LITMIR.BIZ

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silence, then a short bark of laughter. ‘Yes,’ said Matt Sansom. ‘But perhaps that was a mistake.’

      He swung round and looked down over the terraces of vines. ‘So this is where my daughter spent her last years.’ He sounded angry, almost contemptuous, but there was a note of something like regret there, too.

      He stayed two nights at Montedoro, touring the vigneto and asking shrewd questions about its operation, and paying a visit to the local churchyard where Sarah was buried beside her husband, Steve d’Angelo.

      ‘You have his name,’ Matt said abruptly as they drove back to the villa. ‘Was he your father?’

      ‘No, he adopted me.’

      The pale eyes glittered at Rome. ‘Card-sharp, wasn’t he?’

      ‘He was a professional gambler.’ Rome was becoming accustomed to his grandfather’s abrasive style of questioning. ‘He was also a brilliant, instinctive card player, who competed for high stakes and usually won.’

      ‘And you followed in his footsteps for a while?’

      Rome shrugged. ‘I’d watched him since I was a boy. He taught me a lot. But my heart was never in it, as his was.’

      ‘But you won?’

      ‘Yes.’

      Matt peered through the window of the limousine with a critical air. ‘Your stepfather didn’t invest much of his own winnings in the family estate.’

      ‘It came to Steve on the death of his cousin. He’d never expected to inherit, and it was already run down.’

      ‘And now you’ve taken it on.’ That bark of laughter again. ‘Maybe you’re more of a gambler than you think, boy.’ He paused. ‘Did your mother ever speak about your real father?’

      ‘No,’ Rome said levelly. ‘Never. I got the impression it wasn’t important to her.’

      ‘Not important?’ The growl was like distant thunder. ‘She brings disgrace on herself and her family, and it doesn’t matter?’

      Just for a moment Rome caught a glimpse of the harsh, unforgiving tyrant his mother had run away from.

      ‘She was young,’ he said, his own voice steely. ‘She made a mistake. She didn’t have to do penance for the rest of her life.’

      Matt grunted, and relapsed into a brooding silence.

      That was the only real conversation they’d had on personal subjects, Rome recalled. They’d seemed to tacitly agree there were too many no-go areas.

      His grandfather had sampled the wine from Rome’s first few vintages with the appreciation of a connoisseur, drawing him out on the subject, getting him to talk about his plans for the vigneto, his need to buy new vats for the cantina and replace the elderly oaken casks with stainless steel.

      Looking back, Rome could see how much he’d given away, in his own enthusiasm. Understood how Matt Sansom had deliberately relaxed the tension between them, revealing an interested, even sympathetic side to his nature.

      The offer of a low-cost loan to finance these improvements had been made almost casually. And the fact that it wasn’t a gift—that it was a serious deal, one businessman to another, with a realistic repayment programme—had lured Rome into the trap.

      It had only been later, after the deal had been agreed and his grandfather had departed, that he’d begun to have doubts.

      But it was finance he needed, and repayments he could afford, he’d thought. And it would be a definite one-off. Once the last instalment had been paid, he would look for future loans from more conventional sources.

      He remembered a night in Paris when both Steve and himself had emerged heavy winners from a private poker game which had been scheduled to last a week. The other players had been quietly spoken and beautifully dressed, and the air of power round the table had been almost tangible, and definitely menacing.

      ‘Are we going back?’ he’d asked eagerly, but Steve had shaken his head.

      ‘Never return to a pool where tigers come to drink,’ he’d told him, and they’d caught the next plane back to Italy.

      It was a piece of advice that had lingered. But Rome had told himself that his grandfather’s loan was a justifiable risk. The first and last visit to the tigers’ pool.

      Over the past two years communication between them had been brief, and usually by letter.

      Rome had assumed that it would remain that way.

      So the curt demand for his presence had been an unwelcome surprise.

      Matt Sansom lived just outside London, in a house hidden behind a high stone wall and masked by clustering trees.

      ‘Disney meets Frankenstein’ had been Sarah d’Angelo’s description of her childhood home, and, recovering from his first glimpse of the greystone, creeper-hung mansion, its bulk increased by the crenellated turrets at each end, Rome had found the description apt.

      A quiet grey-haired woman in an anonymous navy dress had answered the door to him.

      ‘Rome,’ she said, a warm, sweet smile lighting her tired eyes. ‘Sarah’s son. How wonderful. I didn’t believe we’d ever meet.’ She reached up and kissed his cheek. ‘I’m your aunt Kit.’

      Rome returned her embrace, guiltily aware he’d assume she was the housekeeper.

      He said, ‘I didn’t believe I’d ever be invited here either. I thought my existence was too much of a blot on the family honour.’

      He was waiting for her to tell him that his grandfather’s bark was worse than his bite, but the expected reassurance didn’t come.

      Instead, she said, ‘He’s waiting for you. I’ll take you up to him.

      ‘He’s resting,’ she added over her shoulder, as she led the way up the wide Turkey-carpeted staircase and turned left on to a galleried landing. ‘He’s been unwell. I was afraid it was his heart, but the doctor’s diagnosed stress.’

      If the house looked like a film set, then Matt Sansom’s bedroom emphasised the impression. It was stiflingly hot and airless. The carpet was crimson, and so were the drapes, while the vast bed was built on a raised dais. And in the centre of it, propped up by pillows, was Matt himself.

      Like some damned levee at eighteenth-century Versailles, Rome thought, amused, then met the full force of his grandfather’s glare and realised this was no laughing matter.

      He said, ‘Good evening, Grandfather. I hope you’re feeling better.’

      Matt grunted and looked past him. ‘Go downstairs, Kit,’ he directed abruptly. ‘You’re not needed here.’

      Rome swung around. ‘Aunt Kit,’ he said pleasantly, ‘I hope you can make time for a talk before I leave.’

      She nodded, darting an apprehensive glance at her father, then slipped from the room.

      ‘You can bring us some coffee in half an hour,’ Matt called after her as she closed the door.

      Rome’s brows lifted. ‘Is that my aunt’s job?’

      ‘It is tonight. I’ve given the staff the evening off.’ Matt gave him a measuring look. ‘And you’re very quick to claim family relationships.’

      ‘Are you saying we’re not related?’ Rome asked levelly.

      ‘No. I’ve decided to acknowledge your existence. But in my own time, and in my own way.’

      ‘Am I supposed to be grateful?’

      ‘No,’ said Matt. ‘You’re expected to do as you’re told.’ He gestured at the carafe and glass on his night table. ‘Pour me some water, boy.’

      ‘As we’re dispensing

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