Page 7 of Vengeance in Venice
At least, that was the plan.
*
The events ofthe evening had appalled and shamed Angelo Savelli. If anything could have pulled him up short, shown him how out of proportion this feud had grown in his head and his heart, it was this unforgivable abduction of another man’s frightened wife. A wife who loved her husband—they had been on their damned wedding journey!
Closing his eyes, he rested his forehead against the connecting door to his wife’s room. Never had he yearned so badly to be with her. Or known so completely that he was unworthy.
What had been thinking to go after Giusti like that? To hire those damned mercenaries in the first place? Villains and thugs, all of them, especially Ugo and Pellini, who had brought the Englishwoman. What sort of a man had he become that they should even imagine he would tolerate such behavior, let alone applaud it, make use of it? Even if shehadbeen Giusti’s woman, there would have been no excuse for it. As it was…
He had brought this upon himself, losing his perspective over Giusti and Elena. He had hired Pellini and the others largely to protect his wife from Giusti’s machinations and had gone on the offensive first. A warning that he had to obey, to hand over the jewels.
Or had he just wanted someone to punch Giusti, if he could not do it himself? Stupid. He knew Giusti. Threats like that would only make him dig his heels in harder.
God, it was like a madness, this fear of losing Elena to Giusti, whom she had once promised to marry. It was making him behave in a way guaranteed to disgust his wife, not win her over. And if word ever got back to her…
It would. Venice was a small city. Everyone would know by noon. He knew what he had to do for everyone’s good, for his own self-respect—what was left of it. He tapped on the door and went in to the dressing room. Walking through it, he knocked gently again and found himself in her bedchamber.
She was not in bed but sitting by the window looking out.
She turned to face him.
God, she was lovely. She was everything.
“Angelo.” Her voice was husky and welcoming and he went to her at once, took her hands, and held them firmly between his own.
He blurted it all out at once. “I want you to know I have behaved like a lunatic. I have been a little mad and I am ashamed. I will pay the bodyguard off in the morning.”
“Why?” she asked. She did not seem very interested.
“Because it is too easy to make use of them. And they are too stupid to be trusted. They abducted a foreign lady because they assumed she was Giusti’s mistress.”
Her expression never changed. “Was she?”
“No, but they brought her here as some kind of bargaining tool. I tried to send her home again, but Giusti had already led her husband to the back door. I will find him tomorrow and apologize.”
“I suspect he might find you first.”
“That works too. He will be quite within his rights to go to the authorities. I will smooth everything over, of course, but I don’t want this to hurt you.”
For an instant, irritation flashed in her eyes. She gave a small tug as though to pull her hands free, then changed her mind andgripped his fingers more strongly. “This…vengeanceof yours hurts me,” she said. “I don’t even know what you are avenging. Let this be a warning, Angelo. Leave it, for both our sakes.”
“You are right,” he said. “I don’t know how I let it go so far… But it will be different now, I promise. I will be a better man, a better husband.” He raised her hands to his lips, one after the other, and released them.
As he walked away, she said, “Are you not staying?”
He walked steadily on, blindly, for he had closed his eyes again. “Not tonight.” For he did not deserve her, not yet.
He returned to his own dressing room. He had paced there for some time before it struck him that, just possibly, he was punishing her for his own shame. Where had all his mad joy in winning her gone? Warped into a determination to wineverything, into this stupid war of vengeance on Giusti for loving her first. For Elena loving him first.
This was no way to live, in a stupid feud with someone who had once been his friend. They had gone different ways, but the last thing he wanted was to alienate Elena, whom he loved with all the more passion because she wasallhe loved.
The war had made everything worse, of course. It bred hatred. But he should never have allowed that hatred to become so demeaning.
With a new spring in his step, he went back downstairs to his study, where he spent the next couple of hours pottering amongst the glass cases where he kept his collection of antique arms.
As usual, he paid particular attention to the Savelli dagger, a beautiful fifteenth-century weapon with a jeweled hilt and a razor-sharp blade. It was the centerpiece of his collection, beautiful and deadly, a symbol of his family’s wealth and power stretching back through the centuries. Dusting and polishing it returned him to a sense of peace and proportion. He laidit carefully back in its case, conscious of an exciting sense of renewal. As he locked the case and returned the key to his safe, he felt, finally, that he was leaving the past behind and facing the future with hope.
It was late but still dark when he finally returned, exhausted, to his dressing room. As soon as he relit the candle there, a stone thudded against the window, startling him.
