Venice in the Moonlight (11 page)

“Correct me if I’m wrong, but didn’t you say Signora Gatti was appealing?”

“Her skin is clear, her teeth straight, and her figure pleasing.”

Nico made a disparaging noise deep in his throat. “Your creative descriptions never cease to excite me. So, tell me, is Palladino still a grotesque runt?”

“That he is.”

“Then why did the lady choose him over me?”

“Perhaps her mind is like her father’s?”

It was as close to a quip as Raul would ever make, but Nico took it seriously. He disagreed with a shake of his head. “No, she is quick-witted. There must be another purpose. What is my naughty kitten up to?”

“Why do you care?”

Nico had no answer. He couldn’t say if it was simply a matter of pride since she had refused his advances thus far or something more complicated.

“Signora Allegra Magro asked about you,” Raul said. “She wishes to be seated next to you at dinner.”

“Is she the one who smells like garlic or who laughs like a horse?”

Raul let out a long sigh. “She does have a rather unusual sounding laugh. Perhaps you could be less charming so she doesn’t use it.”

Under his mask, Nico rolled his eyes. “Now that would be like asking a fish not to swim. Nevertheless, let’s go find the fair and hopefully, silent Signora Magro.”

wirling a lively minuet in Consul Smith’s ballroom, Marietta let herself forget her troubles for the moment. Dinner had been a lavish affair with too many courses to count, so she welcomed the exercise, though she swore the musicians were deliberately playing in double time. As the last notes of the song filled the air, she turned away from her partner, George, and came face-to-face with Nico.

“Oh, hello, again.” She dabbed at the drops of perspiration on her forehead with a lace handkerchief. “Signor George Brown is with me.”

The men bowed.

“How are you this evening, Signore?” Nico asked.

Over the opening chords of the musicians’ next song, Marietta didn’t quite hear what George mumbled in reply, but Nico must have from the look of amusement that flashed across his face.

Nico held out his hand. “May I have this dance?”

Marietta glanced around at the promenading couples on the dance floor. “Are you sure?”

“I can do the Giga with my eyes closed.”

He wasn’t exaggerating. They skipped and hopped the country dance, and he never missed a beat. When the dance ended, he slipped a hand around her waist and guided her to an empty alcove in the shadows.

“How do you do it?” Out of breath, she fanned herself briskly.

“Practice.” He dipped his head behind her ear. “You smell delicious tonight.”

A shiver ran down her spine. She pushed him away gently. “I know how much you practice that too.”

His lips tightened into a grimace, but then he smiled good-naturedly. “I’ve a lot of time on my hands.”

She looked up into his handsome face and felt the pull of his desire. All she had to do was say the word and he’d be her lover—and after five long years of living with a horrible husband—the word threatened to escape her lips. However, he was trouble and she had to remember that.

“I’m being rude to the Browns. I should go find them.”

He leaned in again. His potent scent surrounded her like a lover’s embrace.

“Kitty.”

He only whispered her name, but the hot breath in her ear said so much more. Her knees trembled. With one word he offered her a chance at ecstasy. It was hard to turn down.

“Nico,” she said firmly. “I will see you tomorrow for your sitting.”

He shifted his hips to touch hers and then lightly brushed his lips against her temple. “I’d rather see you tonight.”

Her heart pounded out a nervous beat. She backed up against the wall, as far away as she could get from him. “You’re incorrigible.”

“And you’re irresistible.” He smiled teasingly and closed in on her again.

She stared at his perfectly formed lips and strong, white teeth. The room full of dancing guests behind them blurred until it was just the two of them. Before she married Dario, she’d had little experience with beaus. It was why she was so easily fooled by his charms. Now free, she desperately wanted to find the love that was absent in her marriage, but here she stood with a similar man. Nico only had to cock his head and smile to melt even the strongest of wills. She couldn’t fall into the same trap.

The sound of Signor Palladino coughing saved her. “There you are.”

Marietta wiggled past the frowning Nico. “Are you ready to leave?” She hoped she sounded enthusiastic.

Palladino’s round eyes became even beadier as he studied them before he finally nodded.

“Thank you for the dance, Signor Foscari.” Marietta curtsied. “Have a good rest of the night.”

“Pleasant dreams, Foscari. As for myself, I don’t plan on sleeping.” Palladino clasped her hand painfully in his fist.

Marietta paled at his insinuation. She wished she could explain herself to Nico, but then again, she owed him nothing. Instead, she allowed Palladino to lead her away like a prized possession.

arietta stepped from the gondola docked near Palladino’s villa. She smoothed a hand over her rumpled dress and tucked a loose curl behind her ear. Despite his short stature, Signor Palladino had unusually long arms, which his dinner wine hadn’t slowed down.

Humming a song under his breath, Palladino stumbled to his front door and pushed it open. He motioned unsteadily at her. “Come! Your beauty has my blood on fire. I can’t wait any longer.”

Marietta placed a hand on her stomach and closed her eyes. She briefly wondered if she’d gone mad, but then the vision of her father dead in an alley got her feet moving. She owed him this much.

Once inside, Palladino bounced her against the nearest wall. His fingers fumbled with her bodice while his lips scrubbed her neck.

“Signore! Signore! Have some patience. I am not used to such ardor.”

He halted his assault and looked bleary-eyed into her face. “You wish me to stop?”

Before she could answer, a soft shuffling sound came from across the foyer. “May I be of service, Signore?”

Palladino scowled at the servant. “No. Can’t you see we’re busy?”

Grateful for the servant’s interruption, Marietta used it to her advantage. She pretended to pout. “I thought we were going to share a bottle of Frascati.”

Palladino pulled a set of keys from his pocket and dangled them in front of her nose. “I don’t let the servants near my wine. It is too precious.” He drew out the last word, spraying her with droplets of spittle.

“Then
you
will need to get the wine.”

She pushed past him and headed toward the first room off the foyer, which turned out to be the salon. When Palladino’s footsteps retreated, she quickly examined the few paintings in the room, but none held her father’s signature. She peeked into the empty foyer and then scurried to the next room to repeat her search until she determined that none of the paintings on the first floor were her father’s.

Groaning, she stared at the marble staircase as if it led to the gallows instead of the upper floor. If her father’s painting was here, it was in a bedroom. With all that had occurred in her short life, there was no reason to think her luck would change now.

When Palladino returned with a bottle and two long-stemmed glasses, he misunderstood her expression.

“I’m sorry I took so long, my amore.”

He grabbed her hand, pulled her up the stairs, and dragged her down a long, dimly lit hallway. At the last room, he gave her a hungry grin before he opened the door. Inside, a richly draped, four-poster bed stood along one wall. Across the room, double French doors opened out to a wrought iron terrace, and to the left of the fireplace sat a short stack of paintings.

After setting the glasses on a table, he worked the cork out of the bottle. “You will enjoy the taste of this, and then I will enjoy the taste of you.”

Her stomach lurched at the thought of his hands on her body. Somehow, she needed to stop the inevitable. When he gave her a glass, she let it slip through her fingers to smash on the marble floor in jagged shards.

“Oh, how clumsy of me. Look at the mess.” She dropped to her knees to pick up the larger pieces. “I’m so sorry.”

“Leave it,” he said, his voice filled with impatience. “We can share my glass.”

She put on another fake pout. “Now that’s not very romantic. We can’t even properly toast each other. Would you please go get another glass?”

Palladino glowered at her, and for a moment she worried she had pushed him too far, but then he huffed out a breath and left the room.

She hurried to the fireplace and flipped through the stack of paintings. At the bottom, she found a melancholy picture of a small church in one of the poorer sections of Venice. The scene’s gray lighting cast dreary shadows on the adjacent rundown buildings. The only glimmer of hope came in the form of a ray of sunshine breaking through the clouds and landing on the church’s arched doorway. It was where her parents had met. After her mother’s death when she was thirteen, she and her father had gone to this church regularly. Sometimes they sat quietly, but more often, her father told gentle love stories of his life with her mother.

She pushed up her golden mask and squinted at the painting’s details. Woven into the scenery in the lower right corner she found her father’s signature.

The sound of singing from the hallway signaled the approach of her soon-to-be lover. She dropped the paintings back into place and looked wildly around the room, unsure of what to do next.

Palladino entered the room and waved the glass. “Here we are!”

He poured the wine and then handed her the glass. Holding his glass high, he said, “To the best night of your life.”

Marietta didn’t bother to toast him back. Instead, she downed his favorite vintage without pausing. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and shut her eyes as the alcohol hit her stomach.

He took the glass from her hand, threw it where she had dropped the other, and then pushed her toward the bed. When the backs of her knees hit the mattress, she had no choice but to buckle under his weight. They fell in a heap of twisted clothes and arms and legs. His hands and mouth were everywhere at once. He moaned in anticipation. When his tongue found her mouth and forced it open, she felt the night’s food and wine surge into her throat. She squirmed in panic and tried to warn him, but he refused to listen until the first spray of vomit hit his chin.

He jumped off her. “What in God’s name?”

But she couldn’t reply. She rolled onto her knees and emptied her stomach onto his silk covers like a sick dog. When she looked up, Palladino had fled the room.

he next day, Marietta arrived at Nico’s private apartment promptly at the appointed time but without Zeta, who had woken up ill. Tucked away on a little-traveled side street, the nondescript building held four apartments, with his on the second floor. The one large room held several chairs, a writing desk, a table, her requested painting supplies, and a curtained bed.

“So this is your love nest?”

Nico laughed. “This is my retreat from the rest of the world. My family doesn’t even know about it.”