouth, then closed it. She saw that the earl’s half-brother was eyeing the two of them with considerable confusion.
She turned away and sat down in a deeply stuffed leather chair. She ignored her lemonade. “The earl has told me very little of you, signore.”
Caesare spread his hands before him. “It would obviously not be to his advantage to tell you all about me, signorina. He is such an ungainly giant and even wears a sling on his arm. So graceless, it seems, that he returns from England a battered man.”
Cassie’s smile at his gay banter disappeared. “It was not he who was graceless, signore.”
The earl gave a little chuckle. “Let us just say that I was careless, Caesare.”
“It appears that I have hit upon a mystery,” Caesare said gaily, looking from Cassie’s flushed face to the earl’s grinning one. As if he sensed further inquiry would add to Cassie’s discomfiture, he adroitly changed the topic. “Genoa has been bereft without your dashing presence, Antonio, but your business concerns, as usual, continue to prosper. You’ll not believe it, but old Montalto has been in hot pursuit of the charming Giovanna.”
The earl appeared only mildly interested, but Cassie found that she was all attention awaiting his response.
“I fear Giovanna would topple poor Montalto into an early grave.” He grinned ruefully and shook his head. “For a man so astute in worldly matters, it is a surprise that he would succumb to the charms of a woman half his age.”
“Caesare, will you share a glass of wine with us? We can toast Montalto’s success with the fair Giovanna.”
Cassie experienced a twinge of disappointment when Caesare, regretfully, took his leave.
He gallantly raised her hand to his lips and lightly kissed her palm. “You must insist that Antonio invite me more often to the Villa Parese, signorina.”
“You know that you are always welcome, fop,” the earl said, and gave his brother a light buffet on his immaculate shoulder.
