by Mia Gabriel
My role as Eve to his Master was done. Our game, our affair, or whatever it had been had lasted thirteen days, but one day short of what we’d promised each other. If we’d both dared and been more honest, it might have lasted far longer than that. But neither of us had been that brave, and now it was over.
The knowledge pressed like a leaden weight upon me, dull, heavy, and unforgiving. There wasn’t so much a pain as a hollow sadness that was beyond the showy emotion of tears and full of regret for what might had been. I tried not to think of his smile, his touch, the way he looked at me, and how he’d loved me. Because there had been love between us, too. I don’t think I’d imagined it, yet that was also done now. Already I felt the emptiness that he’d left in me, a void that I doubted I’d ever be able to fill.
I’d make only the briefest appearance at the reception, and then I intended to return alone to the Savoy. I’d leave London as soon as I could arrange it. I’d no wish to remain here in a world that was so much Savage’s, even if he, too, was leaving. Paris was of course out of the question, but Florence might be a haven, or Venice, that city of lost souls.
I felt the pressure of the rings on my nipples, his last gift to me. I considered removing them now, here in the carriage while Lady Tremayne slept unawares. If I was no longer Eve, then I’d no right to be wearing them. But my hand reached for my bodice, then stopped. Savage had put them there. If that was our last shared intimate act, his final caress, then I wanted to prolong it as long as I could.
By the time our carriage finally reached the Palace steps, I felt as distanced from myself as Savage must have. It was almost as if I were in a play and I were in the audience, not on the stage.
With Lady Tremayne at my side I joined the long line of other women waiting their turns. With my train looped over my left arm the line inched through the various antechambers and into St. James’s Gallery. The marchioness and I continued our silence, for which I was grateful in my present mood.
I was only vaguely aware of the distance the other women were keeping from me. Because of Savage I’d become that scandalous American lady, and I imagined what they would have thought if they could have seen the rings squeezing my nipples beneath my dress. Whispering, sharp-eyed mothers in line around me were pointedly shielding their virginal daughters from my taint.
At any other time, I would have laughed at their vigilance. So would Savage, and I pushed back the little rush of sadness that he wasn’t there with me. Not that he could be, of course, considering that Drawing Room presentations were for ladies only, but for the last weeks we’d been so nearly inseparable that it felt odd not to have him with me.
Finally Lady Tremayne and I reached the entrance to the Throne Room, and even I couldn’t help but feel awed by all the crimson and gold. Three pages arranged my train behind me, Lady Tremayne handed a card with my name to the Lord Chamberlain at the door, and with a deep breath I glided across the room towards the king and queen, seated on their thrones.
As the Lord Chamberlain announced my name I curtseyed before them as I’d practiced, so low that my knee nearly touched the floor. My heart was racing so fast that I’d only the briefest impression of the queen, but the king clearly remembered me and his smile was full of warmth.
“Mrs. Hart,” he said. “I trust now that you’ve found your way to the Palace, we shall see a great deal more of you.”
Being singled out like this was a great sign of favor, and I blushed.
“Thank you, Your Majesty,” I murmured, praying he wouldn’t say anything of Savage. “I’m honored to be here.”
But all he did was nod and look up expectantly for the next lady, and I was spared. Pages appeared again to help with my train, and I curtseyed backwards (for no one could turn her back on royalty) the long way out of the room without mishap. As I was guided to yet another antechamber an eager young man hurried up to me.
“Please, Mrs. Hart, this way to the photographers,” he said. “They are waiting to take your picture, as a memento of the day for you.”
I knew better than to agree to that. Every ball in New York had photographers happy to take a stage picture for a sizable fee and then sell the images to the press. The less I had to remind me of this day, the better.
“Thank you, no,” I said briskly, walking faster to pass him.
But he didn’t give up, following me. “The New York papers have asked specifically for pictures of you, ma’am.”
“Then the New York papers must be disappointed,” I said. I glanced around me, looking for one of Savage’s bodyguards, but saw none. I had my answer about them, then; my protective escorts must have ended with Savage’s attentions, or perhaps he’d simply felt I wouldn’t require them while I was in the Palace. “Now leave me at once, sir, else I’ll call for assistance.”
That was enough to make the man melt away from me. I’d planned to leave now, but not knowing my way out of the Palace and feeling safer in the hordes than alone, I fell in with the others. Lady Tremayne had vanished, her duty done, and I entered the reception room pointedly alone.
The large room was already filling with people, for here the ladies who’d survived the presentation ordeal were being noisily reunited with their fathers and husbands. A small musical ensemble played in one corner, and long tables were set with a light supper buffet. I was interested in nothing beyond finding my way out and summoning a cab, and I made my way through the crowded room as best I could. I nodded at the few faces I recognized, but didn’t stop. I was in no mood for small talk, and the sooner I could retreat to my hotel rooms, the better.
I felt someone catch me around the arm. I scowled, determined to be as discouraging as possible as I turned around to face whoever had dared to grab me.
“Evelyn,” Savage said. “I kept my word, didn’t I?”
I gasped, shocked to see him and yet overjoyed, too. Unlike most of the other men, who wore bright uniforms or Court dress with medals and sashes, he’d chosen his usual black and white evening clothes for the reception alone, standing out from the rest in a devastatingly handsome way. I’d been so convinced I’d never see him again that having him here now was almost too much to bear. Only the fact that we were in such a public place kept me from throwing my arms around him and kissing him the way I wanted to.
He smiled crookedly. “Are you that surprised to see me?”
“I thought our—The Game was over,” I blurted out in a rush. “I thought I’d never see you again.”
He slid his hand higher along my upper arm to touch the bare skin above my long gloves, the slightest touch, but enough to make me shiver with longing.
“It could have been that, yes,” he admitted. “It might have been. But I would have been an ass to let you go now, and I would’ve always regretted it.”
“So would I,” I confessed breathlessly, the purest truth. It wasn’t a promise for eternity, not from either one of us. I knew that. But for now, it was enough.
“I’m not ready to let you go, Evelyn,” he said. His voice rumbled rough with urgency. “Not when there is too much left unfinished between us.”
I nodded, my emotions running wild as the very air crackled with desire between us. All around us people were pausing curiously to watch, sensing that something dramatic, something scandalous, was about to happen between us.
I wasn’t convinced it wouldn’t.
“Beneath my dress, Master, I am still wearing your gifts,” I said, my voice soft so that no one else could overhear. “They’ve squeezed my nipples tight exactly as you wanted, even as I bowed before the queen.”
His eyes gleamed. “Then you earned your reward, Eve,” he said. “Do you see that gallery, there, overlooking us?”
I followed his glance up. An open passageway with thick pillars ran along one upper wall. The space was dark, unlit, and appeared unused, with a screen of pierced stone to shield whoever walked along it.
“They say the old queen used to sit there when she wished to observe, but not be seen he
rself,” Savage said. “His Majesty has told me how he’d put the space to better use with adventurous ladies when he was younger. There was the sense of being completely exposed to those below even if no one thought to look up—or at least they wouldn’t as long as the lady kept quiet. That, he said, was the real challenge.”
“Oh, Master,” I said, my imagination racing ahead. “Is this another challenge, or a reward?”
He smiled. “For us, Eve, I believe it shall be both,” he said. “I know how the possibility of interruption, of being seen, always inspires you.”
I blushed, knowing how right he was, and lightly bit my lower lip. With him I’d always found the chance of being caught wildly exciting.
“Walk with me,” he said, offering me his arm. “I know the way to the back stairs.”
I tucked my fingers into the crook of his arm, perfectly decorous, and we began walking together slowly through the crowd. We nodded at those we knew, but didn’t stop, and even as Savage smiled benignly at this lord or lady he continued to describe what he intended to do to me as soon as we were alone. The small ensemble continued, to play in one corner, and their music masked his words—except to me.
“I want you to bend over by the balustrade, with your face before the screen,” he said, his voice deep and seductive. “Will you do that for me, Eve?”
“For you, Master, I will,” I said breathlessly.
He nodded, his sidelong glance knowing and tempting at the same time.
“As soon as we are upstairs, I want you to keep your hands on the balustrade and your legs wide apart and ass in the air, the way I like it,” he continued. “Then I’ll push aside your train and your skirts, and I’ll fuck you hard. That’s how you like it best, isn’t it? Hard and fast and hot. All you must do is keep quiet. Not a sound. Because if you cry out, everyone will look up, and see you with my cock in your cunt, and know how you couldn’t wait another minute for it.”
I was already shamelessly wet from his words alone, and my sex was so swollen and ripe that each step was a kind of torment as the tension built within me. My nipples ached, and arousal made the rings tighten so much that I longed to rub them now, here, in the hallway outside the reception room. There were fewer other people here, and desire made me bold.
“Hurry, Master,” I said, curling my fingers into his well-muscled arm. “You know I’m not good at waiting.”
“Mrs. Hart, my lord, good evening to you both,” said Baron Blackledge, suddenly looming to my left. “How lovely you are in your Court dress, my dear.”
Instantly Savage stepped between us, shielding me from the other man with his body. Beneath his elegant evening clothes, he was coiled and ready to strike, his hatred for Blackledge barely contained.
“I warned you to keep away from Mrs. Hart,” he said, each word edged like a knife. “She wants nothing to do with you, and neither do I.”
But Blackledge only smiled, his bright blue eyes sinking in the fat of his cheeks. “You assume that I would force you to accompany me, Mrs. Hart, when nothing could be farther from the truth.”
“I don’t assume it, my lord,” I said, unable to keep silent. “I don’t because I know it to be true.”
“Perhaps, perhaps,” he said, his gaze roaming so freely over my bodice that I flushed, feeling that he surely must be somehow seeing through my dress to the jewels on my nipples. “But you see, I believe there are other ways to persuade you that we belong together. If you came to me of your free will, then—”
“That will never happen,” I said vehemently. “Never. Good evening, my lord.”
I turned away, but he caught my arm again, leaning so close into me that I felt the heat of his breath on my bare shoulders.
“‘Never’ is a word with little meaning to me, Mrs. Hart,” he said easily. “I do not accept it. When I see something I want, I do not rest until it is mine, and you—”
“That’s enough,” Savage said curtly. “We are leaving.”
But Blackledge laughed, slipping his hands casually into the pockets of his trousers, a gesture meant to show he’d no interest in answering Savage’s obvious threat.
“Another moment or two, Savage, and I think the lady will be persuaded,” he said, chuckling still. “As I said, I have no intention of forcing her to do anything against her will. Rather, I wish her to come to me of her own accord.”
“She will never do that,” Savage said curtly, distrusting Blackledge’s show of bonhomie.
“Yes, yes, never this, never that,” Blackledge continued easily. “How certain you both are of the future! But I still say Mrs. Hart will agree to join me for supper this very night, and do so, oh, within the next quarter hour.”
“You’re mad, Blackledge,” Savage said. “And if we were not here in the Palace, I would show you exactly how I’d—”
“Forgive me, Savage, but it appears my estimation wasn’t quite right,” Blackledge said as a Palace footman bowed before us, bearing a silver salver with a sealed letter. “She’ll be abandoning you for me within five minutes. I believe that’s for you. I didn’t think I’d have the pleasure of watching you receive it.”
Savage glowered at Blackledge, then at the footman. “What is this?”
“It is for you, my lord,” the man said, holding the salver up to him.
Savage stared at the letter with distrust for another minute before he snatched it up and broke the seal. He read the message swiftly, his face flushing.
“What kind of damned joke is this, Blackledge?” he demanded, crumpling the sheet in his fingers. “If you do anything to my son—”
“Not Lawton,” I said quickly, already fearing the worst. “Oh, please, you cannot hurt that boy!”
Savage thrust the paper towards me; not only had he crumpled the edges of the paper, but his hand was shaking. As soon as I read the single sentence I understood why.
I HAVE YOUR SON.
Blackledge
“Why should I believe you, Blackledge?” Savage said. His voice was sharp with anger, but I could also hear the fear. “My son was sent away from London earlier this morning in the care of a tutor.”
“I thought you might say that,” the baron said. “It was easy enough to pluck the boy when they stopped at an inn. The old fellow accompanying him hardly put up any fuss at all.”
Relishing his advantage, he reached into the inner pocket of his coat and withdrew a single button, holding it out in his palm. I didn’t have to look closer to recognize it as one from Lawton’s jacket, engraved with the family’s crest.
Savage snatched the button from the other man’s hand and closed his fingers protectively around it. “Where is my son now?”
“In a cab not far from here,” Blackledge said. “For now, he’s safe.”
“Take me to him,” Savage demanded. “I want to see for myself that he’s unharmed.”
“What, and have you summon the police?” Blackledge chuckled. “I’m not such a fool as that. No, my people have orders to keep him safe for the next hour, unless I send word otherwise. But only an hour, just to make certain you attempt nothing foolishly heroic.”
Savage let his head fall forward, swearing with frustration under his breath. I drew closer to him, placing my hand on his arm in wordless sympathy. To my surprise, he took my hand and linked his fingers into mine, as if I were his single lifeline in the middle of Blackledge’s calculated cruelty.
“What do you want from me in return for the boy’s safety, Blackledge?” he asked heavily. “Money, influence, whatever it is that a bastard like you craves. Name it, and give me back my son.”
Blackledge chuckled again. “What I want is simple enough,” he said. “I want your woman.”
“No,” Savage said, stunned. “That is not possible.”
“Wait, Savage, please,” I begged as my head spun with shock and guilt. I should have guessed that this was what Blackledge had meant by my willingness, but I’d never dreamed he’d resort to kidnapping and blackmail to get it. I truly
had become his obsession, and it sickened me. The obvious solution would be to summon the police and have the baron arrested, but I knew that Savage would refuse to do that. I guessed that Blackledge himself must know that, too, or had simply been willing to gamble.
“Anything else, Blackledge,” Savage was saying. “Anything else.”
Blackledge only smiled. “I’m afraid not,” he said. “Mrs. Hart is the only thing of yours that I desire, and the one I mean to have.”
“You must take us to the boy first,” I said, my voice shaking a bit with fear. I wasn’t sure what would happen next, but Lawton had saved me once before and I meant to do my best to save him in return now. “We must see that he is as unharmed as you say before I agree to anything.”
Savage looked at me sharply. “Evelyn, no,” he said. “Do not even consider this, not for a moment.”
I squeezed his hand to reassure him, hoping he would understand. But if I’d ever wanted proof that he cared for me then the look in his eyes—fear, love, and possessiveness, all rolled together—was more proof than I ever could want.
“I’m not considering anything yet,” I said, choosing my words carefully as I tried to both calm Savage and not antagonize Blackledge. “Lawton must come first.”
Finally Savage nodded curtly. “Very well, Blackledge,” he said. “Lead us—both of us—to where you’re keeping my son.”
The baron’s eyes narrowed. “This will be done by my rules, Savage, not yours.”
“Both of us together,” Savage insisted. “I’m not letting you have her alone.”
“Not yet,” corrected Blackledge as he smiled at me. “Not yet.”
I couldn’t help but shiver and drew closer to Savage. Yet we’d no choice but to follow the baron from the Palace to his waiting motorcar. Savage and I sat facing Blackledge, and none of us spoke, the silence weighed with menace. Night had fallen, and clouds hid the moon and the stars. In their place the streetlamps offered their garish light, turning my white Court dress a sickly pale green and making all the costly embroidery glitter like a cheap theatre costume.
