Master of Paradise (31 page)

She rubbed her forehead, which was by now
pounding like a drum. “I was hysterical. I think I started
screaming. He tried to hush me before I woke the whole household.
He told me—” She sobbed and hid her face in her hands. “He said he
loved
me. He said, as he always has, that he never accepted
Douglas as my father. He kept insisting we weren’t related. That he
wanted to
marry
me. And all this time, I just kept screaming
and screaming. He kept his hand clamped against my mouth the whole
time. And soon I began to realize that while I was hearing my
screams in my own head, there was nothing coming out. No sound.
Just this horrible need to scream out my pain, and not even the
ability to do so. He wouldn’t even allow me that.”

She turned then and looked at him for the
first time since she’d started telling the story. “Do you have any
idea of the rage I felt? Not just against Hastings. But against
you, for what happened to me. For not trusting me with your plans.
For not taking me away from that awful place. I swore that day that
I’d never rely on anyone else again. I never did. I roused Cullen
from bed and took him to London that very day.”

There were several moments of silence, in
which she struggled to realize what she’d done. That in a burst of
agony, she’d relieved herself of this awful burden. To the last
person she had ever wanted to know.

“So you see, when you said I hadn’t taken any
other lovers, you were wrong. I took him
willingly
. That’s
what makes it all the worse.”

Exhausted, she fell onto the sand, feeling
drained of words, of thoughts, of feelings. Drained of everything.
It was over now. She’d just thrown away the last thing she loved in
all the world.

He was so quiet, after a time she gave up
expecting words. He’d digest it and, with the cold, private dignity
he’d shown in England, would simply walk away. He’d have a man row
her to Mahé. Back to Hastings. To shut out the pain, she focused on
the sea, the endless rolling of the waves against the shore, the
lap and retreat of the water, the whisper of the breeze. Life goes
on, they seemed to promise.

But how? After this, how?

Eventually, she felt him crouch down by her
side. “How,” he asked in a voice raw with feeling, “could you think
it would make any difference at all?”

Her startled gaze found his face. The face of
a man who loved her, no matter what.

“You aren’t appalled—”

“Appalled! Of course I’m appalled. Appalled
that he took advantage of you. Appalled by what I did to you. But
Gabé, you did nothing wrong. You turned to another man out of love,
thinking he was me. I’m the one to blame.”

“But he’s not just another man. He’s my—”

He put a hand to her mouth to cut her off,
just as Hastings had all those years ago. “Maybe. It doesn’t
matter. You did nothing wrong.”

New tears were flowing now, tears of
gratitude and relief. With trembling fingers, she removed his hand
from her mouth. “You’re not angry? You don’t hate me?”

“Hate you?” He gathered her up and pulled her
into his strong embrace. His warm arms seemed to tell her that
nothing would ever harm her again. “If anyone is deserving of my
hatred, it’s Hastings. Not you.”

She sobbed into his chest. “Oh, Rodrigo, I
was so afraid. I kept asking myself, what would you think of me if
you knew?”

He pushed her away a little so he could look
into her tearstained face. “Listen to me,
carícia
. Hastings
is the bane of our existence. I’m always underestimating him. I’ve
always miscalculated his capacity for evil. But no more. Together
we shall beat him. You and I. We will triumph over his corruption.
This I promise you with my life.”

“I don’t want revenge, Rodrigo. All I want is
you. But can you—ever—love me again without thinking of—him?”

“Do you doubt it?”

“I always have.”

She saw the answer in the tender softening of
his eyes.

She took his hands in her fingers and kissed
them. “I was so afraid of telling you. And yet—now that it’s all
out, I’ve never felt closer to you. I want to leave all this. I
want to go back to the Vallée de Mai. To live like Adam and Eve in
the Garden of Eden.”

“You know we can’t do that now,” he told her
gently.

“Rodrigo, I’m so afraid that we’ve lost all
we found there. That we can never get it back, unless we return to
our magical valley.”

He watched her for some time. Then he asked
unexpectedly, “Are you hungry?”

She took a moment to adjust. “Hungry?
Hardly.”

“Thirsty, then. It’s sticky hot. Perhaps some
cool wine.”

“I don’t—”

“Come, I want to show you something.”

He took her hand and pulled her along, up a
path that led to the interior of the island. It was quite a hike.
By the time they’d stopped walking, she was so thirsty, his offer
of wine was now welcome.

“We’re here,” he said.

They were standing before a cave. He gestured
for her to lead the way. She could see nothing but darkness before
her.

“
Where
are we?” she asked uncertainly.
“There’s nothing here.”

“Ah, but you’re wrong. This is the gateway
back into Eden.”

“It doesn’t look much like Eden,” she said as
they entered the cave.

“It will,” he promised, “before the afternoon
is through.”

He struck a flint against the rock wall and
touched it to a lantern. It hadn’t been lit in some time, so it
sputtered and protested before spilling a tawny, welcoming light
into the cavern. Gabrielle let out an enchanted sigh.

Before her was an intimate grotto filled with
aged bottles of wine. There were stacks of bottles, trunks of
bottles, bottles piled high on all sides. In the midst of this
unexpected wine cellar, beneath a sloping rock ceiling, was a mound
of faded pillows, thickly covered in dust.

As she went to one wall to inspect the
labels, Rodrigo picked up the pillows, took them outside, and shook
them vigorously. When he returned, they were free of dust. The
material was frayed with age, but some of its former rich color
could be discerned.

Gabrielle was picking up bottle after bottle,
holding their labels to the lamp.

“Do you know what you have here?”

“The finest collection of wine in the world,
I would imagine.”

“These are ancient. Here’s a bottle of
Madeira from 1703. And brandy from 1692. Rodrigo, what is this
place?”

He was smiling at her enthusiasm. “
Meú
avô
stashed his booty of wines here. He and his pirate amigos
used to come here and drink their fill, lounging on the pillows you
see, trying to top each other with seafaring tales. This collection
was once famous all along these waters.” He gestured with his arm,
encompassing the whole cave. “Behold the buried treasure of
meú
avô.
”

In her mind’s eye, she could see the pirates,
scarves about their heads, rings in their ears, dressed in bright
silks as they lounged back on the pillows, drinking their booty. “I
can see them now. Telling tall tales and debauching women, no
doubt.”

“No. I’m the first to bring a woman here with
the intention of—debauching her.”

A trepidatious thrill shot through her.

“Take your pick,” he offered with a gracious
sweep of his arm.

It was cool in the cave, so the wines stayed
naturally chilled. She took some time rifling through the antique
bottles, aware of his eyes on her backside when she bent to look.
They seemed to singe through her clothes like a flame. She began to
feel wet and steamy between her thighs—as steamy as the sultry
afternoon outside.

She selected a port, and Rodrigo opened the
bottle and handed it to her. She glanced about as he chose the
140-year-old Madeira and popped the cork with his teeth.

“Did they bother with goblets, your pirate
ancestors?”

He gave her a satirical look. “Do something
really forbidden. Something of which your most proper father would
never approve. Drink from the bottle,
carícia.
”

She put it gingerly to her lips and took a
tentative sip. When she looked up, he was scowling at her.

“It’s not a serpent. It won’t bite you.”

She felt ridiculously tight inside. “It’s
always gone against the grain for me to do this,” she explained.
“Not because of my father. Once he rejected me, I never cared what
he thought. But I remember my mother, in those last awful days
before she shot the duchess. She was drinking a great deal in an
attempt to drown her sorrows. She used to come home so befuddled,
she swilled her liquor from the bottle without bothering to look
for a glass. It’s always seemed to me the very definition of
unrestraint.”

“That’s the point,” he told her. “Drink.” He
took the bottle in his own hand and tipped it so she had to drink.
“Not like I’ve put a sword to your throat,” he admonished. “
Com
alegría. Com entusiasmo.
”

“With joy,” she repeated. “With
enthusiasm.”

“Indeed. That’s hundred-year-old port you’re
drinking. Not to mention,
meú avô
risked his life so you
could drink your fill. Drink it as if you enjoy it. Savor it, Gabé,
as you would savor life.”

“How do you say ‘savor’?”

“
Sabor.
”

“
Sabor,
then.” And she tipped the
bottle again and drank this time as if the liquid were ambrosia
from the gods. As if she were carrying Rodrigo’s very essence over
her tongue and down her throat.

She drank down half the bottle in slow,
extravagant gulps. When she removed it from her lips, she felt
slightly dizzy. She dropped back into the assemblage of pillows and
lay sprawled before him, laughing. “It’s rather fun at that.”
Raising the bottle high, she brought it back to her lips with
dramatic flair and drank again.

Her giddiness made her sloppy. The wine
spilled from her mouth, splashing onto her chin. It caused her to
giggle, but before she could raise a hand to wipe it away, he
pounced upon her to lick her chin clean with his tongue. A shudder
jolted her to stillness. His lips hovered above hers, so close she
could feel them, even though they weren’t touching her own.

“I have a feeling that’s not the only
forbidden thing I shall be doing this day.”

His eyes, smiling into hers, looked elusive.
“Drink your wine.”

“You’re not perchance planning to inebriate
me and then run off, as I did with you? Leave me here panting for
you while you slip back to your duties?”

“Do I appear to you to be a man with
plans?”

His body on hers was heavy, warm, absolutely
exquisite. She moved beneath him and felt him harden against her
belly. “You have a decidedly wicked yet enigmatic look about you.
What are you thinking?”

“I’m thinking you’ve been in a fragile state
of late. That I shall ask nothing of you that you’re not ready to
give.”

His elusiveness was more intoxicating than
the wine. She felt heady as his face began to shimmer like a mirage
before her.

“What—for instance—would you not ask of
me?”

He considered her. “Were you not ready—for
instance—I wouldn’t dream of asking you for even so innocent a
token as a kiss.”

He propelled his bulk over her, pinning her
against the pillows. Then his mouth descended on hers in a scalding
kiss. When he shifted away, she had to grip his shoulder with her
free hand to keep her grip on reality.

“So kind of you not to—overexcite me, in my
delicate condition.”

He reached for his own bottle and drank a few
leisurely sips. When he set it aside, he brought his hand in one
fluid motion to ease her skirt up her calf and over her knee. That
knee bent of its own accord. As she stretched and mewed, he slid
the soft material in a slow decline down her leg, his thumb playing
havoc with her inner thigh.

“Oh, Rodrigo.”

Slowly, he grazed his hand back along the
path of her bent leg to her ankle. He looked up and met her eager
gaze with a smoldering look of his own. Watching her, he took a
single finger and drew it up the back of her calf and slowly,
delicately, along the back of her thigh. So innocent, so
uncalculated, as if he just wanted to feel her with the tip of his
finger. Yet she felt as if dynamite had detonated within her,
sending doubts and inhibitions flying with the debris of her
bruised heart.

“I’d never, for instance, put my lips here,
for I know what it might do.” As he spoke, he kissed the sensitive
inner flesh of her knee, sending chills reverberating through her.
“Nor would I trail my tongue along your thigh.” He did so, nibbling
her inner thigh until she felt helpless to so much as lift her
hand. Her head dropped back, her hair falling in a long sheath to
the ground of the cave. “And even if I were so bold as to kiss you
there, I’d never touch it with my finger, knowing what that might
do to me.” He stroked her thigh, where his lips had been, with the
back of his finger. “Knowing how it would make me want to touch you
here...”—his finger moved higher—“and here...”—higher still—“and
even here...” He reached the nest of wet curls as she opened her
legs to him, wide. Gently, he eased the curls away so he could see
inside. Then he rounded the triangle of hair with one finger that
barely skimmed her. The pressure was so light, she thrust herself
against him, wanting more. But he slid away. “I’d never dream of
touching you there.” Again, he barely grazed her. It was the
sweetest torture she’d ever known. She was crying out to be
touched, but every time she moved toward his finger, it danced
away. “Although I’d want to.
Deus
knows I’d want to. But
even seeing how wet you are, I wouldn’t dare to touch you.
Especially not here.”

He touched her then, spreading her juices all
along her as she cried out. But it was fleeting, so quick that it
left her panting for more. She clutched at his hand, desperate to
move it back, but he pulled it away.