Dark of the Moon

by Karen Robards

  This young woman was not Caitlyn. He knew she was not. She could not be. He had to learn to accept the unalterable fact that Caitlyn was dead. He should take himself off now, before the thefts were discovered, before his bag of jewels was found in the shrubbery beneath the window, before he himself was exposed. He knew he should, but still he stayed. He was in the grip of an obsession so strong there was no fighting it.

  Connor waited for what seemed like hours. Occasionally he heard high-pitched laughter accompanied by lower- pitched murmurs in the hall outside as the female guests retired to their rooms with bed partners in tow. It occurred to him to wonder what he would do if the object of his inquiry was accompanied by a male. Kill him, came the immediate savage thought, and again he had to remind himself that this female was not Caitlyn. If she was accompanied, he would merely ascertain her identity by whatever ruse was necessary and take himself off.

  In any event, when she returned to her room she was alone. It was nearer dawn than midnight, and she unlocked the door and stole inside as if she feared being observed. Once inside, she turned the key in the lock and leaned against the panel in a silent posture of relief. She still wore her costume. At close range, the black silk domino topped by that outrageous plumed and beaded headdress and the cat's-eye mask made her look like some rare exotic bird. Beneath the disguise, her human identity was still impossible to determine. Connor stared, his hands tightening over the arms of his chair.

  The bedchamber was lit only by the fire in the hearth, and it had burned low. It cast but a small amount of light, so he was deep in shadow as he sat in the room's only small chair. She carried with her a candle, which she used to light the taper on her dressing table before she blew out the one in her hand and laid it aside. Then, without becoming aware of his presence, she began to undress.

  She stood by the bed with its sumptuous gold satin coverlet, her back to him, not more than six feet from where he sat. First she took off her domino, revealing the expensive dress in all its glory. Then she lifted off her headdress, shaking her head so that a mass of black hair tumbled down her back in a silken tangle that reached past her waist. Connor swallowed, watching with growing shock. He leaned forward, ceasing to breathe. As she removed her mask and placed it on the bed, he was sure the very blood had stopped coursing through his veins.

  He still could not see her face. Her back was to him as she twisted both hands behind her and tried to work the hooks on the back of her dress. She managed one, then the next. The third one eluded her. Finally, out of patience, she yanked at it, tearing the delicate material. The soft curse that followed the faint ripping sound stilled his heart.

  "By the blessed virgin," he breathed, staring transfixed at her slender back.

  She must have heard him, though he spoke scarcely louder than a breath, because she whirled about. To his stupefaction, Connor found himself staring into the delicately powdered and painted face of his lost love.

  XXXV

  "C-c-c -Connor!" Hands to her mouth, eyes wide with shock, she was staring at him with as much horror as if he were the ghost and not she. Despite his own shock, Connor's mind nevertheless managed to function. Immediately it recognized that his first prayerful hypothesis of what her presence, alive and unharmed and here, might mean-that she had totally lost her memory in the fall from Fharannain and would have no idea who she was or where she belonged-could not be the explanation. Because clearly she knew who he was, and from her expression was frightened out of her wits.

  He could not talk. Eyes never leaving her face, he got to his feet like a man in a dream and took the few steps needed to bring him to her. She looked up at him as he stood in front of her, and there was no mistaking the terror in her eyes. She looked desperate-and desperately scared. Of him? It would seem so. Frowning, he raised his hand to catch her chin, tilt her face up to his for inspection. She shrank away from his touch, but he did as he intended nonetheless.

  It occurred to him that maybe he was asleep and dreaming. But her jaw felt real enough beneath his hand, her skin as silky smooth as he remembered. He could sense the tension that emanated from her body. She sank into a sitting position on the edge of the bed as if her knees had suddenly given out. Those kerry blue eyes that had been haunting him for nigh on a year remained fixed on his face. The next possibility-that he was losing his mind, that his subconscious was somehow projecting her features on an unknown young woman-was rejected too. She had called his name, and he had seen the shocked recognition in her eyes.

  "C-Connor," she croaked again. She seemed almost as stunned as he. But not quite, he told himself with rising grimness. After all, he had believed her dead, while she had known that he was alive. Or maybe not, he thought as another possibility occurred to him. Maybe she had believed him dead from the terrible wound in his thigh, and maybe that belief had left her too grief-stricken to face Donoughmore again, just as he had been unable to stay on at Donoughmore with memories of her haunting him at every turn. Maybe the whole nightmarish year just past had been the result of nothing more than a horrible misunderstanding…

  "Caitlyn." He spoke her name as if his voice had rusted, his hand still under her jaw, his eyes moving over her face as if he had been blind and now could see. The small pink tip of her tongue came out to wet her lips. His stomach clenched. He would know that gesture anywhere. In happier days it had troubled his sleep more times than he could count. Finally he allowed himself to believe.

  "Caitlyn," he said again, deeply, his hands moving to close over her upper arms. Then he pulled her off the bed into his embrace, hugging her so tighdy against his body that the contact hurt. Her arms went around his waist beneath the enveloping black domino that he still wore, beneath the sober blue wool of his frock coat. He could feel the warmth of them even through his shirt, feel the softness of her breasts against his chest, feel the pounding of her heart. His own heart drummed in violent answer. For just a moment she clutched him as fiercely as he was holding her. His head bent, rested against the silky black hair that he had thought never to see again in this life. His eyes closed. Holding her as if he would never let her go, he breathed a silent prayer of thanks.

  "By the miraculous grace of God, it is you! Ach, I have missed you, cuilin."

  He felt her shudder against him even as his world slowly began to right itself on its axis. For once in his life, what was lost was regained. It had all been a hideous misunderstanding, a fiendish trick played by an evil Shedu, the details of which she would now explain. Not that the why or the how of it mattered. Not in the face of this wondrous blessing. She was alive, alive! God in His wisdom had given him his miracle, after all.

  "C-Connor." She did not seem able to say his name without a catch in it. His eyes opened, and he blinked once to rid them of the burning that threatened to unman him. Offering another thanks to God, he pressed his lips against that shining ebony hair, dropped brief hard kisses on her eyes, her nose, her mouth, and her chin before burying his head in the hollow of her neck.

  As if his fierce kisses were some sort of catalyst, her arms dropped from around his waist and she pushed against his rib cage, wanting to be let go. He could not bring himself to do so. Beneath the unfamiliar scent of a sweet perfume, he drew in the clean aroma of her skin and hair. He felt as if he had been frozen from the time she had left him and he was only now just starting to melt. The pain was excruciating, but it felt wonderful to be coming alive again.

  "Let me go, Connor." The words were spoken quietly, but it was obvious from them that at least she had regained her composure. There was also a note in her voice that did not quite fit with his notion of a rapturous reunion. He drew a deep, shaky breath and lifted his head to look down at her questioningly. Still he held her close. Some part of him feared that she was naught but an apparition and that if he lost touch with her, she would vanish into the shadows of the night.

  "We have to talk, Connor. Please let me go."

  There was sense in what she said, he knew. They had to tal
k, to expose the circumstances that had caused him so much pain. Once the hows and the whys were out of the way, he'd be free to sweep her up in his arms again. To carry her back to Donoughmore, with everything the same as before. To marry her, and keep her beside him all the days of his life. To love her forever. He smiled with great sweetness down into her eyes, feeling as if shackles and chains andiron weights had suddenly been lifted from his heart. Unbelievably, miraculously, everything was going to be all right. Caitlyn was restored to him. Her death had been nothing more than a year-long bad dream, and now he had awakened at last.

  "This is noplace for explanations, my own," he told her, smiling though his voice was not quite his own yet. "What was lost is found, and for the moment that's miracle enough. Grab your cloak or whatever garment you need to make that pretty dress passably warm, and we'll be away. Mickeen's waiting at an inn up the road, and by now he's probably grown old with worry over me. I've been here far too long. What a surprise he'll have when he sees you! And my brothers! What a celebration we'll have! 'Tis a miracle, and no mistake! Caitlyn alive! God in all His glory be thanked and praised."

  "I'll not be going with you," she said quietly, and succeeded in pulling herself out of his arms. He frowned. Something was very wrong, but the euphoria of finding her alive overshadowed all else.

  "What do you mean, you'll not be going with me? Of course you will. You belong with me, my own, so get your cloak." He felt an unwelcome premonition even as he spoke. His eyes were seeing what his mind had refused to register. She was his Caitlyn, yet, hideously, not his Caitlyn. Her lovely face was whitened as much by rice powder as by shock, though the artificial rosiness of rouge was readily apparent on her cheekbones. Her lips were very red too, and he suspected she had used paint there as well. For the first time since he had made sure of her identity, his eyes left her face to run over her body. The gown she wore was just this side of indecent, like the gowns the tarts had worn in the ballroom. It was of fine blue silk trimmed with silver lace, caught up around the hem with big silver bows to reveal a silver lace petticoat beneath. The neckline bared neck and shoulders and more than half her lovely bosom. She must have been tightly laced beneath the dress, because her creamy-skinned breasts thrust provocatively upward, lushly available to eyes and touch, and her waist was even more impossibly slender than he remembered. Frowning, he looked her over again. She was tricked out like an expensive whore.

  " 'Tis glad I am to see you, Connor, truly, and please give my love to your brothers, but I wish you'd leave now. Please."

  Connor had the sense of falling again into a nightmare. His frown deepened into a scowl, but he was more bewildered than angry. He reached for her. She took a quick step back from him, and he let his hand fall to his side. "Suppose you explain yourself, lass. We've thought you dead, all of us, and now, when I by the sheer grace of God find you alive, you tell me to go away. We are affianced, Caitlyn. Your home is with me, at Donoughmore. Have you problems with your memory?"

  She looked at him steadily as she took another step away from him. He allowed her to put what distance she wished between them, his eyes never leaving her face. That tantalizing tongue came out to wet her lips again, and he wanted to groan. She was his own beloved Caitlyn… and yet she was not. He began to question his sanity once more.

  "You are entitled to an explanation, 'tis true. I've been remiss, I know, in not letting you know that I was alive, but I've been so… so happy this past year. I'm…I'm in love, Connor."

  He felt as if he had walked into landscape that was familiar at first glance, but as he moved further into it, it became grotesque and hideously distorted.

  "I thought you were in love with me." The words were very quiet, almost puzzled. Her eyes were huge as they met his, then dropped.

  "Faith, this is hard for me to say! I had hoped to spare you this, 'tis one reason I didn't contact you after I… was able to. You were right, all those months ago at Donoughmore: I was naught but a child then. I loved you, and I still do, but not in the way I thought. What I felt then was nothing more than infatuation. You are a very handsome man, Connor! And now-why, now 'tis truly a woman grown I am, and I find I love you like a brother. Just a brother, Connor, and nothing more."

  "A brother." He repeated her words stupidly, feeling as if he were fighting his way through a fog. She flicked a quick look up at him and spoke more rapidly.

  "There's someone else now, the man who saved my life. He was with the dragoons who pursued us that night. When I was shot-oh, aye, I was shot-the wound was grave. I was hit in the back, it was very bloody he told me later, and the rest of that pack of jackals thought I was dead. But he… he found that there was some faint spark of life remaining in me, and that I was a woman. He said naught to the others but volunteered to take charge of the body. There was a reward, you know, which he paid himself out of his own pocket later so no one would realize the highwayman they'd shot had not truly died. But that night he took me to his 1-lodgings, and over the next few weeks he nursed me back to health. He was kind, Connor. And… and I found that I liked him very much. I had no money, nothing to give him, so I… I paid back his kindness in the only way I could. Then, later still, I discovered I loved him. And he loves me. He is a gentleman, an English gentleman. When he returned to his home, he brought me with him. I truly thought it would be kinder if you just never saw me again."

  Connor watched her as she spoke, disbelieving. The Caitlyn he knew could not have done the things she said. She could not have bedded a man out of gratitude and pity, not when she was betrothed to another. She could not have fallen in love with someone else.

  "For a twelve-month I have believed you dead." His voice was hoarse. "You are telling me that you were alive and aware all the while, bedding another man even, and had not the first thought of letting me know? Have you any idea of the grief we have suffered, not just me but my brothers, who loved you too? Have you lost your heart as well as your mind?"

  "I'm very sorry, Connor. 'Twas thoughtless, I know."

  "Thoughtless." He thought of the agony he had gone through, the heartrending pain that had stabbed him as recently as this very night, and fought an uige to wrap his hands around her soft neck and squeeze the life out of her in truth this time. "Aye, I'd say you were a trifle thoughtless in this matter."

  His sarcasm did not seem to move her, and her very indifference enraged him at last. He caught her arm, pulling her toward the wardrobe that rested against one wall. Holding her despite her struggling protests, he flung open the door with his other hand and began to rifle through the contents. All the clothes were expensively lavish, and most were totally unsuitable for the midnight ride through a near-winter night that he had in mind. He threw several dresses on the floor before he yanked out an emerald-green wool walking costume. It had a decent neckline and long sleeves, and the material would be insulating. It would do.

  "Put that on." He thrust it at her. She took it, stopping her useless struggles to stand glaring at him. "Until I sort this tangle through to the bottom, I'll not have you freezing to death."

  "I told you, I'm not coming with you, Connor!"

  "Oh, are you not, then? We'll see about that." With barely restrained ferocity he closed a hand in the shocking neckline of her gown and jerked downward. The thin silk gave with a satisfying rip. She gasped and tried to free herself from his hold, but to no avail. He stripped the gown from her, then his eyes narrowed on her underclothes. They were very pretty, white and lacy and trimmed with satin bows. The underclothes of a woman who meant for them to be seen. A pulse began to pound in his head. She'd said she had a lover.

  "Stop it, Connor! You can't make me go with you! I'll not! Do you hear me? I'll not!"

  He ignored her, whirling her around and yanking at the strings of her stays.

  "What are you doing?" She tried to pull away as he untied the bow and loosened the strings, but he jerked her back into place by the very strings he was loosening.

  "You can't ride in this.
" The stays fell away, and her bosom and waist returned to their natural configuration inside the shift and petticoat she still wore. Instinctively she clutched the green walking costume protectively to her breast as she whirled to face him.

  ' 'What do I have to say to convince you? I'm not going with you! I'm sorry if you've been hurt, but I don't love you any more! I love someone else now!"

  "And what is your lover's name?"

  She laughed. "Think you that I would be fool enough to tell you that? I know you! 'Tis crazy jealous you are, and have always been! You'd kill him in a heartbeat!"

  "Aye, if you've bedded him."

  "There, you see? You see? That's why I never told you I survived! Go away, Connor! I'm happy now, far happier than I was with you, so just go away!"

  "I don't believe you."

  "Oh, don't you now?" Her eyes narrowed, and an edge of fine Irish temper entered her voice. "You always were a conceited creature! You're a handsome man, 'tis true, but you've a temper like the devil and a damned highhanded way with you that I mislike! The man I love is gentle with me, and kind, and lets me do just as I choose! At Donoughmore, I worked from morn to midnight on your bloody sheep farm! And, had I wed you, I no doubt would have continued to do so until I died, and single- handedly raised a houseful of your squally brats besides! The man I love has presented me with my own house in London, and I have servants to fill my every need. I sleep till noon anytime I like, and then do nothing more strenuous than shop! Remember the rags I wore at Donoughmore? The man I love has given me fine clothes, lovely clothes! Fashioned in the latest styles of silks and satins and velvets! See this dress?" She thrust the walking costume under his nose. "I had not a single gown that was half so fine when I lived with you! Now I have a wardrobe full, each more grand than the last! And you say you don't believe me when I tell you I prefer him to you?" She laughed derisively. Her eyes blazed at him. The scene was so familiar that he wanted to kiss her and smack her bottom at the same time-until he considered her words. Then he wanted to wring her neck. He felt his own temper, held in abeyance to some degree by confusion and shock, start to simmer. Whatever else might have changed about Caitlyn, she had not lost the knack of making him wild with anger.