Shadow Dance (12 page)

No expression of sympathy marked his face. “I imagine you consider yourself to be. Marriage to a man like Lemur can’t have been a pleasant experience.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Why else would you have run off?” he countered.

“Perhaps he cheated on me. Set up a mistress? Ignored me?” she suggested.

“In that case, you wouldn’t be running away, obviously terrified by the touch of a man. You would have simply taken a lover yourself, to pay him back.”

“Is that what people do in English society?” she asked.

“It tends to simplify matters.”

“I don’t like it here,” she said flatly, no longer guarding her tongue. Indeed, there didn’t seem to be any point to it. Phelan Romney saw through her lies. “It’s a country full of trickery and deceit.”

“It’s
your
country.”

“Not anymore,” she said firmly. “I’m not sure where I belong, but it’s not here.”

He stared at her for a long, contemplative moment, and she wished she had even a tiny portion of his success at reading minds. “I imagine you’ll find your answers,” he said. “If you stop running away.”

She didn’t move. Her desire to run was stronger than ever, her desire to stay even more overwhelming. She’d told herself she was running from the reappearance of Mark-David Lemur. Told herself she was running back to Egypt, to the exotic lands where she’d felt at home.

But in truth, what had concerned her most was to run from this man who was kneeling too close to her. The man who was watching her with such an intent expression.

“Let me go,” she said suddenly, not bothering to disguise the plea in her voice. “Give me back my earrings and let me leave. You’ll never see me again, I promise. Sooner or later Mark-David would find me here, and you wouldn’t like that. He can be an extremely unpleasant man to cross.”

“So can I.”

“Please,” she begged.

“It would be the wisest thing to do,” he said in a contemplative voice. “After all, our own situation is complicated enough. It was quixotic in the extreme for me to bring you back, rescue you from Pinworth, but then, as I said, I was bored. If I had any sense at all, I’d do as you ask. Even advance you a bit of money to ensure you made a safe getaway from this island you hate so much.”

She could feel the treacherous hope rising within her heart. “Would you?” she asked in a hushed voice.

He put out his hands, cupping her face, threading his long fingers through her hair, and his eyes were gleaming. “I should,” he murmured. “Convince me.”

His mouth was cold and wet against hers, and tasted of the sea. She couldn’t withdraw—his hands were holding her face still—and she couldn’t, wouldn’t, struggle. She knelt in the sand, her fists clenched in her lap, and let him kiss her. She told herself she could withstand anything, if only he let her leave.

She was wrong. She could withstand brute force, she could withstand arrogance. She could not withstand the coaxing gentleness of his lips as they nudged hers apart, or the faintly shocking intrusion of his tongue in her mouth.

Mark-David had never kissed her like that. Mark-David had never kissed her at all, except for dutiful social pecks on the cheek when they had witnesses. And suddenly she wanted to be kissed, wanted to know what it was like. She wanted to kiss Phelan back.

Her tongue touched his, shyly. He groaned deep in his throat, and moved his body up against hers. His skin was cool in the morning air, still faintly damp from his swim, and the hair that swirled across his chest was soft, springy beneath Juliette’s long fingers as she slid her hands up against him, telling herself it was to push him away, knowing she couldn’t even fool herself.

He moved his head, and she expected him to pull back, but instead, he simply angled his head and kissed her again, his tongue thrusting gently, rhythmically, into her mouth, his hips pressed up against hers, his cool flesh turning warm beneath her clenching fingers. There was a soft, moaning sound, one of fear and incipient surrender, and she knew that sound came from her. And the thought terrified her.

She went rigid in panic, jerking herself out of his embrace before he could tighten it, scrambling back against the rock outcropping and staring at him. It was hard to breathe. He’d stolen her mind, her heart, the very breath from her body. She hunched back away from him and shivered.

He didn’t move after her. He simply knelt there in the sand, the breath coming deeply in his own chest as he watched her. She didn’t want to look at his chest, so her eyes cropped lower, to the hard ridge of flesh beneath the tight black breeches, and her panic increased.

“Change your mind, fair Juliette?” he murmured, not
bothering to disguise the tension in his voice. “I thought you were well on your way to bargaining for your release.”

She met his ironic gaze. “What do you mean?”

His smile was mocking, unpleasant. “Simply that you strip off your boys’ clothes and earn your freedom, and an extra twenty bob besides. After all, it’s nothing that you haven’t given Lemur a dozen times over.”

She slapped him. Hard. Her hand crossed his face in a blow that shocked both of them with its force and unexpectedness. She stared at him, white with fear, waiting for him to use that tightly leashed strength to hit her back.

He didn’t. “It’s always possible,” he said in a casual voice, “that I deserved that. I would suggest, however, that you don’t try it again. My temper can be very uncertain.”

Juliette couldn’t move. Never in her life had she hit another creature in anger. She’d seen too much of the world’s cruelties to take out her frustrations on others, but no one had ever aroused her fury as fully as this man. Her hand still hurt from the force of the blow.

“We’ll go back to the house now,” he said, rising to his feet, towering over her.

She glared up at him. “You never were going to let me go, were you?” she asked.

“No,” he said. “Not yet, at least. I was merely interested in seeing what you were willing to barter for your freedom.”

“Would you have given it to me?”

“I can think of a great many things I would have been willing to give you,” he said, “but your freedom wasn’t among them. Stand up, Juliette. Unless you want me to carry you. I doubt you’d like that idea. I’m quite strong, but even such a light burden as you might prove to be too
exhausting, and if we stopped to rest on the way back to the house …”

Juliette surged to her feet. “You’re worse than Lemur,” she snapped.

He was unmoved by the insult. “Am I? Since you have yet to inform me of the depths of his perfidy, I don’t know whether I’m insulted or not. Come along,” he said, starting up the winding path to the house.

She stared at his back, the graceful strength of him, and wished with all her might for a sharp knife to plunge into the tanned, strong flesh. She wondered if there was a chance in hell she could outrun him along the sand.

Not likely. She was a bit younger than he was, but his legs were longer, and he was barefoot, while she was encumbered by her ill-fitting shoes. He’d catch her, push her down on the sand, and her nightmare from the previous night would come true. If, indeed, she could truthfully call it a nightmare.

She tried one last appeal to his reason. “It would be far more prudent of you to send me away. Lemur will find me sooner or later, and he’s a dangerous man to cross.”

He turned to look at her. “I was never known for my prudence. I protect my own. As long as you’re here, I won’t allow him to hurt you.”

“I am not yours,” she said fiercely.

“Not yet, perhaps. But you will be.”

“And if I refuse? Will you turn me over to him …?”

“Mark-David Lemur won’t touch you again,” he said flatly. “You have my word on it.”

“And what makes you think I’d trust your word?”

He shrugged, unmoved by the blatant insult. “Your instincts, fair Juliette. I think they’re very well developed
and, given a choice between your husband and me, you’re wise enough to pick the man who’s at least not a proven villain. You’re right about one thing. He’ll show up here, sooner or later. If not here, then wherever you run to. He’ll catch up with you. You’re a great deal better off with Valerian and me to protect you.” He held up a hand to forestall her protest. “And don’t tell me you can take care of yourself. I’ve seen your best, and it’s not good enough. All you can do is run, and eventually he’ll catch you.”

She stared at him. He was right; she knew it, deep in her heart of hearts. Nothing could be worse than the things Lemur had done to her, had tried to do to her. If she had to submit to the same sort of things with Phelan Romney, she’d survive, wouldn’t she? He could hardly be more brutal. At least she found a certain devastating wonder in his kisses.

Which might make it all the more wretched. Her feelings for Lemur were simple, uncomplicated. She despised him, and wished him dead.

With Romney, fear and longing were all twisted together. And he had the capacity for destroying much more than her body. He could destroy her soul.

“Are you offering me a choice?” she asked, her head held high.

“No. I’m giving you a chance to salvage your pride, to pretend it’s your decision. In reality, it’s not your decision at all.”

Her mouth curved wryly. “At least you’re honest,” she said.

“In some matters.”

“I’ll come with you,” she said, “on one condition.”

“And that is?”

“That you don’t touch me again. You don’t kiss me, you don’t put your hands on me. Is that agreed?”

He crossed the stretch of sand, took her shoulders in his hands, and hauled her up against him. He kissed her hard, a brief, thorough, devastatingly sexual kiss that lasted just until she began to respond. And then he released her.

“Agreed,” he said. And he started up the pathway, this time not bothering to see whether she followed.

She rubbed her hand across her mouth, trying to wipe the taste of him away. She took one last, lingering glance at the endless stretch of sand leading to Plymouth, leading to freedom. And then she started after Phelan.

Yesterday had been pure hell. It had been torture, of the most extreme variety, and he had deserved every exquisite moment of it, Valerian told himself. Phelan had warned him. Hannigan had warned him. If he’d listened, he would have warned himself. He should have stayed away from Miss Sophie de Quincey. Failing that, he never, ever should have brought up the subject of lovemaking. Particularly when she was such a bright, such a curious young lady.

They’d made their way up the rock-strewn beach to the edge of the de Quincey property, Valerian wondering how he was going to change the very dangerous subject he’d introduced, Sophie strolling beside him, lithe and graceful, her hand in his.

“So explain it to me, dear Valerie,” she had said when they’d reached the tiny seaside gazebo at the edge of her mother’s garden, continuing their discussion.

He’d allowed her to draw him inside. In the distance he could see the formidable Mrs. de Quincey herself, observing them with guarded approval. The dashing Mrs. Ramsey was a bit fast for a sweet young girl like Sophie,
but at least she was harmless. It wasn’t as if she were a rapacious young male.

Val threw himself down on the padded seat, stretching his legs out in front of him, forgetting that his overlarge feet were prominently displayed. Sophie, ever tactful, said nothing, simply sitting too damned close to him, practically curled up beside him, tucking her arm through his.

“Tell you what?” The side of his arm was held next to the sweet young swell of her breast, and the tiny gazebo was filled with the scent of Sophie’s perfume.

“About it. About men and women, and what they do together, and why it should be worthy of all the fuss.”

“I thought your mother explained it to you.”

Sophie wrinkled her nose. “She did. In very technical terms. I must say it sounds extremely undignified, and quite messy.”

He glanced down at her, stifling a groan. “It is,” he said. “If the man who’s making love to you is thinking about his dignity, then he isn’t thinking about you. And that’s no fun for either of you.”

“Fun?” She seemed shocked at the very notion. “It’s not supposed to be fun.”

“Of course it is. Why do you think there are so many babies in the world? Not because people want ‘em, Lord love you. Most of those babies are an afterthought. People can’t keep their hands off each other, and then it’s too late.”

“But if people don’t want babies, why do they make love?”

“Darling,” he drawled, “babies don’t come from every lovemaking experience. There are ways to prevent them.”

Her eyes widened in shock. “How?” she asked bluntly.

Valerian had kept himself from cursing. “Things men can do,” he said evasively.

“You aren’t going to tell me?” she demanded. “I wouldn’t think you’d be such a poor sport. Maybe I should marry Captain Melbourne and have him tell me.”

“If you think that stuffed-up popinjay is going to explain anything to you, you’ll be in for a major disappointment. I expect his entire knowledge of lovemaking comes from watching his dogs breed.”

“Then you tell me,” she said. She released his arm, pulling away from him, and he accepted the respite with relief. Until she turned around and stretched out on the padded bench, putting her head in his lap. Dangerously close to a part of his anatomy that sweet Sophie would have trouble identifying.

Hell and damnation, he thought miserably. “You start,” he said, resisting the urge to stroke her golden hair.

She bit her lip, looking adorably serious, as she considered his request. “Well,” she said, “I know a man climbs on top of a woman and puts his member inside her. And she lies there until it’s over, and afterward she’s … damp, and needs to bathe, and use a pad. There’ll be pain the first time, and blood, though not as much as your monthly flow. Was it that way with you?”

Valerian remembered the dairyman’s plump, friendly daughter, the smell of the hayloft, and the glorious pleasure of his first encounter. She’d been a great deal more experienced than he, and until he met Sophie de Quincey, she was the closest he’d ever come to being in love, despite the fact that she was now happily married with three little ones and a jealous husband, and quite alarmingly stout. “Not exactly,” he said.

“My mother says women don’t enjoy it much, though they might like the cuddling afterward. Is that what you prefer?” She shifted her head to look at him, and she brushed against his aching body.

He gulped. “The cuddling’s nice,” he allowed. “Both before and after. But there’s more to it than that.”

“Is there?”

He gave up then. She wasn’t going to be distracted, and he was so damned miserable it couldn’t get any worse. “There is,” he said, letting his voice become low and beguiling. He took a strand of her golden hair and began playing with it, a surreptitious caress she wouldn’t begin to recognize. “For one thing, it’s much better if the woman doesn’t just lie there. She puts her arms around the man, and her legs around him …”

“Her legs?” Sophie echoed, profoundly shocked.

“And she moves,” he said, running the hair between his fingers. He usually wore gloves to disguise the masculine shape of his hands, but he’d ripped his earlier and had discarded them along the way.

Sophie swallowed. “Moves? How?”

“In concert with him.”

“
He
moves?” she sounded horrified. “I thought he just lay on top of her until the seed was planted. Rather like a hen laying eggs.”

Val grinned, leaning his head back against the wall. “Not exactly. A certain amount of … friction is required for mutual satisfaction. He puts himself inside her. And then he moves back out again.”

“Indeed?” Her eyes were wide.

“Indeed. Have you never seen animals mating?”

“Once, a long time ago. But they were doing it differently. One was behind the other, and they were …” Her face turned the most delicious shade of pink.

“It’s a different position, one that humans use as well,” he said, dropping the lock of hair and soothing it against her head. “But the motions are generally the same.”

“And women enjoy it?” she asked.

“Yes, if the man is skilled, and interested in bringing pleasure to his partner as well as to himself. Far too many men are only concerned with their own release.”

“Release?”

The thought was murderously sweet. “Release,” he said. “Both physical and spiritual. The culmination of lovemaking. The couple keep up the friction, back and forth, in and out, until it builds and bunds into a climax. The French call it
la petite morte
.”

“The little death,” Sophie said. “It sounds unpleasant.”

He grinned. “Far from it. It’s quite the most sublime experience in the world. For both of them.”

“I find that difficult to believe,” she said in a doubtful voice. “Where does the dampness come from? Mother said you only bleed the first time.”

If sweet Sophie moved her head just a fraction of an inch, she would find out firsthand. “When the man reaches his climax, he fills the woman with his seed. That’s part of it.”

“And the rest?”

“Comes from her. When a woman is enjoying herself, she gets hot and damp and moist …” He forced himself to stop, taking a deep, calming breath.

“Fascinating,” Sophie breathed. “But messy.”

“Undoubtedly messy,” Valerian agreed. “When the woman comes …”

“What?” she shrieked, moving her head dangerously close.

He gritted his teeth. “The woman climaxes as well. That is, if the man is expert enough. It’s not considered as crucial to the endeavor by some men, but someone who loves you wouldn’t think of leaving you unsatisfied. There would be little pleasure for him if he were the only one to climax.”

“Really?”

He considered telling her the truth. That most men wouldn’t give a damn whether they pleased her; they’d take her luscious young body and use her and leave her, messy and undignified and frustrated, giving her babies and nothing else. He didn’t want that to happen to his Sophie. He didn’t want anyone but him to touch her, to give her babies, to make her come.

“For a man who loves you,” he qualified. “That’s why you shouldn’t rush into marriage with a man who’s more dedicated to his own good looks and his dogs. He’s the sort who’ll put your pleasure last.”

“You don’t think Captain Melbourne would make me …” She searched for the word. “Make me climax?”

I can’t bloody well stand it, Valerian thought desperately, holding very still. “I think it’s unlikely.”

She lifted her head off his lap and sat up, a moment before disaster struck. “Then I’m sure I won’t marry him,” she said serenely. “I don’t quite know how I’ll explain it to my mother. The truth may not suit.” Her mischievous smile nearly undid him.

“If I know your mother, she probably won’t have the faintest idea what you’re talking about.” He disguised his tension in a drawl.

She swung around, tucking her feet beneath her, and delivered the coup de grace. “You know what I wish, Val?”
she said with adorable seriousness. “I wish I could meet a man who was just like you.”

After that, she’d been all solicitude as he’d hobbled from the gazebo, attributing his condition to a back problem. He’d accepted Mrs. de Quincey’s invitation to dinner, and sat through the interminable meal, being questioned as to his bluestocking proclivities; all the while Sophie added to his torment by kicking him gently under the table, ensuring that his uncomfortable condition never abated entirely. He’d taken his leave at an acceptable hour, suffering the sweet torment of having Sophie fling her arms around his neck and kiss him soundly on what he still profoundly hoped was his smooth-shaven cheek.

“You are my very favorite person in the entire world,” she’d whispered in his ear. “Thank you for this afternoon.”

He’d thought of the misery he’d endured. “Thank you for what?” he’d countered.

“For your honesty. I value that above all things.”

He’d taken the words as a blow to the heart. He’d traveled through town sedately enough, waiting only until he’d turned the corner on the seldom-traveled road to Sutter’s Head. And then he’d driven like a madman, trying to race the anger and frustration from him. He’d failed entirely.

When he returned, he finished two bottles of wine, and even that wasn’t enough to drive the memory of Sophie’s trusting face from his mind. Or the way her delicate hand had rested on his thigh. If she discovered she’d discussed such intimacies with a man, she’d never forgive him. Bloody hell, if she discovered she’d been lied to at all, she’d never forgive him.

The words had been a death knell. She valued honesty above all things, and all he’d ever done was lie to her. Any
distant, errant hope he’d had for a miraculous happy ending was now vanished. He might as well join Phelan on his rootless wanderings. Without Sophie, there would be no peace for him at home.

On top of everything, he was pledged to go driving with her the next day. He hadn’t been able to resist, any more than he could resist her innocent questions. He had paid the price for it, and tomorrow would be even worse. Just the two of them, driving in his small, open carriage to the ruins of the old Roman fortress. He would have to keep her mind on subjects other than sex. If he didn’t, he couldn’t be certain that he’d be able to control himself.

The fortress at Kenley was a good twelve miles away. They’d be gone all day, and Sophie’s cook would pack them a picnic lunch. It would be heaven, it would be hell, and it would be the last time he allowed himself such a space of unsupervised time alone with her. After tomorrow, he had every intention of keeping his distance. Of ending this damnable stalemate and heading to Paris, and to hell with guilt and cowardice. He couldn’t worry about the blot on his name. After all, it had never really been his name in the first place. Not legally.

He only hoped he could carry through with that fine intention. The more distance he put between them, the more likely she was to forgive him if she ever found out the truth. Though the possibility of forgiveness was remote indeed.

There was no sign of Phelan or Juliette the next morning when Valerian awoke with a miserable headache. He bathed in unheated water as penance, and was standing in the middle of the room, wearing petticoats and shaving, when Juliette appeared in the open door to watch him out of critical eyes.

“I didn’t know gentlemen shaved themselves,” she said.

He truly liked Juliette, with her wry observations and her unselfconscious air. Why couldn’t he have fallen in love with someone like her?

Because his surprisingly jealous brother would kill him. He glanced over at Juliette and grinned. “But I’m no gentleman,” he said, carefully denuding his chin of stubble.

She laughed. “True enough. I’m not sure what you look like. Maybe some mythical creature, like a centaur.”

“I assure you, I’m entirely male.”

“I remember,” she said, her wry smile at odds with the faint color of embarrassment in her cheeks. It was no wonder Phelan was obsessed with her, Valerian thought.

“What have you been doing this morning?” he asked, working on the other side of his face.

There was no answer, and he glanced at her to see that the color had deepened. So Phelan had moved one step closer. Or perhaps more than that. He wondered where she’d spent the night.

Not in his brother’s bed, he decided. If she had, she wouldn’t be looking quite so … fresh.

“Out walking,” she replied with an airy tone that fooled him for not one moment. Obviously she hadn’t been walking alone. Remembering his brother’s predilection for early morning swims, he could make an educated guess as to the morning’s events. “Good God, what are you doing?” she shrieked.

He grinned at her. “Shaving my chest, dear girl. I have to do it every few days. It would hardly serve for Mrs. Ramsey to have golden hair on her rather nonexistent breasts.”

“That’s disgusting,” she said, shuddering, even as with appalled fascination she watched him apply the razor.

“I tend to agree with you, but I have little choice in the matter. Don’t worry—Phelan doesn’t shave his chest.”

“I know,” she said artlessly. And then she blushed deeper still. “I mean, it doesn’t matter to me what he does with his body.”