LITMIR.BIZ

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understood that love was no more than a passing amusement. Respectable young ladies bored him, and besides, their mothers kept them from his path. He didn’t care, either. He’d no need to marry for money, position or an heir. Lucia was right: for him, love was a game, and he intended to play it as long as he could.

      He smiled at Lucia, hoping to coax her into a better humor. “Since when have you become so kind, darling? That girl is nothing to you.”

      “And what is she to you, eh? Another of your English demons, ready for your scorn?”

      “She’s only a pretty little creature I spied on a balcony, Lucia,” he said evenly. “Be reasonable, pet. You’ve no right or reason to be jealous.”

      “Oh!” she gasped, her eyes wide with righteous fury. “Oh, how dare you say such a thing to me?”

      She shoved her hands hard into his chest, and spun away from him. “Why are you so stubborn—so stubborn that you won’t give me the truthful answer I deserve? Your oldest friend, your dear Lucia! You are impossible, Antonio! Impossible!”

      She tossed her head, sending the elaborate construction of ribbons, sugar-stiffened curls, powder and false hair quivering. With her skirts gathered to one side, she swept from the room and down the stairs.

      Anthony sighed. Everything with Lucia was a scene, to be performed grandioso for the greatest effect. He was fond of her, very fond, but she was also wearying. Surely that lovely English girl would be different. Innocent. Peaceful. Not so eager to bite. A pleasing change, a relief, really, like a still pond in a country meadow after a raging storm at sea.

      He slipped on his coat and reached for his hat, letting his mind happily consider the different ways he could steal this delightful blond girl away from the charmless Lord Edward. He paused before Lucia’s glass to set his hat at a suitably rakish angle.

      He wasn’t handsome by English standards. His more fair brothers had always been quick to tease him about his darker skin and black curling hair, his strongly prominent nose and jaw, all inherited from his mother’s family. But from his father had come his pale-gray eyes and easy smile, and more than enough wit and confidence to make women forget his craggy, swarthy face. The English girl was sure to be no exception. He winked at his reflection and headed down the stairs, figuring by now it should be safe enough to join Lucia in the carriage. She should have had plenty of time to calm herself.

      Or perhaps not.

      “Impossible,” she muttered, her face turned away from him as he climbed into the carriage. “You are impossible.”

      He stopped in the carriage’s door. “I don’t have to go with you tonight, Lucia. If I’m so damned impossible, it might be better for you to go to Giovanni’s fete by yourself. Beside you, no one notices me, anyway.”

      Her head whipped around, her dark eyes wounded even in the half light of the carriage. “Of course they notice you, Antonio. You know as well as I that you are never overlooked or forgotten. That is the kind of man you are.”

      He dropped onto the leather seat beside her and sighed. “There are so many ways for me to take that, Lucia.”

      But Lucia didn’t answer, turning again to face the open window, and for the next quarter hour they rode in a silence that felt more like an uneasy truce.

      “She will be easy for you to find, your little yellow-haired virgin,” she said at last. “Your English consul can tell you her name. There are not so many like her in Rome, especially not this early in the autumn.”

      “I haven’t said I was interested in her, have I?”

      “You needn’t speak the words aloud for it to be understood, Antonio,” she said, touching a handkerchief deeply bordered in lace to the corner of her eye. “Not by me.”

      “Lucia, enough,” Anthony said firmly. “Isn’t your darling Signor Lorenzo the love of your life? The only man in Rome with devotion enough to tolerate your tantrums, and gold enough to keep you in the luxury you demand?”

      “We’re not speaking of Lorenzo.” Impatiently she flicked her handkerchief towards Anthony. “We’re speaking of you, Antonio, and this English girl that you are plotting to seduce. What if you’re the loser in your little game this time? You’re already beguiled with her—no, bewitched! What if she steals you from us, and carries you back to England as her prize, eh? What if you abandon all of us for her?”

      Amused, Anthony leaned his head back against the leather squabs and chuckled. “It won’t happen, Lucia. It can’t.”

      “No?” Her eyes glittered, challenging. “You are very confident.”

      “I’m confident because I’m right,” he said easily. He took her hand and kissed the back of it, right above her ruby ring. “No woman in this world could claim that kind of lasting power over me. You should know, Lucia.”

      She sniffed, and pulled her hand free, curling it into a loose fist against her breasts. “I tired of you first, Antonio. Don’t let your male pride remember otherwise.”

      He glanced at her, so obviously skeptical that she hurried on.

      “I should just let you marry the underfed little creature,” she said. “You could coax her into bearing your weakling children, in the passionless English manner.”

      “You won’t change my mind, darling. I’m not marrying her, or anyone else.”

      Her fingers opened, fluttering over her décolletage so the half light danced over her ruby ring. “Do you believe yourself safe enough that you’ll stake a small wager upon it?”

      He smiled. “Small enough that Lorenzo won’t question it, but sufficiently large to hold my interest?”

      “Exactly.” She leaned towards him. “I’ll wager that before Advent begins, you will become so obsessed—so lost!—pursuing this English virgin that you will need to be rescued by your friends and saved from marrying her.”

      “Marrying her!” Anthony laughed aloud at the sheer preposterous idiocy of such a notion. Him with a wife, a Lady Anthony to dog him to his grave! This girl might be a delicious change, but hardly enough that he’d give up his cheerfully self-indulgent life here in Rome for the sake of her hand. “I’ll take your wager, Lucia, and I’ll set your stake for you, too. I’ll win. I’ll seduce the girl, I’ll enjoy her as much as she will me, but she’ll never be my wife. I’ve no doubt of that. And when I win, I’ll expect you to sing an entire aria on the Spanish Steps.”

      She frowned, not understanding, nor wishing to. “Overlooking the Piazza? Before all of Rome?”

      “For free, my darling,” he said easily. Short of standing on the papal balcony of St. Peter’s, he couldn’t imagine a more public place. The Spanish Steps had been built earlier in the century, a grand, flamboyant flow of marble cascading down the hillside from the French church of Trinita dei Monti to the Piazza di Spagna centered by one of the city’s more celebrated fountains, the Fontana della Barcaccia. The piazza was not only a favorite idling place for Romans, but a prime attraction for foreign visitors, too. Lucia would be guaranteed an enormous audience on the natural stage formed by the steps, and the fact that her performance would be within view of the English girl’s lodgings would serve as an extra fillip of amusement to their wager.

      Anthony smiled, savoring the possibility. “A small gift of your voice to all of Rome. Nothing that will be missed from Randolfo’s pockets, yes?”

      “For free!” Lucia sputtered, outraged. “I never sing for—for nothing!”

      He crossed his arms over his chest. “That’s my stake. If you choose not to accept it, why, then the wager is—”

      “Then if you lose, you must sing instead!” she said quickly. “You, Antonio, who bray like a donkey! If this girl ruins you, as is sure to happen, then you must sing to her yourself on the same steps!”

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