As You Desire (35 page)

Even though she’d arranged this meeting, she was ashamed to face Cal. Her bottom lip must be raw from her chewing it. Her hair—She raised her hand, touched her coiffure. Her hair was coming undone. In a dozen years she’d never appeared in public with untidy hair. She stared stricken at the street scene beneath the balcony.

Cal reached across the table, capturing her chin with lean, strong fingers, and forced her to look his direction. “You best tell me, Marta. So I can fix it.”

“Have you seen Lord Ravenscroft?”

“No. Why?” His mouth drooped with sad irony. “Are you plotting some new way to make Harry Braxton jealous, this time using Blake Ravenscroft?”

She blinked.

He sighed, sat back in his chair, and pulled his watch fob from his vest pocket. Casually he unlinked the jewel from its gold chain and bounced the ruby-crusted ball up and down in his palm. The seemingly idle motion belied the hard set of his features.

“Listen, Marta,” he finally said. “I can’t stay in this hand much longer. I always reckoned myself a good man with a bluff, but the stakes have never been this high before.”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“Fine. Then here it is, all bald and unpretty. I think it’s high time you woke up. Harry Braxton doesn’t love you. He loves Miss Carlisle. And you know it.”

She reacted automatically, tossing her hair disdainfully. “Pshaw. Why would a man like Harry love a mere girl like Desdemona Carlisle?”

“You’re a smart woman, Marta. How is it you can’t manage to see those things that are right in front of your nose?” He tossed the bauble higher. The rubies winked red fire at the top of its arc. He snatched it overhand from the air and tossed it back up again. His movements grew quicker, more abrupt.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Marta snapped.

“Miss Carlisle’s eyes look a mite wiser than a girl’s ought, don’t you think? And she tries so hard to emulate you.” He leaned back farther in his chair, balancing on the back legs, still playing his solitary game of catch with his watch fob.

Marta’s eyes widened in surprise. “Me?”

“Something in that girl’s life has made her want to be something other than what she is. More the pity. There isn’t anything wrong with Desdemona Carlisle just as she is, and I suspect Harry’s the only one who makes her feel that way.”

“It’s amazing that you, on the merit of a few meetings, have managed to discern things about people that I, who have known them for years, have not.”

He came down on the front legs of his chair with a crash, surging forward over the table as his watch
fob fell unheeded to the tabletop. Ignored, it rolled off the edge, dropping to the tiled floor.

She could feel the intensity of his regard, his frustration struggling for voice. Her heartbeat quickened.

“You don’t know Harry Braxton any better than I do,” he said through tight lips. “You’ve just used him as an excuse, is all.”

“An excuse.” She twisted her suddenly cold hands in her lap. She felt as if she were standing on the crumbling edge of a dark, heated abyss, and, though she was frightened by its unknown depths, she was tempted by its promised warmth.

“Yup,” he said, reaching across the table and capturing her wrist. He dragged her hand over the linen surface toward him. “Marta, you’re chasing after a man who’s already given his heart elsewhere and you know it. And I know the reason.”

“I can hardly wait to hear.” Her attempted sarcasm failed. Her voice sounded weak, breathless.

“Good, ’cause you’re gonna hear it,” he answered. “You chase Harry Braxton ’cause you don’t have to worry about catching him. And if you don’, catch a man, you can’t be hurt by him.”

Her eyes widened.

“Your husband died young. I know you and I have no doubts that you loved him passionately and wholly. And I’m real sorry you had so much pain. But a brave woman doesn’t spend the rest of her life afraid of getting hurt again.”

She closed her eyes. His words sounded with the clarion ring of truth.

“You’re a brave woman, Marta.”

“No,” she said faintly. “I’m not.”

“I love you, Marta.”

Once more she heard the truth and recognized it. Her heart, clenched tightly against being hurt, slowly relinquished its fear. With that inner sigh of release, she experienced the unmistakable stirring of love. It didn’t matter that Cal was younger than she or that he came from a wild, raw country or that he was unpolished and elemental. He knew her and he loved her.

Her fragile joy evaporated abruptly. Cal wouldn’t love her when he discovered what her jealousy and alarm had caused her to do to Desdemona Carlisle.

“I’ve loved you from the moment we met, Marta.” Slowly he lifted her hand to his lips and pressed an ardent kiss against her knuckles. “And you love me.”

She did, but she couldn’t find the words to tell him.

He mistook her silence for doubt.

“Marta, five thousand dollars’ worth of pretty colored rocks just fell on the floor and you didn’t even blink an eye. If that ain’t love, honey, I don’t know what is.”

She could almost find a smile for him if she didn’t fear she’d recognized love too late, that she’d already recklessly endangered a prize she hadn’t even known she owned.

“Now, enough about Harry Braxton and Blake Ravenscroft,” Cal said. “Be my wife, Marta. I’ll take care of you.”

“I saw Desdemona Carlisle being kidnapped.” The words came out in a rush. “And I … I think I’ve put her life in danger.”

He regarded her pensively, without condemnation. “What happened?”

“Yesterday morning I saw a man force Miss Carlisle into a carriage. I heard the directions he gave the driver. I know I should have told Harry but instead I told Lord Ravenscroft. He’s had plenty of time to find her. They should have been back by now.” Her voice broke. “I didn’t mean anything bad to happen.”

“Why didn’t you tell Braxton? He knows these people, the lay of the land …”

“I thought if Lord Ravenscroft could effect a rescue, Desdemona would …” She trailed off miserably.

“She would think of Ravenscroft as her knight-errant?”

She nodded mutely.

“Oh, Marta.” He sighed and rose from his seat, holding out his hand for her. She took it and he pulled her to her feet. “Come on. You have som talking to do.”

“I can’t tell Harry what I’ve done. I can’t,” she protested, trying to pull away. He wouldn’t let her. He put his arm around her waist, drawing her gently but inescapably to his side.

“Yes, darlin’,” he said firmly. “You can. I’ll be with you. Forever, if you’ll let me.”

Grateful, she met his gaze. She couldn’t think of anything, or anyone, she wanted more.

She took a deep breath and nodded. “Yes,” she said. “I’d like that.”

Marta watched Harry blanch as if he’d sustained a heavy and unexpected blow.

“…   and then I heard Maurice tell the driver to go take the El Bawki road,” she hurried on.

“Maurice? You’re certain?” Harry asked.

She nodded.

“Maurice Franklin Shappeis. Jesus.” Simon yanked furiously at his beard. “He’s wanted by at least two other governments for various crimes. An export officer was killed …”

“Maurice is a
murderer?”
Marta asked faintly, reading her answer in Simon’s miserable silence. “Oh, God, I never knew.”

“He said El Bawki?” Harry broke in. He’d already absorbed the blow and recovered, far more rapidly than she’d have believed possible. “Are you sure?”

“I’m so sor—”

“Are you sure?” Harry repeated tightly.

“Yes,” Marta whispered. She had a hard time reconciling her genial ex-lover and this stark-faced stranger. He turned from her, motioning the Carlisles’ housekeeper near.

“Send Duraid to the livery where I stable my mare,” he told her, “and have him meet me at my house with her, saddled and ready to ride.”

She was forgotten, Marta realized. Her usefulness in Harry’s time of crisis having ended, she’d been
dismissed from his thoughts. She doubted he even realized she was still in the room.

“Fine, Harry,” Simon Chesterton said. “I’ll have my men marshaled in less than an hour—”

Harry dug out some crumpled notes and pressed the currency into Magi’s hands. “I won’t wait. Come when you can,” he said, and strode from the room. Simon hurried after him.

Marta sat quite still as Magi, too, left to find the boy Harry had named. Only she and Cal remained. She felt him shift behind her. He’d positioned himself there early in the interview and had not moved.

As welcome as it was, his championship had been absolutely unnecessary. She needn’t have worried about Harry’s reaction to her duplicity. He’d had none.

Except for the information she’d provided, Harry had taken no notice of her actions at all. All of his being, his every mental faculty, centered on Desdemona. There was simply no room in that concentration for something so inconsequential as outrage over her actions. What would it be like to be the focus of such devotion?

Cal’s hand cupped the curve of her shoulder and she covered his big, rough hand with her own. Pray God, she’d know.

“T
hank God,” Desdemona whispered as she stared out the tiny aperture at the horse and rider cresting a dune far in the distance. She’d known Harry would come. Love flooded her, relief making her shake. Now they only needed to wait a few hours before making their escape under the cover of night or until reinforcements arrived. She smiled, the sun and relief making her eyes dazzle.

The great ebony steed reared once and the fine manly figure …

Desdemona frowned. It didn’t look like Harry planned on sneaking in later and freeing her. It didn’t appear he was going to wait for the reinforcements. In fact, he was heading straight for the encampment. In broad daylight.

She blinked, finding it impossible to believe her canny Harry would be so reckless. It did no good. She still saw the same thing, a rider approaching pell-mell on a black stallion.

Black?
Desdemona’s foot slipped on the bucket. She righted herself.
Harry’s horse wasn’t black, and it wasn’t a stallion. It was a milk-white mare
.

She grabbed the sill and scrambled up as far up into the narrow window as she could. It wasn’t Harry’s horse because it wasn’t Harry. It was Blake Ravenscroft.

His dark head uncovered under the burning desert sun, his black waistcoat flapping behind him, he cantered toward the abandoned town.

Good God
, she thought,
he is going to get himself killed
.

She raced to the door, grinding heir cheek against the rough wood in order to see between the ill-fitting planks. Outside she saw one of Maurice’s men crouch beneath a crumbling wall. Another scooted up over the edge of a half-ruined roof, like a lizard scuttling onto a warm rock shelf. Then she saw Blake ride by.

“Get out of here!” she hollered. “It’s a trap!”

He leapt from his horse, his head swinging to and fro as he searched for the source of her voice.

“Get away!”

“Oh, but it’s too late for that, my dear.” Invisible to her eyes, Maurice spoke from the other side of the door just before he appeared, walking toward Blake. She saw Blake’s head tilt with British superiority, his shoulders hitch in disdain.

“Honored
Sid,”
Maurice said, “to what do we owe the pleasure of this call?”

“You’re holding an Englishwoman,” Blake said. “Release her to me at once.”

“I’m so sorry, but I’m afraid I won’t do that.”

“I, sir, am a subject of Her Royal Majesty Queen Victoria, and as such I demand—”

Maurice struck him, open-handed, across the face. Blake stumbled backward. “Shut up and listen, and you just may live through this.” A tincture of excitement colored Maurice’s voice. He’d liked hitting Blake. “You’ll deliver this message to one Harry Braxton. Tell him that I hold his woman and that unless he comes for her, the things she shall endure by tomorrow’s first light—”

“You dog!” Blake launched himself forward. Maurice sidestepped the attack easily, clipping Blake on the back of the head and sending him sprawling. Helpless, Desdemona watched Blake lurch to his feet, fists raised as if he were about to go a round of gentleman’s fisticuffs.

Maurice took immediate advantage. He hammered both his knotted fists into Blake’s stomach, folding Blake in half with the force of his blows.

“Don’t be more of a fool than you can help,” Maurice advised. “Just take the message to Braxton. You’ll find him at—”

“I know where to find him,” Blake panted hotly. “He’s my cousin.”

Desdemona, seeing Maurice’s reaction, sobbed. Blake had just signed his own fate.

“Well, this puts a rather different light on things,” Maurice mused. “I now have two baits rather than one.”

Blake braced his hand on his knee and straightened.
The effort cost him much for he was deathly pale now, his face sheathed in sweat.

“My,” Maurice said, “I am impressed. You’re quite a robust man, aren’t you? Unfortunately, a robust fellow like you will bear more watching than I can afford right now.” His gaze flickered behind Blake.