Challenge Page 8

  When she caught sight of him, her resolution nearly faltered. Of course, Sue and the others had taken the yacht's main launch. There must be others Jessica reasoned, but Leandro had elected to use the speedboat. For a moment her heart leaped into her throat and she stopped dead.

  Then her courage reasserted itself. The speedboat was a vehicle like any other. It would only go at frightening speeds if it was driven in that way. All she had to do was indicate that she disliked speed and they would travel more moderately.

  She was aware, though of continuing reluctance to tell Leandro Volpi of her fear of speed. It was too like giving a part of herself away.

  She climbed down into the boat very slowly. They were, she saw, going alone. This time there was no engineer with them as there had been when Leandro challenged her to lap the bay.

  He took her hand in a firm clasp and swung her into the seat beside him. He was wearing jeans like herself,

  but his shirt had been tied carelessly by the sleeves across his broad bare shoulders, and he was wearing dark glasses. He looked the essence of the Riviera socialite at play. He also looked devastating.

  Jessica made great play of putting on her own sunglasses. Leandro grinned at her as he released the anchoring rope and they pulled slowly away from the big yacht.

  There was a breeze on the open sea. Jessica shivered. Although Leandro appeared to be concentrating on the water in front of him, he noticed.

  `Did you bring a sweater? The wind can get quite sharp.'

  `Yes.' She fumbled in her shoulder bag and brought out a crocheted shawl; her mother had made it for her last Christmas. The familiar folds were welcome in this unfamiliar setting. She gathered it round her. 'What about you?'

  He slanted a look down at her, his eyes hidden by the darkened glass.

  `I'm used to it.'

  Jessica was put out, she did not know why. 'Oh, of course.'

  `Now what does that mean?' he murmured teasingly. It sounds like more disapproval.'

  `I wouldn't dare,' she assured him. 'I'm terribly impressed when you're being macho.' She gave a fluttery and utterly false sigh.

  Leandro gave one of his shouts of laughter. 'Yes, I can see you are,' he said.

  The boat sped onward, bucking as it rounded the first point. Unconsciously, Jessica clenched her hands in her lap. Leandro handled the boat expertly, she could see that. He was unruffled by the boat's swoopings as it hit the cross swell, but for Jessica the sensation of high velocity was a torment.

  She fixed her eyes on the splash screen, trying to ignore the horizon which appeared and disappeared with such unsettling motion.

  `How long will it take us?' she asked in her best conversational tone. The palms of her hands were wet with sweat.

  `To get to Castel San Giorgio?' Leandro considered. `Half an hour, maybe.'

  Half an hour. Dear God!

  Jessica swallowed. 'Do you know it well?'

  He shrugged. 'What is there to know? Half a dozen families. Maybe thirty houses. A road like a cycle track.'

  `And one of the best beaches on the coast,' Jessica reminded him.

  It was the beach that had attracted Prince Giorgio in the first place; the beach and, he had told her laughingly, the name of the village. The beach was a great swathe of sand set in granite cliffs. The village was perched above it, the houses and the vine terraces on the gentler upper slopes. There was a steep set of worn steps from the village down to the beach past an outcrop of infertile scrub on a sizeable plateau. It was there that Prince Giorgio intended to build his holiday complex.

  Leandro grinned at her. 'The beach, of course, is wonderful. And up to now undiscovered. We used to go swimming there when I was a child. We would take a picnic and stay for the whole day, my father and I. My uncle too, sometimes.'

  This was the first time Jessica had heard him mention his father. To take her mind off the heaving boat and her wildly hammering heart, she said at random, 'Does your father come from this area, then?'

  `My father is dead,' Leandro said quietly.

  `Oh!' She was shocked. 'I didn't realise. 'I'm sorry.'

  `Don't be.' He stared ahead, the fine profile austere. `He had a hard life and he was very tired. Though he was great fun right up to the end.'

  Jessica was touched. 'You were close?'

  `Eventually.'

  She looked at him consideringly, His tone did not encourage questions, but the remark seemed to invite them. She was debating, when he took the boat in a wide swirling sweep round another headland and she was flung sideways against him. To her horrified eyes it seemed as if the nose of the vessel was pointing vertically to the sky. She clung to the arm she had been thrown against.

  `Sorry. I should have warned you.' Leandro spun the little wheel in his hands. 'There's the bay, directly ahead.'

  Jessica recognised it, though she had not previously approached from the sea.

  `It's beautiful,' she said, righting herself in a little embarassment.

  `There are wonderful little coves all down this coast.' Leandro looked mischievous. 'I could show you one that was even better. If you're brave enough?'

  `Why?' demanded Jessica, not trusting that look.

  `Well, you'd be marooned. At my mercy.' He leered at her, laughing. 'It can only be reached from the water. So if I bore you, there is nowhere to run to. You have to wait until I decide to take the boat home.'

  `Could we swim?' asked Jessica, not knowing how wistful she sounded.

  `All day, if you like,' Leandro assured her. He looked down at her, his glasses glinting. 'Will you risk it?'

  She looked at the bay ahead, the fishing boat on the beach and the figures on the steps. Undoubtedly she ought to vote for Castel San Giorgio and go and look at the site, but the thought of an empty beach of warm sand beckoned.

  `I'll risk it,' she said quickly before conscience had time to change her mind.

  `Good girl,' murmured Leandro.

  And the boat changed course.

  The beach was everything he promised. The sand was almost silver. There were large flat rocks, black as coal, on which they lay to soak up the sun and on which Leandro spread out the provisions he had brought in the boat.

  Did you know you were going to kidnap me?' asked Jessica, eyeing his preparations with ruefulness.

  I knew I was going to try.' He was opening a bottle of wine which he had removed from an ice-packed Thermos. 'Swim now or later?'

  `I haven't brought anything to swim in,' she protested.

  He shrugged. 'So swim without.'

  She shook her head. 'I wouldn't feel comfortable.' Unexpectedly, he did not tease. 'Wear your ordinary underwear, then. It will dry quickly enough.'

  That, she thought, was true. She said doubtfully, 'I don't swim very well. Is it deep?'

  `I'll look after you,' Leandro assured her. 'No, it's not deep until you get out of the bay.'

  Jessica smiled at him. 'A challenge and a promise all in one! How could I resist?'

  He watched her for a moment, the handsome head flung back to survey her as she stood on the outcrop of rock above him. The dark glasses hid his expression, but Jessica had the impression that he was unwontedly serious.

  But all he said was, 'Bear it in mind, then.'

  They swam immediately. The sea struck cold at first, but in seconds Jessica had adjusted. She paddled happily in the margins, turning on to her back and drifting, the sun on her face. The water was astonishingly clear and she could see small fish darting in and out of the crevices in the cliff where it drove below the surface. Eventually she turned over again and stroked in a leisurely way back to the shore.

  She stretched out on her rock, noticing that her daisy-sprinkled cotton underwear became virtually transparent when wet. It caused her a momentary qualm, but then she thought of the topless beauties on the sophisticated beaches that Leandro must be used to. He would only laugh at her if she made a fuss.

  She leaned back on her rock and sank into a half doze, soothed by th
e lulling of the sea to her right and the sun on her closed eyelids. It was only when that sun was suddenly blocked that she, reluctantly, opened her eyes.

  `You look very peaceful,' Leandro told her softly. He had removed his glasses and his eyes were narrowed against the sun. He had obviously just emerged from the sea. There were drops of water on his face and glistening chest and his hair was dark with it. He was smiling lazily down at her.

  In the suddenly deafening silence, Jessica swallowed. Something in the core of her body clenched hard. Oh no!' she thought.

  Apparently unaware, Leandro perched on the rock at her feet, his arms round one bent knee. He shook his head and the water flew. Some of the drops sprinkled Jessica; they were icy on her warm skin.

  `Don't,' she protested, laughing, turning her head away instinctively. If she treated him like any other friendly companion for an afternoon picnic, maybe that terrible instinctive clenching would relax. Carefully she eased herself into a sitting position.

  `Then wake up and talk to me,' he retorted.

  He poured wine and gave her a glass. Miraculously it was still cool.

  `The paradise of modern technology,' Jessica said drily, trying to diffuse the atmosphere that only she seemed to be conscious of.

  `Not at all,' said Leandro calmly. 'In the days before portable ice boxes, we used to bury the wine in the sea

  until we wanted to drink it. It worked just as well.' He raised his glass, toasting her silently.

  Jessica responded reluctantly. Sun and sea and the cool wine were a potent combination, she knew. They set the scene for romance and she did not want it. She did not want it so strongly, she was almost afraid of it.

  But Leandro was unaware of her reservations, apparently. He leaned back against the cliff, the picture of a man at peace with the world.

  `Every time we came to this coast, I used to beg and beg my father to bring me here,' he said reminiscently. `It was the one place I remember in my childhood where I was never hurt or unhappy. We never did anything very special. We would fish a bit, swim a bit, play football. . .' He sighed. 'And the magic always worked.' His eyes lifted suddenly. 'Do you feel like that, Jessica?'

  She looked round her, carefully, aware that her heart was beginning to beat with the reverberation of a drum roll. She hoped he could not hear it.

  `It is a lovely place, of course. .

  He said impatiently, 'Not here. I mean for yourself. Do you have places where you are always happy?'

  Jessica considered it. 'I'm not sure. I used to love my home and when it was sold I thought it was the end of the world. But it wasn't magic, not in the way you describe. I suppose it couldn't be if you lived there all the time. Magic places are only for visiting, I think.'

  `I expect you're right.' He was watching her. 'Why was your home sold?'

  Jessica almost jumped at the unexpectedness of the question.

  `Oh, my father died.' He waited and she went on, not very easily because the memory still hurt. 'There were a lot of debts. His business had not been going very well. And he had a partner who. . .' She bit her lip. No, she was not going to tell Leandro that. It was too private and

  too painful. It would spoil the day if they got too unguarded with each other. Correct that, Jessica, she told herself: if you got too unguarded.

  He asked softly, 'What happened?'

  `There was a car crash. It was an accident.' She put her hand up to her throat. 'He was not very sensible about money and he hadn't really thought about providing for Mother and me. I suppose he didn't expect to die, poor love.'

  Leandro reached out, without changing his posture otherwise, and took her hand. Jessica was startled. But he did nothing else, just held it in a loose, comforting clasp.

  `Go on.'

  It was surprisingly easy. 'My mother was very—well, she'd been protected all her life. She didn't really know very much about running things, or money. Uncle Richard, my father's partner, took it all over.'

  `And?' he prompted, when she fell silent.

  She shook her head. 'He cheated us,' she said brutally. His fingers tightened, suddenly and painfully, on her own. But all he said was, 'How?'

  She shrugged. 'Every way, really. We weren't as badly off as he said, though Daddy hadn't been very successful—that was true. And Uncle Richard set up companies to buy things—the house, the family portraits, the china—at what I am told were knockdown prices. He sold most of it again, developed the land; put the business back on its feet as a result.' She paused. 'He'd bought all my mother's shares by that time, of course,' she said drily. 'He told her it was an act of charity. I remember her crying with gratitude.'

  Leandro said, 'Surely that was fraud? Could you not have prosecuted?'

  Jessica gave him an incredulous look. 'Do you know how much it costs to prosecute someone in England?

  Anyway, we didn't know for ages. Then some employee that he'd sacked came and told my mother all about it. She didn't believe it at first, but. .

  `And she did nothing?'

  Jessica shook her head. 'She just wanted to forget.' She hesitated, remembering all too vividly that dreadful week. 'You see, by that time she'd come to trust Uncle Richard. To rely on him.' She looked away, out at the silver mirror that was the Mediterranean. 'She was going to marry him.'

  Leandro said very softly, 'Dear, sweet heaven.' `Yes,' agreed Jessica.

  `And how old were you?'

  `When my father died? Eight.'

  `No. When you found out about kind Uncle Richard.' `Sixteen,' she said without expression.

  He muttered obscenely under his breath. 'Presumably you trusted him as well. Were you fond of him?'

  `Yes,' she said desolately.

  He gave her a long look. 'So what happened? You didn't prosecute. Did you tell him what you knew?'

  `My mother had to.' Jessica shuddered uncontrollably. `He even admitted it. He said the end justified the means. He was going to make it up to us, after all. That was why he had proposed to my mother. He didn't want to marry at all really, but his conscience prompted him.' Her voice was savage.

  Leandro reached out and pulled her into his arms as if he could no longer bear the story. Jessica turned her head into his shoulder, oddly comforted by the gesture.

  He said in a measured tone, 'And then what?'

  `Then nothing, really.' She settled into his arms so that her head was resting on his shoulder and upper arm, and looked into the cloudless sky. She shrugged. 'We were solvent by then, just about. I was doing all right at school. We had somewhere to live because my mother had got

  a job as a housekeeper to a family.'

  `Your mother sent him away?'

  `That's one way of putting it.' She gave a harsh laugh. `He marched out, saying she was ungrateful, that he'd always looked after us.' The remembered fury rose briefly, then died. 'We never saw him again,' she said.

  `What about your mother, though?'

  `I suppose if I was feeling dramatic I'd say it destroyed her,' Jessica told him in an unemotional tone. 'She'd always been very gentle, you see, very generous. After Uncle Richard, she got suspicious of everyone. She used to look for underhand motives in anything anyone else did for us. Wrongly, of course. That was why. .

  `Why?' asked Leandro softly when she stopped.

  Jessica drew herself out of his arms. She had been going to say that that was why she had ignored her mother's warnings against Chuck. She was so used by then to the warped view that her mother held of the world that she had laughed at her dire predictions. But in the end her mother had been right.

  She was not, she found, willing to tell Leandro anything at all about her own venture into incautious trust. He was too acute. 'Did you travel the same path, then?' She gave him a startled, unguarded look.

  Answering it, he said coolly, 'Well, you clearly burnt your fingers somehow. I don't think you're silly enough to build all these barriers of yours on the basis of someone else's experience, no matter how bad your mother's was.'

>   Jessica drew even further away, veiling her eyes. Leandro watched her, his mouth wry.

  `And you're not going to tell me, right?'

  She said as coolly as she could manage, 'You're imagining things.'

  There was a little silence. For an instant his face looked bleak, almost as if she had hurt him, which had to be

  nonsense. Leandro Volpi was a charming sophisticate who had seen her determined indifference to him as a challenge. He was perhaps kinder than she had expected. He certainly seemed more understanding. But that did not mean that Jessica was going to allow him any closer than he had already come, which was a great deal too close for comfort. What to him was a casual afternoon's conversation, a brief holiday affair, could turn into altogether something much more important for her. Reluctantly but with determined honesty, Jessica recognised the fact. He was too damned attractive and, no matter how much she wanted to be, she was not immune.

  He said quietly, 'No. But if you don't want to tell, then I can't make you.' He was still holding her hand He took it on to his knee now and turned it over, studying the small bones, the neat, unpolished nails. `Will you tell me something else, then?'

  Jessica was wary. 'What?'

  `You don't have to if you don't want. It's a cheek, I know,' he said, not very clearly.

  `What is it?'

  He sighed and said heavily, as if he did not really want to ask but had no alternative, 'Are you a virgin, Jessica?'

  She stared at his bent head. She felt suddenly cold and very frightened indeed, though she was not quite sure of what. As a prelude to seduction it was unthinkable, so whatever his reason for asking, she was certain it was not that. Leandro was neither clumsy not unsubtle. So why did she feel suddenly very specifically threatened?

  She tore her hand away from his in a violent movement. She also—though she could not begin to guess why told him the truth.

  `No,' she said.

  CHAPTER SIX