sheer hard work and brilliance. He’s been my mentor for years.’
‘I can’t picture you with a mentor, somehow. I don’t think you’d let him get a word in edgeways.’
‘Everyone needs a mentor,’ he said seriously. ‘Not just at the start but maybe for always, to give you a sense of perspective. I learned a lot from him when I was just starting, and he still has things to teach me.’
‘A great financial brain, then?’
‘The greatest. He believed in keeping his attention focused and never taking his eye off the ball.’
‘You mean there’s been nothing in his life but financial wheeling and dealing?’
‘He married and has a family, but he’s been a widower for ten years.’
‘I’ll bet he married an heiress.’
‘No, his own secretary.’
‘Oh, well, nothing like securing cheap labour.’
Marco laughed. ‘You may find him a little stiff and puritanical, but you’ll like him when you get to know each other.’
‘But why does he want to meet me?’ she asked lightly. ‘Am I being tested for suitability? If he gives me the thumbs down, am I out?’
‘Don’t be absurd. I think he’s just lonely.’
‘Lonely? With all that money?’
‘Harriet please don’t say that kind of thing in front him? I know it’s a joke, but he wouldn’t understand.’
‘Hey, you recognised a joke. Better not let him suspect that, or you might not be his white-headed boy any more.’
Diplomatically he didn’t answer this.
When they stopped for lunch Marco called Elvino Lucci to apologise for being late. Harriet could just make out the man’s voice.
‘You, late? That must be a first! Only something special would make Marco Calvani break the habits of a lifetime!’
‘It was,’ Marco said.
‘Well, I’m longing to meet her. I’m storing up a little surprise myself.’
They reached Corzena in the late afternoon. It was an old town built on a hill at the edge of a lake, with the villa on the lower part, near the shore. Huge wrought-iron gates swung open at their approach, and soon the house was in sight. There on the steps, waiting to greet them, was a tall man with white hair and a distinguished face. Beside him stood a very young woman who bore a strong resemblance to a sugar-coated doll. She had a mass of blonde hair, dressed high and wide, and sprayed into a confection like candyfloss. Her eyes were large and ingenuous.
‘Good grief!’ Marco murmured. ‘What-’
Lucci advanced to greet them with outstretched arms. After kissing Harriet on both cheeks, he sprang his surprise.
‘Meet Ginetta, my wife,’ he said. ‘We married on impulse, and you’re the first to know.’
Marco maintained his composure, greeting the new Signora Lucci with perfect courtesy, but Harriet could imagine his thoughts. Elvino was at least thirty years older than his bride, and clearly took pleasure in buying her jewels. She was loaded down with them.
There was another shock awaiting. Marco had described Lucci as a man of old-fashioned values, but now Ginetta gave the orders, and her idea of how to accommodate an engaged couple was modern. While not going so far as to put them in the same room she’d given them adjoining rooms with a connecting door.
‘We’ll be waiting downstairs when you’ve freshened up,’ she cooed, tripping daintily away.
When she’d gone Marco knocked on Harriet’s door before entering.
‘I hope you realise that I had no idea of this,’ he said. ‘I never meant to break my word to you.’
‘I know that. You’re not responsible for them putting us together.’
‘Whatever is Lucci thinking of?’
‘He’s in love with her, that’s obvious.’
‘To think of him springing it on me! This visit is going to be an ordeal.’
At first Harriet thought the same, but it wasn’t long before she began to like Ginetta, who seemed genuinely fond of her elderly husband, if not as besotted by him as he was by her. She also had a habit of making apparently naive remarks that turned out, on examination, to be shrewd and witty. Several times over dinner Harriet found herself laughing.
After the meal Ginetta insisted on showing her over the villa, innocently proud of its luxury and her own good fortune in securing a husband who could lavish gifts on her. Even so, her happiness had a cloud.
‘I’m really glad you came,’ she confided. ‘I made Vinni absolutely promise to get you here. Lots of wives don’t want to know me.’
‘I can’t think why,’ Harriet said warmly. ‘I think you’re great fun. But I’m not Marco’s wife, you know.’
‘But you soon will be. He’s nuts about you, anyone can see that.’
Harriet gave a little laugh that sounded odd to herself. ‘It’s not Marco’s way to be “nuts”. And if he was he’d die rather than admit it.’
‘It’s just there in the way he looks at you, when you’re not looking back. He does it all the time. He can’t stop himself.’
‘Nonsense,’ Harriet said, colouring.
‘It’s true. And you do it, too.’
‘I-’
‘Yes, you do. You two fancy each other like crazy. It’s a good thing I gave you connecting rooms.’
It was fortunate that she tripped away, calling back, ‘Come on, let’s find the men,’ because Harriet wouldn’t have known how to answer.
The men were sitting on the broad terrace that overlooked the lake, drinking brandy and deep in discussion. Harriet could see that Marco was displeased, although controlling it beneath a courteous front. Both men rose to greet them. Elvino ordered more champagne and they all strolled along the terrace, watching the moonlight on the water.
This joyful man bore no relation at all to the severe, practical ‘brain’ Marco had described, and which he clearly admired. He was triumphant in his happiness, wanting everyone to share it, laughing and kissing Ginetta repeatedly.
‘This is truly a house of love,’ he declared exuberantly, ‘since it houses two pairs of lovers. I drink to your coming wedding, I drink to your wedding night, I drink to all the pleasure you will take in each other-’
‘Oh, they don’t mind. They’re lovers, as we are.’ He was becoming jollier with every glass, and there was no stopping him now. ‘Come Marco, drink with me to the woman you love.’
Harriet could hardly look at Marco, guessing how he would regard such a boisterous display. But he said quietly, ‘You are right, my friend. Let us drink.’
He raised his glass in Harriet’s direction, she raised hers, and they clinked.
‘Don’t just drink to the girl,’ Elvino bawled. ‘Kiss her, and then kiss her again. And let your kisses be a pledge of the passion to come.’
To demonstrate his point he tightened the arm that was about Ginetta’s shoulders, and gave her a smacking kiss. Marco responded by drawing Harriet close and laying his lips on hers. For a moment she raised her hands against him. She didn’t want to kiss him like this, knowing he’d been forced by politeness, and when he’d been at such pains to assure her that he would keep his distance.
His lips lay lightly on hers, but that was somehow more unnerving than the night she’d sensed his fierce desire. He took her hand, still raised in an instinctive gesture of resistance.
‘Kiss me back,’ he murmured against her lips. ‘Make it look good.’
Make it look good for the client, she thought angrily. But her hand was already reaching up to touch his face, while the other arm wound its way around him. His own arms tightened, drawing her very close. His lips moved across hers, subtly enticing, almost the ghost of a kiss, but a ghost that was enfolding her in a mysterious spell. She let herself slip into that spell easily, for now it was all right to caress his face and press against him, putting her whole heart and soul into what she was doing. He need never know. She was merely helping him keep a client
