The Seventh Night

by Amanda Stevens

  She was nearly whispering now, glancing over her shoulder as though making sure we were alone. “Reid is a very determined young man, Christine. He’s very ambitious. That hotel means everything to him, just as it did his father and his grandfather. In some strange way, his identity as a St. Pierre is all tied up in that pile of mortar and bricks. I suspect it has something to do with the family having lost everything at one time. Reid has a lot of pride, you know.”

  So I’d noticed. “What do you mean, they ‘lost everything’?”

  “Well,” she said, looking uneasy, “I’m not one to carry tales, but in a way you are family…. Years ago, Reid and Angelique’s father lost everything—the hotel, this house, their money—by gambling. The family was destitute. They had to sell all their personal valuables and belongings to meet the rest of the debt. I’ve heard some of the older employees talking about how Reid—he was only twelve or thirteen at the time—stayed at the auction all day and well into the night, watching the family’s possessions being sold one by one. It made a very deep impression on him.”

  I had a sudden mental image of an adolescent Reid, standing alone from the crowd, watching his heritage being dismantled piece by piece. In some strange way, it made me feel a little closer to him.

  “Afterward they moved to the States, to Chicago,” Mrs. DuPrae continued. “But I don’t think Reid has ever gotten over the humiliation. From what I understand, he blamed his father. They had a terrible falling-out. It may be hard for you and me to comprehend, but when a family like the St. Pierres loses all their worldly possessions, as well as their dignity, it affects them in…a lot of ways. It sometimes changes them.”

  “I suppose that’s why Reid seems so protective of the hotel,” I murmured.

  “Oh, yes. It’s his heritage, you see. God help anyone who threatens it.”

  * * *

  “How did you sleep last night?”

  I was standing in the living room, gazing at the portrait of Claudine St. Pierre Greggory which adorned the wall over the mantel. Reid’s voice cut through the silence of the room, but he didn’t startle me. I’d been aware of his presence ever since he’d entered the room moments earlier. Now, as he spoke, I made a concentrated effort to appear calm and casual as I turned to greet him, but my heart was pounding so loudly, I thought Reid must surely hear it.

  “I slept well, thank you,” I lied. There was a glint in his eyes, and I suspected he knew what I was trying to do. I turned my attention back to the portrait. “Your mother was a beautiful woman, wasn’t she?”

  “Yes, she was.” He crossed the room and came to stand beside me. My breath caught in my throat. He was standing so near, I could smell the deep, provocative scent of his cologne.

  I could see him out of the corner of my eye, studying me as I pretended to study the painting, and my knees began to tremble. He was dressed for work in a dark, double-breasted suit. He would have looked more at home on Wall Street than on a tropical island. But, then, dressing for success was the same anywhere, I guessed. And I had a feeling everything Reid did was calculated for success.

  “Angelique looks very much like her,” he remarked. “Though she wouldn’t appreciate my saying so.”

  “Why not?” Why wouldn’t anyone want to look like this beautiful creature? I thought enviously.

  “She and Mother never got along very well. Angelique never forgave her for marrying your father.”

  “But I thought—”

  “You thought we were all one big happy family.” His tone grew slightly acerbic. “I thought it might interest you to know that you and Angelique have more in common than you might think. Old grudges die hard, don’t they, Christine?”

  “Sometimes they do,” I agreed, remembering what Mrs. DuPrae had told me about Reid and his father. “Our parents’ mistakes have a way of haunting us. Your mother’s and my father’s actions have affected a great many lives.”

  “But there are always two sides to every story,” Reid said. “Besides, humans have a weakness where passion is concerned. They can behave irrationally. But then, you probably already know that. After all, you did marry young—and hastily, from what I heard. You must have been swept off your feet.”

  “Yes,” I said. “I was swept off my feet.” But not by my husband.

  I gazed up at him, and the look in his eyes made memories of last night come rushing back. I’d tried to keep them at bay all morning, but standing so near him now, hearing his voice, seeing the passion reflected in his eyes, and remembering…

  “About last night…” I cleared my throat. My face flamed. I cleared my throat again. “I’m afraid I’m not used to drinking. The wine…and…everything…” I gestured vaguely with my hands, avoiding his gaze.

  “Oh, that’s right. You never drink.”

  His words taunted me, mocked my pitiful attempt at an explanation for my actions.

  Why, oh why, did he always make me feel so inexperienced, so…unworthy?

  “But we were talking about our parents, weren’t we? Something you and I also have in common.” He paused, then said, “I take it by your visit here that you and Christopher have mended fences, so to speak.”

  “It’s a start.”

  “Meaning you still have reservations?”

  “Of course I do. I don’t really know him, after all. Until he got in touch with me a few weeks ago, we’d hardly spoken in years.”

  “I still find it strange that he would have contacted you out of the blue like that,” Reid murmured, almost to himself.

  “Why is that strange?” We’d reversed positions all of a sudden. He was studying the portrait of his mother, and I was studying him. He had a marvelous profile, I decided. All the lines of his face were clean and sharp. Very handsome—I felt my mouth grow dry at the thought of his lips on mine, at the image of his arms holding me so close we almost seemed one.

  His gaze shifted suddenly, and I found myself staring into those incredible eyes. My stomach fluttered with awareness, with nerves, and the memory of last night was almost a physical presence in the room with us.

  I wished I had Vinnia’s gris-gris with me, for if ever I needed protection, it was now, with Reid.

  He was thinking about the kiss, too. I just knew it. I could tell by the way he was looking at me, and I could also tell—or hope?—that he was thinking about doing it again.

  The intensity in his eyes deepened.

  The butterflies in my stomach went crazy.

  He took a step toward me, and I think I took a step back, away from him. The blood pounded in my head….

  “Christine—”

  “Reid?” The sound of Angelique’s voice from the doorway startled us both. I jumped; Reid frowned.

  “Why haven’t you left for work yet?” she asked, her gaze cool with accusation as it darted from one to the other of us.

  Reid shrugged, his voice as normal as sunshine. “I’m running late today.”

  Her black-lined eyes narrowed as she walked into the room. “You’re never late. In fact, you rarely spend the night here at this house anymore. He has a suite of rooms at the hotel.” This she said to me, not for clarification, but for emphasis on her next bon mot. “That’s where he usually does his entertaining.”

  “I don’t see you scurrying anxiously off to work, either,” Reid said with an annoyed scowl.

  “Yes, but my interest in the St. Pierre is hardly the same as yours. I’m only an employee, after all,” she said with a very brief but very obvious flash of bitterness. Her eyes turned toward me. “Then, again,” she said slowly, “maybe you are looking out for your interests.”

  My face blazed under her smirking stare, and I had the mortifying impression that she could see right through me, could read every one of my deep, dark secrets.

  “How long do you plan to stay with us, Christine?” she asked as she deliberately turned away from her mother’s painting.

  She was wearing black again today, a tight, knit dress that seemed more suited
for nightclub wear than an office. But I was hardly one to criticize Angelique’s fashion statement. My own simple yellow dress must have looked the very end in boring conservatism. At that moment, I fervently hoped the gold still shone in my brown hair, that my eyes still sparkled with green. But somehow, the longer I was around Angelique, the more ordinary I felt.

  “How long I stay depends on how soon I hear from my father.”

  Her cool eyes gave me an appraising stare. “Don’t you have to get back to your kiddies? You are a teacher, aren’t you?”

  “Yes, I am.” Where was all this leading?

  She smiled. “You know what they say. Those who can, do. Those who can’t, teach. Or dream.”

  It was as if she’d climbed into my head and read my thoughts. How could she know about my dreams? She couldn’t. She’d guessed. Or perhaps, as she’d said, that was all she thought I was capable of doing.

  I think at that moment I began to get angry. And determined. She and Reid had always had things their way. But not this time. If they wanted me gone, they were in for a huge disappointment.

  I tilted my chin and looked her in the eye. “I’m on spring break. But if I need longer, I’ll take a leave of absence.”

  “You may need to,” she said, her own eyes flickering in anger. “Christopher may turn up today, tomorrow, next week. Then again, if we’re lucky, he may never come back.”

  “Angelique, I think you’ve said enough,” Reid said, scowling.

  But his reprimand hardly registered with me. Angelique’s callous dismissal of my father shocked me. She didn’t even pretend to hide her dislike. “What have you got against him?” I asked coldly, not bothering to question my sudden defense of a man who had abandoned me years ago. “What did my father ever do to you?”

  “He killed my father.”

  A sort of stunned silence settled over the room. I stared at Angelique in shocked disbelief. “What are you talking about?”

  “Just what I said.” Her eyes—so much like Reid’s—flashed with blue scorn. “Christopher wanted Mother and he didn’t let anything or anyone stand in his way. Not even Papa. So he killed him.”

  “Angelique, that’s enough! You’re way out of line.” When she started to say more, Reid grabbed her arm. She jerked herself free, and with one last scorching glance in my direction, turned and stalked out of the room.

  I turned on Reid. “What the hell is she talking about?” My language had slipped in my agitation, and Reid’s brow lifted ever so slightly in surprise.

  “As you said, all that’s in the past and best left there.”

  I shook my head. “You can’t drop a bomb like that, and leave it to explode later. I want to know exactly what Angelique meant.”

  Reid sighed, running his fingers through his black hair. “Angelique has a big mouth,” he said darkly, moving across the room toward the terrace doors. He opened one, and a fragrant breeze blew through the room. “Let’s go outside.”

  I followed him through the glass door onto the brick-paved terrace. It was a beautiful morning. Intermixed with the green haze of eucalyptus, banyan and pine trees, an occasional flamboyant flamed scarlet in the misty morning sunlight. Overhead, like a saffron arrow, a formation of tiny yellow birds zeroed in on the uppermost branches of the pines. Their high-pitched chirps filled the air with excited chatter.

  “Well?” I said impatiently. “I’m waiting for an explanation.”

  “Yes, I know,” Reid said dryly. He glanced at me, his blue eyes cool and beckoning. Yet, like still waters, I had a feeling dangerous currents lurked somewhere in those fathomless depths. “You know the story, I’m sure, of how Mother and Christopher met in Chicago and fell in love while they were both still married. They began an affair.” He looked at me, as if carefully gauging my reaction. “Christopher obtained his divorce first. From what I’ve gathered over the years, he and your mother had talked about it for quite some time.”

  “No, they hadn’t,” I contradicted with quick heat. “There was never any mention of a divorce until your mother…until he met Claudine St. Pierre.”

  “You were only a child, Christine. I’m quite certain they wouldn’t have discussed their problems in front of you. At any rate, Christopher was free, but my father, Stephan, refused to grant Mother a divorce. She sued, and there was a very messy custody battle that resulted. Angelique wanted to remain with our father, but in spite of Mother’s affair, the court awarded her sole custody of us both. Angelique never forgave her.”

  “But how can she blame my father for that? He brought you all back over here, to Columbé. He helped you buy back the hotel and this house. In a very real sense, he gave you back your heritage.”

  “Yes,” Reid agreed, but I sensed a hesitation on his part, as though he didn’t fully concur with my assessment.

  “How did your father die?”

  There was a brief flash in Reid’s eyes, no more than a shadow really, but it was enough to leave me with a sort of vague sense of impending doom. I shivered, folding my arms around myself as I waited for his answer.

  He said slowly, as though dredging up the words from some deep, dark, hidden place in his soul, “After court that final day, my father went home and shot himself.”

  CHAPTER SIX

  Long after Angelique and Reid had both left for work, I sat on the terrace in the sunshine, hoping the brilliance of the light would illuminate the darkness that was seeping into my heart. The house loomed behind me, so charming and fanciful in daylight, yet harboring so many secrets. So much hidden passion.

  I wondered if my father had any idea how deeply the consequences of his actions years ago had affected all our lives. And yet, strangely enough, I felt I understood him better now than I ever had before. I could understand a desperate attraction between a man and a woman and how it could happen unexpectedly, without encouragement from either party. The old cliché held true—it just happens.

  It had happened to me.

  But the attraction I felt for Reid could easily become dangerous. I couldn’t allow my feelings to interfere with my judgment. Whatever happened, finding my father had to come first.

  As the sun rose, a shadow fell over the terrace, and I got up, shivering. I walked around the house, toward the front, and as I neared the driveway, I saw Rachel and Mrs. DuPrae standing by a car, talking. The driver’s door was open, and Rachel’s arm was perched on top of the car as she faced her mother. I couldn’t see Mrs. DuPrae’s face, but from Rachel’s scowl, I gathered the two women were arguing.

  I hesitated, but Rachel saw me over Mrs. DuPrae’s shoulder. Both women turned to face me, and identical, placid masks dropped over both their expressions.

  “Christine, Rachel is just on her way to work. Do you need a ride down the mountain? You mentioned something about filing a report,” Mrs. DuPrae said casually.

  “That’d be great. I was wondering what I might do for transportation.”

  “You can drop me off at work, then use my car,” Rachel offered, but I couldn’t tell if it was an offer made out of genuine courtesy or merely obligation. Whatever it was, I ran to get my purse before she changed her mind.

  Within minutes we were heading down the mountain, and I couldn’t help comparing Rachel’s rigid control of the wheel with Reid’s breathtaking casualness. Somehow, Rachel’s caution was far from reassuring. However, I sat back and tried to enjoy the scenery.

  The blaze of sunlight caught the summit to our right, igniting the tips of the trees. Clouds of birds sped across a sky so clear and blue, it looked as fragile as blown glass.

  “So how long have you worked at the St. Pierre?” I asked curiously.

  The brown eyes never left the road. “Ever since graduating from high school.”

  “What do you do?”

  She gave me a glance as though she expected me to already know that answer. “I’m Reid’s personal secretary.”

  I don’t know why that revelation surprised me. Or disturbed me. Was it because, on the
fringes of my mind, I’d noticed the way she’d looked at Reid last night and had wondered about it?

  My imagination again, I chided myself. I was seeing ulterior motives and hidden agendas in everyone’s expressions. And if my imagination was so powerful that I could actually feel a picture burning my fingers, God knows what else it could conjure up. Perhaps even an unrequited love.

  Our gazes met, very briefly, and I smiled. “Columbé’s beautiful,” I said. “You must love it here.”

  “Things are not always what they seem,” she said in a vague, colorless tone. “There are those on Columbé who consider the island little more than a prison.”

  For some reason, her words brought back Vinnia’s obscure warning. “He is alive but not well, the servant of a malfacteur…”

  I looked at Rachel quickly, but nothing about her quiet demeanor gave anything away. She looked serene, guiltless and perhaps even a little sad.

  * * *

  The St. Pierre Hotel was like a magnificent pearl, all shimmering white, set against a green backdrop of lavish tropical landscaping. Crowning the top of a steep cliff, the sprawling complex looked down on the undulating turquoise waters of the Caribbean. Every room would have glorious, sweeping vistas of both sea and mountains. A veritable paradise. Never in my life had I seen anything so beautiful.

  Inside was just as impressive—if a bit overwhelming—with huge glass walls looking down on the sea, towering potted palms crowding every nook and cranny, trailing vines with brilliant blossoms circling columns and outlining arches, tiny birds in gilded cages hanging from the ceiling, and fountains oozing water from dolphins’ mouths and cherubs’ pitchers.

  “Thanks for the ride,” I said to Rachel as we stood just inside the glass doors to the lobby.

  She looked at me in a way that was coolly detached, yet I suspected there was intensity simmering beneath that frozen facade, an intensity she worked to keep hidden.

  “Do you want to see Reid before you go?”