by Anne Mather
Emma stared at him, and despite her surroundings, and the hopelessness of her situation, her heart leapt. So she had not been wrong about Cesare after all. He was not a member of a drug-smuggling gang, but something entirely different.
‘And so you see, Miss Maxwell,’ went on the Moor, ‘when your good friend walks in here, so unsuspecting, he will be walking into imminent danger. There is not a chance that I would let him go free, knowing conclusively who I am.’
Emma’s stomach turned over, and she felt sick.
‘But if he is a member of the Intelligence service, surely any information he has will be shared by the other members of the organization.
The Moor shrugged. ‘Only up to a point. No one else knows his contacts; no one else knows this hideout. Kavir will find him and bring him to me.’
Emma clenched her fists tightly, her mind searching for holes in his argument.
‘And before you think of it,’ he said, smiling, ‘there will be no give-away homing devices attached to his person on his arrival here. We are not so stupid as they think.’
Emma slumped. Everything the Moor had said was true, and it seemed unlikely that either of them would get out alive.
Suddenly there was a sharp rap at the door, and the Moor gestured to the man beside Emma, who immediately slapped his hard, dirty hand across her mouth. When one of the men moved to open it two men came in; one was Kavir, and the other was Count Vidal Cesare, looking lazily indolent as he followed the other man into the room. He looked supremely confident and Emma moved restlessly, trying to attract his attention.
His eyes swung swiftly round the room, taking in at a glance the tall massive figure of the Moor standing by the table, the other men sprawled around the table and Emma struggling to free herself. Then with superb assurance he crossed the room to the Moor and uncaring of the eyes upon him addressed Sidi Ben Mouhli.
‘At last we meet. I am addressing the Sidi Hassan Ben Mouhli, am I not?’
The Moor’s eyes glittered. ‘You are. And you are remarkably cool when one considers the hopelessness of your situation.’
‘Hopeless?’ The Count shrugged. ‘Oh, I hope not!’
‘Cool, but unconvincing,’ remarked the Moor, reseating himself.
Count Cesare’s eyes narrowed. ‘My mission here is to rescue the fair maiden,’ he replied lightly. ‘But in the process, there is no reason why we should not do each other a little good.’
‘Signor Count, you are doing me good just by being here,’ returned the Moor smoothly. He snapped his fingers. ‘Will you have some wine?’
‘Thank you, but no,’ Count Cesare put his hand into his pocket, and immediately the butt of a gun was thrust into the small of his back.
‘I think not,’ said the Moor, as his men searched the Count thoroughly, and produced a gun triumphantly from a shoulder holster. ‘Wait,’ said the Moor. ‘What were you to take out of your pocket?’
Cesare smiled, albeit a little dryly now. ‘Merely this,’ he said, and threw a linen bag on the table in front of the Moor.
The Moor opened it cautiously, examined the contents intently, and then frowned.
‘Hemp,’ he said slowly. Then he fastened the bag. ‘Thank you, Count Cesare. This will indeed increase my debt to you. Unfortunately, it is a little too late to try and regain your losses. Your presence here satisfies me completely. My business in Venice is now finished, or it will be when you and your little accomplice are disposed of.’
Count Cesare’s face did not mirror his racing thoughts, but the Moor laughed and signalled that the man might release Emma.
‘You see,’ he said, ‘I know all about you, Signor Count. Everything!’
Emma looked desperately at Cesare, and Cesare at last lost some of his indifference.
‘It would seem that I have behaved foolishly,’ he said slowly.
The Moor smiled grudgingly. ‘It would seem like that,’ he agreed. Suddenly the door burst open and another man came into the room.
‘Magnificence,’ he cried, ‘there are men everywhere! The warehouse is surrounded!’
Sidi Hassan Ben Mouhli got rapidly to his feet. ‘How is this?’ he thundered furiously. ‘Where were the guards? Surely the canals were watched?’
The man shook his head. ‘I don’t know, Magnificence. There are none of our men to be seen.’
The Count smiled a little sardonically, despite the fact that his common sense told him that this was the end so far as he and Emma were concerned. He ought to have known that Cortina was too much of an intelligence agent to be able to care one way or the other who was involved when the stakes were so high. He had agreed too amiably to his plan; he had felt then that it was too easy.
‘You should have asked your man Kavir where he caught up with me,’ he said to the Moor, ‘and he would have told you that I was on my way to find you. He did not stop to ask me whether I had met anyone on the way.’
‘You mean …?’ The Moor smote his fist down on the bare table. ‘Fool, imbecile!’ He glared at Kavir. ‘So this is the end, is it, my friend?’ He turned to Cesare. ‘In, other circumstances we might have been allies,’ he said, surprisingly. ‘You have qualities that I admire. Unfortunately, so far as you are concerned, this is as far as you go.’
He pulled a lethal-looking little revolver out of the folds of his gown and turned it on the Count. ‘Au revoir, and arrivederci,’ he murmured, and to Emma’s horror he pulled the trigger.
It is impossible to dodge a bullet fired at such close range, and even Cesare’s swift reflexes were not swift enough and he fell heavily to the ground.
‘You’ve killed him!’ Emma screamed, ignoring the man who tried to prevent her as she ran across the room and fell on her knees beside Cesare.
The Moor smiled. ‘What did you expect?’ he said coldly. ‘Are not traitors deserving of execution?’
‘He wasn’t a traitor,’ cried Emma, cradling Cesare’s head on her arms. ‘You are the traitors!’
The Moor’s eyes darkened, and she felt the stinging slap of his fingers across the side of her head.
‘No one speaks to me like that!’ he said violently. His eyes grew appraising. ‘Little English girl!’ His tone was sneering. ‘Perhaps we should not have wasted the day. Maybe I would have found you most entertaining –’
Emma was horrified, but even as he spoke there was the sound of voices outside on the canal, shouting and gunfire.
The men were restless and were gathered near the door.
‘Come, Sidi,’ said the man called Labul. ‘There is no more time. If we are to escape capture …’
‘Yes, yes,’ said the Moor. ‘I am coming. Come.’ He dragged at Emma’s arm. ‘You are coming with me!’
‘No!’ Emma’s eyes were wide with fear.
‘But yes, signorina, there is unfinished business between us.’
Despite her pleas and attempts to struggle free, Emma was dragged across the room, and down the back staircase to the wharf below where the launch waited. The men climbed in impatiently, eager to be gone, but the Moor seemed loath to leave, just like that. He glanced at the piles of crates nearby, and with deliberate enjoyment he lifted a can of petrol and sprinkled the contents lavishly over the wood. Then he lit a taper, and drawing back threw the flame into the petrol.
There was a violent explosion, all the worse for the enclosed space it occurred in, and Emma was thrown back against the side of the boat, hitting her head sickeningly, and then losing her balance and falling into the icy waters of the canal.
She could hear shouting and screaming as she surfaced, struggling weakly to stay afloat despite the buzzing of her head. Then she realized that the flames had completely engulfed the wharf and even the boat was on fire. Men were yelling and shouting and diving into the water around her, uncaring about her now in their own fear. Some had been caught by the flames, and Emma thought she could see the robes of Ben Mouhli burning on the quay.
Nauseated by the heat and smoke, she swam wildly for t
he low passage which led to the canal outside. Hampered by her clothes, and dizzy from the bump, she found the swim incredibly tiring.
Men were following her, but she didn’t care. The sunlight was outside and it was intensely desirable to feel the fresh air on her face again.
Then she remembered Cesare, lying dead on the floor above that burning inferno, and her heart felt as heavy as lead. It no longer seemed to matter what happened, whether she got out alive or dead. All meaning was gone from her life now.
She floundered, but was near the concrete of a wharf, and strong hands lifted her to safety. She stared at her rescuers blindly, and one of them said:
‘Miss Maxwell? Good,’ at her nod, ‘we’ll get you to safety now.’
‘Cesare,’ she began bleakly, and their faces changed. ‘We’ll find him,’ they said.
‘But he’s dead,’ she said, her voice breaking.
‘No, he’s not,’ said another voice behind her, and a big man lifted her chin smilingly.
‘He is, I tell you,’ she cried, shaking with misery. ‘I saw him. That … that Moor killed him. I saw him!’
The big man laughed. ‘It would take more than one bullet to kill Vidal Cesare,’ he said, sobering. ‘Thankfully I say this. For my name will be mud when he recovers.’
Later that day Emma was allowed to see Cesare in the hospital. They were keeping him in for a few days, despite his own assertion that he felt perfectly fit. The bullet had missed his heart by inches and had lodged itself in a lower rib. Its removal had been comparatively easy, and he was no longer in any danger of dying from the wound.
‘You frightened me so,’ she murmured, standing beside the bed, rather shakily.
‘I frightened myself,’ he remarked laughingly. ‘I really thought I’d had it.’
‘Oh, Cesare,’ she whispered, and turned, looking towards the door where Marco Cortina was standing. Cortina withdrew, and Cesare said:
‘So, Mouhli was too clever even for himself.’
‘Yes. Fortunately for us.’
‘For you mainly,’ said Cesare. ‘I at least would have recovered. If he had touched you …’ His voice was husky. ‘I … I’ve asked Celeste to leave.’
‘Have you?’ Emma twisted her hands.
‘Yes. That’s what you wanted, isn’t it?’
‘Me?’ Emma bit her lip. ‘What have I to do with it?’
Cesare half rose and then sank back as the wound pained him. ‘All right, Emma,’ he said thickly. ‘You can go now. But when I get out of here, we have some reckoning to do,’
Emma nodded, and left, while she still had the strength to do so. She still could not take it in. There had to be a catch somewhere. Miracles did not happen!
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
At the end of that unreal and strange week, the old Contessa died. Celeste had left the Palazzo, and Emma stayed on, despite her misgivings.
Cesare came home for the funeral, his arm still in a sling, but otherwise completely recovered. It was an unusually cold and dismal day, and afterwards when the mourners had left and only Emma and Cesare were alone in the huge lounge he said: ‘Let’s get this straight, shall we, Emma? I don’t ever want you to leave. I … I couldn’t live without you, not now.’
‘Do you think I want to go?’ asked Emma shakily. ‘But, Cesare, I’m not cut out to be a Contessa. I … I couldn’t live in this marvellous old palazzo, wonderful as it is, as its mistress. I’m just plain, ordinary Emma Maxwell.’
‘Emma, stop it,’ he muttered abruptly, turning away. ‘Look, I haven’t much money, I’m not wealthy. The Palazzo is my only asset. But I do have a villa in Ravenna, by the sea. If you could be happy there, then that’s where we’ll live. And you will be the Contessa Cesare, and I will be your adoring husband, if you’ll have me.’
‘Oh, Cesare.’ Emma pressed her hands to her cheeks. ‘But … but what about this place? This palazzo? You can’t give it up. It’s your birthright.’
‘It’s a millstone about my neck,’ replied Cesare briefly, lighting a cigarette. ‘I don’t want to live here any longer. I want to be free. And I want you.’ His eyes were dark and passionately brooding.
‘And Celeste?’ She had to know.
‘Was never anything to me. It was my grandmother’s idea.’
‘But the old Contessa … I mean … her dearest wish was that the Palazzo …’ Emma faltered.
Cesare half-smiled. ‘You sound as though you want to be free of me,’ he remarked sardonically.
‘Cesare! I … I only want you to be sure. I couldn’t bear it if you regretted it later.’
‘Regret marrying you?’ Cesare reached out and pulled her towards him. ‘I think not. As to the other, the morning you were captured the Contessa told me that she had been thinking it over and she had decided that the Palazzo was less than important compared to a person’s happiness. She said you had convinced her of that.’
‘Me?’
‘Yes. I think she guessed I was in love with you.’
‘Oh, Cesare, I’m so glad.’ Emma slid her arms round his neck. ‘And I’m sorry I doubted you. It’s been an awful week.’
‘But it’s over now,’ murmured Cesare, burying his face in the softness of her hair, feeling her instant response. ‘You realize your reputation will be in ruins if you stay here with me.’
‘Hmn. Who cares?’ murmured Emma, turning her face up for his kiss. ‘And you are going to make an honest woman of me, aren’t you?’
‘As soon as it can be arranged,’ said Cesare huskily.
They were married four weeks later, and left for a prolonged honeymoon in the West Indies. Emma was in seventh heaven, madly in love with her handsome husband, and supremely conscious of her own power over him. In the warmth of his love she grew tanned and beautiful, and Cesare took a delight in choosing her clothes himself and transforming her into a sophisticated socialite, while at other times, in tight-fitting jeans and sweaters, she looked like a teenager.
One lazy afternoon when they were lying in the shade of a beach umbrella on the silvery sands below the villa they had rented, Emma said:
‘Cesare, tell me, honestly, did you call at the Danieli that morning after we bumped into one another in the foyer?’
Cesare grinned. ‘Will you believe me?’
‘Yes, if you say it’s so.’
‘Then … yes … I did.’
‘But why?’
He shrugged. ‘I don’t know, I guess you looked so forlorn and lonely I felt sorry for you.’
‘Thank you,’ she retorted sarcastically.
‘No, really. Was that when Celeste had broken the news to you?’
‘Hm. I’d just met the Contessa for the first time, and I felt terrible about deceiving her.’
‘Oh? Well, I’d met Celeste, too, that evening, and I was afraid her presence, and the presence of her several million dollars in my palazzo might jeopardize my chances with the syndicate. They thought I was flat broke, willing to do anything for a dollar. Then I met you, and when you came to the Palazzo I thought I might use you as a decoy, you know, ignoring Celeste, and so on. Naturally, I made a complete hash of it, as I did of everything else.’
‘Except us.’
‘Even that. I almost lost you, through my own stupidity, and if Hassan Ben Mouhli had touched you …’ He whistled through his teeth. ‘Let’s not think about that.’
‘To think,’ she murmured incredulously, running her fingers through the hairs on his bare chest, ‘I almost lost you!’
‘But you didn’t,’ he murmured softly.
‘No. I think I’d have wanted to die if I hadn’t you to love.’
Cesare grinned sardonically. ‘Lots of men make love very satisfactorily, so I’m told,’ he remarked laughingly.
‘There is only you, so far as I’m concerned,’ whispered Emma quietly, half embarrassed at her own audacity.
‘And that’s how it should be,’ said Cesare, pulling her mouth down to his. ‘Did I tell you I find you very satis
factory, too?’
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IMPRINT: Mills and Boon Special Releases
ISBN: 9781488743382
TITLE: DARK VENETIAN
First Australian Publication 2014
Copyright © 2014 Anne Mather
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