by Princess
His laugh was as soft as a sigh. “All right.”
“I wish we never had to leave. Darius, why do we never get what we wish?”
He cupped her cheek. “That’s just the way life is. Don’t be sad. You are too pretty ever to be sad.”
“I can’t stop thinking about it.”
“Give me a kiss,” he whispered as he curled his hand around her nape.
She did.
He was right. His kiss made her fears vanish. She sighed as she melted into his embrace and drank the kisses thirstily from his sculpted lips. He gathered her into his arms, pulled her down onto the blanket with him, and made her forget.
For three days, they were constant companions.
As if from a distance, Darius observed the king’s most trusted man courting disaster and didn’t care. He tasted rest it seemed for the first time in his life, a soul-deep sweetness that lingered, an end to the exhaustion of constant watchfulness, and an easing from him of the iron grip that was his decades-old, acute wariness for his own survival.
Serafina cuddled him like he was one of her animals. Though he played it fairly cool, he thrived on every minute of her attention, moved by the sweet joy she took in fussing over him.
Merely hearing her call his name in the house did profound things to him.
He would not have thought it possible, but she became even more beautiful as her happiness blossomed, and it awed him, almost beyond his grasp, to imagine that he, the Gypsy bastard, the nothing, was the cause. He could only watch her like a half-wild animal, marveling at the way she tamed him. Dimly he sensed that somehow this woman was the answer to every need he’d ever suffered, even those which had gone unmet for so many years he’d given up on them.
She absorbed every particle of his attention. He saw a man who was like a child for her, soaking up her laughter and her smiles, her artless caresses, and he wrapped her love around him like a blanket on a cold winter’s night. He fed upon her innocent kisses that turned so frequently to feverish desire, and yet the sense that theirs was a chaste and sacred bond never left him.
They ignored the future and neither dared speak aloud what he knew both of them foolishly daydreamed—that it was forever. That this ancient villa with its fading yellow paint was their house.
That he was her husband.
That she was his wife.
He knew it was absurd. He didn’t care. He knew it would hurt terribly later. Didn’t care. They were playing like children at a reality that could never be, but for now it was easy to forget that a war-torn world existed beyond the estate’s protective wall.
He didn’t get any work done, aside from penning some correspondence to his estate manager in Spain. He wrote the man his instructions from their bed, using the smooth curve of Serafina’s naked back for a desk. For days, he didn’t practice or train, didn’t even want to look at the elegant rifle he would soon bring to Milan.
Caught up in learning for the first time how to live, he didn’t want to think about death.
His whole existence turned upon her kiss. His dignity, he decided, was a small price to pay for the joy he had found. She was the delight of his life. In the mornings, they languished and played in bed together well past breakfast. In the afternoons, they watched clouds, painted outdoors with watercolors, collected botanical specimens from the woods and fields. They waded in the little lake, they had picnics, and somehow, in spite of unbearable temptation and frustration, they refrained from making love.
On the fourth night, as they lay in bed, their bodies entwined, they stared for innumerable moments into each other’s eyes, doing nothing but caressing and touching.
But soon he felt her skin heating with the blush of arousal, his innocent seductress. She slipped her arms around his neck and gave him a hungry kiss. His muscles trembled with his awareness of how unbearably easy it would be to slip inside her, take what was his, and quench the endless ache.
This he vowed he would not do. He vowed it with the last shred of honor he had left. He would not leave her ruined and possibly with child when he went off to die. It was bad enough that she would mourn him.
She whispered his name, running her hand down his stomach. He shivered.
Slowly, he lay back on the cool sheets, pulling her atop him. He tasted her mouth deeply while his hands roamed up and down her back, caressed her arms, kneaded her backside, her silken thighs enfolding his hips. When she moaned softly with desire, he rolled her onto her back again, on the edge of desperation.
The curtains billowed over the open window, carrying to them the fragrances of the night. They petted and played, spending themselves lavishly, recklessly, while the precious moments continued ticking away, sand steadily draining from the hourglass.
Something’s wrong.
Darius awoke suddenly in the middle of the night, with crisp, instant alertness.
The room was dark. Beside him, Serafina slumbered peacefully. He held very still, listening.
All he heard was the stridulating song of insects and Serafina’s restful breathing, but his heart was pounding and the hairs on his nape stood on end.
He sat up, swung his legs over the side of the bed, and reached silently for his breeches and a shirt, then pulled on his boots. He walked quietly to the door and listened, hearing nothing.
With a dark glance back at Serafina, he opened the door and went out. Moving soundlessly down the hall, he descended the wooden stairs, avoiding the steps that creaked. On the first floor, he rounded the newel post and glanced into the first room he passed, the dining room. Here, as in every room on the first floor, he had stationed a man at the window.
“All clear, private?”
“Yes, sir. All’s quiet,” said the soldier.
“What’s the hour?”
“Three, sir.”
Darius gave a firm nod. “Hold your post.”
He checked in with the others without incident, but the instinctual sense of warning did not diminish. His sixth sense, honed so early in life, had saved his neck too many times for him ever to ignore its sometimes illogical proddings. Still uneasy, he went into the small, spartan room he had abandoned days ago, and opened the armoire, where he took out a black leather case which housed his usual arsenal of weapons.
Lifting his ebony-handled dagger from its velvet bed, he felt better the instant his favorite weapon was in his hand. He tucked a pistol into the waistband of his breeches for good measure.
Restlessly, he paced through the house and went out to the back porch, where he found Tomas, the sergeant of the squad, smoking a cheroot.
“Something wrong, Colonel?” the sergeant asked, offering him his cheroot.
“I don’t know,” he murmured as he bent down, accepting it. “I have a bad feeling.”
Tomas shrugged, stifling a yawn. “Everything’s quiet so far tonight.”
“Maybe too quiet.” He took a deep drag, and sauntered to the edge of the porch, gazing out at the woods. The air was cool and balmy, the half-moon riding high.
“Have you seen anything unusual?”
“No, sir. The sentries have the dogs out with them. I’m sure we’ll hear those monsters barking if anyone’s out there.”
“Let’s hope so.” He exhaled a stream of smoke, took a second drag, and gave it back to Tomas, then wandered inside. Restlessly, he paced through the house, glanced out the windows here and there, but what he could make out of the night-clad landscape was still.
At length, he made his way to the kitchen for a drink of water. He took a metal ewer from the cupboard and went to the hand pump, pumping until the cool mountain springwater gushed with a tinny ring into the ewer. He thought he heard something, maybe horses’ hooves.
He swiveled his head to look over his shoulder, brows knit. He heard men’s voices in shouted conversation coming from out in front of the house, but the water’s noise splashing into the metal pitcher obscured the words.
Idiots. They’ll wake Serafina, he thought in annoyance.
He went to the window and stared, seeing one of the black government coaches parked in front of the house, the horses still blowing. He could see the royal insignia emblazoned on the door. Then he squinted in puzzlement to see Captain Orsini in the driver’s seat.
What the devil is that sweaty ox doing here? He’s supposed to be catching spies, Darius thought. He watched Tomas walk toward Orsini, and finally the water quit running and he could hear.
“Well, I’ve got clearance and those are my orders!” Orsini was saying. “They want me to bring her back now. I don’t know why. You think they tell me anything?”
“Let’s see your documentation. There’s no way His Majesty could give an order like that without Santiago not already knowing about it,” the sergeant protested.
Orsini never got the chance to reply.
It all happened in perhaps ten seconds.
Darius’s eyes widened as the coach door burst open and two black-masked men with crossbows jumped out. In smooth symmetry, they took two steps apart and dropped to their knees, firing in deadly silence on the men posted at the door. Like clockwork, six more masked men sprang out of the carriage and rushed the house.
Darius was already bolting for the hallway. “To arms!”
He paused on his way out of the kitchen when the knife rack hanging on the wall caught his eye.
He lifted a carving knife from its place on the rack. He whirled around the corner into the foyer just as the front door crashed open. The masked men leaped over the dead front-door guards and poured into the house in neat, lethal pairs.
Darius hurled the carving knife into the chest of the first man over the threshold, then lifted his pistol, bracing his aim with his fist, and shot the second in the face.
“Serafina!” he roared as he swept out his dagger. “Lock your door!”
They were upon him.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
One of the masked French agents lifted a large gun and aimed at his chest.
Darius whirled back behind the base of the stairs just as the bullet slammed into the library door. He flattened himself against the corner, heart pounding.
When the Frenchman stepped into view, Darius brought up his elbow and drove it straight into his chin. The masked head whipped back and the Frenchman fell flat on his back. Darius stepped over him and punched him in the face to make sure he stayed unconscious, then, dagger in hand, he glided silently back out to the foyer, a battleground now where twenty men grappled. The French had thrown stinkpots to create a smoke-screen. Eyes watering, Darius squinted against the foul, choking smoke.
Serafina.
He had to get to her. He could barely see, and the melee blocked his path to the foot of the stairs. Wildly swinging lantern light bounced off the smoke. Flintlocks flared with the report of shots fired amid the din of frantic, angry shouts. The front door was hanging open and he could see the bodies of the guards stationed there lying across the threshold, arrows sticking out of their chests.
Just then, he saw two of the enemy agents break away and rush the stairs.
Beyond thought, Darius raced after them, pushing ferociously through the fight. They were running up the steps, but he was right behind them. He seized the first of the two agents several steps shy of the upper hall. The man turned on him suddenly, slicing at him with a smallsword. Darius dodged the blow and wrenched the man’s arm. He used the force of the other man’s swing to send him sailing with a shout over the rail into the fray below.
Turning forward again, he saw that the second one, at the top of the stairs, had turned and was ready for him, sword drawn.
Another came running up the steps behind Darius, hemming him in.
He cursed mentally, looking at one Frenchman, then the other with a wordless snarl. He bristled as the one lower on the steps closed in, holding him at bay.
All of a sudden, a wedge of light spread over the landing as the bedroom door opened above. No. Serafina took a half-step out into the hall, her anxious, lovely face illumined by the taper she held aloft.
“Stop it!” she screamed at all of them.
“Get back!” Darius roared.
The Frenchman on the landing turned and stared for a split second at the goddess in the white peignoir, her sable curls flowing wildly about her shoulders.
Darius seized the moment and spun, kicking the man on the lower step square in the face. As the Frenchman crashed backward down the steps, Darius lunged upward, driving his dagger in between the ribs of the man on the landing. Darius dropped him, leaped over the body, and grabbed Serafina about the waist, sweeping her into her bedroom.
“Lock it and stay put!” he commanded. “That was not in the drill!” he growled, then pulled the door shut in her face.
He whirled around, blocking the door as he waited to hear both locks slide home, but no more black-masked agents appeared.
The enemy had been vanquished.
Panting and covered in sweat, his muscles trembling slightly, Darius leaned his head back against her door, his chest heaving.
Back and forth she paced in the pink bedroom, arms around herself, her night rail flowing out around her. Just then, a soft knock at the door broke into her dread.
“Angel?”
She tore back the locks with shaking fingers and threw open the door. “Are you hurt?” she cried.
“I’m fine,” Darius said soothingly as she took his forearm and pulled him into the room.
Frantically, her gaze scanned the tall, powerful length of his body. “Are you sure you’re all right?”
“Yes.” He took her gently by the shoulders.
“Blood!” She grabbed his wrist, examining a smear on his sleeve.
“Not mine,” he said. “Calm down. Look at me.”
Heart pounding, she jerked her head back and met his even stare.
“Shh, you see? I’m all right,” he whispered.
She stared up at him, then flung her arms around his neck and held him with all her strength, squeezing her eyes shut.
“You had no business coming out of this room, angel.”
“I’m sorry. I had to see if you were all right.” She was willing to apologize for anything, she was so relieved he was unscathed.
He smoothed a lock of her hair behind her ear. “Get dressed, beauty. I’ll be back.”
She followed him to the door uncertainly.
One hand on the doorknob, he turned back and touched her face, tilting her chin upward with two fingertips. He leaned down and brushed her mouth with a nuzzling kiss. She laid her hand on his chest, caressing the V of his hot, damp skin where his shirt lay open. Her fingertips came across the warm, tiny medal she had given him so long ago.
Catching it in her palm as her mouth lingered against his, she sent up a prayer of thanks to the Blessed Mother for protecting him yet again.
“I’ll be back,” Darius whispered, ending the kiss.
“You saved me again,” she told him with a starstruck gaze.
He cupped her cheek and gave her a tender smile in the dark. “Because you are my princess and I am your knight.” He gave her a wink and silently slipped out the door.
She sighed, holding a hand to her heart. She stepped into the doorway after him and watched him walk away, soaking in the beauty of his loose, wary grace as he stalked down the hall, but then her gaze wandered to the scene below.
Several lanterns had been lit, and by their glow she could see the squadron’s medics already getting to work. Her throat burning with the smoke-roughened air, she walked to the top of the stairs and stared at the chaotic scene below.
Wounded men lay strewn about the foyer, while the nimble medics knelt here and there beside them, gave aid, cleaned wounds, wrapped bandages, and efficiently moved on to the next patient. One man was borne away on a stretcher. A few were dead.
Darius had done this. Savage, wild Darius. This was the work of his hands, the same hands that were so gentle on her body and that could pluck such beautiful music fr
om his guitar. Her magnificent unicorn stallion had gone on the rampage to protect her, wild and lathered as a deadly warhorse with slashing hooves and fiery eyes.
Shaken, she quickly closed her bedroom door and dressed. Grabbing the sewing basket containing her medical equipment, she left her room to see if she could be of help.
“Where is he?” Darius asked in a low, deadly tone.
“This way, sir! I’ll show you!”
Darius followed the young private around the house to the back garden, where he found Orsini closed in by a ring of infuriated soldiers. The captain of the Royal Guard was on all fours, his broad, meaty face sweating. Every time he tried to get to his feet, they shoved him violently back down again. The men looked like they wanted to lynch him on the spot.
“You’re in for it now,” one of the men said as Darius stalked into their midst.
Orsini cursed and attempted to crawl to the far edge of the ring of jeering soldiers and servants when he saw Darius. Darius stood shoulder to shoulder with his men for a moment, staring down at Orsini.
“You pig,” he spat, then strode toward him, seized him by the collar, and threw him on his face in the turf. He grabbed Orsini’s right arm and wrenched it up behind his back. “Do you know what we do to traitors on this island?” he snarled.
“They made me do it! They had a gun to my head!”
He wrenched Orsini’s brawny arm higher. “I see you are not going to cooperate. That suits me fine.”
“I’m not a traitor! I took a few bribes—I never meant for anything like this to happen! They forced me!”
“Listen carefully. You lie to me once, I’ll break your arm. Lie again, and I’ll cut it off.”
“No, no! I know you’re crazy enough to do it,” he blubbered.
“You’re damned right I am. I want names. Shall I bring out the dogs?” he asked, producing his dagger. “They’ve scented blood tonight, Orsini. They’re hungry.” He waved his dagger slowly back and forth before Orsini’s eyes. “Hold out his finger,” he said to the men.
