Teresa Medeiros

by Once an Angel

  “Misunderstanding?”

  He ducked his handsome head and gave her a sheepish look from beneath the obscene length of his lashes. “At the house in Mayfair. Knowing you a lady of quality, I sensed you’d become embroiled in circumstances beyond your control. I knew of a back exit, but I’m afraid you misread my intentions when I sought to lead you to it.”

  Her gaze flicked involuntarily to the snowy folds of his tie. If Justin hadn’t intervened that night, she wondered how long it would have taken before they found her strangled corpse.

  She inclined her head, hoping he’d mistake her flush of anger for shyness. “An unfortunate incident, to be sure. I fear it was a result of a rather unpleasant quarrel with my guardian. Let’s speak of it no more, shall we?” Emily offered no more of an explanation, allowing him to speculate on the sordid circumstances that might have led a lady of quality to seek shelter in a notorious bordello.

  He cast Justin a nervous glance and lowered his voice to a whisper. “His Grace’s attendant suggested I not approach him until you arrived. He said you had a calming effect on him.”

  Recovering her composure, Emily smiled sadly. “Only on his good days, I fear. Yesterday was one of those. We don’t dare take him out too often.” She forced her fingertips up to graze Nicky’s swollen lip. “I’m sure you understand why.”

  A feral growl came from the other side of the room. Emily snatched her hand back.

  “Dammit, man,” Justin snarled, knocking away the box of cigars Penfeld was offering. “I don’t want a cigar. I want my soldiers.” His eyes narrowed as he peered through the gloom. “Who goes there? Do I know you?”

  As Penfeld scrambled for the fallen cigars, Emily cast Nicky an apologetic look and rushed to Justin’s side. She patted his hand soothingly. “There now. You mustn’t fuss so. Your Emily is here now.”

  Justin wrapped his long fingers around her wrist and jerked her down to study her face. “Who the devil are you?” His voice rose an octave. “Mother, is that you?”

  The devilish sparkle in his golden eyes was almost her undoing. She choked back a frantic giggle. “You remember me, don’t you? It’s Emily. David’s Emily.”

  His face lit up with boyish pleasure. “Of course I remember you. Emily, my darling child.”

  He pressed a fervent kiss to her palm. She tried to pull away, but he refused to free her until she reached beneath the blanket and gave his thigh a sly pinch.

  Throwing him a warning look, she crooked a finger at Nicky. “Look who’s come to see you this fine afternoon, Your Grace. A very dear old friend.”

  Nicky approached, twisting his hat in his hands, but Justin ignored him. He tugged at the back of her skirt instead. “Why don’t you sit for a while, love? Perhaps we can play at soldiers together.” His smile slanted to a triumphant leer. “My Napoleon came very close to mastering your Wellington last night.”

  She reached behind her and slapped his hand, all the while keeping her smile pasted on. He just tugged harder. Her seams groaned and she was forced to sit on the rug at his feet or risk losing her skirt altogether.

  His fingers threaded gently through her hair; her scalp tingled a warning.

  Nicholas cleared his throat. “Perhaps this isn’t a good time …”

  “Balderdash!” Justin bellowed, startling them all. Beneath the shelter of her hair his hand found her sensitive nape. His broad fingers pressed, working their soothing magic on her tense muscles. Her skin burned beneath his livid touch, and her breath came fast and shallow.

  He glowered up at Nicky. “Who the hell let you in?” He drew back fearfully in his chair. “Are you a native? Penfeld! Check the brush. It’s crawling with savages, you know. I can scent them.”

  Penfeld dutifully parted the fronds of a palm plant. His face emerged like a broad moon on the other side. He gave Nicky a conspiratorial wink. “No savages, sir. They’re all locked in the water closet, just as I promised.”

  With Justin’s hand stroking her so possessively, it was no challenge for Emily to summon an embarrassed blush. “Perhaps you’re right, Mr. Saleri. Perhaps this isn’t a good time.” She rose. “If you’ll keep an eye on His Grace, Penfeld, I believe I shall accompany Mr. Saleri for a walk in the garden.”

  “That’s my girl.” Justin grinned. “Run along now and play like a good child.” Emily choked back a yelp as he gave her bottom a fond pat, his hand lingering an instant too long on its rounded curve.

  As she escorted their guest from the room, her cheeks burning from more than the stifling heat, Justin’s querulous voice rose to a shout. “I don’t want a frigging cup of tea, Penfeld. I want my soldiers. Fetch them for me posthaste, or it’s off with your heads for the bloody lot of you!”

  Emily chose a muslin shawl from the coat rack and accompanied Nicholas Saleri into the garden. After the stifling gloom of the smoking room, the cool, sunlit air sparkled with iridescence. A gentle breeze blew from the south and the plain little wrens hopped and twittered across the softening earth in a poignant reminder that winter would not last forever.

  They strolled in companionable silence for several moments before Nicky sighed heavily. “He’s much worse than I feared. How do you bear it?”

  She lifted her shoulders in a delicate shrug. “On his good days he flirts with amnesia. On his bad days, insanity itself. I fear the shock of seeing you yesterday put a terrible strain on his mind.”

  His voice oozed polite sympathy. “I’d heard rumors about his more bizarre incidents, but I didn’t suspect the worst of it. Did he really threaten to eat one of your suitors?”

  Emily bit her lip to keep from laughing. “I’m afraid so. But that wasn’t nearly as devastating as the night he tried to end his life by throwing himself out of our opera box.”

  Saleri shook his head. “Tragic. Simply tragic. He was such a talented young man. It breaks my heart to see so much promise wasted. It’s astounding what guilt can do to a mind of such fragile, artistic bent.”

  Emily sank down on a rustic garden bench, hugging her shawl about her in a protective gesture. “Perhaps we shouldn’t speak of him so, Mr. Saleri. He did take me in and give me a home. I feel disloyal.”

  “You, disloyal?” He folded himself beside her, propped his walking stick against the bench, and cupped her hands in one of his own. “Surely you must be the most forgiving of creatures.”

  He tilted back his hat with one finger. Emily forced herself to meet his dark, hypnotic gaze. “Forgiving? How could I not forgive him? He explained everything to me in one of his brief moments of clarity.”

  Frowning as if deep in thought, Nicholas freed her hands and withdrew his cigarette case from his pocket. “I’m afraid my encounter with your guardian has shaken me deeply. May I?”

  She inclined her head demurely. “By all means.”

  He lit the cigarette, his hands steady, and took a deep draw. His lips puckered to blow out a flawless smoke ring. “I suppose Justin told you that ridiculous story about shooting your father to spare him a gruesome death at the hands of the natives.”

  “Ridiculous?” Emily echoed, trying to ignore the icy pounding of her heart.

  “A charming fiction, I assure you, although perhaps he’s grown to believe it himself over the years. I always told him he should have been a novelist instead of a pianist.” He slanted her a look as if to assure himself of her full attention. “Justin’s ambitions unbalanced him long before he shot your father. David suspected him of cheating us both and, sadly enough, chose to confront him while I was visiting with the natives.”

  “The Maori,” she said softly. “I know of them. I spent some time with my guardian on the North Island.”

  “A kind and gentle people, as I’m sure you discovered. Hardly the devils with long forked tails of Justin’s absurd tale.” Trini’s beaming face floated in Emily’s vision. Saleri tapped away a cylinder of ash before continuing. “I heard Justin and your father quarreling when I approached from the bush that night. From what I could gathe
r, David had caught Justin altering our land grant, erasing our names in favor of his own, all the better to cover the mysterious disappearance he’d planned for us.” Emily remembered the ornate sheet of paper she’d found in Justin’s cubbyhole. The sheet of paper she’d never bothered to examine. “David was threatening to expose him to the governor general. Justin panicked and shot him. I had no choice but to flee for my own life.”

  “How terrible for you!”

  “It was. After the murder Justin fled and I sought shelter with the Maori until I could be sure he wouldn’t return. Then and only then did I dare to claim the gold mine. But I spent years looking over my shoulder, knowing Justin still had in his possession that altered land grant and a motive for murder. You can imagine my shock to discover he was once again living in London.”

  “And what brought you to London again after all these years, Mr. Saleri?” she asked, fearful she was treading on dangerous ground.

  “You.”

  His answer so closely mirrored Justin’s that it shook her to the core. “Me?” she whispered.

  “I’ve been holding David’s share of the gold mine in trust for you all these years. I would have returned much sooner, but I feared my very presence might put you in jeopardy. I had no way of knowing you were already living with the man who had gone unpunished for your father’s murder.”

  Emily wrung her hands. “Perhaps the price he has paid for his treachery is worse than imprisonment.”

  “Perhaps,” he said, skepticism thick in his voice. He dropped the cigarette and ground it into the sparse grass. His gaze floated over her like silken fingers. “He could still be dangerous, you know. I hate to think of a sweet, fragile creature like yourself living under his influence.”

  Emily stood abruptly, as if his bold look had shied her. “Your concern touches me.”

  He stood, his big, masculine shadow dwarfing her. “I’ve arranged for my solicitor to call on you to discuss your inheritance. I cannot help but feel somewhat responsible for your present situation. Perhaps if I had not waited so long to return …” He cupped her chin in his hands. His smooth thumb grazed her lower lip. “May I call on you again as well, Miss Scarborough?”

  She gazed up at him, softening her lips with the hint of a provocative pout. “I should be wounded if you did not, Mr. Saleri.”

  He snatched up her hand and pressed it to his lips. “I would rather destroy myself than wound you.”

  With that passionate declaration he gathered his walking stick and started toward the drive, pausing only once to look back and doff his hat to her in gallant farewell.

  She stood alone after he had gone, the fringe of her shawl whipping in the wind. One question haunted her: Why was Nicholas Saleri offering to hand over her father’s share of the gold mine without so much as a murmur of protest? Could Justin have been wrong about the man? And if he was, was he wrong about other things as well? The cold finger of a lengthening shadow touched her, making her shiver. She glanced toward the house. The sinking sun had set the windows of the west wing ablaze, but there was no mistaking the watchful stance of the dark figure framed in an upstairs window. Tucking the shawl around her, Emily bowed her head and strode quickly toward the house.

  Shadowy shapes cavorted in the firelight, their bronze bodies sheened with sweat. They leaped and twirled in a feral frenzy, rolling eyes and thrusting hips to the hypnotic chant of the sea and the thundering rhythm of Emily’s heart. She stood in their midst, her sheer nightdress dancing in the balmy wind.

  The natives parted ranks and that’s when she saw him—a dark figure emerging from the bush, a panama hat tilted low to hide his eyes. She tried to move, tried to run, but the sand sucked at her ankles. It was too deep, too thick.

  Toying with her, the man drew a cigarette case out of his pocket and slipped the thin cylinder between his chiseled lips. He struck a match, and in that brief flare of glowing ash Emily saw his eyes—not the molten brown of Nicky’s eyes, but ruthless gold. Justin’s eyes.

  He advanced on her, stalking her with the lean, deadly grace of a tiger. As he passed through the shadows cast by the feathery branches of a punga tree, he became a tiger, padding toward her on all fours. His powerful muscles shifted in lethal synchronicity as he crouched for the kill. Then he was Justin again, flicking the burning cigarette into the night.

  Emily stood frozen. She couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe. Bewitched by his approach, she realized she didn’t want to move. Tears of shame trickled down her cheeks as she realized she was willing to pay any price to feel his embrace one last time. He slipped behind her and wrapped his strong arms around her waist. He had the eyes of a tiger but the hands of a man. They were so warm, she could feel her flesh melting beneath their heat. Her head fell back in surrender.

  The heat from the flames climbed as he bent his leg between hers, dipping low to mold the muscular planes of his body to her own. His palm drifted down to cup the damp fabric of her nightdress to her breasts, then to the throbbing flesh between her legs. She could feel the dark, watchful eyes of the natives on them, but was helpless to stop his sensual mastery of her body and soul.

  Through a haze of dark pleasure she felt a new weight, heavy and cold, against her belly. Her gaze drifted down to see the pistol gripped in his beautiful hand. With exquisite tenderness he trailed the barrel between the aching fullness of her breasts and up until she felt the icy press of the muzzle against her temple. She writhed against him.

  At the exact second his artful fingertips pressed her into ecstasy, his mouth sought and found hers, his kiss so sweet and fraught with tender promise that it made her sob …

  … then he pulled the trigger.

  Emily sat bolt upright in bed, gasping for breach. The flames of her dream were gone now, leaving her drenched with sweat and shivering among the twisted bedclothes. Her bedroom was dark, the fire almost out. She kicked the sheets off her ankles, remembering how the sand in the dream had held her fast. Her body still tingled as if from a lover’s touch. She glanced at the door, half wishing the knob would turn, the door would swing open.

  Justin’s mocking words came back to her: I have no intention of going where I’m not wanted.

  Justin was wrong. She wanted him badly. She wanted him to cradle her in his arms, to reassure her that Nicky was lying about her father’s death, to chase away her doubts and nightmares with his tender kisses. But he’d kissed her in the dream, hadn’t he …?

  Shuddering, Emily threw back the covers and padded restlessly to the hearth. Justin obviously had every intention of keeping his word. They’d barely spoken after Nicky’s departure. Supper had been a stilted affair with the duchess and Justin’s sisters casting puzzled glances between their guarded faces.

  She stabbed at the glowing embers with the poker, hoping to stir the dying fire into flame. Beneath her clumsy probing, the last burning coal crumbled to ash. She dropped the poker and hugged herself, shivering. The sweat was drying on her skin and her bare feet felt like ice. Glaring at the door, she made her decision. Without bothering to grab her robe, she threw open the door and plunged into the black corridor.

  Emily quickly realized it must be very late. The candles left burning at bedtime had all guttered in their sconces. The darkness enveloped her in its unrelenting folds. As she navigated the corridor, her toes slammed into the taloned base of an occasional table. Swearing under her breath, she caught a teetering china figurine before it could fall.

  She continued on, hugging the center of the corridor. A loose board groaned beneath her weight. She froze, foot poised over the next board, waiting for a bevy of servants to come rushing up the stairs or for Harold to pop out of his bedroom and hit her over the head with something, believing her a burglar. The silence held its breath along with her.

  She dared to move on, wandering the long corridors until she stood before the door to the master suite. Its carved mahogany splendor dwarfed her. She lifted a hand to knock, then drew it back. Was this how Justin had felt
at her door—like a desperate pauper come to beg?

  She brushed back her curls, then lifted her hand again. She still could not find the courage to shatter the fragile silence. So she folded her trembling fingers around the brass handle and gently eased the door open.

  Chapter 33

  Everything I did, even the wrong things, were done out of love for you.…

  As Emily peeped into Justin’s room, an unbidden rush of fondness flooded her. She should have known he wouldn’t be sleeping at this late hour. He sat propped against the pillows, reading by the flickering light of a single candle. The heavy curtains of the four-poster had been drawn back and tied with incongruous lengths of hemp.

  The downy comforter rode low on his abdomen. His chest was bare, his hair tousled. The candlelight danced off his gold spectacles. There was something so compelling about eyeglasses on a handsome man—such a teasing hint of leashed potential that Emily felt her breath catch with desire.

  He looked up then to find her peering in at him. His eyes darkened with surprise, then displeasure.

  Seeing no chance of honorable retreat, she crept into the room and stood shivering in the middle of his Aubusson carpet. A fire stoked by fresh coal crackled on the grate. Justin laid aside the book, then drew off his spectacles and folded them on the nightstand. Emily approached the bed. It loomed over her, sumptuous, warm, and inviting. Unlike its occupant.

  “I … um … I wanted …” She stammered, unable to find her words beneath his harsh gaze.

  He threw back the comforter and bounded out of the bed, dragging the sheet around his waist. Emily realized he was nude beneath it.

  He paced the bedroom in long strides. “So this is what it’s come to between us. You think you can waltz in here after you’ve made it clear what you think of me.” He paused in his pacing to glower at her. “Do you think me so desperate I’d take any scrap you’d care to throw my way?”