The Prisoner (28 page)

Constable Drummond would be smashing down her door with an army of police officers, ready to drag Haydon away and crush his neck at the end of a rope.

She turned and looked out the frozen black pane of the window. Her hands gripped the cold wooden ledge as she studied the snow-dusted street below. A man alighted from a carriage in front of the hotel and turned to assist his young wife. It was clear the two had not been married overly long, for she giggled as he presented his hand to her, which caused him to bow gallantly before her, making her laugh even harder. Now they would go into the dining room and share a lovely meal together, Genevieve thought, accompanied by a bottle of wine. They would linger over some beautifully presented dessert, piled high with imported berries and freshly whipped cream. Then the husband might indulge in a cigar while his wife drank coffee from a tiny china cup rimmed with gold. And after all this mannered civility, they would retire to their room and he would take her into his arms and kiss her and touch her and plunge himself deep inside her, until there was nothing beyond the fire and passion burning between them. At last they would sleep, each secure in the knowledge that the other would be there when they awoke, ready to help them with their buttons as they dressed, and sit across from them over breakfast.

It was an exquisite state of familiarity and comfort, which she would never know.

“Tomorrow I will escort you back to Inveraray,” Haydon was saying, restlessly pacing the room. “I have to be sure that you return safely. Caldwell is here for the week and then he is returning to Inverness, so there is no reason to think that anyone in Inveraray will learn of my identity. Once you are home, I will leave immediately. You will tell people that I have gone to France to see Boulonnais, to let him know how his exhibition went and bring him his share of his earnings. Since I was just responsible for his glorious introduction to the Scottish art world, no one should find my desire to tell him about it in person implausible. From there, you can say I am going to England to take care of a few business matters. Give the impression that I will be gone at least several weeks. After a month or two has passed, you can tell people that I have been killed—either by illness or accident, it doesn't matter.”

“No.”

He raised a dark brow in surprise. “What do you mean, no?”

She turned from the dark windowpane to face him. “You cannot accompany me to Inveraray, Haydon. It is too dangerous. Wherever it is you intend on going, you must leave now. You cannot be delayed because you feel I must be escorted home.”

In truth, he could not bear the thought of abandoning her so suddenly. He had not prepared himself for this. The thought of Genevieve being torn from him without preamble was too painful. The return to Inveraray would take two days. That was two more days of being with her. It wasn't nearly enough, he realized hopelessly. Even so, it was better than being forced to leave her now.

That was, quite simply, unthinkable.

“I will be fine taking the coach on my own,” she assured him, trying to get him to see reason. “I can tell people that you were detained here because of business matters, and that you then intend to go on to France to see your artist friend. You can slip out of this hotel right now and disappear into the night. That is far better than taking the risk of returning home with me.”

“And the moment you arrive without me, you will be under a mantle of suspicion, especially if anyone hears that you were seen at the gallery conversing with the marquess of Redmond, who just happens to look exactly like the man claiming to be your husband.” Haydon threw his hat and cloak onto a chair. “I won't permit you to be put at further risk, Genevieve. Appearances must be maintained—especially given that people have already found our sudden marriage somewhat odd. It will look far better for you if you return from Glasgow with your husband, and then I leave on business from there. Anything else will be suspect.”

“If anyone there does hear Mr. Caldwell's tale that I was seen in the company of Lord Redmond, I will just say that I spoke with many people at the opening of Monsieur Boulonnais's exhibition, and I don't remember. There is nothing to Mr. Caldwell's tale to suggest that the marquess was in fact posing as my husband. We made a great show of your having to deliver me back to Mr. Maxwell Blake, so as far as Caldwell is concerned, I am a respectable married woman with a jealous husband lurking somewhere in the shadows.”

She may be right, Haydon thought, raking his hand through his hair. He wasn't sure. All he knew was that he wasn't about to abandon her in a hotel in Glasgow, never to see her again, not knowing if she had been arrested or abducted or attacked by thieving scum on the long journey home. And he damn well wasn't going to leave without saying good-bye to the children. Each of them had suffered enough disruption and desertion in their short lives. At the very least he wanted to speak to them and make them understand that he was not abandoning them by choice, as so many others in their lives had, but of necessity.

Making them aware of that distinction was vitally important.

“I'm not leaving you now, Genevieve.”

Anger flared within her. “Don't you realize that going now gives you your best chance for escape?” she snapped.

“At the cost of destroying the situation we have so carefully constructed around you as Mrs. Maxwell Blake. Were I to suddenly disappear this evening, the authorities would immediately wonder just what the devil ‘business matters' were so bloody urgent that your husband had to vanish in the middle of the night like a guilty thief. I might get away, Genevieve, but you would be left to explain my abrupt disappearance, and the situation would be dangerously incriminating for you. It wouldn't take much of a leap of logic to piece together that the missing Maxwell Blake and the elusive marquess of Redmond are the same man. You would be arrested and forced to confess how you have sheltered and protected me these last few weeks.”

“Whatever they do to me will not be as terrible as what they are going to do to you, Haydon. They are going to hang you for a crime you didn't commit!”

Fury glittered in her velvet-brown eyes, tinged with a wrenching fear. She stood rigid before him, her chin set with purpose, her hands gripping at the cool silken bell of her evening gown. She looked as if she were ready to do battle with him, with him and anyone else who might come crashing through the door behind him to try to take him away. She was like a lioness in that moment, all fire and courage and determination. She was still trying to protect him, he realized, feeling humbled and distinctly unworthy. She had been trying to protect him from the moment she laid eyes upon him, as if he were one of her wayward urchins that could be saved with kindness and care.

He raised his hand and caressed her cheek with the back of his fingers, telling himself that it would be enough, that he would touch her just so, and no more.

“I cannot let you do it, Genevieve.” His voice was rough and steeped in regret. “I cannot permit you to risk destroying your life and the lives of all your children because of a worthless piece of refuse like me.”

“You're not worthless—”

“You don't know anything about me,” Haydon insisted, silencing her by laying his finger against her mouth. “And if you did, you would regret everything that you have done to help me. There is a stain upon my soul, Genevieve, and nothing I can ever say or do will ever wash it clean.” He hesitated a long moment before confessing harshly, “I never deserved to be freed that night from the jail.”

She stood trembling before him, imprisoned beneath his touch, though he held her with nothing but the gentleness of his hand upon her cheek and the torment burning in the shadowed blue of his eyes.

“You told me you killed that man in self-defense,” she ventured, trying to understand.

He shook his head. “I'm not talking about the scum who attacked me. I did kill one of them out of necessity, and would do so again in an instant. The life I'm talking about was far more precious and innocent than that of a common murderer.”

His face was carved in anguish. It pained her just to look upon him, for she could feel his suffering as surely as if she had started to bleed from within. Whatever misdeed he had committed, it was torturing him to the depths of his soul. His jaw was clenched with emotion, as if he feared that if he spoke or otherwise permitted it to relax, he might begin to weep. The knowledge that he could feel such anguish over an act of which he imagined himself responsible told her that whatever it was he had done, it must have been a horrible accident.

And the guilt of it was destroying him.

“It's all right, Haydon,” she whispered, reaching out and wrapping her arms around his enormous shoulders. “It's all right.”

He didn't know which surprised him more, the incredible wonder of her granting him forgiveness without even knowing the nature of his sin, or how swiftly his body reacted to hers. She was pressing herself against him, her silky cheek buried against his neck, filling his senses with the sweet floral fragrance of her hair. She held him hard and fast, as if she would absorb his pain and suffer it herself if she could, sharing her compassion and her strength, giving of herself and her seemingly endless ability to nurture and comfort and care. He didn't deserve her. He understood that. He could not name a single act in his useless, self-absorbed existence that merited even a droplet of her tenderness. And yet suddenly he wanted nothing less than all of her. He wanted to cleave her to him so that they could never be separated, wanted her blood to course through his veins and his through hers, wanted their flesh and their souls to be melded as one.

He groaned and crushed his mouth to hers, knowing as he did so that he would not be able to stop, and not giving a damn. He would see her safely home to Inveraray and then he would leave her, not knowing if he would ever return. Until then there was only the softness of her gathered in his arms, with the keen, black cold shimmering on the streets outside and the apricot light of the oil lamps glowing warm upon her skin.

In that moment, she belonged only to him.

He lifted her into his arms and strode toward the bed, aware of the swish of silk and lace as he lowered her onto the feather mattress. He swept his tongue hungrily through the dark heat of her mouth, tasting the sweet tang of champagne. He tore off his jacket and yanked at the stiff fabric of his cravat, anxious to be rid of the bloody thing. It unraveled quickly from his neck and then his shirt followed it onto the floor, baring him to the waist. Genevieve's fingers fumbled at the buttons of his trousers, inadvertently brushing against the hardness of his arousal. She abandoned the buttons to caress him through the finely woven wool, but the sensation of her stroking him through a barrier of fabric was too much to be borne. With a groan Haydon pulled himself away so that he could peel off his trousers and stockings. Finally he stood naked before her, all hard planes and sinewy curves, his body etched in the shadows and light afforded by the bronze ripple of the small fire burning in the hearth and the soft wash of the lamps.

Genevieve stared at him, her eyes flickering with carnal desire, aroused and unashamed. She had opened herself to him before, had lain panting and writhing beneath him as he kissed her and licked her and thrust himself into the deepest recesses of her body. Any virgin sensibilities she might once have cherished were long gone, lost to the tempest of the burning splendor they had already known. She wanted Haydon with a desperate passion, wanted him touching her and covering her and filling her with himself. Soon he would leave her and she would be alone again. She had not understood the depths of her loneliness before, for she was always surrounded by her children and Oliver, Doreen and Eunice, caught in an endless blur of meals and lessons and housework and bills. But Haydon had delved beneath the carefully constructed facade of her hard-won independence. He had opened her heart and filled it with something that was brilliant and glorious and utterly agonizing.

He stretched out beside her and covered her mouth with his while his hands hungrily roamed the silk and steel barriers wrapped around her. It had taken Alice well over an hour to carefully pull and tie and hook Genevieve into the intricate enigma of her gown, corset, crinoline, and petticoats, yet Haydon was expertly versed in the art of freeing her from them. One by one the layers gave way and were tossed upon the floor, until finally she wore only her corset and drawers. Her breasts swelled above the tightly molded constriction of her corset, giving her a lush, wanton appearance, and the fine French lace trimming her drawers had ruffled up to her thighs, at which point the soft opening to the delicate undergarment lay teasingly unguarded. There was a dark sensuality to the fact that she remained clothed in her intimate apparel while he was utterly naked. She could see his desire for her in his magnificent erection and in every hard curve of muscle covering his body. As he stared at her with hunger, she sensed her power over him as the object of his lust.

She rose to her knees and pulled at the pins in her hair, releasing her elegantly arranged coiffure into a glossy cascade of coppery waves. Then she leaned over and placed her hands firmly upon his shoulders, pinning him to the bed as she lowered her mouth to his and swept her tongue inside. Haydon growled with pleasure at her unexpected dominance of him. Emboldened by this, she pulled her mouth away to trail kisses upon the rough skin of his cheek and jaw, then down the thick column of his neck to the massive granite of his chest. She nibbled and swirled her tongue in tiny circles as she explored him, taking the dark medallion of his nipple into her mouth and suckling hard, then grazing across the valley of his chest and teasingly flicking her tongue over the other one. His skin was warm and faintly salty, and he smelled clean and distinctly male, a woodsy, spicy scent that enlivened her senses as she pressed her cheek against the ebony hair on his belly and inhaled deeply. He reached for her and tried to pull her up to him, but she pushed his hands away and boldly continued her forbidden exploration.