A Fall of Water
Page 23

Beatrice laughed and squeezed her husband’s waist. “He’s got a point.”
Giovanni scowled, but she could see the smile flirting at the corner of his mouth. “Blackmail is an ugly business.”
“But so lucrative.” Matt held the door open and a mustached host, who nodded toward Matt and Giovanni, greeted them. She saw her mate scan the restaurant, but her own senses had already located the energy signature in the corner. They walked toward the vampire, who rose to greet them when they were a few feet away.
Like everything else in immortal society, Beatrice had discovered that greetings usually mirrored the culture and time where the vampire originated. She briefly wondered what the form of greeting had been in the Roman Republic, but was surprised when Emil Conti simply held out a hand to Giovanni. The two men shook before Beatrice was introduced.
“Emil, I would introduce my wife, Beatrice De Novo.”
“A pleasure.” Emil bowed slightly over her hand as he took it. Emil Conti looked nothing like an ancient Roman. He looked like a very formal, very successful, Italian businessman. He was handsome and wore clothes straight out of a fashion magazine. His dark hair was trimmed neatly, and his broad smile was gleaming white. Beatrice wondered whether dental care was really that good in ancient Rome, or whether he’d had work done.
“Beatrice, this is Emil Conti, a very old acquaintance of mine.”
“May I call you Beatrice?” the vampire asked politely. “A beautiful name.”
“Sure.” She couldn’t help but smile back. “It’s nice to meet you, Signore Conti.”
“But you must call me Emil, of course.” He turned to Giovanni. “May I congratulate you on your marriage? I cannot deny I was surprised by the news, but very happy for your fortune. It is a blessing to find one’s true mate.”
Giovanni glanced at the blond woman still sitting at the table silently. “And where is Donatella this evening?”
Emil gave a careless shrug. “Shopping, probably. I think she’s in town, but she’s getting ready to leave for the lakes for the summer. You know how the city can be.”
“Of course.”
“I don’t want to keep you; I saw your friends waiting for you, but thank you for introducing me to your lovely wife.”
“Will you be at Livia’s later?”
“Of course,” he said. “Who would miss it?”
“You, Emil.” Giovanni chuckled. “If you could avoid it graciously.”
Emil gave another shrug and waved them off. “Go, enjoy your meal. I’ll see you at the circus later. The squid-ink capellini with lemon and caviar is excellent tonight.”
“Thank you.”
Beatrice smiled. “Very nice to meet you.”
He gave her a little bow and a wink. “And you as well, Beatrice De Novo. Benvenuto a Roma. May you have a pleasant visit in our beautiful city.”
They walked back to the table and she could feel Giovanni’s fingers in the small of her back.
“Benvenuto a Roma,” he muttered. “Welcome to the shark pool, Tesoro.”
Castello Furio, Lazio
“So, this is a castle?”
“Yes.” He looked out the window as they twisted through the country roads northeast of the city. “Livia keeps a rather lavish apartment in the city during the winter, but she leaves the city in the summer when it starts getting warm and there are more tourists.”
“Well, that makes sense.”
“And she likes to make people come to her.”
“That kind of makes sense, too.”
He laughed and draped an arm around her in the dark car he had ordered. They were seated in the back with the privacy shield raised so they were not disturbed. Livia had offered to send a car for them, but Giovanni had demurred, stating that he didn’t know how long they would be able to stay. He had done the polite dance over the phone the evening before with Livia’s social secretary, the secretary pressing Giovanni to spend a few days at the castle, while Giovanni insisted that they could not neglect their own guests in the city. In the end, her husband’s polite stubbornness had prevailed.
“So, we will go. We will introduce you to everyone. She will try to persuade you to persuade me to stay for a few days at the country house—”
“You mean, the castle.”
“Why are you stuck on the ‘castle’ bit? This is Europe. There are castles everywhere.”
“But not all of them are owned by my mother-in-law.”
He frowned. “Livia is not my mother.”
“But you said she kind of acts like it.”
Giovanni shrugged. “She tries to.”
Beatrice sighed and leaned into his shoulder. “This is so damn complicated. I thought my family was dysfunctional.”
“Tesoro, you don’t know the meaning of dysfunctional until you have spent time in an ancient Greek or Roman family.”
“I’m starting to get that idea.”
They turned into a small lane leading to an elaborate gate that didn’t open by electronics, but by two uniformed servants who swung the gates out when Giovanni rolled the window down to identify himself. She saw the quick look of deference on the servants’ faces before she caught the sheepish expression on Giovanni’s face.
She narrowed her eyes. “You’re kind of a big deal here, aren’t you? Even more than your usual bad-assedness.”
He cleared his throat and squirmed a little. “That is not a word, and I am somewhat well-known.”