Dangerous Ladies (37 page)

“Yeah! I mean, no, it’s right here.” She delved all the way to the bottom and felt the small, smooth circle. She drew it out, then stared at the old, worn yellow gold and the polished stone in puzzlement. She’d seen this before. On Mossimo’s hand. “It’s Mossimo’s ring.”

“No.” He touched her cheek with his claw. “It’s the Contini ring, stolen by one of my ancestors so many years ago its origins are lost in myth. The head of the Continis wears that ring. My
nonno
wore it until he married; then he gave it to Nonna with love and honor. She wore it until she died; then my
nonno
put it back on his finger. It should never have left him until the moment he passed on the mantle as head of the Continis.”

“How did he lose it?” As if she couldn’t guess.

“When Mossimo smashed Nonno’s hand, he stole the ring.”

When she thought how she and Roberto had faced off against that beast, she wanted to faint from fear and beam with pride. “And how did you get it back?”

Roberto opened the dragon’s mouth and grinned at her. “At the Stuffed Dog, I lifted it off Mossimo when I threw him.”

He looked so pleased, so mischievous, she couldn’t hold it back anymore. She laughed. “You are so bad!”

“Nonno told me to give the ring to you.” Roberto put his scaly arm around her shoulders. “I would be honored if you’d wear it and add my name to yours.”

She carefully placed the ring on the desk. She laid her head on his scaly chest. “I do like dragons, but I like Roberto better.”

In a flash the two of them started tugging, trying to free him from the costume that encased him.

They thumped around Sanjin’s office.

“There’s got to be another zipper.”

“Don’t you know how you got in here?”

“The person at the shop dressed me, and I didn’t know if you were ever going to let me out.” As they struggled to free his head, his tail repeatedly hit the door.

“You liar. You knew all you had to do was bat those beautiful dark eyes at me and I’d melt.” She found another zipper. “Here. Right here. That’s it!”

“That’s not true.” He almost tumbled over.

She caught him. They teetered on the verge of falling. “You just don’t want to admit it until we’ve got you out of the costume.”

“Shouldn’t you be glad to marry a wise man?”

She jerked on the ridge on his back, and suddenly his head was free, his shoulders were free, and she could see his face without gazing through white pointed teeth.

The tussle suddenly stopped. They stared at each other, and Brandi could think of nothing but how much she loved him.

“Give me the ring,” he whispered.

Without looking down, she groped until she found it. She handed it to him.

Taking her left hand, he slid it on her third finger.

She looked at the smooth green stone and knew she held the weight of Roberto’s history in her hand. Slowly she said, “It doesn’t matter who your father is, or your grandfather, or your mother. I treasure them all, but only because they brought you into this world. For me. Just for me.”

“Yes, I am just for you. And you are just for me.” Still half in the dragon costume, he caught her in his arms and kissed her. “The ring . . . do you know what they call the Contini ring?”

She kissed him back. “What?”

“The dragon’s scale.”

She laughed. And laughed.

Fate had an interesting sense of humor.

They fell over in Sanjin’s office.

In the corridor outside, Sanjin heard the sound of Brandi’s mirth and again heard the rhythmic thump of the tail against the door. With an exasperated sigh, he walked away.

 

 

 

Thank you to Kara Welsh for a fabulous promotion and publishing schedule, and to Anthony Ramondo and the NAL art department for gorgeous covers that fly off the shelves.

And as always, thanks to the Squawkers, friends, booksellers, and fans who make writing and life in general such a pleasure. All my love.

 

 

I
n the fourth-floor studio in the majestic Waldemar House, Isabelle Benjamin finished the last painting she would ever do there. Over the past week, the light had been good, the humidity oppressive but manageable, and the temperature had never topped eighty degrees. Now, when she stood back and studied the canvas, she nodded in satisfaction.

This was, without a doubt, her best work to date.

Taking a thin brush, she dipped it in black paint and, with a flourish, she signed her name.

She covered the pots of paint and cleaned her palette. She wiped her brushes on a rag, washed them in the sink, and carefully arranged them on the table. Untying her apron, she hung it on the hook.

She didn’t know why she bothered. When she was gone, Bradley would throw everything that reminded him of her into the garbage. But she was betting—betting her daughter’s future, in fact—on the
probability that he couldn’t stand to throw away her painting. If she was wrong . . . well, it would be a loss to the art world.

But then, no one would ever know.

She picked up the canvas. It was large and awkward and still too wet; nevertheless, she carefully maneuvered it into the heavy gilt frame. She tapped at the nails that would keep it in place, then turned the whole thing around and studied it. Her fingers had smeared a little of the detail along the edges, but she’d figured on that and created an unfocused background that hid the damage. The paint would seal the canvas into the frame; no one would try to separate the two. Certainly not Bradley . . . A bitter smile twisted her lips, and a single tear escaped and trickled down her cheek.

But she dashed it away. Enough of that. She’d cried too much over the last two years.

Her marriage was over now, and past time, too.

Picking up the painting in both hands, she carried it down to the third-floor nursery.

The room was absolutely perfect. Pink ruffled curtains hung in starched splendor at the long, old-fashioned windows. A colorful alphabet danced across the wall, and each teddy bear occupied its proper niche. The gleaming antique crib was fitted with white sheets over an appropriately firm mattress, and the sleeping three-month-old inside was swaddled in a pink blanket, and rested on her stomach to discourage colic. Her sweet pink lips moved occasionally as she dreamed of milk, and Isabelle’s heart broke again when she remembered how her husband and her mother-in-law had bullied her out of nursing her child.

But no more bullying for Isabelle. No more cold, hard, proper nursery for Sharon. They were escaping. Going free.

The sour-faced nanny sat in the rocker reading a
Reader’s Digest
condensed version of
Les Misérables.

Isabelle appreciated the irony.

At Isabelle’s entrance, Mrs. Graham stood as a gesture of courteous—and false—respect. “May I help you, madam?”

“I’ve come for Sharon. Would you carry her downstairs for me?”

“If madam would allow an experienced nurse to advise her, after a baby has been put down for the night it’s not a good idea to disturb her. Such an action sets a bad precedent and leads to reprehensible habits later in life.”

“According to you, so does holding her when she cries and feeding her when she’s hungry.”

Mrs. Graham stiffened in offended horror.

Isabelle had never spoken to her that way before. Before, she’d tried to make the best of a bad situation. Tried to compromise and create change from within.

But now she had a child to consider. She couldn’t allow her baby to grow up loveless, stifled, fit into a box furnished with white lace gloves and hats held under the chin with an elastic band, friends picked by their income and family background, and a debutante ball at seventeen that led to another tearstained marriage, another loveless childhood.

“Please put the knit hat on Sharon, wrap her in her down blanket, and bring her to me. I’ll be in the library,” Isabelle instructed.

“As you wish, madam.” Mrs. Graham bobbed a curtsy that mocked Isabelle and promised that another phone call would be made to Mrs. Benjamin.

Isabelle didn’t care. Not even the threat of her mother-in-law’s displeasure could dissuade her from her course.

She walked down the two flights to the library. The painting, held carefully away from her body, got heavy. Her arms grew tired. And this part . . . this part she dreaded more than any other. But when it was over . . . it was over forever. And she’d be relieved. So relieved.

She walked into the lofty room with its shelves packed with leather-bound books, its massive desk and old-fashioned chair, and the alcove where two snarling lions guarded a marble fireplace.

As she expected, she found Bradley in his easy chair, his bourbon on the table beside him, his smoking cigar between his fingers.

He was a handsome man with a shock of dark brown hair. When
she first met him, his appearance had been what turned Isabelle’s head. That, and the flattering experience of having a wealthy older man paying court to her. He’d said all the right things. He’d enjoyed her conversation. He’d been indifferent to her poverty.

Most important, he’d admired her art. For the first time in her whole life, someone who’d visited the Louvre and Florence and the Taj Mahal had seen in her paintings enough promise to call in the foremost art expert in the world.

Bjorn Kelly had been half Scandinavian, half Irish, with an eye patch, a limp, and an incredible charisma that mesmerized and enticed. He also had no patience with being dragged halfway across the world by the infatuated Bradley to look at a stupid woman’s paintings—until he’d seen them. Then he’d yelled at her for bad technique and no vision, told her to stop drawing like a girl, and given Bradley the names of two American art teachers worthy of her genius.

That was the term Bjorn used—
genius
.

When Isabelle remembered that moment and how her love for Bradley had swept through her heart, she wanted to break the painting she held over his stubborn, handsome head.

Instead she walked with firm footsteps across the library—no more tiptoeing around—and leaned the painting against the fireplace facing him.

As if stung, he half rose from his chair. “What the hell is that? Some kind of cruel going-away present?”

“It’s a gesture of my appreciation, Bradley. Without you, I would never have been able to create a painting like this.” She dragged the wooden chair away from the desk and over to the fireplace.

“Without me—and that damned Kelly.” Bradley’s lips were so stiff they hardly moved as he spoke.

“Yes. Damned Kelly helped me, too.”

“Don’t be smart with me,” Bradley snapped.

Isabelle looked him right in the eyes. “Or what?”

The silence between them grew and seethed until Mrs. Graham bustled in, breaking the spell.

“Sharon is still asleep,” she said, her tone making it clear that she didn’t expect the condition to continue, and that it was all Isabelle’s fault. Mrs. Graham was an officious, judgmental woman who for thirty years had served the best Southern familes and fancied herself above Bradley Benjamin’s upstart wife. Mrs. Graham would be delighted to see the back of Isabelle.

She wouldn’t be quite so delighted to see her employment disappear at the same time.

“Wait there,” Isabelle told her. “I’ll take the baby when I’m done.” She stood on the seat and lifted the old painting off the hook. She stepped down, walked over to the bookshelves, and placed it there. Picking up her painting, she stepped on the chair again. It rocked under the weight of her and the heavy canvas.