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Yes, she had to admit, she was intrigued by his proposition. And although she knew it sounded a bit crazy, she was reassured by the man who proposed it. There was something very agreeable about Antonio. He was serious, quiet, obviously well-educated and intelligent. And he was generous with his time and money. In short, he felt safe.
But aside from all that, she’d never met a man as physically appealing or as aware of his power over women. She’d seen the looks he’d gotten from women in the restaurant and shops they’d visited. She wasn’t the only one attracted to him. He knew it. But he hadn’t shown it.
She’d bet if anyone knew about making love, Antonio would.
“I’ll call in!” The words burst impulsively from her lips, but she reined in her runaway hormones almost immediately. “We can spend tomorrow together. Doing fun stuff like today. But the rest of it…that demonstrating part…” She shook her head.
He nodded, his expression composed, revealing nothing of his thoughts. “As you wish. Tomorrow we will visit a few museums, have lunch, talk about life.” He gave her an encouraging smile.
“It sounds very nice,” she admitted releasing a breath she’d held so long she’d begun to feel lightheaded. “No more sex talk, right?”
“Not a word,” he agreed, solemnly.
She studied his expression a moment longer. She believed him.
So why did her body tingle as if his palms—as strong and weathered as the bark of his olive trees—were moving over the surface of her flesh? Why did she sense that they’d already entered a silent pact, whose terms she couldn’t yet read?
Antonio stood before the painting he had most looked forward to seeing that day. It was in a collection temporarily loaned to the National Gallery of Art—Portraits of Italian Renaissance Women. When he’d first seen Maria, this was the painting that had made him wonder if he’d met her before.
Now Maria stood beside him gazing up at the proud woman’s delicate features, and he was entranced by her reactions. She frowned, concentrating. Her arms were folded across her body, hugging herself.
“What are you thinking?” he asked.
She tilted her head slowly, side to side. “I don’t know. This one seems so real, so modern in a way. But I can’t put my finger on why. Is it because da Vinci’s style bridges the centuries?”
The picture was labeled, Portrait of Genevra de Benci, signed by the master. Antonio had viewed it many times in his own country. His mother had first pointed it out to him, as she and the model shared the same first name. There the resemblance ended.
The portrait was exquisite, not only because of the famous painter’s talent but because of the simple, natural beauty of the woman who sat for him.
“Perhaps,” he said, “it’s a combination of his artistry and the woman’s beauty. Tell me what you see when you look at it.”
Maria gave him a puzzled look but didn’t object to the exercise. He moved closer to her, as if to better hear her lowered voice in the museum’s hushed exhibit room. He liked the way she smelled of soap and baby powder. Simple yet erotic fragrances. He focused on the smooth curve of her throat, so similar to that of the portrait before them.
“Well,” she murmured, “her hair is shining and pale, elaborate braids woven with those strands of baby pearls and satin ribbons. And she wears a choker of gold chains clasped with a cameo at her throat. The blond hair—” She squinted thoughtfully at the graceful coils lifted above the subject’s head. “She must have been considered a rare beauty back then.”
“Yes, Italians are drawn to light complexions, to pale-haired women and children. Back then, before chemical hair dyes, they were probably rare for my part of the world.”
“Her dress is beautiful. A kind of rich brocade, with lace panels.”
“Another sign of her wealth,” he agreed.
“There’s something else.” Her frown deepened, intensified.
“Do you not yet see it?” he asked, moving still closer until his lips nearly brushed the rim of her ear.
Maria’s eyes slowly cleared then widened. “You’re not thinking that there’s a resemblance between her and me!”
“Most definitely, there is,” he said, pleased that she’d finally seen the similarity, although she denied it. He gently lifted heavy strands of hair from her neck and held them in a soft coil above her head. “Look at me, cara.”
She turned self-consciously. “Antonio,” she whispered, “people are watching us.”
“It’s of no matter.” He smiled. “I’m just looking at another Renaissance woman. The room is full of them.”
She laughed, embarrassed, and brushed his hands away. “I’ve been having so much fun today, I forgot that flattering a woman comes easily to you.”
She was wrong.
How long had it been since he’d bothered to even look at a woman with any interest? Not since Anna died had he allowed himself such pleasure. But Maria was more than physically attractive. He had felt very close to her since first seeing her. Only later had he realized why.
The painting.
The de Benci family was linked with his own through marriage. Genevra had wed a distant relation of his southern Italian ancestors. She, so the story went, came from the north, from a family of less wealth than the de Bencis. But her husband loved her deeply and had given her pearls, jewels, and expensive silks for her gowns. She had returned his affection by wearing his gifts every day—around her throat, in her blond tresses, on her fingers and curling round her tiny wrists.
Antonio imagined strings of tiny pearls woven through Maria’s pale hair. He closed his eyes and was nearly overcome by a wave of desire. He snapped his eyes open immediately.
Why now? Why two long years after losing Anna was he allowing a stranger from another country to affect him this way? This was not a woman to have an affair with. This was not a woman to soothe his tormented soul. She was looking for a husband, and he would never marry again.
A cold hand closed around his heart. He set his jaw and moved away from Maria. After a moment, she followed him to stand before a bust of a patrician lady. She was silent, as if thinking thoughts as deep as his.
Neither spoke again while in the museum.
They drove next to the private Corcoran Gallery. Antonio silently led her through rooms displaying rare Greek and Roman antiquities.
She spotted several examples of brilliantly glazed Italian majolica of a more recent era. “They’re gorgeous!” She traced a bunch of rich purple ceramic grapes with one fingertip. “You only have to look at these to be happy,” she bubbled.
He stared at her, amazed. It took so little to make the woman happy? But yes, he could see it in her soft gray eyes—pure gladness, simple joy over an exquisite bowl. He wished life could be that easy for him.
For several minutes he felt as if he couldn’t breathe. The atrium into which he’d stepped went dark around him. He stood gazing out at the gardens without seeing them. The sadness was suddenly overwhelming.
After some time, he became aware of Maria standing beside him. He hadn’t heard her approach.
“Are you all right? Did I say something to upset you?” she asked cautiously.
He couldn’t speak for a moment. “It’s nothing. I’m sorry if I’ve spoiled your day.”
She laughed. “You haven’t spoiled my day at all. Listen, I haven’t had this much fun in as long as I can remember. Ever maybe. You’re great company, Antonio. I just wish I took the time to museum crawl more often. I should. It’s not as if it costs much.”
“I should too,” he said, testing his voice, relieved to find it didn’t break. “I should live again.”
“What?” She frowned at him.
“Never mind, cara. Let’s have lunch. I know just the place. You will love it.”
He took her to Coeur de Lion, a popular city restaurant he hoped to make one of his first American clients. His plan was to introduce Boniface Olive Oils to the U.S. market through fine restaurants.
The Coeur de Lion’s vaulted ceiling with its sunshine-filled skylight brightened his mood. Besides, he was determined to not rain on Maria’s day, a continuation of her birthday celebration.
They sat on tufted chairs at a table apart from the others, covered with a heavy white damask cloth. He told her stories of Apulia, his ancient homeland in Italy, and she listened intently.
Tomorrow, he thought, I will be gone. He’d rescheduled his flight again, but would delay his return no longer than that. Now that Marco had been dealt with, he needed to return to the groves. Although it was still barely spring in Washington, already there was important work to be done in Carovigno.
By the time they left the restaurant and had driven back to her apartment, it was nearly three in the afternoon.
“I shouldn’t have had so much wine.” Maria giggled as she fumbled her key into the lock. “I’m going to be sleepy before dinnertime, though I don’t think I could eat another bite all day. Oh, that was delicious!”
He smiled, took the key from her and let her into her apartment. She spun around twice before flopping like a little child on her couch and laughing to herself—a final comment on the fun of the day before letting her eyes drift drowsily closed.
“You’re leaving now, aren’t you?” she asked without opening them.
“Yes,” he said, with honest regret, “I should.”
She nodded. “Probably best.”
“Probably?” He frowned. Was she sending him a different message now? “I thought you didn’t want my company other than as a touring companion.”
“Didn’t…don’t…not sure anymore.” She sighed and opened her eyes with obvious effort to nibble at a corner of one fingernail, her brow delicately furrowed. “Must be the wine talking. It’s just that I was thinking last night, after you left— No, I can’t say that.”
“Say what?” he asked, smiling indulgently at her confusion.
Her cheeks flushed a pretty pink. “I wouldn’t want you to get the wrong idea. But the concept…the theory of being coached, so to speak… Well, it appeals to me.”
He laughed softly but felt a nearly forgotten masculine tug down low in his body. “Does it now? But you said you’d have to know me better to trust me.”
“Yes, I did.” She seemed to be having trouble remembering her earlier statements through the wine. “I definitely said that. And it’s true, you need to trust a person to be intimate with them. Don’t you?”
“It’s wise,” he agreed, walking closer to her and dropping her keys on the coffee table in front of her. “Especially for a woman.”
“Yes, and espe—” She had trouble getting that word untangled from her tongue. “—es-pe-cially when that other person has had a lot more experience than you. Experience in activities that might cause him to be exposed to dangerous viral things and such.”
“You needn’t worry about that with me,” he assured her.
“Why not?”
He loved the way she scowled at him, her lips pouting, her brow wrinkling, a shadow of the little girl…inside the body of a woman. He ached to kiss her, but wouldn’t take advantage of her. The wine’s effect hadn’t yet begun to wane.
“Because I have been very careful,” he stated. Because, he could have added, there has been no one to share my bed in two full years. And for the five years before Anna died, he’d been only with her. “Let’s just say, I’m safe. But if the situation arose, I’d still use protection to ease your concern.”
“Of course you would.” She pulled a tasseled pillow toward her and hugged it so hard he wondered if the seams might pop. She squinted up at him speculatively. “If the situation arose,” she echoed him. “But your teaching…well, it wouldn’t include that arising stuff, right?”
He laughed delightedly and shook his finger at her. “Signorina, something definitely would rise, but we wouldn’t go all the way, as you say in this country.”
Her brow smoothed. “That’s right. We wouldn’t. So there would be no need at all to worry. Would there?”
“None.”
“All right,” she said, looking suddenly wide-awake and sober as she pushed the pillow away. “Let’s go for it.” She smiled up at him.
He was shocked. “Aspetta un momento! I thought you didn’t want to…that you were saving yourself for—”
“I am. Of course I am. I just want you to show me what I need to know. Everything except the end part.” She looked up at him solemnly.
He roared with laughter. “You don’t know what you’re saying. You’ve had too much wine, Maria. Tomorrow you’ll regret asking this of me.”
“I will?” She pouted again, and he nearly dragged her into his arms then and there.
“Yes,” he said softly. He took her hand, sat on the couch beside her and drew her close. “We will sit quietly together, let the wine wear off. If you feel the same way after another hour, we’ll do whatever you decide.”
She looked up at him with wide, trusting eyes. “All right.”
Maria wasn’t aware of the moment when her eyelids floated shut, or when she first awoke. The subtle lingering scent of a man’s aftershave came to her, then the sense that the surface beneath her was shifting.
Her eyes flashed open. “Antonio!”
“Yes?” a deep voice answered from above her.
She rolled over to discover that she’d been lying with her cheek pressed into his lap. She sat up abruptly, causing him to lift his arm, which had been draped protectively over her.
“You’re still here. What time is it?”
“Nearly five-thirty,” he said.
“I slept for over two hours?”
“Si. I took a little nap too. Sitting up.”
She had slept with a stranger in the room…with a stranger under her. Unexpectedly, the intimacy warmed rather than frightened her.
“Thank you for staying,” she whispered.
“I wouldn’t have left without saying goodbye,” he assured her.
“Then you are leaving?”
“That’s what you want, isn’t it?” He tenderly touched the tip of her nose, just once, with his long finger. “Do you remember what you asked of me before you fell asleep?”
She did. Vividly.
And, strangely enough, the only thing that had changed was her confidence that she could handle the lessons she’d requested of him.
“I remember,” she said, watching his expression. “I’d still like you to show me. I’m just not sure how.”
He observed her for a long time before answering. “It’s up to the man to know how. It’s up to you, the woman, only to say yes or no.”
A rush of heat swept through her body. When she tried to speak, the words dried up before crossing her lips. At last she managed the only ones that seemed important. “Then I say…yes.”
He nodded solemnly, no longer questioning her. Gently, he lifted her out of his lap. He stood up. “Then we must do this right.”
She watched from the couch as he put on his coat and moved toward the door. A wave of panic and disappointment swept over her. “Where are you going?”
