All he had to do was burst out bitterly to the first friend he saw in the scullery, or the first pretty serving maid who took him to bed and consoled him with what a coldhearted bitch I was. And after that, the whole household would know how a kitchen apprentice had seduced the maestra di cucina, and I’d have not a single crumb of authority left. The maids and the pot-boys would all be giggling behind my back, and once it got up to Madonna Adriana . . . maids in this household were dismissed if they gained reputations as whores. Pantisilea was our resident harlot, and as much as everyone liked her, she would have been packed out years ago if Madonna Giulia had not intervened. And a maestra di cucina would be held to an even higher standard—if she could not keep order among her underlings, she was worth nothing. How my underlings would love whispering about Carmelina, the inviolable Madonna of the kitchens, revealed as no better than Pantisilea.

Stupider than Pantisilea. She was at least clever enough to keep her belly flat using all those prudent tricks with halved limes or cups of pennyroyal extract. I knew those tricks too, but had that stopped me? Had I really been so foolish and lonely and lust-drunk that I hadn’t even thought of pushing a halved lime into myself before my apprentice pushed his way in after it? If my belly swelled, it wouldn’t even matter if Bartolomeo held his tongue. I’d be out on the streets the moment my apron showed a bulge, and even Madonna Giulia wouldn’t be able to save my position for me.

Dear God, I was going to lose everything. All because I couldn’t keep my legs closed. My father was right—I really was just a slattern.

“Not one word to anyone,” I said desperately, jabbing a finger into Bartolomeo’s chest. “You will take my orders, you will do as I tell you, and you will never presume to touch me again.”

“Carmelina—”

“Or call me anything but signorina,” I rode over him. “You are an apprentice, and you are a silly boy, and I should never have let you touch me. It was a mistake, you hear me? A mistake.”

He stood there with his hands hanging at his sides, still naked except for the cross about his neck, looking at me. He flushed slowly, so dark his freckles disappeared all the way down his chest. He turned away from me, fumbling for his breeches, and I felt a pang. But I kept my stony expression. I’d suffered calf love too when I was his age—painful though it was, it went away quickly. He’d forget about me with the next maidservant to bat her lashes at him. Far better for his future if he did.

If he would just not ruin my future by talking . . .