A few moments later, she was pulled out to the floor by another dottore. She stared into his eyes the best she could while moving to the music.

No, not Jared.

During an excellent interpretation of an Elvis Presley ballad, Ragnor cut in on the dottore. She thought about protesting, then wondered why. She was attracted to him. She liked being with him, even if her thoughts ran to the erotic. She was an adult; Steven had been gone now for a long time. She didn’t deserve the guilt with which she seemed to be punishing herself.

She allowed herself to be drawn comfortably into his arms.

“Still no sign of Tiff?” she asked.

He shook his head. “No.”

“There’s something really wrong.”

“She may still turn up,” he murmured.

She didn’t think that he believed that.

When the song broke, she told him that she was thirsty. A cold beer seemed the best thirst quencher, since there had been so much dancing that they had actually run out of bottled water.

For a moment, Jordan reflected on what she might be doing to her liver. Champagne, Bellinis, red wine, espresso with Kahlua, and now beer. But it was very cold and felt so good going down.

Ragnor wasn’t wearing a mask or sunglasses. For once, she could see his eyes. He seemed to be searching for someone.

“Looking for Tiff?”

“What?” he asked, as if she had startled him. “Um. Excuse me for a moment, will you?” Once again, he simply walked off.

Lynn found her by the table. “Hey, that’s my favorite disco song. Want to dance with a matador?” Jordan looked out to the floor. Guests had begun to depart, and the dancing had gotten down to a group of happy?partly sloshed?people wildly moving about. As usual at most such gatherings, the sex of a partner didn’t matter anymore. People were just having fun.

“Sure.”

“The costume may not have been such a great idea,” Lynn admitted, shouting above the music as she gyrated. “No cute guys have hit on me! Actually, no guys have hit on me.”

“I’m afraid it might be the mustache!” Jordan called back to her.

A moment later, another dottore popped in front of her. Lynn had turned around to dance with the gypsy sun god on her other side.

“So?”

Jordan raised her brows, looking at her companion.

“It’s me, Jared. Are you having fun? What’s the matter, too many Venetian friends? You don’t talk to me anymore?”

She laughed. “Jared, I’ve tried conversations with a German and, I think, a Brazilian dottore. How was I suppose to know this one was you?”

“Because I’m tall and devastatingly handsome, even in a cloak and mask!” he told her.

“How silly of me! I forgot!” she teased. “Hey, have you seen Tiff yet?” He shook his head. “But if I had?”

“Yeah, yeah, I know. You might not have recognized her.”

“It would be like Tiff to purposely stand us all up, create an air of mystery, and then tell us tomorrow that she was the silver space alien or the woman in the Swarovski crystal cloak and mask. Did you see that costume? Man, it was spectacular.”

“Everyone here is spectacular.”

The music had taken a break; she realized that she had shouted that last comment. A slow tune began again.

“Go find your wife!” Jordan told her cousin.

He nodded. “You’re okay, right? Having a good time?”

“Absolutely.”

He moved off. Jordan walked back to the buffet table where they were beginning to pack up what was left of the food. A waiter handed her another beer. She shrugged, thanked him, and accepted it. She watched the dancers and found herself approached by the sun god.

“Per piacere. Please?” he asked politely.

With a rueful shrug and a smile, she took a long swallow of the beer, set it down, and allowed him to lead her to the floor.

As they danced, he told her not to miss the Peggy Guggenheim museum. She assured him she had seen it several times.

“And the churches! So many, but you must try to see them. There are over two hundred.” The sun god was an Italian with a good conversational knowledge of English. “When an address is ‘Campo’

something or the other, it means a square with a church. Pop into any of them; you’ll be astonished at the art work you find, especially in some of the lesser known.”

“I saw a great church the other day, but . . . oh, a friend stopped me. Maybe I can find it again.”

“Make an effort to do so.”

The band leader announced the last number of the night: another Elvis Presley song, slow and sweet.

“He likes Elvis,” Jordan commented to her partner.

The sun god nodded. “That’s my friend, Rico Andretti. He knows every song Elvis ever wrote. He loves this party; so many Americans. And he sounds like Elvis, yes?”

“Yes, he does, he’s excellent.”

The sun god was pleased with her comment. And he was a very decent dancer. When the number ended, he asked her if she needed a walk back to her hotel.

Over his shoulder, she saw a dottore at the door. Tall, dark-haired. And surely, devastatingly handsome, even in a mask.

“Thank you, but no. I came with family. They’re just leaving.” Her partner graciously bowed aside.

The dottore slipped out the door.

Jordan followed, looking around as she did so. No sign of Lynn, Anna Maria, or even Raphael. They must be there somewhere; Jordan was certain that Anna Maria never left her own ball until the last guest had departed. But all she saw were the caterers cleaning up and a few people slipping out to the dock beyond.

She started across the floor, anxious to reach the dottore.

A hand caught her arm before she could cross the marble floor. She stopped, turning. Ragnor was there.

“I need to catch up with Jared,” she told him.

“That’s not Jared.”

“How do you know?”

“He left a few minutes ago with Cindy. She wasn’t feeling well.”

“So he just left me?”

“He knows you have friends here.”

“Oh?” she paused, staring at him. “I don’t think that he likes you very much, and he doesn’t trust you at all.”

Ragnor shrugged. “That’s natural. But you cannot go home alone.”

“This is Venice. It’s a very safe city.”

“We’re going to the same hotel.”

“Then you’re free to follow me.”

The last of the vaporettos had left with most of the guests; they waited with a few stragglers?all going in different directions?for water taxis.

They wound up last in line.

“See, you’re supposed to be grateful for me,” Ragnor told her, as a group ahead of them boarded a water taxi.

“Oh?”

“There’s no one left.”

She inclined her head toward the Swiss Guard who was standing on the dock, ready to hail their taxi.

“He’s a stranger.”

“I don’t think that anyone is stranger than you.”

He shrugged. “That may be true.”

“Why don’t you talk more about yourself?”

“Why don’t you trust what you feel?”

“Maybe I feel that you’re a very dangerous character.”

“Maybe I am?in a way.”

She sighed. “We never get anywhere.”

“We would, if you’d let us,” he said very softly. A breeze stirred, and it felt as if there was a warmth to it, though the night was chill. His words were definitely a sexual innuendo. And to herself, there was no denying that it evoked a sexual response.

Yet even as she felt a growing excitement, a slow burn within, she thought she heard a hissing sound.

Looking back toward the palazzo, it seemed that shadows swooped and fell around the entry. She looked up at the sky, wondering if the moon had been covered. A sense of fear and unease in the darkness again swept through her.

Yes, she was glad that he was there.

Inadvertently, she took a step closer to him.

She didn’t protest when he slipped an arm around her shoulder.

The water taxi arrived. The Swiss Guard and driver helped her on; Ragnor followed closely.

The water taxi took off flying over the canals. She realized then that she’d definitely had far too much to drink. Her head was swimming.

She leaned against his shoulder. Fingers smoothed her hair beneath the fantasy headdress she was wearing. The touch was nice. She gave way to it.

A moment later, they’d reached the dock near the Danieli.

“What time is it?” she asked him, trying to steady herself to disembark.

“Almost three.”

“My Lord, we did close that party.”

“Deep midnight,” he murmured.

She shook her head. That expression again. He hopped out of the water taxi, and she noted that he was careful to skirt any possibility of slipping into the seawater. He helped her out; she was more careless herself, and amused.

“Afraid of water?” she teased, as he steadied her on the dock.

“Trust me, that water is very, very cold.”

He started leading her toward the hotel. As they reached the promenade, she looked back toward the dock.

Shadows, changing, shifting. She gave her head a shake, thinking again that she heard whispers, and flutterings, like the sounds made by birds. Bats ...

But there could be no bats near the docks.

Ragnor turned back. The sounds stopped. Were they real, or had she imagined them? Had he stopped them by merely looking that way?

“Come, let’s get to the room. It is very late. And clouds are coming. The moon will be covered.” She leaned against him as they walked. “Are you afraid of the dark?”

“I love the dark.”

As they neared the door to the hotel, she paused again, looking back. A shadow seemed to stretch nearly to the door; it shifted, receded. Fear stole into her. She could have sworn she heard whispering again.