amoral, shallow and selfish cheats.
What am I doing? Jodie asked herself wryly. Surely
she wasn’t actually feeling sympathy for Lorenzo?
As she watched Caterina walk away, Jodie told herself
that it was a good job she was not marrying
Lorenzo for love.
Jodie turned to look at the granite hulk of the Castillo
walls. She was alone in the garden now, Caterina apparently
having grown tired of issuing her dark warnings.
She would not have entered an unwanted marriage
in order to possess such a place, Jodie thought
wryly, but she was not Lorenzo. It must be a matter
of family pride to him that he was its master.
She tensed as she heard footsteps on the gravel,
recognising them immediately as Lorenzo’s. A tiny
feathering of sensation started to uncurl slowly inside
her: a potent blend of danger, excitement, and challenge
pumped intoxicatingly throughout her whole
body by the jerky, speeded-up bursts of her heartbeat.
It was reassuring to compare what she was feeling
now with the emotions and sensations she had felt
when she had first met John. The two reactions had
nothing in common, and therefore this feeling she had
now was not a sign that she was in any way attracted
to Lorenzo.
"I saw Caterina speaking with you earlier. Tell me
what she was saying."
It was typical of him, of course, that he should not
only make such a demand but actually expect it to be
met — as though he had the right to question her, and
also to be answered.
Jodie answered him as bluntly. "She told me that
you were lovers."
"And what else?" he demanded, refusing to react.
Jodie shrugged her shoulders. "Only that you would
do anything to gain possession of the Castillo — but
then I already knew that. And that your mother deserted
you and your father when you were a small
child — which of course I did not."
Now she had the reaction she had not had before.
Immediately Lorenzo’s expression hardened. "My
childhood is in the past and has no bearing on either
the present or the future."
He was wrong about that, Jodie decided. It was
obvious from the way he was reacting that his childhood
held painful issues which had never been resolved.
"How is your leg? I noticed that you were rubbing
it earlier, when Alfredo was here."
What had motivated that comment? Concern for
her? Or a deliberate attempt to change the subject?
Jodie knew which she believed was the more likely
reason, but that wasn’t enough to stop her answering
him.
"that’s just a…a habit I have. It doesn’t mean…
My leg’s fine." She was behaving in as flustered a
manner as though he had paid her some kind of unexpected
compliment, she realised angrily. John’s rejection
might have battered her self-esteem, but it certainly
hadn’t reduced her to the pathetic state where
she was grateful to a man for asking after her health!
But Lorenzo’s comment had reminded her of something
she knew she had to do.
And now was probably a good time to do it, she
thought, since the fading light meant that Lorenzo
wouldn’t be able to see her red face.
"I–I owe you an apology," she told him abruptly.
"I realise from what Alfredo said that I was wrong to
suggest that you knew nothing about the horrors
of war."
"You are apologising to me for an error of judgement?"
Jodie risked a quick glance up at him through the
indigo-tinted evening air, and discovered that the
downward curve of his mouth was revealing the same
cynical disbelief she could hear in his voice.
"Yes, I am," she said. "But if you’d told me about
your aid work in the first place, I wouldn’t have
needed to, would I?"
"Ah, I thought so. I’ve yet to meet any woman who
will genuinely admit that she could be to blame for
anything."
"that’s the most ridiculous exaggeration I have
ever heard!" Jodie objected immediately. "It’s like
saying that—"
"That You’re never going to trust another man because
one man has let you down?" Lorenzo suggested
silkily.
"No! that’s a personal decision I’ve made about
my own future. It doesn’t mean — and I have never
said — that all men can’t be trusted. Maybe you should
look more closely at why you think the way you do,
instead of making unfounded accusations against my
sex!" she told him recklessly.
"That was an apology?" Lorenzo said derisively.
She felt so tempted to tell him that she had changed
her mind, and he would have to find someone else to
help him to secure his wretched Castillo. But her determination
to salve her pride with the possession of
a husband to replace the one she had so humiliatingly
lost was stubbornly refusing to let her do so. She
would withstand whatever she had to in order to enjoy
the sweet satisfaction of seeing John and Louise’s expression
when she introduced them to her "husband".
She didn’t want revenge, or money — such negative
aspirations were empty and worthless — but she so
badly did want the ego-boosting experience of seeing
everyone’s faces when she turned up at the wedding
with Lorenzo.
With a handsome, multi-millionaire, titled husband
at her side, no one was going to pity her, or glance
at her leg when they thought she wasn’t looking, or
whisper about her, explaining who she was and what
had happened. Yes, it was shallow. Yes, it was foolish.
Yes, a part of her felt ashamed that she should
give in to such a need. But she was still going to do
it. And if it turned out that she ended up upstaging
the bride? Tough!
A small shiver of shocked awareness of her own
growing strength tingled over her skin. Two months
ago she had been so low she couldn’t even have contemplated
feeling like this. Who knew what she could
achieve once the wedding was behind her? She could
begin a whole new life, a life doing the things she
wanted to do, without having to worry about pleasing
any man ever again.
"What are you hoping for? That he will turn round
at the altar, see you and leave her?" Lorenzo demanded
harshly.
Jodie stared at him and blurted out, "How did you
know I was thinking about John?"
"There is a certain look in your eyes when you do
so."
"Well, You’re wrong," she fibbed. "I wasn’t thinking
about him. I was thinking about what I am going to
do in the future. I wasn’t well enough to go to university,
or to train to do anything after the accident,
but there is nothing to stop me doing so now."
"Most admirable," Lorenzo said, making it clear
that he found her mission st
atement for the future anything
but. "Now, if we Don’t go in soon Maria will
be coming to warn us that it is time for dinner. I hope
you like pasta, because that is all you are likely to
get. Her cooking is of the plain and simple variety,
but at least it might add some flesh to your bones."
Perhaps she was a little bit on the thin side — emotional
pain did that to a person, after all — but there
was no need for him to keep on pointing it out to her,
was there? Jodie decided crossly as she turned away
from him.
"Be careful," he warned her sharply. "There is a step
here—"
But it was already too late, and Jodie gave a small
cry as she missed it in the darkness and stumbled
forward.
Powerful hands seized her waist, and, as he had
done before, Lorenzo caught her before she hit the
ground, lifting her back onto her feet and steadying
her there.
When was it that her instincts registered and recognised
the subtle shift in the way those hands were
holding her? The movement that took their hold on
her body and turned it from the impersonal dig of his
fingers into the curve of her waist as he supported her
into an explorative search for the femaleness of that
curve? Was it really after it was too late to check or
reject his instinctive male reaction? Had he really
drawn her closer? Or had she been the one to move
towards him?
In the shadowy darkness it was impossible for her
to see his face, or to judge which of them had promoted
the body-to-body intimacy they were now
sharing, and she hoped it was equally impossible for
him to read her expression.
He bent his head towards her and took her mouth
in a shockingly intimate kiss of hard passion that was
over almost as soon as it had begun. Then, without a
word of either apology or explanation, he released
her.
She was in more danger of stumbling now than she
had been before, Jodie realised, as her suddenly shaky
legs carried her unsteadily towards the light of the
Castillo.
Jodie was on the verge of falling asleep when she
heard the sound of Lorenzo’s bedroom door opening.
Sucking in her breath, she tensed her body, her concentration
focused on her own door, but the firm footsteps
were already fading as Lorenzo walked past her
room without even hesitating.
Jodie sat up and looked at her watch. It was gone
midnight. Where was he going? To Caterina? And if
he was there was no reason for her to be concerned,
was there? And certainly not enough to lie here wide
awake, checking her watch every few minutes, her
ears stretched for the sound of his return, like a jealous
lover.
CHAPTER EIGHT
FLORENCE! How well its medieval ruler Lorenzo de
Medici had loved his city, and how willingly he had
shown that love, commissioning the best of the
Renaissance"s gifted artists to embellish and enhance
both its glory and his own.
Jodie could only catch her breath as she sat beside
Lorenzo in the Ferrari whilst he edged it through the
city"s busy traffic, stretching every sense she could to
take in as much as possible of the wonders all around
her. Lorenzo turned off the busy main road that ran
alongside the River Arno and drove the Ferrari down
a street lined with elegant seventeenth-century buildings.
"My apartment is in the block above us," he informed
Jodie casually, as he turned into a narrow alleyway
and then down into an underground car park.
Jodie’s eyes adjusted to the gloom of the car park
after the brilliance of the sunlit street. He had already
informed her that he lived in Florence, but he hadn’t
said as yet just where they would be living once they
were married. Given the choice she would far rather
be in Florence than the Castillo, Jodie thought as they
left the car.
Lorenzo guided her towards a door which opened
onto a flight of stairs that took them up to an impressive
entrance hall, with an equally impressive coat of
arms prominently displayed above its main doorway.
The same coat of arms, surely, which she had seen
carved into the fireplace lintel in the great hall of the
Castillo?
"Come — the lift is this way," Lorenzo instructed
her. "My apartment is on the top two floors. I chose
it when I had the Palazzo remodelled because of its
views — although my grandmother used to complain
that she wished I had chosen one at ground level. She
did not care for enclosed spaces or lifts."
"The Palazzo?" Jodie questioned suspiciously
"Does that mean that the whole of this building—?"
"Was originally the home of my family? Yes. The
Palazzo was built for the tenth Duce, who had many
business interests in Florence. During my grandfather"s
lifetime it fell into disrepair — much like the
Castillo. When I inherited it I was faced with two
choices. Either I abandoned it and sold it, or I restored
it and found a way to make it pay for itself.
Converting it into apartments seemed the most sensible
option. That way I could retain control over any
work to be done."
"Is this where we will be living, then?" Jodie asked
as they got out of the lift and she followed him across
an elegant marble-floored outer hallway to a pair of
intricately carved heavy wooden doors.
"There will be times when we will live here in
Florence, yes, which is why—" He broke off from
whatever he had been about to say to unlock the doors
before opening them for her.
The room beyond them was another hallway: a
long, rectangular double-height space, with a gallery
around the whole of the upper storey. Its ceiling was
domed in the centre and painted with allegorical
scenes from mythology, whilst its walls were hung
with paintings.
"My family were at one time renowned patrons of
the arts. The eleventh Duce enjoyed entertaining the
English visitors who came to Florence in the seventeenth
and eighteenth centuries. He held court here in
the Palazzo, and his mistress"s salons were famous."
"His mistress"s salons?" Jodie queried uncertainly.
"The eleventh Duce was something of a rebel.
While he stayed here in Florence, and set up home
with his mistress, his wife and children were banished
to a villa outside the city. He was a great patron of
beauty in all its forms. He caused something of a
scandal in Florence by having his mistress depicted
in a series of paintings, each one portraying her readiness
to receive him in a different sexual position. It
is rumoured, in fact, that in order for the artist to
faithfully portray the correct angles of her body, the
original sketches were made whilst she and the Duce
> were in the act of making love. But the Duce’s figure
was removed by the artist for her final painting, so
that her patron could visualise his lover’s body as she
waited to receive him."
"Oh," said Jodie weakly. "The artist was a woman?"
Lorenzo shrugged. "My ancestor was probably concerned
that a male artist might find such an erotic
commission too much for his self-control. And rumour
has it that Cosimo himself was not averse to
persuading his artist to abandon her work in order to
join them in their pursuit of sexual pleasure."
When Jodie couldn’t help glancing at the walls,
Lorenzo told her grimly, "You will not find any of
the paintings here — they vanished a long time ago—
looted, so it is believed, on Napoleon"s instructions.
He had heard of them and wanted them. If they still
exist they will be in the possession of some private
collector." Lorenzo give another shrug. "Their value
was not in the hand of the artist who painted them so
much as in their notoriety." He flicked back the cuff
of the linen jacket he was wearing and glanced at his
watch.
"It is now almost four o"clock. I telephoned ahead
and arranged for you to have a private showing at a
designer salon on Via Tornabuoni. The manager there
understands the situation, and she will help you to
select a suitable wardrobe — including a wedding
dress. It isn’t very far from here, and—"
"No!" Jodie could see the look of hauteur darkening
Lorenzo’s eyes. He obviously didn’t like having his
plans questioned. Tough, she decided grittily. No way
was she going to be treated like some kind of mindless
doll he could have dressed up in over-priced designer
clothes to suit his own idea of how his wife
should look.
"I agree that I need to buy something suitable to be
married in, but I am perfectly capable of making my
own choice and paying for whatever I need with my
own money. Think of how much medical care you
could donate to those children in need, instead of
wasting money on designer clothes for me," she urged
him.
"You have a valid point," he agreed. "But Italian
society, like any other society, has its rules and its
obligations. For you as my wife not to be dressed as
the other wives will cause questions to be asked—
which could raise doubts as to the true validity of our
THE ITALIAN DUKE’S WIFE Page 9