Sandra Marton - Roman Spring

“I don’t see how you could,” she said pleasantly. “You’ve just about gone the limit now.”

The little man’s eyes narrowed momentarily, but then he smiled. Even if his English permitted him to understand her answer, his ego would not.

“Enjoy yourself, signorina ,” he said with a smile, and then he hurried off, his assistants trotting after him.

“Fat chance of that,” Caroline said. “Well, it’s the thought that counts, I guess.”

“Is that what’s supposed to keep me in this dress? Positive thoughts?”

Caroline whirled around. Trish was coming toward her, her pretty face twisted in a grimace. She was wearing a chartreuse dress that looked as if it had been spray-painted on.

“My God,” Caroline said with a groan, “what’s that?”

“A good question.” Trish lifted her hair from her shoulders and turned her back. “Do me a favor, would you? See if you can zip me up.”

“I can,” Caroline muttered as she inched the tiny plastic teeth shut, “if you can do without breathing. There. How’s that?”

“Impossible—but who am I to complain?” Trish swung around and faced her. “It is beautiful,” she said coyly, “it is the most beautiful dress I will ever wear, until I surpass myself the next time.”

Caroline laughed. “You heard?”

“Yeah.” She stepped back, eyes narrowed, and surveyed her roommate dispassionately. “Too bad you couldn’t tell him the truth—that whatever class that dress gets it owes to you.”

Caroline tugged at the thin straps that held the red silk up over the generous curve of her breasts, then smoothed down the skirt as if her touch might somehow magically make it extend beyond her thighs.

“And you haven’t seen what I get to put on next,” she said with a shudder. “What the heck? Another hour or so, I can get back into my jeans and—”

“Not tonight, old buddy.”

“What do you mean, not tonight?”

“Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten. The cocktail party after the showing? We’re expected to mingle.”

Color rose in Caroline’s cheeks. “I don’t mingle.”

“Hey! I don’t, either, remember?”

“I’m sorry, Trish. I didn’t mean—”

Trish sighed. “I know you didn’t. Look, tonight’s different. The party’s for charity. For kids.”

“So? We’re here to show Fabbiano’s misbegotten collection, that’s all.”

“Exactly. And he’s pledged five per cent of tonight’s take to the Children’s Aid Fund, which means—”

“Which means the old boy’s one clever manipulator.”

“Which means,” Trish said patiently, “that we’re on the books until the party ends. We have to smile pretty as we work our way through the ballroom so that the carriage trade will want to place orders.”

“And the men can try to finger the merchandise.”

Trish grinned. “I’ve never seen one of them manage that with you yet.”

“You’re damned right,” Caroline said sharply. “It doesn’t say a word in our contracts about us having to put up with being hit on by every male who thinks he’s got the price of our bodies.”

“Look, I agree. Some of these guys are jerks. And some of the girls—well, some of them seem to think the men are perks of the job.”

“They’re one of the horrors of it.”

“Uh-huh. But try telling that to Giulia. Or to Suzie. They’re both seeing guys who’ve promised to get them into films.”

“And I,” Caroline said with conviction, “am seeing no one but the cabdriver who takes me home.”

“Sounds good to me,” Trish said with a shrug.

“Signorine.” The girls turned. One of Fabbiano’s assistants was standing on a low stool, clapping her hands. “Ladies,” she said excitedly, “ e ora di farlo . We are about to begin.”

Caroline felt a familiar knot forming in her belly. I hate this, she thought fiercely, I hate this!

“Hey. Are you okay?”

She looked at Trish, forced herself to smile. “I’m fine.”

* * *

IT WAS, he thought, one hell of a place for a man to spend a Thursday evening. Not that he didn’t like women. Nicolo Sabatini permitted himself a little smile. Damn, no. No one would ever accuse the Prince of Cordia of that.

The trouble was, there were too many of them packed into this room. Beautiful ones. Homely ones. Young ones. Old ones. And all of them had one thing in mind.

The Fabbiano Collection.

Nicolo shifted unhappily in the little gilt chair that had certainly not been made for a man’s body. It wasn’t as if he wasn’t interested in what women wore, either. He liked the softness of silk, the slippery feel of it under his hands as he slowly undressed a woman in a shadowed bedroom.

But to have to sit here and pretend interest in an endless parade of painted mannequins wearing bored looks and the ridiculous fashions he’d already glimpsed in the huge sketches plastered on the wall as decorations— Nicolo shifted again. No, he thought, no, he couldn’t do it, not even for la Principessa . He would do anything for his grandmother, his beloved nonna —hadn’t he proved that by accompanying her here tonight, to this benefit for her favorite charity?

But to sit here, like one of the effeminate fools smirking over there or, worse still, like Antonni and Ferrante and the others he’d spotted, who boasted of the conquests they made of the long-legged girls who dreamed of jewels and furs and sold themselves so easily—to sit here, to even be in the same room with such men, made him feel filthy.

And there was no reason for it. He could step out into the anteroom, smoke a cigar, even take a walk around the block, and still be back in plenty of time to escort la Principessa safely through the crowd and out the door.

Nicolo leaned toward the elderly woman seated beside him. “Nonna,” he said softly.

La Principessa looked up. “Si, Nico.”

“Would you mind very much if I stretched my legs?”

She smiled. “You are restless?”

“No, not at all. I just—”

“Restless, and out of your element. I should have realized.” She smiled again as she touched his cheek. “A man like you prefers his women one at a time, eh?”

He grinned, white teeth flashing in his tanned face. “You know me too well,” he said.

The Princess waved her fingers at him. “Go on, Nico.”

“Are you sure you don’t mind?”

“Of course not. I shall be fine.”

“I won’t go far,” he said. “If you need me—”

“I won’t,” she said firmly. “Now, go.”

He rose from the ridiculous chair and made his way carefully down the crowded row, responding politely to those who greeted him by name, noting with carefully repressed surprise that two women who gave him private little smiles were seated next to each other, friends who had no idea they had something more than friendship in common.

It was less crowded at the rear of the room and he thought of pausing there, where he could watch la Principessa and still draw a breath of air that was not perfumed half to death, but then he patted the slender cigar in the breast pocket of the dinner jacket that had been hand-tailored to fit his sinew-hardened body and decided that only a whiff of tobacco would fully cleanse his nostrils of the mix of scents that hung in the overheated room.

He turned toward the door—and all at once the room was plunged into darkness and a whine of hideous music exploded from the overhead speakers.

“Dio mio,” he growled, and he leaned back against the wall, folded his arms across his chest, and prepared to wait out the boredom of the long moments ahead.

Lights on the ceiling blinked to life, spraying the stage with wild colors. The curtains parted, revealing a line of models wearing too much makeup, too much hair, and not enough clothing to stretch a man’s imagination. One of them stepped forward, bouncing frantically to the music, and the others followed her down the catwalk. The audience applauded, and the parade was on.