How To Host a Seduction (18 page)

He flipped the portrait over, and Ellen scanned the name on the back, gazed up in surprise at Christopher.

“Felicity,” he said. “What's her portrait doing here?”

She had no idea, though if she'd had enough of a grip on her faculties to play the
what if
game, she could have come up with numerous possibilities.

But Ellen couldn't concentrate on games now. Not when her pulse jumped into action and her breath came in wispy bursts.

He'd called her Ellen, not
love,
an endearment she'd grown accustomed to hearing. An endearment she hadn't even acknowledged she liked until now, when he had retreated behind the formality of her name.

The Study

C
HRISTOPHER WOULD KEEP
his mouth shut if it killed him. He wouldn't try to convince Ellen to stay. He wouldn't wrap his arms around her and tip that sweet mouth toward his and kiss her until she admitted she didn't want to leave.

Ellen has to choose to let her guard down.

Ellen also had to choose how best to balance her obligations and where to fit him into the equation. Without a word, he handed her the miniature portrait, watched her turn it over to study the young girl's image as though it could somehow answer the questions its appearance raised.

“This miniature suggests a personal connection that we hadn't considered,” she said softly. “But to which Lafever—Julian or Brigitte?”

She didn't meet his gaze, and her impending departure stood between them like a wall, no less an obstruction for its invisibility. The mystery provided her the perfect place to retreat from the emotion of the moment, from the un-asked questions.

“A personal connection might substantiate our revenge theory,” he said, letting her slip away, deciding that keeping his mouth shut just might kill him.

But on a gut level Christopher knew that now was not the time to push her. She was too tightly wound, as though she expected him to come at her in a full frontal assault.
She'd promised him the whole session and was reneging on that promise.

But Christopher was nothing if not skilled in personal relations. Pushing her, or seducing her, or even heaping on the guilt would only give her something to react to, something to help her retreat even farther away.

“Most likely Brigitte had known Felicity since they were both young women about the same age,” he said, a change of direction. “How do we follow up on that assumption?”

“Let's give some thought to how they might have known each other. The Lafevers obviously didn't swing with the same social set as the rest of upper-crust New Orleans, if we've interpreted our clue correctly.”

“Which leaves what else? Church, proximity—”

“School.” Ellen finally lifted her gaze to his, clearly willing to let the mystery sweep them from the turbulent emotional place they'd been. “The waiter said Brigitte attended a fancy school in New Orleans. Given the education system of the time, that would mean a finishing school for young women.”

“The school's owners probably wouldn't snub a student whose wealthy brother was willing to pay the tuition. Even if the rest of New Orleans's high society did.”

Ellen's eyes sparkled, a stunning display of snapping gold fire and jewel-green lights.

“I'll bet Brigitte and Felicity went to school together,” she said. “If we could just find the diary, we'd most likely be able to confirm that.”

“Julian had to pay tuition.”

“His study?”

“Right.” Retrieving the treasure map from where he'd left it on the love seat beside her purse, Christopher scanned the floor plan. “It's in the east wing. Let's go.”

Gathering up their belongings, he led her out the door, purposely ignoring the fact lunch would be served downstairs in a few minutes. His appetite had gone the way of the morning's good mood since he'd answered her phone. Right now, he had a chance to get her caught back up in the chase. He was going for it.

As much as the parlor was a place where guests of both sexes could be entertained in comfort, the study was clearly the captain's retreat. Mahogany paneling covered the walls and the black walnut furnishings comprised freestanding bookshelves, comfortable chairs and a massive desk that could hold all sorts of clues to Félicie Allée's master.

A man who was apparently a collector…although Christopher couldn't imagine of what practical use that information could be. Nautical navigation equipment of the period had been housed behind glass-fronted shelves, while specimen coins, trophies, maps and even a variety of hunting equipment were displayed in cabinets and huge chests.

He recognized the master's private domain in the tobacco jars, decanters of port and brandy, and business papers scattered around the room. A place to discuss business. And pay bills.

“I'll go through the desk,” he said.

“I'll look around and get a feel for our captain. This was his place. It'll reveal a lot about who he was.”

Christopher couldn't quite rally a smile at how single-mindedly she pursued her character study of their murderer. Instead, he turned his attention to the drawers and files, seizing the chance to consider how best to bump up his timetable to accommodate this change in plans.

The desk proved jam-packed, and as Christopher waded through stacks of bills and receipts for stone, lumber and glass, he decided the only way to proceed with Ellen was
to lower his expectations. He'd meant to go for the gold during this event, but he'd settle for getting her to agree to see him again. He just needed a chance to continue his seduction in New York and convince her he could fit into her life.

Preoccupied with his thoughts, Christopher almost flipped past a bill he might not have noticed but for the red ink marking it in arrears. He slid the bill from the pile to consider it more closely.

“Look at this,” he said.

Ellen had been kneeling in front of a sideboard where a globe and a variety of scientific gadgets were displayed. She glanced up at him. “What is it?”

“A bill for a huge lumber purchase that's in arrears.”

“Really?” Shoving soft bangs back from her eyes, she frowned. “I thought the captain was fabulously wealthy.”

“That's the impression I had, too.” Christopher set the bill back inside the folder. “Maybe revenge isn't the only motive. Maybe money factors.”

Ellen didn't reply—just sat there with her checked skirts spread around her, looking entirely kissable with a pouty frown.

Then she inhaled sharply. “Christopher, remember what Miss Q said in the garden?”

“What?”

“That the British approached the captain and Jean Lafitte about using their ships to attack New Orleans. Remember what she said—the captain convinced Lafitte to pass this information along to the U.S. government
for a price.
”

“You think he needed the money?”

She nodded. “Assuming he did sell the information, who would pay the bill?”

Christopher sat back in his chair and folded his arms
across his chest. “A public official would be my guess. The governor or the mayor.”

“Both of whom were guests at Félicie Allée the weekend Felicity was murdered.”

“What if they thought the presidential pardon should have been enough payment?”

She frowned. “That's a big
what if.
”

“
What ifs
are all we've got right now.”

And Ellen's game was all Christopher had to breach the distance her father's phone call had created.

“Well, it's a possibility.” She relaxed, a visible release of tension that had her sitting back on the carpet, tucking her knees beneath her and looking up at him. “The captain wasn't the only one to leave the bayou. Jean Lafitte had a falling-out shortly after the war that made him relocate to Texas. Following your logic, he might have left because the government issued the pardon but then stiffed him the money.”

“How do you know about Jean Lafitte? Did you come across something in the newspapers?”

“No, it's fact. Susanna has a knack for getting history into her stories without making them read like textbooks.”

“Clever, love.” He smiled, hoping to bridge the distance even more. “Then the governor must have been the one holding out. The mayor had a son who was also here at Félicie Allée.”

“That's right. Noah.”

“If revenge over money was the motive, it makes sense the captain would kill the governor's daughter and not bother with the mayor's son.”

“But Felicity was a young girl and the captain had a sister. I just don't see it.”

What she did see, though, was something on the floor that had her scrambling on her knees to pull up the edge
of the rug. “Christopher, come help me. I think I've found something.”

Kneeling beside her, he lifted the corner of the heavy wool rug she struggled with, to reveal a small trapdoor in the floor.

“Beautiful and brilliant.”

She shot him a sidelong glance, eyes glinting, excitement heightening the color in her cheeks. Then she slipped a fingertip into a metal ring in the wood and lifted the door.

A centuries-old safe.

“I wonder what the captain was stashing in his floor-boards?” She opened the top to the rectangular metal box and withdrew several official-looking documents and a stack of envelopes tied together with a silk ribbon.

“Another trick you picked up from Susanna's books?”

“Lennon's, actually,” she replied while scooting backward so he could drop the rug into place. “She used a similar device in
Milord Spy,
the book she just won the RAVE Award for.”

Christopher crossed the room, locking the door before anyone stumbled upon them and their discovery. As he turned the key in the lock, the irony of the action didn't escape him. He went to sit beside Ellen, remembering his earlier thought about wanting to lock her inside this room.

Be careful what you wish for….

“So, what have you got?” He sat down and accepted the papers she handed him.

“Looks like the deed to Félicie Allée and some other documents about the property.”

“What about those?”

She untied the silk ribbon binding the stack of envelopes. “They look like love letters.”

Content with his business documents, Christopher pe
rused the information, found that in addition to the deed, he held the land surveys, which showed the bordering property.

“The mayor is the neighbor Josh and Lennon were talking about, the one who wasn't happy about the Lafevers moving in,” Christopher said. “Which might just tie into our money-revenge motive. Maybe the mayor told the governor to withhold payment to force the captain into losing the plantation. If the captain couldn't pay his bills…”

He trailed off because Ellen clearly wasn't listening to a word he said. She was scanning a letter with an expression of growing amazement.

“What is it?” he asked.

“You're not going to believe this.”

“Then, don't make me guess.”

Her gaze pierced the distance, sparkling with excitement, and in that instant, Christopher knew he'd never loved this woman more than when she was breathless and animated—a mood he would help her explore if only she'd give him the chance.

She held out the letter. “The captain and Felicity were in love.”

 

T
HERE WERE FOUR LETTERS
proving that Felicity Clayton was a young woman head-over-heels for the socially unacceptable privateer. Ellen insisted they read them all before Christopher unlocked the study door and risked anyone happening upon them. And luckily she did because someone tried to get into the room.

“Shh.” Ellen signaled Christopher to silence with a finger on his lips.

It had been an unconscious gesture, but one that introduced an intimacy to the moment she hadn't planned on. Before she even realized what he was about, his lips
parted, drawing her finger inside, a suggestive motion that made her gasp.

Those too-blue eyes glittered.

Ellen sat back, tugged her finger away, a withdrawal from his warm velvet mouth and the thousand soft sensations swirling inside, melting the distance between them.

Christopher wouldn't let her.

Nipping her fingertip with his teeth, he halted her retreat, sucked her finger back inside his mouth with a slow pull so suggestive of lovemaking that those soft swirling sensations began to crash in on each other like waves.

Knocking echoed through the room, followed by “Whoever's in there, are you going to be much longer?”

Susanna.
One of the last two people on this plantation that Ellen wanted to have find her sequestered behind a locked door with Christopher. She'd probably already been to the summer bedroom and encountered Josh and Lennon.

Christopher held on defiantly, several interminable moments ticking by before he relinquished his grip.

“What was that all about?” she whispered.

“You tasted good.” Without another word of explanation, he unfolded the next letter and began to read.

That was it. Christopher wanted and he took. Such a simple explanation to account for this riot of emotion inside her. But an explanation that was quintessential Christopher Sinclair. Though he wasn't guided by impulse as she'd once believed, he'd chosen to take what he wanted from life. Pleasure, fun and excitement were all aims he considered worthy pursuits.

She had to admire a man who took what he wanted. That sort of focus suggested strength of character…

Which Christopher had in spades.
…and a love for life's pleasures that seemed positively liberating to a woman who spent so much time talking
herself out of what she wanted because of potential consequences.

Which she did in spades.

An undeniable and sobering little truth. One that was too much to tackle while she sat so close to this man, with their knees bumping, their fingers brushing when he returned the letter, and her insides a jumble of awareness that made his every breath whisper through her like a warm breeze.

Ellen forced herself to focus on her own letter, a letter that gushed with the longing of a young girl for a man more than a decade older. A very noble man, apparently, who wouldn't denigrate their love or risk her reputation.

“This wasn't a crush. It was a love affair that explains so much,” she said, grateful—yet again—for the mystery that provided a distraction from the turmoil of self-analysis.

“Explains what?” Christopher glanced up, only this time Ellen was ready to take on those eyes. “I haven't found a clue about why the captain might murder her.”