by TJ Bennett
And what if word should reach to those back home on whose goodwill I might be forced to depend? How would I explain?
I could not. It would not matter to them how I felt about Gerard, or that I found him nearly irresistible. It would not matter that his loneliness cried out to me, making me want to sooth whatever hurts he had endured, to share whatever shame or burden he bore. My own loneliness, even while I had been married to Jonathan, had become a lingering ache in my heart. I was weary of being alone, but God must have decided that loneliness was to be my cross to bear, for my conscience would not relent.
I had known Gerard only a few days. We were not married, nor were we likely to be.
It would not be right.
I rested my hand on the cameo over my heart and sighed, knowing the time had come to make a difficult decision.
I had to tell Gerard.
…
I hesitated before entering my room, a sixth sense telling me I would not be alone once I did. The doorknob turned of its own accord, and the door swung silently inward.
Of course, no one stood behind it. I gasped, but not for that reason—I was becoming used to such things. No, it was because Gerard had covered nearly every available surface in the room with candles in red-tinted goblets, and those surfaces not so ornamented had been drenched in red rose petals. Entranced, I gazed at the warm glow from the flickering flames. It spilled like liquid rubies across the opulent furnishings, the light revealing a heavy-lidded Gerard propped up against my bed pillows in only his fine lawn shirt and buckskin breeches, his ankles crossed, his boots still on, a goblet of amber-colored liqueur held loosely in one hand. He looked so deliciously, sensuously wicked lying on my emerald satin counterpane that my resolve wavered dangerously.
Then I thought of the consequences of giving in, and reaffirmed my resolve.
He watched me while I advanced slowly into the room, his lazy gaze never leaving mine, even when the door swung shut behind me.
“Oh, Gerard,” I murmured, looking around at everything he had done to create an air of romance, and pressed my hands to my flushed cheeks.
“For fear of setting the place on fire once we are otherwise engaged,” he drawled, “I’m afraid we must remove to the bedroom across the hall. I have filled it top to bottom with nothing but pillows and fur blankets.” He rose languidly and set the drink aside. “But I wanted to see you in the glow of candlelight first, your hair unbound for me. Only for me,” he murmured, reaching for the pins holding my chignon in place. He stood close behind me, pulling them out one by one, his spiced breath feathering across my cheeks, the heat of his body warming mine as my hair tumbled around my shoulders. He speared his fingers through my hair, gently massaging my scalp at the back of my neck. I nearly groaned from the pleasure of it, then sighed.
“Oh, Gerard.” He could not have missed the regret in my voice.
He stilled, quiet for a long moment, then turned me to face him. “You’ve changed your mind.”
I pleaded for understanding with my gaze. “Don’t be angry.”
His mouth twisted, and he leaned his forehead against mine. “I should have taken you in the garden when I had the chance. I should not have given you an opportunity to reason yourself out of wanting me.” He stepped back and retrieved his goblet, disappointment clouding his dark features as he dropped into a nearby armchair.
He took a deep swallow from the glass, staring at me over the rim. “What happened?”
I twisted my hands together. He had every right to be angry with me. I doubted he would understand the moral strictures I had imposed upon myself for so long they were a second nature to me.
“Gerard, please do not think I find you unappealing.”
He tilted his head. “Oh, I know I appeal to you. I felt you nearly come apart in my arms in the garden. I had hoped to feel it again, but having been denied this pleasure, I’d simply like to know why.”
I frowned at him, annoyed. My decision had not been easy, and he did not appear inclined to make it any easier. “Must you be so arrogant?”
His eyebrows rose. “Would you prefer I deny the attraction between us? Pretend, if given enough time, I could not change your mind? Come now, Catherine. We are too honest for those kind of lies.” He raised his glass to me in a salute.
“Honest?” I crossed my arms. “That is not a word I would associate with you. You are made of subterfuge and secrets, and I have not even begun to scratch the surface of the riddle that is Gerard.”
“True,” he acknowledged. He set his glass aside, rose from the chair, and walked toward me. His hand shot out, a blur, and the next thing I knew he held my cameo, the chain still anchored around my neck. “And I suspect you have a few secrets of your own, little cat.”
My heart pounded. He watched me carefully. I swallowed, my mouth dry, and wrapped my hand over his.
“Let go.”
“Tell me what this means to you first.” He leaned closer, his nose inches from mine. “Give me a little of your heart. Do that much, at least.”
“Must you know?” I could not prevent the tremor in my voice.
His gaze lowered to my mouth, then farther down to the necklace trapped between our fingers, then back up to my face. “Yes. I want to know everything about you. I want to know what keeps your heart locked inside this.” He gripped it in his hand until his knuckles turned white, and I feared it would shatter. “I want to know why you will not give yourself to me. If I cannot possess you tonight, take pity on me. Let me warm myself with your trust.”
“Trust?” I released his hand, but could not move away because he kept me bound to him with the chain. “Trust runs both ways. It can only be given when it is shared.”
He stared at me for a long time, the glow of the candles reflecting in his eyes. “You don’t want to know my secrets.”
“I do.” I understood Gerard’s desperation to know my heart, because I felt the same with him. I wanted to share his burdens, lighten his torments, but he ran from me every time I tried.
Even now, I saw the yearning in his gaze, his face etched with longing, not only for my body, but for something more. For a moment, I thought he would speak. His mouth opened, his breath coming quick and harsh. He had the look of a man about to confess, and I wanted to be his priest.
Then he released my cameo and stepped back, stalking away from me to stare out the window into the moonlit garden below. He leaned his hands against the window frame, gazing out, and when he spoke again, he sounded like a man tormented by demons.
“I-I cannot, Catherine.”
I tucked the cameo back into its hiding place.
“Then I am sorry. I cannot make love to you because it would be wrong. We don’t know each other. We are not man and wife. I cannot stay, and you will not go. We have no future together, no past we can speak of, and the present alone is not enough for me.” I hugged my arms around me, despair welling in my throat and making it raw with emotion. I wanted to burst into tears, but I would not humiliate either of us that way. “Please leave.”
He slid a dark look over his shoulder at me. “I could make you want me. We both know it.” His voice was low and tight, threat and promise entwined in one.
A thrill of fear passed through me. “You could,” I admitted. “But I would never forgive you.”
“I’m already damned. What’s one more sin?”
I clasped my hands before me and lifted my chin. “I don’t believe you would do it.”
“Liar,” he said softly, catching me out. He stared at me, his eyes burning with fathomless need. “Jonathan may have loved you, but he never satisfied you.”
I inhaled sharply.
“Do you want to know how I know? The way your skin flushes, so pretty and pink like a virgin, when I am nearby. The way you kiss me, as though you have never before tasted true passion. You are the very picture of longing, and you are mine.”
“You’re mad.” I gathered myself to run from him, but he took a step away fro
m the window, toward me. It would be foolish to run. He would catch me, easily. And I would succumb.
“I promise, little cat, you’ll know pleasure at my touch. I’ll bring you to your peak, over and over, until you release your claws on my back. You will leave marks, but I won’t heal them because they’ll remind me of how they were drawn by your passion.” His gaze compelled me. “Come here.”
My knees trembled; my feet struggled to obey, and I made a sound of distress. By sheer will alone, I resisted, until only moments before my resolve immolated, before I could fling myself at him, he released me from his gaze.
He put a hand to his temple. “I—forgive me. I don’t want it to be that way between us.” His eyes closed and he inhaled deeply. “Dear God… I have become an animal.”
I could not answer, made breathless by my narrow escape.
His winter-gray gaze returned to mine. “I’m so tired of being alone. Let me stay. Let me hold you for a while. I promise I won’t do anything—just let me stay.”
The loneliness in his voice was more tempting than the promised pleasure. But once he held me, I would never be satisfied with merely that. “For my sake, go.”
After a long moment, he moved away from the window, dejection evident in his posture. He stopped, casting a pleading glance my way. “I…”
I held my breath in hope. “Yes?”
“I care for you deeply, Catherine. Couldn’t that be enough for now?”
His halting admission tore at my heart, but I could not allow myself to give in. I did need to be able to trust him, and he needed to trust in me.
“It is a lovely sentiment, Gerard, but no, it is not enough.”
I turned from him, and after a long moment, heard the door open and close again. When I turned back, he was gone, leaving dozens of glittering candles in his wake.
I blew them out, one by one, until I had extinguished the last flame, then dropped onto my bed. Wrapping myself in the counterpane fully dressed, I cried myself to sleep, dreaming of gray eyes and black beasts all night long.
When I awoke the next morning, it was to find the window ajar, the mist streaming in through the open curtains—
And the black beast of my nightmares watching me from the foot of my bed.
Chapter Fifteen
In my twenty-nine years, I had raced across oceans and cowered from mortar attacks and given birth and buried my own. I had seen sunrises over a Turkish battlefield and sunsets over the Thames. I had loved fiercely and laughed heartily and cried deeply. But nothing, nothing had ever prepared me for this moment.
If I lived, I would remember it forever.
A huge, black, leopard-like animal sat at the foot of my bed, examining me with an inscrutable air.
My throat trapped my breath. Every hair on my body rose as if an electric current had passed through my skin. I dug my fingernails into the counterpane, struck dumb as I stared at a creature that could not possibly exist.
It was fear and judgment and eternity all rolled into one. It was beauty and terror and the present and the past, and it held my future in its sharp, deadly claws. Its predator’s eyes were the color of molten silver, oval-shaped and tilted, rimmed with coal black, the lashes long and luxurious. Its gaze slid over me, and I knew the creature scrutinized me by the slight lowering of its eyelids, the quiver of its whiskers, the flare of its nostrils. I sensed the alertness in its stance. Watching, watching me, the way it might track the weakest creature in the herd, waiting for it to stumble, to fall to a burst of speed, to a flash of claws, beneath sharp, white teeth.
How had it entered? Could it have climbed through the open window? I’d shut it last night, and I did not believe a creature such as this—monstrously large with sleek black fur and sharply angled features—would be able to crawl straight up two stories using only the wall. Had someone come to my room and let it in? To what end?
It rose, and I shrank back beneath the counterpane while it padded around the bed, pacing in a way that reminded me of a captured Bengal tiger I’d once seen on display in the Royal Menagerie. The tiger had shifted back and forth, back and forth, inside the bars of its cage, glaring at the gawkers outside its reach, its killer’s eyes promising retribution as soon as it could discover a way out. Even with the tiger contained, I had a respect for it that had me stepping back from the bars, safely out of reach.
There were no bars between this beast and me, however, and danger hung thick and heavy on the air like incense floating over a sacrificial rite. Restless, rapacious power emanated from him, its sleek muscles shifting and bunching as it moved, some invisible barrier only it understood preventing it from devouring me whole.
The mist drifted in from the window, curling around the posts of my bed, its wispy tendrils surrounding the creature. A faint breeze disturbed the red rose petals Gerard had scattered until they drifted down to the floor, falling like drops of blood across the carpet.
Gray spots started to form in my vision. I had forgotten to inhale. I took a slow, shuddering breath, trying to stay as silent as possible, but the creature halted at the sound, its implacable gaze focusing on my face, mesmerizing me like a cobra does its victims before it strikes.
Here it was, the moment of my death, and I could not move, could not even turn away or shut my eyes as it stalked closer. Instead of opening its powerful jaws to devour me as I expected, however, the creature brought its nose up to my face, then dipped it down into my neck, snuffling as if it hunted for my scent.
I shuddered from the push of its hot breath on my skin, the brush of its stiff whiskers against my cheek. Rigid with terror, I wondered what message my flesh communicated to it, what language my fear spoke.
I fought the visceral pull to get it over with, to arch my neck for its pleasure and become a willing accomplice in my own death. Then I thought of the children who needed me, of Gerard who would be devastated by my death.
No, I would not provoke the creature; I would remain as still as wood, as silent as dust, as dumb as marble. I would pray to whatever pagan deities had created it for it to spare me, for surely nothing from Heaven had given birth to this creature who was as beautiful and as deadly as Lucifer himself.
Something wet and rough stroked across the vulnerable skin of my throat, and I jerked. I could not help it. I felt the sensation again and realized the creature had licked me.
Perhaps it tasted me to see if I was worthy of eating; perhaps it sought information about me through the saltiness of my skin, the panic oozing through my pores. I did not know. I only know I whimpered in fear, and it pulled back, staring at me nose to nose. It lifted one of its massive paws, placing it on the bed between us. The claws gleamed dark and deadly before they slowly retracted into their sheaths.
The creature stared at me. I stared into its eyes, then at the paw, then back at the creature again.
And I understood.
It would not attack me. Not yet, anyway. But it was curious, perhaps as curious about me as I was about him. Its gaze slid down my body again, which had begun to tremble and quake beneath the counterpane with the fight-or-flight instinct inherent in every prey. The creature lowered his sharp teeth, and taking one corner of the counterpane in his mouth, pulled it out of my hands. I released the useless shield, letting it go.
Let him examine me. Let him do what he wanted, as long as he let me live.
His quest continued, inquiries posed by a nose with which he prodded and poked and bumped me, investigating my nooks and crannies through my clothing so thoroughly that, when his head dipped low between my thighs, I gasped and had the temerity to smack him on the nose.
“Stop now,” I said sternly and without thinking.
To my astonishment, it did. It blinked at me as though it was as surprised as I at its obedience to my command.
Not at all certain the timing was a coincidence, I decided to attempt another one. “Back away. You are frightening m-me out of my wits.”
After a subtle hesitation, the creature withdre
w, sitting on its haunches. It wrapped its tail around its back legs, gazing at me with a stately tilt of its head.
Somehow, it had understood and complied, but I did not think for one moment it had become the subject and I the master. Its razor-sharp claws, teeth, and sheer bulk put it firmly in control. It obeyed because it chose to, and the bright gleam in its eyes reminded me that I should not forget it.
“What do you want?” I whispered. “Why have you come?”
It did not respond, although by now I think I would not have been surprised to hear it speak.
“Will you—will you let me up?” To test it, I slowly moved toward the edge of the bed, prepared at any moment to stop in case it expressed displeasure. I gained the territory of the floor and stood on shaky knees.
It gave a slow blink.
I sidled toward the door, gauging the distance between it and me.
The creature rose on all fours, drilling me with its narrowed gaze. The warning was clear. I was not to leave.
I slowly sat on the bed, realizing I was now a hostage of the Terror of Ynys Nos. I had no idea what he wanted of me.
“Am I to be at your mercy all day? Has Gerard sent you to ensure I obey his edicts?”
At the mention of Gerard’s name, his ears twitched, but he did not otherwise react.
I clamped my hands over the edge of the bed, clasped my trembling knees together. We were at an impasse, it seemed. I could not simply sit here until he decided to let me go, if indeed he ever did. On the other hand, I was not brave enough to contradict his obvious desire to have me stay.
I chewed on my lip, trying to think what to do next. When he approached, I tensed, fear spiking through me again. He turned his body at the last moment and pressed his back against my knees and hands, waiting. I was momentarily confused, but in a flash I understood what he wanted.
He would allow me to explore him the way he had explored me, quid pro quo.
I could not resist the opportunity. I was drawn to touch him, and so I stretched my fingers out and tentatively stroked the dark sable of his fur. When he did not object, my touch became firmer, and I began to explore.
