Suzanne Robinson (24 page)

He entered the Banqueting Hall at one o’clock and was lighting a lamp when Mattie came in. She hadn’t changed, either, and the pearls on her dress gleamed a soft ivory that nearly matched her skin. She walked stiffly to one of the Italian Savonarola armchairs and sat with a rustle of silk against silk.

He was thinking that her hair was darker than the Banqueting Hall’s ebony floorboards and must have missed something, because she bent toward him and said, “Did you hear me?”

“I beg your pardon?”

“What did you want to talk to me about? Has something happened?”

He loved the little parallel furrows of skin that appeared between her brows when she was confused or angry. She’d removed the choker of pearls she’d worn to dinner. Her neck was bare, every perfect inch of it. And he found it impossible not to follow the long slope of it down to her bosom. The gentle curve was barely revealed by the neck of her gown. His hands clenched. He wanted to peel the silk and pearls away from those curves.

“Are you hard of hearing, my lord?”

“What? Oh. No.” Hell. He’d been lying to him
self all night. He wasn’t interested in talking to her. Especially not now; in fact, he couldn’t. He began to walk toward her, slowly. “Miss Bright. Mattie. I was wrong.”

She eyed him suspiciously as he drew near. “Wrong about what?”

“It makes no difference.”

He was five feet away when she jumped to her feet and moved away from the chair. He changed his path and kept coming. He was three feet from her when she sidled behind the Italian chair.

“What makes no difference? Stop stalking me like a mountain lion after a calf.”

Cheyne smiled. “What makes no difference?” He stopped, leaned over the chair and whispered, “The trousers.”

Now she was staring at him in confused alarm. “What do you mean?”

Holding her gaze with his, Cheyne quickly laid his hands on her forearms to prevent her from stepping out of reach. She started when he touched her and pulled back.

“I mean, sweet Mattie, that you drive me insane whether you’re wearing trousers or not.”

She gave a little cry and tried to get away. He laughed softly and pulled her. She stumbled, and as she fell against him, he wrapped his arms around her with the chair still between them.

“Let go, dang it!”

He felt her chest heave. Her breast rose and fell against the pearls at the neck of her gown, and
he had to fight to drag his gaze from the sight. He lifted his eyes to her lips. They were tight and pale. He wanted them loose and red from kissing. His mouth was almost on hers when she hissed at him, “Trousers. Is that all you think about?”

He leaned back and met her angry look. “No. I think about your hair and wonder how something so dark can shine like that. I think about your eyes and how they seem to catch fire from your hair. I think about your lips and what they feel like beneath mine.”

Her mouth dropped open. “I—you think all that?”

He nodded and touched her cheek with his. “I assure you.”

“Seems—” She cleared her throat as he brushed his lips across her forehead. “Seems like you think about me a powerful lot.”

His fingers toyed with a lock of hair that had escaped its pins. “I think about you constantly.” He breathed into her ear, and she shivered.

“I didn’t know. I thought …” Her voice trailed away as his lips slid from her ear to her neck.

“Don’t think, my midnight sun. I’m not.”

He kissed his way from her neck back to her mouth and captured her lips. Submerging into a dark whirlpool, he was dragged to the surface when she tore her lips from his and stared into his eyes.

“You don’t even like me.”

He grinned at her. “How could I not like a young lady who thinks I’m courageous and intelligent?”

“You were eavesdropping!”

“Old Barmy was wrong. Your blush isn’t applered, it’s the most delightful shade of scarlet.”

With an enraged and rueful cry, Mattie squirmed out of his grasp and bolted for the door. He caught up with her as she opened it, pushed it closed and trapped her against it. She whipped around and he dodged a jab she had intended for his stomach.

“Will you calm down?”

“Spying on me. Listening to private conversations. Sneaking and skulking and sniggering at me.”

Cheyne grabbed her wrists and gave her a little shake as his own temper flared. “I wasn’t sniggering, damn it. I was honored to have gained your admiration.”

She stopped fighting him and stared. “Honored?”

He looked away. “Yes.” He still hadn’t told her the truth about his birth, but nothing seemed to matter now except her regard and her touch on his body. He couldn’t lose either. Suddenly he knew the devastation would be irreparable. “Yes,” he repeated softly.

“You were honored,” she whispered.

“Yes.”

Mattie said nothing, and he grew more and more reluctant to look at her. He almost laughed at himself. He was afraid of what she thought. He, Cheyne Tennant, who could have a dozen women with a mere nod of his head. After long moments of silence, he felt her move. She stepped closer to him and gave him a shy smile.

“You could kiss me again, if you wanted to.”

He felt a spasm of relief combined with the pain of holding himself in check. “Bloody hell, Mattie. If I kiss you again, I’m not going to stop.”

“I know.”

This time he raised his eyes to hers and didn’t look away.

 
17
 

Mattie knew she was in some kind of dreamlike fog. Cheyne Tennant had caused it with his sudden reversal in conduct. He’d been as distant and wary as she had until this evening. Her mind couldn’t keep up with the impulses her body was sending faster than the pistons churned in her motorcar. First he pounced on her. Then, when he’d stirred her senses and her alarm, he’d burst out with that admission. He was honored by her regard. He’d said it with such humble shyness that she’d lost all wariness.

They were staring at each other now, in that suspended moment after she’d as much as admitted she wanted to be here in the Banqueting Hall with him. Her mistrust and anger had vanished, and with them her defenses.

Cheyne took her hand and kissed it, and then stared into her eyes as though searching for something he needed desperately. “Mattie, are you certain?”

“I—I’d rather spend this time with you than spend my life with some fool with a fancy title and the sense of a drunk armadillo.”

She started when he threw back his head and laughed.

“Mattie, Mattie, Mattie, my little colonial savage. There’s no one like you.”

“You got no call to—”

His lips silenced her protest. Mattie pressed her hands against his chest, still irritated at being called a savage, but the irritation faded at the feel of his body. Her hands kneaded the flesh over his ribs, then slipped around to feel the muscles over his back. He breathed into her ear, sending violent stabs of sensation through her. It seemed as if his lips were everywhere—her mouth, her cheeks, her neck, her breasts. Then her gown seemed to melt from her body, trickling down her legs to pool at her feet. She followed it, dragging Cheyne down with her onto the black floor and piles of silk.

She heard someone cry out, and realized it was her voice that burst into the silence when his tongue touched her nipple. Vaguely she wondered where the rest of her clothing had gone, but the thought dribbled away under an onslaught of kisses that pressed a wet path down her stomach. She fought her way through his clothing to find hot skin and working muscles. Digging her fingers into his biceps, she almost cried out again as the kisses became impossibly intimate. Soon she had no breath and gasped, only to find his mouth on hers again.

At the same time she felt him nudging her. She opened in answer to his plea, and felt pain. She jumped, but he held her against him until she moved again. Then he joined her in a hot race, holding himself back, guiding her, encouraging her with rapid, hard kisses that matched their rhythm until Mattie felt her body explode.

As she shivered and clawed at him Cheyne threw his head back and groaned. Mattie grabbed him and pulled him deep inside her while she shoved with her hips, desperate to relieve herself of this madness. Finally they collapsed, she to the floor and he on top of her.

Mattie didn’t know how long they lay there, but after a time she began to feel thousands of tiny pearls pressing into her flesh. Cheyne lifted his head. His gaze was unfocused for a moment. Then he shook his head and looked at her. He gave her a slow, pleased and lazy smile. When he kissed her nose, she giggled, and he moved off of her.

“I can’t move,” she said.

“I’ve never felt this drained.” He winced and pulled her corset from beneath his hips.

Mattie took it and tried to sit up. “Ouch. Danged pearls.”

Cheyne stood and offered his hand, but she remained on the floor looking at him.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

She surveyed the long legs, the bulge of thigh muscles and wide shoulders that had blocked her vision during those moments of madness, and smiled. “Nothing’s wrong. Not a blamed thing.”

“Are you trying to make me blush, Miss Bright?”

They grinned at each other. Teasing and laughing, they began to search for their clothing. Cheyne had his trousers on, and Mattie was trying to fasten the buttons of her stained gown when what sounded like a cattle stampede echoed outside the Banqueting Hall. Holding his shirt, Cheyne quickly stepped in front of her as the doors flew open to admit Mutton, Lady Julia Stellaford, and two footmen. Mattie huddled behind Cheyne, clutching her gown, mortified. The men halted in confusion when they saw the room occupied, but Julia rushed to Cheyne.

“Have you seen my husband? He came this way.”

Scowling, Cheyne said, “I beg your pardon. Please leave—”

“I fear for his life!” Lady Julia cried. “He found a note in our room tonight, and just now he got up, took his shotgun and ran out.”

Mutton and the others had turned their backs. Mattie held her dress together and tried to make sense of what Lady Julia was saying. She heard Cheyne’s tone change to one of concern.

“Mutton, you search the cellars and the dungeon. Niven and Panby can take the upper rooms.”

Before he could finish, an explosion sounded nearby. Without a word, everyone rushed out. Cheyne kissed Mattie, told her to stay where she was and ran after them. Her embarrassment forgotten, Mattie fastened the top buttons of her gown, stepped into her slippers and raced out of the Banqueting Hall.

She found Cheyne, Mutton, and Niven on the floor above, clustered around a small closet. Cheyne was kneeling beside Sir William Stellaford, whose boots lay over the threshold. As Mattie ran up to them, Cheyne rose and grabbed her.

“No, Mattie.”

“Is he all right?”

“He’s dead,” Cheyne said as he guided her away. “No, you’re not going to have your way in this.”

She almost protested, but when she saw Cheyne’s remote and chilly expression, she allowed him to escort her to the stone bridge corridor.

“He’s dead.”

Cheyne stopped at the entrance to the corridor. “Yes. Panby took Lady Julia to her room. He’ll find Capgrave and have him see to her.” He looked at her in the light from a gas lamp mounted on the wall outside. “You’re trembling. Are you all right?”

Mattie hugged herself. She couldn’t seem to keep warm. “I’m fine. I’ve seen dead men before. A fella was thrown from his horse at the ranch one time and broke his neck.”

Warm arms surrounded her, and she lay against Cheyne’s chest with her eyes squeezed shut. She opened them because she kept seeing Sir William’s boots.

“I must go, Mattie. Promise me you’ll stay in your room until I can sort this out. I’ll send for you.”

“I can help.”

“No, you can’t. Not this time.”

“Why?”

He held her at arm’s length. “They saw us together, Mattie.”

“How can you worry about that when Sir William just shot himself?”

She heard the strain and horror in her voice and bit her lip. Cheyne pressed her hands together and held them to his lips.

“I have to worry, as you call it. Your reputation and my honor demand it.”

“What are you saying?”

Footsteps and voices came from the main castle. Cheyne glanced down the corridor. “This isn’t the time, Mattie. Do as I say.”

He gave her a little shove, and because she was shivering and trembling at the same time, she did as he ordered. It was his house, and his responsibility lay with the dead man. He didn’t need her arguing with him. She could do that later. Mattie hurried back to her room. On her way she met several servants, who stared at her as they hurried toward the Gloriette.

Narcissa had the room next to hers, and she was hovering outside her door when Mattie arrived. “What’s happened? Where have you been? Goodness, what’s happened to your hair, and your dress?”

Mattie shook her head and went into her room, but Narcissa followed. “Mattie, what’s happened?”

“Sir William shot himself in a closet in the Gloriette.”

Narcissa sat down on the bed while Mattie began
to unfasten the buttons on her gown. The dress fell off her shoulders.