Deep and Silent Waters Read Free Page B

bumped off their enemies – the Borgias, the Visconti, even the Doge of Venice himself.
    ‘Perhaps, or perhaps they jumped of their own accord.’
    She remembered shivering at the cool, dispassionate voice but she had had no glimpse into the future. Rachel Lear had not fallen from that hotel window for another year.
    ‘Why would they kill themselves?’ she had asked.
    He had shrugged. ‘Why do people ever kill themselves? They had their reasons, no doubt.’
    At the time, she had listened like a child being told fairy stories. Now she had dozens of questions she wished she had asked. If he had been born in such a house why had he and his father ever left? Who else had lived there with them? He had never mentioned anyone. Why had they never been back to Venice? Why had he said that the family in the palazzo had the surname Angeli when his was Ferrese? Why had Sebastian so little to say about his family? Especially his mother. It was clear that he had loved his father, Giovanni Ferrese, but he had told her nothing about his mother, except that she had died when he was six. When she had asked what Giovanni had done for a living he had said curtly, ‘He had his own business.’ And when Sebastian’s dark eyes chilled, as they had then, you were wise to stop asking questions.
    ‘You owe it to yourself to go, you know. It’s a great honour,’ Melanie said.
    And she might find the answers to some of those questions, Laura thought. She would look for the palazzo where Sebastian had been born: if it existed, it might tell her a lot about him.
    That night she dreamt about him, not the nightmare but the wild sexual dream she had also had so many times. She was back again in the caravan she had used on that first film. Sebastian was with her, talking about the scene they would shoot next day, watching her take off her makeup in front of the scrappy mirror on the dressing table. Laura avoided his eyes, kept her attention on her face, her skin shiny with cream.
    She looked like an awkward schoolgirl, like the girl her friends had once called Lanky and made fun of whenever she tripped over her own feet or had to stand up in class, looming over them all. She hated Sebastian watching her: compared to his beautiful wife she was ugly and clumsy. Hurriedly she wiped off the cream and picked up her normal makeup bag, but Sebastian took it from her and tossed it back on the dressing table.
    ‘Don’t put anything on your lovely face. Nothing ruins the skin faster than plastering it with makeup day and night. Clea has destroyed her skin with that stuff. It’s like orange peel now. Only wear it when you have to, in front of the cameras.’
    He called Rachel by a nickname her brother had given her when he was beginning to talk, lazily running her two names together. She preferred Clea to Rachel and even the press often used it now.
    ‘I’ll feel naked!’
    ‘There’s a thought,’ he said, his dark eyes teasing, and she felt her mouth go dry. His face changed; he leaned forward and kissed her softly. She shut her eyes, breathless, her whole body shaking.
    In her dreams that was the moment she relived: the hunger and need that flared up between them then. Her arms round his neck, they had clung together as if they were drowning.
    ‘I want you so badly,’ he had groaned, his hands moving down her body, caressing her breasts, stroking her buttocks, pressing her even closer.
    They had never been to bed together, but the intense attraction between them would have led to that before long if Clea had not caught them.
    The caravan door had opened and a cold wind had blown over them.
    ‘So it’s true! You are screwing the little bitch,’ a hoarse voice screamed. Sebastian stiffened, his head lifting. He let go of Laura, moved away from her, his face dark red.
    Laura wanted to die. She did not dare look at the woman in the doorway.
    ‘How long has it been going on?’ the famous whisky voice sneered. ‘Did you audition on the couch,