The Stargazer (26 page)

She remembered the mirror in the ceiling, and she tilted her head to look. Wide-eyed, she saw his head moving up and down as he pressed his whole mouth against her, then she watched as, mouth as wide as it would go, he sucked her into him. She saw herself arch up and throw her legs over his shoulders to pull him closer, saw him slide his hands under her, first holding her bottom, then slipping his fingers into where his mouth was. She watched as he took his mouth away and pressed her hot, waiting lips open with one hand, using all five fingers of the other to stroke the tender nub that proudly stood out from them. He began grinding it between his thumb and forefinger, and then, when he saw she was close to a climax, covered it once again with his mouth. His fingers pushed her into his tongue, pressing and kneading her against its abrasive surface, until, nipping at her with his teeth, he sent her over the edge. She bucked against him once, twice, thrice, then collapsed with a wild moan, her thighs still straddling his shoulders.

Disentangling himself from her legs minutes later, Ian moved up her body until he was lying beside her, admiring the way the sapphires sat against her collarbone.

“Was that all right?” he asked disingenuously.

Bianca opened one eye. “It was likable.”

“More likable than I am?” Ian sounded worried.

Bianca opened the other eye. “About the same.”

Suddenly Ian sat up. “Did you mean what you said before?”

“Before?” Bianca looked confused, then amused as comprehension dawned. “About the soup you mean?” When Ian nodded, she pulled him back down and pressed her body against his.

He was not sure if he had gotten an answer to his question, but with her body pushed close to his like that it suddenly seemed unimportant. Bringing her to her climax had made him thoroughly aroused, a condition only exacerbated when she twisted his ankles between hers and wrapped her arms around him. His already hard shaft was being tickled by her soft patch of curls as she moved her hips in small circles.

“Shall we make love again, Ian?” she asked in the voice of one whose sensual hunger was anything but slaked.

“If you insist,” Ian answered gallantly, pushing his organ between her thighs and into her.

It had begun like their lovemaking always began, but there was something different about it, and they could both feel it. Neither of them even noticed the mirror on the ceiling, too intent were they on looking into each other’s faces. Ian studied Bianca as he lay over her, peering into the depths of her fascinating eyes, searching for a clue to help him understand the miracle of her caring about him. Bianca looked back up at him, trying to convince him he would be safe with her, to penetrate his last defenses. They gave themselves to one another without reservation, without apprehension, without limit, and without question.

Both Ian and Bianca would soon look back on the moment and wonder how they could have been such fools.

The woman smiled her half smile, humoring him, for she still needed his obedience.

“There is always flogging,” the young man continued, his thoughts making him hot. “It would be much more exciting to watch her writhe in chains.”

The woman shook her head and pursed her lips. “Can’t you come up with anything more original? Or does your near relation to her preclude your affections for me and cloud your judgment?”

It was a dangerous challenge. “It is only your pleasure I was concerned with. I did not have originality in mind, only what would entertain you most,” he defended himself.

She ran her hooded gaze over him, decided he had told the truth, and began to gently stroke his chest. “In that case, I have an idea. Bring her here, to me. I will take care of her.”

“Will you tell me what you intend?” The thought of the girl as his mistress’s captive was as wildly arousing as anything he had thought of that day.

The woman spoke in a matter-of-fact tone, as if discussing one of her business transactions. “Of course, I shall want some time with her alone, to find out why she has gone to such great lengths to hurt me. And then you will have a turn. After that, I have not decided. Perhaps the treatment you gave that Enzo creature,” the woman said, her hands moving lower on the young man’s anatomy. “But there are always the giants.”

“The giants?” the young man queried, but only halfheartedly, so preoccupied was he with the movement of the woman’s hands on his body.

“Oh, yes,” she said, matching her tone to the moans emanating from his lips. “She must be terrified. She must know how it feels to be abused and taken advantage of. She must get what she deserves. But that is only part of it.” Her hands were still on the young mans’ body, but she was speaking more to herself than to him. “There must be marks, and scars, many of them. The real triumph will be that bastard’s face when he sees the body, sees it and knows that justice has been done.” She smiled and let the young man climb atop her as she reached the climax of her vendetta. “It will be even better than I had planned. He will be broken, destroyed, completely undone by his utter failure to protect her.”

The couple lay spent, breathless, he with the exertions of his body, she with the breathtaking beauty of her plan. When the woman had recovered enough to speak, she pulled the young man close to her and gave him his orders. “Bring her to me tomorrow. You know where to find her. Bring her and we shall enjoy ourselves.”

Crispin looked contrite. “
Mi scusa
, Ian, if I had known you were,
um
, accompanied, I never would have barged in this way.”

“Don’t worry,” Bianca answered with a gaping yawn. “I was just leaving. Indeed, if you would turn your back for just a moment, I will be off.”

Ian, barely awake enough to follow the conversation, was trying to summon up the words to protest, but Bianca had hopped out of bed, slid into the silk robe she had worn the night before, planted a tender kiss on his forehead, and scurried out of the room before he had even managed to open his mouth. She wanted nothing to interfere with the revelation she was sure Crispin was about to make.

“Kindly explain why you have spoiled a perfectly nice morning of dalliance,” was Ian’s warm welcome to his brother. Then he studied him more closely. “You look like you haven’t slept. What did you do last night?”

Crispin regarded him with amusement. He could not remember the last time anyone had taken the slightest interest in his comings and goings, not to mention his nocturnal amusements. “I assure you, I am well out of short pants and need no supervision from you. Interesting though they may be, I did not come to tell you about my night’s adventures. I came to show you this.” He flourished a piece of cream-colored stationery. “This was brought up to me this morning, as I was changing.”

It took Ian only a few seconds to absorb the content, for the message was admirably brief and to the point. “Isabella Bellocchio told me how tightly you are bound to her. Should the details fall into the wrong hands, your life could become very disagreeable. To avoid such unpleasantness, come masked to the small reception room at Ca’Dona this evening as the clock strikes five.”

“Lovely.” Ian looked placidly at his brother. “You are being blackmailed. How much do you suppose they will want to keep from publishing your engagement?”

“I have already given you my word of honor on that.” Crispin moved to the divan and sat. “I am not now, nor was I ever, engaged to Isabella Bellocchio.”

“Can you offer another interpretation of this note?” Ian held the paper up to the light to see if it bore any identifying marks.

Crispin crossed his legs and leaned back. “I don’t have any idea. That is why I brought it to you. You seem to have taken some interest in her recently and I thought you might know something.”

“Have you ever told Isabella anything that could be used to blackmail you?”

“
I
do not disclose business secrets to women, if that is what you are asking.” Crispin’s pointed reference to an indiscreet act in Ian’s past, the source of Mora’s financial success, should have sliced through his brother, but its effect was disappointing.

Ian went on as if Crispin had not said anything inflammatory. “Let me tell you how it looks to me. By your own admission, there is nothing that Isabella Bellocchio could blackmail you with. Therefore, it would seem that the threat is empty and you have nothing to fear.”

Crispin was rising to his feet, visibly relieved, when Ian resumed speaking. “On the other hand, just because there is no real information does not mean that someone has not manufactured something incriminating. We both know well that gossip need not be true to be dangerous.”

“Oh,
capisco!
” The divan creaked as Crispin plopped back onto it, the full weight of Ian’s words finally hitting him. “What you are saying is that with that rumor out about Isabella’s engagement to a patrician, none of us are safe—at least none of us who are blond. It would be easy to stigmatize my name just by asserting that I am Isabella’s fiance, especially because I would have no definitive way to refute it until she comes back. I shudder to imagine the effect that the slightest hint of such an association would have on our credit.”

Ian looked surprised. “Why just yesterday someone was suggesting it might be beneficial.”

Crispin, disliking the feel of having his own words thrown back at him, glared from his perch on the divan. “I doubt whether Queen Elizabeth or even the lord chamberlain will still receive me after news reaches them of my engagement to a courtesan. We may as well prepare to cut our trade relations with England.”

“L.N. might be able to do something. Or Miles.” Ian was trying to be encouraging. “And there is always the black market. We could become renegades.”

Crispin’s glare turned to a look of confusion. Was this Ian, his brother, joking with him about the possible destruction of the Arboretti? Maybe the blackmail attempt had shunted him into madness. Or maybe it was that woman. He would have liked to probe for clues, but at that moment Giorgio knocked and was told to enter.

“The oversized man is back,” Giorgio reported to Ian, not sure how much his master wanted Crispin to know about his personal activities. “He insists on seeing you. He says it’s urgent.”

“Did you bring him up to the library?”

Giorgio nodded. “With difficulty.”

Ian grinned at the joke, remembered that he did not grin, and turned it to a grimace. Crispin, who was still concerned about his state of mind, took the operation as another sign of his brother’s plunge into madness.

“Are you sure you are feeling well enough to dress?” Crispin asked with an unusual level of brotherly concern.

“Of course.” Ian peered quizzically at his brother. Maybe the blackmail attempt had shunted him into madness? Clearly Crispin could not be trusted to attend the meeting at Ca’Dona that night. “Besides, I’ll have to be wearing clothes if I am to attend that soiree tonight.” Ian was giving orders to Giorgio to find his mask and great cape when Crispin interrupted.

“I could not ask you to do that. I will go.”

“No, you most positively will not.” Ian spoke emphatically in his old tone, calling upon the full force of his cold, intimidating exterior. “Being less closely involved, it will be easier for me to remain objective. Plus, as nominal head of the Arboretti, I feel it is my responsibility to stave off any threat to the company. I will go in your place, and I will brook no argument.”

Crispin ignored the last part. “What if your presence instead of mine is unacceptable to them? What if they take that as a sign of disobedience?”

Ian held out the paper to his brother. “It specifies that you arrive masked. I hope you will not take it as an insult to your superior comeliness when I point out that in a mask and cape no one would be able to distinguish me from you.”

It was true that in a mask the brothers would look identical and equally true that Ian, with his sangfroid, was much better suited to attend a touchy meeting than the more volatile Crispin. And yet, Crispin could not rid himself of the feeling that he should assume responsibility for the situation. He racked his brain for another excuse.

“What if they are dangerous?” he supplied lamely.

“Are you implying that my swordsmanship leaves something to be desired?” Ian’s chilly tone gave no hint of his amusement at Crispin’s pathetic attempt to dissuade him.

Crispin leapt to defend himself. “No, no of course not. It’s only that I don’t feel quite right—”

“You don’t look quite right either. Why don’t you go take a nap?” Ian rose from his bed and headed for the screened-off corner of his room to relieve himself.

That was a dismissal if Crispin had ever received one. He paused for a moment, considering a retort, decided against it, changed his mind, changed it back, admitted to himself that he was relieved to be excused from attending the delicate meeting, and finally turned his thoughts to other matters, like wondering how his near-sister-in-law was planning to spend her afternoon. Bidding adieu to Giorgio but ignoring his unmannerly brother, Crispin took his leave.

Observing the brothers together, Giorgio felt he now had something else to thank Bianca for. Not only had she apparently kept silent on the topic of his ministrations to Marina, but it seemed that she had somehow brought back the old Ian, the Ian who was wry rather than bitter, and a pleasure to deal with rather than a curse.

Valdo Valdone would have been surprised to hear Giorgio’s assessment that Ian was a changed man. He would not have described him as a curse perhaps, but the words “wry” and “pleasure” were certainly not those that sprang instantly to mind as he examined the meticulously dressed, impassably formal, and completely imperturbable Conte d’Aosto later that morning. If Ian was shocked to see the twin of Crispin’s invitation, or if his curiosity was piqued about the intentions of the sender, he did not show it. Indeed, his reaction to the note Valdo held out to him with large sweating fingers was entirely disappointing. Valdo had hoped for at least surprise, if not spitting outrage or desk-beating contempt, but the cool d’Aosto just sat and nodded.

“Have you any idea where it came from?” Ian asked, handing the piece of cream stationery back to the large man as if it were just a normal note.

“You know, from whoever is holding my precious Isa!” Valdo refused to take the paper back, the look on his face showing clearly that he did not trust it to maintain its present shape and not transform itself into a grotesque and poisonous adder at any moment.

Ian let the paper fall and went on as if Valdo had not said anything, as he had not, or at least not anything helpful. “It does prove one thing. Even if my talk with her the other night had not persuaded me, we can now be completely sure your wife is not holding Isabella.” Ian looked up, saw that Valdo was baffled, and explained himself slowly. “Certainly your wife would not threaten to disclose information to herself that she was already in possession of.”

“My wife.” Valdo repeated the word as if he had never heard it before and was sampling its flavor on his tongue. “My wife.”

Ian watched, fascinated, as Valdo used the sleeve of his overtight velvet jacket to remove the little beads of sweat that had collected on his forehead, an operation that required the large man to shift dangerously about in his chair. Ian was on the point of offering his own sleeve rather than watch his furniture be destroyed, when Valdo regained his powers of speech.

“I promised my wife I would take her this evening at five to Piazza San Marco, you know, to see the Moors ring in the hour. But how can I if I have to go to this Ca’Dona place? What excuse can I make? She’ll see through anything.” The expression of acute misery on his face changed suddenly to one Ian learned momentarily signaled joy. “But here’s an idea! Why don’t you take her? I know it is much to ask, but if you offered to escort her surely she could not refuse, and I am sure it would make my absence much easier for her. You could even tell her you wanted to be with her alone.”

Ian had to think hard to come up with a prospect less appealing than having to spend time alone with Lucretia Valdone and when he finally did think of something—a flight through the air in the talons of a bloodthirsty eagle who would drop his body into a craggy mountain pass to stun him and then eat his vital organs while he was still partially alive—he was not really convinced it would be worse than being her escort. There had to be a better way.

“You flatter me by suggesting your wife would condescend to my company, but I am sure I would prove an unsatisfactory substitute for you.” The fine example of Ian’s wry wit was lost on Valdo, whose broad face again clouded with misery.

“What can I do? What can I tell her?”

Ian was ready with his generous offer, but he tempered his voice to avoid sounding overeager. “Why don’t I go to the meeting at Ca’Dona in your stead?”

“You would do that for me, d’Aosto?” The man’s eyes looked as if they might fill up with tears of appreciation.

“Certainly. It will be the most efficient way to find out who is holding Isabella,” Ian responded brusquely, hoping to scare the man out of his gratitude.

Valdo sat staring at Ian with an expression bordering on worship, then abruptly stood and made a deep bow. He stayed that way for so long that it looked as though he might be unable to right himself, but finally, with only a minimum of huffing, he managed it.

Unwilling to allow anything to impede his perfect delivery, Valdo waited until his breathing had returned to normal to address Ian. When the time was right, he pulled himself up to his full height and boomed, “May the only thing harder than your heart be your word.” He paused for effect, then rushed ahead in a slightly less boisterous voice. “What do you think of that? I composed it just for you, and I’ve been dying to use it. I am putting together a book of phrases for every occasion, phrases I make up myself. That way no one will ever be at a loss for just the right thing to say.”

Ian, gripping the side of his desk for support against the massively unpleasant sounds emanating from the being before him, spoke quietly. “An extraordinary idea. I am sure you are just the man for the job.”

Valdo was smiling ear to ear when the door of the library finally closed on his large back, as was Ian at the prospect of a brief span of uninterrupted silence. But within a few minutes his solitude was again disturbed when Bianca knocked and entered.

She had decided to see him on the spur of the moment, after catching sight of the unmistakable form of Valdo Valdone leaving the house. She had sent a note to Valdo, who was not actually one of her suspects, in order to insure that Ian would find out about the gathering she was planning even if Crispin failed to mention it. If she had correctly guessed his reason for calling on Ian, everything was going just as she had hoped it would. Exultant at the continued success of her stratagem, she felt brave enough to take a risk. Ian’s permission to leave the house was not crucial to her plan, but it would certainly make its execution easier. Indeed, she found that the prospect of alighting from her balcony had lost much of its appeal in the hours since the ball.

“I am sorry to bother you, Ian,” she paused and faced him across his desk, “but I wanted to ask your permission for something.”

The sapphires were still clasped around her neck, an attractive adornment to the gold silk gown embroidered with little blue flowers she was wearing. Ian was so busy admiring her and deciding whether to pull her onto his lap that at first he did not clearly hear what she had said.