Rose Red (15 page)

It was all she could do to hide her
excitement from the others, especially from Bianca, who was always
aware of her moods. She managed it by the simple strategy of
keeping silent. It did occur to Rosalinda that, without wanting to,
she was learning the ways of courtiers and of intrigue as Eleonora
had described those skills to her daughters out of her own youthful
experience. There was much to be said for the patience and silence
that Eleonora recommended, though Rosalinda did regret the loss of
freedom involved in thinking carefully before she spoke and in
waiting patiently for something to happen when she much preferred
to take immediate action to make things happen. She told herself a
private visit with Andrea would be worth her efforts during the
day.

At last the ladies and Bartolomeo retired for
the night and the villa was silent. Rosalinda waited a bit longer,
just to be sure everyone was asleep. When she thought it was safe,
she wrapped a heavy shawl around her shoulders over her linen
nightgown and took up a lighted candle.

Walking in her bare feet for quietness, she
made her way along the corridor, tiptoeing past the suite of rooms
used by Eleonora and the smaller suite where Bartolomeo and Valeria
slept. At the end of the corridor, the door to the servants’ stairs
swung open on well-oiled hinges. Rosalinda stepped onto the
landing, pulling the door partly shut behind her but leaving it
unlatched for a quieter exit.

In front of her, the stairs led down into the
darkness of the lower level of the house. To her right they
proceeded upward. Gathering the skirt of her nightgown in one hand
so she would not trip on it, and holding the candle high in the
other hand, Rosalinda began to climb.

There was no door at the top. The steps
simply opened out onto a hall. Rosalinda knew this uppermost floor
of the villa well, for she and Bianca had often played there when
they were children, and periodically Eleonora decided the rooms
must be cleaned and her daughters must help. Rosalinda looked along
the floor of the hall, seeking a sign of candlelight showing
through a crack at the bottom of one of the doors leading to
servants’ bedrooms. She found what she sought beneath the third
door on her left. Going to it, she rapped twice, waited a moment,
and rapped twice more, giving the signal to open as she had heard
Bartolomeo describe it to Andrea.

She heard a sound from within, as though
someone was startled at being disturbed so late at night. Then,
very quietly, the latch was drawn back and the door opened.

Poised to defend himself, Andrea was holding
his dagger with the red-and-gold hilt. He wore only his linen
shirt, and his hair was in such disorder that Rosalinda decided he
must have pulled the shirt over his head in haste before opening
the door. The candle in her hand threw light upon his cheekbones
and his high-bridged nose. He looked freshly shaven and he was so
sharp-eyed that Rosalinda knew he had not been asleep. He stared at
her as if he could not believe she was standing before him.

Rosalinda took advantage of his surprise to
push past him and into the room. He peered into the hall behind
her. Apparently satisfied that no one else was with her, Andrea
turned back to find her firmly planted in the middle of the room.
Her candle sat beside his on a small table next to the bed, the
twin flames sending flickering light and shadow across the
whitewashed walls. Andrea laid his dagger on the table, ready to
his grasp should he need it. Rosalinda caught her breath at the
silent implication that he believed danger lurked even here, in his
Spartan room.

Then his eyes met hers. They gazed at each
other in silence until Rosalinda spoke, forgetting the caution she
had learned since first meeting him, forgetting everything save her
love for this man, and her anger at him.

“Why am I not supposed to know you are at
Villa Serenita?” she demanded in a harsh whisper. “You promised to
return to see me, yet now that you have come back, you keep your
presence a secret from me.”

“Rosalinda.” He lifted one hand as if to
touch her cheek. Before he made contact with her skin, he pulled
his hand back, clenching it into a fist at his side. “Surely you
know what you risk by coming here to me, at so late an hour,
wearing only your nightgown?”

“And a warm shawl.” She pulled it more
closely about her shoulders. Her bare feet on the wooden floor were
cold. She told herself that was why she was trembling.

“You must leave at once,” Andrea said. “If
anyone heard you prowling about and followed you, your reputation
will be in ruins before morning.”

“No one followed me. Even if someone had,
there is no person in this house who would spread gossip about me.”
She glared at him, fully aware that he could see how she was
shaking. But it was all from anger now. Furious at his chilly
reception when she had expected a warm embrace and words of
affection, she spoke with her own calculated coldness, each word
falling separate and distinct into the space that separated
them.

“Do not attempt to change the subject,
Andrea. If I had not accidentally heard your voice this afternoon,
I would never have known about your secretive visit.”

“You were eavesdropping,” he accused her.
“How else could you know the signaling knock Bartolomeo
suggested?”

“Not eavesdropping. Waiting for you. As I
have been waiting for almost three months. Waiting for you to tell
Bartolomeo that you intended to see and speak to me, no matter what
he said. But it seems that you will speak to him, and to my mother,
but not to me. Why, Andrea?”

“You don’t understand,” he protested.

“That is what I have just said. Explain to me
what I do not understand.”

“I cannot.” His mouth was hard, closing
tightly on the clipped words.

“You do not trust me. You think I am a
foolish girl who will tell everything she knows to anyone who asks
a question of her.”

“It’s not that I don’t trust you,” he
insisted. “It’s because I have sworn an oath not to speak to you or
Bianca about what I am doing.”

“You told me that what you were doing was
seeking your brother’s killer.” Rosalinda halted on an indrawn
breath, because one of his words had just rung a warning bell in
her mind. “An oath, you say? And it is intended to protect Bianca
and me? Then it must have been sworn to my mother.”

“I owe her a great favor,” he said, “in
return for taking me into her house and saving my life.”

“It was I who brought you inside,” she
reminded him. “Everyone else thought you were a wild beast. The
others would have left you to die outside, in the cold. I think the
favor you spoke of is owed to me. You may repay it by speaking
honestly.”

“I haven’t forgotten what you did, Rosalinda.
But even for you, I cannot break my word to the Duchess
Eleonora.”

“The duchess? Oh, Andrea, what have you
discovered and what have you promised to do?” She sank down on his
hard, narrow bed. “Shall I tell you what I think?”

“Please, let it go. Don’t say anything more.”
He went to the single window and rested his hand on the latched
shutter as if he would fling it wide to gulp the fresh outside
air.

“Better not open that,” Rosalinda warned.
“Someone might see the candlelight and wonder who is in the
servants’ quarters.”

Andrea could not have missed the blatant
sarcasm in her words. With a muttered curse that expressed deep
frustration, he left the window to kneel before her.

“Go now,” he commanded. “For your own good,
return to your bed and say nothing about my presence here.”

“You know who we are,” she said, refusing to
respond to his order. “You have seen my father’s portrait in the
sitting room. You have recognized my mother as the Duchess
Eleonora. I am amazed that you were allowed to leave Villa Serenita
alive.”

“Your mother had -” He stopped.

“Yes, she had extracted your oath of silence.
Furthermore, she had a mission for you. That is why you were sent
with a letter to Luca Nardi. You see, I am not a complete fool. I
can reason as well as anyone else in this house.” Rosalinda’s mouth
twisted with her disdain for all secretive intrigues. She could not
bear to think of Andrea caught up in a plot that would put his life
in danger, and the idea that he was keeping secrets from her was
even more distressing.

“Why don’t you tell me the truth, Andrea?”
She watched his face as she spoke, seeking confirmation of all she
knew to be fact and, in addition, what she so far had only guessed
at. She did not miss the way he quickly hid his feelings behind a
bland expression.

“Everyone who knows her knows my mother’s
dearest dream,” Rosalinda said. “That dream is to take back
Monteferro from those Guidi upstarts, then to marry Bianca to a
strong man who will hold the city with Bianca as his duchess. Are
you to be that man, Andrea? Are you to be the next Duke of
Monteferro, with my sister for your wife?” she demanded, her voice
rising out of control.

“No! Be silent.” Andrea clapped a hand over
her mouth, cutting off her too-loud words. Rosalinda struggled, but
there was no real contest. Andrea was far stronger than she. The
most she could do was pull him down until he sat awkwardly beside
her, his left arm across her shoulders, his right hand still on her
mouth.

“Will you be quiet and let me explain before
you rouse the entire house?” he demanded.

Rosalinda was tempted to bite the side of his
hand, but he was looking at her so beseechingly that she did not
have the heart. She nodded her agreement instead and Andrea took
his hand away.

“I remain bound by the promise of secrecy I
made to your mother,” he began. “So I will say only that you have
guessed a part of the truth.”

“My mother has set you the task of taking
back Monteferro for her. The message you carried to Luca Nardi was
her order to Luca, telling him to give you the money you will need
to raise an army, and also to give you any information he may have
that will help you succeed.” Rosalinda’s heart was aching as she
worked out the details of the scheme. “I suppose Mother has also
promised you shall have Bianca as your wife, so that after you
conquer Monteferro you can hold it legitimately in Bianca’s
name.”

They were sitting side by side, their faces
turned toward each other, their noses almost touching while they
hissed and snarled their claims and accusations, trying to keep
their voices low yet unable to do so because they were both
fighting emotions that threatened to break through and overpower
them.

“I don’t want Monteferro,” Andrea growled.
“Nor do I want Bianca. What do I have to do to make you believe
me?”

“I am not sure I can be convinced,” she told
him. “In fact, I am beginning to believe that everything you said
to me on your last night here was a lie.”

“I do not tell lies.” Andrea’s face flushed
at the insult and he spoke through gritted teeth. “Especially not
to you.”

They were so close, with their shoulders and
thighs touching. Rosalinda was aware of his warmth. He had not
stopped to pull on his hose before he answered her knock, so his
legs and feet were bare beneath his shirt. He moved as if to rise
from the side of the bed, and his foot brushed against Rosalinda’s
ankle.

She caught the front of his shirt in her
fist, holding it so he could not pull away from her without tearing
it. He paused with one knee on the bed and his other foot on the
floor. Something told Rosalinda that if she let him go now, he
would be forever lost to her. They were both so angry, she at the
truth of the secret she had inadvertently uncovered, and he that
she had dared to seek him out and then to challenge him, that a
desperate act was required to salvage the sweeter emotions that had
risen between them during the early winter. An ancient, atavistic
female knowledge woke in Rosalinda’s heart, telling her what she
must do, spurring her next actions.

“Exactly what are your feelings for me,
Andrea?”

“I have told you,” he began.

“Don’t tell me,” she interrupted. “Show
me.”

“
I warn
you—”

“Don’t warn me. Show me,” she said again.
While she continued to hold tightly to his shirt, she lifted her
other hand to brush his hair off his forehead. She let her
fingertips trail down the side of his face. He shuddered in
response to her touch.

“If I dare the slightest part of what I want
to do,” he whispered, “if I indulge in the least kiss or caress,
then we will be lost, for I have not ceased to think of you since
the day I went away. And I tell you now, Rosalinda, those thoughts
were far from pure.”

“
If you
do not kiss me, then I will be forced to kiss you.” With a delicate
touch she outlined his mouth and when she was done, she inserted
her little finger between his lips. His reaction was a groan that
rose from deep in his chest. Rosalinda saw a flame leap in his eyes
until his usual soft brown gaze changed into a blaze that scorched
her – and that aroused in her an answering fire. She ran her tongue
across her lips and watched his mouth part in response to what she
did. Yet still he clung to his control.

‘‘Let go of my shirt,” he whispered.

“You will have to pry my fingers off, one by
one,” she told him. Nearly overcome by the potent combination of
mystery and tough maleness that Andrea represented, Rosalinda let
herself fall backward until her head rested on his pillow.

“You are innocent. You cannot know what you
are doing,” he said.

“I know that I want you to kiss me, and to
put your arms around me. How can I be completely innocent after the
way you kissed me and touched me in the garden on that last, cold
night? I want you to touch me that way again.”

“This is too much for any man to bear.” He
groaned. “If I do not kiss you, I will die.”