Louisiana History Collection - Part 1 (131 page)

“A prophecy,” she answered, “unless you are incapable of feeling anything.”

“There was a time when I would have forfeited that point. I’m not sure that’s true any longer.” He reached to pick up a lustrous strand of her hair, letting it drift from his fingers in a shimmer of soft golden highlights. “Come to bed.”

A suffocating tightness rose in Félicité’s throat at that simple command. Her heartbeat quickened, and her fingers curled slowly into fists. “I can’t.”

“You are tired,” he said, taking the hairbrush from her hand and putting it on the dressing table, holding her wrist in a loose grasp as he scanned the pale oval of her face, noting the dark circles like bruises under her eyes. “Come on.”

At the roughness of those last words, Félicité allowed herself to be led a few steps before she drew back. “Colonel McCormack—”

“I’ve told you before. My name is Morgan, something you would do well to remember. Are you going to get into bed, or am I going to have to put you there?”

“Your wound—”

“To hell with it! At this moment I have the firm intention of letting you rest unmolested, but if you force me to lay hands on you, I can’t answer for the consequences!”

Félicité snatched her wrist free. With a glowering glance from under her lashes, she set her foot on the stool that sat beside the bed and mounted to the high mattress. Sinking into its comfort, she reached for the sheet, drawing it up over her knees. She would have liked to draw it higher, but despite the cooling effects of the rain, it was still warm in the room. That prospect of discomfort was one more thing to be laid at Morgan’s door. She watched him balefully as he moved to snuff the candle, then open the shutter for air.

Surefooted, quiet-moving in the dark, he approached the bed. The bed ropes creaked as they accepted his weight. The ceiling hook jangled as he took down the looped-up mosquito baire, drawing it around the bed, enclosing them in its gauzy folds. He lay down, and all was quiet.

Félicité eased down against her pillow, stretching to full length. She lay still, listening to the steady breathing of the man beside her, aware of the thud of her heart against her ribs. Her nerves tingled with the urge to jump up and fling herself off the mattress, to scream her hatred and her refusal to carry this game a single step further. She could do no such thing. She had to accept this. It was her penance forever becoming involved with this man, for being her father’s daughter.

Abruptly, he stretched out his arm across the width of the mattress that divided them, pulling her toward him, turning her to fit her body to the curve of his own. She lay stiff and unyielding, staring into the dark, waiting for the marauding hands, the violation of her senses.

“Go to sleep,” he said, his breath warm against the back of her neck. “Morning will come before you know it.”

Félicité came awake by slow degrees. There was a disturbed feeling at the back of her mind, a sensation of distress that was allied to an odd excitement. Daylight, dim but unmistakable, seeped under her eyelids. Her nightrail had worked upward with her twistings and turnings during the night nearly to her waist. There was a weight across her chest as she lay on her back. The warm globe of one breast felt confined, cupped in a gentle yet firm hold.

Her eyes flew open. Morgan leaned above her, resting on one elbow. His green eyes held a curious, questioning light while a wry smile flickered over his mouth.

“Good morning.”

She closed her eyes, and opened them again. He was still there. “Good morning,” she said, her tone far from gracious.

“It is indeed.”

She sent him a venomous glance. “For you, maybe.”

“It does depend on your point of view,” he agreed as he slowly tightened his hold on her breast.

Like a recoiling spring, she caught his hand and flung it off, rolling away. He lunged for her, clamping an arm across her waist despite the wince of pain that passed over his features. It was the glimpse she caught of that fleeting grimace that stilled Félicité’s movements. He took instant advantage of that weakness, hefting himself closer, lowering his head to cover her warm lips with his own. Félicité felt the touch of his tongue, the press of his naked body against her own bare thighs. Resistance now was futile, since her purity was forever gone, and for so many reasons she must steel herself to surrender eventually. It would be less hurtful, less likely to arouse Morgan’s anger, if she permitted him to do as he pleased, if she accepted the treacherous languor that hovered at the edge of her consciousness, allowing it to sap her strength and make submission bearable.

A knock came on the bedchamber door. Hard upon it, Ashanti called, “Your morning chocolate, mam’selle, M’sieu Colonel!”

Morgan raised his head, a frown drawing his brows together. “Chocolate? By your orders?”

“My maid always wakes me at this hour with chocolate,” Félicité said, her tone a trifle defensive. There was confusion in the depths of her brown eyes as she tried to free herself from the self-induced lassitude that gripped her.

He gave a soft grunt, staring down at her, his green gaze clashing with the velvet of her own. Abruptly, he pushed away from her, levering himself to one elbow. “It’s just as well. I need to report for duty at the governor’s house anyway.”

“Your sword cut—”

“I doubt it will interfere with paperwork, all that I spend my time doing these days.”

Félicité called to Ashanti to come in, then sat up, pushing her hair over her shoulder as she watched him stretch, flexing the muscles of his right arm that had also been injured as the sword had sliced across it. “What about your uniform? It will need repairs, cleaning and pressing.”

He shook his head. “It will do until I reach my quarters, where I can change.”

Ashanti, pushing aside the mosquito baire, cleared her throat. “I found the coat of M’sieu Colonel in the salle last night. It has been sewn up, sponged, and brushed already. I would be happy to attend to the rest also.”

“That was considerate, but my man will see to anything more that may be necessary.” The expression on his face was arrested, thoughtful.

“As you wish, M’sieu Colonel.” The girl brought the chocolate tray to Félicité and placed it across her lap, meeting her eyes with such a limpid gaze that Félicité was at once certain the colonel had reason to be wary. Turning with her quiet grace, Ashanti left the room, though she failed to close the door.

Morgan glanced from the open portal to Félicité, pouring chocolate from the china pot, her lashes lowered. Whipping back the covers, he strode to the door and slammed it shut. Returning to stand beside the bed, he accepted the cup she offered.

“It strikes me your servants are well trained, in most things,” he drawled. “This should be a comfortable bivouac.”

Rage at the reminder of his decision the night before washed over Félicité, then receded. “I trust you will continue to think so.”

He sent her a long glance, his gaze lingering over the shining, tumbled glory of her hair, the creamy perfection of her skin with its tint of angry pink, and the proud, thrusting outlines of her breasts under her soft nightrail. “So do I.”

He sipped at his chocolate, then, finding it none too hot, drank it down in a few swallows. As he brushed aside the baire, leaning across the bed, she flinched, but he only set his cup on her lap tray. His face grim, he drew back and turned.

Through slitted eyelids, Félicité watched as he moved away. He seemed unconscious of his nakedness in her presence. Was he so used to appearing in that guise before women, then? Perhaps he often frequented the rooms of the filles de joie, the daughters of joy, the harlots of the seaport towns and the garrison towns that were a part of his life? It was more likely than not, no matter how distasteful the idea might be. Soldiers, common adventurers, were not the sort of partis fathers looked for when casting about for a husband for their daughters; their chances of advancement were slim and the prospect of an early demise great. What other type of feminine companionship was there for them except the public women?

Morgan McCormack was a man who exuded power despite his state of undress. The morning fight, increasing at the windows, sculpted the muscles of his back in light, outlining in harsh clarity the paler strips of old scourge marks in the sun-bronzed darkness of his skin. As it slipped along his tapering waist to the flat hardness of his flanks, it brought forth the contrast in shading between his upper and lower body in a sharp demarcation line, as if he was accustomed to going without a shirt. Though she had little to go by, to Félicité he appeared more rampantly male than any other man of her acquaintance. There was about him a quiet assurance that she had never come in contact with before. The discovery was unsettling. It would have been much more satisfactory if there had been some obvious weakness which might have been exploited.

It was as Morgan found his breeches, pushing one leg into them, that the door opened. Ashanti paused on the threshold, then, ignoring the colonel with determination, spoke to Félicité.

“Breakfast will be no more than a few minutes in preparation, mam’selle. Shall I serve it in here?”

Félicité slanted a quick look at Morgan unhurriedly pulling up his breeches, fastening their side buttons. “I — yes, please, Ashanti.”

The maid signified her understanding, then, tilting her head in the direction of the copper tub with its cold, soap-scum-coated water, asked, “Shall I remove the bath now?”

Félicité was about to agree when Morgan answered for her. “Later. And never mind breakfast for me. I won’t be staying.”

“Yes, M’sieu Colonel,” Ashanti said, dropping a smart curtsy before she departed once more in obedience to the tone of dismissal in his voice.

It did not sit too well with Félicité to have him order her servants for her, especially Ashanti. The prospect of his, early departure was too welcome for her to risk saying anything that might make him alter his plans, however. She pressed her lips together.

Morgan picked up his shirt pulling it on over his head, breathing a soft imprecation as he stretched his wound trying to push his right arm into the sleeve. If she had not been at such odds with him, Félicité might have been tempted to help. As it was, she sat unmoving, sipping at her cold chocolate.

When he had begun to push the tail of the blood-splotched shirt into his breeches, she finally spoke. “When will you return?”

“Why?” He straightened the pleated ruffle of his shirtfront and picked up his waistcoat, sliding it carefully up his arm.

“I only wondered if you would be here for dinner — so I could decide what to tell the cook to prepare.”

“Don’t worry about a meal for me. Anything will do.”

She supposed from that she was to assume he would be back by that time. His attitude was not a familiar one. Oh, Valcour was often vague as to the hour of his return; regardless, he demanded the richest and most time-consuming foods be prepared against the eventuality that he might decide to put in an appearance. Even her father had been deeply interested in the dishes that were to be set before him at the table.

Thinking of her father, Félicité felt a deep chill settle over her. She bit the side of her lip, then, with a hard set to her mouth, glanced at the man now buckling on his sword belt. “Colonel — Morgan?”

“Yes?” He flicked her a quick look as he adjusted the hang of his rapier.

“What will happen now? In the matter of our agreement, I mean.”

“You want to know if I will honor it, even though you tried to cut your part in it short?”

“I told you, I did no such thing!”

“The question is, can I afford to believe you?”

“The question is,” she corrected him, “do you want to, or would you rather pretend I am at fault so you won’t have to face what you have done!”

“There is that possibility,” he agreed, and looked up from the search for his boots with a grim smile for her astonishment. “It is a minute one, but because of it, I am prepared to let the previous arrangement stand.”

“You will use your influence to see that my father receives his freedom?”

“That was never assured. I will see that the sentence is as light as possible. More than that is beyond my ability to guarantee.”

It was so little, so small a concession, and yet if it meant the difference between life and death, so great a one. Could her contact with Morgan really change the punishment to be meted out to Olivier Lafargue in the Spanish court? Would it? She did not know; therefore she had no way of telling if the price she was now paying was too high.

“And what of me?” she asked, forcing the words past the hard knot in her throat.

“You?” He lifted a brow, fully dressed now, raking his hair back, confining the waving strands with the black tie that held his queue.

Félicité pushed the gauzy folds of the mosquito baire aside, her eyes dark as she searched his face. “What will I do? What will I be to you in the meantime, your chère amie?”

“If it pleases you to style yourself that way.”

The quiet mockery of his words fanned her sense of helplessness. “‘It doesn’t! You may think you have the upper hand, but I won’t tolerate this a day, an hour, a second longer than I must to save my father!”

“The trial is likely to be a long one. It may go on six weeks, even two months, before a verdict is reached.”