The Count's Blackmail Bargain (4 page)

Well, she was fast coming to the conclusion that no amount of cash was worth the hassle that the next two weeks seemed to promise.

Although most of her concerns about Paolo’s future behaviour were largely laid to rest. The Signora, she thought with wry amusement, would prove a more than adequate chaperon. And if she had been in love with him, she’d have been faced with a frustrating time.

Her head was beginning to ache, and she reached down to her bag by the side of the bed for the small pack of painkillers she’d included at the last minute, and the bottle of mineral water she’d bought at the airport. It was lukewarm now, but better than nothing, she thought as she swallowed a couple of the tablets, then turned onto her side, resolutely closing her eyes.

The deed was done. She was in Italy, even if it wasn’t turning out to be a dream come true.

Whatever, she thought wearily. There was no turning back now.

Dinner that night was not an easy occasion. Paolo had announced plans to take Laura out for a meal, but the Signora had pointed out with steely insistence that this would be unwise, as they would be making an early start in the morning to avoid travelling in the full heat of the day.

So they ate in the formal dining room, at a table that would have accommodated three times their number with room to spare. It did not make for a relaxed atmosphere, and conversation was so stilted that Laura wished Paolo and his mother would just speak Italian to each other, and leave her out of the situation.

She realised, of course, that she was being grilled. Remembered too that she and Paolo had agreed to keep her actual personal details to a minimum. As far as the Signora was concerned, she was a girl who shared a flat with several others, and who enjoyed a good time. Someone, she hinted with a touch of coyness, who had not allowed for the sudden entry of Mr Right into her life. And she sent Paolo a languishing look.

And whatever slights and unpleasantness might come her way, Laura knew she would always treasure the memory of the

expression on the august lady’s face as she absorbed that.

She had rehearsed the invented story of how and when she and Paolo had met so often that she was word-perfect. After all, she needed to give the impression that theirs was an established relationship of at least two months’ standing, which deserved to be taken seriously, and might be ready to move on to the next stage.

For Steve, she thought with wry regret, substitute Paolo.

She even managed to turn some of the Signora’s more probing queries into her background back on themselves by ingenuously asking what Paolo had been like as a small boy, and whether there were any childhood photographs of him that she could see.

She had to admit the food was delicious, although she’d had little appetite for it. And when dinner was over they returned to the salotto, and listened to music by Monteverdi.

And that, thought Laura, was by far the most pleasant part of the evening, not just because her late father had loved the same composer, but because conversation was kept to a minimum.

She was just beginning to relax when the Signora announced in a tone that did not welcome opposition that it was time to retire for the night.

Paolo wished her a very correct goodnight outside the salotto, but when Laura, dressing-gown clad, returned from the bathroom, she found him waiting in her room.

She checked uneasily. ‘What are you doing here?’

‘I wished to speak to you in private.’ The grin he sent her was triumphant. ‘You are completely brilliant, carissima. Dio mio, you almost convinced me. And Mamma is in such a fury.’ He shook his head. ‘I have just overheard her on the telephone, and she was incandescente. She must be speaking to her old friend Camilla Montecorvo, because she mentioned the name Vittoria several times.’

‘Does that mean something?’ Laura felt suddenly tired, and more than a little bewildered.

‘Vittoria is the nuora—the daughter-in-law—of Signora

Montecorvo,’ Paolo explained, his grin widening. ‘She causes big problems, and Mamma has heard all about them. Always, she has been the one to give advice to Camilla. But now it is her turn to complain,’ he added gleefully. ‘And she insists that her friend must listen, and help her.’

He almost hugged himself. ‘It is all going as I hoped.’

‘I wish I could say the same.’ Laura bit her lip.

‘You are regretting Tuscany?’ Paolo shrugged. ‘It was an unwelcome surprise for me also. And Alessio has other houses he could have lent Mamma that are not as remote as Besavoro,’ he added, grimacing. ‘For instance, he has a place near Sorrento where he keeps his boat, but no doubt he will be using that himself.

He would not choose to stay anywhere near Mamma, so calm yourself on that point.’

‘You’re not a very close family,’ Laura commented.

‘Alessio likes to go his own way. Mamma tries to interfere.’ He shrugged again. ‘Maybe he is hoping she will stray too far from the house, and be eaten by the wolves.’

Laura stared at him. ‘You mean there are such things..actually running wild?’ Her tone held a hollow note.

‘Yes, and they are on the increase. And there are bears too.’ He laughed at her expression. ‘But they are mainly found in the national parks, and I promise you that they prefer orchards and beehives to humans.’

‘How—reassuring.’ Laura took a deep breath. ‘But it’s not just disappointment over Tuscany, Paolo. Or the thought of moving to some Italian safari park either.’

She gave him a steady look. ‘We shouldn’t have started this. If your mother’s so genuinely upset, it isn’t a game any longer. I feel we should rethink.’

‘For me, it has never been a game.’ Paolo smote himself on the chest. ‘For me—it is my life! I need my mother to know that my future is my own affair, and that I will not be dictated to by her or anyone. And that I am not going to marry Beatrice Manzone.’ He lowered his voice. Made it coaxing. ‘Laura—you promised you would help me. We have an agreement together. And it is going well. Just two weeks—that is all. Then you will be free. You will have had your Italian vacation, and also been paid. This is so easy for you.’

He dropped a hand on her shoulder, making her move restively.

‘After all,’ he went on persuasively, ‘what can possibly happen in two short weeks? Tell me that.’ He smiled at her, then moved to the door. ‘I tell you there is nothing to worry about.’ His voice was warm—reassuring. ‘Nothing in the world.’

CHAPTER THREE

LAURA did not sleep well that night. She was constantly tossing and turning, disturbed by a series of fleeting, uneasy dreams. Or, she wondered as daylight imposed itself at last, was she simply troubled by finding herself under the roof of a woman who cordially detested her—and with no reprieve in sight?

It was no particular surprise to find that the early start to Besavoro did not transpire. The car arrived punctually with Giacomo, its uniformed chauffeur, and there the matter rested while the Signora, after a leisurely breakfast, issued a stream of contradictory orders, made telephone calls, and wrote a number of last minute notes to friends.

Laura had discovered to her dismay that Caio was to accompany them and more time was wasted while Maria hunted the apartment for the special collar and lead he wore on holiday, and the new cushioned basket specially bought for the trip.

By the time the luggage was finally put in the car, Paolo looked as if he was about to become a basket case himself, Laura thought without particular sympathy.

It was one of the most luxurious vehicles she’d ever travelled in, but, seated in the back with the Signora and her dog in the opposite corner, she found it impossible to relax.

She’d expected another barrage of questions, and steeled herself to fend them off, but it didn’t happen. The Signora seemed lost in thought, and, apart from lifting his lip in the occasional silent snarl if Laura glanced at him, Caio seemed equally detached.

There were numerous stops along the way—comfort breaks for Caio featuring frequently. But there were also pauses to buy coffee, chilled mineral water, and, once, some excellent rolls crammed with ham and cheese, at the busy roadside service stations. The Signora did not deign to leave the car on these occasions, but Laura was glad to stretch her legs in spite of the heat outside the air-conditioned car.

Her back was beginning to ache with the tension of trying to remain unobtrusive, she realised wryly.

She’d chosen her thinnest outfit for the journey—a loose-fitting dress in fine cream cotton with cap sleeves and a modestly square neckline. She wore low-heeled tan sandals, and a broad brimmed linen hat that could be rolled up in her bag when she was in the car.

Apart from the obligatory sunblock, she’d put nothing on her face but a shading of mascara on her lashes, and a touch of light coral lustre to her mouth.

She tried to comfort herself with the reflection that the Signora might loathe her, but she couldn’t truthfully complain about her appearance. Still it seemed small consolation.

The car didn’t really need air conditioning, she thought ruefully.

Paolo’s mother could have lowered the temperature to arctic proportions with one look. And the cost of her brother’s school trip was rising by the minute. He’d better enjoy it, that’s all, she muttered under her breath.

But as they drove into Umbria she found herself succumbing to the sheer beauty of the scenery around her, all other considerations taking second place. Everywhere she looked seemed to be

composed of endless shades of green, and every hilltop seemed crowned with its own little town, clinging precariously to its rocky crag.

Half an hour later they reached Besavoro, which seemed to be hardly more than a large village on the bank of a river, which Paolo told her was a tributary of the Tiber. The central point was the square, where houses and shops huddled round a tall, ornate church. There was a market taking place, and the cramped space had to be negotiated with care.

Once free of the village, they began to climb quite steeply, taking a narrow road up the side of the valley. They passed the occasional house, but generally it was rugged terrain with a steep rocky incline leading up to heavy woodland on one side, and, on the other, protected only by a low wall, a stomach-churning drop down to the clustering roofs, and the river, now reduced to a silver thread, below them.

She remembered Paolo’s comment about a death trap, and

suppressed a shiver, thankful that Giacomo was such a good driver.

‘We are nearly there, signorina.’ To her surprise, Laura found herself being addressed by the Signora. The older woman was even smiling faintly. ‘No doubt you are eager to see where you will be spending your little vacation. I hope it lives up to your expectations.’

Any overture, however slight, was welcome, and Laura responded.

‘Has the house been in the family long?’ she enquired politely.

‘For generations, although it has been altered and extended over the years. At one time, it is said to have been a hermitage, a solitary place where monks who had sinned were sent to do penance.’

‘I know how they feel,’ Paolo commented over his shoulder. ‘I am astonished that Alessio should waste even an hour in such a place.

He has certainly never repented of anything in his life.’

His mother shrugged. ‘He spent much of his childhood here.

Perhaps it has happy memories for him.’

‘He was never a child,’ said Paolo. ‘And his past is what happened yesterday—no more.’ He leaned forward. ‘Look, Laura mia. You can see the house now, if you look down a little through the trees.’

She caught a glimpse of pale rose stonework, and faded terracotta tiles, and caught her breath in sudden magic.

It was like an enchanted place, sleeping among the trees, she thought, and she was coming to break the spell. And she smiled to herself, knowing she was being utterly absurd.

Impossible to miss the sound of an approaching car in the clear air, Alessio thought. His unwanted guests were arriving.

Sighing irritably, he swung himself off the sun lounger, and reached for the elderly pair of white tennis shorts lying on the marble tiles beside him, reluctantly dragging them on. For the past few days, he’d revelled in freedom and isolation. Basked in his ability to swim in the pool and sunbathe beside it naked, knowing that Guillermo and Emilia who ran the villa for him would never intrude on his privacy.

Now his solitude had ended.

He thrust his feet into battered espadrilles, and began walking up through the terraced gardens to the house.

Up to the last minute, he’d prayed that this nightmare would never happen. That Paolo and his ragazza would quarrel, or that Zia Lucrezia would love her as a daughter on sight, and withdraw her objections. Anything—anything that would let him off this terrible hook.

But her phone call the previous night had destroyed any such hopes. She’d been almost hysterical, he remembered with distaste, railing that the girl was nothing more than a gold-digging tart, coarse and obvious, a woman of the lowest class. But clever in a crude way because she obviously intended to trap into marriage her poor Paolo, who did not realise the danger he was in.

At the same time, she’d made it very clear that her threat to expose his fleeting affair with Vittoria, if he did not keep his word, was all too real.

‘I want the English girl destroyed,’ she had hissed at him. ‘Nothing less will do.’

Alessio had been tempted to reply that he would prefer to destroy Vittoria, who was proving embarrassingly tenacious, bombarding him with phone calls and little notes, apparently unaware that her voluptuously passionate body in no way compensated for her nuisance value.

If she continued to behave with such indiscretion, Fabrizio and his mother might well smell a rat, without any intervention from Zia Lucrezia, he told himself grimly.

He’d been thankful to escape from Rome, and Vittoria’s constant badgering, to this private hideaway where he could remain incomunicabile. He hoped that, during his absence, she would find some other willing target for her libido, or he might ultimately have to be brutal with her. A thought that gave him no pleasure whatsoever.