Free Wanton Angel (Blackthorne Trilogy) by Shirl Henke Page B

acquaintance.”
           “Not true. We have been acquainted for over three years,” he corrected.
           “I shudder to remember our first meetings,” she said with a nervous laugh.
           “You do seem to have a remarkable propensity for wreaking mayhem on my person. Another day and you may well have me in my grave.”
           “Do you wish to be a coward and cry off?” she asked, polishing off the last bite of her pie and licking a smear of tomato sauce from her fingers, all the while watching him from the corner of her eye.
           “I'm willing to take a risk...and you, my Amazon warrior...?”
           The lazy taunt in his low husky voice sent shivers down her spine. “Is that a challenge, sir?” she replied.
           “ Twas you who issued the challenge, madam. I but answered it. My choice of ‘weapons' is dinner tonight.”
           He was daring her and she wanted to take that dare, but she could not. Sighing with genuine regret, she replied, “Tonight I am committed to accompanying the contessa to a masquerade at the Duke di Arcovito's palace. She went to some little trouble obtaining an invitation for me.”
           “I thought you disliked the social whirl of the nobility. Why would you importune her to get you an invitation to a gathering of court sycophants?” He was surprised at his sudden blaze of disappointment, and perversely angry with her for causing it.
           “Because only last evening did I learn that your illustrious J. M. W. Turner will be present, and I'm dying to meet the finest landscape painter of our generation...even if he is an Englishman!”
           He threw back his head and laughed, pulling her into his arms beneath the shade of a shopkeeper's canvas awning. “There's much to be said for we Englishmen! But I'm relieved to know the reason for your refusal has to do with your art,” he replied, bending down to kiss her, heedless of the press of people on the busy waterfront street.
     
    * * * *
     
           Derrick stood in an alcove partially hidden by a huge potted palm, observing the scene on the polished marble floor of the Duke di Arcovito's ballroom. Men and women dressed in costumes every color of the rainbow whirled around the floor to the lively strains of the Viennese rage, the waltz.
           Everyone wore masks, from simple black silk dominoes such as his to incredibly elaborate sequined and feathered affairs that covered most of the wearer's face. He scanned the dance floor, searching for a tall russet-haired woman amid all the jeweled headdresses and turbans. Then he saw her, in a fantastical costume made of softly tanned white leather, elaborately worked with tiny shells and beads. Around her head she wore a matching beaded band, with her hair plaited into a fat gleaming braid that hung all the way down to her waist. Not a woman in the room could compare.  
           She stood in a far corner, deep in discussion with a slight, fair-haired man who must surely be English judging by his pallor. Turner, the painter. Their conversation was animated.
           Derrick smiled faintly. Always so predictable, puss. Art before pleasure.
           Of course, he also had a professional reason for wangling an invitation through the English charge d'affaires office. He had mixed and mingled, listening and convincing several of Queen Caroline's ladies-in-waiting to reveal with whom her majesty had been corresponding in recent weeks. If the exiled Napoleon planned to foment an uprising in Italy, Lord Liverpool's government in London would be advised of it well in advance.
           That was how he'd justified his presence at the masquerade to his snappish “manservant.” Drum had fumed about Derrick being tricked out like a Bartholomew baby when he dressed all in black from domino and swirling cape to thigh-high leather boots.  
           The idea of masquerading as a