She raised herself on one elbow and looked down into his face. The shutters were open, flooding the room with moonlight, throwing shadows between her breasts, absorbing all his attention so that he didn’t hear her question.

‘What was that?’ he murmured, tracing the swell with his finger.

‘I said it was about time you finished telling me what carissima means.’

As she spoke she was easing herself over him, moving slowly and with purpose.

‘If you are my carissima,’ he said, ‘you are dearer to me than all the world. You are my love, my beloved, the only one who exists for me.’

A week later they went to Maremma, an area in the south of Tuscany, near the coast. It was often known as ‘the Wild West of Tuscany’, since there cattle were raised in large numbers, and the traditional cowboy skills were still in everyday use.

Each year this was celebrated by a rodeo that consisted of a parade through the nearby town of Grosseto, and a show that lasted one afternoon. Leo took Selena to the town to meet the organisers, describing her achievements in glowing terms.

Then Selena produced a surprise of her own. All the way over she’d been clutching a large, flat object, refusing to let Leo see it. It turned out to be a photograph of him bull riding.

‘I know this guy who takes photographs of everything,’ she said, ‘even the people who don’t win. I looked him up, and he had this one of you. You look real good, don’t you?’

He looked magnificent. One arm was high in the air, his head was up, his face full of a wide grin of delight and triumph.

‘You’d never know that I was off the next second,’ he said.

One of the organisers regarded the picture and coughed respectfully.

‘Perhaps, signore, you could give us a demonstration of bull riding, at our rodeo.’

‘I don’t think so,’ Leo said hastily. ‘They have very special bulls in Texas. Bred for their ferocity.’

‘I don’t think we would disappoint you, signore. We have a bull here that has already gored two men to death-’

It took Leo ten minutes to talk his way out of that one, with Selena doubled up with laughter.

‘I told him that you’d demonstrate barrel racing,’ he told her as they made their escape.

‘That’s fine. But it won’t be the same without you riding that bull.’

‘Get lost!’

Leo’s family had never made the trip before. This year, however, they were coming in force, for by now they knew what everyone knew-that Leo, the all-embracing lover of ladies with voluptuous forms, had fallen ‘victim’ to an angular young woman with a figure like a rail and a head like fire. Temper, ditto.

So the bulk of the Calvani family planned to head for the farm to stay the night before going on to Grosseto. Only Marco was missing. The Count and Countess Calvani, with Guido and Dulcie, would be travelling from Venice.

Knowing these plans were afoot, Leo knew that the day of reckoning couldn’t be postponed much longer. Some time soon he must confess all to Selena-his reprehensible wealth or his shocking connection to a title. It was a moot point which one would horrify her the most.

While he was still trying to broach the subject he was overtaken by events. Selena, seeking him one morning, came to his study.

‘Leo, are you in here?’

She pushed the door further open. There was no sign of Leo but she could hear his voice coming from the passage beyond, and went further into the room to wait for him.

Then something caught her eye.

Several photographs were spread out on the desk, and curiosity drew her over to look at them. What she saw made her first frown, then stare.

They were wedding pictures, reminding her that Leo had recently been to the marriage of his brother, Guido. There were the bride and groom, the bride gorgeous in white satin and lace, the groom with a wicked, appealing face. And there, next to him, was Leo, dressed as she’d never seen him before.

Dressed for best. In costly finery. With a top hat!

So what? Everyone dressed up at weddings.

But there was something in the background that wouldn’t be dismissed. Chandeliers, old pictures, mirrors with gilt frames. The clothes fitted perfectly, which hired clothes never did. And the people had the awesome confidence that came with money and status.

A strange feeling, something like dismay, was starting to take over her stomach, prior to invading the rest of her.

‘They just arrived.’

Leo was standing in the doorway, smiling in the way that could make her forget everything else.

‘Let me introduce you to my family,’ he said, coming forward and sorting the pictures. ‘That’s my brother Guido, and Dulcie. These two cheesy characters here are her father and brother, and if I never see them again it’ll be too soon. This one here is my cousin Marco, and that’s his fiancée Harriet. And this man is my uncle Francesco, and his wife, Liza.’

‘What’s that place behind all of you. Did you hire the town hall or something?’

‘No,’ he said casually, ‘that’s my uncle’s home.’

‘That? He lives there? It’s like a palace.’

Leo’s tone became even more casual. ‘I suppose that’s what it is, really.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘It’s called the Palazzo Calvani. It’s on the Grand Canal in Venice.’

‘Your uncle lives in a palace? What is he, royalty?’

‘No, no, nothing so grand. Just a count.’

‘What was that? You mumbled that last word.’

‘He’s a count,’ Leo said reluctantly.

She stared at him. ‘You’re related to a real count?’

‘Yes, but on the wrong side of the blanket,’ he assured her, like a man arguing mitigating circumstances to a crime.

‘But they know you, don’t they?’ she accused him. ‘You’re part of the family.’

He sighed and admitted it.

‘My father was Uncle Francesco’s brother. If his marriage to my mother had been valid I’d be-well-the heir.’

She turned an appalled gaze on him.

‘But it wasn’t,’ he placated her, ‘so I’m not. That’s Guido’s problem, not mine. And boy is he mad at me about it. Like it was my fault. He doesn’t want it any more than I do. All I ever wanted was this farm and the life I have here. You’ve got to believe me, Selena.’

‘Give me one reason I should ever believe a word you say again.’

‘Now, come on, I never lied to you.’

‘You sure as heck never told me the truth either.’

‘Well, did you give me your life story from day one?’

‘Yes.’

She had him there.

‘And you’re not being logical,’ he changed tack hastily. ‘If I was that poor, how come I knew Barton, and went to visit him?’

‘You sold him some horses, you told me. And you can get cheap air tickets these days. And there’s other things. This place, the people, the land-the way you talked I thought you rented some dirt-poor little place at the back of beyond, but you own it don’t you?’

‘I’ve never pretended about that.’

‘And how much do you own? You’re the padrone, aren’t you? Not just here but the village and halfway to Florence, for all I know.’

‘Rather more than that, actually,’ he confessed miserably.

‘You could buy Barton out, couldn’t you?’

He shrugged. ‘I don’t know. Probably.’

‘I thought you were just a country boy-you let me think that. But you’re really more like a-a tycoon.’

‘I am a country boy.’

‘You’re a country tycoon, that’s what you are.’

She was pale with shock.

‘Leo, be honest with me for the first time since we’ve known each other. Just how rich are you?’

‘Darn it, Selena, are you only going to marry me for my money?’

‘I’m not going to marry you at all, you conceited-’

‘I didn’t mean it like that, you know I didn’t.’

‘All those things I said to you, about millionaires not being real people-’

‘Well, now you know you were wrong.’

‘The hell I do! I reckon you’ve proved me right about all the worst. I wouldn’t have thought you could do a thing like this to me!’

‘What have I done?’ he implored the room. ‘Will someone please tell me what I’ve done?’

‘You’ve pretended to be one thing, while actually being another.’

‘Well, of course I did,’ he roared. ‘I wasn’t going to take the chance on losing you. Think I didn’t know? Sure I knew. We hadn’t met five minutes before I knew you were the most awkward, unreasonable female with no common sense. I didn’t want to scare you off, so we played by your rules. I couldn’t even tell you I’d-’ He stopped with his feet at the edge of the precipice.

‘Tell me you’d done what?’

‘I forget.’ But then, with her eyes on him he reckoned he might as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb. ‘All right, the van and the horse trailer-they came from me.’

‘You-bought the replacement van-and horse trailer?’

‘And Jeepers. Selena, the insurers would have laughed at you. You knew that yourself. It was the only way to get you back on the road. I just hoped you wouldn’t find out, or that you wouldn’t be too mad at me if you did.’ He studied her face, hardly daring to believe what he saw there. ‘Why-are you laughing?’

‘You mean-’ she choked ‘-that you were the miracle after all? Not Barton?’

‘Yes, me, not Barton.’

‘No wonder you looked green around the gills when I said that.’

‘I could have killed him,’ Leo confessed. ‘I wanted to tell you the truth but I couldn’t, because I knew you wouldn’t want to be beholden to me. But I’ve thought of a way around that. We get married and then it’s your wedding present, and we’re all straight.’

She stared. ‘You’re serious, aren’t you?’

‘Well, the way I see it, if you marry me, all that disgusting money will be yours too, and then you’ll have to shut up about it.’

She considered this. ‘OK, it’s a deal.’

She didn’t say she loved him then. She said it later that night, when he was breathing deeply beside her, the sleep of peace and satiety, as he always did when they’d released each other from passion by indulging it without limit. He slept heavily, so she could smooth his hair, kiss him without his knowing, and whisper the words she didn’t know how to say when he heard her.

Another night he brought wine and peaches, and they sat feasting and talking.

‘How do your family come to be out here?’ she asked. ‘If you’re Venetian counts, what are you doing in Tuscany?’

‘How can you ask? Everyone knows the evil aristos commandeer property wherever they can. That’s how we keep our feet on the necks of the deserving poor.’

‘Oh, very funny! I’ll thump you in a minute. What are you doing here?’

‘My grandfather, Count Angelo, fell in love with a woman from Tuscany, called Maria Rinucci. This-’ he indicated the valley ‘-was her dowry. Since he had the Venetian property to bequeath to his eldest son and heir-that’s my uncle Francesco-this was used to provide an inheritance for Francesco’s younger brothers, Bertrando and Silvio.

‘Silvio took his share in cash and married a banker’s daughter in Rome. Their son is Marco. You won’t meet him next week because something’s gone wrong between him and Harriet, his English fiancée. She’s gone back to England and he’s followed her, trying to talk her around. Let’s hope he brings her back for our wedding.’

He stroked her face, trying to distract her with the thought of their wedding. She accepted his caress and kissed him enthusiastically, but she wouldn’t be distracted.

‘And?’ she insisted.

‘Bertrando liked living on the land, so he came out here and married a widow, Elissa, who became my mother.

‘She died soon after I was born, and he married again, Donna, Guido’s mother. But then it turned out that Elissa hadn’t been a widow, as everyone had thought, but still married to her first husband. So I was illegitimate, and as she was dead it was too late to validate her marriage to my father, so that was that. Guido and I kind of swapped inheritances.

‘I can’t tell you how glad I am now that we did. Because otherwise, you and I-’

‘Nix,’ she said as he’d known she would say. ‘I couldn’t marry you if you had a title. It’s against my principles, and besides-well anyway, it doesn’t matter. But your family wouldn’t fancy me as the countess.’

‘You don’t know anything about them. Forget those stereotypes you’re carrying in your head. We don’t all eat off gold plate-’

‘Shame, I was looking forward to that.’

‘Will you hush, and let me finish? And don’t look at me like that or I’ll forget what I was going to stay.’

‘Well, there are more interesting things to do-’

‘When I’ve finished,’ he said, seizing her wandering fingers. ‘My family aren’t the way you think. All they’ll care about is that we love each other. Guido and Dulcie have just married for love, so did Uncle Francesco. He waited forty years for her to say yes, and refused to marry anyone else. She had some funny ideas too and he was a patient man, but I’m not. If you think I’m waiting forty years for you to see sense, you’re nuts. Now, you were saying about doing more interesting things…’