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The opening of the door heralded the entry of a girl whose appearance was totally at odds with her surroundings. Multilayered and finger-raked into a rough tumble about her tempestuous young face, her hair looked more like a bird’s nest than the crowning glory it must once have been. She was clad in black leather, the trousers skin-tight about rounded hips, the jacket outlining a well-endowed figure.
It was apparent at once that she recognised Gina, though she gave no sign of discomfiture. She addressed her brother in Italian, switching to English with no more effort than he had displayed himself when told to do so—and with even greater fluency.
‘The blame wasn’t mine,’ she declared flatly, without glancing in Gina’s direction. ‘There’s no damage to my car.’
‘Only because I managed to avoid what would have been a head-on crash!’ Gina asserted before Lucius could respond. ‘You were going too fast to stop. You didn’t even attempt to stop! Even to see if I was all right!’ She was sitting bolt upright in the chair, not about to let the girl get away with her denials. ‘Leaving the scene of an accident is against the law where I come from—especially where there are possible injuries to either party.’
‘If you’d been injured you wouldn’t be sitting here,’ Donata returned.
Gina kept a tight rein on her temper. ‘That’s not the point. I’m going to be stuck in Vernici until my car can be repaired—with a hefty bill at the end of it. At the very least, I need your insurance details to pass on to mine.’
‘But what you really want is for Lucius to give you money now!’ flashed the younger girl.
Her brother said something short and sharp in Italian, increasing the mutinous set of her jaw. When she spoke again it was with sullen intonation. ‘I’m sorry.’
Lucius made no attempt to stop her from leaving the room. His mouth tautened as the door slammed in her wake.
‘I add my apologies for the way Donata spoke to you,’ he said. ‘I also apologise for her appearance. She returned last week from her school in Switzerland…’ He broke off, shaking his head as if in acknowledgement that whatever he had been about to say was irrelevant to the present matter. ‘I believe it best that I take responsibility for the financial affairs,’ he said instead. ‘You have accommodation already arranged?’
Gina shook her head, the wind taken completely out of her sails.
‘So where is your luggage?’
‘I left it locked in the boot of the car,’ she said. ‘My car, not the one I came here in. I hired that from the garage.’
‘It will be returned, and your luggage brought here. If you give me your car keys I will make the necessary arrangements.’
‘Here?’ Gina looked at him in some confusion. ‘I don’t—’
‘You will naturally stay at Cotone until your car is repaired,’ he stated. ‘That will be done in Siena.’
‘I can’t let you…’ she began again, voice petering out as he lifted a staying hand.
‘You must allow me to make what reparation I can for my sister’s lack of care. It would be most discourteous of you to reject my hospitality.’
‘Then I must of course accept,’ she said after a moment. ‘Thank you, signor.’
His smile sent a further quiver down her spine. ‘You will please call me Lucius. And I may address you by your first name?’
‘Of course,’ she said, bemused by the totally unexpected turn of events. ‘You’re very kind.’
The dark eyes roved the face upturned to him, coming to rest on the curve of her mouth. ‘I find it difficult to be otherwise with a beautiful woman. A weakness, I know.’
Gina gave a laugh, doing her best to ignore the curling stomach muscles. ‘I doubt you’d allow anyone, male or female, to get the better of you!’
‘I said difficult, not impossible,’ came the smooth return.
His gaze shifted from her as the door opened again to admit a young maidservant. He must, Gina surmised, have summoned her via some hidden bell press.
‘Crispina will show you to your room,’ he said, having spoken to the girl. ‘Your bags will be brought to you. Until then, you would be advised to rest. An ordeal such as the one you experienced can produce delayed shock.’
Gina didn’t doubt it; she felt in the grip of it right now. She got to her feet, vitally aware of his eyes following her as she crossed to the door. Crispina answered her greeting smile with a somewhat tentative one of her own. She shook her head when Gina asked if she spoke English, which left the pair of them with very little to say as they climbed the grand staircase to the upper storey.
The bedroom to which she was shown was every bit as grand as the rest of the house, with glass doors opening onto a balcony that overlooked the magnificent view. The spacious en suite bathroom had fittings Gina was pretty sure were solid gold, the walls lined in mirror glass. She eyed her multireflection in wry acknowledgement of a less than pristine appearance. Clambering from a car halfway down a hole in the ground had left its mark in more ways then the one.
Back in the bedroom, she extracted the long envelope from her bag, and sat down on the bed edge to study the photograph afresh. Arms about each other, the young couple portrayed looked so blissfully happy, the girl’s fair skin and pale gold hair a total contrast to her partner’s Latin looks—both of them scarcely out of their teen years.
Gina had come across the photograph while browsing in the attic one rainy afternoon when she was fifteen. The accompanying marriage licence had tilted her world on its axis, the explanations reluctantly furnished by her mother when confronted with the evidence even more so.
Her mother and Giovanni Carandente had met as students at Oxford and had fallen madly in love. Knowing neither family would approve the match, they had married in secret, planning on taking their degrees before telling them. Her pregnancy had changed everything. Giovanni had set out to face his family with the news in person, only to meet his death in a road accident on the way to the airport. Two months later, with her parents still unaware of the truth, Beth had married her former boyfriend, John Redman, the two of them allowing everyone to believe that the baby was his.
Sitting here now, Gina went over the scene in her mind once again, recalling the anguish. Although she bore no facial resemblance, John Redman’s colouring had always lent credence to hers. She would never in a thousand years have suspected the truth.
Asked why she hadn’t attempted to contact the Carandentes herself, her mother had made a wry gesture. She knew nothing about them, she admitted, except that they lived in the town of Vernici in Tuscany. They had been the ones informed of Giovanni’s death not her. She had found out only on reading about the accident in the following day’s newspaper.
‘It was a terrible time,’ she acknowledged. ‘I hardly knew which way to turn. If it hadn’t been for your father—’
‘But he isn’t my father, is he?’ Gina said hollowly.
‘In every other way he is. He gave you his name—provided us both with a home and a good life. He’s a good man. The very best.’ Beth’s voice was tender. ‘I love him dearly.’
‘But not the way you loved Giovanni?’
Beth shook her head, her smile wry again. ‘No two loves are the same, darling. What Giovanni and I had was wonderful, but whether it would have lasted—well, who can tell?’ She hesitated before continuing. ‘I know it’s a lot to ask, but can we keep it just between ourselves? John regards you as his own child. He’d be terribly upset if he knew that you knew you weren’t.’
Loving him the way she did herself, she’d had no inclination to tell him what she knew, either then or since, Gina reflected, but the knowledge couldn’t be wiped out. For years she had toyed with the idea of some day coming out here and searching for her forebears, only an idea was all it had been until now. She had three more weeks before she started the new job she hoped would rekindle the interest and ambition so lacking this last year or so. Once into that, her free time would be severely restricted.
It was coming up to six o’clock, she saw, glancing at her watch. She’d been sitting here for more than half an hour thinking about it all. The question of whether these Carandentes were of the same family line as her father still remained to be answered. The most direct way was to ask outright, of course, but she was somehow reluctant to do that.
A knock on the door signalled the arrival of her bags. Dinner, she was advised by Guido in fragmentary English, would be served at nine-thirty in the salon. The master requested that she join the family for prior refreshment on the terrace at nine.
Gina thanked the man, receiving a bare nod by way of return. It was obvious that her presence was not looked on with favour. As an old family retainer, he would naturally take Donata Carandente’s side in the matter of who was to blame for the accident, she supposed. It was possible that the rest of the staff would take the same attitude—although Crispina had shown no sign of it.
Whether through the delayed shock Lucius had spoken of, or simply the effects of a long day behind the wheel, the weariness overtaking her was not to be denied. It was doubtful if she’d sleep, but a couple of hours just resting would revive her for the evening to come. She would hate to nod off over the dinner table.
She took off her outer clothing before lying down on the silk bedspread, stretching out luxuriously beneath the spinning fan. So much nicer than functional air-conditioning, she thought, watching the moving blades. The soft, whirring sound was soporific in itself.
Lucius had said Donata was his younger sister. Were there other siblings? For him to be padrone, his father must be dead too, but perhaps there was still a mother alive. If these people really did turn out to be her father’s kith and kin, then she and Lucius could be cousins. She found the idea oddly displeasing.
Daylight had faded to a dim glimmer when she awoke. It was a relief to see there was still half an hour to go before she was expected to join the family on the terrace.
The sleep had refreshed her, the shower did an even better job, but no amount of revitalisation could make what was to come any easier. At some point this evening she had to bring up her father’s name and learn the truth. For peace of mind alone she needed to know her origins.
Having planned on staying at good hotels throughout her journey, she had packed clothes to suit most circumstances. Cut on the bias in deep blue silk jersey, the dress she picked out to wear to dinner skimmed her figure to finish on the knee. Teamed with a pair of high-heeled sandals, it should fit the bill, Gina reckoned.
A stroke or two of mascara along her lashes, a dash of lipstick, and she was ready to go. There hadn’t been time to put her hair up into the French pleat she would have preferred, but it would have to do. Thick and glossy, it fell in soft waves to her shoulders—the bane of her life when it came to drying after washing, but she could never bring herself to have it cut short.
Night was fast encroaching when she reached the wide, stone-balustered terrace, the lamps already lit. Of the five people gathered there, three were female, the family resemblance pronounced.
Lucius came forward to greet her as she hesitated on the threshold of the room through which she had emerged, the look in his eyes as he scanned her shapely length tensing muscle and sinew. He was making no secret of the fact that he found her as much of a draw as she had to admit she found him. A man who might well be her cousin, she reminded herself forcibly. A first cousin, even.
The prospect of a family relationship was hardly enhanced by Donata’s open hostility. Her sister, Ottavia, was around twenty-seven or eight and married to a man some few years older named Marcello Brizzi. Their response to the introduction was courteous enough on the surface, but it was apparent that they too regarded her presence as an intrusion.
It was left to the matriarch of the family to show any warmth in her welcome. Skin almost as smooth as Gina’s own, the still luxuriant hair untouched by grey, she scarcely looked old enough to have a son Lucius’s age.
‘My son tells me you are half Italian yourself,’ she said. ‘I believe you never knew your father?’
Seated in one of the comfortable lounging chairs, the gin and tonic she had asked for to hand, Gina shook her head. ‘He died before I was born.’
Signora Carandente expressed her sympathy in a long, drawn sigh. ‘Such a terrible thing!’ She was silent for a moment, contemplating the girl before her. ‘You have older siblings, perhaps?’
Gina shook her head again, eliciting another sigh.
‘For a man to die without a son to carry on his name is a sad matter indeed! Should anything happen to Lucius before he produces a son, our own lineage will be finished too. You would think, would you not, that he would recognise such a responsibility?’
‘I am not about to die,’ he declared calmly.
‘Who can tell?’ his mother returned. ‘You must marry soon. You have a duty. And who better than Livia Marucchi!’
His shrug made light of the moment, but Gina sensed an underlying displeasure that such matters should be discussed in the presence of a stranger. She’d found the episode discomfiting enough herself. From what little she had seen of him, she judged him a man who would make his own decision about whom and when he should marry anyway. His choices, she was sure, would in no way be limited to one woman.
‘What was your father’s name?’ asked Ottavia, jerking her out of her thoughts and into sudden flaring panic. She wasn’t ready! Not yet!
‘Barsini,’ she said, plucking the name out of some distant memory without pause for consideration. ‘Alexander Barsini.’
She regretted the impulse the moment the words left her lips, but it was too late to retract.
‘Barsini,’ Ottavia repeated. ‘Which part of Italy did he come from?’
Having begun it, she was left with no option but to continue, Gina acknowledged ruefully. ‘Naples,’ she said off the top of her head.
‘He has family still living?’
This time Gina opted for at least a partial truth. ‘I don’t know. I came to Italy to try and find out.’
Ottavia’s brows lifted in a manner reminiscent of her brother, though minus any humour. ‘Your mother failed to maintain contact?’
Gina returned her gaze with a steadiness she was far from feeling. ‘My mother never met his family. They knew nothing of the marriage.’
‘I think that enough,’ Lucius cut in before his sister could continue the catechism. ‘Let the matter rest.’
Ottavia looked as if she found the command unpalatable, but she made no demur. Gina doubted, however, that her curiosity would remain contained. Catching Donata’s eye, she tried a smile, receiving a glare in return. There would be no softening of attitude there for certain. She was well and truly in the doghouse!
Dinner proved less of a banquet than anticipated, with no more than four courses. Gina drank sparingly of the free-flowing wines. She loved the reds, but they didn’t always love her. The last thing she needed was to waken with a hangover in the morning.
Lucius insisted that all conversation was conducted in English for her sake, which made her feel even more of an outsider. Marcello, she learned, was the estate comptroller, Ottavia a lady of leisure. The latter confined her questions this time to Gina’s present background, expressing astonishment on hearing she was a qualified accountant.
‘Such an unusual job for a woman!’ she exclaimed. ‘Do you not think so, Lucius?’
‘An admirable achievement for anyone,’ he returned, directing a smile that set every nerve in Gina’s body tingling. ‘Especially at so young an age.’
‘I’m twenty-five,’ she felt moved to respond. ‘Not that much younger than yourself, I imagine.’
The smile came again, accompanied by an unmistakable glint in the dark eyes. ‘Eight years is no obstacle, I agree.’
Obstacle to what, Gina didn’t need to ask. Neither, she was sure, did anyone else. That his interest in her was purely physical she didn’t need telling either. It could hardly be anything more.
Her cool regard served only to increase the glint. Opposition, it appeared, was an enticement in itself. More than ever she regretted the situation she had landed herself with. If she wanted to know the truth, not only was she faced with the prospect of explaining a lie she had no logical reason to have told in the first place, but the possibility of mortifying Lucius with the news that he had been making advances to a relative.
‘And what does your stepfather do for a living?’ Ottavia persisted, claiming her attention once more.
‘He’s in textiles,’ she acknowledged.
‘On his own account?’
‘His own business, yes.’ A highly successful one, Gina could have added, but saw no reason to go into greater detail—especially when said success was dependent on factors she found rather worrying at times.
Ottavia seemed content to leave it at that for the moment, but Gina sensed that the digging was by no means done. Plain nosiness, she assured herself. There was no way the woman could suspect the truth.
Midnight brought no sign of an end to the evening. Hardly able to keep her eyes open, Gina finally gave in.
‘I hope it won’t be taken amiss if I go to bed,’ she said. ‘I was on the road at seven this morning, and didn’t have all that good a night’s sleep before it.’
‘But of course!’ Signora Carandente responded. ‘You must feel free to do whatever you wish while you are our guest. Perhaps you would prefer to have breakfast served in your room?’
‘Not at all,’ Gina assured her. ‘I’ll be fine.’ She added impulsively, ‘Your hospitality is second to none, signora.’
‘Contessa,’ corrected Ottavia with some sharpness of tone.
‘You may call me Cornelia,’ her mother told Gina graciously.
Still grappling with the implications, Gina inclined her head. ‘Thank you.’
She took her leave with a general ‘Goodnight,’ avoiding any clash of glances with Lucius himself. If his mother was a Contessa, his father obviously had to have been a Count, which meant the title must have been handed down. It made the likelihood of her father having any connection seem even more remote. What would a son of such a family have been doing attending an English university as an ordinary student?
On the other hand, it was surely unlikely that either now or in the past another, entirely unconnected, Carandente family resided in Vernici.
She was going around in circles, Gina acknowledged. The only way to be sure was to do what she should have done several hours ago and tell the whole story. Concealing the name had been an idiotic gesture all round. Tomorrow, she promised herself, she would come clean. It was hardly as if she was after feathering her nest in any fashion. All she wanted was to know who her father had really been.
CHAPTER TWO
DESPITE her tiredness, Gina was wide awake at six. The early morning sunlight beckoned her out onto the balcony to view the beautifully landscaped gardens stretching to all sides. The vistas beyond were shrouded in early morning haze.
There was no one about that she could see from here. On impulse, she returned to the bedroom to don a pair of light cotton trousers and a shirt. Half an hour or so’s exploration would still leave her plenty of time to get ready for the day proper.
She could hear the muted sound of voices coming from somewhere towards the rear of the premises as she descended to the lower floor, but no one appeared to question her purpose. Not that any member of staff would do that in any case, Gina supposed. As a guest of the house she was, as Cornelia had assured her, entitled to do as she wished.
All the same she reduced the chances of running into anyone by using the front entrance. The Fiat was gone, the driveway clear of vehicles of any kind. There would be garages around the back somewhere, she assumed.
