CHRISTMAS ANGEL
An Ellora's Cave Publication, DECEMBER 2003
Ellora's Cave Publishing, Inc.
PO Box 787
Hudson, OH 44236-0787
ISBN MS Reader (LIT) ISBN # 1-84360-736-0
Other available formats (no ISBNs are assigned):
Adobe (PDF), Rocketbook (RB), Mobipocket (PRC) & HTML
CHRISTMAS ANGEL © 2003 LISA MARIE RICE
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. This book may not be reproduced in whole or in part without permission.
This book is a work of fiction and any resemblance to persons, living or dead, or places, events or locales is purely coincidental. They are productions of the authors’ imagination and used fictitiously.
Edited by Sheri Ross Carucci
Cover art by Darrell King.
CHRISTMAS ANGEL
Lisa Marie Rice
Naples, Italy
Christmas Eve, 2003
‘Guarda o’ mare quant’è bello,
Spira tanto sentimento’
Look at the sea, how beautiful it is,
How it moves the heart
-Old Neapolitan Song, Torna a Sorrento
A full moon shone brightly over Mount Vesuvius, casting an exquisite shimmering veil of silver over the Bay of Naples. Cruise ships lit from stem to stern with bright twinkling lights made their stately way across the bay like floating Christmas trees. The moonlight reflected off the calm bay sketched a pearly-white path to forever.
It was the most beautiful sight Nicole Caron had ever seen, and she’d traveled the world and seen her share of them.
The terrace of the French Consulate in the 17th century Palazzo Loredana was right on the bay itself, affording a view of Vesuvius, the bustling brilliant glittering city of Naples and the isle of Capri, a distant glimmer strung out on the horizon like a necklace of diamonds.
It was heartbreakingly beautiful and exactly as Alessandro had described it a year ago in Amman.
She’d laid in bed with him, her head on his broad chest and listened to his deep rumbling voice as he described his Naples.
She hadn’t been listening all that closely, to tell the truth. She’d just had the most explosive series of orgasms in her life and any kind of exertion other than breathing and smiling seemed insanely ambitious. Nonetheless, his deep voice was hypnotic and she listened to what he had to say.
Some.
Just enough to get an impression of a glittering city by the bay, beautiful and lively and sparkling.
At the time, Naples had been the last thing on her mind, or what passed for a mind in the time she’d come to think of as ‘The Alessandro Period’. Like an art historical period studied in college. From the 17th of December 2002 to the 24th of December 2002.
As historical periods went, it was short. Only a week, but a week that had rocked her world. She’d fallen wildly in love and had been brutally abandoned, all in a week. Seven days.
There was even an Italian film on it. ‘Sedotta e Abbandonata’. ‘Seduced and Abandoned’. 1964, director Pietro Germi. She’d seen it during an art film festival in her sophomore year at Brown, when she’d fancied herself an intellectual, dressing entirely in black, with a dyed white Susan Sontagian streak in her dark hair.
At the time, she’d been so sure of herself. So certain that romantic love was dead, a figment of oppressed female imagination. Modern liberated women didn’t do love; they did conversation and sex. She’d dated Howard Morgan, another intellectual, that year. They’d spent endless hours talking, going to the movies and having very bad sex.
The last she’d heard, Howard was curator of a major museum in Texas and was on his fourth marriage.
To her surprise, Nicole hadn’t stayed in academia. On a whim she’d sat for the Foreign Service exam, aced it, and had found herself in the diplomatic corps at the age of 25. Postings in Haiti, Peru and Jordan had followed. All hard posts. Career makers. With hazardous duty pay and opportunities for advancement.
All in places where a single woman had to watch her step.
Turned out sex and the single girl were unspoken Foreign Service no-nos.
Taking a lover meant—always—a security concern. ‘Locals’ were generally off limits. Single female foreign service officers were prey—considered by all the other male foreign service officers in the tightly knit diplomatic community a highly prized fuck. A single female officer would never endanger her career by making a fuss over being treated badly and she would be gone in two years, anyway. Which made them targets for all the married scumbags in all the embassies in the entire world.
Sex had been more trouble than it was worth.
Nicole had safely negotiated the shoals of singledom in the Foreign Service, feeling smug about resisting temptation and concentrating on her career, which she wanted to crown with an ambassadorship in twenty years’ time. So she’d kept her nose clean and very close to the grindstone.
Until Amman.
Until Alessandro.
He’d caught her in the Christmas season, at a party thrown by the Italian Embassy in Amman. If there was an embassy in the world that could make being in a poverty-stricken, dusty charmless city chic, it was the Italian Embassy.
One step into the premises, after having negotiated three security perimeters in evening dress and stiletto heels, and it was like being in a little dream world designed by Versace. Designer premises, designer clothing, designer food. After spending a 12-hour day negotiating with the Jordanians and Syrians over textile quotas and human rights abuses, Nicole had been ready for some playtime.
She’d arrived alone, as usual. Though there had been offers—an attractive single woman in the diplomatic corps is never without an offer of an escort, especially in Islamic countries—she’d opted to arrive alone, chauffeured by the Embassy driver, an endearing African-American who’d befriended her and whom she suspected was the resident CIA officer.
The food had been good at the Italian Embassy, the wine better, the conversation a little on the insipid side. Nicole had been about ready to call Mike to drive her home when a deep voice behind her had said, “You look exactly like the angel on top of my family’s Christmas tree.”
She’d turned in surprise and her heart stuttered.
He was gorgeous. Out and out gorgeous, a heartbreaker of a man. Tall, broad-shouldered, dark-haired, dark-eyed. Olive-toned skin, perfect features except for a slightly crooked nose, which saved him from pretty-boy looks.
“I’m not an angel,” she replied.
“I’m happy to hear that,” he’d said, a deep dent appearing in his cheek, the male equivalent of a dimple. He spoke excellent English with a slight but highly sexy accent. “It makes things more promising.”
She’d been taken totally unawares, cut off at the knees by her attraction. She hadn’t even noticed time passing until they were the last guests left. They’d talked for five hours straight.
She hadn’t called Mike after all. Alessandro had driven her home, followed her right up to her luxurious penthouse apartment paid for by the Embassy and had proceeded to strip her, in between deep, drugging kisses. Then he loved her until dawn, spending almost the entire night inside her.
The next day, Nicole worked in a fog of sleeplessness and sensuality. At moments when she needed to concentrate, she’d be utterly blindsided by a sensory memory. All it took was her blouse brushing against her nipple and she’d suddenly remember—could almost feel—Alessandro’s mouth tugging at her nipple, licking and sucking. One of her countless orgasms had been from that alone—his mouth on her breast. She’d cross her legs and be instantly reminded of Alessandro’s mouth
there, too. And then—God!—his penis, talented and tireless.
He was very large and it had been a little uncomfortable the first time. He’d risen up on his elbows and looked down at her in shock, a lock of dark hair falling in a curve over his forehead. “Nicole, carissima, you’re not—?”
She’d smiled and shook her head at him. Of course not. She’d gotten rid of her virginity on her seventeenth birthday, on principle.
But Alessandro still hadn’t moved. He was deep inside her, huge and hot and burning. His dark eyebrows gathered in a slight frown. “When was the last time you made love, cara?”
The question threw her. Though the foreplay had been long and luscious, she was still adjusting to the feel of him inside her, internal muscles working to accommodate him. Tendrils of pleasure were starting to work their way outwards. It was hard to pay attention to what he was saying.
“Tesoro,” he’d murmured, pressing more deeply. “When was the last time a man was inside you?” His dark eyes were magnetic; she found it impossible to look away, impossible to remember even one man she’d slept with while looking at Alessandro’s fascinating face an inch above hers.
“Ummm…” Who was the last man she’d had sex with? No one in Amman, of course. Not in Lima. Not in Porte au Prince. So it must have been while she was taking the Foreign Service exams. That smarmy SEC lawyer, scrawny and hairless, the one who always wore white suits like a cut-rate Tom Wolfe. That was it. The one with a marshmallow for a penis. What was his name?
How could she think of the lawyer’s name when her arms could barely reach around Alessandro’s broad back? When his dark chest hairs rubbed against her nipples, still wet from his mouth, exciting her almost beyond bearing?
“Six—“
Alessandro rotated his hips and she could feel herself opening even more to him.
“Six years ago,” she gasped. “Maybe more.”
“Dio.” He’d closed his eyes a moment, as if in pain, then started thrusting heavily. She’d climaxed so explosively she’d burst into tears.
She’d never had sex like that. Hadn’t known sex like that was possible.
After she’d reassured a frantic Alessandro that they were tears of joy, he’d loved her embarrassment away. All through the night.
She sleepwalked through her duties, waiting impatiently for five o’clock when Alessandro said he’d pick her up.
Sure enough, there he’d been, at the security entrance, waiting for her. Tall, broad, elegant, even more insanely attractive than in her memory.
Alessandro della Torre. All day, she’d run through the few things she knew about him, little snippets of information she’d gleaned between the bouts of soul-shattering sex.
He was 35, four years older than she was, Neapolitan, never been married though he’d come close with the daughter of a family friend. They’d both heaved a sigh of relief when they separated.
He spoke superb English and French and had a smattering of Arabic and Russian. German, he’d confessed with a smile, had eluded him entirely. He’d made her shriek with laughter when he did a deadpan imitation of Hupper, an amazingly ugly German teacher.
He had a law degree but had never practiced law, having gone into the Italian Foreign service at 25, the same age she’d entered. He was higher than she was in his country’s hierarchy, the deputy Ambassador with a trade portfolio. He was an ardent promoter of his country’s food and wine, but thought French literature was better and enjoyed American movies. He liked Italian soccer, American football and English tennis.
At the time, it seemed more than enough knowledge to fall in love, though later, with bitter hindsight, Nicole realized that she never got to know anything else about him. He’d been very sparing with personal details. She knew only the most general facts, what would be available on a CV. She hadn’t thought to dig deeper. She had somehow convinced herself he was the love of her life, her soul mate. She thought they’d have the rest of their lives to get to know each other.
And, of course, there was the biggie; the real reason she didn’t know more. They’d spent most of their free time in bed. He was such a stupendous fuck, talking was the last thing on her mind.
She used the crude term in her head, to reduce the experience to mere sex. It had helped a lot after the first searing pain had started to subside. When she no longer cried all night, but merely woke up after a restless night with tears drying on her face. When she was able to eat again.
She tried to put it all in perspective in the painful months afterwards, though the parts didn’t fit. Angular, jagged memories that didn’t mesh at all. The Alessandro she’d known, who’d loved her so thoroughly and so well. And the Alessandro who’d left without a word.
She’d spent every single free second with him after that first incandescent night, most of it in bed, though they hadn’t always restricted their sex to the bed. There’d been the kitchen table, her enormous terrace, the bathtub, the huge Persian carpet in the living room.
At times, almost drugged with sex, she wondered dazedly whether she was subconsciously making up for the past few years of enforced celibacy.
The sex had been so overwhelming, she hadn’t even realized she’d fallen in love until it was too late.
Alessandro had to be away on the 24th of December, Christmas Eve, which wasn’t a holiday anyway in an Islamic country. He said he’d be back that evening. With his suitcases. He was moving in with her.
Christmas Eve found her anxiously preparing a gourmet candlelit meal in her brand-new silk negligee. She hadn’t been wearing underwear, which would have been pointless around Alessandro, anyway. He’d ripped several pairs of expensive La Perla panties in his haste to be inside her.
He was supposed to arrive not later than 7:30. She’d been in a frenzy of delight since the late afternoon. Cooking madly, spraying perfume on herself to get rid of the smell of cooking, straightening the cushions, taking another bath, keeping the bathroom door open so she could hear him come in, pacing through the house…
By 9 she’d calmed down a little. Alessandro had been detained, that was it. Though it was very strange that he didn’t call to say he’d be late.
The food turned from lukewarm to cold, then congealed.
The candles guttered, then went out.
By midnight she started to get worried and at two in the morning she was sweating with fear. Anything could happen in the Middle East, all of it bad. A car bomb, a terrorist attack, a suicide bomber. She switched on CNN. Nothing unusual. The Internet yielded nothing overtly dangerous, either. Nicole wanted to call Alessandro but realized with a sudden chill she didn’t know his home number. Or his address.
His cell phone wasn’t on.
By morning, Christmas Day, she was in turn frantic and angry, in a bewildering whiplash of emotions. The Italian Embassy was closed, with only a lowly secretary on duty to answer the phone. She was no help, and indeed, seemed not to recognize Alessandro’s name.
Nicole spent Christmas day and the next day in her negligee, compulsively watching TV and checking Google News. When she finally went back to the office on the 27th, she felt as if she’d been in a war, frayed nerves sparking and sputtering.
She must have called the Italian Embassy a dozen times in the next few days. Though Nicole knew for a fact that everyone at the Italian Embassy spoke excellent English, she somehow couldn’t manage to communicate with anyone in any meaningful way.
And then the Ambassador, Count Stefano Volpi, called her personally, at home. And in his gentle, aristocratic way, he managed to let her know that there was no Alessandro della Torre working at the Embassy and even if there were…it was better to leave him alone.
Count Volpi’s call came on Friday evening and Nicole huddled on her couch with the cordless in her lap for twenty-four hours after that, frozen with shock. The Count’s voice had been gentle, but firm, and quite clear in the message he managed to convey.
Don’t bother Alessandro again.
How had she got
it so wrong? Alessandro hadn’t been the love of her life. He’d been a good—very good, incredibly good—fuck. That was all. They’d had a brief affair, and he’d moved on.
Pity Nicole couldn’t move on as well.
She became stuck in a groove of grief and sorrow.
Nicole sleepwalked her way through her job. There was a major diplomatic scandal that broke out in the new year, lasting all spring. A ring of low-level diplomats funneling millions of dollars of illegal arms in diplomatic pouches into a region already bristling with arms had been unmasked in a sting operation. There’d been two smugglers uncovered in the U.S. Embassy itself, dozens more in other embassies. Everyone in the Embassy ended up working 12-hour days trying to cope with the fallout.
Nicole the best she could during the day, then came home to her cold empty flat with no appetite for dinner and knowing she faced a restless and sleepless night.
She lost weight. She would catch colleagues at the Embassy falling silent when she walked by. Though socializing was part of the job, she simply couldn’t accept any of the invitations to concerts and receptions a woman in her position received as a matter of rote. There was no lightness in her any more, no ability to chat at a cocktail party.
That summer, Nicole decided she needed to find herself a lover. Maybe what she was mourning wasn’t Alessandro but sex. He’d awakened her to her intensely sexual nature, then left her dangling. It hadn’t been love, it had been fucking and now she needed to get back into the saddle, as it were.
There was no shortage of candidates. Nicole chose carefully. It couldn’t be someone in the diplomatic corps, which would be fouling her own nest. It couldn’t be someone who lived in Amman, she wasn’t in any way looking for commitment.
She finally found the right man. The physical opposite of Alessandro, too. Medium height, slender, blond and blue-eyed with sharp pale features. David Anderson, a visiting businessman from the Midwest, representing some company that manufactured farm machinery. A big company and he was high up in it. Best of all, he didn’t live here. She could have a short affair, fuck another man, get Alessandro out of her mind and body and move on.
Twelve Quickies Of Christmas 12: Christmas Angel Page 1