Page 1 of The Virgin's Dance with the Devil
Chapter One
Federico Esposito,better known to all who loved and hated him – not always mutually exclusively – as Rico, was propped against the bar of the vast party room with his brothers watching the guests doing their thing on the dancefloor. This was their little sister’s engagement party, which meant lots of female pickings. Even better, there were some fresh faces.
One fresh face in particular had caught Rico’s eye, a dark chestnut-haired beauty whose hot little body was wrapped in a white halter neck dress. There was something self-conscious and uncertain about the way she danced, clumsy even, as if this were the first time she’d ever let herself sway to music. Or maybe it was her shoes. He’d spotted her earlier when she’d crossed the room, the flared skirt of her dress swishing behind her. The stiffness in her gait suggested a woman unused to wearing five-inch black heels. When she stepped out of them, he doubted she would reach his armpit. Rico wasn’t particularly fussy when it came to women, but there was something about the shorter ones that did it for him.
He nodded in her direction. “Who’s that in the white dress?”
Both of his brothers followed his stare, and then Tommaso, the middle brother, grinned. “That’s Marisa Rossellini.”
“Luisa’s sister?”
Luisa Rossellini was married to Gennaro Martinelli, brother of Niccolo Martinelli, the man marrying their sister in four months. Now that he thought about it, Rico could see the sisterly resemblance.
“Yes. She’s one of Niccolo’s guests.”
“She’s hot. How have I never met her before?”
Tommaso smirked. “Because she lives like a nun.”
“Nuns don’t wear dresses like that.” The only thing holy about Marisa Rossellini’s dress was its colour. Backless, its front plunged in a V to her midriff, its design cleverly revealing only a hint of cleavage.
“She’s a good girl who’s never had a boyfriend and attends mass every Sunday. My guess is she’s a virgin, so if she’s your chosen conquest, my suggestion would be to forget it – that one doesn’t put out.”
People thought money made the world go around, but people were wrong. Information was king. Information was power, a fact of life instilled in the three Esposito sons when they were learning to read.
Take Niccolo Martinelli. Niccolo was a member of one of Italy’s oldest, wealthiest and most aristocratic families. That was no secret. However, it was information their father had harvested about him that had enabled him to lure Niccolo into his lair.
Since the engagement had been agreed, Rico had been charged with keeping Niccolo under surveillance. Through this surveillance, information had come that Rico’s future brother-in-law had spent the last weekend shacked up in a Parisian hotel with a woman who was not Rico’s sister. No one, not even Siena, expected Niccolo to be faithful. All he had tobe was not stupid. As information was also currency, Rico had pocketed his knowledge of Niccolo’s infidelity on the basis that one never knew when information would need to be cashed in.
It was the Espositos’ thirst for information and self-preservation that meant every guest in attendance that evening had been thoroughly vetted, a task overseen by Tommaso. Again, you never knew when uncovered information could be cashed in. Or weaponised.
“How old is she?” Rico asked, his interest piqued even more.
“Twenty-five.”
“A twenty-five-year-old virgin?” he murmured. “Rarer than a unicorn.” And this one was more beautiful too. “Does she work?”
“In accounts.”
“Of the creative kind?” Creative accounting was the only worthwhile accounting as far as Rico was concerned, a sentiment shared by all Espositos.
“I told you, she’s a good girl. She works in the accounts department for a fashion chain. When she’s not working, she helps with the care of her father. He has Parkinson’s disease. When she’s not at work or caring for him, she goes to mass.”
“No interests at all?”
“She’s in a book club.”
“A what?”
“A book club – it’s where a group of people choose a book to all read and then get together to discuss it.”
“To discussbooks? Why would people do that?”
Tommaso shrugged, his expression mirroring Rico’s bemusement, but Mattia, the eldest brother, said, “Maybe if you’d ever read a book, you would understand the appeal.”
Rico and Tommaso looked at each other and then burst intolaughter.
Unimpressed, Mattia raised an eyebrow and drained his bourbon. “You two are philistines.”
