“Don’t you dare try to see her.”
“Then tell me how you persuaded her to pretend to be married to Colt when she was in love with someone else.”
“Very well,” Triesta said finally, frostily, “I’ll tell you, though it won’t do you any good, because you can’t undo what’s been done.” She then went on to recount how, when Colt was injured, the crewman who’d found him assumed Lorena was his wife because she was there. Regretfully, he had told her her husband was dead. Lorena had been stunned, shocked, did not think to correct him, and when it was discovered Colt was actually alive, but unconscious, she remained by his side as a concerned friend and, unintentionally, was thought to be his wife.
“Lorena is so naive and stupid sometimes,” Triesta sneered. “She was so upset by your supposedly being washed overboard and killed, and there was Colt near death, that she went into some kind of stupor and paid no attention to anything going on. I took over, as I always have to do, and by the time we reached New York, the only people in authority that mattered presumed she was you, and I let them go on thinking that. Once we got Colt into the hospital and Lorena realized what I’d allowed to happen, she made a feeble protest, but I made her agree to let it go on.”
Jade shook her head, dazed by such madness, whispered, “Why? Why would she allow you to do something so insane?”
Triesta all but snarled, “Because I told her if she didn’t, I’d send her to a convent for wayward girls and pay them to keep her there till she rotted. Pretending to be married to Colt was a viable alternative. Heaven knows, I’d been trying for ages to marry her off. It certainly wasn’t in my favor to have a spinster on my hands.” She flashed a gloating grin. “It’s worked out well. Colt is good to her, and he adores the baby. That was a plus I hadn’t counted on—that she’d get pregnant right away.
“In fact”—she paused for effect, wanting to twist the knife a little deeper—“she admitted she got pregnant while Colt was convalescing in the hospital, a few days before he was discharged. She got right in the bed with him, right there in his hospital room, and—”
“Stop it!” Jade screamed, covering her ears with her hands and swinging her head from side to side. She did not want to hear it, for that had to have been around the time he’d lain there in a stupor calling her name. Had he, in his dizziness, thought he was making love to her?
Triesta was satisfied she’d gotten her point across. “You must realize that there’s nothing you can do except forget him. You’ve got a nice husband now, from what I’ve heard about him, and you should be grateful. If you continue to chase after Colt, you’ll only succeed in making a lot of people unhappy.”
She walked toward the door, paused to say, “I realize that Lorena isn’t as beautiful or exciting as you, Jade. And I also realize that even if Colt doesn’t find out who you really are, he might be tempted to leave her for someone like you. But even if Lorena is no competition, I think you’ll have to agree I am…”
Jade watched, mutely, as Triesta swung the door wide open and left, When she’d gone, Jade could only collapse in a heap on the floor and let the tears wash over her.
At that moment, she wished she had died in the angry sea, never to know such anguish and pain in this world.
The telephone rang.
Jade moaned, lifted her head to stare with bleary eyes at the instrument.
It continued to ring as Colt would not give up hoping she was there.
Finally, she knew what she must do: see him one, more time to tell him it was over. She would tell him what she had decided in these tragic moments as the dream had ended. She was going back to Russia, back to her family, her people.
She struggled to her feet, lifted the receiver, did not utter a greeting but instead raggedly whispered, “Nine. Tonight.”
She hung up the telephone, moving in a daze to dress and leave the studio.
When the door closed behind her, Lita stepped out from behind the curtain of the dressing alcove at the farthest end of the studio.
Things were, Lila thought and smiled with satisfaction, working out far better than she’d hoped!
Chapter Thirty-Two
When Jade arrived home, she found Bryan sitting in the glass sun porch. He did not look up as she entered but continued his unseeing vigil into the outer world beyond. “Good afternoon,” he said tonelessly.
She removed her gloves with quick, jerking movements. “How long have you been back?” she asked stiffly.
“Apparently since right after you left this morning, according to the servants.” Then he turned to face her, eyes cold, accusing. “Where were you, Jade?”
Her gaze flicked over him contemptuously as she sat down on the divan opposite.
He repeated, “I asked where you were, Jade.”
She remained silent and continued to stare at him.
His mouth was an angry, set line. “Very well. If you don’t tell me where you were this morning, suppose you tell me why you chose not to come back from the Valley when you said you would.”
Still she did not speak.
He lifted his hands and slammed them angrily against the arms of his chair as he leaned forward. “You’ve been acting funny ever since you ran into Coltrane. I don’t know what the hell is going on, but you’re my wife, and I want some answers. Now.”
She bestowed a frosty smile. “You’re wrong, Bryan. I’m not your wife and I never was, because our marriage wasn’t legal, and you know it.”
His head snapped back in surprise. He hadn’t expected this. “What are you saying? Of course our marriage is legal. I told you that your other ceremony was in a foreign country, and—”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“In the eyes of God—”
“In the eyes of God,” she sneered. “In my eyes, you’re a contemptible scoundrel.”
He reeled as though she had slapped him. Slowly, menacingly, he got to his feet to tower above her. In a deadly voice, he commanded, “I think you’d better explain yourself, woman.”
Jade also rose, though the top of her head hardly reached his chin. “You’re the one who needs to explain, Bryan…explain why you lied about what was in that Pinkerton report.”
Obviously, he’d not expected that, either, and he swung around to go to the small liquor cabinet set against one wall. “Why—I—I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he sputtered, hedging. He filled a glass with Scotch from a crystal decanter, downed it in one gulp.
“I saw the report, Bryan. I went to your office and tricked Miss Pearson into opening your safe, and I read with my own eyes how the detectives told you everything—about Colt suffering from amnesia, how he was reportedly married to Lorena Vordane in Paris—which you knew wasn’t possible,” she added testily. “You kept all that from me because you knew I’d never marry you if I’d known the truth about Colt’s condition.”
He decided it was useless to lie. “So? Can you blame me? I was willing to do anything to get you to marry me.” He whipped about to look at her in abject misery. “Surely you can’t hate me when my only motive was love.”
Her expression told him she could.
He spread his hands in a helpless gesture. “When I got the report, he’d already been discharged from the hospital and was living in the Vordane house as Lorena Vordane’s husband.”
“You should have told me.”
“Why? What could you have done about it?”
“Oh, Bryan, don’t be ridiculous. You know what I would’ve done—marched over there and claimed my husband, my real husband—the one I’m still very legally married to. But you manipulated me into thinking he never really loved me and that was the reason he could marry so quickly after I was supposed to have been killed. You got me so fired up and furious that I married you as a kind of vengeance. Only it wasn’t a real marriage, and we both know it. Just like Colt isn’t legally married to Lorena. We are still married to each other!”
He stared at her thoughtfully fur a moment, then s
hrugged. “Maybe so,” he said flippantly, then went on to confidently point out, “but there’s absolutely nothing you can do about it, my dear, except hurt a lot of people. Including Colt. He thinks he’s married to Lorena. And she’s given birth to his son. You can’t change that. All you’ll succeed in doing is stirring up trouble and scandal.”
Jade knew all that but was not about to give him the satisfaction of agreeing with him. She regarded him coldly for a moment, then said with finality, “I’m leaving you.”
His eyes widened for an instant, and then he laughed off the incredulity of such a possibility. “You know I’d never allow that to happen, Jade. And why would you want to? We were happy before all this. This trouble has come up quickly and can end just as quickly. We’ll just forget about it and go back to the way we were before.”
He set his glass aside, crossed the room to attempt to take her in his arms, but she slapped away his reaching hands. “No, Bryan, we can’t go back to the way we were, because all of that was based on a lie. I could never trust you again. And I can’t forgive you for what you did.”
Furious, he cried, “You said yourself Colt doesn’t know who you are. How can you go to him and tell him all this? Turn his life upside down, ruin his son’s life?”
“I’m not going to,” she said simply. “You’re right, Bryan. I can’t undo what’s been done, but I don’t have to live my life with a man who’s so selfish and egotistical he’ll stop at nothing to get what he wants. I’m leaving you, but not to pursue Colt. He’s gone to me forever. I’m going to do what I should’ve done long ago. I’m going home!”
She turned to leave, but he grabbed her arm, fingers digging painfully into her flesh as he yanked her so tightly and close against him she could feel his furious breath on her face.
“You weren’t thinking about Coltrane all those nights you moaned with passion in my arms, Jade,” he boldly challenged, his eyes burning into hers. “Can you forget that? Can you so easily toss aside all those beautiful memories of our time on our island? No! You can’t deny you loved me when our sexual relationship was so wonderful!”
She laughed up at him. “Oh, Bryan, that doesn’t prove anything. You don’t have to be madly in love with someone to enjoy sex. All that proved was that we enjoyed each other.”
He stared down at her as though seeing a stranger and gasped, “That’s no way for a lady to talk!”
Again she laughed. “When it comes to good sex, Bryan, there’s no place for a lady!”
She walked out.
He screamed after her, “I won’t let you. I’ll stop you, Jade. I swear it. You’re my wife, and you’re just upset, but when you calm down, you’ll see how crazy you’re reacting to all this…”
She kept on going, and he heard her footsteps clattering through the house, then disappearing upstairs.
He picked up his glass and smashed it against a wall.
“Mr. Stevens…”
He turned at the sound of the timid voice, saw Lita peering hesitantly from the door that led to the lawn. Annoyed, he growled, “Yes, what is it?”
She stepped inside, clenched her teeth to suppress the triumphant smile that was making the corners of her mouth twitch, then began, “There’s something you need to know…”
Jade locked herself in her room, strained to push a larger dresser against the door. She had no intention of arguing with Bryan further. Her mind was made up, and for the first time since the nightmare had begun, she was confident of the future. She was going home, and no one would stop her.
She had also decided it would be less painful for Colt if he didn’t know her plans. She’d see him one more time, love him for one more time…to remember always and ever…and then she’d leave America.
Her plans were simple, but she knew she’d have to keep them secret—Bryan might try to stop her. Right now he thought she was just angry, was confident she’d calm down later and accept things as they were. It was that kind of arrogance that had brought all this about, she fumed. So she’d be careful. Monday morning she’d take her money from the bank, then hide out somewhere until she could book passage to Europe.
A short while later Bryan knocked on her door, called to her, “Please, Jade. We need to talk about this.”
She did not respond.
He went away, returning an hour or so later to announce dinner was being served. Still she did not answer. She heard him sigh loudly, say he’d have a tray left outside her door. “We’ll talk tomorrow, when you’ve had time to think about how foolish you’re being, Jade. You can’t throw away what we’ve had together.”
She bit back a caustic retort, thought how ironic it was she’d been unable to forget happy memories with Colt yet now found it difficult to remember any with Bryan. That, she realized, told her where her heart and loyalty belonged!
Cursing because waiting until dark would make her late meeting Colt, Jade impatiently counted the minutes before she felt secure in sneaking out without being seen. She dared not go through the house. Her litheness and dexterity from so many years of dancing helped as she easily made her way down the trellis outside her window to drop gracefully to the ground below. Then she hurried through the shadows to her bicycle, mounted, and pedaled furiously toward the city proper and her studio.
No one was about, and she let herself in at the ground floor, rushing up the stairway. Before she even reached the landing outside the door to her studio, she could hear footsteps quickly ascending behind her but felt no panic, for she knew, with a tremulous skip-beat of her heart, that it was Colt.
She had just inserted the key in the lock, twisted the knob, when he grabbed her from behind. Nuzzling the back of her neck with warm, eager lips, he whispered huskily, “Where’ve you been, princess? I’ve been waiting over an hour. I was afraid something had happened and you couldn’t make it.”
Jade blinked back tears of joyful remembrance. He’d called her princess. Did he somehow remember that was his pet name for her, or was it a casual endearment with no specific meaning? She dared not ask.
She turned in his arms, eager for his kiss. He lifted her in his arms, moving inside, closing the door with his foot. The room was dappled with light rising from streetlamps below. He could see to make his way across the room, to where a sofa was positioned against one wall. Laying her down gently, he began to remove her clothing. “I’ve got to have you, little one. Now. I can’t wait any longer. I’ve thought of nothing else except how wonderful it is to be with you. I can’t imagine ever wanting another woman more.”
When she was naked before him, he bent to kiss each nipple to taut erectness, his tongue moving down to savor her china-white skin, glistening in the milky light from outside.
“It was always this good for us, wasn’t it?” He smiled down at her fondly as he stood to unfasten his trousers, then straddled her there on the sofa.
“Yes…” she gasped in ecstasy. “Yes, it was always good, and we never got enough.”
And then there was no need for words. With great tremors, they clutched each other, both moaning and crying aloud with the awesome splendor of their love.
Afterward, Colt trailed a fingertip down her cheek. “I had another dream, my precious. This time it was about a beautiful lady with bright golden-red hair and sparkling violet eyes, and a man who looked just like me. I think it was my mother and father.”
“It was,” Jade said, eager to hear more.
“I thought so. I talked to Lorena about it, described the people in the dream, and asked if she knew who they were. She wouldn’t talk about it—said I shouldn’t be thinking about things like that because it gives me a headache.”
“Does it?”
He drew in his breath, let it out slowly, trailed his, finger down to dance about her still-taut nipples. “Sometimes,” he admitted, “but I can’t let that stop me. I’ve got to keep trying to remember, and it seems my dreams are trying to tell me something.
“There was something else,” he continued, and his
voice had an edge to it. His gaze locked on hers. “I had a dream about a wedding, and you were dressed in white.”
Jade stiffened. Too far. He was going too far, too soon. She tried to sound nonchalant as she proclaimed, “You dreamed of your wedding to Lorena.”
He shook his head. “I don’t think so. I mentioned it to her, and she looked funny. The truth is, I’ve wanted to ask her about you…and why I know you—”
“But you can’t!”
“I know that. I can’t risk her finding out I’m seeing you. Not yet. Not till we make our plans, but I wish I could, because she’d probably slip and tell me something. She gets so nervous when I start asking questions about the past. Did you two know each other before? When you knew me?”
“Vaguely.”
“Before or after I married her?”
Jade felt the creeping shadows of danger. This was to be their last time together, only he did not, could not, know it, and she dared not give him any fodder for future torturous attempts at remembering. “It doesn’t matter,” she said finally, unable to keep the anger from her voice. “Stop thinking about it, Colt. We can’t undo what’s done.”
She pulled out of his embrace and began to dress. Reluctantly, Colt reached for his own clothes.
“That was you in the wedding dress.”
She turned sharply to stare at him, felt an icy chill move over her.
“Are we divorced, Jade?” He looked straight at her, demanding an answer. “Is that why I’m so drawn to you? Because we were really married but stupidly got a divorce? I’ve a right to know the truth, and I intend to have it. I was set to ask Lorena this morning, no matter the consequences, but when I got up, she was gone. Her mother said she took the baby and went away to visit relatives somewhere in New England…wouldn’t say where. I’ve got a sneaking feeling she left because of the questions I’ve been asking lately.”
He went over to her, gripped her shoulders, and gave her a frustrated shake. “Something’s going on, Jade! And you’ve got to tell me what it is.”
With more misery than she’d ever known in her life, Jade blinked back tears as she looked up into his dear, beloved face. “Oh, Colt…my dear, sweet Colt. I wish I could explain everything, but some things are better left alone.”
Love and Dreams: The Coltrane Saga, Book 6 Page 31
