LITMIR.BIZ

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said brusquely, ‘Then she has my sympathy.’

      ‘Why?’ His brows lifted enquiringly. ‘Is the car so difficult to drive?’

      ‘Certainly not,’ Lucy snapped. ‘I meant that I—I pity anyone who’s involved with a—a Lothario like you.’

      ‘You imagine, perhaps, that Lothario was an Italian.’ Giulio Falcone shook his head again. ‘You are wrong, signorina. He was the invention of an English dramatist. Just as you seem to be inventing me,’ he added, his tone dry.

      ‘It doesn’t take a great deal of imagination,’ Lucy retorted. ‘Nina was right, after all. You Italian studs are all the same.’

      ‘The looks of a dove and the tongue of a wasp,’ he said silkily. ‘An intriguing combination.’

      ‘Not for much longer.’ Lucy swung the case off the bed. ‘Will you loan me your—contessa’s car to drive to Pisa, please?’

      ‘No,’ he said. ‘I will not.’

      She lifted her chin. ‘Right—then I’ll walk there.’ ‘In that dress?’ He surveyed her mockingly. ‘You’d be lucky to get half a kilometre. Even if the police did not stop you first,’ he added, almost casually.

      ‘I planned to change, given some privacy,’ she said. ‘I don’t think jeans and a shirt would make me liable to arrest.’

      ‘No,’ he said. ‘But there is the matter of trespass, which you seem to have overlooked.’

      Fright was building up again, making her stomach churn. Her fingers tightened almost convulsively round the handle of her case.

      She said jerkily, ‘You can’t be serious, signore. I—we acted in good faith. We didn’t know this was your house.’

      ‘That is hardly a defence,’ he said. ‘Especially when added to the acts of vandalism committed against my possessions.’

      She couldn’t argue. Her knowledge of Italian law was nil. Perhaps it ws one of those countries where you were guilty until you proved yourself innocent, she thought faintly.

      She tried again. ‘But you can’t put all the blame on me. There were others involved.’

      ‘True,’ he said softly. ‘But they have gone, and you, columbina, are the only one left to make the recompense I require.’

      ‘You think I’m like them—like Nina and the others.’ Her voice shook. ‘But I’m not—I swear to you.’

      ‘I believe you.’ He lifted a negligent shoulder. ‘Otherwise I would not want you.’

      The amber eyes, hooded, watchful, swept over her, lingering on her breasts, the curve of her hips, the slender line of her thighs.

      The dark face was coldly, almost dispassionately absorbed. Like his namesake, the falcon—the ultimate predator—with its prey in sight, and helpless, Lucy thought wildly, her body trembling, her brain teeming with desperation.

      She said, ‘You have no right—no right at all to keep me here against my will.’

      ‘I think, under the circumstances, I have any rights that I choose to assume, Lucia mia.’

      ‘Don’t call me that.’

      Giulio Falcone frowned. ‘I was told it was your name.’

      ‘Yes, but I didn’t give you permission to use it.’ She stood her ground, glaring at him.

      ‘A minor detail,’ he said softly. ‘At such a time.’ He paused. ‘And when we are already on terms of such intimacy.’

      ‘Because I ran to you for help?’ Lucy asked scornfully. ‘In that situation I’d have run to Frankenstein’s monster.’

      ‘No,’ he said. ‘Because you have been occupying my room. Sleeping, mia bella, in my bed, which presumably you chose out of all the others. Doesn’t that establish some kind of bond between us?’ He watched the shocked colour storm into her face and laughed. ‘Don’t tell me you hadn’t guessed.’

      ‘Think what you like.’ Lucy gritted her teeth. ‘But I’ll never spend another night in it, or anywhere else under your roof.’

      ‘I don’t think that is your choice,’ he said. ‘Make me the restitution I require, and I promise that afterwards you will be driven to Pisa, your air fare paid, and a suite at the best hotel put at your disposal while you await your flight.’

      ‘No deal.’ Lucy made her tone brief and cutting. ‘I am not for sale, signore.’

      ‘And I am not buying, signorina. But I am prepared to—hire you for a while.’

      ‘You disgust me.’ In spite of herself, her voice trembled. ‘Call the police, why don’t you? Even jail would be better than another minute in your company. And I shall have my own story to tell them too,’ she added bravely.

      ‘In my bedroom—in that dress?’ He sighed. ‘I think appearances would be against you, Lucia.’

      ‘Your wife might take a different view,’ Lucy flashed. ‘Or does she take your lousy, deceitful behaviour completely for granted?’

      ‘It would be worth keeping you here if only to teach you to speak civilly,’ Giulio Falcone said grimly. ‘Anyway, you are under a misapprehension. I have no wife.’ He paused. ‘You are also ludicrously wrong about my motives for detaining you.’

      He saw the sudden bewildered question in her eyes and smiled sardonically. ‘The little comedy is over between us, signorina. My interest in you, alas, is more practical than romantic. I hope you are not too disappointed.’

      She said between her teeth, ‘Not in the slightest—if I had the least idea what you’re talking about.’

      ‘Actually, it’s quite simple. I have a problem to which you could provide the solution.’ He gave a slight grimace. ‘Early yesterday, my sister was in a car accident. Neither she or the two children were badly hurt—cuts, bruises and shock, that’s all. But the governante—the nanny—was not so fortunate. She broke her leg, and has to spend some time in the clinic.

      ‘Fiammetta wishes to come here to rest and recuperate, but there is no one now to look after the children, and Marco and Emilia can be more than a handful.’

      He spread his hands. ‘I thought, of course, that Maddalena would be here to take charge until Alison recovers. The children are accustomed to her.’ He paused. ‘But, of course, there is no Maddalena. Only you, Lucia.’

      ‘Me?’ Lucy swallowed, aware that relief was being overtaken by a curious sense of deflation. ‘But I’m not a nanny.’

      ‘No,’ he said. ‘But you are here at this moment. You have admitted you owe me a debt you cannot pay. In turn I have ruined your holiday.’ The amber eyes looked into hers, and she felt her heart thud suddenly and painfully. ‘Tell me truly, Lucia, do you really wish to leave Tuscany so soon, when you could stay here, and be paid for doing so?’

      ‘I couldn’t possibly,’ Lucy denied, trying to control her flurried breathing.

      ‘Why not? With my sister and the children, you would be well chaperoned, if that is your concern.’

      Lucy saw the amusement in his eyes, the sensuous curve of his mouth, and decided it would be safer not to explore that particular avenue.

      ‘But I’d be totally unsuitable,’ she protested instead. ‘You don’t know anything about me, after all.’

      ‘You are unused to children, perhaps?’

      ‘Well, no,’ she said reluctantly. ‘I have nephews.’

      ‘Of what age?’

      ‘Six and four,’ she admitted, an involuntary smile curving her mouth. She saw him assimilate that betraying tenderness,

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