A Venetian Affair

by Catherine George

  ‘But you’re right. It’s true, Venice can be menacing, especially on quiet winter nights. Its history has been one of blood as well as romance, and even today there are times when an assassin seems to lurk around each corner, and peril haunts every shadow.

  ‘In the summer the tourists arrive and say, ‘‘How pretty! How quaint!’’ but if Venice were only pretty and quaint it would soon grow dull.’

  ‘Pretty and quaint are two words that never occurred to me,’ she said wryly. ‘That’s what sleeping on the stones can do for you.’

  His grin broadened into a laugh, and she realised how seldom there was real amusement in his face. It was there now, and it delighted her.

  ‘You have all my sympathy,’ he said. ‘Nowhere else are the stones as hard as ours. Venice is the loveliest city in the world, but it can also be the most cruel. And that’s why I wouldn’t live anywhere else. Does that sound crazy?’

  ‘No, I understand it. You can’t study art for long without knowing that anything that’s merely pretty grows tedious very soon.’

  He nodded.

  ‘In the same way, a woman who has only looks soon palls. Sadly, it takes a man time to understand that, and when he’s found out it may be too late. The woman with the dark, dangerous heart may be already beyond his reach.’

  She gave a wry smile.

  ‘That’s very nice talk, but aren’t you deluding yourself?’

  ‘Am I?’

  ‘How many men truly want a woman with a dark, dangerous heart?’

  ‘The discriminating ones, perhaps.’

  ‘And how many men are discriminating? You don’t need a dangerous heart to do the washing-up.’

  ‘You mean that it would be an attribute of a mistress, rather than a wife?’

  ‘I mean that you’re spinning glittering fantasies in the air. They have no reality behind them.’

  ‘I didn’t realise that you knew me so well.’

  The words were lightly spoken, but with a slight warning edge. In truth, she didn’t know him at all.

  ‘I like to choose my own fantasies,’ he said lightly. ‘And I decide what they mean.’

  His eyes challenged her. She met the challenge and threw it back, but she could think of no words that weren’t more perilous than silence.

  She glanced at Piero, afraid that she would find him regarding them with gleeful interest, but he was engaged in a mad flirtation with Celia, who was laughing at his jokes, and giving him extra food and wine. He consumed everything with gusto, especially the wine, and it was clear that he was soon headed for blissful oblivion.

  Seeing him so absorbed, she began to feel as though she were alone with Vincenzo, who didn’t take his eyes from her.

  ‘Why won’t you tell me who you are?’ he asked softly. ‘And why you are here. I might be able to help.’

  At one time she would have replied quickly that nobody could help her. Now she merely shook her head.

  ‘You’ll have to tell someone, some time. Why not me?’

  ‘Because you get too close.’

  ‘People who care should get too close. Don’t keep yourself shut away. Why are you smiling like that?’

  ‘Nothing,’ she said. ‘I wasn’t really.’

  ‘There you go again, hiding. You’re like someone who barely exists. I know only what you choose to tell, and, since that’s almost nothing, it’s like being able to see right through you. I don’t know your name or what brought you here, or why you try so hard to conceal yourself in the dark.’

  ‘The light frightens me,’ she whispered.

  ‘But why? You answer one question and a thousand others spring up. When will your mysteries end?’

  ‘They won’t. Vincenzo, please, it’s better if you don’t seek to know them.’

  ‘Better for whom?’

  ‘For both of us, but mostly for you.’

  ‘Then you already know what’s happening to me.’

  ‘Don’t. Don’t say it. Don’t think it. Don’t let it happen.’

  ‘Don’t you want to be loved?’

  ‘How can I tell? What is it like?’

  ‘Are you saying that no man has ever loved you?’

  ‘Please—’

  ‘No man has wanted to take you in his arms and lie with you, demanded the right to claim and possess you in every way?’

  ‘It doesn’t matter what they’ve wanted,’ she told him. ‘Who cares what men say? Only fools believe them. No, I’ve never been loved. I might have thought so, but we all have these little self-delusions.’

  ‘Until the truth breaks in at last,’ he agreed. ‘There’s nothing you can tell me about self-delusion. But the biggest self-delusion of all is to tell ourselves that we can manage without love in future.’

  ‘Look at my face,’ she said, drawing the hair back. ‘I’m an old woman.’

  ‘No, you’re not. There’s suffering in your face, but not age. You’re a young woman who’s learned to feel old inside.’

  She smiled in ironic acknowledgement. ‘You see too much.’

  His fingers brushed her hand, and she could feel in the light touch everything he was trying to say.

  ‘Don’t,’ she warned him. ‘Don’t reach out to me.’

  ‘Suppose I want to?’

  ‘But I can’t reach back. Can’t you understand? I have nothing to give.’

  His fingers possessed hers and he didn’t look at her directly as he said, ‘Perhaps I don’t want you to give, but to take.’

  ‘It makes no difference,’ she said sadly. ‘I no longer know how to do either. I forgot both long ago.’

  ‘How long?’

  She took a deep breath. ‘Six years, two months and four days.’

  The stark precision of the answer startled him.

  ‘And what happened, six years, two months and four days ago?’ he asked.

  ‘I packed my feelings away in an iron chest marked, ‘‘No longer required’’. Then I buried that chest too deep to be found again. I’ve even forgotten where it is.’

  ‘I don’t believe that. You’ll remember when you want to. Can’t I help you do it?’

  ‘I don’t want to remember,’ she whispered. ‘It hurts too much. Tell me, Vincenzo, how deep is your iron chest buried?’

  ‘Not as deep as I’d like. I find I can’t do without those feelings, even if they hurt. Better be hurt than dead inside.’

  ‘Meaning I’m a coward?’ she demanded swiftly.

  ‘I didn’t say that.’

  ‘You implied it.’

  ‘Why are you trying to quarrel with me?’ he asked quietly.

  ‘Perhaps because I really am a coward,’ she admitted after a moment. ‘I have so little courage left, and I need all of it.’

  ‘And I threaten it?’

  ‘Yes,’ she whispered. ‘Yes, you do.’

  She had said that she could not reach out, but she knew how fatally easy it would be to seek warmth from this man who seemed to have so much to give. But it would deflect her from her true purpose, and nothing must be allowed to do that.

  ‘You do,’ she repeated.

  ‘Don’t be afraid of me.’

  ‘I’m not afraid of you, but I will not let you in. Do you understand?’

  ‘I told myself the same thing about you, but somehow you got in.’

  ‘I wasn’t trying to,’ she said quickly.

  ‘I know. Maybe that’s how you managed it. You were there before I could put my defences in place.’

  ‘You’re forgetting that I don’t really exist,’ she said.

  She tried to speak lightly, but it was hard, and he made it harder by coming back swiftly with, ‘Sometimes I wish you didn’t. You’re trouble. I don’t know how or why, but you’re big trouble, and you’re going to throw my life in turmoil.’

  ‘Just ignore me.’

  ‘That’s a dishonest reply.’ For a moment he was angry. ‘You know it’s too late for that.’

  ‘Yes,’ she murmured after a moment. ‘Ye
s, it’s too late. It’s much too late.’

  Hours had passed. Customers were leaving the restaurant, and lights were going off. Lost in her awareness of Vincenzo, Julia hardly realised it was happening.

  A waiter approached them to say that Vincenzo was needed for some formality. When he’d gone Julia turned back to Piero, and found him, as she’d expected, deeply, blissfully asleep.

  Vincenzo returned as the last customer was leaving, and smiled at the sight of their friend.

  ‘He’d better stay here tonight,’ he said. ‘There’s a little room behind the kitchen where I sometimes sleep when I’m working late.’

  He summoned a waiter. Together they carried Piero through the kitchens into the tiny bedroom and laid him gently on the bed.

  ‘You’d better stay here, too,’ he told Julia. ‘You can have the apartment upstairs that Celia has just vacated.’

  He showed her up the narrow staircase into the tiny apartment. Celia had stripped the bed before leaving, and he helped her make it up.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘But there was no need for you to take so much trouble. I could have gone back.’

  ‘No,’ he said at once. ‘I don’t want you sleeping in that huge, empty place alone. I couldn’t feel easy about you.’

  ‘You don’t have to look after me,’ she said with a little smile. Then she gave a little laugh. ‘Except that you do, all the time, don’t you? I just hate admitting it, which isn’t very nice of me.’

  Her voice fell softly on his ears and caused an ache inside him. She worked so hard to keep her gentler side hidden that when she allowed him a sudden glimpse it caught him off guard.

  He came closer, looking at her with hot, dark eyes. He remembered another time when he’d looked at her like this. Then he’d held her in his arms, kissing her, and she had known nothing about it. She knew nothing now.

  She had felt soft and good against his body, and her lips had been sweet against his. That sweetness had taken possession of him, making him long to kiss her more deeply, although he’d known he must not do so while she was asleep. Instead he had kissed her eyes and her tears.

  But for her it hadn’t happened. That thought was very bitter to him.

  Unable to stop himself, he brushed her cheek with gentle fingers. She didn’t draw away, only looked at him sadly, quite still.

  ‘Vincenzo,’ she said at last.

  ‘Hush,’ he begged. ‘Say nothing.’

  His fingers continued their way down her cheek and across the soft contours of her mouth. He was entranced, absorbed by her, lost in her. He touched her cheek and her mouth again with fingertips that barely brushed them, yet which seemed to burn her.

  She tried to protest, but no words would come. She should stop him, but she lacked the will. This had been inevitable since a few hours ago, when she’d become aware of him as a man. She should have taken flight then, when there had still been time. Except that there had never been time.

  He was going to kiss her, and she wanted it with an intensity that shocked her. It was against every plan she had made, but suddenly that no longer mattered. She could feel her hands tightening on him, pulling him forward until his lips touched hers.

  They felt strangely familiar, as though they had kissed before in some other life. But in her other life there had been no kisses, no warmth or sweetness, or gentleness of lips teasing hers, part plea, part command, part exploration.

  ‘Who are you?’ he whispered against her lips.

  ‘It doesn’t matter,’ she said through her swimming senses. ‘I’m not real.’

  ‘You’re real now—in my arms.’

  ‘Only here,’ she whispered.

  ‘The rest doesn’t matter. Kiss me—kiss me.’

  She did as he wanted, finding that after the years alone she still knew how to tease and incite a man. It was an intoxicating discovery and it sent her a little wild.

  Now she allowed her hands and mouth to do as they pleased, and the things that pleased them were sensual, outrageous, experienced. He was right. This alone was real, and everything in her wanted to yield to it.

  With every movement she made Vincenzo felt shock flowing along his nerves. He’d suspected the fires inside and it had tormented him, but now he knew for certain. He’d partly discovered the truth that afternoon when he’d discovered that her breasts were surprisingly generous, given her apparently boyish figure.

  All the sensuality she normally kept banked down was flaming in his arms now, inciting him to explore her further, wanting more. He didn’t know her real name, but her name no longer mattered. This woman was coming back to life, and he knew that he, and no other, must be the man to make it happen.

  She kissed dreamily, but like a woman who understood a man’s body, and every soft touch lured him on. Entranced, he dropped his lips to the base of her throat, moving them in soft, teasing movements and sensing her heated response. His own response was roaring out of control.

  Only she could stop him now, and she made no attempt to do so. When he began to remove her clothes she trembled, but was removing his at the same time. It was she who drew him to the bed, and after that nothing could have stopped him.

  Chapter Five

  MY FIRST man in six years.

  The thought came to Julia as the dawn crept in. The night had been hot and fervent, and it had left her feeling at ease in a way she had forgotten. The sheer sense of blinding, physical release had at first stunned, then invigorated her.

  They had claimed each other again and again. After the first time it was she who had taken the initiative, voraciously demanding as she felt her body return to life. And he had responded with unflagging vigour.

  Six years of cramped frustration, deprivation, ending in one night of blazing fulfilment.

  Images came back to her: his body, hard, lean and strong, his love-making, a mingling of power and tenderness, with the power becoming predominant as he’d sensed her need.

  My first in six years. And before that—ah, well!

  Before that there had been passionate adoration given to the wrong man, who had betrayed it and left her with a smashed life to endure.

  She sat up, careful not to awaken Vincenzo, who slept silently and heavily, as though exhausted. It was a tight fit in the narrow bed, especially as he stretched out in abandon.

  He’d made love like that, she thought, with an abandon that had startled her, so different was it from the controlled surface he presented to the world.

  She hadn’t meant to take him to bed, so she told herself. Either that or she had meant it from the first moment. One of the two. Did it matter which?

  Their aggressive encounter in the attic had awoken in her a physical hunger, long suppressed, and satisfying it had become urgent.

  I didn’t think I was like that, she thought wryly. But I suppose after so long…

  He moved in his sleep and stretched out a hand, seeking until he encountered her skin. Then it stopped, lying gently against her as though nothing else in the world mattered.

  Strangely, it was that gesture that alarmed her. If he’d grasped her robustly she would have cheerfully returned to the fray. But the touch against her body was tender. It spoke of emotion, and she knew that emotion must be kept out of this. Only that way could she feel safe.

  After a moment she moved his hand away.

  Vincenzo stirred and stretched, almost pushing her out of the tiny bed. She laughed, clinging on for dear life, and he awoke to find her looking down at him. He grinned, remembering the night they had passed together.

  Her passion had astounded him. More accustomed to her mental and emotional defensiveness, he’d been taken aback by her sensual abandon. She’d given everything with fierce generosity and demanded everything with an equally fierce appetite. When he had been satiated she had been ready to start again.

  Now she looked fresh, light-hearted and mysteriously younger. There was even a teasing look in her eyes that had never been there before.

 
‘That was fun,’ she said.

  The words brought him back down to earth. ‘Fun’ described a race through the canals, a brilliant costume for Carnival. It bore no relation to the experience that had just shaken him to his roots.

  But he answered her in kind, speaking lightly.

  ‘I’m glad you feel the night wasn’t wasted.’

  She was silent, but shook her head, teasing.

  He reached out so that she could take his hand, then he would draw her closer for a kiss. But instead she laughed and got to her feet, looking around for something to throw over her nakedness. Finding his shirt on the floor, she seized that.

  ‘Spoilsport,’ he sighed.

  She chuckled and left the room, heading for the kitchen. He followed at once, catching up, putting his arms about her from behind, and nuzzling her hair.

  ‘All right?’ he asked softly.

  ‘Of course,’ she said brightly. ‘Everything’s fine.’

  He partly withdrew his hands, just as far as her shoulders. ‘That’s good,’ he said quietly.

  ‘Do you know how I make coffee in this kitchen?’ she asked with a laugh.

  ‘I’ll make it.’

  ‘Lovely. Then we’ll go down and see if Piero’s awake yet. He and I should be going soon.’

  He dropped his hands.

  ‘Whatever you say.’

  She turned suddenly. ‘There’s something you should know. Don’t expect too much from me just now. I’m not used to being in the land of the living. I’ve forgotten how things are done there.’

  He frowned, alerted by a new note in her voice, but not understanding it. ‘The land of the living? I don’t understand.’

  ‘For the last six years I’ve been in prison.’

  Julia had told Vincenzo that kicking the door in had been one of the great healing experiences of life, and it was true. With that one blow she had put her lethargy behind her, and was ready for the task that had brought her here.

  Walking home with Piero that morning, she bought a map, and studied it as soon as they were inside.

  ‘Can I help?’ he asked.

  ‘I want to go to the island of Murano.’