Echoes in Stone (7 page)

Perhaps this wouldn’t be so hard if she were not sitting so near Lily’s volatile husband. Didn’t have to see the reaction to the story she had to tell on that ravaged face. She swallowed hard, then rose, crossing to the fireplace.

He made no move to stop her this time.

Her stomach was queasy. She stared into the fire. This wouldn’t be easy. There was no telling how Dash would react. So few people knew the truth. It wasn’t the sort of thing bandied about in polite company. Then again, there was nothing about Dash that suggested he even remotely understood the concept of
polite company
.

Lily had feared this man. Distrusted him. So far, he’d done nothing to persuade Jessa to think any differently. There was no telling how he’d react if he knew—

Holly. She must do this for Holly. If she told Dash the truth—at least some of it—he’d see how much Holly needed the protection, the love Lily never knew. The kind of protection Dash couldn’t give her.

“Lily and I didn’t grow up together” she said at last. “I didn’t meet her until I was ten years old, although she’d always been a presence in my life. I’ve known
of
her for as long as I can remember, but didn’t
know
her. My family rarely spoke of her, but there was a small portrait of her that sat on the chimneypiece above the fireplace.”

She paced in front of the fire, wanting to get this over. Already, acid churned in her stomach.
God, how can I  tell this man, who already has such contempt for my sister, exactly who it was he’d married
? She took another deep breath, holding her hand to her waist in a futile attempt to sooth the ache that churned her stomach.

“Have you heard of a man named Marcus Wilkerson?” she asked.

He jerked up straight, slamming his teacup down with enough force to threaten breakage to the expensive bit of china. “God Lord, Jessamine! What kind of upbringing did that misguided mother of yours provide you, that you’d have even heard that name?” Captain Tremayne stared at her. “I was just a lad when the rumors were making the rounds, but the man was notorious. His name was synonymous with depravity. A knight, or some other petty title, wasn’t he?” Dash waved his arms as he spoke, sprinkling crumbs of saffron cake. “My God, woman, what would bring that name to such innocent-seeming lips as yours?”

He rose and strode to the desk. Though it wasn’t yet noon, he decanted a splash of brandy into a glass, then raked his fingers through his hair, disordering the neat queue. “Forgive me for what I’m about to say, Jessamine, but obviously you already know something of him or you wouldn’t have so casually uttered his name.”

The captain took a sip of the brandy, then stretched out the hand he’d clenched into a fist. “That man—if you could call him that—was the vilest, lowest… A soulless bastard who preyed on children. Children! My God, there is a special place in hell for his kind.”

He tore at his cravat as if it were strangling him. A vein throbbed at his temple. “They say he was run out of every brothel in London, when even the most obscene and corrupt of the madams grew sickened by his disgusting tastes.”

“Dash—Captain—” Jessa fought back the bile burning in her throat. “Marcus Wilkerson was Marguerite’s first husband. Lily’s father.”

There’d been no way to soften the blow. Violent color rose on his cheeks, then receded as he blanched, swaying back to lean upon the desk. The crystal glass dropped from nerveless fingers, landing with a small thud, spilling brandy across the patterned carpet.

“The law, and his creditors, were closing in on him,” Jessa said.
Blast you, Marguerite, for leaving it to me to be the one to tell him this
. She pitied him, but he’d asked for the truth. “Word of his predilections had finally reached even Marguerite’s willfully ignorant ears.”

She could no longer look at Dash, who clutched the edge of the desk as if it were the last solid piece of deck on a ship that foundered in storm-tossed seas. “He stole his daughter—he stole Lily away with him when he was forced to flee the country. She was four years old. He had sole care of her until his death, when she was sixteen. No one knows for certain what happened, but, given his tastes…” She met his eyes.

Eyes etched with horror. And unmistakably, fury.

11.

…a fey woman-child…

DASH CLENCHED HIS FISTS, his blood roaring in his ears. His heart slammed against his ribs as if trying to escape. He strode across the room, snatched Jessa by the shoulders, and shook her, snapping her head hard enough that pins flew from her hair. Gold tendrils tumbled down her back as she stared up at him.

“What kind of foul, unnatural mother is Marguerite,” he shouted, “that she’d allow her child to be carried off by an animal like that? And don’t tell me she was some feather-brained schoolgirl, taken in by a handsome face. There was never anything feather-brained about Marguerite.”

Jessa’s jade eyes swam with tears, but his shock was too great for him to be moved by them. Lily had cried too, great crocodile tears, whenever he refused to give in to one of her whims. The tears in Jessa’s eyes meant no more to him than Lily’s had. Raw animal fury clawed at his belly.

“And then,” he continued, the rage in his voice resounding against the walls like thunder, “when she has her daughter back, instead of protecting her, Marguerite tarts up her broken child in fancy clothes and trots her off to town to sell her off to the first man rich enough—and gullible enough—to be taken in by her beauty.” God, he’d been such a fool. That red hair. That lusty figure. He’d paid too high a price for a passing lust.

Marguerite had no excuse. What the hell had the woman been thinking?

“God knows I hated Lily at the end,” he said, “hated her tantrums. Her lies. Her utter lack of discrimination or discretion. If Marguerite had only been honest with me in the beginning—” He flexed his fingers on Jessa’s shoulders, unwilling to release her.

“I was besotted by Lily, in the beginning. If I had known—if they’d told me— I would have done more. Protected her. Was Marguerite afraid if she told me the truth, that the fat, titled fish she’d just landed for her daughter would wriggle off her hook?”

Though his chest was heaving, he found it hard to draw breath.
Damn Marguerite
! And damn this green-eyed emissary she’d sent to steal his child. Or worse.

“Instead, I bring home a fey woman-child who could never be a wife to me. Marguerite’s
penchant
for keeping secrets destroyed any chance of happiness we might have had.” He laughed mirthlessly. “In the end, that fat, titled fish did manage to escape.” His voice dripped bitterness. “Lily died, and with her, the small income I sent monthly to her mother. So that panderer sends you here to take Lily’s place.”

Dash’s hands, still gripping Jessa’s shoulders, tingled, pulsed, just as they did every time he touched her. He raised a hand, running his fingers through the heavy curtain of her hair. Satin. He massaged her scalp, then snatched the hair at her nape, pulling her head back, forcing her to look at him. He lowered his face to hers; mere inches separated his lips from the plump beauties she nibbled.

Her gasp allowed her breath, redolent of the clove-scented apple butter she’d just eaten, to waft past his nose. The scent was temptation itself. Had Eve tasted like Cornish Gillyflower apples, no wonder the poor sot had surrendered. Dash’s cock stiffened painfully against the restraint of his tight trousers. Even if he were damned in the next instant, he had to have a taste of those apples.

Marguerite sent her to him, he was sure of it. He could hear the harridan now. “
Go. Capture back the prize Lily lost. Do whatever it takes to entwine him, entrap him
.”

Just as Lily had. This little chit in his arms, tears coursing down her pale white cheeks, couldn’t possibly be the innocent she portrayed. Not after having been raised in a household such as that. Those tears were not fear, but frustration that her machinations were for naught.

Well, hell. Why not take the consolation prize Marguerite offered? At least this time, he’d know what he was getting. He licked the shell of her ear, leaving a damp trail there, then blew softly.

She tried to flinch away from him, but his iron grip wouldn’t allow it.

“Are you prepared to take Lily’s place, Jessamine?” He whispered against her ear. “Will you open for me, as she opened herself for so many others?” He slid his hand from her shoulder to her waist, pausing to brush his palm along the outer curve of her breast.

She struggled in his arms, pummeling his chest, trying to shove him away.

Hellcat. Witch. Just like Marguerite. Like Lily. They’d perpetrated their last deception at his expense. No quarter would be granted this time.

“No Jessamine, that’s not the way to catch a husband. Didn’t Marguerite and Lily offer you better instruction in the fine art of seducing a wealthy man?” He pulled her tight against him, allowing her to feel the rigid shaft between his legs against her belly.

“Did they not teach you that you must open your mouth to him, bare your ripe, full breasts to him? Invite him to lick, to suckle there?” His hand moved from her narrow waist to cup her bottom, kneading the flesh hidden by her skirts. “And then, my oh so lovely Jessa mine, will you open even more for me? Will you draw me into madness with you? Just as Lily tried to do?”

How dare this fussy little miss waltz in here, tossing such bombshells? Rage formed a misty red haze in front of his eyes. Jessa’s hands on his chest burned like twin brands. Lust pounded like a drum between his thighs. There was no help for it; he closed the gap between them and claimed her lips.

No gentleness softened his kiss. He slid his tongue along the seam of her mouth, licking her lips, then nipped at the lower one.

She gasped.

He took advantage, swept into her open mouth, his tongue wrestling with hers.

It was everything he’d imagined. Sweet. Wet. The taste of ripe, juicy apples. He groaned into her mouth. Her mewling cries and struggles in his arms only inflamed him further.

One small part of his mind retained some semblance of sanity. He had to let go of this warm armful of flesh before his lust got out of hand. But dear God, she tasted of heaven. No woman had ever tasted this way. No woman had ever had this painful effect on him. No other woman had ever brought him so close to the brink of losing control. Not even Lily.

Lily.

He released Jessa as if she were a blazing torch, singeing his hands. He fell back, breathing hard. This wasn’t Lily. This was Jessamine. Another dangerous Palmer woman. Possibly more dangerous than even Lily.

.

JESSA FELL AWAY from Dash, swamped by a whirlpool of emotion. Too much. It was too much. The revelation of Lily’s tragic past. Dash’s fury at Marguerite. His insane suspicions about her motivations for being here.

That kiss. Wondrous. Disturbing. She should be feeling shocked. Violated. But something in her had enjoyed that kiss; some heretofore hidden part of her had blossomed in the strength, the domination, the unleashed power of the scarred devil who nipped her lips and plunged his tongue into her mouth.
Dear God, is this how passion feels? Is this what Marguerite felt in Marcus Wilkerson’s evil embrace? This loss of control? Is this how Dash had made Lily feel
?

The room had grown far too hot. She squeezed her eyes closed, her head throbbing as if clenched in a vice. She couldn’t draw breath. Her stomach truly roiled now, making dangerous gurgling noises. Her hand flew to her mouth to cover her bruised, kiss-swollen lips.

Outside. Right now. She needed to draw the damp air into her lungs, to cool the skin that burned as if heated pokers branded it.

Jessa raced past Dash and flung back the silk draperies, struggling to open the French doors.

A shadow loomed over her, but the wall of heat at her back was somehow comforting. She moaned, clutching her stomach. Dash reached around her and undid the catch. She shoved the doors open, burst through them, but only made it a few feet down the flagstone path before she dropped to her knees on the wet ground, and retched the contents of her stomach into the rosebushes.

Footsteps. Coming fast. A cool hand on her forehead, holding back the length of her unbound hair—heaven. Arms like iron bands swept her up, held her to a chest hard as stone, but thundering in her ears. The world dipped and swirled around her, before darkness descended on her.

12.

He’ll corrupt her, just as he corrupted Lily…

FLAMES CRAWLED OVER Jessa’s skin. A boulder lay on her, cutting off her breath. She struggled to throw it off, but it only pressed harder, as if it were some living thing. A rope wrapped around her neck, strangling her. She tried to cry out for help, tried to scream, but no sound escaped her raw, torn throat. Worse, she could see only dim shapes, tenebrous shadows, in a room that looked to be on fire whenever she managed to slit open her eyes.