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FREGENE

Outside the city, Kate encouraged Marcello to let the Ferrari loose It wasn&039;t a long drive but the roads widened enough to allow the car to get up speed She wanted to travel fast Wind haers, ja behind her spectacles into her open eyes

Her head didn&039;t clear She told hied Sheep scattered It was hilarious A shepherd&039;s curses were lost in their wake

They rounded a corner The Palazzo Otranto stood on its proentle slope led down to the beach For the Engagement Ball, Dracula had declared a holiday The toas like a carnival, full of pale people in elaborate costu the seafront This was not like Brighton or Blackpool Va costu with parasols the size of the big dish at Jodrell Bank, keeping circles of safe shadow over theirand drinking Kate was one of the across the beach, teeth and claws clicking and clacking, leaving a snail-trail of blood All faces were skulls, cheekbones and teeth glea, eye-sockets ehter The sun bleached everything to the colour of sand

Marcello was afraid of her, could deny her nothing That , empty when abandoned For once, she was free to think only of herself, her desires and drea with the rest of the world

She vaulted out of the Ferrari, limber with the quickness of the blood in her, and landed like a cat, even in heels She had found a black and tiny Piero Gherardi gown and tossed away most of her lire on it She wore it with scarlet scarves that matched her hair

People on the beach took notice of her So a sea creature out of the surf turned to whistle She posed like Malenka, hipping her scarves like squid tentacles She wanted to roar, like a lady panther The boys throbbed with blood If they came near her, she would rip them open with love

Marcello parked the car, and ca i her not to pay attention to the sea-boys He was acting like her father

She slapped hiave her a &039;well, if that&039;s how it is&039; shrug The slap was a mistake, too obvious She exerted her control over hi his arteries into puppet strings, jerking hi a sharp kiss on his mouth He surrendered, which irritated herof hi She had been in this whirl for days now Weeks?

She didn&039;t want to think of loss She nipped Marcello&039;s neck and scraped sos better again, for the ed a smile and a wave

Kate had his co He surrendered his blood and his body, but a ring of ice surrounded his heart She knehat he was thinking, but rarely what he was feeling He must love her By his actions, by his words, she could tell His love was a cloak, a protection She ed their sea monster up the beach and dropped it in tribute to her It was a living wing, with a long, barbed tail A single eye, lashless and round, looked up at her, clouding over What did this dying thing see?