One Christmas Night in Venice. Jane Porter

let emotions cloud reality.

      She nodded once, and that was all he needed. He’d done his duty. Displayed proper hospitality for a guest in his home. With a curt goodnight he walked swiftly away, his sumptuous robe swinging from his shoulders, powerful hands clenched at his side.

      The past, he reminded himself harshly, was dead.

      Diane shuddered as he walked away.

      His voice. Dom’s voice. He’d sounded just like Dom. Spoken like Dom. Touched her like Dom.

      But Domenico was dead. Dead. Gone. Buried in the family vault. And this, the beautifully restored palazzo, belonged to Dom’s sister, who had graciously donated the use of the waterfront palace to the charity Foundation for their fundraiser.

      She knew this. Knew the facts. But facts right now didn’t explain anything. The facts somehow were wrong.

      Diane watched the tall winged lion join the magnificent Venus. Their heads tipped together and Diane’s heart ached. Jealous. Jealous. Crazy as it was, she felt as if she was watching her beloved with another woman.

      It made her ill. Her stomach heaved. Time to leave, she told herself. You’re losing your mind. Confusing reality and fantasy. Letting the costumes and masks distort your mind and cloud your memory.

      In the antechamber a uniformed maid emerged with Diane’s dark wool cloak. Pietra, Diane thought, recognizing the maid who’d just started working for the Coduccis when she and Dom had honeymooned here seven years ago. “Thank you, Pietra,” Diane said softly from behind her mask.

      The maid smiled. “You know me?”

      “Of course.” Feeling lost, and needing to connect, Diane lifted her mask, revealing her face. “It’s Diane. Diane Mayer-Coducci—”

      The rest of Diane’s words were drowned out by Pietra’s shriek. “Madre Maria, protegger mi dal fantasma!”

      Diane, fluent in Italian, had no problem translating the maid’s strangled cry. Mother Mary, protect me from the ghost!

      “Pietra,” Diane choked, embarrassed by Pietra’s theatrics. “It’s me. Diane. Domenico’s wife—”

      Pietra screamed again, louder than before.

      Diane’s flagging confidence deserted her and, clutching her cloak to her breast, she limped out as quickly as her bad leg would allow her.

      Such a mistake coming tonight. How could she have thought that it would invite anything other than more pain and suffering? So stupid to want a peek at the life she’d lost.

      Shivering, Diane struggled with her cloak and mask and shepherdess staff. It was freezing cold and the Venetian fog had settled in, veiling the Grand Canal, making the gondolas at the water’s edge appear to float in the air. Just go home, she told herself, get out of here and go home.

      Diane was but steps from the bobbing gondolas when a firm hand descended on her shoulder, stopping her.

      “What game is this?” The deep, rough male voice gritted, even as a warm palm bore down on her thin bare shoulder, forcibly turning her around.

      A shiver raced through her. That voice again. A voice she’d thought she’d never hear again. Could it be?

      Was it possible?

      With her mask dangling in her fingers, she turned toward him, lifting her face to the light.

      He hissed a breath as his gaze searched her face.

      “What?” she whispered, her mouth drying.

      Fury darkened his eyes. “My lady, you’ve taken the masquerade too far.”

      “I don’t know what you mean.”

      “You do.”

      She shook her head, denying his accusation. “Take off your mask.” Her voice was raspy, her mouth dry as sand. “Please.”

      “Who are you?” he demanded, his voice as sharp as cut glass.

      “Let me see you,” she begged.

      He looked at her for the longest moment before reaching up to lift the lion’s mask from his face.

      The impressions hit her fast, furious—the forehead, the eyes, the cheekbones, the strong patrician nose.

       Domenico.

      Diane bit ruthlessly into her lip, biting back the pain.

      Trickery—the moon, the light, the December night.

      Trickery—this Venetian fog.

      How cruel the night to conjure beautiful, dark, sensual Domenico.

      Her heart ached. Her body grew feverishly warm. He looked so much like her Domenico that desire licked her veins.

      Cruel night.

      Cruel city of masks and balls and dreams.

      Cruel city floating on pillars in the sea.

      “Domenico?” she breathed, heart thumping wildly.

      “Who are you?” he demanded.

      Her bewildered gaze held his. Was it him? Could it be? “Diane.”

      He groaned deep in his chest and took a menacing step toward her. “Do not speak her name. You have no right.”

      It was him.

      But it couldn’t be.

      Dom had died. Dom and the baby had died. Only she had survived the accident outside Rome. Only she, and barely at that.

      In agony, Diane dropped her mask. It cracked as it hit the stone pavers, and even as it shattered Diane reached out a trembling hand to lightly touch his bare chest. His chest was hard, taut with sinewy muscle, the skin warm, firm.

       “Domenico.”

      He took a step closer, looming over her. The lamp flickered yellow light over his profile and it was him. Beautiful. So beautiful. Tears scalded her eyes. “It is you,” she whispered.

      He took her hand from his chest, bent his head to reject her.

      The light flickered again, and it was no longer his beautiful face but the face of a stranger. Scarred. Burned. Changed.

      Not Domenico at all.

      Diane’s weak leg gave out and she collapsed, tumbling at his feet.

      CHAPTER TWO

      DOMENICO caught the fragile shepherdess just before her head slammed against the stone. Her heavy staff clattered to the ground instead, joining her broken mask.

      She was small, light—lighter than Diane. Because this wasn’t his Diane. No matter what this woman said. No matter the game she played.

      But he couldn’t leave her here. The night was cold and her cloak was nearly as thin as her sheer costume. Effortlessly he swung her up, lifting her high against his chest. It angered him that she felt more like an angel than a woman. So frail. Too frail.

      His robe swirled around his legs as he carried her back to the palazzo, and he tried to concentrate on the cold and the fog instead of the woman in his arms.

      When she’d touched him he’d burned. That brush of her fingers across his chest had hurt. Not tingled. Burned.

      Just like the fire that had consumed the car the night of the accident.

      His gaze dropped to the top of her head with its elaborate white wig. How strange that he felt nothing when Valeria touched him, and yet he felt everything when this little impostor touched him.

      Jaw hardening, he resolved to get to the bottom of this charade—but it would be in private, away from the guests and the revelry.

      A