Evening Star

by Catherine Coulter

  Giana saw Alex’s jaw tighten.

  “Miss Guthrey has been in a regular snit, sir, ever since we got your letter about your marriage.”

  “Oh dear,” Giana said, touching her hand to Alex’s sleeve. “It must have come as quite a shock. Shall we go to the nursery and see her?”

  “No. Herbert, send Ellen to fetch my daughter down. I will see her in the library in five minutes, Miss Guthrey with her.”

  “Very good, sir,” Herbert said.

  Alex ushered her into his library, a dark masculine room with heavy leather furniture, a massive oak desk, and dark burgundy velvet curtains that fell ceiling to floor along one wall. There were a globe, a dictionary open on its stand, and a table stacked with newspapers beside the fireplace.

  Giana felt Alex’s hands slide up her arms, and she leaned willingly against him. “Your home is beautiful, Alex. You must be very proud of it.”

  “I suppose I am. Now, you, madam, are looking a trifle peaked.” He closed his arms about her back. “I’m putting you through too many paces today, I fear.”

  “I am not a horse, Alex,” she said, nestling her cheek against his broad shoulder.

  “No, you’re a stubborn little mule. After you’ve met my daughter, I’ll take you upstairs. We’ll have a quiet dinner in our room tonight.”

  “Wouldn’t you prefer to dine with Leah, Alex?”

  Before he could reply, there came a scratching knock on the library door. It opened and a tall, attractive woman with honey-blond hair and doe-brown eyes swept in, a thin child peeping from behind her voluminous skirts.

  Alex slowly released her. “Miss Guthrey,” he said, his voice cold. “Why were you not downstairs?”

  Amanda Guthrey eyed the small Englishwoman with great composure. “Leah wasn’t feeling well, Mr. Saxton.”

  “Leah,” Alex called. “Come here and meet Giana, your new stepmama.”

  Giana returned Amanda Guthrey’s scrutiny. Alex had said something to her, she remembered, about blond women. Miss Guthrey was certainly blond, and quite attractive. Her eyes followed Leah as she skipped happily toward her father. The child was ruffled to her eyebrows with a ridiculous array of bows, flounces, and lacy insets. But she had her father’s eyes, Giana saw, and her father’s firm chin. Her hair was a soft brown, and styled in little sausage ringlets around her thin face, a fashionable style, but one that made her seem too sharp-featured.

  Alex dropped to his haunches and drew Leah into his arms. “It’s been a long time without you, puss. She is quite pretty, isn’t she,” he continued, seeing that she was staring toward Giana. “Give me a kiss and we shall talk to her.”

  Leah gave her father a wet kiss and wrapped her thin arms about his neck. “You will stay home now, won’t you, Papa?”

  “I’ll be hanging about like a heavy rock,” Alex said. “Her name is Giana, puss. It’s a trifle odd, I know, but you’ll get used to it. She is rather nice, and fond of little girls.”

  “Hello, Leah,” Giana said, extending her mittened hand. Leah placed her own small hand in Giana’s, and eyed her curiously a moment. “You are not nearly as large as Papa, ma’am. Does he crush your ribs like he does mine when he hugs you? Does he hug you?”

  “Occasionally,” Giana said, smiling up at him. “He is rather like a huge bear, isn’t he?”

  Leah was still studying her new stepmama, her dark eyes wide with curiosity. “Is it true that you’re English, Giana, and you’re very rich?”

  “Where did you hear that, puss?” Alex asked his daughter.

  “Miss Guthrey told me.”

  Alex said smoothly, his eyes meeting Miss Guthrey’s, “Your governess is well-informed, it appears.”

  Giana saw Miss Guthrey stiffen. She wondered why. Was it being called a governess that had offended her? How could that be, unless she were something more—a mistress, perhaps. Giana said to Leah, “I am rather tired now, Leah. Tomorrow morning, would you like to have breakfast with your papa and me? We can get acquainted and I will tell you all about our exciting ocean voyage.”

  “Leah usually breakfasts with me,” Amanda Guthrey said.

  “Well,” Giana said pleasantly, “that was very thoughtful of you. But now that I’m here, Leah will breakfast with her father and me.” She ran her fingers over a particularly vile row of yellow lace at the child’s throat. “Perhaps, Leah,” she continued, “we could go shopping together. Would you like that?”

  “Leah is used to a dressmaker coming here to fit her clothes,” Miss Guthrey said. “She does not like crowds.”

  Alex watched, fascinated, as Giana said with all the hauteur of a grande dame, “Perhaps her dressmaker will appreciate my instructing her on what is suitable for a nine-year-old girl with Leah’s coloring.”

  “I like to feed the ducks in the park,” Leah said.

  “It is also one of my favorite pastimes, Leah,” Giana said, “particularly after I’ve been shopping.”

  She looked down into Leah’s eyes—Alex’s eyes—and felt a tug of protectiveness. She had had a Miss Guthrey once, certainly not as pretty or as seemingly possessive as this one, but a governess nonetheless. And she had been so lonely. The child deserved much more, and Giana intended to see that she received it, both from her and from Alex.

  “Actually,” she said in a low voice to the child, taking her small hand in hers, “the ocean crossing was vile, and I was embarrassingly ill. I must rest now, Leah, but tomorrow you and I will shop and feed ducks and”—she raised her voice so Alex would hear her—“your father will take us to a very elegant restaurant for lunch and ice cream.”

  “A fine idea,” Alex said. “I will make sure your stepmama is in the top of her form tomorrow, puss.”

  There was a screech behind the teapot.

  “How dare he. He is married. And to an Englishwoman.”

  Derry Lattimer set down her fork as she watched her stepdaughter wad up the newspaper in a snit and hurl it to the carpet.

  “How could he?” Jennifer said again, her fist setting the scrambled eggs trembling on her plate.

  “How could who do what, Jennifer?” Derry asked, swallowing a tired sigh.

  “Mr. Alexander Nicholas Saxton, that’s who. How could he do this to me?”

  “I wasn’t aware that Mr. Saxton had ever encouraged you, Jennifer,” Derry said calmly. “Besides, you know your father doesn’t approve of him.”

  Jennifer waved away her father’s opinions. “Daddy would have come around. He always comes around when it’s something I truly want. And now Alex is married, dammit.”

  “An Englishwoman? How interesting. Does the paper give her name?”

  Jennifer retrieved the wadded society page and smoothed it out. “Mrs. Alexander Saxton, daughter of the Duchess of Graffton, is sailing with her husband on the Halyon to New York. The former Miss Georgiana Van Cleve—”

  “Giana. Dear heavens, Alex has married Giana Van Cleve. Do you not remember her, Jennifer? She was my best friend at school.”

  “That flat-chested little snirp?” Jennifer said. “Alex wouldn’t look at her twice.”

  “Four years is a long time, Jennifer,” Derry said dryly, “and bosoms do fill out. I’ll thank you to moderate your language. Giana Van Cleve is anything but a snirp. Indeed, she is a first-rate businesswoman, her mother’s partner in Van Cleve Enterprises. Dear heavens,” she said again, sitting back in her chair. “Giana married to Alex. How very odd.”

  “If they left England—goodness, they’ve arrived by now. What do you mean, how very odd?”

  Derry smiled. “From Giana’s letters, I had got the impression she never intended to marry. And now the both of us are married to American businessmen.”

  Jennifer dropped her eyes again to the paper. “It says that Mr. Saxton was in London to negotiate a merger with the Van Cleves. He must have married her to get hold of her money. He probably owns the Van Cleves now.”

  To her chagrin, Derry burst into gay laughter. “Oh no, Jennifer. Giana
is as hardheaded as Alex, and so is her mother. If she married him, it could only mean that she finally fell in love.”

  “It still doesn’t mean he loves her,” Jennifer said. “He doesn’t even like the English, with all their peers and titles. I heard him say once that if you weren’t a lord in England, you are best off learning to be a servant. And her steppapa is a duke.”

  Aurora Van Cleve married as well, Derry thought. It must have been quite recent, else Giana would have written her about it. And why hadn’t Giana written about her own wedding?

  “He was only in England for two months. How could she have gotten her coils into him?”

  Alex must have swept Giana off her feet to get her to the altar in but two months’ time. Derry would not have thought he could do it, though he was a tantalizingly handsome man, the darling of every parent with a daughter of marriageable age in New York.

  “Jennifer,” she said, striving for patience, “I do not appreciate your insulting my best friend.” She glanced down the expanse of breakfast table at her stepdaughter. To the best of her knowledge, Alex Saxton, never hapless, had not so much as glanced twice at Jennifer. It was not, she thought, that Jennifer was ill-looking. Indeed, her hair was a lovely chestnut color and her eyes a brilliant gray. But the man who married Miss Lattimer would likely be driven shortly to drink.

  “I want to go shopping, Derry. I will not be outdone by that Englishwoman.”

  Jennifer, Derry thought, you are not only outdone, you are undone the minute you open your mouth. Still, there was a smile of happy anticipation on Derry’s face when she escaped to her sitting room. She wondered what Giana thought of the marriage bed, with Alexander Saxton in it.

  “Is she your mistress, Alex?”

  Alex lowered his shoeless foot to the carpet of the master bedroom and bent an eye toward Giana.

  “Well, is she?”

  He was at first tempted to throw his shoe at her, but the rancor in her voice made him smile. Could it be that his counterfeit wife was jealous?

  “I assume you’re speaking of Miss Guthrey?”

  “Yes, Miss Amanda Guthrey—very blond, I noticed.”

  He smiled at her wickedly. “Ah, and natural, I am certain of it.”

  “I will not have your mistress living in my house, Alex. Install her elsewhere, if you wish, but you will at least pretend to be my faithful husband while I am your wife.”

  Her face was charmingly flushed, her eyes darkened with anger. “Your house, Giana?”

  He saw a cynical wariness return to her eyes, and cursed himself for teasing her. “Come here, Giana,” he said, patting his thigh.

  She said in a distant voice, over her shoulder, “I am sorry, Alex. It is not my place to criticize you or anything you may wish to do or continue doing. It is your house. I am but a temporary boarder.”

  He rose angrily and strode over to her, one foot still shod. “I was but teasing you, little fool,” he said against the back of her head. “I’m no saint and no celibate, but regardless of any pretense, Giana, I will treat you as my wife. I am not one of your lecherous husbands. God knows, I am from Puritan stock, and it is the most monogamous breed in the world.”

  He glided his hands down her arms and gently turned her about to face him. She stared, as if fascinated, at his unbuttoned shirt.

  “I had a mistress before I left New York, I have no reason to be ashamed of that fact. But you may be certain that Lucy knows of my marriage and will expect to see me shortly to end our liaison.” He pressed his fingers beneath her chin and forced her face upward. “Do you really believe I would bed my daughter’s governess in my own house?”

  Giana sighed. “No.” She raised her hand and dashed it over his forehead. “I do not know why I am being such a harridan. It is just that when I saw the way she looked at you—”

  “Jealous, princess?”

  “Of course not, Alex. Your overwhelming conceit is showing again.”

  “My conceit disappears when you are making love to me, Giana. I can be coaxed into bed, if you’ve a mind for it.”

  She was silent for a moment, then whispered, “All you have to do is look at me and I want you. It seems I have as much need as any man.”

  “But only for this man, I hope. Let me take off my other shoe, Giana.”

  She helped him, giggling, then rose and pressed herself against him. “Please kiss me, Alex.”

  He did, tangling his hands in her thick hair. He eased her dressing gown off her shoulders, freeing her breasts. He gently stroked her. “Your breasts are larger,” he said. “Do I hurt you?”

  Giana was stroking his thick black hair, trying to arch her back upward to be closer to him. “No,” she said softly. “You are always so gentle. I love for you to touch me.”

  He let his hand fall to her belly, his eyes following. It seemed incredible to him that his child could be nestled in her womb, so slight and flat as she was. “You are not even a bit round, Giana.”

  She laughed, her stomach muscles tightening beneath his splayed fingers. “I am not even three months pregnant, Alex. Do you wish me to be an ungainly cow so soon?”

  “I shouldn’t care,” he said, and leaned down to capture her mouth.

  Giana didn’t believe him, of course, but she clasped her arms tightly about his waist and closed her mind against what she knew to be the truth. For a few months, she could let herself enjoy him. It would have to last a lifetime.

  It was only later when they sat opposite each other, with their dinner on a small table between them, that she asked him, “Why are you being so nice? You were such a ruthless ass in London.”

  He grinned at her over his fork of fluffy potatoes. “I am only trying to lull your suspicions to get you to marry me, so I can finally have your fortune and rub your nose in it.”

  The grin momentarily left his face when he felt a sprinkling of peas hit his cheek. “Must you always be so physical, Mrs. Saxton?” he said, throwing the peas, one by one, back at her.

  “Clod,” she said.

  “Poor Ellen,” he said. “She will wonder what kind of perverted games we play when she sees all the food on the floor tomorrow.” Embarrassed, Giana slipped out of her chair and scrambled about to pick them up, finishing on her hands and knees at Alex’s feet.

  “Now, that, Giana, is a tempting position for a woman.”

  He wished he had not teased her in that way, for her eyes flew to his face, and he knew she was remembering Rome, remembering Madame Lucienne’s girls on their knees before the men, pleasuring them with their mouths. She responded to him so naturally, so freely, that he had forgotten all she had seen.

  He leaned down and pulled her up into his lap. “I did not mean to embarrass you, princess,” he said, forcing lightness into his words. “Forgive me.”

  “I shouldn’t know about that,” she said against his shoulder. “I shouldn’t know about anything.” He stroked her back until he felt her relax against him. “I saw too much, Alex. It is hard to forget, sometimes.”

  “Day by day it will fade, Giana, and you will forget.”

  She straightened against his arm and gave him a crooked smile. “You will soothe it all away?”

  “A husband, even a fake one, is good for something, princess.”

  Chapter 18

  “This is very spacious, Alex, and I love all the light your windows let in.”

  “Thank you, ma’am, for your compliment. Not quite as impressive as your mother’s throne room, but I survive.”

  “Jake is here, sir, about the mainmast,” said Anesley O’Leary, looking toward Mrs. Saxton, who seemed to be studying Mr. Saxton’s nautical books.

  “Show him in, Anesley,” Alex said.

  Jake Ransom, Alex’s foreman at the shipyard, reminded Giana of Lanson. His forearms were the size of her waist and his nose was off center, from one too many brawls in a barroom.

  “Welcome home, sir,” Jake Ransom boomed out.

  “Good to be back, Jake. My wife, Mrs. Saxton.�
��

  “Ma’am.” Jake pulled on the shock of brown hair that fell over his forehead.

  “Mr. Ransom. I understand the mast on the Eastern Star isn’t behaving as you expected.”

  “Ma’am?” Jake regarded the young lady with an uncertain eye.

  “Let’s sit down, Jake,” Alex said. “Giana, would you care to join us or accompany Anesley on a tour of the building?”

  Giana’s eyes twinkled at the foreman’s obvious discomfort. “I shall be with Anesley, Alex, if you need me. Oh, Mr. Ransom,” she said over her shoulder in the doorway of Alex’s office, “it may help to relathe the Baltic lumber, before you dry it in your kiln, of course.”

  “Huh? Oh, yes, ma’am.”

  Alex firmly closed the door and turned back to his foreman, a grin on his face. “Well, Jake, have you done what Mrs. Saxton suggested?”

  “I wasn’t born yesterday, sir.” Jake fell into a brooding silence for a moment. “Well, I didn’t think I should do that without your permission, sir.”

  In Anesley’s office outside, Giana heard Alex laugh, and wondered if he was mocking her to his foreman. “I don’t particularly care for Mr. Saxton’s office, Mr. O’Leary,” she said. ‘’The furniture is too heavy and dark. But the windows are nice. Show me what we have at the opposite end of the floor.”

  “I don’t understand, ma’am.” Anesley fidgeted, wishing that Mr. Saxton would appear.

  “Why, Mr. O’Leary, I wish an office. As you doubtless know already, Van Cleave and Saxton have merged. I will be directing the Van Cleve interests here in New York, as well as my own business affairs.”

  A half-hour later, Alex emerged from his office to see a trail of clerks looking numbly at him, hauling ledgers down the stairs to the second floor. He found Giana, a stunned Anesley at her side, directing his employees as they moved desks, chairs, and files out of the large accounting office. He frowned, put out that Giana would begin to take over without even a word to him.

  Giana turned to him, a smudge of dirt on her cheek and a happy smile on her face, then hurried toward him, wiping her dusty hands on her gown. “Oh, Alex, it will be perfect. You needn’t worry about your clerks, there is a fine room for them on the second floor. Anesley tells me that we can have the space decorated within a week. I’ll go to the furniture warehouse today to select pieces.”