by Meg Hennessy
“I said that when I didn’t know who had Enio. I now do and no longer need you, as you are no longer a suspect.”
Though his point was valid, Colette waved her hand in the air, hoping to dismiss it. With a slight shake of her head, she narrowed her eyes at him. “But I need you to get him back. As I said, I will stick so close to you; your own shadow will be behind me. And you are still a suspect.”
“Ah, Colette, that is very close. Shall I show you how close that is?” He stepped around the table toward her. Expecting his reaction, she had come prepared. From beneath her shawl, she pulled out her small flintlock.
“I go.”
He stepped closer. “You do not.”
She aimed her small shooter at his chest. “I do.”
He stepped closer, so close she could smell the minty oil he had used to bathe. She drew a deep breath, remembering that scent. Her knees caved slightly under the weight of the memory. She forced her feet apart for better balance.
“What did I say about you pointing a pistol at me?”
He reached behind her and pushed the dining room door. As the heavy mahogany fell into the frame, the small click of the latch echoed throughout the room. Her breath caught deep in her throat; standing so close to him, she could hear each breath he took. “I believe I was not listening.”
He leaned in to her; the heat of his skin radiated off her cheek.
“Are you listening now?” he whispered, his breath hot against her cheek, melting her body clear through to the floor. His lips roamed along her throat until he nuzzled her ear, taking a slight nibble on her lobe that made her nearly sway into him. He started to run his hand down her arm and she knew he was angling to take her pistol away. She tilted her face upward to place her lips to the lobe of his jeweled ear. With pistol in hand, she cocked the hammer in his other ear.
She felt him smile, stepping back from her. A tiny spark lit each of his dark eyes and matched the slight turn of his lips. “Si, senora. Perhaps you will go, but only if you are aware when I leave.”
Her heart sank. He wouldn’t.
He would.
She bit her lip thinking through her next step. He had her in check, but she had a few rooks and knights in her arsenal. “If I am left, I will engage my brothers and give chase, to Spain, if necessary.”
He chuckled, his white teeth in contrast to the honey tint of his skin. “Your threat has no meaning, for they will follow, regardless.”
“Perhaps.”
He stepped away from her. His posture stiff and unyielding, he had grown tired of the game. “I will remind la senora, she is still my wife.”
He noted her silence with the nod of his head. He refilled his glass of wine, offering to refill hers, but she declined. “This journey might be a long time at sea.”
“You will catch them soon?”
“Could be, three, four months if we are forced to follow them all the way to Spain.”
“We will not.”
“Then I give you this challenge.” He turned those dark dreamy eyes on her, her skin grew warm all over, and an odd little current traveled down her spine. “Thirty-five days.”
“Thirty-five days?”
“If we are still at sea in thirty-five days, I will bed you as my wife.”
“Thirty-five days? Why that number?”
“Disappointed? Shall we discuss no days, say, zero days and I bed you?” He waited for a response then added, “Tonight.”
Her mind screamed yes, but her lips held tight. The time frame intrigued her, nearly as much as the idea of having him again.
“Thirty-five days?”
“Si, those are the only circumstances under which you will board my ship.”
That little current changed direction and dived deep inside her belly.
“I agree.” Not wanting to discuss her future intimacy with her husband, she left the dining room and headed back up the stairs, the route so familiar she didn’t need to think about where she was going. Yet her teeth chattered slightly, and her heart hammered, radiating up the sides of her neck to her temples. She rubbed tiny circles around them with her fingers to little relief. He had bested her. She had thought to joust and lost. But she’d accepted his challenge. He had to catch that ship. Neither wanted to sail to Spain.
But thirty-five days…why such an odd number?
Could he catch his sister’s ship in thirty-five days?
She pushed the door open to her bedroom and stormed through, noting that the adjoining door to Donato’s room stood open.
He better catch his sister in less than thirty-five days.
“Unfasten quickly, then leave. Merci,” she instructed Clarita, who had shown up to help with the undressing, but Colette wanted to think without distraction. When the door closed behind her servant, Colette dropped her gown.
The soft, luxuriant silk puddled around her feet. She stepped free and picked up the dress, a beautiful green gown heavily trimmed with satin ribbons that set off the low-cut neckline.
Unlike fashions she’d worn since her return home, this dress had been made to speak of Spain, with a tight bodice and sleeves adorned with ruffles. The lower third of the gown had more layers of lace ruffles, highlighted with gold embroidering. Donato had had the dress made for her, supposedly to honor her spirit of fire.
Where did he see that? Colette never saw herself as anything but plain and uninteresting. Spirit of fire…it nearly made her laugh if it weren’t for wishing it to be true. As her memory had slowly returned after seeing the crystal, she felt out of step with the island, with Donato. Dressed in silks and satins, draped with jewels, she had remembered a covenant she made with God. And this life was not a part of it.
She pulled off the lacy mantilla, dappled with diamonds, and unrolled her hair, letting the long tresses fall around her shoulders. She shook her head, loosening the curls and combing through them with her fingers.
She opened the wardrobe and hung her dress on a hook, running her hand across the fabric of another dress; the smooth satin felt like warmed silk. With the candelabra in hand, she allowed herself to fall back in time and opened the door wider to see what had once been her wardrobe. They were gowns of such beauty, bright beautiful colors, that she had taken for granted until now. She fingered their hems, remembering their caressing feel against her skin. Everything in the room had been left as is, as if she had never left.
When recovering from her injury after her abduction, Donato had brought in a seamstress to make a wardrobe for her, for she’d had no gowns with her. She remembered him saying he wanted her in colors to celebrate her beauty and her return to the living. Colette smiled, remembering the joy of wearing such dresses, things that would never have found their way into her wardrobe in America or France, for Spain had her own style of dress.
She fingered the fine jewelry still neatly organized in the top drawer of her cedar chest. Pulling free a pair of long diamond earrings, she slipped them into her ears and felt them dangle against her neck. She glanced into the mirror. Beautiful, all of it.
To the bottom of the wardrobe sat a row of delicately hand-stitched slippers, one pair for every dress. She slipped on a pair, lacing them up, remembering the feel of such quality leather against her feet. What a luxury they were, then and now. She hooked a matching diamond necklace around her neck and placed it to rest within the cleavage of her breasts.
There she stood before the mirror, watching the candlelight play amid the diamonds, dressed in nothing more than a thin cotton chemise, with short sleeves and a low-cut neckline. It had been a long time since she had worn her hair loose and free around her face, and the sudden infusion of freedom brought a painful twist inside her chest as her heart squeezed out one beat after another.
Who was she really? Why, after learning her real identity and being reunited with her family, did she still feel so lost? Because she had forfeited the only life she had ever made for herself, Donato, and her son? If sitting in that chair now, in Enio’s room,
would she again so easily leave? Thinking over that decision, she instinctively knew she’d not make the same one again. She had earned the right to choose something else rather than service, whether Donato or not. She had more than paid her dues for the lives of her parents.
She heard Donato enter his room from the patio. She went to close the adjoining door, not wanting him to see her, but Donato reached it first. He looked her over, taking in the jewelry and chemise. “If you remain in a state of undress, my shadow will have to get out of my way.”
“Your shadow will have to wait for thirty-five days. Not my rule, yours.” She took pleasure in spouting off what he had thought was a check point. He had thought that would deter her from sailing with him. But nothing would; nothing would stop her from boarding his ship.
So far, she had avoided going into Enio’s bedchamber for fear the loneliness and worry would be unbearable, but at this moment the memories of her little baby boy were so strong, she could almost hear her son’s cooing. She spun on her heel, needing to dismiss the want in Donato’s eyes that mirrored her own need for him, and walked into Enio’s room.
There stood the rocker she had been sitting in the day Jordan arrived to take her home. Some of Enio’s clothes still hung over the crib, the ones she had tossed aside in her rush to pack. They would no longer fit the growing boy.
Her life had changed the second Jordan walked through the door, just like it had three years before when pirates had captured her ship. Looking around her son’s room was like a memory come to life with no Enio. Her heart sank; mist filled her eyes.
How could this have happened? And why?
Sensing Donato standing in the doorway, she didn’t turn around, but asked him, “You will catch your sister?”
“Si.”
“Why does she have him?”
“I know only the who, not the why.”
She no longer believed him. His calm aplomb ate at her nerves, making her all the more suspect that he and his sister were a part of some greater plan, and perhaps Colette was a victim once again.
“You must have an idea; you let them take our son.” She turned and faced him.
“I could not stop them.”
But the denials, the questions, the suspicions had twisted themselves in her mind and settled with a heavy weight in her stomach. “Of all the men who ride the sea, you are the most feared man of the gulf, yet someone had the courage to take your son? I do not believe you!”
She rushed toward him, halting a few inches from his body, trying to quiet the angst, the fear, the suspicion that this was a plan. Her heart raced, pounding at her temples, not with anger, but with her desperate need of him.
“It is the only truth, Colette.”
Feeling helpless and missing her son more than she could imagine, she brought up her hand and slapped him.
He said nothing but looked down at her, though she could see the marks of her fury against his skin. “I cannot change what has happened to Enio or…to us.”
The finality of his statement, as if he were through with her, made her anger soar to the surface faster than the storm wailed outside. She raised her hand again, but he caught her wrist and reeled her into his arms.
“I cannot change this, Colette.”
“But you are the most powerful man I’ve ever known. If you can’t, who can?”
“It will take time.”
Water filled her eyes, and damn it, tears rolled down her cheeks, making her look weak. The emotions she had kept in check for days now boiled into a dark roux that started to burn under the heat of his touch.
“Let me go,” she whispered, feeling weakened by his strength.
He didn’t move, nor did he release her. They stood with bodies locked together simmering in a heat only they could generate. As it used to be. She sank into his arms, her face flush with his chest, finding solace in the warm beat of his heart. He gently stroked the side of her face and whispered, “I will get Enio back.”
Whether he meant it or not, his caring love bled through that simple touch, a touch she craved, yet could not accept. The damage between them had been done.
She pushed free of his embrace, looking away from him. “Only you can.”
Chapter Nine
Donato stepped back from Colette, pulling free of the spell in which he found himself, but his withdrawal was too late. He had held Colette in his arms, an embrace for no other reason but to embrace, something that he had thought would never happen again. Not like he had on the dock when she had fought to reach his sister’s ship, or when he had lifted her to negotiate the high marsh grass. This was different.
It was a moment of vulnerability for him and her. A moment of love they felt for their son, a moment of grief, loss, and betrayal. A moment when his emotions drained through his facade and he could pretend no longer.
That step back gave him the second he needed to rein in unfettered feelings and collect himself. It was Colette who spoke first in the uneasy silence that followed their embrace.
“You’ve changed nothing since I…I left.” She indicated their son’s room with a sweep of her arm. “Have you not been in here?”
“My son was no longer here. For what purpose would I come in?” He almost thanked her for the reminder of how he had felt that day, the day her brother had arrived and taken Donato’s world away. The day Colette had betrayed him and left a gaping wound that would never heal.
She thought to leave him, leave his life, to protect their son. But that wasn’t the real reason. She had wanted to retreat into that safe little world her brother offered. The one she had lived in since the French Revolution. Instead of growing from it, she had withdrawn.
He hadn’t known her true identity when he’d bought her off the auction block. By the time he learned that her brother searched for her, he didn’t want her found. She was his world, the mother of his child, and the only woman he had ever given his heart.
So much pain between them and here she stood, dabbing at eyes that continued to tear, against her efforts. The light of the lamp wove delicate sparkles into her long golden-brown hair that splayed across her shoulders and down her back. Her eyes, oblong, dark green, and trimmed in sweeping lashes, were soiled from teardrops and glistened nearly as much as the diamond earrings she had donned.
Her body stiff, she nibbled on those lips that normally formed a four-cornered square when closed, but now, they had elongated, wanting to turn down and barely holding back the emotional dam that was about to break.
He could see her breasts rise and fall beneath the low-cut chemise as she breathed heavily. They pressed the fabric to experience life then retreat, a lot like Colette. The lamplight ebbed on and off her body with each breath, highlighting the juncture of her breasts, the hollow of her throat he so wanted to taste. He ran a tongue over his own lips, savoring the taste he knew to be there.
As she stood, dressed in a chemise with diamonds hanging from dainty earlobes that once had felt his kisses, wearing a necklace that trimmed the contours of her throat, supple, soft, and so inviting, wearing satin slippers, she looked more the expensive courtesan than a wife gone rogue.
But his compassion was gone, vented, like a winded sail suddenly pierced. He reached out and laced his fingers in the wild and free locks of her hair and wound them tightly in his hand.
Slowly he reeled her into him, pressing her body close to his with her face upward. He ran his other hand up along the terrain of her throat as would a sculptor admiring his work. She inhaled deeply and ran a tongue over her lips.
He held her there, immobile, vacillating between cursing himself for wanting her and cursing her for having left him. He tilted her head slightly, allowing his hand full access to her throat, cupping her neck with his thumb and forefinger. Straddling her larynx, he applied light pressure because he could, and she couldn’t stop him.
“Where is this little pistol of yours?”
“I do not have it.” She didn’t try to resist; instead she close
d her eyes. He wondered if she thought he would end her life here, for she resisted not. His thumb stroked the flawless skin beneath her chin, reminiscing about the feel, having never touched a woman like her.
She opened her eyes and met his. The sea-green color reflected the mist she had thought to dab away. A tear rolled down her cheek and over the tips of his fingers.
“You wish to harm me?” she whispered. “It will not make this go away.”
He kept his focus on her face, her eyes, for in them he would always find his truth.
“Do you think I wish to?” His voice as low as the rumbling thunder that rattled the window panes. “Or that I would?”
She drew another long, deep breath. Her breasts pressed against his chest; he felt the air come and go and a slight muffled sob that escaped. She was powerless and she knew it. “No, I do not think that.”
Her voice was just a whisper, but had a hungry sound to it that made him wonder who he was speaking to, his wife or Jordan’s sister?
“No, harm you, I will not, but take you at my leisure, I will.” He brushed her lips with his. Her mouth opened slightly for him. She tasted sweet and salty, tears mixed with beauty. He dropped his hand from her throat and wrapped it around her body.
At more than six feet, Donato towered over Colette. He nearly lifted her from her feet. But he didn’t care; he had wanted this kiss since he’d seen her in New Orleans, when she had fought him on the dock, when she had kept a rigid spine and led them through the swamp, and when she had fallen overboard and dangled above a furious sea. He had almost asked her permission before, only to be rebuked, but not this time. This kiss was his, and damned if he wasn’t going to take it.
He unwound his fingers from her hair and pulled her flush against his chest. He wanted to feel her every response, knew her breasts would pump with each labored breath, her nipples tighten and rise. He knew her hand would touch his arm, then journey upward until she reached his shoulders. He knew how Colette would react, even if she didn’t.
With her lips parted slightly, he maneuvered his tongue between her teeth and slid it into her mouth. He savored the taste of her, allowing the hotly stirred mixture of her mouth to marinate him in her natural scent of saccharine and danger. Feeling the hot pulsation of her mouth against his, he drew his only breath before her hand slowly migrated upward; not in protest, her fingers walked along his lower arm.
