Rebecca Hagan Lee (7 page)

He groaned again, this time in agony, instinctively releasing his hold on her as warm, sticky blood gushed from his nose. "You can't leave now. Dammit to hell, Cristina, I'm not after your bloody virtue. I'm trying to save it.

But I need some sleep." He pinched his nostrils, attempting to,, staunch the flow.

Cristina slid off the bed and pressed herself against the wall as he rolled off the opposite side of the bed and got to his feet. She dared not breathe as she waited for his next move.

Water splashed in a basin nearby. She listened intently to the mutters and moans as he poured more water into the bowl. Cristina peeked around the bed hangings and stared in astonishment as her velvet cloak disappeared from the back of a brocade chair. She realized suddenly that she was in her underclothes. Her dress and petticoats had been removed. She tried to remember where she'd last seen them, but her head ached unbearably and she was unable to recall anything except the vague blur of her arrival and the vivid dream.

The splashing ceased abruptly. Cristina pressed farther back against the wall, scarcely daring to breathe. She listened to his footsteps as he left the basin and stumbled back to bed. She recognized a grunt of pain, a muffled thud, and the scrape of furniture against the floor. Colorful curses in a variety of languages filled the air. The brocade, Cristina thought, as the chair crashed to the floor.

She sucked in a deep breath at the sound of the mattresses creaking beneath his weight.

"Are you coming back to bed?" His words were somewhat muffled, but Cristina heard him.

She didn't answer, but remained pressed against the wall.

"Suit yourself," he said as he rolled over in bed and pulled the covers up around himself.

Cristina allowed herself a tiny sigh of relief when she heard him begin to snore. She would wait a little while longer, she decided, to be sure he slept and then she would make her escape.

She awoke with a start sometime later to find herself in bed, the covers wrapped firmly around her. Her memories of the previous night returned with a vengeance and she jack-knifed into sitting position, prepared to do battle with him once again. But she was alone. He was gone. She rolled from the bed and stumbled to her feet. Her queasy stomach rumbled in protest at the sudden movement and Cristina rested her head against the wall for a moment, willing her unruly stomach to settle down.

She raised her head and swallowed a new wave of nausea. Her head pounded from the effects of too much wine and Leah's concoction and her body ached in a dozen different places. But Cristina forced her eyes to focus in the dimly lit room before she made her way around the foot of the bed to the brocade chair. Her feet throbbed and her legs wobbled like the legs of a newborn colt.

She used every ounce of her concentration to lower herself onto the chair.

Gritting her teeth against the incessant pounding in her temples, she belatedly realized the folly of looking for courage in the bottom of a wine bottle. The wine hadn't helped at all. It hadn't steadied her nerves. It had given her only a colossal headache.

Forcing herself to her feet and moving as quickly as possible for a human being in her condition, Cristina began the arduous task of dressing herself.

Her underclothes were torn and damp, but wearable. She could only guess at the condition of the rest of her clothes as she scanned the room in hopes of locating them. But the rest of her clothes were gone. She was left with the clothes she wore--her camisole and drawers--and a chemise, petticoat, and her cloak. And all of them were damp.

Cristina inched toward the velvet cloak. It lay in a heap on the floor beside the screen. She hated to wear it. She could feel the rough, matted spots where the blood from his nose had dried. He had used it as a towel, then kicked it aside. She pulled it around her, anyway. She had no choice. Dressed in her underclothes and wrapped in her traveling cape, she waited in the chair gathering her strength, preparing for her escape. A surge of nausea threatened her. She balled her cold, numb fingers into fists and jammed them into the pockets of her cloak. Her right hand touched the small glass bottle and she remembered Leah's insistence that the medicine would help her on the morning after.

Tiptoeing to the washstand, Cristina poured a glass of water, mixed the powder, and drank it down as Leah had instructed. Then she crept from the room without a backward glance.

She paused in the doorway studying the corridors before she made her decision. Turning right, she headed down the maze of passageways. Her satin slippers pattered against the marble floor.

Somewhere down the hall, a clock chimed six times. She had very little time. Soon the staff would begin their workday. She could not be seen leaving the house with her hair lying loose about her shoulders. She could not be seen leaving the house at all. Cristina stopped short, trying to get her bearings.

She must have turned wrong. Where were the doors? She bit her lip, mentally cursing herself for not being able to concentrate when she arrived, and slowly retraced her steps. Her heart pounded as she spotted the doors at the opposite end of the hall. Through those doors lay the stairs. Three flights down and freedom. Down and down and down once more and then she was free.

Cristina emerged from the house and stepped out into a downpour, but she paid the rain little heed. She was free and that was all that mattered at the moment. She ignored the burning in her lungs, the pounding in her chest and the cold rain soaking her to the skin. Drawing a ragged breath of the early-morning air, Cristina mouthed a prayer of thanks to the heavens for allowing her to escape. And she prayed for the strength that would carry her down the long winding drive, on aching feet, to the streets of London and all the way to Fairhall if necessary.

The pink- and mauve-colored fingers of dawn streaked the misty horizon before she made her way to the end of the drive. Her wet slippers blistered her heels and added to the agony in her feet. She limped slowly down the drive until the blisters forced her to remove her shoes and walk barefooted.

A cabbie caught sight of her and pulled to a stop.

Cristina climbed into the comfortable cab, rested her weary feet on the opposite seat, and allowed her mind to wander at will. She would have to face her mother once she reached Fairhall, but the London morning traffic was heavy. She had a little while to rest before the confrontation. She didn't have to think about the coming battle. For as long as it took the cabby to negotiate the crowded streets of London, Cristina could close her eyes and forget.

Those sweetly smiling angels with pensive looks,

innocent faces, and cash-boxes for hearts.

--HONORE DE BALZAC 1799-1850

*Chapter Six*

"I want the necklace." There was steely determination in the voice of the girl who stood dripping in the doorway. A determination that surprised the occupants of the room.

"Cristina, what are you doing here? I thought you'd be busy this morning."

"I came to collect my belongings," Cristina ignored her mother's other remark. "And I want the necklace."

"Darling, this isn't the time." Patricia glanced at her lover, then back at Cristina. "I thought I taught you better manners than to enter my bedroom unannounced. Why don't you run down to the kitchen for breakfast? We can discuss the necklace later."

"With you fluttering about somewhere in Europe? I don't think so, Mother.

We'll discuss the necklace now." Cristina's gaze bored through her mother, noting the rumpled bed and the naked man lying next to Patricia. Yesterday she would have left the room in embarrassment, but Cristina had changed overnight.

The sordid tableau before her angered rather than embarrassed her. "I want the necklace. It was sent to me and I mean to have it."

Patricia recognized the change in her daughter. There was a new strength of will about her that hadn't been there the day before. The night with Crown Prince Rudolf hadn't broken Cristina's spirit. If anything, the night with the crown prince had added to Cristina's strength of mind, given her confidence, made her more determined than ever to defy her. Patricia smiled nevertheless and tried to dismiss her daughter.

"Darling, all this quibbling over a necklace. Why don't we discuss this after you've cleaned up and eaten breakfast? When you are in a calmer frame of mind?"

"Stop it," Cristina demanded. "Stop your pretended concern for me. You don't care about me. Let's end the hypocrisy. You simply want to delay the inevitable. We aren't quibbling over the necklace--you are. It was sent to me and I will have it. Give it to me."

"Cristina, you're making too much of this," Patricia began.

"Too much? Hardly. I don't consider being sold too much," she replied coldly.

"You would have been auctioned anyway," Patricia declared. "What do you think marriage is for people like us but a business transaction? It's all buying and selling."

"No, it isn't. Marriage is about choosing a mate because you can't stand the thought of living without him. It's a partnership, a sharing, and before I spent the night alone with a man, I should have had a ring on my finger, the blessings of the church, and all the rights that go along with being legally married."

"You can still think that after being brought up in this house? After viewing the sorry state of my marriage to William Fairfax?" Patricia laughed.

"My darling, you are an innocent. A married woman has no real rights. Marriage for women of our status is a form of slavery. We are commanded and we must obey. For life, Cristina. When you marry, you're trapped until one of you dies."

"I don't believe that."

"Then you're going to be very disappointed," Patricia warned. "Love is an illusion, Cristina. It's like a fairy tale. It makes a nice story, but nobody really believes it. It's what we're promised when we're young children, but I'm here to tell you that it's just a word. It has no meaning."

"It may mean nothing to you, because even I'm aware you're very free with your favors." Cristina stared at Claude, who lay watching the mother-daughter confrontation with interest. "But it means something to me. I'm not like you."

"Yet you're demanding the necklace in payment for last night...," Patricia mused aloud, fingering the emeralds and diamonds she still wore around her neck. "Perhaps there is more of me in you than you think." She smiled a decidedly catlike smile, arching her brow as if to pursue the thought more fully.

Cristina could stand no more. Anger welled up inside her and demanded release. "There is nothing of you in me," she said. "I'm not a whore."

Outrage and naked hatred gleamed instantly in Patricia's eyes. "You will regret that remark, Cristina."

Cristina masked the apprehension hidden deep inside her. Pulling herself to her full height, Cristina glared down at her mother. "I don't think so, Mother. I only wish I had had the courage to say it sooner. It might have saved me a great deal of grief."

Patricia was livid. She scrambled out of bed, raised her arm, and slapped her daughter with all her strength. She detested this stranger who stood before her refusing to quiver in fear or humiliation, refusing to look at her with those green eyes that had begged to be loved, refusing even to place a hand over her burning cheek, to show any sign of pain or regret. Cristina stood her ground and she reminded Patricia so much of William that she wanted to hit her again just to make her cry out.

"Claude, take Cristina to her room and lock her in. I'll deal with her later. In the meantime, you may punish her in any way you see fit. Give Leah the key to her room when you've finished." Patricia turned and began dressing.

Claude made a move toward Cristina, but Cristina stopped him with her words.

"Claude isn't taking me anywhere. I'm not leaving until you hand over the necklace." Cristina smiled at Patricia, then played her trump card. "It won't go very well for you if my 'gentleman friend' has to force you to surrender his gift." Cristina's heart hammered in her chest as she plunged ahead, weaving a fabric of half-truths, not daring to let them know just how alone and afraid she was. "You've made me a mistress, Mother, but I'm still a lady and a member of the peerage. My lover"--Cristina stressed the words--"would be shocked to learn I don't have his little token of affection. And, I'll tell him if that's what it takes to get my way. He was disappointed that I didn't wear his gift last night. Shall I tell him the truth and explain why I didn't wear the necklace? Is that what you want, Mother, to have the whole of London know you acted as procurer and sold your own daughter for less than a traditional wedding band?" Cristina began to tap her foot against the floor in a deliberate show of impatience. "Now, please. I've kept him waiting long enough."

Claude stepped to the window, ignoring his nakedness, and drew back the drapes.

Cristina was glad she had had the forethought to ask the cabbie to wait.

"There is a cab waiting outside."

"She's bluffing." Patricia jeered.

"That may be," Claude admitted. "But the driver is obviously waiting for her to come out. And we have an early train to catch."

Cristina copied her mother's purring tones. "Well, Mother, what shall it be? The necklace or the truth?" She held out her hand. Waiting.

"Take it!" Unwilling to risk her social standing with London society further, Patricia unfastened the diamond and emerald creation and flung it at Cristina. "Take it and be damned!"

"The feeling is mutual." Cristina caught the heavy jewelry against her body and squaring her slim shoulders, walked away from her mother and out of Fairhall into the blinding rain.

She didn't dare stay long enough even to pack a bag. The cramps had begun wracking her body during the confrontation and Cristina couldn't risk remaining a minute longer than necessary. She couldn't risk having them see how weak she was.

She slipped on the stone walkway as she trudged through the puddles on her way to the carriage and fell to her knees. The driver jumped down from his seat to help her inside.

"I hope it was worth the chill we're going to catch, miss," he grumbled.