DEVIL’S EMBRACE by Catherine Coulter

Caesare said slowly, “It is odd that he said nothing to me before he returned to England about bringing this girl back with him.”

“That is because he did not know of her existence before he left. Do you not see, Caesare, she has tricked him. She knew she could not convince him to wed her unless she became pregnant with his child.” She spread her hands in front of her. “I wonder if indeed the earl is the father of her child.”

“My half-brother is not a fool.”

“Mayhap not in this instance, but surely he has not treated you as he ought. That old fool, Montalto, still shares his confidence, while you—” She shrugged her white shoulders.

“Whilst I what?”

“I do not mean to imply that the earl does not hold you in affection. But has he ever allowed you to direct his business dealings?”

“You know very well that he has not. He treats me like naught but an amusing, useless fribble.”

“If he were alone again, I cannot but feel that you, his half-brother, would gain in stature and trust in his eyes.”

Caesare rolled away from her and rose to look down at her. “What is it you are saying, Giovanna?”

“I am saying, my love, that you must not be cheated out of what is rightfully yours.”

Caesare looked deep into her doe-brown eyes, and raised a surprised eyebrow at her audacity. Perhaps jealousy compelled her, but that did not, he discovered, overly distress him. He thought a moment, and frowned at her. “Even if what you say is true, what is to be done?”

“The earl must not wed the little strumpet.” She gazed at him beneath arched brows. “Do you not want her, Caesare, perhaps just once? To keep the earl on a string, she must employ quite tempting skills in his bed.”

Caesare remembered the desire Cassie had stirred in his loins. But when he spoke, his voice was harsh. “You expect me to seduce the girl away from my half-brother? Hardly likely.”

“No, you could not seduce her, Caesare.”

“I believe the Borgia’s habits are long out of practice.”

“But there are other ways, are there not? Other ways that would never lead the earl to suspect his loyal half-brother.”

Caesare felt a thrill of excitement, despite himself, and a tempering shaft of fear. “Yes,” he said slowly, “there are other ways. But it is dangerous, Giovanna, very dangerous.”

“But you are such a resourceful man, my love.”

He looked deep into her eyes, then turned and pulled on his discarded clothing.

“It must remain our secret, Giovanna,” he said, once he was fully dressed.

“Of course, caro. Our secret.”

He leaned down and kissed her lightly on her soft mouth.

“Do not stay away from me too long, Caesare,” she called after him.

* * *

Cassie shaded her eyes with her hand as she walked up the stairs to an upper terrace of the garden and gazed toward Genoa and the sparkling blue Mediterranean. She felt strangely lethargic, as if she were somehow drugged, her thoughts strewn about her unpredictably. She supposed it was the severe bout of illness she had suffered that morning. In all her eighteen years, she had never really known illness—save, she remembered ruefully, for the time when she was seven years old and had stuffed herself with Christmas sweets.

She turned away from the spectacular view, knelt down, and pressed her nose against a full-blossomed red rose. The sweet fragrances that hung about the gardens like a perfumed mist would soon began to fade, as summer drew to a close. Most of all, she supposed, she would miss the vases of flowers that Rosina brought daily to her room. She straightened slowly, her eyes caught by Joseph, who was talking to Paolo in the lower garden. She loved to watch Joseph talk, for though his face rarely changed its placid expression, she could make out much of his conversation from his expressive gestures.

But this afternoon, she found no interest in him. Indeed, nothing seemed to touch her. She wondered if she was becoming vaporish, like that ridiculous Lady Cumberland who seemed to produce a child every year, all the while lounging indolently upon a daybed, her vinaigrette in hand.

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