Veretti's Dark Vengeance. Lucy Gordon

armed.’

      He stopped a passing young woman and spoke to her in Venetian. When she’d departed he said,

      ‘I asked her to bring us some refreshment outside, where we can sit down.’

      Outside was a wooden seat on a terrace that overlooked a small canal with shops along the bank. It was pleasant to sit there drinking coffee.

      ‘Is this your first visit to Venice?’ he asked.

      ‘Yes, I’ve thought about it for years but never got around to it before.’

      ‘Do you travel alone?’

      ‘Quite alone.’

      ‘I find that hard to believe.’

      ‘I wonder why.’

      ‘Let us not play games. You don’t need me to say that a woman as beautiful as you need never lack company.’

      ‘But perhaps you need to hear that a woman may prefer to be alone. It isn’t always the man’s choice, you know. Sometimes she consults her own preferences and consigns men to the devil.’

      He gave a wry smile. ‘Touché! I suppose I asked for that.’

      ‘You certainly did.’

      ‘And have you consigned us all to the devil?’

      ‘Some of you. There are men who are fit for nothing else.’

      He nodded. ‘You must have met quite a few of them.’

      ‘A fair number. The virtues of solitude can be very appealing.’

      ‘And so you travel alone,’ he said slowly.

      ‘Alone—but not lonely.’

      That seemed to disconcert him. After a moment he said quietly, ‘Then you must be the only person who isn’t.’

      ‘To be enough for yourself,’ she answered, ‘safe from the onslaughts of other people, and happy to be so—it isn’t really very hard.’

      ‘That’s not true, and you know it,’ he replied, looking at her intently. ‘If you’ve achieved it, you’re one in a million. But I don’t believe that you have achieved it. It’s your way of fooling the world—or yourself.’

      She felt as if a hand had been laid on her shoulder, halting her in her tracks. It was a moment before she drew a deep breath and said, ‘I don’t know if you’re right. Perhaps I never will.’

      ‘But I would like to know,’ he said in the same quiet tone. ‘I’d like to see behind that mask you keep so firmly in place.’

      ‘If I removed it for everyone, there would be no point in having it,’ she pointed out.

      ‘Not everyone. Just me.’

      Suddenly she found it hard to breathe. It was as though a cloud had crossed the sun, throwing the world into shadow, making complex things that had seemed simple only a moment before.

      ‘Why should I tell you what I tell nobody else?’ she managed to say at last.

      ‘Only you can decide that.’

      ‘That’s true. And my decision is…’ She hesitated. Something in his eyes was trying to make her say what he wanted to hear, but it had to be resisted. ‘My decision is that I’ve kept my secrets safe so far, and I’ll go on doing just that.’

      ‘You think your secrets are safe, do you?’

      Something in his voice filled her with the conviction that nothing in the world was safe, her secrets, her heart, herself—nothing.

      ‘I think—I think I shall work hard to keep them safe.’

      ‘And woe betide intruders?’

      ‘Exactly.’

      ‘But don’t you know that your attitude is, in itself, a challenge to intruders?’

      She smiled. She was beginning to feel at ease again.

      ‘Of course I know. But I’ve fought this battle before, and I always win.’

      He raised her hand and brushed the back of it with his lips. She took a long, shaky breath.

      ‘So do I,’ he assured her.

      ‘Do you know, that’s twice you’ve told me you’re invincible, once about business and once about—well, whatever?’

      ‘Why don’t you give it a name?’ he asked.

      She met his eyes. ‘Perhaps names don’t matter.’

      Before he could reply her attention was caught by the sound of a motor. Turning her head, she just made out the boat that had brought her here, appearing around the edge of the building and streaking away across the water.

      ‘Hey, they should have waited for me,’ she protested.

      ‘I told them not to. I said I’d take you back myself.’

      ‘You told them to go without me?’ she said slowly. ‘Without asking me first?’

      ‘I was sure that you would agree with me.’

      ‘No you weren’t. That’s why you didn’t tell me. You’ve got a cheek!’

      ‘In that case I apologise. I meant no harm.’

      ‘Of course not,’ she said affably. ‘Just to get your own way with the least inconvenience. Where’s the harm in that?’

      ‘I couldn’t agree more.’

      ‘I suppose the poor idiot who owns this place is going to get the same treatment until she gives in.’

      ‘Don’t pity her; she’s no idiot but a very clever woman who got her hands on Larezzo by cunning and will sell it for the highest price she can extort.’

      ‘And since you want the place, she’s laughing.’

      ‘I doubt she’ll be laughing when I’ve finished. Let’s not talk about her further. She isn’t interesting and you still haven’t told me your name.’

      She was saved from having to answer by the sight of Rico appearing behind him.

      ‘I think you’re wanted,’ she said.

      Rico was anxious to let him know that the manager had now returned and awaited his pleasure. Salvatore thanked him and turned back to Helena.

      She was gone.

      ‘What the—? Did you see where she went?’

      ‘Round that corner, signor,’ Rico said.

      But when Salvatore followed he found himself facing a small piazza with no less than four exits and nothing to show which one she had taken. He made a token pursuit, hurrying from one little street to another, peering vainly down the narrow length of each, but knowing it was useless.

      At last he stopped, furious at how easily she’d given him the slip on his own territory. Before returning he adjusted his expression so that he could say casually to Rico,

      ‘Do you happen to know who she was?’

      ‘No, signor. She just came as one of the group. Is it important?’

      ‘No, not important at all,’ he said heartily. ‘Let’s get back to business.’

      Helena found that it was simple to return to Venice. Taxis were as easy to come by as in any other city, except that they moved on water. Soon she was streaking back across the lagoon, trying to sort out her conflicting emotions.

      Satisfaction warred with annoyance. She’d bearded the enemy in his lair, looked him over, assessed him, been intrigued by him, and come off best in their parting. All that remained now was to make him