Courtesan's Lover by Gabrielle Kimm Read Free Book Online Page B

his well-being. But then it would strike him, even as he got to his feet, that in fact he possessed something precious that none of these paying patrons had ever had: he knew the Signora in ways none of them ever would or could. Private, unspoken ways more intimate than the wildest of those men’s purchased couplings.
    What he had said to her was true: she needed him.
    In his strange, indeterminate position as something between nursemaid, pimp, and bodyguard, he had had occasion to comfort her at her most vulnerable—faint with fatigue, flushed with fever—he had washed her, mended her clothes, and braided her hair with more care than many maidservants. But then, on other occasions he had—with fierce enjoyment—swung a heavy fist and laid out a rowdy, drunken customer who had begun to frighten the Signora. And once—just once—he had walked a naked and gibbering sadistic aristocrat backward out into the street at the point of the man’s own rapier, threatening to run him through if he ever—ever—showed his face in the vicinity again. A trembling and terrified Francesca had clung to him on that night, he remembered, gasping out her gratitude for his having quite certainly saved her life.
    After a long pause, his eyes fixed on those of his mistress, Modesto shook his head and said with a small, twisted smile, “No. I am not jealous.”
    â€œI could not do any of this without you.”
    â€œI know, Signora.”
    She reached for his hand and squeezed it. And then the absurdity of the situation suddenly struck Modesto and he began to laugh.
    â€œWhat is it?”
    His laugh died away into a sigh. “Nothing. Just…just the thought of us tucked up here together: the seedless and the strumpet. What a bloody pair.”
    ***
    â€œShe is upstairs, Signor di Cicciano,” Modesto said. “In her chamber.”
    â€œThank you. Can you take this?” Michele di Cicciano swung a coat from his shoulders and draped it over Modesto’s outstretched arm, crossed the hall in a couple of long-legged strides, and took the stairs three at a time. Modesto hung the coat on a hook by the door and followed the visitor up to the first floor. The door to the Signora’s chamber was already closed by the time he reached the little landing, and Modesto sat down upon the chair which stood just to the left of the door. He hunched and rolled his shoulders, preparing for a long wait. Sometimes—with trusted patrons like Benevento, for instance—she would say she was happy for him to leave her unattended, but with men like Cicciano, whatever she said, he knew better.
    Although he never exactly tried to listen to what went on on the other side of the chamber wall, it was hard not to hear, and Modesto frequently found he could not prevent lively images forming in his mind to match the sounds he heard. Depending on his mood, he could find himself either entertained or enraged. Today, though, he felt oddly awkward when he thought about last night’s intimacy with his mistress—it somehow made the contemplation of her energetic liaisons with her patrons rather harder to endure.
    All he could hear at present was an indistinct rumble of conversation, and he tried not to think of what was to come, distracting himself with thoughts of the covert concert engagement the Signora had told him about some hours before.
    But then her voice, sharp with anger, cut through Modesto’s musings, and his pulse raced.
    â€œ Cazzo! I said no! Just get rid of it, Michele! Put it away!”
    Modesto stood, his heartbeat thudding in his ears; he put one hand on the handle of the door and reached for the hilt of his dagger.
    Signor di Cicciano said something, but Modesto could not distinguish his words, and then the Signora spoke again, her voice cracking.
    â€œNo—I know, but not in here, damn you! You know why. Just give it here, or—”
    There was a moment’s pause,