by Donald Robyn
It was a relief to set her on her feet. ‘Show me that you can walk,’ he commanded.
Ready to snatch her back, he watched closely as she moved, at first stiffly and slowly, grimacing once when she straightened, but her head came up and she said gallantly, ‘I’m fine. I’m not going to be the fastest person on the street, but I’ll manage.’
‘A walking stick will help,’ Max said. He gave an order to the hovering manservant.
A stick was the last thing she wanted, but after a few more steps she had to admit that he was right. Although the protests from her body eased slightly, she felt unbalanced and precarious, so with relief she accepted the stick produced by the servant.
‘What a beauty!’ Carved from some dark wood, it finished in a dragon’s head made of amber, worn smooth by many hands. She examined it with interest.
‘Never mind what it looks like, try it,’ Max ordered.
Rosa obeyed, carefully at first and then with more assurance. ‘It does make a difference.’ With a fleeting, fascinating glance up from beneath her lashes, she murmured, ‘I feel quite dashing.’
His eyes must have revealed something of his feelings, because she coloured and lifted her chin in mute defiance.
Reining in his overwhelming need to protect her from anything that might hurt her, he said lightly, ‘Dashing? Yes, you look it too—but then you always do. Now, before we go—’
‘We?’ Excitement funnelled through Rosa like a gift from the old gods of the island, bringing more colour to her skin, and a fugitive smile. ‘Why? Are you coming too? You don’t need to—’
‘Of course I am. I don’t trust you—you’d keep going until you dropped, and no one else has the power to tell you what to do.’
‘Neither do you,’ she said sweetly.
His grin was swift and very buccaneering. ‘But I can pick you up and carry you away.’
‘Brute force is not in the least appealing,’ she said, then stopped, chagrined as she realised she was flirting with him.
Detachment cooled his voice. ‘I’m not trying to appeal to you. You’re important to Niroli.’
Her lashes flickered as she acknowledged the hit. ‘Of course,’ she said evenly, straightening her back and shoulders to stride out into the sunlight.
Chapter 7
Rosa spent that day with the team who’d oversee the monitoring after she left Niroli. She impressed on them why everything had to be done in a certain way, and why it was vital to keep records up to date, why double-checking any significant deviation from the norm was important.
Max stayed with her until mid-morning, when a call on his phone brought a frown to his face.
‘A business emergency,’ he told her curtly, snapping the tiny phone shut. He looked around. ‘Giovanni, I have to hand over to you. Make sure the princess doesn’t tire herself too much. If she does, you know how to find me.’
Chagrined, Rosa snorted, but her eager group of students grinned and some of the braver ones chorused that they’d monitor her as closely as they planned to check the vines.
Often during that long, hot day Rosa looked up to find Giovanni’s gaze on her. Each time he smiled and looked away, seemingly without embarrassment.
At first she thought it might be that he, like his fellow islanders, found the existence of a woman in charge oddly dislocating. Later it occurred to her that somehow he might be suspicious of the relationship between her and Max. Hot with shame, she wondered if someone had seen that forbidden kiss. Her mother used to say that servants knew everything…
That night she insisted she could walk up the first flight of stairs. Crisply, Max said, ‘Don’t be an idiot, Rosa. You’re exhausted. I’ll carry you up.’
‘Carrying me up will be harder than coming down.’ A quick survey of his formidable expression persuaded her to try for a compromise. ‘All right—I’ll go as far as I can, and you can carry me from there.’
She met his hard green scrutiny with a level stare. For a second she thought she’d lost, until his shoulders lifted in an abrupt shrug. ‘So. Try then.’
Relieved, she gritted her teeth and made it to the landing before her legs finally informed her they weren’t going any further. Stone-faced, Max picked her up and set off up the stairs.
Rosa kept her eyes fixed on the paintings up the staircase, an impressive collection of landscapes from the golden age of the eighteenth century. Halfway up she mustered her courage to ask, ‘Why does Giovanni watch me?’
Max’s frown was obvious in his tone. ‘I don’t know.’
So he’d noticed it too. In a low, troubled voice she said, ‘You don’t think that anyone saw us—the other night?’
‘No one saw it.’ This time his tone was even yet forbidding. ‘Giovanni knows me very well. He may suspect, that’s all.’
Alarmed, she caught her upper lip in her teeth. He didn’t look at her, and she didn’t take him up on the final sentence. Eventually she said, ‘I’ll leave as soon as I can. I just hope no more vineyards are affected.’
Was it her imagination, or did his arms tighten around her? At the top of the stairs she said, ‘Put me down, please.’
He didn’t object. Once on her feet she looked up and saw a gleam of sweat across his forehead. ‘I told you it would be too much,’ she said accusingly. ‘I hope I haven’t given you a hernia!’
Max threw his head back and laughed, and after a moment she laughed too, unwillingly compelled by the personal magnetism that gave him such presence.
‘No hernia,’ he said. ‘Good night, Rosa. Sleep well.’
‘You too,’ she said quietly.
He gave her a smile so impregnated with irony that it hurt. ‘The important thing is for you to rest. Oh—Maria the maid says she has some special ointment that her grandmother heartily recommends for bruising. She’d like to massage you, if you want her to.’
Without heat Rosa said, ‘I’m sure you’ve already discussed it with the doctor.’
‘He thinks it an excellent idea,’ he told her smoothly. ‘And Maria assures me she has gentle hands. She’s worked at the spa on the south coast, so she should know what to do, but if you find her too rough I’ll get one of the masseuses from the spa here.’
‘I’ll try anything if it helps.’
‘So that you can get away sooner?’ he said with a twisted smile, and left her staring after him.
Rosa woke in the early dawn, and gave a few exploratory stretches. The maid had promised her that the herb-scented cream she’d used to rub her down would work like a miracle from the saints. She’d been right; although the bruises were now spectacular, the deep-seated ache had gone, and if she moved cautiously there was almost no pain.
‘Someone should patent it,’ Rosa murmured, climbing cautiously out of the bed. Perhaps the spa on the south coast would like to hear about it…
Whatever, she felt almost human this morning.
For the next two weeks Max divided his time between Cattina and the capital, with one foray to a high-powered business meeting in Geneva that kept him away overnight. When he was home, Rosa made first her bruises, and when they’d faded the reports she was writing to New Zealand, an excuse for retiring to her bedroom immediately after dinner—acutely aware of his relief, well-hidden though it was.
At least she was now feeling fine. The doctor was pleased when at Max’s insistence he visited her one last time.
‘You’re young and strong,’ he informed her. ‘And you have no bad habits. Naturally you heal fast.’
‘So when will I be able to fly back to New Zealand?’
His satisfied smile transmuted into a frown. ‘I certainly wouldn’t advise that. You feel well now, but the body is a delicate instrument, and so many hours cooped up…’ He shook his head. ‘Wait a week—better yet, two.’ And when she opened her mouth to protest he added with the air of one who knew he had a clincher, ‘I am sure the prince would agree with me.’
Max did. ‘I’ll send you back in the private jet,’ he said
when she raised the point after dinner that night. ‘But not for another ten days. Dr Fiorelli was very definite.’
‘Whatever happened to patient/doctor confidentiality?’ she demanded, incensed.
‘Apparently he feels it’s superseded by his duty to his patient,’ he shot back, eyes green and implacable. ‘So do I. And had you forgotten that your boss wants you here until at least the end of the month to report progress?’
‘I hadn’t.’ She looked down at her hands, ruthlessly shutting off the part of her brain that kept obsessing over how addictive he was. Clearly she was doomed to stay here until Max decided she could go.
Rosa didn’t try to change his mind; she knew her limitations. Switching tack, she said, ‘I hope—I think—I’ve managed to impress on everyone concerned the need for absolute regularity and impeccable record-keeping.’
‘You have,’ he said with a confidence that warmed some vulnerable part of her. ‘They might seem a bit casual, but they know how much depends on this.’
‘And Giovanni says he’ll keep a very close watch on them.’ She hesitated, some hidden superstitious part of her wondering if her next words were tempting fate. ‘At least it doesn’t look as though there are going to be any further outbreaks.’
‘With any luck we’ve got it under control.’ He walked across to the drinks tray. ‘Would you like a drink before you go to bed?’
‘No, thank you.’ Since the night he’d given her brandy she’d allowed herself nothing more than a glass of wine with dinner. Anything else might weaken her will-power, already incredibly fragile where Max was concerned.
She went on, ‘But it’s only a stopgap measure, Max. We—or some other research centre—will eventually find a cure, or a way to stop transmission that doesn’t involve such brutal measures as burning every vine. Until then we can only do what we already have done. And hope.’
‘It’s called buying time, and, in a situation like this, sometimes it’s the only thing left to do.’ He smiled at her, his expression softening. ‘Having seen you work here, I’m sure you’ll come up with something. You have great dedication.’
The compliment brought a rush of colour to her cheeks. Hoarding it to the tiny cupboard in her mind where his other compliments had been stored, she said, ‘We will.’ But honesty compelled her to add, ‘If it’s at all possible.’
‘And if it’s not possible, we’ll have to learn to live with it.’
His words sounded flat and ominous. Rosa flinched, then told herself she’d have to stop connecting everything he said with the tension that had been building between them since she’d come back to Niroli.
She looked down at her hands, their long fingers entwined in her lap. ‘Before I go I want to visit my parents’ grave on Royal Island—just for an hour or so. And when I see Grandpapa in Porto Di Castellante I’d like to call on your mother.’
‘An excellent idea, but unfortunately she’s still in France. Do you have friends in the capital?’
‘Not really,’ she confessed with reluctance.
The children she’d known on Niroli had been the sons and daughters of the aristocracy, chosen by her mother, with each encounter supervised by her governess. Her enduring friendships had been made at the school in Switzerland and at university.
‘Poor lonely little princess,’ Max said softly.
She gave him a sharp look, expecting to see mockery gleaming in his eyes. Instead, she saw a shadow of tenderness that stabbed her to the heart.
Ever since their explosive kiss they’d been so careful not to cross that forbidden boundary. Their restraint should have worked to ease the situation. It hadn’t; Rosa felt as though she were walking a tightrope, each long day increasing the unspoken tension between her and Max until her every nerve was on edge, charged with feverish, forbidden anticipation.
Curtly she said, ‘I’m not poor, and I’m certainly not lonely. I’d go to Mont Avellana to stay with Isabella and Domenic, only I want to be close to Cattina in case something else develops here.’
‘Why don’t you finish recuperating on Royal Island?’ Max watched her with eyes shaded by long lashes. ‘You’ll be well looked after at your family villa.’
Rosa said unevenly, ‘I don’t know—I haven’t stayed there since Mamma and Papà were…died.’
After a moment’s taut silence he came across to crouch beside her chair and take her hands in his. ‘You should go back, Rosa. Although their death was tragic, they would not have wanted you to grieve for ever.’
If he came with her she could bear it, she thought, but of course he wouldn’t.
Couldn’t. Playing with fire had never been her favourite way of entertaining herself either. Swallowing the lump in her throat, she conceded bleakly, ‘I know, but—’
He interrupted, ‘You need to face the ghosts.’
‘There are no ghosts,’ she protested. ‘We were always so happy on the island.’
‘The ghosts of the happy past are sometimes harder to face than unhappiness,’ he said quietly.
His understanding pierced her heart. If she looked up she’d see the tiny nerve flicking in his jaw, but keeping her eyes fixed on their linked hands was another, more subtle torture. His touch was warm and secure. If only it could be like this…
Someone coughed from the door.
Max got to his feet in a rapid, almost abrupt movement, and said in a voice totally without inflection, ‘Giovanni. What has brought you here?’
Rosa eased out of the chair. ‘I’ll leave you to talk alone.’
‘It is about the vines,’ Giovanni said.
Rosa froze, and looked up at Max. His face had hardened; in a voice like a whip-crack he said, ‘Tell me, man!’
With a troubled glance at Rosa, Giovanni said, ‘It looks like another outbreak.’
‘Dear God,’ Max said in a voice that sent chills down Rosa’s spine. ‘Where?’
‘Next door to one of the vineyards we’ve just treated for the blight.’
Max said harshly, ‘And thank God for that. At least it’s not a new outbreak. So the vines will have been drenched with the disinfectant?’
‘Yes,’ Giovanni said.
Max looked at Rosa. ‘Could this be a reaction to the spray?’
With all her heart, Rosa wished she could say yes, but she shook her head. ‘It doesn’t seem likely,’ she said slowly, her mind racing to recall all the information she had. ‘None of the test vines showed any reaction, but I can’t say it’s impossible. If you’ll wait a few minutes I’ll just change my clothes—’
‘There’s no need for you to go out.’ Max’s expression was forbidding. ‘You have done what you came to Niroli to do—given us hope. Now you must let us work on it. Go up to bed.’
‘I am not a servant—’ she began heatedly, falling silent when she met his eyes.
Hard and cold and completely intimidating, they gave no quarter. ‘Show the people you have trained that you trust them.’
She narrowed her gaze. ‘You’re a manipulative devil,’ she said jaggedly, but her tone told him he’d won.
The eastern sky was a soft dove-grey when Max drove into the castello forecourt. Beside him Giovanni sat in silence, his brows drawn together as though dealing with unpleasant thoughts.
Max glanced at him. He looked old, he thought, and weary, but that was to be expected. He felt old and weary himself. At least it wasn’t another outbreak! Rosa’s checklist had proved conclusively that the vineyard was clear of shot blight; the holes had been chewed by insects. In fact there was a lot to be pleased about; one of the vineyard hands had reported the possible outbreak, so clearly the message was getting through to everyone.
But he sensed that something else was worrying the man who had been more than a father to him than his own had ever been.
‘Come inside and we’ll have a drink to warm our hearts,’ he said. ‘Then you can go home and sleep. You’ve been working long hours, and it’s showing. I don’t want to see you again before tomorrow mor
ning. What you really need is to spend a couple of days sitting in the sun and talking about anything but vines. When this is over, old friend, we’ll both do that.’
Although Giovanni smiled, his heart wasn’t in it. ‘Not you—you have other responsibilities. And thank you, I will come in, even though I am dirty.’
‘I’m just as dirty as you are,’ Max told him wryly.
In the study Giovanni watched Max poured two small glasses of the island’s potent brandy. He held one out to him, saying, ‘Sit down, and drink this—it will warm you, and give you heart before you go home to bed.’
But Giovanni stayed standing, looking down into the small glass where the amber liquid shifted slightly. His hands were trembling, Max realised, and he felt a sudden stab of compunction. This situation had been difficult for them all, but Giovanni had taken it harder than most.
Rosa’s faint perfume drifted tantalisingly in the air. Max suspected that he’d never be able to rid the castello of that fragrance; it was one of the happy ghosts, he thought, then chided himself for being morbid. Soon the castello would no longer be his home.
Once in the palace, he’d eventually be able to wall off the bitter ache that was his feelings for her.
Uneasily, Max watched as his companion, normally almost abstemious, tossed the brandy down his throat in one swallow. ‘Sit, man,’ he said.
‘I’ll stand.’ Giovanni looked around him, avoiding Max’s scrutiny. ‘I wish to speak to you—one man to another.’
Max frowned. ‘Have we not always spoken—one man to another?’ he said. ‘Or have I been mistaken these many years?’
‘No, you have not been mistaken, but when one man carries a secret in his heart, there is not complete frankness. I must ask you—do you love the Princess Rosa?’
Max felt his face stiffen into an austere mask. He didn’t answer for a long time, but Giovanni waited, obviously tense but not giving in. He looked old and grey, as though faced with an agonising decision. Or death.
‘Why are you asking this?’
Giovanni said patiently, ‘I know that you feel something for her.’
‘So?’ Max demanded.