In the Count’s Bed

      SARA CRAVEN

      CATHERINE SPENCER

      AMY ANDREWS

       www.millsandboon.co.uk

      THE COUNT’S

      BLACKMAIL BARGAIN

      SARA CRAVEN

      About the Author

       SARA CRAVEN was born in South Devon, and grew up surrounded by books, in a house by the sea. After leaving grammar school she worked as a local journalist, covering everything from flower shows to murders. She started writing for Mills & Boon® in 1975. Apart from writing, her passions include films, music, cooking and eating in good restaurants. She now lives in Somerset.

      Sara Craven has appeared as a contestant on the Channel Four game show Fifteen to One and is also the latest (and last ever) winner of the 1997 Mastermind of Great Britain championship.

       CHAPTER ONE

      IT WAS a warm, golden morning in Rome, so how in the name of God was the city in the apparent grip of a small earthquake?

      The noble Conte Alessio Ramontella lifted his aching head from the pillow, and, groaning faintly from the effort, attempted to focus his eyes. True, the bed looked like a disaster area, but the room was not moving, and the severe pounding, which he’d assumed was the noise of buildings collapsing nearby, seemed to be coming instead from the direction of his bedroom door.

      And the agitated shouting he could hear was not emanating from some buried victim either, but could be recognised as the voice of his manservant Giorgio urging him to wake up.

      Using small, economical movements that would not disturb the blonde, naked beauty still slumbering beside him, or increase the pressure from his hangover, Alessio got up from the bed, and extracted his robe from the tangle of discarded clothing on the floor, before treading across the marble-tiled floor to the door.

      He pulled the garment round him, and opened the door an inch or two.

      ‘This is not a working day,’ he informed the anxious face outside. ‘Am I to be allowed no peace?’

      ‘Forgive me, Eccellenza.’ Giorgio wrung his hands. ‘For the world I would not have disturbed you. But it is your aunt, the Signora Vicente.’

      There was an ominous pause, then: ‘Here?’ Alessio bit out the word.

      ‘On her way,’ Giorgio admitted nervously. ‘She telephoned to announce her intention to visit you.’

      Alessio swore softly. ‘Didn’t you have enough wit to say I was away?’ he demanded.

      ‘Of course, Eccellenza.’ Giorgio spoke with real sorrow. ‘But regrettably she did not believe me.’

      Alessio swore again more fluently. ‘How long have I got?’

      ‘That will depend on the traffic, signore, but I think we must count in minutes.’ He added reproachfully, ‘I have been knocking and knocking…’

      With another groan, Alessio forced himself into action. ‘Get a cab for my guest,’ he ordered. ‘Tell the driver to come to the rear entrance, and to be quick about it. This is an emergency. Then prepare coffee for the Signora, and some of the little almond biscuits that she likes.’

      He shut the door, and went back to the bed, his hangover eclipsed by more pressing concerns. He looked down at all the smooth, tanned loveliness displayed for his delectation, and his mouth tightened.

      Dio, what a fool he’d been to break his own cardinal rule, and allow her to stay the night.

      I must have been more drunk than I thought, he told himself cynically, then bent over her, giving one rounded shoulder a firm shake.

      Impossibly long lashes lifted slowly, and she gave him a sleepy smile. ‘Alessio, tesoro mio, why aren’t you still in bed?’ She reached up, twining coaxing arms round his neck to draw him down to her, but he swiftly detached the clinging hands and stepped back.

      ‘Vittoria, you have to go, and quickly too.’

      She pouted charmingly. ‘But how ungallant of you, caro. I told you, Fabrizio is visiting his witch of a mother, and will not be back until this evening at the earliest. So we have all the time in the world.’

      ‘An enchanting thought,’ Alessio said levelly. ‘But, sadly, there is no time to pursue it.’

      She stretched voluptuously, her smile widening. ‘But how can I leave, mi amore, when I have nothing to wear? You won all my clothes at cards last night, so what am I to do? It was, after all, a debt of honour,’ she added throatily.

      Alessio tried to control his growing impatience. ‘Consider it cancelled. I cheated.’

      She hunched a shoulder. ‘Then you will have to fetch my clothes for me—from the salotto where I took them off. Unless you wish me to win them back, during another game of cards.’

      This, thought Alessio, was not the time to be sultry.

      His smile was almost a snarl. ‘And how, precisely, bella mia, will you explain your presence, also your state of undress, to my aunt Lucrezia, who counts Fabrizio’s mother among her closest cronies?’

      Vittoria gave a startled cry and sat up, belatedly grabbing at the sheet. ‘Madonna—you cannot mean it. Promise me she is not here?’

      ‘Not quite, but due imminently,’ Alessio warned, his tone grim.

      ‘Dio mio.’ Her voice was a wail. ‘Alessio—do something. I must get out of here. You have to save me.’

      There was another knock at the door, which opened a crack to admit Giorgio’s discreet arm holding out a handful of female clothing. His voice was urgent. ‘The taxi has arrived, Eccellenza.’

      ‘Un momento.’ Alessio strode over and took the clothes, tossing them deftly to Vittoria who was already running frantically to the bathroom, her nakedness suddenly ungainly.

      He paused, watching her disappear, then gave a mental shrug. Last night she’d been an entertaining and inventive companion, but daylight and danger had dissipated her appeal. There would be no more cards, or any other games with the beautiful Vittoria Montecorvo. In fact, he thought, frowning, it might be wiser, for the future, to avoid discontented wives altogether. The only real advantage of such affairs was not being expected to propose marriage, he told himself cynically.

      He retrieved his underwear from the pile of discarded evening clothes beside the bed, then went into his dressing room, finding and shrugging on a pair of cream denim trousers and a black polo shirt. As he emerged, thrusting his bare feet into loafers, Vittoria was waiting, dressed but distraught.

      ‘Alessio.’ She hurled herself at him. ‘When shall I see you again?’

      The honest reply would be, ‘Never,’ but that would also be unkind.

      ‘Perhaps this narrow escape is a warning to us, cara mia,’ he returned guardedly. ‘We shall have to be very careful.’

      ‘But I am not sure I can bear it.’ Her voice throbbed a little. ‘Not now that we have found each other, angelo mio.’

      Alessio suppressed a cynical smile. He knew who his predecessor