by Juliana Gray
Loyalty to Lilibet had won out, in this instance.
“You’ve got to find her straightaway and hustle her out.” Beadle snatched the glass from the window ledge and took a large gulp. “Lord Somerton arrived in Florence yesterday, off the train from Milan.”
“Good God.” A rush of panic went through his veins. He forced it down. “Where did you hear this?”
“I asked the officials in Florence to keep me apprised.” Beadle set the glass back down and dabbed at his mouth with his handkerchief. “As a precaution, of course. I didn’t think it would come to this.”
Roland shook his head. “Bloody damn. Does Sir Edward know?”
“I’ve cabled him. Look, Penhallow, what the bloody hell is going on here? What’s Somerton after?” Beadle folded his arms and fixed Roland with a steady gaze. A lazy-seeming chap, Beadle, quite happy to dawdle away his middle years in the relatively sleepy Florentine air, but Roland gathered he’d been a crack agent in his prime. That thinning hair, combed in long, neat strings over the top of his head, concealed a more penetrating mind than it appeared.
Roland put his fist to his forehead. “His wife and son, I think. I hope to God he doesn’t know I’m here as well, or he’ll have no mercy on her.”
“But I was made to understand . . . Sir Edward’s opinion is that he has some sort of plot against you.” Beadle’s voice took on a hint of silk. “Why would that be, Penhallow?”
Roland met his gaze directly. “I don’t know. I’m sure you’re aware I shared a brief flirtation with Lady Somerton, but that was before her marriage. Until March, until after she’d arrived in Italy, I’d had no contact with her at all. I assure you”—his tone went icy—“I took the most rigid precautions to ensure we didn’t enjoy so much as a drawing-room handshake.”
“Then why the devil is he attempting to bring you down?”
“I don’t know.” Roland went to put his hands behind his back and realized he still held the pirate book in his left fist. A fierce surge of protectiveness filled him, for Lilibet and for Philip. He paced a short distance down the hall. In the near-darkness, the arches at the end loomed like mountains. “That’s the deuce of it.”
A brief pause. “Penhallow,” Beadle said, in a low voice, “I feel I must ask, for the sake of the investigation, whether there’s anything at all of an improper nature between you and Lady Somerton.”
Roland bit back an angry retort. After all, in Beadle’s place, he’d want to know the same thing. His hands knotted behind his back, clutching the book. “My reply to your question, Mr. Beadle,” he said, quite calmly, staring at the distant wall, “is that there’s nothing at all improper in my relations with her ladyship. Quite the opposite.”
“I see.” Beadle gazed at him with full understanding, and perhaps a hint of compassion.
Roland closed his eyes. “The question is, where did he learn about Lady Somerton’s whereabouts? Or mine, if he’s after me? Damnation. If I knew what was in his mind . . . Has Sir Edward found anything new, since our last meeting?”
“No. The fellow’s covered his tracks well. Only that hint of his involvement in Johnson’s escape to Argentina last winter, and that secondhand. The Navy office claims he’d never worked with them at all. Laughed at the idea.”
“That means nothing.” Roland turned and strode back in Beadle’s direction. “If he wanted to keep his involvement secret, the Navy boys would damned well keep their mouths shut for him. They’re fiercely loyal.”
Beadle shrugged. “Then I’ve no bloody idea.” He took his watch out of his pocket and examined it in the faint light from the window. “Look, I’d best be off, if I’m to be back in Florence by dawn. As I said, I’d encourage you to take her ladyship somewhere away. Somewhere distant. Only do let us know where you’ve gone, eh? I can alert the local Bureau man, if I have enough warning.”
“Yes. Thank you. Thanks very much for coming out, Beadle. I appreciate it.” Roland reached out to shake his hand. “Anything I can do for you, only ask. If you’d like to exchange your horse for something fresher, the stable’s yours.”
“That’s good of you.” Beadle picked up his jacket and hat from the window seat and turned to leave. “Oh, there’s another thing. Dashed odd. Somerton sent off a telegram, from his hotel, soon after his arrival. Wasn’t able to intercept the contents, but I did discover the recipient.”
“Who’s that?”
Beadle replaced his hat on his head and gave it a reassuring pat. “Your grandfather, Penhallow. The Duke of Olympia.”
* * *
The hand on Lilibet’s shoulder roused her from reverie. She looked up into the face of Signorina Morini, alive with the shifting glow of the nearby torches.
“Signora, the signore is finish the story. My Francesca, she is watching the boy.” The hand on Lilibet’s shoulder squeezed gently. “You find him now, yes?”
Lilibet smiled and turned her gaze back to the mass of dancers, laughing and moving with the rhythmic chorus of the musicians, feathered masks fluttering in the air. Abigail was leading a reluctant Alexandra into the throng, her chestnut hair shining in the torchlight. “Why ever for, signorina? I’m sure he’s exhausted.”
“Not so tired, signora. Not so tired. He is thinking perhaps of love, eh?” Morini sat down next to her at the table and placed a tray before them. On its surface rested two small glasses, half-full with a clear liquid. “He is hoping, I think. Hoping to find you, to dance with you.”
“I’m far too tired to dance, Morini,” she said. “I’ve been serving food all evening. My feet are aching. I only want to go to bed.”
Morini gestured to the glasses before her. “I bring you a little something. Is our tradition, on the Midsummer. Is a kind of limoncello, a special mixture.”
“Oh, I must refuse. Wine and spirits turn my stomach, at the moment.”
“Is not spirits. Is not harming the baby.” Morini took one of the glasses and held it out to her. The liquid swished along the sides, cool and alluring. “Is tradition. Is good luck. You drink this, you are finding much happiness in the year. Much love.”
“I have quite enough love already, thank you,” she said. But her fingers reached toward the glass anyway, as if compelled by some unseen power. She glanced back at the dancers on the courtyard flagstones, looking for Abigail and Alexandra, but they had disappeared into the crowd, into the rhythmic oom-pah of the enthusiastic philharmonic.
“You will like. Is not hurting the stomach, the baby.” Morini nudged the bottom of the glass. “Drink a little.”
Lilibet returned her eyes to the glass before her and shrugged. “Very well,” she said, and took a sip. It trailed enticingly down her throat, cool and hot all at once, the lemon fragrance wafting upward to fill her head. “Oh, it’s lovely!”
“You see? Is very nice. It is bringing you good luck.”
Lilibet tilted the glass and finished it. Energy seemed to flood through her body, coursing down her limbs. “Marvelous. The good luck and the drink. I feel quite better already.”
“Ah, is working. I am so glad, signora. Perhaps I give the other drink to Signore Penhallow?” Morini rose from the table and picked up her tray.
“Yes, I rather think you should. He’d like it very much.” Her brain began to dance, a clear, shining, joyful dance. She rose next to Morini and smiled at the dancers, the dear, kind villagers and musicians and cousins. How she loved them all.
“Signora, perhaps you like walking? You walk to the lake, signora. I send Signore Penhallow to follow you, yes?”
“Oh, would you, Morini?” She kissed the housekeeper on the cheek. “That would be darling of you. It sounds just . . . delightful.”
* * *
Roland strode out into the courtyard, filled with determination, his mind humming with plans and contingencies. If they left straightaway, they mi
ght be in Siena by daybreak. From there, Rome or perhaps Naples, where they could lose themselves in the bustling streets of the metropolis. Or perhaps the other direction? Venice, or even across the sea to Greece. An island, Crete or Rhodes or Corfu. Large enough to have a decent doctor for Lilibet, of course. Oh, damn. The baby. What if something went wrong? Could he trust the local hospitals?
“Signore?” A hand touched his arm.
He spun around. One of the housemaids. Not Francesca, the other one. Maria? Her hair was bound in a red scarf, and a plain feathered mask covered the top half of her face. “Yes? What is it?” he asked, a little more brusquely than he intended.
She took a half step backward. “You are looking for Signora Somerton?” she asked, in a tentative voice.
“Yes. Yes! Have you seen her?”
“Signorina Morini . . . she say . . . the signora is go to the lake. She wait for you.”
“To the lake?” He shook his head and cast a quick glance into the darkness, where the terraces dropped down one by one to the lakeshore. “Why the devil?”
“She wait at the lake, Morini say to me. She say, give you drink.” She held out a small tray with a glass. “Is a tradition.”
“Oh, damn it all.” Roland snatched the glass without thinking and tossed down the contents. A pleasant burn filled his throat and belly, scented with lemons and some sort of unfamiliar herb, some note of flavor he couldn’t quite identify. “I say,” he murmured, holding up the glass to the torchlight. “That’s jolly nice.”
Maria shrugged. “Is tradition. You go to the lake, Morini say. Is . . . ah . . . is must . . .”
“Important?”
She nodded her head with vigor. “Very important!”
“Well, then.” He smiled and set the glass on the tray. A tide of good humor seemed to engulf his body. The urgent need to find Lilibet remained, but the worry and anxiety had fled. Everything would be quite all right. Everything would sort itself out. “I’d best be on my way, hadn’t I?”
The moon shone high and bright above him, lighting the meadows and the rows of grapevines, bursting out with bunches of tiny new grapes; the great mass of the peach orchard, thick with leaves and growing fruit; the rows of corn, already reaching his knee. All of it was familiar to him, from his daily walks and rides with Philip, his solitary rambles, his swimming and fishing and reflection. He whistled as he walked, savoring the delicious sense of well-being, of anticipation that tingled his nerves.
Perhaps he might even tease a kiss out of Lilibet, before they left.
It would be lovely, this journey of theirs. Like a honeymoon. She couldn’t cling to propriety any longer, not with Somerton breathing down their necks. They’d take Philip, of course, and explain things to him somehow. Once his little family was safely hidden, in some idyllic Mediterranean haven far from the tyranny of London society, he’d go out and find Somerton and end this mysterious game, by force if necessary. He’d do whatever was required to en-sure that Lilibet and Philip no longer had anything to fear, anything to dread, from the Earl of Somerton.
He’d marry her, of course, the instant the divorce came through, but the ceremony would be a mere legal convenience. She was already his, in every moral sense, with an inalienable claim to all the love and loyalty and protection he could give her.
Yes, everything would sort itself out.
He reached the olive trees that rimmed this stretch of lakeshore, small leaves glinting silver green in the moonlight. Between the branches, he could just glimpse the tranquil waters of the lake, reflecting the light. A dark shape blocked the ripples: the boulders, he thought. “Lilibet!” he called.
“Here!” she sang out, from somewhere ahead. He caught a flash of movement.
“Where are you?”
“On the rocks! It’s lovely, all warm. I’m going for a swim.”
A swim?
He emerged from the trees and his breath stopped in his chest.
Lilibet stood atop the boulder, just as she had in April, when he’d brought Philip back to her. Only this time she was naked, or nearly so, just stepping free from her chemise. The moonlight bathed her body in silver, gilded the tips of her heavy round breasts, outlined the slight perfect swell of her belly and the curve of her hip. She stretched out one slender leg to the edge of the boulder and looked over her shoulder at him. “There you are! Isn’t it glorious?”
“Glorious,” he whispered, frozen to the pebbles beneath him.
She smiled and turned back to the lake and leapt off the boulder.
* * *
The water rushed cool and silken against her skin. She touched her feet to the bottom and surged up again, until her face broke the surface. She treaded water for a moment or two, enjoying the sensation, and turned back to the boulder.
Roland was scrambling up to the top. “Come in!” she called. “It’s delightful! Much warmer than last month.”
“You’ve been swimming?”
“Of course. Every day, while you’re giving Philip his lessons.” She kicked her legs, feeling her own strength, and floated onto her back. The stars glittered above her, millions of them, distant and friendly. Though the air was warm, she could feel her nipples pucker as they rose above the level of the water.
“Good God,” came a mutter from the shore. She turned her head. Roland was shucking off his jacket, his waistcoat, his shirt; his muscled chest gleamed in the light from the moon. So beautiful, so perfectly proportioned, every detail sculpted by some loving creator. His hands moved to his trousers; she watched dreamily as he peeled them off, as he let his drawers drop to the ground and kicked them off. His feet were already bare. She had a lightning glimpse of his legs, of the jut of his aroused masculine flesh, before he dove off the boulder in a clean arc, scarcely disturbing the water at all.
She closed her eyes and smiled, waiting for him to appear next to her. Seconds passed by, ticking off some invisible clock.
She opened her eyes just before a warm hand emerged from the water to cover her breast. Oh! she exclaimed, and then ah! as the hand drew her backward into the solid wall of his chest.
“Water sprite,” he murmured next to her ear. “I’d no idea you could swim.”
She turned and put her arms about his neck, tangling her legs with his as they treaded the water. The tips of her breasts just touched his skin. “There’s a great deal you don’t know about me, Roland Penhallow.”
“I’d like to find out.” He kissed her, his mouth warm and soft and lemony as it mingled with hers. His hands stole around her waist under the water, melting her skin, melting her entire body.
She whispered into his lips. “Roland. I think . . . I think . . .”
“What do you think?” He kissed along her jaw, her ear.
“I think . . . I don’t want to wait any longer. It might be ages, it might be never, and I want . . . I want you so much . . .”
“We can’t,” he said, his lips hot and alive against the hollow beneath her ear. “Not now. Not tonight. I’ve come to fetch you. We’ve got to leave here, straightaway.”
“What?” The information didn’t disturb her, for some reason. “Why’s that?”
“Your bloody husband,” he said, kicking his legs, drawing her with him inexorably toward the shore, “is in bloody Florence at the moment.”
“Oh.” She leaned into him, letting him carry them along. He was so warm, so strong beneath her. She kissed his throat. “That’s an awful nuisance. Can’t we simply stay and fend him off, if he comes here?”
“Darling love, I’d like nothing more, if it were just me. But I can’t take a chance that he’ll harm you, in your condition. Or Philip, God forbid.” He feathered kisses along her cheek, her temple. Her body lay atop him as they stroked through the water, her breasts pressing against his chest, her hips tucked into his. Even in the c
ool embrace of the water, he wanted her. She could feel his arousal, hard and urgent between her legs.
“You’re terribly gallant.”
“Rather a coward, really,” he said softly. “I ought to stay here and fend him off. Finish him, once and for all. But he’s Philip’s father, and things would get off rather on the wrong foot if I killed the old earl outright. Not that he doesn’t deserve it.”
The air seemed to still in her ears. “What things?” she whispered.
“Being Philip’s stepfather. Raising him with you, if God grants me such a privilege.”
His words stole across her heart. She pulled at his neck, drawing them upright. Her toes just dragged the bottom of the lakeshore. “Make love to me, Roland. We don’t need to leave right away. What’s an hour or two?”
“Shh.” He pushed her wet hair away from her face. She could just see his eyes in the moonlight, gazing at her with tender joy. “I’d like nothing more, darling. As you can plainly see. Have thought of little else, these past months. But you were quite right about waiting. At least until you’re safe, at least until I’ve got you somewhere he can’t find us.”
“No.” The lemony charge of Morini’s drink surged through her body, giving her confidence and purpose, the pure certainty that this man had been designed for her alone, and she for him. She put her hands to his wide cheekbones and held him between her palms. “Make me yours, Roland. Before anything else. Before we go back to the castle, before we step out of this lake.”
He laughed softly. “Well, strictly speaking, my dearest love, we’ve done that already.” His hand slipped around her waist to rest on the curve of her belly.
“You know what I mean, Roland. That was . . . that was passion, lust. That was for the old days. For what we used to share, young and fragile. This”—she kissed him, parted his lips, and kissed him more deeply—“this is for the future. Our future. For what we share now, a thousand times stronger and deeper.”
