LITMIR.BIZ

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its dubious magic.

      Nolan sipped the coffee and watched the Piazza San Marco come alive in slow, predictable rhythm. First would come the carters and vendors bound for the markets, then the shopkeepers and the restaurant owners who depended on the vendors to supply their businesses. Finally, long after he’d drunk his coffee, would come the daily shoppers and the tourists.

      After six weeks in Venice, he still hadn’t tired of the rhythm. Venice felt good. The city suited him, as if they were made for one another. In a way, he supposed they were. Like him, Venice was a city that had accrued its power through wealth instead of landownership. He owned nothing, not yet.

      Of course, that was the old Venice, the Venice of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, a Venice that was long gone now. But modern Venice was like him, too. Modern Venice preferred pleasure. Venice had refashioned herself around that pleasure, lifted herself from the ashes of Napoleon much as he had lifted himself from the ashes of his family and his father’s unyielding dominance.

      The city was a subdued phoenix, certainly not the pleasure capital she’d once been, but a phoenix none the less. The city and himself had decided not to tolerate their dismal situations and had taken efforts to change them. There was a saying he was quite fond of: if you do what you’ve always done, you’ll get what you’ve always got. In other words, change was only possible when one changed his circumstances. The Grand Tour had been his chance to do that in the most literal of ways.

      Why aren’t you doing that with Gianna, then? You know it works. The thought hit him forcefully. He was waiting for her to convince herself sex didn’t have to be only a weapon, a means to an end. But her convincing might need some help. What if she didn’t know how to convince herself? What if he changed her mind for her? The whole day lay before them, with nothing to do but wait for the masquerade. Until now. Nolan rose. He was going to seduce Gianna for her own good and what better place to do it than Venice, a city made for pleasure.

      * * *

      ‘Get dressed, we’re going out, sleepyhead!’

      Gianna threw an arm over her face against the invading light. She’d slept poorly and it seemed patently unfair that Nolan should be so freakishly cheerful. She had not pegged him as morning person. Gianna rolled over and hid her face in the pillow with a mumbled protest. ‘Whatever happened to breakfast at noon?’

      ‘We’ve got a lot to do today.’ She could hear Nolan moving about the room, opening drawers and wardrobes. Something soft and filmy hit her face.

      ‘Please stop going through my undergarments.’ She nudged the chemise aside.

      ‘Then get up and get them yourself.’ Nolan dropped a pile of clothes on the bed and pressed on the mattress with the full force of his hands, bouncing it.

      ‘You’re obnoxious, just like...’ She stopped herself. She’d nearly said my little brother. She didn’t want that to slip out, not yet. She’d tell Nolan about Giovanni when the time was right, or if the time was ever right. Perhaps, once she had the jewel case, she would be able to go after Giovanni on her own. Nolan need never know the count had her brother locked away on the mainland. Tonight was the first step in getting him back. Gianna swallowed back the lump in her throat.

      ‘Just like what?’ Nolan stopped jiggling the bed and moved away. She could hear him pouring something. Then the aroma hit her.

      ‘Ahhhh.’ Gianna sat up, eyes open. ‘You brought coffee. I love you.’

      Nolan passed her the cup. ‘Twenty minutes, that’s all you get. It’s already half past ten. The day’s a-wasting.’

      Gianna took a long, fortifying swallow of coffee. ‘Where are we going? You haven’t forgotten we’ve got the count’s house to burgle.’ She said it lightly but she did fear for a moment that perhaps this was a strategy to get out of his promise.

      Nolan leaned down so she could see those amazing grey eyes and that infectious smile up close. ‘We are going to the fish market and, second, I have not forgotten about the count’s house, but that is hours away, a whole day away and we must do something to pass the time.’

      ‘The fish market?’ Gianna wrinkled her nose. ‘Whatever for?’

      ‘You’ll see.’ Nolan grinned and pulled out his pocket watch, snapping it open. ‘Eighteen minutes, Gianna. Tick-tock.’

      She dressed quickly in the deep-raspberry walking gown because she was curious and because the dress was exquisite. At least that was what she told herself as she tucked a final pin into her hair. She told herself her quickness had nothing to do with the excitement of being out with Nolan, or the anticipation of what might happen next between them. She knew there was a sexual game between them. How could there not be under the circumstances that had thrown them together? And yet, even knowing that game was there, he constantly took her by surprise.

      The church last night had been enlightening. It had stripped her bare in all ways; her wanting exposed by his hands, his lips; her strategy exposed by his words. He’d spiked her guns most effectively. He knew she meant sex to be her weapon against him, the tool by which she would manoeuvre him into compliance. He’d called her bluff against that hard wall at San Giorgio Maggiore and then given her the choice—to explore the pleasures of sex instead of the politics of it...with him.

      Gianna flung her cloak about her shoulders. If that was what today was about, she’d best be on her game. Or off it, a wicked little voice tempted. The thought gave her pause. Perhaps today wasn’t meant to be so much about being on her guard as it was about letting her guard down. Did she trust him enough for that? Did she trust herself? The part of her that remembered his mouth on her in the church, his hands in her hair, wanted to. The cynic in her launched a violent protest.

      What would happen if she let him in? It was frightening to contemplate. Letting him in risked much. Her world was a dark mess full of the count’s betrayals and cruelties. If Nolan truly knew the darkness that surrounded her, he might rethink all of it—the burglary tonight, even his association with her. Giovanni needed her to act circumspectly. She’d failed her brother once. It had led to him being sent away, an act the count had meant to punish her and it had. For four years now, it had been the driving force behind everything she’d done, everything she’d endured at the count’s hand: save Giovanni; make a new life for the two them where he could not be made to suffer for her rash actions. She had cost him four years of freedom already, she would not cost him any more. She would make it up to him somehow, even if it meant resisting the temptations Nolan offered.

      * * *

      Nolan was waiting for her in the lobby, offering her his arm, sweeping her out to the piazza and into the throng of sightseers who’d come to enjoy the city for Carnevale. Apparently, along with rooting out her clothes, he’d grabbed some for himself as well and had taken time to freshen up somewhere else, perhaps the club room, while she’d changed. He’d traded his evening clothes for walking attire and tall boots. He’d even managed to shave. No one looking at him would guess he’d been up the entire night.

      ‘Isn’t this a little backwards?’ Gianna asked as they headed towards the Rialto. ‘Shouldn’t I be showing you around the city? Technically, you’re the visitor.’

      Nolan merely grinned. ‘No, today, you are the tourist. I am going to show you Venice my way.’ When he smiled at her that way, making her the sum of his world in that gaze, she had the feeling resistance would be pointless no matter what vows she’d made herself.

      North of the Rialto Bridge was the fish market, the pescheria, the largest and arguably the oldest in the city...and it was exciting. With Nolan’s hand at her back, they navigated the stalls, taking in the fish, all fresh caught that morning in the lagoon or farther out in the Adriatic: shrimps, scallops, lobsters, crabs, cod, sole. The rows of stalls piled with fish on display were mesmerising in their diversity—fish of all shapes and colours stared back at her.

      The market was bustling with customers. Fishmongers called out their wares, people haggled over prices, loud

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