‘No,’ he said tightly. ‘She’s not here.’
Where the hell is she?
‘Pity,’ said the man, leaning in a little. ‘She’s a rare jewel. But I doubt she’s that rare any more...’ He winked. ‘If you get what I mean... After all, she’s been married twice now. Winterborne got the best of her, lucky sod. If I’d had more money at the time maybe it would have been me.’
Ciro looked at the man with an awful kind of cold horror sinking into his blood. ‘What on earth are you talking about?’
The man looked up at him and suddenly appeared uncomfortable. ‘Ah... I thought you knew... The auction, of course. I mean, obviously it wasn’t a real auction. Just something between a few of Thomas Templeton’s friends. Girls like Lara are few and far between these days. Innocent. Pure...’
Lara’s voice was in Ciro’s head. ‘He sold me like a slave girl at an auction. To Henry Winterborne, the highest bidder.’
The man slapped him on the shoulder. ‘All right there, Sant’Angelo? You’ve gone very pale.’
Ciro felt sick to his stomach. ‘How many men were involved?’ he managed to get out.
Blissfully unaware of the volcano building inside Ciro, the man looked around and said conspiratorially, ‘There’s always a market for girls like her. With the right breeding. Especially virgins. It’s a rare commodity these days, you know.’
Ciro didn’t stop to think. His right hand swung back and his fist connected with the fleshy part of the man’s face, sending him windmilling backwards into the crowd, where he collided with a waiter holding a tray of glasses, and a woman, who shrieked just before he landed in a heavy heap on the ground.
Instantly security men were beside Ciro, taking his arms in their hands. He briefly caught the eye of the member of the royal family he’d been talking to and saw disdain spreading over his aristocratic features. Everyone was staring at him. Shocked. And then they started whispering as Ciro was led out.
And he didn’t give a damn.
For the first time in his life, he didn’t give a damn.
* * *
It was another hot, muggy evening in the bar and Lara’s feet were aching. But at least she wasn’t wearing heels any more. She was wiping down the counter under the bar when she heard it.
‘Lara.’
She stopped. She’d dreamed about him nearly every night. Was she hallucinating now?
She kept cleaning.
‘Lara.’
She looked up and her heart jumped into her throat. Ciro. Standing head and shoulders above everyone else around him at the bar.
‘Oi, mate—if you’re going to take up space at the bar, put in an order for us too, will ya?’
A group of young guys behind Ciro sniggered. He ignored them.
Lara gripped the cloth. ‘What are you doing here?’
‘Can we talk?’
She noticed that he looked drawn. Dishevelled. ‘Is something wrong? Has something happened?’
He shook his head. ‘Everything is fine...but we need to talk.’
It was the familiar bossy tone that reassured her in the end—and also told her that this was real, not a fantasy. She was aware of her grumpy boss hovering...aware that no drinks were being served.
Lara sent her boss a reassuring glance and said to Ciro, ‘I can’t just leave. Sit down and I’ll bring you a beer. You’ll have to wait until my shift ends.’
‘How long is that?’
‘Three hours.’