The Infamous Bride (14 page)

"Magnificent, you say?" She looked down upon him, and he felt a shiver pass through him. The moonlight shone bright ivory on half her face and shadowed the other half. "You have used that very word twice tonight." She appeared ethereal and unreal. "Even if I choose only to believe you hold the sentiment half true, that would still be a far cry from passionless, I give you that."

"Is that all you will give me, then?" He had meant to speak wryly, but some devil in him threw the words out with the same heat that coiled within him as he stood on the ground beneath her balcony.

"You would dare ... just because I ... " With a sniff of disdain, she pulled back from the balcony until her entire face was shadowed. "A thousand times good night!" she answered in anger, as if he had spoken aloud his wish that she come down from her balcony and couple with him in the soft, sweet grass of the darkened garden.

He did not want her to withdraw. "Nay, say it is not so, maiden. Can you not see it is I, your Romeo?" He wanted the two of them to stay this way forever. He wanted to imagine her in his arms, only the thin lawn of her nightdress between his skin and hers. He would never admit such a thing aloud, though. Perhaps she had read the desire in his face? He stepped out of the moonlight, back into the shadows of the yew.

She came to the edge of the balcony again then, still shielding herself from his eyes with her arms. Her chin was tilted high, but there was a bud of a smile on her lips as she replied, "I can see nothing, but I hear a jackass braying in the dark." Her voice vibrated with emotion through the darkness of the night. But was she more amused or annoyed? He could not tell.

She had not retreated inside. He would take that as encouragement. He sighed theatrically. "That sounds more like Kate berating her Petruccio than sweet Juliet speaking to her Romeo."

Her eyes shifted restlessly as she searched the darkness of the night. "Perhaps I sound so because you, sir, are like Kate's unfortunate suitor, seeking a woman with a fat dowry to take back to Boston. You need to be taught how to treat a lady."

"I am certain you are mistaken." He had never been accused of offending a lady before. Had his words been improper? "Let me prove myself to you."

"Prove yourself to me? What do you think you have done all these weeks? Keeping your sister from me as if I carried the plague? Chiding me for my pretty, useless buttons? Calling me passionless? Just how could you redeem yourself?"

She had dropped her arms and leaned upon the balcony, looking down into the darkness, which no doubt made him as shadowy to her as she was to him. Only their voices had substance here. Which was why, perhaps, he dared say what he did. "I would kiss you as you were meant to be kissed."

"A kiss?" Her laughter should have wounded his pride. Instead, the blood rushing through his veins increased with every mocking word she spoke. "Your success has made you mad. I assure you, you are no Romeo to turn this Juliet's head."

He knew what the true Romeo would do. But he was R.J. Hopkins. Practical. Sensible. Rational.

Which was why he was startled to hear himself proclaim boldly, "If I were to climb up to you — to press a kiss to your lips as you did to mine earlier — perhaps you would not be so quick to stab me with your sharp tongue, my lady." His words provoked an unexpected image of her tongue stabbing sweetly at his mouth in passion, not anger.

She leaned over the balcony's edge and spoke softly into the night. "What makes you think I want your kiss?"

"Are you not Juliet? Am I not Romeo?" For the first time, he said his own name without a twinge of shame. His mind was filled with an image of himself kissing Juliet. Was an image like that what had fueled Shakespeare as he penned his passionate lovers?

"Are you, Mr. Hopkins?" R.J. closed his eyes and gave himself up to his own imagination for the first time since he was a small child in his mother's arms. Perhaps, as she said, he had gone mad. Surely it was madness to continue to dream of sliding his lips down the silken skin of her neck until his head was cradled on her shoulder and he inhaled the warm scent of her skin.

He opened his eyes again and moved into the moonlight beneath the balcony. Madness. After all, she stood so near and yet so far away. Why didn't he end this torture? Why didn't he walk away? He reached for the ivy-covered trellis and shook it as he stared up at her. It would hold his weight.

She leaned over farther to gaze down at him. At his hand on the trellis. "Will you dare it?"

"Tell me if you wish a kiss from me."

"How can I?" She laughed softly. "I won't know if I want you to kiss me until you do."

He began to climb. "Tell me you want me to kiss you, Juliet."

There was only the rustling of the ivy and the raggedness of his own breath in his ear as he continued his climb. And then she asked, "Do you think I want a kiss from a man like you?"

There was a sadness in her voice that echoed within him and made him answer boldly, "I think you need a kiss from a man like me."

"What makes you think such a thing?" He could hear the tension that built in her voice as he climbed.

"The moon hanging in the sky tells me so." He looked upward. He could nearly touch her face where she bent toward him over the balcony railing. Only a few more steps and he would touch her for real, as he had in his mind. But did he dare? He felt as if he, like the moon, were hanging on the edge of something momentous. But what? Reason? Passion? Madness?

The lawn of her nightdress made a soft sound as she pulled away from the railing and backed out of his sight. "The moon hangs so every month." He could hear no disapproval shading the husky tremor in her voice through the silken black of the night.

"I have never noticed it before, then." He climbed the last few feet of the trellis, the ivy crisp and springy under his hands as he grasped the firmly nailed latticework.

The balcony was narrow. She stood as still as the night air. Her feet were bare, he was surprised to notice, as he grabbed onto the railing to pull himself over.

A large part of Juliet did not believe this was happening. Did not believe that R.J. Hopkins, staid and sober Boston businessman, was climbing the latticework to her balcony. For one moment, she considered retreating to the safety of her room rather than stand her ground against an uncertain enemy. Was this the man who had the heart of deadwood? Had Shakespeare's play somehow transformed him into an impetuous lover — or a madman?

No doubt the wise course was retreat. But her heart beat faster as he climbed higher, as his hand reached the railing and the top of his head moved near enough to touch. She wanted to look into his eyes and see for herself whatever was there to be revealed by the moody moonlight.

While she debated her decision, the lattice cracked under him. Instinctively, her heart in her throat, she reached out to grasp the cloth of his jacket. "I would never have expected this of you, Mr. Hopkins," she said as she helped him scramble onto the narrow iron balcony.

He was breathing hard, and his hand closed tightly over the iron rail as he stood straight. With one glance at the moon, he focused on her. He seemed more puzzled than passionate. "I have never done anything this absurd in my life, Miss Fenster."

The scent of brandy was strong, and she felt overwhelming disappointment. "Fool. You have been drinking."

He blinked, and the puzzlement left his eyes. He moved a step closer, crowding her to one end of the small balcony. "If I have, it is only because you have driven me to it."

His body was between hers and the doorway to her room and safety. Still, she had no intention of letting him know that he had discomposed her. "That is a poor excuse."

"Everyone was so pleased with my performance. I could not pass someone that he would not put a drink in my hand. Or that she would not look at me as if I were a Christmas treat." Apparently realizing that he had forced her to press uncomfortably against the cold, hard railing, he stepped backward.

She inched nervously toward the doorway. Who was this man?

As if he could see her dawning disapproval, he added in a more conciliatory tone, "And I could not find you. What would you have me do? Waste the duke's fine brandy?"

She stopped. The moon illuminated the planes of his face but shadowed his eyes from her examination. "You were looking for me?"

He hesitated, his lips pressing together first, before he answered her. "I was."

"Why?" Did he seek her out because he thought since she had kissed him once during the play, she would kiss him again? Should she be flattered or insulted if he had thought such a thing?

"I ... I can't say. I just needed to see you." Uncertainty radiated from him. He reached a hand out to her tentatively but dropped it when she instinctively stepped backward. He glanced down to the ground where he had been standing moments ago.

If he had wanted to see her, he should at least be looking at her, not formless shadows, she thought testily. After a moment, when he made no move toward her, she said restlessly, "Well, you have seen me. Are you satisfied now?"

"No." His gaze, hungry and wild, caught hers. "What have you done to me?"

"What have I ...? " she whispered, her mouth dry.

At any moment she expected him to take her in his arms as he so obviously desired to do. But he did not. With blinding insight, she realized he was as off balance emotionally as he had been physically a moment before on the broken latticework. Apparently R.J. Hopkins was as unsure of why he was on this balcony as she was. The thought was unexpectedly heady.

She sensed his struggle, waiting for him to reach his breaking point. Suddenly, the hunger left his eyes, and he looked away from her. He had not completely won his battle. No. She could feel his desire just as she could feel the cool night air against her skin. Could he feel hers?

"I shouldn't have climbed the trellis." The smile he threw her was almost boyish. Almost disarming. But he didn't dare meet her eyes.

"Then why did you?" Half of her was afraid to awaken the hunger again. The other half ... the other half frightened her so that she shivered.

"You needed to be kissed. I thought I should do the job." Was it only the brandy that had made him climb up to her? Had the night air cleared his head sufficiently that he would leave her without a kiss?

"How improper of you, Mr. Hopkins."

He answered in his familiar starchy tone, but the smile still lingered on his lips. "Improper of me? That you should need me to kiss you?"

Juliet didn't know how to answer him. He was teasing her, and she was used to being teased in such a way. But not in such circumstances — standing practically outdoors in her nightdress, with the moon shining much too brightly. If she wasn't careful, he might actually follow through on his threat to kiss her. She might see that hunger in his eyes again, and then where would she be? She decided the only safe answer was a complete denial, even if she wasn't certain how she felt about his wanting a kiss. "I most certainly do not want you to kiss me, Mr. Hopkins."

Her flat denial seemed to take him aback. He turned his face up to the moon and sighed. After a time, still looking at the moon, he said softly, almost as if to himself, "Then perhaps it is I who want to kiss you."

"Me?" She faked a start of shock, although in truth his words had raced up her spine like fireworks. He wanted to kiss her. It wasn't the brandy. He wanted to kiss her.

He turned his gaze from the moon to her once again as she asked, "You wish to kiss me? The inconstant Juliet?" She moved toward him, just one step.

He stepped backward, only to come up against the railing, as she had earlier. "Yes." He struggled again to suppress the hunger. And then it flared again in his eyes as he said huskily, "I believe I do." Still, he did not.

She stepped closer until she could detect the warm, masculine scent of wool and peppermint emanating from him. "Me? The woman who would give my heart to any man who paid me the right compliment and take it away again as soon as I tired of him? Who would never be content with one man?"

"Yes. You." He watched her as intently as if she held his life in her hands. And still he did not kiss her.

Words were not possible now. Not when she felt so powerful, as if she could command the moon if she wished it. And yet she did not know what command to give. A sudden intuitive fear that she had stepped off safe ground urged her to retreat now. Back to her room. Back to safety.

Instead, she moved forward to touch his chest lightly with her hand. She looked into his face and simply stood, staring up into the odd play of shadows and light along his head and shoulders. Still no words, only a sigh as soft as the night air.

"So you believe you want to kiss me? And yet you make no move toward me. Lips cannot touch without one of us moving. Or so I have always believed."

He said nothing. Did not move. But she could feel the rapid rise and fall of his chest against her palm. The moment shimmered between them, all possibility. But what would be wise? Or better yet, what did she want from him? "Perhaps you are mad, then, as well as without passion, my Romeo."

His lips tightened, and he moved into a shaft of moonlight that showed her that he had taken her words as a challenge. The set of his features clearly demonstrated his silent struggle with desire. She saw the moment his will lost to his hunger. As he bent toward her, she felt a thrill of wonder.

But wonder warred with trepidation as he leaned over her slowly, ever so slowly. Even now he left her an escape if she wished it. She was caught between retreat and surrender. What matter? She sighed once again, giving herself up to the uncanny notion that fate had already decided the matter for them as finally as Master Shakespeare had done for his lovers two centuries ago.

His sigh mingled with hers. "I am tired of words after all these days of practice." He bent his head. "Master Shakespeare should have written in fewer words and more kissing." His lips touched hers lightly where she stood motionless, waiting.

Amazement drowned the last remnants of fear as she felt the warm satin of his undemanding and yet compelling kiss. Juliet pressed her lips against his and stepped into the shelter of his arms. Why had she told him she did not want to be kissed? Why had she not known how she craved this? Her body vibrated like a fine tuned harpsichord with the sheer need to feel him pressed against her.