Elizabeth Elliott (25 page)

“You have known the truth since we left Lonsdale.”

The accusation stung, yet it was his silent reproof that made her ashamed, his knowledge that she hadn’t trusted him. “It seemed a good truth to keep to myself. You would have forced me into marriage had you known.”

“Would I?” He leaned back and his gaze flickered over her, quick and dismissive. “You seem to know my mind very well.”

She lifted her chin. “I know you are a man determined to get what you want at any cost. You meant to pay a fortune for Halford when it cannot be worth a tenth of that amount. You refuse to sell Flemish bolts of cloth because you do not like their merchants. I refused the fortune you offered to become your mistress, yet now I should believe that you intend to marry me when I am in your bed willingly?” Just stating her reasons aloud made her sure of her convictions. She gave him
a firm nod. “I know your mind well enough, Baron. You will go to amazing lengths to have your way.”

“You are right, of course. Had I known of Halford Hall, I would have kidnapped and married you the moment we rode through the gates of Montague. ’Tis obvious I have proved myself a ruthless knave in your eyes since then.”

“You are being sarcastic.”

“Am I?” His smile sent chills down her spine, a perfectly civilized smile that managed to look predatory. “In truth, I am only guessing at the thoughts that made you decide to keep this news from me. Why don’t you enlighten me? Was it fear that I would rob you of your inheritance? Revenge for taking you from your snug home at Lonsdale? A pleasant surprise you were saving for just the right moment?”

She lowered her gaze. “I intend to sell you Halford at a fair price.”

“And just when do you intend to make this sale?”

When would she learn to keep her mouth closed? Sensing that anything she said would only make him angrier, she shrugged her shoulders.

“You own nothing more than a piece of paper, Claudia.” He shook his head, as if she should already know what he told her. Oddly enough, the lines around his mouth indicated irritation more than anger. “Halford belongs to whoever controls its walls. Your uncle’s men are there now. My men will be there soon enough. Did you think I would pay for what I had gained already by conquest?”

What could she say? That she hadn’t thought that far in advance? In the silence that followed, Guy seemed to read her mind. He rolled his eyes. “Do you aggravate me on purpose, or is it a natural talent?”

Claudia wisely ignored the question. “Will you punish me for not telling you about Halford?”

“Nay.” He raked one hand through his hair, still scowling. “But you should have told me sooner.”

“I realize that now,” she murmured. She had badly misjudged him and he knew it. The urge to comfort him overcame
her wariness. She reached out and laid her hand on his cheek. “Are you terribly angry?”

“I am not angry, but I am more than a little annoyed.” He looked sideways at her hand. “Is this your attempt to placate me?”

“Aye.” She smoothed her fingers over his forehead, then rubbed his temple. Her lips curved into a shy smile. “Is it working?”

The corners of his mouth twitched upward. “Aye.”

She traced his high, sharp cheekbone and the line of his jaw. He urged her hand lower, along the corded contours of his neck to his collarbone. The banked fire in his eyes burned brighter.

“I am in need of much placating. Or will be,” he qualified. “I want to know what other ‘good truths’ you decided to keep to yourself.”

Her fingers swirled small circles toward his heart. She would much rather explore the interesting planes and ridges of his chest than argue. “I cannot recall anything.”

“Tell me about your parents.”

Her hand stopped moving. What had he learned about her parents? She decided to test the waters before she blurted out something else she would regret. “My parents?”

“Aye, how did your mother happen to possess such valuable emeralds?”

“The usual reasons,” she murmured. “My father was a wealthy man. He liked to give my mother pretty gifts.” She explored the shape of his breastbone with the tip of her finger. This might not be such a bad time to tell him the last of her family secrets. Not that there would ever be a good time. He would find this secret even more sordid than the one that involved Roberto. She bit her lower lip and remained silent.

“If your father was so wealthy, how did you and your brothers find yourselves so destitute?”

“My father’s family conspired to seize our wealth when my father died. My brothers and I were forced to flee our home with nothing more than we could carry.” She smoothed
her hand over his shoulder. “Are you certain you are not angry about Halford?”

He wasn’t to be distracted so easily. “How did your parents die?”

That was the question she had dreaded. She drew a deep, unsteady breath. “You will not like the story.”

“I wish to hear it anyway.” He tilted her chin up and waited until she met his gaze. “Give me your secrets, Claudia. You can tell me anything and it will not affect what I feel for you.”

“What
do
you feel for me?”

He shook his head. “Your story first.”

He couldn’t know what he asked. Claudia focused her gaze on a point just past his shoulder, seeing images of her parents. Her father had always seemed larger than life, tall with dark hair and piercing green eyes, yet she always remembered his smiles. Her mother looked delicate in comparison, with the fair hair and blue eyes of the Lonsdales. Claudia recalled only worried frowns from her mother. Her parents were different from one another in their temperaments, but Claudia never doubted their love for their children and each other. Their family was the most important thing in all their lives. They never said anything critical of one another in the presence of outsiders, and family secrets were just that: secrets told to none other. Yet Guy had a right to know of her family if he truly intended to make her a part of his. She closed her eyes and pictured the sunlit villa where she grew up, the endless vineyards and olive groves, and in spring, the scent of almond blossoms.

“The trouble began when my father’s sister, Giovanna, married the son of a neighboring nobleman. The two families were often at odds over a rivalry that began so many generations ago that no one can even remember how it started. Some thought a marriage might help ease the troubles between the houses.”

“I take it that did not happen?”

She opened her eyes and stared at his chest, longing to
rest her head there to listen to his comforting heartbeat. “Nay, Giovanna became her husband’s means to an end. You see, Lorenzo wanted much more than a Chiavari bride. He wanted everything the family possessed. As soon as Giovanna bore him a healthy son, Lorenzo devised a plan to seize control of everything.”

“He laid seige to your home?” Guy guessed.

“Sieges are not as common in Italy as they are here,” she informed him. “Lorenzo employed a much more cowardly means to achieve his goal.”

Now that she had started the story, it seemed almost a relief to tell him. She had foolishly hoped that Guy would never ask about her parents, but then again, she had never thought he would ever ask her to marry him. She knew now that marriage to Guy was but another tantalizing glimpse of what could never be. Learning that Roberto was her brother should have turned him away, but that was a matter that involved their brothers and not either of them directly. What she intended to tell him affected her irrevocably. It would affect Guy as well. He would never want her after she finished the tale. Not even as his mistress.

If she remained silent on the matter he might come to care for her, perhaps even to love her. Then she would hurt them both when he discovered the truth and sent her away. It was too late to spare her own heart, but she could not bear the thought of hurting him with her silence. She plunged into the worst of the story.

“My father had no other siblings, but he had three healthy heirs. Lorenzo was too clever to have us all murdered, for he knew none would believe him innocent of the crime. Instead he poisoned my father. He had spies employed as servants in our home to carry out the crime, then those same spies stepped forward to swear that my mother and her alchemist had plotted and carried out the murder. Lorenzo used his marriage to my aunt to proclaim himself our guardian and his men took my mother away the day after my father died. A
fortnight later, we learned that she died of the tortures they inflicted because she refused to confess.”

Claudia struggled to bar the images of those gruesome days from her thoughts, closed her mind to all but the words themselves. Her voice sounded almost devoid of emotion. “The alchemist proved more cooperative. They tortured him until he begged for death, until he knew his confession was all that would release him from the pain. He swore before a council of priests and magistrates that he had been my mother’s lover for years, that he fathered all her children, and that they murdered my father so they could marry.”

She wet her lips and recalled the pressure of Guy’s mouth against them. In the eyes of the Church she was the daughter of a murderess. Guy would never want to kiss her again.

“Lorenzo petitioned the Church to have my parents’ marriage annulled on grounds of adultery,” she went on. “The pope himself signed the decree, and my brothers and I were declared bastards. Roberto and Dante did all they could to convince the Church of my mother’s innocence, but Lorenzo had planned too long and too carefully. His son was named my father’s closest legitimate male relative and sole heir. Dante and Roberto decided we should flee to England when one of my servants died from drinking a goblet of wine meant for me. It was Lorenzo’s way of telling us we would never be safe if we remained in Italy.”

With the tale ended, a deafening silence fell over the room. Claudia waited for Guy to roll away from her, or express some other sign of aversion as soon as he recovered from his shock. Then again, perhaps he would not care that the Church marked her a bastard, that she would be required to confess as much to his priest before they married. If they married. She forced herself to meet his gaze. His icy expression put a heartrending end to the dim hope that he might still want her. His gaze moved over her face as if he searched for something.

He reached out to brush his thumb across her cheek. “Have you no tears for your parents and brothers?”

“They are a sign of weakness. I learned to control them.”

“Yet you wept for me.”

She lowered her lashes, unable to look him in the eye any longer. “I—I seem to have no control when it comes to you.”

“It grieves me to see you cry, but I would not have you harden your heart any more than you have already. There is no need.” Before she could guess his intent, his hands were at her waist, then he drew her into his arms. The kiss he pressed against her forehead was infinitely gentle. “You made yourself strong to survive and learned to depend upon yourself and no one else. Am I right?”

“You are not far wrong,” she murmured. Actually, he could not be any more right. She didn’t know what to make of this show of tenderness. The story of her family should have repulsed him. “You realize that there are those who consider me a bastard? The daughter of a murderess?”

“Aye.” Guy sounded no more concerned by that revelation than he would had she told him the skies looked like rain tonight.

She chewed on her lower lip, almost afraid to ask her next question. “Then you will abandon this crazed idea of a marriage?”

“Nay.” He answered with enough force that she leaned back to look at his face. Other than the slight lowering of his brows, she could see nothing to reflect his thoughts.

“Barons do not marry bastards,” she pointed out. “Not unless they are the king’s own. You will—Why are you smiling?”

“ ’Tis your choice of words that make me smile.” He leaned toward her for a sweet, lingering kiss that made her forget about his smile and everything else for a moment. All too short a moment. He drew away from her but pressed his fingertip against her lips as if to seal his kiss there. “I do not care what some might call you, for I know what you are. And I know what you will be. Soon none will dare call you anything but ‘baroness.’ ”

“Why are you so determined to marry me?” she whispered.
“You cannot wish to align yourself with what is left of my family. My dowry is worthless, for you intend to seize that property either way. What gold my necklace might fetch will not affect your wealth by any great measure. Still, you insist on marriage. Why?”

“Can you not guess?”

She gave an exasperated sigh. “I just gave you the reasons why I cannot. The only other possibility is lust, but that cannot be the reason because you know I will come to you willingly, without the promise of marriage.”

“You will?” He sounded amazed, even though he managed to keep a straight face. “You will sate my lust willingly?”

“Who twists whose words?” She pushed against his shoulder. “Will you tell me your reasons or not?”

“Hm.” He gave her a considering look. “I think not. That does not seem my wisest course at the moment. You said yourself that you know how my mind works. The answer will occur to you soon enough.”

“You need an heir?” she tried, even as she shook her head. “You could have your choice of brides. You do not need to marry me to get your heir.”

“Perhaps I require an heir with green eyes,” he teased. He took her hand and placed it on his chest. “This is the quickest path to your answer, Claudia. Where you will find what you are looking for.”

“I will find the answer by touching you?” Her mouth turned downward. “Then lust is the reason after all.”

He just smiled and shook his head. “Do you like to touch me?”

“I have told you that I do,” she answered, wondering at the sudden change in him. The remote look in his eyes had disappeared, leaving the man she liked best. He should be scowling, raging at her for keeping her secrets for so long. Instead he smiled and teased her. She would never understand how his mind worked.

His fingers tugged on the laces at the side of her gown. “I like to touch you, too.”