The Girl Behind the Mask (29 page)

‘Dear Luciana.’ She pulled me to my feet. ‘I prefer lovers like you.’

I did not know what to say.

Bending over me, Ernesta brushed her rubious lips across my cheek. She had kissed me before, but this time, I felt something different. I felt intent in her embrace. A moment of silence and stillness hung between us before Ernesta finally took hold of my face and drew my lips to her own.

‘You are such a beautiful child,’ Ernesta whispered. ‘I have wanted to kiss you since I first saw you at the Ridotto. Boy or girl, I knew I’d have you.’

‘But—’

‘Don’t resist, my love.’

I closed my eyes tightly, shutting out the face that drew closer to my own. What would Giacomo have said?

Ernesta persisted, kissing me softly on my nose, my ears, my eyelids, my forehead and then on my lips again. Her touch was lighter and gentler than any man’s. Her breath was sweet, like sugared almonds, her skin as smooth as satin as she pressed her cheek against mine. Finding my lips still tightly shut after all this gentle persuasion, Ernesta made a little noise of amusement before she set to work at prising them open with her tongue.

I did open my mouth then. To protest.

‘Ernesta! What about Giacomo?’

‘He would not grudge you my love. He’s very generous with his own.’

Ernesta drew away from me to see my reaction. She knew she had upset me.

‘Oh, come now.’ She drew a finger down my cheek. ‘You are not the first girl he has taken to my little house.’

‘It belongs to you?’

‘Yes. He could hardly take you back to his family home. You must have known that.’

I shook my head.

Ernesta led me to the bed and gently pushed me backwards onto it. She lay down beside me and lifted one of my hands. She laced her fingers through mine.

‘His heart is big enough to hold many loves. Your heart will be too.’

She kissed my fingers.

‘Sometimes we have to accept that a good lover stays only long enough to teach us how to be better for the next one. Kiss me,’ said Ernesta. ‘I am the next one.’

And soon a warm hand was creeping beneath my white shirt, caressing a nipple that hardened in spite of my misgivings. I let Ernesta’s hands wander curiously over my body for a moment or two, unsure of what I should be doing in return. I guessed I should probably be doing exactly the same as she was doing to me, but the move from kissing another woman to actually caressing her eager, feminine body seemed too great a step to take.

Ernesta was patient, whispering sweet little words of pleasure and encouragement until finally I felt myself ready. But she herself was far from shy. She had struggled out of her gown at the earliest possible opportunity and happily laid her half-naked torso against mine. She pushed my clothing out of the way so our bodies rested in some places skin to skin. When I was finally undressed, my nakedness felt more than skin-deep.

‘Touch me, Luciana,’ Ernesta murmured, ‘touch me too.’ Her quickening breath softened her commanding words. I moved a shaking hand from her back in the direction of her ample breasts. She shifted eagerly to make herself more easily reached. She held herself slightly above me and to my side, jutting out her perfect breasts like fleshy battlements so the target for attention could not be more obvious.

I began to caress Ernesta’s breasts, in the way she had caressed mine.

‘Kiss them,’ she begged me, ‘suck them. They’re yours to do with whatever you wish.’ I poked out my tongue and her tiny pink nipples stiffened immediately. She pulled my head closer to her breast and thrust one of the quivering buds right into my mouth. ‘Bite it,’ she commanded softly. Part of my mind still fought against the suggestion but I soon found I had gently closed my teeth together on the stiff little bud.

‘More,’ she rasped. ‘Bite a little bit harder.’

As I paid attention to my new lover’s breasts, Ernesta’s hands had crept lower. Suddenly noticing the shift in focus, I tried to push them away.

‘Don’t,’ I pleaded. ‘I really don’t think I want—’

‘This?’ It was too late.

I closed my eyes as Ernesta’s fingers tangled in my pubic hair, waiting for the inevitable. Soft but insistent fingers on my clitoris made me bite my lip as the sensation sent tiny prickling arrows all over my body. Ernesta kissed me again, thrusting her tongue inside my mouth as, down below, her fingers echoed the action.

I called out.

‘Ssssssh,’ she whispered. ‘My darling. You’re so wet, so ready.’ A peculiar tingle ran down my spine at these words, which echoed my teacher’s so closely. ‘Just lie back. I’m going to make you come all over me . . . You don’t have to do a thing.’

The words, so quiet yet so commanding, stripped me of my last inhibitions. I raised my hips and pressed my body against her thigh. Ernesta smiled her approval before she ducked her head down between my thighs.

With the first flick of her tongue Ernesta found my clitoris. I bucked my hips upwards with the surprise of the perfect hit and while they were thus raised, she grabbed my buttocks and used them to lift me still further. Her tongue moved slowly at first, up and down the shiny shell-pink skin of my vulva, tantalising my clitoris. Her eyes were on mine all the time. Every sinew in my body was vibrating with sensation.

‘Let go,’ she demanded. ‘I can feel you’re almost there.’

Ernesta’s face was wet from her nose to her chin and I knew that it wasn’t all saliva. When she returned to her frantic tonguing this time, my hips bucked higher again, as if to drive her tongue into me. I was not thinking of my teacher any longer. My body took over. I could no longer even think of resistance as I shuddered and groaned and covered Ernesta’s face with sweet cum.

When I had finished shaking, Ernesta crawled up the bed to lie beside me and kissed me carefully on the mouth. I tasted my own love juice on her lips. What had I done? I was going straight to Hell. And yet I found that I was happy.

My happiness was to be brief. The following morning, my father did not leave for his warehouse as usual, but instead called me into his office. He had a smile on his face. A horrible smile. I suppose he has not had much practice over the years. But it was a smile nonetheless as he informed me, ‘Luciana, I have the most marvellous news.’

‘Really, Father?’ I didn’t suppose for one moment he was going to tell me he had decided to get rid of Maria, but I hoped for something rather better than I was about to hear.

‘I want to talk to you about marriage.’

‘For you, dear Father?’ For a moment, I convinced myself that all would turn out well.

‘Not for me, you silly girl.’ My father reached for my hand and I knew I was in trouble. ‘For you. For the most beautiful girl in all Venezia.’

‘But no one has seen me. How can they know I am beautiful?’

‘You have been noticed in church, of course. And there can be no questioning your goodness and your purity.’

If only he knew.

‘You are a true prize for any man.’

‘But which man intends to make me his?’

‘It is such wonderful news,’ my father continued. ‘You are sure to be delighted.’

‘Then let me begin to enjoy my great happiness right away!’

‘I have received an offer for your hand from the Duke Magherini.’

I fainted. My father assumed it was with delight.

How could I marry the Duke Magherini? I could not tell my father he was a thug and a villain. As far as he was concerned, I knew nothing of the man except my father’s recommendation of him.

I made every other objection I could think of.

‘I am not worthy of being a duchess!’ I began.

‘My darling,’ said my father. ‘You are worth a thousand queens.’

‘But he is the first man to ask. We may get a better offer,’ I said, in direct contradiction of my last point.

‘A better offer than a duke? For a merchant’s daughter from Turin?’

‘Am I not a little young still to be married?’

‘You are seventeen, my love. You are of the perfect age. Though I appreciate you may be a little unprepared compared to other girls since you lack the guidance of a mother. I will ask Maria to tell you what will be expected of you. No, hang on,’ he muttered to himself. ‘Maria wouldn’t know. She’s not yet married herself.’

Oh my father. My dear sweet father. So utterly blind to what happened under his very own roof.

‘No,’ he concluded. ‘I will not listen to any more of your silly objections. This is the perfect match for you. The Duke will visit us tomorrow afternoon.’

‘What if I don’t like him?’ I burst out.

My father placed his hands on my shoulders and looked into my eyes.

‘You will like him. You will love him. You will be a perfect wife.’

He smiled at me. He was as happy as I had seen him since my mother died. I smiled back, though inside, worms of misery were already eating my heart.

Chapter 43

Oh, I knew all about worms of misery. I’d been experiencing more than a few of my own since the day I called Marco’s bluff. I had heard nothing from him. Not even a note to acknowledge he had received my last email. I felt well and truly stupid. He’d taken all that he wanted from me. He’d had his fun and probably posted the video to Rude Tube. I had been an idiot to think that he could ever want more from me. He was a man who had dated supermodels. A little virtual fun was fine, but he was never going to let himself be seen with a dowdy academic on his arm.

Neither had I heard anything more from Steven. There was no follow-up to his strange and unexpected email. Of course, I had reread it over and over. Sometimes his protestations of love chimed loudest in my heart but most of the time it was that awful, damning phrase. ‘A vanilla sort of love.’ To think I’d thought that was the ideal. I cursed my naivety.

I couldn’t go back to the library after that morning when Marco had me pleasure myself for his entertainment. Fortunately, I had scanned some of Luciana’s diary entries so I had plenty to be going on with. It was frustrating from time to time, when I found a word that hadn’t scanned so well, not to be able to refer to the original, but the frustration was a small price to pay to avoid humiliation for a while. I could not face going back to the library, sitting at that desk, knowing what was inside the drawer. Assuming the vibrator was still there. Had Marco retrieved and cleaned it, ready for the next girl? I shuddered at the thought. Then there was the mirror. Was its presence why Silvio had regarded me so strangely? How many times had he seen it before?

Nick and Bea noticed that I was spending more time in the office. Neither of them knew about the cybersex, of course, but Bea knew about my flirtation with Marco and guessed that something might have gone wrong. She also knew I had heard from Steven, if not about the details of his proposal. Bea offered me her services as a confidante and I took them as far as I could bear. When I finished talking about my upset and confusion, she told me, ‘There are nice men out there. Uncomplicated men. Men who want to make you happy and who don’t know the first thing about playing games. Men like Nick. Nice guys can be sexy too.’

She was right about Nick in one respect. He was the archetypal nice guy. When he joined us at the bar, he fetched us drinks and paid us compliments. He jumped to his feet every time Bea or I got up to leave the table. He was self-deprecating and funny. I knew that he liked me. But he was not Steven. He was not Marco. When Nick placed his hand on the small of my back to guide me through a crowd, I felt no electricity. I could not imagine falling into his arms. What was wrong with me? Why did my idea of love have to be spiced with distance, pain and hurt? Why did I only lust after the unattainable? Steven: the arrogant academic with his heart in his trousers. Marco: the elusive billionaire. Where his heart was, nobody could know. Assuming he had a heart at all.

Then, of course, Marco broke his silence. My chest ached as I opened his email. I was ready for another humiliation. Instead, I read this:

I asked you what you wanted to happen and you answered me, at length and with an honesty I hoped for yet didn’t expect. For that, the very least I owe you is my own honest answer to the same question.

I too wish that we could meet face to face. Like you, I have a very clear picture in my mind of my charming correspondent, but I am aware that a photograph doesn’t tell one everything. They say the camera never lies, but in the era of Photoshop, we know for sure that’s not the truth. However, I agree with you there is one thing we cannot fake, which will always give us away. It is the look in our eyes.

Though I saw you only in a photograph before I admitted you to my library, I had the strangest sense that you could see into my soul. Perhaps that we’d even known each other before. Our conversations since have only served to make me more certain that you, and only you, could really understand me. Your willingness to open yourself up for me, even though I couldn’t be with you, showed a trust that thrilled my soul. You are brave and you are beautiful, Sarah. Your trust in me is a gift greater than you can imagine. I do not want to take you for granted.

So, yes, what I want more than anything is to meet you in person. Properly. What prevents me, I cannot tell you. I am afraid that even you, with your loving heart, would not be able to handle the truth of who I am. I am not the man in those photographs. For that I am more sorry than you could know. I am a coward, I suppose.