Lair of the Lion

taking you out in the weather alone, with only your robe, and for entering the room while you bathed." She hesitated, floundering for the right words. "Did he touch you, Isabella?"
    "He's in a foul mood because he thinks to send me away again for my own good. He's afraid he'll harm me."
    Tears glittered in Sarina's eyes. "We all hoped you would be the one to help us. But it was wrong of us to sacrifice you. It's possible the don is right and you should go." Her hand brushed over Isabella's shoulder. "He is very dangerous. It's why he keeps to himself—to protect us all from the beast."
    Isabella pulled away from Sarina in a fit of temper, her dark eyes stormy. "He is a man, and like any other man he needs companionship and love. Did it occur to any of you that had you treated him more like a man and less like a beast, you might have seen him as a man?" She paced the room in restless fury, then swung around to make her challenge. "He's sacrificed much for his people. Are you coming with me to look at his wounds?"
    Sarina studied Isabella's furious face for a long moment. She sighed softly. "He'll not be happy to see us," she warned.
    "Well, that's too bad. He'll have to live with it."
    "And it's entirely improper for you to visit him in your nightclothes," Sarina pointed out, but she led Isabella out of the steamy room to the wide staircase leading to the upper stories.
    Isabella's shoulders were stiff as she marched up the stairs, prepared for war. She was angry with the lot of them. And close to tears. That made her even angrier. She had fainted like a dolt. It was no wonder the don was ready to send her away. Her father had been right about her all along. She had never measured up, never had the courage to be sold into marriage to further the Vernaducci interests. Perhaps when Don Rivellio had first offered for her, had she accepted, her father would still be alive. Her brother would not have been imprisoned and their lands confiscated. She had been such a coward, not wanting to be touched by a grasping, greedy man with a sick, lustful smile and flat, cold eyes.
    She had been twelve summers when Don Rivellio had visited their palazzo the first time, his gaze following her every move. He licked his lips often, and twice, beneath the table, she had seen him obscenely rubbing his crotch while he grinned at her. He had sickened her with his cold good looks and evil smile. After his visit, two of the maids had been found sobbing—raped, bruised, battered, and almost too frightened by his perverted tortures to tell their don what had taken place. Both claimed he had nearly killed them, deliberately strangling them to terrify them into silence. The bruising around their throats had convinced Isabella they were telling the truth.
    A sob escaped, and she jammed a fist against her lips to choke it back. She knew she lived in a world where a woman was little more than a way to acquire property or heirs. But Lucca had valued her, had conversed with her as if she were a man. He had patiently taught her to read and write and speak more than one language. He taught her to ride a horse and, most of all, to believe in her own strength. What would Lucca think of her when she confessed to him she had fainted?
    And Don DeMarco. He was so alone. So wonderful to her. A man like no other. Yet she had failed him as she had Lucca and her father. Nicolai needed her desperately, yet when it counted the most, she had let him down, taken the coward's way out. Fainted. She should have continued to call to him, to bring him back to her. She had had the strength to hold the other lion, yet she had fainted like a child when the don needed her.
    "Isabella?" Sarina's voice was filled with compassion.
    Isabella shook her head adamantly. "Don't. I don't want to cry, so don't be nice to me. I hope Nicolai is angry so I can be angry, too."
    They were at the bottom of the staircase leading to the don's private wing. Sarina hesitated, glancing up fearfully, her hand on the head of a sculpted lion. "Are you certain you want to do this?"
    Isabella went up the stairs quickly, staring down the guards in the hallway and defiantly knocking on the door.
    She jumped when Nicolai flung the door open with a crash. A snarl was on his face, a mask of brooding anger. "I told you I did not wish to be disturbed for any reason!" he bit out before he focused fully on Isabella.
    Sarina crossed herself and looked steadfastly at the floor. The guards turned away from the