Lost Love Found (30 page)

“Sebastian! You must stop!”

“I want to make love to you,” he said frankly. “I know you are virtuous, Valentina. I suspect you have known no man but your late husband, but I must have you! From the moment I saw you this morning, I knew that I must have you! You enchant and bewitch me with your beauty and your strange innocence. I cannot remember the last time I felt this way about a woman.”

“The others …” She attempted to draw him away from the subject. “The others will be wondering what has happened to us, Sebastian.”

He laughed. “You will not deter me, madonna, but very well, I shall yield to your good sense this time.”

They moved down the side of the hill toward the pink villa and its gardens, which were also lit with silver torches. “Are you always so bold, so very determined in your desires, monseigneur?” Valentina asked.

“Are you not determined in your desires, madonna?” he returned.

“I have been very sheltered, and I have never known a man like you,” she told him truthfully.

“Nor I a woman like you, madonna. You look a man in the eye. You do not simper. You do not hide your intelligence. You quite fascinate me, and I am not ashamed to admit it,” he told her.

They were nearing the villa’s gardens, and to Valentina’s amusement, both Padraic and Tom were coming to meet them.

“They are very protective of you, your two cavaliers,” the duke noted with just the barest hint of humor in his deep, musical voice.

“You have paid me extravagant attention this evening, and they are quite jealous, I fear,” she told him.

“They have cause to be jealous, madonna,” he told her, and kissed her hand. “I will leave you here. Until tomorrow.” With a courtly bow, he turned and went up the hillside to his home.

“How kind of you to bring me the rest of the way,” Valentina said with false sweetness as her two suitors reached her.

“You look flushed, divinity,” said the earl, his voice strained.

“Did he kiss you?” demanded Lord Burke angrily. “He has no right!”

“You have no right, either of you, to interrogate me or comment on either my appearance or my behavior,” Valentina told them sharply. She swept by them and hurried into the villa.

Nelda, awaiting her, chattered brightly as she showed her mistress to her apartment. “Isn’t this just lovely, m’lady? Tis so nice to be in a room that don’t rock! Isn’t this the dearest little house? The gardens are ever so nice, and so are the servants, even if I can’t understand a word they’re saying! It sounds like so much jibber-jabber. But they never stop smiling.”

Valentina’s rooms were beautiful, airy, and spacious, looking out over the gardens and the sea, which was silvered with moonlight. The salon held gracefully carved furniture and the marble floors were covered with magnificent carpets of blues and golds. The bedchamber was equally lovely, and the bed was hung with coral-colored silks.

“And look here, m’lady! I’ve never seen anything like it!” Nelda opened a small door set almost invisibly into the bedchamber wall. “The captain says ’tis a bathing chamber! Imagine! A whole room just for washing yerself! Me mum won’t believe it, will she, m’lady?”

Valentina laughed. “I promise to back your word, Nelda. After all, the queen’s godson, Sir John Harrington, built Her Majesty a water closet inside the palace. A bathing room seems little different, though nicer.” Valentina’s gaze swept the little bathing room. Its walls were of pale green marble, as was the round pool set directly in the center of the room and sunk into the green marble floor. Above the bathing pool was a round glass window through which Valentina could see the night sky.

“The water’s nice and warm,” Nelda said, breaking into her mistress’s thoughts. “I stuck my hand in it. Now, how do you suppose they do that?”

“If I remember my history lessons,” Valentina mused, “there is a water tank beneath the room that rests just above an open coal stove. They had baths like this in ancient times. And remember, this land was part of that ancient world, Nelda.”

“A coal stove to heat the water! If that don’t beat all!” the saucy servant exclaimed.

Valentina laughed again. Nelda was such a cheerful little thing. “It is assuredly easier than hauling buckets of hot water, which sometimes cool off while they’re being hauled,” she told Nelda.

“But how do they get the water into the pool, m’lady?”

“It is piped in, Nelda. See the gold spigots on the side of the bathing pool? The ones shaped like swans?”

“Well, if that don’t beat all!” Nelda repeated. “Ma ain’t gonna believe a word of this! I don’t care what you say, she just ain’t!”

San Lorenzo offered a peaceful and charming interlude. The duke redeemed himself somewhat with Lord Burke and Lord Ashburne by taking them hunting in the mountains behind Arcobaleno. They were gone for three days, during which time Valentina explored the town thoroughly, indulged her passion for bathing in the fragrant warm waters of the bathing pool, and rested. She saw Murrough only in the evening, for his days were taken up with supervising the provisioning of their little flotilla.

The Royal Bess
had sprung a small leak when the anchor crashed into the ship just beneath the water line, where there was a bit of rotted wood. Murrough insisted that the leak be repaired and the ship inspected for any additional rot. He would not sail until that was done, for even a minor leak could cause serious trouble in a storm. Murrough was too good a captain to endanger either a crew or a ship. The repair meant a slight delay, which the visitors to San Lorenzo found no great hardship.

Two days before their scheduled departure, just after the hunting party returned to Arcobaleno from their mountain retreat, a winter storm bore down fiercely on the duchy of San Lorenzo. It rained so hard that night that they could not join the duke for supper, and when a jagged streak of lightning tore across the sky followed by a rumble of thunder, Valentina reminded the others, “Thunder in winter is the devil’s thunder, it is said. I am grateful we’re not out at sea.”

“I’ve ridden out worse storms,” said Murrough casually.

The wind rose as the evening lengthened and was howling noisily about the pink villa by the time they were ready to retire. At every crack of thunder and its accompanying flash of lightning, Nelda crossed herself.

“Do you not like storms, Nelda?” teased the earl in an effort to relax the girl.

“Not good, honest English storms, m’lord, but this foreign storm, well, I guess I’m a mite edgy,” she replied bravely.

“There is no need to worry,” Lord Burke assured the servant. “We are safe within a marble building. Come, Nelda. Look out the window. The storm over the sea is very beautiful viewed safely from our elegant shelter.”

With some coaxing from her mistress, Nelda stood with the others, gazing out, fascinated by the lightning. She had never considered that one might actually stand and watch a storm. Everyone sheltered from a storm until it was over, didn’t they?

Suddenly, a great flash of lightning hurled itself from the black sky and, for a moment, the world was as bright as day. There was a loud crack as the lightning found a target, and even from where they were, they could hear the sound of splintering wood.

“Jesu! Mary!” Murrough swore ferociously. “ ’Tis one of the ships! I know it! Nelda, lass, get my cloak! Hurry!”

“You cannot go out in this, cousin,” Valentina protested.

“Do you not understand, Val? Tis one of our ships that has been damaged!” Murrough said impatiently.

“
Has
, Murrough,
has
been damaged. The injury is already done, whatever it may be, and you can do nothing to prevent it now. Your first mate is in command. If he needs you, he will send for you. Wait at least until you hear from him, or until the storm is over.”

“She’s right, Murrough,” Padraic said. “ ’Tis what Mother would do.”

“Hah! Mother would rush out into the storm just as I would like to do,” Murrough replied. “But given your good advice, Mother just might listen to reason, and so shall I.”

The storm blew itself out in the early hours of the morning, and the day dawned clear and warm. After hurrying down to the harbor before the sun rose, Murrough discovered that Archangel had been hit. One of her masts had been split in two by the lightning. It was not, fortunately, the main mast, but a smaller one that could be replaced with material available on San Lorenzo, though it would take two to three weeks to do so.

The voyagers were not happy. Murrough, like Valentina, was anxious to continue on their odyssey. Both Padraic Burke and Tom Ashburne were concerned by the attention paid Valentina by the duke. Why, the wench even seemed to be enjoying herself despite her protestations of wanting to get underway as quickly as possible. They could not complain to the duke about his actions, for the man was their host.

There had been hot caresses in the duke’s gardens within a rose arbor. Twice he had managed to fondle her plump, wonderful breasts, to bring soft cries of pleasure to her lips, even as she protested his bold hands with her own hands and pleading amethyst eyes. His own hunger rose wildly on each occasion, pressing hotly against his clothing.

The days had slipped by. One week. Two weeks, and now the day of their departure had been set for two days hence.
Archangel
was fully repaired and being provisioned once again. Valentina was relieved. It had grown increasingly hard to put the duke off, for he was incredibly persistent in his pursuit of her. She had been perilously near, she frankly admitted to herself, to succumbing to him on several occasions, for she could not help but be curious about his attributes as a lover. She was not a wanton by nature, but Valentina’s brief encounter with Padraic had opened a Pandora’s box of curiosity for her.

“I think it a good thing that we leave in two days,” Valentina told Padraic. “You have come perilously close to insulting the duke, and we cannot go on like this.”

“Do you not wish your virtue protected?” demanded Lord Burke.

“I am quite capable of defending my own virtue, Padraic,” Valentina answered irritably.

“I am not so certain of that, divinity,” Lord Ashburne told her. “For once I must agree with Padraic. Our host presumes too much. Without a doubt, the fellow is a scoundrel.”

Overhearing them, Murrough, who had just returned to the villa from the waterfront, spoke up. “Not really, Tom. You must understand that Sebastian is used to getting his way, for he is a ruler. Then, too, he is, by reputation, quite a lover. I can imagine the rebuff to his pride that my fair cousin has caused him.”

“You are ridiculous, all of you,” Valentina said. “The duke has been a perfect gentleman. He has asked for nothing, and I have given him nothing. I am quite able to look after myself, and I very much resent being spied on by two buffoons with the manners of schoolboys!”

“You little fool!” raged Lord Burke. “Do you think your short stay at court, cloistered as you were with the queen’s ladies, has given you the wisdom of the world? The duke would seduce you in a minute if only he believed he could get away with it! It is the constant presence of these two
buffoons
that has saved you, Val. What a pity you are not wise enough to see that.”

“Aye, divinity!” put in the earl. “If Padraic and I joust with one another over you, at least you may be certain that our intentions are honorable. We each love you, and we each hope to make you our wife, though one of us will, of necessity, fell by the wayside. The duke’s intentions are of a different nature. As a man well schooled in the art of seduction, I can assure you that what I say is true.”

Murrough could see that Valentina was prepared to give battle, so he said quickly, “Let us not argue among ourselves. In two days we will once again be at sea, and ’twould be a shame to be angry with one another over such a trifle as the duke.” His blue eyes twinkled at his cousin. “I know you are competent to handle Sebastian, Val. Do not be angry with these two. They are jealous and fretful at the thought that another man might engage your heart.”

“I suppose I should be flattered,” grumbled Valentina. Then she laughed. “Very well, Murrough, I shall not be angry. I shall instead indulge myself once again in my bathing pool, for it is one of the things I shall miss when we leave San Lorenzo.”

“And what are the other things, divinity?” demanded Tom Ashburne.

“What, indeed, my lord?” she answered, and, with a mischievous smile, sauntered off toward her apartment, humming.

Lord Burke’s visage was thunderous, and only his older brother’s warning look kept him from going after her. “She is the most irritating vixen,” he growled angrily.

“If she so arouses your ire, Padraic, then perhaps you should leave her to me,” teased the earl with a wicked grin.

“Go to hell, my lord!” was the furious reply.

Murrough burst into laughter at the antics of the two, and his sibling sent him a dark scowl.

“Do you think,” Padraic asked Murrough, “that our mother aroused her gentlemen to such heights?”

“I cannot remember my father,” said Murrough, “but I do remember yours. Niall had a tendency to react when Mother irritated him in very much the same way you do when Val irritates you.”

“Hmm,” said Lord Burke thoughtfully. “I find it interesting that none of our mother’s daughters is very much like Mother, even our headstrong Velvet. Yet Valentina’s behavior bears striking similarities to our mother’s.”

Murrough chuckled. “Aye,” he concurred, “I’ve noticed.”

“I remember my father speaking of your mother,” said Tom. “She cut quite a swath through court in her heyday, didn’t she?”

“Aye!” the brothers agreed, each smiling with his own particular memory of Skye O’Malley. “She did, indeed!”

The visitors were invited to dine that night at the palace. The skies above the balustraded terrace were like black silk sewn with sparkling gemstones, for the waning moon had not yet risen. The meal was delicious, and afterward a troupe of Gypsies entertained them. Valentina had never seen Gypsies like these before, for the tinkers who came to her parents’ estate were very English. This group was very different in appearance and manner: dark-haired and swarthy with strong, handsome features and bold ways.