Rose Red Page 12

  “Exactly what are your feelings for me, Andrea?”

  “I have told you,” he began.

  “Don’t tell me,” she interrupted. “Show me.”

  “I warn you—”

  “Don’t warn me. Show me,” she said again. While she continued to hold tightly to his shirt, she lifted her other hand to brush his hair off his forehead. She let her fingertips trail down the side of his face. He shuddered in response to her touch.

  “If I dare the slightest part of what I want to do,” he whispered, “if I indulge in the least kiss or caress, then we will be lost, for I have not ceased to think of you since the day I went away. And I tell you now, Rosalinda, those thoughts were far from pure.”

  “If you do not kiss me, then I will be forced to kiss you.” With a delicate touch she outlined his mouth and when she was done, she inserted her little finger between his lips. His reaction was a groan that rose from deep in his chest. Rosalinda saw a flame leap in his eyes until his usual soft brown gaze changed into a blaze that scorched her – and that aroused in her an answering fire. She ran her tongue across her lips and watched his mouth part in response to what she did. Yet still he clung to his control.

  ‘‘Let go of my shirt,” he whispered.

  “You will have to pry my fingers off, one by one,” she told him. Nearly overcome by the potent combination of mystery and tough maleness that Andrea represented, Rosalinda let herself fall backward until her head rested on his pillow.

  “You are innocent. You cannot know what you are doing,” he said.

  “I know that I want you to kiss me, and to put your arms around me. How can I be completely innocent after the way you kissed me and touched me in the garden on that last, cold night? I want you to touch me that way again.”

  “This is too much for any man to bear.” He groaned. “If I do not kiss you, I will die.”

  “I do not want you to die, Andrea. Surely, you know that by now.” Rosalinda had never before heard her own voice sounding so low and seductive. She feared that she, too, would die if Andrea did not kiss her without further delay. She did not fully understand why he should hesitate when he admitted he wanted to kiss her and when she was afire to be in his arms. She tugged a little harder on his shirt, and he came down on top of her.

  His mouth was gentle on hers, sweet and tender, just as she remembered. A delicious warmth began to spread through her body. She soon realized that this was partly caused by Andrea’s own body heat. Her nightgown was twisted up around her knees, so her bare legs were tangled with his, but more than that, her insistent pulling at his thigh-length shirt had lifted its hem up to his waist. Her linen nightgown offered only the flimsiest of barriers between Andrea’s torso and hers. And she was beginning to understand that there was a great deal more to his torso than she had previously appreciated. A large part of Andrea was extremely hard and it was pushing against her in a most determined way.

  At the same time that she became aware of his hardness, Andrea moved his mouth on hers and his tongue flicked over her lips in a hint that she should open them. In response, Rosalinda parted her lips a little. Emboldened by this sign of encouragement, Andrea gathered her closer and let his tongue surge into her mouth. Rosalinda felt as if her entire body was opening to him, for her thighs parted even as her lips did. She was being swept away by a tide of longing, by a desire to go on lying in his arms while he continued to kiss her. She could lie in his arms forever and not grow tired of it.

  Andrea’s tongue stroked against hers, inflaming her senses, while between her thighs he also stroked against her, only the fabric of her nightgown separating his flesh from hers. Between her bosom and his broad chest, her hand was still clenched on his shirt. When she was trembling and writhing against him, consumed by the new longings he was arousing in her, Andrea broke off the kiss to raise himself on his elbows. He smiled to see her fist at his chest. Gently he unwound her fingers from the linen and kissed each fingertip, slowly, one by one.

  When he lifted the upper part of his body, the lower portion of him pressed more closely against the increasingly sensitive area between Rosalinda’s thighs. She sighed and pushed back.

  “My sweet, innocent girl,” Andrea whispered, “do you know where this is leading?”

  “Yes.” She felt as though her body was about to dissolve into his. “Don’t stop. I’ll die if you stop.”

  “So will I, though I know well enough that I ought to stop.” With a swift motion he tore off his shirt.

  Rosalinda laid both of her palms flat against his chest. He gave her only a moment to touch the firm muscles, to let her fingertips find and circle his nipples. She whimpered when he pulled away from her, but it was only to remove her nightgown. He pushed it and her shawl to the foot of the bed, leaving Rosalinda naked to his eyes. She was not at all ashamed. She let him look at her, taking pleasure in his open delight, murmuring softly when his hands enclosed her breasts, moaning low in her throat when he kissed them. Slowly his fingers moved across her body, caressing shoulders and breasts, abdomen and hips, thighs and knees.

  “Lift your hips, my darling,” he instructed, and she obeyed.

  “Andrea, what are you doing with your shirt?”

  “You will understand soon enough.” He tucked the linen beneath her hips, then separated her thighs and knelt there, between them. His hands stroked upward in the way she remembered from the night in the garden. The part of her that longed for his touch felt the pressure of his fingers. She closed her eyes, savoring the moment, aware of her own moisture and heat and knowing that this time the wonderful thing they had almost achieved on their last encounter would happen without interruption.

  Then Andrea removed his fingers. Startled and disappointed, wanting him to continue that delicious pressure, Rosalinda glanced downward. For the first time she saw clearly the hard part of Andrea that had been pressing against her thigh. She watched in fascination as Andrea moved forward, pushing himself into her. The stiff portion of his flesh began to disappear between her thighs. She was aware of it stretching her body. She tore her gaze away to look into Andrea’s eyes, to see the joyous wonder there. And the question still lurking.

  “Yes,” she said, answering that unspoken question. To emphasize her assent, she wrapped her arms around him and pulled him closer, ignoring the uncomfortable sensation his entrance produced.

  She wanted him too much to care if he hurt her, so did what she could to help him, pushing herself hard against his masculine intrusion, opening herself to him, body and heart together. Then, with a quick, little whimper on her part and a cry of pleasure from Andrea, he plunged deeply and they were one.

  He began to kiss her again, long, slow kisses, with his tongue and that other, harder, part of him moving in and out of her in a matching rhythm, until Rosalinda was drawn out of herself to become part of Andrea, as he was part of her.

  He dragged his mouth from hers, gasping for air. Rosalinda did not mind the end of their kiss, for she was gasping, too, clutching at Andrea’s shoulders, while her hips moved of their own accord and the rhythm of their joining quickened. Suddenly, she was flying somewhere in the heavens, while still inside her own, familiar skin. Andrea’s mouth covered hers again, this time to stop her wild cry of release and to smother his shout of triumph that came an instant later.

  It took Rosalinda a while to return to herself, to become a person separate from Andrea once more. She sensed that he was as reluctant to remove himself from her as she was to have him go. Yet she knew, even when at last they lay side by side, that they would never really be separate again. Not after being so close that their souls as well as their bodies had touched.

  “As close as two people can be,” she whispered.

  “As close as my own heart,” he said. “I hope you never regret what we have just done.”

  “How could I? What happened between us was too beautiful to regret.”

  “I hope I have succeeded in convincing you that I do not want your sist
er,” he murmured, kissing her ear lobe. “The only woman I want is you.”

  “Andrea?” They were still lying so close together on the narrow bed that she only had to move her head a fraction of an inch to look into his eyes. “You told me before you went away that your purpose in leaving was to discover your brother’s killer.”

  “It was true then, as it is now.”

  “But what of my mother’s plan to regain Monteferro?”

  “Her plan fits perfectly with what I want do,” Andrea said.

  “I don’t see how.” Rosalinda leaned on one elbow, looking down at him. Andrea put his hands behind his head and stretched out his long, muscular legs, crossing them at the ankles. Now that he was healthy again and completely recovered from his ordeal in the mountains, he was lean and tough and, to her eyes, incredibly handsome. Rosalinda loved him with all of her heart. She prayed that she would not have to choose between Andrea and her mother.

  “It will not be enough to conquer just Monteferro,” Andrea explained. “The Guidi control Aullia, too.”

  “The city-state that borders Monteferro,” Rosalinda noted. “It is said to be beautiful, though I have never seen it. Have you ever been there?”

  “In my youth.” Andrea dismissed the question with a smile and went on to the important issue. “In order to secure Monteferro, it will be necessary for me to take Aullia, too.”

  “This scheme of my mother’s seems more dangerous the more I hear of it.” Rosalinda shivered.

  At once Andrea sat up to snatch her shawl from the foot of the bed and drape it around her shoulders. He held the edges together over her bosom while he kissed her with a tenderness that made Rosalinda think he understood her fears.

  “Any danger is worth the risk if, at the end of it, I win my heart’s desire,” he told her. “Rosalinda, I would lay the world at your feet if I could. Lacking power over the entire world, I will lay Aullia at your feet.”

  “Aullia?” she breathed.

  “I will have you, and Aullia, and my brother’s death avenged,” he said.

  She stared at him wordlessly, trying to comprehend all that he was promising, and failing to do so. Perhaps seeing her confusion, Andrea pulled the ring off his little finger. The ruby shone as red as blood in the candlelight. He slipped it onto Rosalinda’s hand.

  “This is my pledge,” he said. “When I return to Villa Serenita the next time, we will lie together like this again. Every night we are apart, I will think of you and what we have done in this room, and I will hope that you are also thinking of me and remembering.”

  “I cannot wear it. Someone will notice and remember it was yours.” Rosalinda looked at the ring on her finger, wanting to keep it there and knowing she could not. “I know. I’ll tie a bit of ribbon around it and pin it to my underdress each day. I will wear it over my heart in the daytime, and on my finger at night, when I am alone.”

  “And you will wait for me to return?”

  “Till the end of the world, if I must. Though I do beg you to come sooner, for I will ache during every moment we are apart to be in your embrace once more.”

  “I want to love you again,” he whispered, his lips against her shoulder. “I would love you all night long if I could, but if we are discovered, your mother will be very angry with both of us. I do not mind for myself, but I do not want to leave you in an unpleasant situation.”

  “Andrea, how soon must you leave?”

  “Well before dawn. Bartolomeo will come for me. I want you out of here and into your own room again before he stirs.”

  “I know you are right, though I don’t want to go.” Rosalinda reached for her nightgown. As she moved, she looked down.

  “Andrea, there is blood on your shirt. My blood.” She looked at him, sudden tears trembling in her eyes. “That’s why you put it under me. It was for my sake, so no one would see the blood on the sheet and guess that we have been together. But now your shirt is bloody.”

  “I will wear it proudly,” he said. “That pure blood is your gift to me, a gift I will treasure for the rest of my life.”

  “Do you think there is time for one more gift-giving?” she asked. She knew that when he left the villa he was going into certain danger. They might not meet again for a long time. Or they might never meet again. Her heart constricted painfully on that thought. Loving him, she wanted to give herself to him once more before they parted. She tried to speak lightly, so he would not guess how frightened she was for his sake. “I can see that you do want me again, and I want you so much that I do not believe it will take us very long this time.”

  “I knew you were a passionate woman the first time I saw you riding that horse of yours.” Andrea pulled her down beside him and, to her great delight, he put his mouth and his hands on her again.

  Chapter 8

  Bianca awakened suddenly, sitting up with her hands over her mouth to hold back a cry of alarm. Her room was cold and the quilt had slipped away while she thrashed about in her sleep. Even as the dream faded from her mind, she tried to call it back so she could piece together the remnants of her too-familiar nightmare. Her thoughts grappled with the impression that this time there had been something different about the dream, something she ought to remember because one particular image had been so vivid.

  The same dream had tormented her since she was five years old. It always began with a sense of doom for, after so many years, she knew what was going to happen and knew there was nothing she could do to prevent the horror.

  Once again she was a child and back in Monteferro. She had run away from her nurse and was playing a game of hide-and-seek, peeping into every room she came to as she explored the ducal palace, and hoping the nurse would not find her. She knew she was being naughty and knew both her mother and the nurse would be annoyed with her, but she was having so much fun that she didn’t care a bit what punishment they decreed when they finally located her.

  Having reached the great reception room, she tiptoed inside. It was the most beautiful room in the palace and certainly the most resplendent room Bianca had ever seen. There were tall marble pillars, and wonderful paintings in golden frames on the walls. The long windows that lined one wall were draped in a rich shade of green velvet that had the Farisi eagle embroidered in gold. Bianca’s father was sitting in his chair of state, relaxing for a few moments between audiences. Half a dozen of his trusted guards stood about the room. At the scuffing sound of Bianca’s soft slippers on the polished floor, her father turned his head toward her.

  “What are you doing here, little one?” he asked. It was said that Girolamo Farisi’s smile could charm the birds from the air to sit on his shoulder. Certainly, his smile charmed his daughter. “Come and give your father a kiss.”

  Bianca ran forward and he swept her up in his strong arms, depositing her on his lap. His clothes were very fine, all red velvet and soft fur trimming, with a heavy gold chain hanging down across his chest. Bianca cuddled against him, enjoying the softness of his clothes while knowing the man himself was strong and indestructible. To Bianca at age five, her father was as constant as the stars she saw each clear night when she lifted the curtains over the window in her room. After kissing him, she rubbed her little cheek against his, feeling the faint stubble on his otherwise smooth skin. Aware of the rumbling beginning deep in his throat, Bianca sighed with happiness and awaited the affectionate laughter she so loved to hear.

  But she never did hear her father’s laughter. His arms tightened around Bianca until they began to hurt her. Then he stood her on her feet, pushing her behind his chair with a rough gesture very different from his usual treatment of her.

  “Go away, Bianca,” he said in a low voice he had never used to her before. “Run to your nurse. Find your mother. Do as I tell you. Go!”

  Bianca stumbled, catching at the back of his chair. She knew she had been naughty, but she did not understand why her father should welcome her and lift her onto his lap and hug her, and then suddenly change his mind and
send her away as if he was angry. Because his order made no sense to her child’s mind, she did not obey it. Instead, she scurried across the room and ducked behind one of the green velvet curtains. Thus, she was present to hear the shouts, the clash of weapons, and her father’s roar of rage.

  “Traitor! Villain!” Girolamo Farisi shouted at someone Bianca could not see. “To think I trusted you!”

  Always in her dream, as on the day when it had actually happened, Bianca began to cry at this point. Always she looked down to see a trickle of red seeping beneath the edge of the green curtain and oozing toward her toes. Bianca twitched aside the curtain. One of her father’s guards lay upon his back at her feet. He was staring up at her with wide, open eyes, but she did not think he could really see her because he did not smile as he usually did for her. His right arm was flung out, with his sword lying beside his hand.

  Elsewhere in the room men were sticking swords and daggers into each other. Bianca’s father was using his dagger, holding off another man who also had a dagger.

  Bianca did not think they were playing a game because her father looked so angry.

  Bianca knew she ought to pick up the fallen guard’s sword and go to help her father. She reached down to the sword, but it was so heavy she could not lift it. She tried again and got both of her hands around the hilt, but the sword slipped out of her small fingers to make a loud clattering noise when it landed on the floor. Afraid someone would see her and stick a dagger into her, Bianca jumped back behind the curtain.