Prince's Virgin In Venice

Except he wasn’t looking at her with derision. Didn’t look at her as if she was out of place. Instead she saw something else in his eyes. A spark. A flame. Heat.

And whatever it was low down in her belly that had flickered into life this night suddenly squeezed tight.

‘You say you made your costume yourself?’ he asked.

If she wasn’t wrong, his voice had gone down an octave.

‘Yes.’

‘Very talented. There is just one thing missing.’

‘What do you mean?’

But he already had his hands at her head. Her mask, she realised. She’d forgotten all about it. And now he smoothed it down over her hair, adjusting the crown so that it was centred before straightening the lace of her veil over her eyes.

She didn’t move a muscle to try to stop him and do it herself. She didn’t want to stop him. Because all the while the gentle brush of his fingers against her skin and the smoothing of his hands on her hair set off a chain reaction of tingles under her scalp and skin, hypnotising her into inaction.

‘There,’ he said, removing his hands from her head. She had to stop herself from swaying after them. ‘Perfection.’

‘Vittorio!’

A masculine voice rang out from the top of the stairs, saving her from having to find a response when she had none.

‘You’re here!’

‘Marcello!’ Vittorio answered, his voice booming in the space. ‘I promised you I’d be here, did I not?’

‘With you,’ the man said, jogging down the wide marble steps two by two, ‘who can tell?’

He was dressed as a Harlequin, in colours of black and gold, and the leather of his shoes slapped on the marble stairs as he descended. He and Vittorio embraced—a man hug, a back-slap—before drawing apart.

‘Vittorio,’ the Harlequin said, ‘it is good to see you.’

‘And you,’ Vittorio replied.

‘And you’ve brought someone, I see,’ he said, whipping off the mask over his eyes, his mouth curving into a smile as he held out one hand and bowed generously. ‘Welcome, fair stranger. My name is Marcello Donato.’

The man was impossibly handsome. Impossibly. Olive-skinned, with dark eyes and brows, a sexy slash of a mouth and high cheekbones over which any number of supermodels would go to war with each other. But it was the warmth of his smile that made Rosa instinctively like the man.

‘My name is Rosa.’

She took his hand and he drew her close and kissed both her cheeks.

‘I’m right in thinking we’ve never met, aren’t I?’ he said as he released her. ‘I’d be sure to remember if we had.’

‘I’ve only just met Rosa myself,’ Vittorio said, before she could answer. ‘She lost her party in the fog. I thought it unfair that she missed out on the biggest night of Carnevale.’

Marcello nodded. ‘That would be an injustice of massive proportions. Welcome, Rosa, I’m glad you found Vittorio.’ He stepped back and regarded them critically. ‘You make a good couple—the mad warrior protecting the runaway Princess.’

Vittorio snorted beside her.

‘What’s so funny?’ she said.

‘Marcello is known for his flights of fancy.’

‘What can I say?’ He beamed. ‘I’m a romantic. Unlike this hard-hearted creature beside me, whom you managed to stumble upon.’

She filed the information away for future reference. The words had been said in jest, but she wondered if there wasn’t an element of truth in them. ‘So, tell me,’ she said, ‘what is this Princess hiding from?’

‘That’s easy,’ he said. ‘An evil serpent. But don’t worry. Vittorio will protect you. There’s not a serpent in the land that’s a match for Vittorio.’

Something passed between the two men’s eyes. A look. An understanding.

‘What am I missing?’ she asked, her eyes darting from one to the other.

‘The fun,’ Marcello said, pulling his mask back on. ‘Everyone is upstairs on the second piano nobile. Come.’

Marcello was warm and welcoming, and nobody seemed to have any issues with the way she was dressed. Rosa began to relax. She’d been worrying about nothing.

Together they ascended the staircase to the piano nobile, where the principal reception rooms of the palazzo were housed one level above the waters of the canal. With its soaring ceilings, and rock crystal chandelier, Rosa could see that this level was even more breath-taking, more opulent, than the last. And the pièce de résistance was the impossibly ornate windows that spread generously across one wall.

‘Is there a view?’ she asked, tempted to look anyway. ‘I mean, when it isn’t foggy?’

‘You’ll have to come back,’ Marcello said, ignoring the crowded reception rooms either side, filled with partygoers, and the music of Vivaldi coming from the string quartet, and walking to the windows before them. ‘On a clear day you can see the Rialto Bridge to the right.’

Rosa peered through the fog, trying to make sense of the smudges of light. But if the Rialto Bridge was to the right... ‘You’re on the Grand Canal!’

Marcello shrugged and smiled. ‘Not that you can tell today. But Venice wearing its shroud of fog is still a sight to behold, so enjoy. And now please excuse me while I find you some drinks.’

‘We’re in San Polo,’ she said to Vittorio.

The hotel where she worked was in the Dorsoduro sestiere, the ball she was supposed to be attending was in the northern district of Cannaregio. Somehow she’d ended up lost between them and within a whisker of the sinuous Grand Canal, which would have hinted at her location if only she’d found it.

A smudge of light passed slowly by—a vaporetto or a motorboat carefully navigating the fog-shrouded waterway—and Rosa’s thoughts chugged with it. Vittorio had been kind, asking her to accompany him, but strictly speaking she wasn’t lost any more.

She turned to him. ‘I know where I am now.’

‘Does that matter?’

‘I mean, I’m not lost. At least, I can find my way home from here.’

He turned to her, putting his big hands on her shoulders as he looked down at her. ‘Are you looking for yet another reason to escape?’

A wry smile kicked up one side of his mouth. He was laughing at her again, and she found she didn’t mind—not when seeing his smile made her feel as if she was capturing something rare and true.

‘I’m not—’

He cocked an eyebrow. ‘Why are you so desperate to run away from me?’