'I . . .' She sniffed. 'I've got nowhere else to go, Benito.'

Benito had a sinking feeling in his gut. He knew the answer before he even asked. 'Caesare . . . the apartment . . . ?'

She swallowed. 'He threw me out. I came home this afternoon . . . he was making love to another woman.'

Benito didn't know what to say, so he just held her. It was the right thing to do. 'He said . . . he never loved me. He used me, Benito. He used me. And I loved him. I wanted him so badly. Am I so ugly?'

'Lord and Saints no! You're really . . . well, when I saw you in that outfit of Kat's I thought you were one of the most beautiful women in town.'

'You're a smooth talker, Benito Valdosta.' But she didn't let go of him.

'No, it's truth.' A dash of the old Benito audacity returned. 'You feel pretty good too.'

This didn't get him the slap it would've normally earned him. She leaned against him instead. It made the gondola rock, dangerously. 'I'm too thin and my feet are too big.'

Benito clicked his tongue. 'Now what man is going to look at your feet?'

'So what do you look at, Benito?'

Benito realized he was in dangerous and unfamiliar waters. 'Um. I like your eyes.' He was aware of curves pressed against him.

'And what do you like about my eyes?'

'Uh, the way they spit fire when I look any lower down. Um. Not too low.' He hoped turning it into a joke would at least ease things.

She pushed him away. The moon was out again, and a small, sad smile trembled at her lips. She tugged at the cords of her bodice-lacing. His eyes almost popped out of his head as she spilled her breasts out of her bodice. The white curves were hypnotic. The nipples stood out sharply in the moonlight. 'You mean these?'

'Uh. Y . . . yes,' stammered Benito.

Maria's voice was still sad, questioning, doubtful. 'Benito. I need someone to make love to me. To kiss my breasts. To tell me they're beautiful. To tell me he wants me . . .'

Benito Valdosta found himself suddenly very dry in the mouth. 'They're really really beautiful. They're . . . they're . . .' His biblical lessons with the Dorma pastor came to his rescue. 'They're like twin does, it's, it's . . . from the Song of Solomon,' he said thickly.

She smiled a little. 'Come and kiss them now, Benito.' She lay back on the duckboards, and pulled him down with her.

Benito found himself exploring a nipple gently with his tongue, her belly with a fumbling hand. He was both more excited and more . . . awkward feeling . . . than he could ever remember. This was no young boy's eagerness. Even Benito understood that for the first time in his life he was seized by a man's passion. Not for any girl, but for a particular woman. Maria! He was almost desperate in his desire to please her.

Gently! he told himself. But Maria was having none of it. She was caught up in her own passion--and a more furious one even than his. Her hands were tugging at his breeches cord. The boat rocked wildly as he attempted to help.

'You'll have us over, you fool!'

That sounded so like the old Maria, that Benito paused. 'We shouldn't be doing this. . . .' His body was betraying his mouth.

'I asked you to, Benito,' she said, a hand guiding. 'I need . . . aaha!'

And after that there was no more talking for some time. Nothing coherent, at any rate.

* * *

'I think there's more water in the boat than in the canal,' Maria said, laughing softly. 'Ooh. I am going to have bruises. Duckboard stripes on my behind.' The arms that held him tight didn't seem perturbed.

Вы читаете Shadow of the Lion
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