The Wrong Way to Catch a Rake, page 8
‘Life is horrid. It was that or a convent. I don’t know what she would have preferred, in truth. It saved the ducal fortunes for a while, but my grandfather quickly went through her dowry as well.’
‘Was she very miserable?’
‘Not really. Her own father had been very strict and she loved London. She was beautiful and vivacious and she very quickly discovered her husband did not in the least mind if she took lovers since he had plenty of his own. Dommy—that was what I called her—was full of fun.’
‘You knew her well?’
‘Very well. She raised me after my mother died in childbirth when I was two years old. Dommy’s house was always lively. She loved music and made friends among musicians and artists and there was always noise and...activity in her house. She even turned one of the drawing rooms into a studio for artists and she would model for them in the nude. She was considered very scandalous, but because she was Italian and a duchess it was almost expected of her.’
‘And you grew up amidst all this?’
‘It seemed perfectly normal to me. She enjoyed being the centre of attention and she was proud of her body and her wit and wanted me to be the same. I was painted more times than I can recall. I suppose quite a few cherubs and young Davids are modelled after me. Artists enjoy free models.’
‘Did you enjoy it?’ Her words were tentative, but they demanded an answer. Long lost memories popped up above the surface. Standing on the raised dais, the wood hard beneath his bare feet, his muscles aching from the pose and a wreath of leaves scratchy against his forehead. Someone turning him, touching him, someone telling him to raise his arm, bend his leg, everyone watching, eyes wide, like owls perched on their stools, their paintbrushes like evil wizards’ wands...
He remembered the cold.
‘No.’
‘Did she know that?’
‘No. She loved that people lined up to paint me. It made her happy. So I didn’t mind.’
‘But you did mind. You weren’t like her.’
I wanted to be.
He was still sensible enough not to say that. He smiled and shrugged.
‘It was long ago. I dare say there were plenty of things you did for your parents that you didn’t wish to do.’
The compassion in her eyes slipped behind her barriers as he’d hoped, but the intelligence was there.
‘That is true. But when I was seven I realised they were wrong about the world.’
‘Seven? That is precocious. What did they do?’
‘Told me that God hated people who read the books I wanted to read. I told them I would choose a god who didn’t read over other people’s shoulders and turn up his nose at them like a censorious old biddy.’
‘Good for you, Rosie. Though I suppose they weren’t too pleased with your answer.’
She smiled. ‘No. I learned to keep my opinions to myself after that.’
He straightened, as alert as if a knife had just been pressed to his throat. ‘What did they do to you?’
She hesitated, looking out towards the basilica. ‘Nothing dramatic. I was given a week of solitude to consider my blasphemy.’
He moved closer, oblivious to the flow of humanity around them. ‘They locked you in your room for a week?’
‘Not in my room. That was my first visit to the redemption closet where “the rebellious dwell in a parched land”, subsisting on a daily cup of water, dry bread, and plenty of prayer. When I pointed out the next verse was all about God knowing what we really need in our heart, which in my case was my books, they added two more days. So you can see why I enjoy reading Cleland’s book in church.’
There was laughter in her tigerish eyes, but he felt only a vicious outrage for that girl. He wanted to reach through time and crush her parents’ bones, one by one.
She smiled, canting her head to one side. ‘You look very fierce. There’s no need. As you can see, I am quite in one piece and perhaps all the better for having my illusions starved out of me. A world without gods makes a great deal more sense to me. Very freeing. I enjoy my life.’
‘Yes,’ he said slowly. There was definitely an air of contentment about her; a sense of peace that made no demands on anyone but herself. Perhaps that was why he felt so comfortable with her. Unjudged.
‘But it was different for you,’ she continued with that disconcertingly direct gaze. ‘You loved your grandmother. I don’t know that I ever loved my parents. Milly was always more my parent than they were.’
‘Milly?’
‘Lady Grafton. I suppose she was to me what your grandmother was to you. What happened to your Dommy?’
‘She fell afoul of one of her lovers and he strangled her and then threw himself into the Thames.’
Her mouth rounded into a shocked O. ‘Oh, no, that is terrible! How old were you?’
‘Eight, I think. Perhaps nine.’
‘I’m so sorry, Dominic.’
‘You needn’t sound so agonised. That was aeons ago, swee—Phoebe. Old history.’
‘Losing the woman who was a mother to you is never old history.’
He sighed and continued down the bridge. ‘I shouldn’t have told you any of this. Now you’ll put it in the box of reasons why I’m the feckless fool I am. I don’t want your pity, Phoebe.’
‘Sympathy isn’t pity.’
‘It is still annoying.’
‘Says the expert at annoying people.’
‘I am rather good at it, aren’t I?’
‘As good as you are at evasion.’
‘Not as good as you on that front. You’re the master, or mistress, of making yourself invisible. Down to the spectacles that you don’t need to read.’
‘I do need them.’
‘You didn’t wear them in the basilica.’
She drew a short, sharp breath. ‘You...you unsettled me.’
He had?
‘I thought I annoyed you.’
‘That, too. I forgot them in my room, but I was determined not to give you the satisfaction of thinking that you’d made me give up my reading. I can read without them, but the words are a little blurry and it gives me a headache.’
‘So I annoyed you, unsettled you, and gave you a headache.’
She cast him a quick sideways smile. ‘That sums it up nicely.’
He almost told her she had the same effect on him, but self-preservation finally intervened. They’d reached Campo San Stefano and children were playing with a stuffed leather ball by the statue in its centre, watched by a group of old men. A strong kick sent the ball speeding their way and he kicked it back, angling it through the gap between the wooden chairs at the other end of the square. The boys and old men cheered with a great deal of hand waving.
‘Nico! Vieni, vieni a giocare!’
‘Non adesso,’ he called back and turned her towards the narrow road behind the palazzo.
‘They seem to know you well.’
‘I told you, I like calcio. My grandmother taught me.’
‘Your grandmother may have been imperfect, but she sounds like a most amazing woman. Nico.’
‘She was.’ He almost told her Dommy would have liked her, but they’d reached the door to the palazzo courtyard and good sense finally prevailed. ‘Thank you for an enjoyable afternoon, Miss Brimford.’
‘Likewise, Lord Wrexham. Aren’t you coming in?’
He shook his head. ‘I have business elsewhere.’
She nodded, her face turning serious again. There was no condemnation. Merely that flicker of worry. It was almost worse. Her stray dog straying.
‘Good day, then.’
The door closed softly behind her.
* * *
Phoebe entered the coolness of the palazzo and stopped to absorb its echoing shabbiness. Was this how Cinderella felt at midnight? As lights and warmth and excitement shrivelled into rags and duty?
Foolish Phoebe, she admonished herself. You are certainly no Cinderella, and you knew it was a mistake to go with him today. You knew you would enjoy it. Him. Yet you went and you allowed yourself to be charmed enough to do something you’ve never, ever done—you shared yourself with him.
Except it wasn’t his charm that had pushed her over that line—it was the pain he hadn’t really tried to hide. She hadn’t wanted him to stand there alone on that pedestal, bared, used, even betrayed by those who should have protected him. So she’d offered her own pain as solace.
She wished she could formulate some excuse for herself—sometimes she did employ empathy as a tool; it was amazingly effective in manipulating people. But she’d had no thought of that today. There had been no calculation to her revelations. She’d wanted him to share himself with her and she’d wanted him to see her.
Foolish, foolish, foolish.
This was how mistakes were made—and in her occupation mistakes could harm others beside herself. It was beyond foolish—it was dangerous.
Make your own memories, indeed. Well, she’d done a good job of that. She doubted she would ever forget her visits to the Schiavantis. She very much hoped people would not pay for her indulgence.
She made her way up the stairs to her room. In the lazy hours of midday most of the guests were resting in their rooms. Milly wouldn’t need her until they prepared for their visit to the Montillio casino that evening, which meant she had several hours yet to stew in the juices of her own stupidity.
Now at least she understood better how this man survived and thrived. It was as if he’d found her secret list of wishes and ticked them off one by one. Clever, clever. She wondered if he’d set out to do it on purpose for the pure fun of proving his skill or because her barbs had piqued his pride and his curiosity.
Strangely enough she thought he was being honest, in a way. She’d felt he truly had enjoyed her company at the restaurant. There had been a moment when she’d glimpsed a sudden sensual intensity in his gaze, felt it reach out and grab her as if he’d touched his hands to her cheeks, his fingers to her mouth. Her whole body had lit with crackling heat, making her muscles contract, her pulse lurch forward. But then he’d looked away and she’d sat in silence, scalded inside and out. She had never considered it possible, but perhaps...perhaps someone like him wouldn’t turn down the opportunity of bedding her. His kind could find pleasure in all manner of corners of this world. But he would as easily move on and make new friends and have new experiences. Until drink or illness overtook him.
She set down her bonnet carefully, rolling the ribbons into a neat spool. Then she sat on the side of her bed, her gaze taking in the sparsely furnished room, her little pile of books, her plain dresses neatly folded and hung. Despite her occupation, her life was a simple one. As agents of the War Office she and Milly had no need for a home or permanence. Today she was in Venice, tomorrow Verona, the next day wherever that duty called. She had not been labelled the Zephyr for nothing. She was nothing more than a passing breeze. Barely noticeable.
This strange...friendship—if it was even that—with Lord Wrexham was an anomaly.
Remember who you are, Phoebe. What you are. You may enjoy his jests and his unforeseen attentions, but that is all. In the end what matters is what you and Milly have built on the ashes of your old lives. And what you have built is prodigious. You are an excellent agent. One of Sir Oswald’s most trusted, despite being a woman. Perhaps as trusted as Jack had been in his heyday.
Her uncle’s deterioration was a warning she’d not fully comprehended until now. Sir Oswald had cautioned her there would be times when she would be tempted to relax her guard. When he’d told her she’d be in the greatest danger if she ever imagined herself in love, she’d shot back that she doubted he warned his male agents of such eventualities. Rather than be annoyed, he’d laughed.
‘I worry far less about you on this account than most of my agents, Phoebe. Men are far more likely to think with their cocks than you with your cunny, to be vulgar. In that sense your aunt is far more like them than you are. But my role is not merely to train you to complete your tasks, but also to prepare you for all possible dangers and most especially those within each of us. This is one of them, and in all likelihood one day you will be in the unenviable position of finding your mind in conflict with your body. So when that day happens, as it will, I want you to consider how you will separate it from your duties. I would hate to lose my trusted Zephyr for something so ephemeral and transient as an infatuation.’
She shivered, as if she could shake off this foreign confusion as one could send a dress crumpling to the floor. Oswald and Uncle Jack had given her plenty of good advice over the years, but right now the most pertinent was the one decent piece of advice her father had given her before she’d escaped his shackles: ‘Don’t stare at the sun or you’ll ruin your eyes.’
Well, that was applicable here. Don’t stare at Dominic or he might ruin your good sense.
Chapter Ten
Phoebe wasn’t fond of gambling, but she had to admit that some of the Venetian gambling halls were not only excellent places to observe people and gather valuable information, but also rather wonderful on their own account.
Many of the ones located around St Mark’s were not attended by respectable women, not even women who trod the outskirts of society like her aunt. But their little English crowd often spent the evenings in grand old palazzos along the canal, many of which clung to the mantle of noble grandeur they had held before Napoleon’s conquest ended eight hundred years of the Venetian Republic. Their salons and drawing rooms were now transformed into ridotti, resplendent with gambling tables, musical entertainment, and delicious food.
Phoebe had two favourites. One was Casino Venier with its elaborate frescoes and ornate fireplaces and Delft tiles, and the other was the Palazzo Montillio, a newer casino not far from Rialto bridge with an elaborate Moorish façade and now crowded to the gills with visiting dignitaries. Established by Count Giovanni Montillio and the infamous owner of one of London’s most successful gaming hells, Sebastian Crawford, it had swiftly become a favourite among Venetian and Austrian nobility. It wasn’t merely the sumptuous rooms, deep play, and excellent wine; Crawford had also introduced one of his trademarks—female croupiers and entertainers.
Whatever the secret of Montillio’s success, Phoebe noted as she and Milly accepted glasses of cool champagne, the rooms were full to brimming with the cream of international nobility. She was glad to be concentrating on something other than her strange lapse earlier that day. She’d surprised herself by falling asleep that afternoon, lulled by the unaccustomed food and spirits. She’d woken a little groggy, but reassured she’d exaggerated her strange fancies. It was merely as Milly had said—she wasn’t accustomed to indulging herself and it was rather pleasant to do so now and again.
She ought to take it more lightly, enjoy it only for what it was in the moment. That was the resolution she set before her and felt better for it—calmer and even cheerful. She was certainly capable of enjoying some of life’s pleasures without misconstruing them, wasn’t she?
‘One would think next month’s diplomatic Congress is taking place at Palazzo Montillio rather than in Verona,’ Milly murmured, her feathered fan brushing her gently rouged cheek.
‘Even dyed-in-the-wool statesmen need to let their hair down a little, Milly.’
Her aunt’s grin turned predatory. ‘I don’t think it’s their hair they’ll be letting down by the end of the night, Phoebe, dear.’
Phoebe’s laughter was cut short as she noticed a familiar figure descending upon them.
‘Good evening, Herr von Haas.’
Von Haas gave a sharp bow and nodded at them. ‘Lady Grafton, Miss Brimford. I am glad to see you here. I have made enquiries regarding the Giardini Reali.’
His words sounded almost accusatory and Phoebe proceeded cautiously. ‘I had not meant to sound intrusive, Herr von Haas.’
‘You did not. You sounded interested in earnest and you ignited my own curiosity. I have secured the company of the garden’s caretaker for a viewing. I would be happy if you would accompany me. And Lady Grafton may come as well if she wishes.’
Phoebe did her best not to look at Milly. ‘We would be delighted, Herr von Haas. It is very kind of you to think of us.’
‘Good. I shall inform you when it is arranged.’ He bowed once more, hesitated, smiled, and was off.
‘Well,’ Milly said after a moment.
‘Well?’ Phoebe asked, sipping her glass of wine.
‘Perhaps he really does like them quiet.’
‘Who likes what quiet?’ enquired a familiar voice behind them before Phoebe could answer. She closed her eyes briefly and turned, inwardly reciting her good resolutions regarding this man.
‘Good evening, Lord Wrexham.’
‘So your championing of von Haas was not merely on academic grounds, I see, Miss Prim.’
‘He invited us to view his gardens,’ Milly crooned, her fan swinging lazily as she lingered on the last word.
‘He invited us to see the Giardini Reali,’ Phoebe corrected sharply. ‘We discussed them when we met in St Mark’s Square. As they are not open to the public, he very kindly offered to take us there.’
‘A signal honour. He is a very busy man.’ The drawl was back, but the eyes were still sharp.
‘He is. Which makes his invitation all the kinder.’
‘Von Haas hasn’t a kind bone in his body. He certainly didn’t get where he is today by being kind.’
‘Perhaps he’s lonely?’ Milly twirled her fan, the pink feathers dancing. ‘Even the unkind and the uncouth can be human at times.’
Phoebe couldn’t help smiling at Milly’s fine thrust, but she watched Wrexham. Again she saw the flicker of something not quite nice in his blue eyes. They were a far darker blue than von Haas’s and today they were the colour of the sea beyond the lido—a turbulent blue that mariners knew to navigate warily.
