Bartering Her Innocence

And then he’d publicly and unceremoniously dump her.

CHAPTER THREE

ARRIVING in Venice, Tina thought, was like leaving real life and entering a fairy tale. The bustling Piazzale Roma where she waited for her bag to be unloaded from the airport bus was the full stop on the real world she was about to leave behind, a world where buildings were built on solid ground and transport moved on wheels; while the bridges that spanned out from the Piazzale crossing the waterways were the ‘once upon a time’ leading to a fairy tale world that hovered unnaturally over the inky waters of the lagoon and where boats were king.

Beautiful, it was true, but as she glanced at the rows of windows looking out over the canals, right now it almost felt brooding too, and full of mystery and secrets and dark intent …

She shivered, already nervous, feeling suddenly vulnerable. Why had she thought that?

Because he was out there, she reasoned, her eyes scanning the buildings that lined the winding canal. Luca was out there behind a window somewhere in this ancient city.

Waiting for her.

Damn. She was so tired that she was imagining things.

Except she’d felt it on the plane too, waking from a restless sleep filled with images of him. Woken up feeling almost as if he’d been watching her.

Just thinking about it made her skin crawl all over again.

She pushed her fringe back from her eyes and sucked in air too rich with the scent of diesel fumes to clear her head. God, she was tired! She grunted a weary protest as she hauled her backpack over her shoulder.

Forget about bad dreams, she told herself. Forget about fairy tales that started with once upon a time. Just think about getting on that return plane as soon as possible. That would be happy ending enough for her.

She lined up at the vaporetto station to buy a ticket for the water buses that throbbed their way along the busy canals. A three-day pass should be more than adequate to sort out whatever it was her mother couldn’t handle on her own. She’d made a deal with her father that she’d only come to Venice on the basis she’d be back at the farm as soon as the crisis was over. She wasn’t planning on staying any longer. It wasn’t as if this was a holiday after all.

And with any luck, she’d sort out her mother’s money worries and be back on a plane to Australia before Luca Barbarigo even knew she was here.

She gave a snort, the sound lost in the crush of tourists laden with cameras and luggage piling onto the rocking water bus. Yeah, well, maybe that was wishful thinking, but the less she had to do with him, the better. And no matter what her frazzled nerves conjured up in her dreams to frighten her, Luca Barbarigo probably felt the same way. She recalled the vivid slash of her palm across his jaw. They hadn’t exactly parted on friendly terms after all.

Tourists jockeyed and squirmed to get on the outer edge of the vessel, cameras and videos at the ready to record this trip along the most famous of Venice’s great waterways, and she let herself be jostled out of the way, unmoved by the passing vista except to be reminded she was on Luca Barbarigo’s patch; happy to hide in the centre of the boat under cover where she couldn’t be observed. Crazy, she knew, to feel this way, but she’d found there were times that logic didn’t rule her emotions.

Like the time she’d spent the night with Luca Barbarigo.

Clearly logic had played no part in that decision.

And now once again logic seemed to have abandoned her. She’d felt so strong back home at the kitchen sink, deciding she could face Luca again. She’d felt so sure in her determination to stand up to him.

But here, in Venice, where every second man, it seemed, had dark hair or dark eyes and reminded her of him, all she wanted to do was hide.

She shivered and zipped her jacket, the combined heat from a press of bodies in the warm September air nowhere near enough to prevent the sudden chill descending her spine.

Oh God, she needed to sleep. That was all. Stopovers in Kuala Lumpur and then Amsterdam had turned a twenty-two hour journey into more like thirty-six. She would feel so much better after a shower and a decent meal. And in a few short hours she could give in to the urge to sleep and hopefully by morning she’d feel halfway to normal again.

The vaporetto pulled into a station, rocking sideways on its own wash before thumping against the floating platform and setting passengers lurching on their straps. Then the vessel was secured and the gate slid open and one mass of people departed as another lot rushed in, and air laced with the sour smell of sweat and diesel and churned canal water filled her lungs.

Three days, she told herself, as the vessel throbbed into life and set course for the centre of the canal again, missing an oncoming barge seemingly with inches to spare. She could handle seeing Luca again because soon she would be going home.

Three short days.

She could hardly wait.

The water bus heaved a left at the Canale di Cannaregio and she hoisted her pack from the pile of luggage in the corner where he’d stashed it out of the way. And this time she did crane her neck around and there it was just coming into view—her mother’s home—nestled between two well-maintained buildings the colour of clotted cream.

She frowned as the vaporetto drew closer to the centuries-old palazzo. Once grand, her mother’s house looked worse than she remembered, the once soft terracotta colour faded and worn, and with plaster peeling from the walls nearly up to the first floor, exposing ancient brickwork now stained yellow with grime at the water level. Pilings out the front of a water door that looked as if it had rusted shut stood at an angle and swayed as the water bus passed, and Tina winced for the once grand entrance, now looking so sad and neglected, even the flower boxes that had once looked so bright and beautiful hanging empty and forlorn from the windows.

Tourists turned their cameras away, searching for and finding more spectacular targets, an old clock tower or a passing gondola with a singing gondolier, and she almost felt ashamed that this was her mother’s house, such an unworthy building for a major thoroughfare in such a beautiful city.

And she wondered what her mother could have done with the money she had borrowed. She’d said she’d needed the money to live. Clearly she hadn’t spent much of it on returning the building to its former glory. She disembarked at the next stop, heading down one of the narrow calles leading away from the canal. The palazzo might boast its own water door but, like so many buildings fronting the canals, pedestrian access was via a rear courtyard, through an ornate iron gate in yet another steeply walled lane, squeezing past clumps of strolling tourists wearing their cruise ship T-shirts and wielding cameras and maps, or being overtaken by fast moving locals who knew exactly where they wanted to go and how to get there in the shortest possible time.

For a moment she thought she’d found the right gate, but ivy rioted over the wall, unkempt and unrestrained, the ends tangling in her hair, and she thought she must have made a mistake. Until she peered closer through the grille and realised why it looked so wrong.

She remembered the courtyard garden being so beautifully maintained, the lawns mowed, the topiary trees trimmed to perfection, but the garden looked neglected and overgrown, the plants spilling from the fifteenth century well at its centre crisp and brown, the neat hedge along the pathway straggly and looking as if it hadn’t been clipped for months. Only two bright pots spilling flowers atop the lions guarding the doorway looked as if anyone had made an effort.

Oh, Lily, she thought, looking around and mourning for what a sanctuary this garden had once been. What had happened to let it go like this?

There was no lock on the gate, she realised, the gate jammed closed with rust, and she wondered about her mother living alone, or nearly alone in such a big house. But the gate scraped metal against metal and creaked loudly as she swung it open, a sound that would no doubt frighten off any would-be thief.

It wasn’t enough to bring her mother running, of course—Lily was too much a lady to run—but Carmela, the housekeeper, heard. She bustled out of the house rubbing her hands on her apron. Carmela, who she’d met a mere handful of times, but greeted her now with a smile so wide she could have been her own daughter returning home.

‘Valentina, bella! You have come.’ She took her face between her hands and reached up to kiss each cheek in turn before patting her on the back. ‘Now, please …’ she said, wresting her backpack from her. ‘I will take this. It is so good you have come.’ A frown suddenly came from nowhere, turning her face serious. ‘Your mother, she needs you. Come, I take you.’

And then she smiled again and led the way into the house, talking nonstop all the time, a mixture of English and Italian but the meaning perfectly clear. And Tina, who had been on edge the entire flight, could finally find it in herself to smile. Her mother would no doubt treat her daughter’s attendance upon her as her God-given right; Luca Barbarigo would probably see it as a necessary evil, but at least someone seemed genuinely pleased to see her.

She followed Carmela across the threshold and, after the bright autumn sunshine, the inside of the house was dark and cool, her mother still nowhere to be seen. But, as her eyes adjusted, what little light there was seemed to bounce and reflect off a thousand surfaces.

Glass, she realised, remembering her mother’s passion for the local speciality. Only there seemed to be a lot more of it than she remembered from her last visit.

Three massive chandeliers hung suspended from the ceiling of the passageway that ran the length of the building, the mosaic glass-framed mirrors along the walls making it look as if there was at least a dozen times that. Lily blinked, trying to stick to the centre of the walkway where there was no risk of upsetting one of the hall tables, also heavily laden with objets d’art, trying to remember what this hallway had looked like last time she was here. Certainly less cluttered, she was sure.

Carmela led her through a side door into her kitchen that smelt like heaven, a blissful combination of coffee and freshly baked bread and something savoury coming from the stove, and where she was relieved to see the only reflections came from the gleaming surfaces, as if the kitchen was Carmela’s domain and nothing but the utilitarian and functional was welcome.

The older woman put down Tina’s pack and wrapped her pinny around the handle of a pan on the stove. ‘I thought you might be hungry, bella,’ she said, placing a steaming pan of risotto on a trivet.

Tina’s stomach growled in appreciation even before the housekeeper sliced two fat pieces of freshly baked bread and retrieved a salad from the refrigerator. After airline food it looked like a feast.

‘It looks wonderful,’ she said, pulling up a chair. ‘Where’s Lily?’

‘She had some calls to make,’ she said, disapproval heavy in her voice as she ladled out a bowl of the fragrant mushroom risotto and grated on some fresh parmigiano. ‘Apparently they could not wait.’

‘That’s okay,’ Tina said, not really surprised. Of course her mother would have no compunction keeping her waiting after demanding her immediate attendance. She’d never been the kind of mother who would actually turn up at the airport to greet her plane or make any kind of fuss. ‘It’s lovely sitting here in the kitchen. I needed a chance to catch my breath and I am so hungry.’

That earned her a big smile from the housekeeper. ‘Then eat up, and enjoy. There is plenty more.’

The risotto was pure heaven, creamy and smooth with just the right amount of bite, and Tina took her time to savour it.

‘What happened to the gardens, Carmela?’ she asked when she had satisfied her appetite and sat cradling a fragrant espresso. ‘It looks so sad.’

The housekeeper nodded and slipped onto one of the stools herself, her hands cupping her own tiny cup. ‘The signora could no longer afford to pay salaries. She had to let the gardener go, and then her secretary left. I try to keep up the herb garden and some pots, but it is not easy.’