One With the Shadows (15 page)

Her thoughts careened around her head. He had explained away any supernatural elements about him through his disease. Could a disease make one live forever? He might not be eternal, but he had lived more than three hundred years and showed no trace of it. She believed her eyes, no matter any tales he might tell of ancestors who had posed for the
David
. He might not be supernatural, but he was certainly beyond her experience of natural.

In the twilight, she gazed up at the statue. She had imagined him looking just like this, in a stone prison, in chains, being tortured in a way she couldn’t understand by the great, green stone that had come into her life shortly after he did.

She felt sandwiched between two unimaginable realities. Gian Urbano was, by any human standards, something beyond natural, regardless of his disease. And she was having visions about things she could not possibly know.

She pushed through the crowd, unseeing, as chaos trembled in the air around her.

*   *   *

“Gian,
cara,
you are up early. The sun isn’t yet set.”

Gian didn’t look up as his mother entered the dim room. He had not even been to bed today. He was still in shirtsleeves and trousers from last night. He ran a hand through his hair, knowing he looked haggard and disheveled. So much was eating at him: the things he had done in North Africa in the name of a cause, how to get the emerald back to Mirso, his strange pyrotechnic abilities. Everything was confusion. Then too, Kate was leaving soon, and he could not get her out of his mind. For an instant he had considered telling her what he was, asking her to stay. One should never trust anything considered in the small hours of the afternoon. In the twilight, they were revealed as ridiculous.

“I’ve been thinking about whether I should escort her to England before I embark for Mirso with the stone.” He realized he hadn’t used her name, but just referred to Kate as “her.”

“Ahhhh.” His mother sat, her dressing gown of rust-colored silk shushing softly around her. “And you have been considering this all day at the cost of your rest?”

He shrugged. A crack of light around the shutters let in one bar of light.

“But of course you can’t do that. You must go to Mirso. Is that why you look so bleak?”

He rose, filled again with the restless energy that had made him pace all day. “No. I just don’t see the point anymore, Mother. I mean, after I return the stone … it’s done. The war is over. Mission completed. Then … what?”

“Find something that interests you and do it.”

He chuffed a half-laugh and paced to the door and back to the shuttered windows. “What else is there? I’ve done it all. I built a shipping industry at Amalfi. I worked to establish the duchy here, I was a patron of the arts, but—”

“I never forgave Lorenzo for giving Firenze to his own wretched son when he knew you would have been a better leader. The Medicis.” His mother was still bitter after more than three hundred years. “Dynasty over the public good.”

“I even joined the Church. Venality, political machinations.” He stopped. “I admit you were right about that.”

“A miracle, your mother was right.” She smiled up at him, her eyes soft. “So does nothing interest you? Not even women?”

He swallowed. “Not … not since I returned from Algiers.” Her eyes narrowed and he turned away in order not to have to watch her speculate. She wouldn’t stop until she knew the whole. So he might as well just tell her. “I can’t believe I’m admitting this to my mother.” He took a breath. “The man who made Casanova look constant can’t … hold up his end of the bargain. Perhaps it’s a sign that I’m ready for Mirso. I’m half an ascetic already.”

“No,
cara mia.
Mirso is the absence of life, though the Elders won’t admit it. The war was horrible. But these things pass. You have had no … stirrings at all?”

“Well, yes. Stirrings. Always stirrings. But that does not consummate the act.” He happened to be standing in front of a heavy bench with an ornately carved back, dark with age. He collapsed onto it. “But I’d lost interest in life even before the war. People, events, places, all took on a dreadful repetition. I think the war actually gave me purpose, for a while.” He closed his eyes. “What a purpose. Killing innocents.”

“Innocents! Hardly.”

“Some of them. Deluded but not evil.”

“Delusions have their own evil.” Now it was her turn to rise and pace in front of him, her hands stuffed into her rust-colored wrapper’s pockets. It swirled around her delicate form. “There is much in the world to do. What one does doesn’t always last. But the world inches along toward order and goodness. Sometimes it takes three steps back.” She sighed. “All you can do is push the world forward as best you can.”

Gian wondered what gave her the strength to find purpose. She had her fingers in a dozen pies. She financed building and improvements across Europe. She provided for artists exiled by the Church, so their work could continue abroad. It was she who encouraged the treaties with Napoleon and suggested his brother Joseph as the king of Napoli. Now she was looking for a way to oust the Spanish. She was indefatigable.

“You didn’t seem so defeated yesterday.” She stood, tapping her finger on her chin.

“It was you who started me thinking about my future. Or lack of it.”

“Was it I?” Now her foot was tapping too. They both felt the sun go down. Their kind always knew where the sun was. She went to the window, throwing open the shutters. “I think perhaps it was the fact that the girl is leaving.”

“Nonsense.” There
was
something else he wanted of her. “Could you escort Miss Sheridan to England in my stead? Elyta might think she still has the stone.” His mother did not move. “And she thinks to start life over in an English village. You must convince her not to do it. She would never listen to me. She doesn’t understand the provincial mind. She would be dreadfully unhappy there. The local boys would taunt her. People would look away…”

“You told her about the Companion.” His mother’s voice drifted back into the room.

He shrugged. “She is not unintelligent. She guessed I was vampire. I had to give her some explanation for the traits she observed.”

His mother turned into the room. “She knows about the blood?”

“No. Nor about translocation or compulsion. That would only frighten her.”

“It is good to have one person who knows. Perhaps you should tell her the whole.”

“And have her despise me for a monster? I have considered it carefully.”

“In fact, you are preoccupied with this girl.” She stared at him without seeing him as she speculated. “I think it is because she does not fawn over you. Indeed, she doesn’t seem to even want you. It must be hard for you, who are used to every woman wanting you.”

At that he turned, disgusted. “She wants me. I smell her woman’s musk.” Heightened senses were another gift from the Companion. It was one of the things that had preoccupied him so today. Her wanting him should have made her like all the other women he’d known. It didn’t.

“Hmmm.” His mother was a silhouette. “Then it shows strength of character in her not to fawn. She will never have anyone make love to her. She knows that.”

“Nonsense, Mother. One gets used to her scar. Why, I hardly even see it when I look at her. She’s a diamond of the first water, except for that. A man will love her one day.” That was good, wasn’t it? She deserved love after the indifference she had known in her life.

“You accept her because you were enclosed with her in a carriage for three days and got used to her scar. I doubt that will happen again. Especially in some remote English village.”

“You will talk her out of that silly scheme.”

“I have no faith in my ability to do so. She seems extremely strong-willed.” His mother tapped her finger against her chin. “I would merely like to point out that you do seem to have an interest in life. It is this girl. You should either pursue that interest, or determine she is unimportant so you can move on.” She came to stand over him. Now he could see her eyes plainly. “You take the time to find out. I’ll bring the stone to Mirso.”

He was about to protest when she put her fingers to his lips. “I must away to feed my Companion. Think about it. I will do this for you gladly,
cara mia.
”

In a rush of copper-colored silk, she was gone.

His mother was right. Kate might never have a man make love to her again. That was bad. She deserved a full life. He was certain she wasn’t a virgin. In a life like hers, what woman could be? That was good. He found virgins boring. But … but it must have been a long time since she’d made love. She’d been scarred for what, eight years? And her experience might not have been a good one. To the men who took her, she was no doubt just an object to be used.

As she had been all her life. The “nefarious character” used her to steal. The nuns used her as a good deed in the eyes of God. Matthew Sheridan used her talents. The people she duped used her as a conduit to their dreams. Had anyone ever valued her for herself? Probably not. And no one had ever cared for her comfort or her pleasure. She deserved more.

He wanted to give her more. And if he made love to her, he might just get her out of his system. His mother was no doubt right about that too. That Kate didn’t fawn over him or treat him like an object to be acquired was what enthralled him. If he made love to her and she began to cling, well, then he’d know that she was just like all the other women. He’d be free of this strange obsession and be able to go on with life. He could ask the Elders at Mirso if they had any other tasks for him when he returned the stone. Maybe that wouldn’t sound so pointless after he had freed himself of Kate Sheridan.

Could he complete the seduction? He couldn’t compel her to have wonderful memories in order to erase his failure as he usually did. He swallowed.
Courage, Gian.
There were other ways of making love than with an erect cock. He’d show her the pleasure of mouth and hands. He’d go gently so she wouldn’t be frightened, since he was willing to bet no one had cared enough to pleasure her in that way. Perhaps she would forgive his other failure.

He sniffed the air around himself. If he was going to engage in a seduction, he needed fresh clothes and a bath.

*   *   *

Kate marched into the grand Palazzo Vecchio’s carriageway, determined to confront Urbano with his crime of concealment. What else had he concealed from her besides the fact that he had a very, very long life span? It was his fault entirely that her world was infested with visions, and stones that drove one mad, and people with red eyes who smelled of cinnamon and something else, something sweet.

Footmen pulled open the great, carved door.

She had been a perfectly normal person who knew very well that cards didn’t tell the future, and that people were out for what they could get, before she met him. And now it looked very like he was going to give her twenty thousand pounds instead of stealing the stone
she
had stolen, and nothing was normal at all.

She limped up the grand staircase, furious. First, she’d just get off these damned half-boots. A maid appeared at the door to her apartment, took one look at her countenance and went wide-eyed. It was Carina.

“Signorina?” Her voice held a tremor.

Kate felt ashamed. “Oh, please, Carina. Don’t mind me. My feet hurt.”

The girl looked much relieved. At least she wasn’t crying. She seemed positively cheerful. “The pinched feet always make for the foul temper. Let me take them, signorina.”

Kate collapsed on the dressing table chair and Carina knelt to unbutton the boots. “Joseph! Joseph, a bath,” Carina called. “I have the salve, signorina, that will soothe your feet.” Taking the offending boots, she pulled open a tiny drawer in the dresser and retrieved a green glass jar. The bath was poured in no time. Did they keep hot water boiling constantly in the kitchens? Kate was soon soaking in nirvana. Her feet felt slightly less like burning logs the size of those in the fireplace in the grand hall, but she was still fuming inside. She heard Carina moving about in the outer room, brushing and hanging her clothing.

The door to her apartments opened. “Signore!” she heard Carina gasp.

“That will be all,” the familiar voice rumbled. “You can go.”

“Si, signore.”

The outer door closed. Kate went still. She wanted this confrontation, but not when she was in a bath. He would never dare enter. Would he? She sighed in relief. She’d locked the door.

The knob turned, stopped … and then clicked open with a snap. She gasped. Had she not locked it after all? She covered her breasts with her arms and sank into the water.

He strode into the dressing room and looked around at the shelves for shoes, and cupboards of mahogany imported from India to hold a lady’s dresses as if he had never seen anything like them. She would wager he had, a thousand times.

All her planned remonstrations seemed to have dissolved in the steam from the bathwater. “Sir, what … what are you thinking?” was all she could say.

His gaze stopped its fluttering progress about the small room. Lord, but he filled it! His energy flapped at her psyche. His eyes came to rest on her. She flushed. They went liquid, hot and swirling in that sea of green. She had the sense of … secrets, glimpsed and concealed, almost like the emerald. They fascinated and frightened in equal measure, just like the stone.

“I … I came to ask…” He cleared his throat. “Do you plan to leave tomorrow?”

“Yes, if the draft came through today and if the carriage can be arranged.”

“I am not sure the draft came through.”

“Oh. Perhaps it will come in the morning.” She frowned. He was in his shirtsleeves. His cravat had been tied in haste. His hair was wet, and … and now that she noted it, his shirt clung damply to his body, as though he had not fully dried himself after a bath.

She imagined him bathing, naked, the muscles in his back moving, like the statue in the piazza, but living and warm.

Oh, dear. She was naked in her own bath. Had she ever felt so vulnerable? “Sir, I beg you to retire. I will attend you in … in a room of your choice when I have dressed.”