Virgin Star (23 page)

Shalyn covered her nakedness, rose from the bed, and calmly, so calmly, moved to the door. She never turned back. Seanessy fell back against the covers and closed his eyes, laughing at the worst bit of luck in what otherwise had been an exceptionally lucky life. He wondered at a disappointment so keen as to be painful.

Then he heard only: "If you ever touch me again I will kill you."

Doreen watched the strange creature leave the room. The. door shut. "Well, la de da—"

Seanessy held up his hand, and she stopped instantly. "No, don't speak. Not a word. Just listen—"

She awaited his instructions, her eyes sparkling with good-natured anticipation. "Take off every blessed stitch of clothes."

Excited, she obeyed, piling her clothes into a heap at her feet. He did not look at her when he said, "Lie down on the bed and part your thighs. I believe, I am quite certain, I am coming."

"And he did!" Doreen later told her friends. "Three times without stopping, like he was a dying man and I was his last chance!"

She thought, I want to kill him ...

Shalyn stared at the shining star made of gold and studded with rubies. It could not possibly be real; it could not possibly have once been in her hand. Kyler had called her into Seanessy's sitting room, one of the last places she wanted to find herself after last night, but he'd said it was important.

Butcher, Kyler, and Seanessy stood waiting for her response.

She looked into Seanessy’s eyes. He stared back steadily, his face expressionless. If he thought at all about the horror of last night, he gave no sign of it.

Perhaps, she thought, slow torture, then a kill.

Holding up the ruby jewel, Seanessy stared, wondering how she could look so tempting in his blue silk dressing robe. Even though it covered her neck to toes. The sleeves were rolled up, and it trailed behind her. She clutched it tight at her neck, staring up with those lovely dark eyes, the delicate lines of her face framed in the crinkled gold hair knotted at the back of her neck. Dear Lord, she was lovely.

After last night. After rutting, as she called it, with ... with ...

For a moment he forgot the woman's name.

Doreen, he remembered. It had taken him three swipes at Doreen to rid himself of the heat this unlikely girl put in his loins. Three times.

What in blazes had he been thinking of last night? Kissing and petting the girl like a love struck adolescent with too much heat in his loins and precious few outlets. Good God, she was a virgin.

Shalyn stared at him. The way he looked at her.

A murderous rage filled her. She decided to forgo the torture. She'd go right for the kill ...

Seanessy stared at her eyes, eyes darker than midnight, filled with emotional intensity as she tried to remember these blood red uncut rubies set in gold. In those eyes was all the evidence of how badly he had hurt her. The last thing he wanted was to hurt her, the very last. Thankfully Doreen had interrupted them just in time ...

He grimaced still. What a bloody rogue he had been! Seducing her when she woke three sheets to the wind with terror. He knew a name for that kind of ruthless seduction. There was just something, something about that slim body of hers! And that something of hers raised his cock to full sail and kept it there with a gale force wind.

What the devil was his problem?

The poor girl! He just was not a man to attach soft sentiments to his bed, but he'd have to explain, as gently as possible. He would make it perfectly clear that he'd never touch her again, that if he did he'd submit to a well-deserved castration ...

"Well, Shalyn?"

The way he stared. She felt her cheeks grow hot with the memory of last night. Slowly her hands fitted over her cheeks with silent mortification. She shook her head, slowly and then more adamantly.

"You have never seen this before?!"

They stood in his room, Kyler and Butcher behind him. They had hoped the pretty piece would trigger her memory, if she even had a memory to trigger.

Sean had begun to wonder.

A delicate palm went to her forehead; she rubbed.

Seanessy took her palm, turned it up, and brusquely slapped the treasure into her hand. "Well, Shalyn mine, 'tis yours. Wear it in good health. And speaking of health." He turned to Kyler. "Send the good Doctor Rush up."

With a sigh of disappointment, knowing how much Sean wanted the girl out of his life, Kyler left the room to pass word to the doctor.

Seanessy just stared at the lass, while Butcher stared at him. He knew that tone of Sean's, irked and irritated, the exact tone he used moments before his fists connected with someone's face. The poor lass had turned her back to them, unable to bear Sean's proximity.

"Sean," Butcher said slowly, meanly, "what the devil did you do to the lass?"

Nothing that is any of your concern, my friend." The words were a warning. "And nothing I don't regret with every breath I take. Butcher, if you will?"

With a sorry shake of his head, Butcher left the room.

Shalyn tensed, afraid of being alone with him. She did not dare turn to look at him. She clenched tight

the folds of the blue silk dressing robe Tilly had given her and wished desperately she were a thousand miles away.

If he touches me, I will kill him. I will! I swear I will!”

"Shalyn, I am so sorry. About last night. I did not mean to hurt you like that. Needless to say"—he chuckled lightly to diffuse the tension of the moment—"I am hardly in the habit of lying with untried young, women! It's inexcusable, leading you through the trifling preliminaries like that." His booted feet stepped quietly behind her. "A goddamn gnat has more sense."

The rage swelled through her.

"And one of the hundred reasons I should have kept you out of my bed and my greedy hands to myself is how much I've hurt you." His hands came to her shoulders and he gently turned her toward him. She flinched under his palms, but faced him, her head high. For a moment he was startled by the emotional depth in her eyes; her vulnerability was his point. "Shalyn, I am so sorry ..."

Breathing hard and fast, she stared up at those cock-sure hazel eyes and thought, I am going to kill him. I am! I'm going to kill him ...

Dear Lord, those eyes. He saw that she was about to cry. "Shalyn darling," he said softly, alarmed by her extreme fragility. "It's something you'll understand when you're older. You see I'm not a man who ssigns any importance to the act of lovemaking, much less meaning, and I can't—"

"Why, you insufferable oaf!" And she raised a quick open palm and landed a hard slap to his face.

"What the blazes—" Seanessy grabbed his cheek with shock.

"That's what I think of your honeyed words! Words meant for some silly love struck schoolgirl! Save them—I care less than you about last night, except as to make certain it never happens again!"

Never in all his life had Seanessy felt his blood boil so hot or so quick. "Why, you vicious ungrateful little termagant—"

And the fight was on.

Dr. Rush stared at one of Diego Velazquez's lesser paintings, Surrender of Breda. A hand went to his overstuffed brocaded vest pocket. He withdrew an eyeglass and, holding it to his eye, he stepped closer to the picture.

A lesser piece by the master, but still absolutely brilliant. He stepped back, pleased. Imagine owning a Velazquez! Two Rembrandts, a Ruben’s masterpiece, and a Van Eyck. He had heard that Captain Seanessy's private collection rivaled any in all England, and still, he had not been prepared for this.

When the captain's man had arrived at the academy and explained the unusual situation—a young lady found on the doorstep, who had apparently lost her memory—he'd leaped at the opportunity to visit this house.

A smile lit the doctor's face, a smile owing in part to the pleasure of his private viewing of the gallery and in part to the captain's explicit demand for secrecy. The captain need not have made the request; a pistole to his head could not drag the information from him. Few people excited society's interest as much as Captain Seanessy, and if it were known that he had come here, especially with the extraordinary circumstances surrounding his new patient, every lady between the ages of fourteen and eighty would be on a singular life mission to get every blessed detail from him.

As the doctor stepped in front of the next picture, he chuckled out loud. So, it was true after all! Here was the proof!

Vermeer's The Spinner!

Some years ago now, a fantastic story had circulated throughout society, but he had never believed it, certain it was spawned by the exaggerated romantic interest in the famous man. Apparently, there once was a pirate who sailed the channel through the Mediterranean waters. His name was Benito de Soto, captain of a ship aptly named the Black Joke. This beast was known and feared for his savage decapitation not just of the crew of the ships he took, but also of all passengers, including women and children. Hair-raising descriptions of the speed with which he would do the dastardly business had circulated in the London Times for years, followed by scathing editorials indicting both Admiral Gaylord and William, brother of the current king and next in line to succeed. William, humiliated by the editorials, had approached Seanessy with the task. After all, the captain had helped the young American navy rid its seas of Giles and his ships: The rumor claimed that Seanessy was not interested, as he had at the time been engaged in some highly profitable East Indian venture. In desperation, William continued to escalate the amount he'd pay for Benito de Soto's death, but got no response until, at last, he offered Seanessy this painting.

It apparently took Captain Seanessy and his men only two months to find the Black Joke, capture the crew, and set fire to the ship. Benito de Soto and most of his crew were brought to the admiral, who quickly dispatched justice.

And this marvelous painting was proof!

"Doctor." The captain's butler stepped quietly inside the spacious room. "I believe the patient is ready to receive you."

The patient lay backside on the bed, her arms and legs neatly pinned by his. He did not accomplish the feat unscathed; his triumph came at a cost. The girl had landed three goodly blows before he had managed the trick.

He'd felt each one of them.

She'd give him another as soon as he let her up.

Seanessy felt the full effects of his growing dilemma; the problem was one of potentially catastrophic proportions. He stared into her eyes, eyes full of spite, venom, and fury. She was breathing hard and fast. The tangled mess of her crinkled gold hair spread in a rich fan across the comforter. This was not the problem. He could handle her comeliness, it being little more than a singular pleasure to stare at her, still more excitement with her fury and his need to harness it. On a good day he probably could handle that, if that were all there was to it.

No, most of his problem lay in the fact that somewhere in the space of this brief battle, her robe had parted. She was naked beneath him. It made him lift slightly, a ridiculous act of torture, in order to view the most luscious coral-pink tips of her breasts.

He swore softly, viciously. Red-hot desire swept through him in a near-violent quake. He didn't know whether to laugh or cry; and because his predicament was too pathetic for tears, he started laughing.

"Let me up, you fiend!"

"Fiend? Shalyn darling." He laughed, his chest

bouncing lightly against hers, that curious tingling alighting there, her body knowing this game even when her mind did hot. "You really must generate more appropriate endearments if you keep insisting on these intimacies with me. You know what I'm thinking, don't you?"

Actually no. She looked into his eyes, searching the handsome face. Then she realized: "Why, you want to kiss me again!"

Her shock would live forever in his mind; he laughed even harder. "It’s only the beginning, too."

"Well, I want to punch you!"

"And, perversely, that only makes me want to kiss you more!"

"And do you know what I think of you? Why, I hate—" ,

Seanessy stopped her from saying the words.

"No. Do not say that, child! 'Twould be a piercing blow I'd not easily recover from." With sudden inspiration he said, "You love your literature. Do you know your Shakespeare? One of the last sonnets—" To her utter amazement; he recited a sonnet from memory:

"Those lips that Love's own hand did make, Breath'd forth the sound that said 1 hate,' To me that languish'd for her sake: But when she saw my woeful state, Straight in her heart did mercy come, Chiding that tongue that ever sweet, Was used in giving gentle doom; And taught it thus anew to greet; I hate,' she alter'd with an end, That follow'd it as gentle day, Doth follow night, who like a fiend, From heaven to hell is flown away—"