The intimacy of this struck Jess with such force she breamed in sharply. "I still can't believe this is happening, darling."
Lorenzo nodded vigorously. "I know, piccolo. I feel this also." He raised himself on an elbow to look down at her. "Believe that I love you, Jessamy Dysart," he said very quietly.
"I do." Jess returned the look very steadily. "I love you too, Lorenzo Forii,"
And as though they'd exchanged a vow, Lorenzo picked up her hand and kissed the finger which would wear his ring. "Come, carissima. It is time to go."
Jess heaved a sigh. "If we must. But first I need to tidy up."
After an interval spent in Lorenzo's bathroom Jess presented herself for inspection in the soft lamplight of the beautiful outer room.
"Do I look all right?" she asked anxiously.
He smiled appreciatively. "Good enough to gobble up, as your friend would say."
"Lorenzo," said Jess suddenly. "There's something you should know."
His smile faded. "Tell me, then."
Her eyes fell. "I don't count the fiasco with the school-boy, but I'd known the other two a long time before-"
"Before you became lovers?"
She nodded, flushing as she slid her feet into the famous sandals. "I wouldn't describe the arrangement like that, but that's what I meant, yes."
Lorenzo took her hands in his, looking down at her very soberly. "You are telling me that'it is not your habit to make love with a man you've known such a short time. But for you and for me it is different. I love you, Jessamy."
"I love you, too," she said, oddly shy now.
"I asked you to marry me. And you consented. A church ceremony will make no difference to the way I feel," he assured her. "To me you are already my wife."
Jess felt tears well up in her eyes, and smiled at him damply. "Sorry. I'm not usually the weepy kind."
"Do not apologise, carissima, I love to kiss your tears away-"
"Remember what happened last time," she reminded him, sniffing hard.
He heaved in a deep sigh. "I do. Most vividly. So come. Let us go before I scandalise Anna by returning you after midnight."
"Hold me for a moment," she said gruffly.
"For the rest of my life!" he assured her, and held her up against him so that she stood on tiptoe and had to wreath her arms round his waist to keep her balance.
"I need your arms around me to convince myself this is all happening," she whispered.
Lorenzo looked deep into her eyes. "This is no fairy-tale, Cenerentola, this is real life. Our life." His arms tightened. "Now you have given yourself to me you are mine. I shall never let you go."
Chapter Nine.
Emily was too sleepy to do more than ask if Jess had enjoyed herself, and once Anna had gone to the room Lorenzo had reserved for her, Jess showered swiftly and slid into bed, reliving the evening over and over again before she slept at last. She woke only when the nurse arrived early next morning to see to Emily, which ruled out any private conversation with her friend, and Jess was grateful for it. The magic with Lorenzo was a glorious, private secret. And in the bright light of morning, despite Lorenzo's parting words, it was still hard to believe that the whole episode wasn't some figment of her imagination.
When her last relationship had soured Jess had been philosophical when Leonie questioned her about it. "Some day my prince will come," she'd said flippantly, but had never really expected a fairy tale scenario for herself. Ever. Yet now, with Lorenzo, it seemed that the dreams she'd once dreamed had finally come true.
While she shared an early breakfast with a slightly improved Emily, Jess described the delicious dinner she'd eaten, but because Anna was bustling about, preparing for the journey to the Villa Fortuna, she made no mention of dining alone with Lorcnzo in his private apartment.
"I'm entitled to loss of appetite, but you're not," Emily accused, when Jess contented herself with orange juice and coffee.
"You know I never eat breakfast"
Emily cast a knowing eye on her friend's dreaming face and raised an expressive eyebrow, Anna's presence preventing any teasing.
Due to Anna's efficiency Emily was bathed and dressed and ready well before time, but looked even less robust once she was on her feet.
"Take it easy, Em," said Jess, sitting her down in a chair near the open balcony doors. "Apparently it's not far to the villa, and when we get there you can go straight to bed, if you want."
"It is most necessary that she does so after the journey," said Anna firmly. "Dottore Tosti orders this. Tomorrow, Emily, you shall get up for a longer time."
"Yes, Nurse," said the invalid, so meekly it was plain that the thought of bed was more welcome than Emily cared to let on.
A few minutes later a porter arrived to take their luggage, then Jess and the nurse supported a very shaky Emily on the short distance to the lift.
"I feel like a new-born lamb," gasped Emily, wincing as the familiar pain gripped her ribs. She leaned gratefully against Jess as the lift descended.
"You'll soon be stronger," said Jess firmly, catching Anna's eye anxiously for confirmation.
The nurse nodded benignly. "A few days of fresh air and rest will see much improvement."
Lorenzo was waiting for them in the foyer, dressed more casually than usual, and to Jess's eyes so irresistible she wanted to throw herself into his arms there and then, regardless of the staff gathered to expedite their departure.
"Buon giomo!" he said, smiling at all three of them, but the quickly veiled look he gave Jess told her he was controlling a similar impulse to her own. "How are you feeling this morning. Miss Emily?"
"Fine," she said manfully, but even with Jess holding her tightly by the arm it was obvious to everyone that this was a polite lie.
"Actually, Lorenzo," said Jess in an undertone, "she's not too good. Is it far to the car?"
"No. It waits outside." He turned to Anna and gave her some swift instructions, then, with a smile at Emily, said "Permesso," and picked her up, telling Jess to follow them as he carried the invalid outside and down the red-carpeted steps to the car. He settled Emily gently in the back seat alongside Anna, held the front passenger door for Jess, then excused himself to go back into the hotel to talk to the manager.
"Are you all right, love?" Jess turned anxiously to peer at her friend.
"Of course I am." Emily smiled valiantly. "How could I be anything else with all this star treatment?"
Lorenzo Porii drove out of Florence with due care for the welfare of the invalid, and after a short journey on the autostrada turned off on to a quiet minor road, slowing down to allow his passengers time to admire the views. The narrow, winding route was lined in places with groups of flame-shaped cypresses used as windbreaks for the olive groves and vines grown on the slopes of rolling amber hills. Here and there a patch of brighter gold indicated a crop of sunflowers, and in some places Lorenzo pointed out fields of the barley and maize used to feed cattle and poultry.
Jess was entranced by it all, smiling radiantly in response to the occasional questioning glance Lorenzo sent in her direction. It amazed her that in such a short distance from the sophistication of Florence they were deep in a timeless landscape which seemed little changed from those in the Renaissance paintings she'd seen in the Uffizi.
A few kilometres later Lorenzo turned off on a much narrower road which he informed them was one of the strode vicinali, the neighbourhood roads which wander over the Italian countryside. This one was little more than a track which wound up to the summit of one of the rounded hills, where the car nosed through a gap in a ring of cypresses to bring them to a house very different from the formal, classical villa Jess had expected. Lorenzo's country home was a long, two-storey house with cinnamon roof tiles and white-shuttered windows, the natural stone of the walls gilded by the morning sun. There were outbuildings in the background, and big earthenware pots of geraniums stood in a paved courtyard where a table and several chairs sheltered under a group of trees from the heat of the Tuscan sun.