Knaves (10 page)

As they walked into the latter, Eloise
’s perfume filled his nostrils. He had been watching her hips sway from side to side for almost an hour now, and he had to admit the way that her waist pinched in the black dress, with a long slit up the back revealing her shadowy thighs as she walked, had almost hypnotised him into forgetting all about Karla. He shook his head at this thought. They should be getting back.

“
I suppose you’re meant to seduce me here,” he said, trying to sound sour. Somehow his sarcasm didn’t quite manifest itself as clearly as he’d intended. When she turned around, Eloise’s smile was mysterious.

The room was preposterous, like some over-the-top fantasy from a scene in
Barbarella
, and as she came closer Eloise looked for all the world like a hyper-sexualised alien intent on devouring her prey. Once more she placed a hand on Hayden’s shirt, this time squeezing her fingers together, digging into the fabric of his shirt and the flesh beneath.

“
I could if you’d like,” she said.

Despite himself, Hayden was starting to stiffen. He took a step back and almost tripped over a rug that behind him. Eloise laughed but now there was a hard, lustful look
—similar to the one that he’d seen in Valmont’s eyes as the Marquis regarded Karla—and he came towards her.

“
What’s that?” he asked stupidly, pointing behind her to a door. “Where does it lead?”

Frowning slightly, Eloise barely turned.
“It’s nothing,” she replied, still moving towards him. Now her hands came up to him again but this time he caught them in his grip, holding her strongly so that she couldn’t move.

“
Answer me,” he said.

Sighing, she shrugged.
“It’s nothing,” was her reply.

And yet, a gut feeling told Hayden that wasn
’t true. There was something odd, almost uncanny about that door. It was clearly old, and yet the carvings, of lewd figures crudely cut from the blackened oak, made it appear disturbing, almost Satanic.

Realising that his eyes were indeed fixed on the door, Eloise let out a small groan.
“It’s not for you,” she replied weakly.

Almost absent-mindedly, Hayden let her go and went across the room, not diverting his gaze. In a castle that had been decorated with eighteenth-century exquisiteness and contemporary casual elegance in mind, the door was almost gothic in its appearance. A huge keyhole lay beneath the handle and Hayden didn
’t need to try it to know that it would be locked.

“
It leads into the old tower,” she told him, almost reluctantly.

“
And what’s in there?” Now he turned to face her. Her eyes flickered past him to the door, and for an instant Hayden almost thought that he saw fear in her expression.

“
Do you know the story of Bluebeard?” she asked at last.

It was Hayden
’s turn to frown now, but he nodded.

“
Le Barbe Bleue
.” Eloise seemed to be speaking more to herself now. “When he is married, Bluebeard gives his bride a set of keys. ‘You can go into any room,’ he tells her, showing her all the keys, ‘but this one, the room which this one opens—that one you cannot visit.’ One day, Bluebeard leaves the country, and his young bride visits each of the rooms, until at last she comes to the one that’s forbidden.”

Her eyes were distinctly odd as she looked at the door.

“Well?” asked Hayden finally.

Seeming to waken from a dream, Eloise stared at him blankly for a moment.
“Well what?”

“
What did she find, behind the door?”

Eloise
’s smile was mysterious. “A secret,” she replied. Without another glance at Hayden—or the door—she turned on her heels and left the room.

For a few seconds Hayden regarded the thick, heavy door. The lock would probably be easy to pick, he thought to himself. Later, perhaps, he would come back to find out what Bluebeard Valmont kept hidden in his own chateau.

As she saw Hayden walk away with Eloise, Karla felt her heart twist inside her chest. As Valmont leaned across her, dominating her space, she made herself smile as though there wasn
’t a care in the world that affected her.

“
That’s better, don’t you think?” he said in French. “Now we’ll be able to talk more freely.”

“
Of course,” she replied lightly, reaching out for her drink and lifting it to her lips in a wide, flowing motion of her arm—which also had the effect of forcing the Marquis to take a step backwards. The move was not wasted on him, and he smiled ironically. Actually, when his features lit up with amusement Karla decided that he was, after all,
very
handsome—she just preferred to take things at her own pace. “And what is it that you’d like to ask, Donatien?”

Pulling up the seat next to her where Hayden had been
sitting only moments before, he leaned forward languidly, his chin resting on his hand so that the large emerald of his ring shone in the candlelight. Karla affected not to notice it. On the far side of the room, Latour stood, ugly and silent.

“
Well, I’m interested in how such a… I was going to say beautiful, but I won’t insult your intelligence. Both of us know how beautiful you are. No… a better question would be to ask how such a cultured, such a sophisticated woman ended up with…” He let the question drift away as languidly as his pose, but she could see that his eyes were watching her intently.

“
Why I’m with Sebastian?” she said. “I suppose that
is
a good question.” At this moment in time, while he was off with that bitch, it was a
very
good question. “But then his charms must be evident.”

Valmont grimaced slightly at this.
“Evident, yes—but shallow. Not worth more than a few nights’ pleasure, I would have supposed.”

“
Well,” she teased. “We met in Amsterdam and he seemed exciting.” She shrugged. “Who knows where the heart will lead?”

“
Where indeed,” agreed Valmont with a laugh. “And how long ago was that?”

“
A while,” she replied enigmatically.

“
But not long enough for you not to be jealous.”

“
Why did you say that?”

Again Valmont laughed.
“I could see how you and Eloise were looking at each other. With her, it’s easy enough to surmise the attraction. All that… meat. But you.” Valmont stared at her, his dark eyes attempting to penetrate her. “Forgive me, Jeanne, but the attraction is not so clear.”

Karla smiled at this, and a thrill ran through her body at the memory of her first meeting with Hayden
—as well as a flash of half-forgotten anger. He’d betrayed her then. Perhaps that would always be the way with Hayden Carter. “I guess I’m more shallow than I appear.”

“
I doubt that,” he replied, averting his eyes for a second and tracing his finger around the glass from which Hayden had been drinking and which had not yet been cleared away. Now it was impossible for Karla to ignore his emerald, and when he raised his eyes to hers again he smiled at the direction of her glance.

“
Do you like it?” he asked.

Karla did not answer immediately, but simply raised an eyebrow.

“Perhaps you would like to have it,” he said.

That threw Karla for a second and he laughed with pleasure.
“And perhaps I would give it to you as well,” he continued, “but I would prefer you to win it. That is more exciting, don’t you think?”

“
Yes,” agreed Karla, seeking to keep her greed out of her eyes. “That would be… interesting. And what would you propose, Monsieur le Marquis?”

“
Please! Donatien,” he said warmly. “I thought perhaps a game of cards.”

“
Ah, then you have the wrong person,” she replied archly. “Sebastian’s the gambler.”

“
Not true, not true at all. All of us are gamblers—for the right stake.”

“
So you would tempt me with your ring, but I’m afraid that I don’t have anything as valuable as that.”

Reaching forward slowly, delicately, Valmont took the tips of her fingers and raised them to his lips.
“If what you said before was untrue, this is a lie that no gentleman could ignore.” He turned to where the green baize card table sat in the corner of the mirrored hall and gestured at it with one hand while still holding onto her fingers with the other.

“Will you join me?” he asked, his voice low with a slight vibrancy that made Karla’s body thrill for a moment. “Of course,” she replied.

She noted as they crossed over with some annoyance that the table had four seats around it: no doubt Valmont had intended for both her and Hayden to join them alongside Eloise. She hid
her anger, however, and graciously seated herself across from the Marquis. “What game do you propose?”

“
Baccarat? Punto Banco?”

Karla sighed at this.
“Now you
do
have the wrong person,” she replied. “Blackjack or perhaps poker.”

Valmont smiled and nodded his head.
“Poker would be appropriate,” he said. When she frowned at him he laughed again. “After all, I do believe that is the usual game when the stakes I’m thinking of are applied?”

“
And what would those be?”

“
Why, your clothes. I told you that your beauty exceeds this paltry trinket on my finger. What do you think, Jeanne? Your beauty against my ring?”

She glanced across where Latour still remained, not looking in their direction. Following her gaze, Valmont called out:
“Latour, you may leave us!” The giant stared across at them slowly and then ponderously lumbered from the room.

“
He hears well,” Karla murmured.

“
Indeed,” Valmont replied, turning his attention now to a deck of cards that he began to deal exquisitely, his hands manipulating the cards in such a fashion that they appeared to ripple in his hands. “He is mute but not deaf. A good man to find secrets—and keep them.” With a smirk he looked up at Karla. “And what are your secrets, Madame Duval? After all, there’s something about your accent that I can’t quite place.”

For a second, Karla
’s smile froze. There was always the chance that her linguistic mastery would not prevent a native speaker from recognising certain intonations, but then she had prepared for that.

“
A legacy of my mother,” she replied. “I’m not actually French, you see.”

“
Oh?” For a moment Valmont’s brow creased, his eyes intrigued.

“
I was born in Switzerland—in Jura. My mother was German. Oh, you wouldn’t have known: in many ways she spoke French better than my father, but it was never her native tongue.” Karla shrugged. “Even as a child I suppose I inherited a few of her… characteristics.”

“
Ah,” Valmont murmured, nodding his head sagely. “Where the tree is planted, where it takes root, will always shape its boughs—though rarely are such fruits as lovely as yours.”

“
Thank you, Donatien,” she said, blushing slightly despite herself.

“
So,” he said, his dark eyes glittering as he held the cards in front of him. “What do you think, Jeanne? Do you accept my challenge?”

She nodded.

“Very good, very good.” Now those eyes shone and he began to deal. “We’ll keep things simple, shall we? Five card stud, and my ring for…” He glanced up and down her, one eyebrow raised in appreciation: “Let’s begin with your shoes.”

She laughed at this and nodded. Inside her chest, her heart was beginning to race. Valmont himself seemed to be genuinely enjoying the situation, and Karla wondered whether it was really the ring she was gambling for. A hot spike of anger rose inside her as she thought of what Hayden could be up to with Eloise by now. She
’d show
him
!

As the cards lay before her, she lifted them to her face and rearranged them. Oddly, she was much less sure of herself than would have been expected. The few times she
’d played against Hayden his professional pride had refused to allow him to let her win, and so in general she avoided card games. Still, she had two nines and a king. A decent enough start, she supposed. Laying down the two other cards, she drew a pair from the top of the deck.

“
You asked me about Sebastian,” she mused, apparently idly. “Yet Eloise seems a strange choice…” It was her turn to let the sentence drift away.

“
For a member of the aristocracy?” he asked. “And I suppose it is. But then, French nobles were ever noted for their perversions.”

“
Is that what it is? A perversion?”

Once more Valmont smirked.
“I was referring to my choice, not any acts. Oh,
La Lupa
might have had all kinds of stories about her, but in the end a naked porn star is much like any other woman.”

His reply distracted her and, unable to think what to say, she lay her cards in front of her. Two kings now matched the two nines.

“Wonderful!” Valmont began to lay down his cards melodramatically, a two, a three, a four—she wondered for a second if the next card would continue the straight and felt a queer mixture of relief and disappointment as it was followed by another two. Well, she would keep her shoes at least. Valmont held his final card in front of his face, watching her reaction before he laid it beside its fellows. A third two.

“
It seems that I win,” he said.

Smiling graciously, she leaned forward and slipped off her shoes, placing them on the table. The cold marble of the floor felt oddly sensuous against her bare toes, and she flexed them, wondering at how decadent such a simple act could feel in this grand hall.

“Here,” she said, lifting up the deck and shuffling it once more. “Let me deal.”

“
Don’t you trust me?” he asked warmly, his eyes flashing once more as she began to hand out the cards. “And what do you bet this time for my ring?”

“
If I’d known how the evening would end, I would have worn more clothes,” she remarked, avoiding his eyes but smiling as she spoke. “As it is, I think it will have to be my dress.”

“
I accept,” he responded, rapping the table with his hand. She placed cards before the two of them and then lifted her own. Dealing herself had not brought her any extra luck, so she held onto the high cards—a Jack and an Ace—and replaced the others. Another knave joined the first.

“
So how long have you known…” For a second the name stuck in her throat. “Eloise?”

Not lifting his eyes from his cards, he replied casually:
“Two—no, nearly three years.”

“
That seems a long time,” she said, trying to prevent the blood from rising to her cheeks.

Valmont shrugged.
“Is it? Not so much. Our acquaintances are more… casual, I suppose you could say. Sometimes she is with other men, and I with other women.”

“
Oh.” Karla was surprised at her own surprise. Hadn’t it been the same with her only a year before? How much
had
she changed by being with Hayden?

“
Are you jealous?” he asked.

“
Not at all, not at all,” she lied. Placing her cards down, she revealed her two Jacks. This time, Valmont’s hand consisted of a straight—five to nine.

“
It seems I win again,” he said, watching her closely.

“
You win the battle, Donation,” she replied warmly. “But I only need to defeat you once to win the war.”

He nodded his head in agreement and then gazed on her, his eyes half lidded with lust, as she stood up. The dress, so sheer and sleek against her body, had barely offered any protection against the warm, summer air, but for a moment Karla wondered about how she would react to her own nakedness in front of this man, her feet suddenly cold against the floor. Coming to a decision, she reached up boldly to her shoulders and slipped the fabric to the floor, feeling it slide against her skin. Almost immediately tiny
goose bumps prickled against her flesh, though the room was not cool enough for her to feel a chill.

As she returned to her seat in nothing but a pair of lace camisoles, her confidence returning now, she looked at Valmont slightly defiantly, her nipples stiffening as she saw his eyes rove over her torso, taking in her slender shoulders, her smooth, firm breasts.

“Magnificent,” he breathed.

Karla felt her chest swell slightly at this.
“I may not match Eloise—” she began, but he scowled slightly as he raised a hand to interrupt her.

“
Please,” he said. “There is no comparison. You are beautiful, Jeanne. And you know that.” His eyes were glowing as he spoke.