even boost sales. Who knows?’
‘Oh, you are impossible.’ She reached for her bag and rose. ‘I have not the patience to reason with you.’
‘As I am fast running out of patience to listen to you,’ Angelo said crisply. ‘Busy yourself with finding a wife for Mauro. That should occupy you for the next several years.’
She gave him a look of concentrated fury and swept to the door. When it had closed behind her, the Contessa said mildly, ‘That was neither kind nor polite, mio caro.’
‘Yet it had the ring of truth she allegedly admires so much. However, I will send her some flowers and make peace.’ He was silent for a moment, then sighed irritably. ‘She did not come here today, I am sure, just to lecture me on my sins. No doubt she has a suitable candidate in mind as a wife for me.’
‘Davvero, she mentioned—someone.’
Angelo’s face relaxed into faint amusement. ‘But of course,’ he said softly. ‘And are you going to tell me her name?’
‘She is called Elena—Helen in her own language.’
‘An English girl?’ He didn’t hide his surprise.
‘With Italian blood,’ the Contessa nodded. ‘Her grandmother Vittoria Silvestre was a dear friend of mine and Dorotea also had affection for her. She married an Englishman, and one of her daughters did the same, a man called Blake. They eventually settled near Genoa, but sadly were killed one winter in an accident on the autostrada. Elena, their only child, now lives in Rome, and works as a translator for the Avortino publishing company.’
‘She works?’ His brows lifted. ‘So she is “not just a pretty face” as the English say.’
‘You would be a better judge of that than myself.’ The Contessa played with her rings. ‘It seems you have met her.’
‘I have?’ Angelo frowned. ‘I do not recall.’
She said expressionlessly, ‘She was at a dinner party you attended at the house of Silvia Alberoni.’ She paused. ‘A name that is familiar to you, I think. And certainly a pretty face.’
Under his breath, Angelo cursed his Aunt Dorotea, wondering at the same time how she came by her information.
I shall have to be more careful in future, he thought grimly.
Married to the wealthy but dull head of a firm of top accountants, Silvia was as bored as she was young and beautiful, and also ripe for mischief as he’d swiftly detected at their first meeting. Subsequent and more private encounters had proved her just as ardent and inventive as he’d conjectured, and their affaire had prospered.
Until then, he had also believed it to be a secret, which was why he’d risked accepting her invitation to dinner. Most of the other guests had been from the world of finance, so he had found the evening instructive as well as entertaining, but he seemed to remember there had been a girl, quiet and essentially nondescript, seated at the other end of the table. The fact that he’d barely noticed her, he thought, said it all.
He said coolly, ‘It is kind of my aunt to bring her to my attention, but I believe I require at least a modicum of personality in the woman I marry. Signora Alberoni’s guest seemed—a complete nonentity—a girl without looks or significance.’
‘I am sorry to hear it,’ his grandmother said after a pause. ‘I would not have thought Vittoria’s grand-daughter could be so signally lacking in appeal. But any decision must naturally be yours—when you choose to make it.’ She paused. ‘Now ring the bell, mio caro, and Maria will bring coffee.’
And the conversation, to Angelo’s relief, turned to other topics.
But that did not mean he was off the hook, he thought, as he drove home later. And in many ways his grandmother and interfering aunt were right. He should be married, and if this might be possible to achieve without having to abandon his bachelor pleasures, he would propose to the first suitable girl who took his eye.
But the experiences of some of his married friends whose submissive doe-eyed brides had turned into control freaks before the honeymoon was over had proved an active deterrent. True, they seemed more philosophical than crushed, but Angelo knew it would not do for him.
But, at the same time, he could not envisage what he might find acceptable either.
He enjoyed women, and the pleasure of women, always making sure that he gave back the delight that he took, but he had never fallen in love with any of the girls who’d shared his bed, or considered that they might also share his future on a long-term basis.
He offered no promises and made it clear he expected none in return.
In addition, there was a kind of inner reserve in him which seemed to warn him when each liaison had run its natural course, and could be safely ended, with charm, generosity—and finality.
And he suspected with a trace of regret that his affaire with Silvia Alberoni might already be reaching those limits.
She was a passionate and insatiable mistress, but that reliable antenna of his had recently picked up that she might have begun to foresee a different role in his life for herself, if the worthy Ernesto could be conveniently sidelined.
The word ‘annulment’ had even been mentioned, lightly and amusingly, it was true, and solely in the context of her failure to become pregnant during the two and a half years of her marriage.
‘I was told once that a woman’s body can reject the seed of a man she does not truly love.’ One crimson-tipped finger had drawn an enticing pattern in the curling dark hair on his chest. ‘Do you think that is true, mi amore?’
He had curbed his instinct to dismiss the idea as ludicrous nonsense but in much pithier terms, and, instead, murmured some meaningless platitude about a woman’s sensitivity which appeared to satisfy her. But the exchange had raised a red flag in his consciousness just the same. As did her use of the word ‘love’ which he’d always deliberately avoided in his affaires.
But even more alarming was the possibility that rumours might be circulating about them. That if Zia Dorotea had learned of their relationship, then others might also have done so, and that the stories might eventually reach Ernesto Alberoni.
Angelo would deny them, of course, but he had to ask himself if Silvia could be trusted to do the same, or if she might see this as an opportunity to escape from a disappointing marriage, and find a husband more to her taste. And there was a real danger she might want it to be him. Could insist that having destroyed her marriage, he had an obligation towards her. Had even once expressed disappointment that she had not met him while she was still ‘free’. Another word to set alarm bells ringing.
Because Silvia, though beautiful and entertaining, was hardly the material from which good wives were made. After all, she’d had no compunction about putting horns on the unfortunate Ernesto, and who was to say she would not do the same to another husband, given the opportunity?
Suddenly he could see the precipice yawning in front of him and knew that, for safety’s sake, he needed to step back, and fast, while he still could.
For there was another reason why any kind of open scandal should be avoided, particularly at
