Eros bounded after her. He caught her wrist, and with a tug she pirouetted straight into his arms. She instantly recoiled. “Let go! You’ve had your lunch. Now let me return to the cabin.”
He put a finger beneath her chin, tilting her face up to his. “You are more beautiful than I remembered, Alanis, and although I promised myself I’d leave you be, I find it…almost beyond my control. Three more days of this will turn me into a softheaded imbecile.”
It took her mind several seconds to resume working. “You remember me? It’s impossible! I don’t know you. We’ve only met last night, for heaven’s sake!”
“We have crossed paths, Alanis,” Eros whispered, “and I can prove it. Dine with me during these three days we have together and I promise to tell you everything before we part company.”
Alanis stewed in a mental caldron of curiosity and enmity for a long moment, enfeebled bit by bit by the potent plea in his bedeviling blue eyes. “Fine. Now release me. I…I am starving.”
Chuckling, Eros did as asked and invited her to take her seat once again.
CHAPTER 3
It was not a good night to be an Italian prince. Cesare Sforza sank into a torn wingchair and scanned the cold, austere walls of Castello Sforzesco. Its splendor had been sacked. Efficiently. Brutally. Completely. Looted by his blood-sucking debt collectors. He had nothing. Worse. His days in his family palazzo were numbered.
A weak flame leaped on the hearth. Cesare’s gaze fell on a shattered mirror leaning against a wall. Well built, raven-haired, clad in black from head to toe, his reflection sadly complemented his surroundings. Though in his prime, he looked finished: His white features were as cold as a statue’s; his dark blue eyes held the glare his enemies labeled “the look of a savage beast at bay.” Cesare smiled viciously. That which had earned him contempt and vituperation would win him glory and dominion in the end. One day soon he would find the scar-faced dog who had stolen the Sforza medallion. He would kill him and become the next Duke of Milan.
In the meantime, Cesare had to survive by his wits and cunning alone while the Spaniards looted Milan’s taxes. He swore and downed a shot of cognac. It was the last bottle. The cellars’ old treasure of wines and spirits had followed the sad path of the art and furniture. And now that the Imperial Armies were at the gates of Milan he had to flee as well, except where could he go? Every country with the Grand Alliance was a cul-de-sac for him because he openly sided with France. He did so after the emperor and the pope denied his diritto de imperio, his rightful claim to the Duchy of Milan. Should he go to Paris? He wondered. There were worse places to spend the coming winter, but what good was Paris for an impoverished Milanese prince? Also, one had to consider the unfortunate incident with the French heiress. Two years ago, Louis chased him off in disgrace, vowing that if Cesare ever neared a French woman again, he’d install him in the Bastille and lose the key. So he was married. It wasn’t his fault that the bullnecked, pop-eyed pope refused granting him dispensation for annulment. If a man beat his wife, was it not a clear sign he had enough of her? Pity he hadn’t poisoned Camilla after squandering her fortune. He was stuck with her, but the stupid cow had fled to Rome to cry to her uncle—who inconveniently was Pope Clement himself—what a wicked husband she had. Hence, he could definitely not go to Rome. He could go to Spain. Find a rich heiress in Madrid. Charm her, poison her, take her money…The idea appealed to him, but Spain didn’t. He hated the sharp-bearded Spaniards.
Fast approaching steps echoed off the Great Hall’s stark walls. Cesare drew his dagger, his lustrous, lethal old friend. “Who goes there?” he barked, squinting against the gloom.
Wrapped in a black cape, a diminutive man materialized in the feeble firelight. His voice was a raspy whisper. “I bring good tidings, Monsignore. Excellent tidings.”
Cesare snorted and sheathed his dagger. Already bored, he muttered with the enthusiasm of a dead goat, “Tell me what you’ve learned, Roberto.”
“I found him, Monsignore.” Roberto snickered. He put the tip of his finger to his left temple and carved an imaginary crescent scar.
Cesare shot out of his chair. “Are you certain?”
“Si, Monsignore. He flies the biscione. ‘The viper that leads the Milanese to the field.’”
“I know that, stupido!” Cesare looked daggers at the spy. “Where is he? Tell me now!”
“I watched the Alastor sail from Genoa with the crescent-scarred man onboard. Though he didn’t come ashore, I saw him with my own eyes, and he still looks—”
“I’m not interested in his looks, stronzo!” Cesare bellowed. He was interested in getting his hands on the medallion and then slitting the bastard’s throat. His archenemy. His curse. “Tell me everything! Don’t try my patience!”
Cringing under his master’s fury, Roberto blurted, “He…he sailed to the Caribbean. What should I do now, Monsignore? Should I go after him? Merge with his shadow?”
Cesare sat. He had to think fast and craftily, exercise that killer instinct he had perfected on the baccarat tables. The King of France was the only man powerful enough to dispose of the dog, but to obtain Louis’s assistance Cesare would have to give something in return. What?
Louis wanted Spain, so he put his grandson, Philip, on the Spanish throne and was waging war against the entire continent to keep him there. He wanted Italy, so he sent half his army to occupy it. Now Prince Eugene of Savoy, the supreme commander of the Imperial Armies, was threatening Louis’s triumphs. There was nothing Louis wanted more than to eliminate Savoy.
Cesare smiled. He knew the exact method to capitalize on that. He looked at Roberto. “Yes. Go after the pirate. Merge with his shadow. I’ll meet you in Gibraltar within two months. Find out where he goes, whom he talks to, whom he sleeps with. If you have to bribe, poison, or strangle someone to do so—do it. I want to know everything! Capisce? And…kill him, if the opportunity presents itself. I want the golden medallion he wears around his cursed neck.”
Roberto flinched. “Kill the…?” But when he saw his master’s glare, he curtsied quickly, murmuring, “Si, Monsignore. It will be done.” He crept away, his cape swelling behind him.
Smiling with satisfaction, Cesare lifted the cognac bottle off the floor. Soon he would have everything he ever wanted. He stretched his long legs and saluted the royal viper carved out of the stone wall. “Ah, Stefano. Though you must die, fear not, for death is bitter, but fame eternal.”
CHAPTER 4
Eros leaned forward in his chair, emerging from shadow into candlelight. He selected a red flower from the vase on the dinner table and tossed it into her lap. “A flower for your thought.”
Alanis missed a heartbeat seeing his tanned, patrician face accentuated by the soft glow of the flame. She could no longer deny she took pleasure in his attentions. For the first time in her life she appreciated the power of femininity. Here was a man whom most of the world feared, but he endeavored to amuse her, to find favor in her eyes. Since their first lunch together the day before, he had become seamlessly amiable and courteous, behaving as a perfect gentleman. Yet despite his efforts, she wasn’t entirely fooled: Eros was a predator—quiet, elegant, and lethal.
Absentmindedly she twirled the gilded lock arranged to fall over her exposed shoulder. “It would cost more than a flower to purchase my thought.”
“Then perhaps the Malaga wine will do the trick. As the saying goes, ‘In vino veritas’.” He refilled their glasses, his amused expression spiced with blatant masculine interest.
Alanis didn’t fail to detect his appreciation of her low-cut bodice. His eyes were caressing her all evening. She pressed the wineglass to her warm cheek. “I had a different price in mind…”
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