why the pages might have ended up here under the castle.’
He had a theory? She looked up. She wanted to hear that.
She just wasn’t certain about the you-show-me-yours-and- I’ll-show-you-mine subtext. ‘Or,’ she countered, ‘you could just tell me now.’
‘But you have work to do, my dear Dr Hunter. And I have already disturbed you enough.’
True, but he would continue to disturb her whether or not he was here—now more than ever. ‘Look,’ she said, shaking her head, knowing it would be crazy to expect they could dine together and pretend that kiss had never happened. She gestured down at her casual singlet and skirt. ‘I didn’t expect to be entertained. I brought nothing—’
‘On the contrary,’ he interjected, ‘you look charming. But if it pleases you I’m sure we can find you something you will be more comfortable in.’
She sighed, knowing she was fighting a losing battle. Of course he was sure to have an entire women’s wardrobe at his disposal. Or maybe Bruno was also a fine seamstress. ‘Fine,’ she said in resignation, just wanting more than ever to get back to her work. There was an outside chance she could finish up the translations today, and if she did that, given the excellent condition of the pages, there was no reason why she couldn’t leave early and finish the rest of her report elsewhere. She had contacts in any number of universities across Europe that had the right facilities and who would be delighted to play host to such a famous text. And he wanted her gone. Surely she could survive just one meal together? ‘Fine. In that case I’d be delighted to join you for dinner.’
His eyes glinted with victory. ‘It is a long time since I had the pleasure of a beautiful woman as my dinner companion.’
‘You don’t have to resort to flattery, Count Volta. I have already said I’d come.’
‘Alessandro,’ he said, with a nod and a smile at her acquiescence. ‘And I shall call you Grace. I think we can drop the formalities, don’t you?’ He bowed his head and finally headed for the door. ‘Until dinner, then.’
She nodded absently, turning back to her work, knowing she should be concentrating on that rather than replaying the sound of his name in her head.
Alessandro.
Oh, no. She didn’t like that. She didn’t want to give him a name. She didn’t want to think of him as Alessandro. She preferred to think of him as the Count. It made him sound remote. A little unreal.
Whereas Alessandro made him sound almost human. It made him sound like a man.
And she didn’t want to think of him as a man.
‘Oh, and Grace?’
She blinked and looked around. ‘Yes?’
‘That wasn’t flattery.’
He had her. He strode back to his office, knowing that tonight she would grace both his table and his bed. She was as good as his. And tonight, and for all the nights that she remained here, he would have her. Nothing surer.
He almost growled in anticipation. He didn’t understand this need, this compulsion to have her. He hated strangers. And yet he wanted her more than he had ever wanted anything before in his life.
Did it matter why?
Wasn’t it enough to know that he wanted her and that she was his for the taking? And by the time she left he would have rid himself of whatever spell this was that she had cast over him—rid himself of this compulsion to bed her and to watch the sparks in her eyes, to feel the electricity inside her as she came apart around him. He could hardly wait.
CHAPTER SEVEN
GRACE rubbed her eyes and leaned back in her chair, a bubble of excitement glowing pearlescent and pretty as her raw theory took shape and substance—a bubble only slightly tainted by a niggling concern that she had missed something.
She couldn’t quite put her finger on it. Her supposition that the pages had been removed to protect them rather than to destroy them wasn’t just a rash idea now; the pages she had translated since then only lent weight to her theory.
One page had been in praise of mothers and motherhood and the sacred mother-child bond. Another had been a celebration of spring and renewal in all things spiritual and physical. Another an endorsement of acting kindly to friends and strangers alike. All of them fabulous. All of them a revelation into thoughts based more on humanitarian principles rather than the dictates of any particular religion. That would have been crime enough to have