Dear Impostor

by Nicole Byrd

  She scrambled out of bed and relit her candle. Pulling a knitted wrap about her thin nightdress, she lifted the candlestick and headed for the hallway. With no thought of danger to herself, she unlocked the bedroom door and pulled it open just a little, peering into the hall.

  She saw nothing but shadows, yet the cry came again. Psyche slipped out into the hallway, shivering with nervousness. Who was in distress?

  The sounds came from next door. Gabriel? Who had dared to assault him in this house of ill memory? She tried to turn the doorknob; at first she thought the door was locked, but then it moved beneath her palm. “Gabriel?” She looked inside the darkened room, keeping her voice low. “Are you there?”

  An inarticulate cry was her only answer. She slipped inside and shut the door behind her, then held the candle higher. Its faint light threw wavering shadows on the bed sheets, which heaved with the movements of the body beneath them.

  “Gabriel, are you ill?”

  She set the candle down on the nearest bureau and hurried to his side. Gabriel’s eyes were closed, but he moved restlessly. She put out on hand, and he grasped it as if he were a drowning man. The strength of his grip made her gasp.

  “Gabriel, it’s Psyche!”

  At last, to her relief, he opened his eyes. He seemed dazed, and he blinked at her in the flickering light. “Psyche?”

  “Yes, my dear, you were having a nightmare.” She touched his cheek gently, and he shivered.

  “I dreamed my father had locked me in my room, and I could not get out.”

  This house evoked bad recollections, she thought. No wonder he had not locked the door of his bedchamber.

  “In my dream, I was a child again,” he explained, as if afraid she would laugh. Psyche touched his cheek.

  “But you are not a child,” she reminded him. “And you have proven you are no longer in your father’s power.”

  For a moment, she remembered the scene at the dinner table, and wondered if she should have reminded him of that painful incident. But to her surprise, Gabriel laughed softly. “No, indeed I am not. Not a child, because a child would not be thinking what I am thinking when I look at you in such lovely disarray. And not in my father’s power, thank God, never again.”

  She felt self-conscious for a moment, then became aware that indeed, her bare feet were cold and she had a tendency to shiver.

  “Then take me into bed with you,” she suggested. “Because the rug is thin and the floor is cold, and so are my feet.” Psyche gave him a comically-coquettish flutter of lashes. “As a matter of health only, of course.”

  He grinned, looking much more like his usual self, and pulled back the covers. “Anything less would be inhumane, indeed, my dear Miss Hill.”

  She climbed in beside him, content now that she could lean her cheek against his bare chest, be pulled even closer beneath the warm coverlet. His body was hard and firm, and not the least childish.

  He leaned down and kissed her, then ran his hand down the outline of her back. This was how marriage would be, she thought wistfully. A real bed, a quiet room, no one to disturb them. This bliss, this close companionship, every night if they wished. The delightful thrill of his touch–

  Then he kissed her again, and Psyche happily surrendered all thought to his heated caress.

  He hadn’t meant to make love to her tonight, in this bleak house of bitter memories. But the warmth of her skin affected him like dry wood on a kindling flame. Desire leaped; all his senses seemed intensified, and he wasn’t sure he could manage his next breath.

  Her lips parted in answer to his kiss, and he saw the warmth of complete trust in her blue eyes–how had he ever thought her cold? Ice maiden, indeed. She was everything that was good and lovely and pure.

  Damn. He should try–swallowing hard, he pulled away. “Psyche, it would probably be better if I took you back to your room.”

  “My bed is bigger?” Her blue eyes twinkled.

  “No, you vixen!” Gabriel told her in mock censure. “You know that I should leave you to sleep alone. I will–I can endure alone the hell of old memories that this house holds for me; I am learning my own strengths, thanks to you.”

  She took away one of her hands–good, she was listening after all–but then he felt it touch his cheek gently. “Gabriel, I have no doubt that you can. But the point is that you don’t have to suffer alone. I am here for you. Heaven or hell, I want to share it with you.”

  He could feel the whirlpool of his desire pulling him deeper and deeper into its yawning maw. Longing grew inside him, pulling on his limbs like treacle. He tried to be logical.

  “You certainly aren’t fit for hell. I, on the other hand, have been familiar with the nether regions–and my haunted memories–for years.”

  “It would be hell if you left me.” Her voice was soft, and she still held her hand against his cheek.

  “You are made for Paradise, my dear.”

  “Then take me there again,” she whispered.

  She leaned into him. He felt the blood pounding in his veins, and the last of his self-control washed away with its pulsating tide.

  Swiftly, he reached beneath the heavy covers and pulled her long gown up and over her head. Psyche raised her arms to help shed the nightdress, then pressed her soft, full breasts against his chest. Unable to resist, he lifted and shaped them with his hands while she nibbled delicately on his jaw and neck.

  Psyche threw a long, silky leg over him and then pulled back in surprise at the feel of fabric.

  “I thought you were as bare as I beneath these covers,” she said with such blatant disappointment that he did not try to stifle his laugh.

  “Habit, love. It’s best not to be completely naked when you might need to leap out a window at any moment.”

  Her beautiful eyes narrowed in suspicious disapproval. “Jealous lovers?”

  His lips twitched, but he managed not to give in to the grin. “Poor losers.”

  “Hmm,” she considered. “A perfect non-answer. One could infer that by poor losers you meant card-players or that the jealous lovers were the poor losers. Knowing you, however, I– umhhf . . .”

  The rest of her words were muffled by Gabriel’s laughing lips. But Psyche did not mind. Instead, she used her energies more pleasurably by pushing back the bedcovers, then ridding Gabriel of his breeches and tossing them to lie with her gown on the cold floor. Turning, she rose on her hands and knees and crawled on top of Gabriel’s outstretched body.

  “Tonight, I wish to see all of you, feel all of you.” She sighed against his chest. With seeking lips, she discovered all the new and different textures of his skin. Silky flat nipples, tickly swirls of hair, sweetly hot skin over hard curves of muscle.

  Her curious fingers trailed down his tightly ridged stomach until she grasped him in her hand, squeezing softly, then firmly.

  Shuddering with enjoyment, Gabriel silently blessed Psyche’s distinctive take-charge attitude. He lay in pleasurable acquiescence beneath her for as long as he possibly could. But her naive touches—sometimes hesitant, sometimes bold–made it impossible for him to remain inactive for long.

  Inflamed by her awakening desire, he could not remain just a participant. Reaching down, he grasped the back of her thighs and spread them so she was straddling his hips. Psyche sighed with pleasure at the feel of his rigid length pressing against her. Raising her head, she sought his mouth with her own. Before she could fall completely into the kiss, Gabriel pushed her up into a sitting position and with a slight readjustment of his hips slid deep inside her waiting warmth.

  “Ohh,” she breathed in wonder, throwing her head back at the glorious sensation. This time there was no stretching tightness, only undiluted pleasure. She gripped his hips firmly with her thighs as he rolled and thrust beneath her. Psyche gave herself up, following his lead in this most sensuous of dances.

  She lifted her body a bit to change her position but stopped in delight at the sweet friction her movement caused and Gabriel�
��s resulting groan of pleasure. Experimentally, she rose to the tip of his hardness and then sank down suddenly. Gabriel’s eyes, which had been half-lowered and slumberous, flew open with heightened arousal.

  Oh this is heady stuff, indeed, she thought.

  She granted him no mercy as she raised and lowered herself by teasing increments, only giving in to his hoarse pleas when he grabbed her hips.

  “Goddess, please,” he groaned, trying to end the sublime torture.

  Smiling the wicked smile of a woman reveling in her newfound dominion, she evaded his hands. But she had underestimated Gabriel’s own power.

  Eyes ardent with fevered passion, face tense with impending release, he touched the pad of his thumb against her swollen, tender bud just above their joined bodies. He fondled her once, twice, a third time, and she was plummeting over the edge of ecstasy into completion and Gabriel’s grasping arms. Her body’s clenching tremors sent Gabriel into his own magnificent release; he slipped out of her just in time.

  They lay still entwined. Gabriel drew shuddering breaths in and out of his lungs. He could feel Psyche’s heart pounding against his, and nothing had ever felt so right. She raised passion-dazed eyes to his and smiled with such love, such trust.

  It made the knowledge that he had to leave her that much harder to bear.

  Later, when they lay in quiet repletion, limbs entangled and her hair cloaking his chest, she said, “You are not still desiring your father’s approval?”

  “No,” he said too quickly, then sighed. “I suppose I would like his respect.”

  “But failing that, can you not respect yourself?” she suggested.

  “For what?” he asked, his tone troubled. “For running away from the scandal I had caused?”

  “You were a boy,” she reminded him. Somewhere, a cricket rasped its nighttime song.

  “But I am a man now. What have I done to be proud of?”

  “You have returned, older and wiser,” she shot back. “You have saved me from my greedy uncle and annoying cousin; you have stood up to your enemies, you have faced your old fears. You have faced your father.”

  “When I left, I said I would come back and force him to his knees,” he said, very low.

  “That was a boy’s threat,” she told him.

  “So you do not think less of me, that today I allowed him to walk away?”

  She leaned up to kiss the tip of his chin. “No, my dear, I do not.”

  He was silent for a moment, then he moved restlessly beneath her.

  “Older, yes, but wiser? Because I know how to win a game of whist, how to dance and shoot and handle a sword? Because I know how to charm a woman? Or at least, most women. You were not amused by my banter when we first met, as I recall.’ He kissed the top of her head.

  She smiled into the dark; the candle had guttered out some time ago. “Even charm is a gift that can be used well or ill.”

  “You think I have used it well?” There was a glimmer of hope in his voice; funny how she could hear even more layers of meaning in his words when she could not see his face.

  “Yes, I do. I have seen you make a plain woman feel beautiful.”

  “You think that is worth commending?” He moved his arm slightly so that he could stroke her cheek; his touch was soft and sure.

  “I think it very commendable,” she agreed. “And not a gift to be lightly dismissed.”

  He made a sound that was almost a sigh. “It seems little enough to me.”

  “But not to the woman whose day you have brightened,” she countered. “You must let go of the memories, Gabriel, and also of your anger. You have a good heart, it must not be tainted by bitterness. You have courage and loyalty. These are valuable attributes.”

  “Funny,” he whispered into her hair. “All those pleasing tributes I would have used to describe you.”

  She smiled, though he could not see. “Really?”

  “Of course. And perhaps you, too, need to let go of your anger, the anger you feel for your parents.” He said it very softly, and for a moment, she was not sure that she heard him correctly.

  “I–angry? I most certainly am not angry!” She was about to argue further, when the truth of his words hit home. “Oh,” she whispered, pulling the covers tight around her neck. “Oh, yes, why did I never see it? I fear you are right. I was so angry because they left me, because they died. Yet how can I blame them for that?”

  His only answer was to stroke the soft curve of her back. And she knew that only she could decipher that puzzle. For a long time they lay, two halves of one whole, their bodies curved together, and eventually, she slept.

  In the morning, Psyche woke in the other guest chamber to find the other side of the bed empty. She raised her head in alarm, then lay it back on the pillow as memory returned. He had carried her, half asleep and protesting, back to her own bed in the early hours of the morning. He would not embarrass her before his father’s staff, she thought, smiling. Would they ever have the chance to lie late in bed, with no fear of awkward explanations? She would enjoy teaching him to lie abed until dawn was past, holding her close as they nestled into smooth linen sheets. Then she remembered that she might not have that chance, that despite everything, he might not stay, and a wave of grief threatened to overwhelm her. With an effort, she pushed it back. He would come to see clearly, she reassured herself. But she was wide awake now, and she sat up, stretching, and pushed the bedcovers away.

  Dressing quickly in the same navy gown, she pulled her hair into a smooth knot and then made her way downstairs. She found Gabriel in the dining room, and to her relief, no one else except a nervous-looking footman who served her.

  Psyche took her seat and sipped her tea..

  “Good morning, Miss Hill; did you sleep well?” Gabriel asked, his usual mischief lighting his eyes.

  Since he knew very well what had troubled her sleep, she frowned at him for an instant, before remembered pleasure softened her expression. “Tolerably well,” she murmured, aware of the servant still hovering near the sideboard.

  “Mrs. P. makes a nice sleeping draught; you should try it,” Gabriel suggested, his blue eyes still laughing.

  “Thank you, I will keep that in mind the next time I have a disordered night,” she answered gravely; she saw him grin.

  The footman offered her platters filled with sausage and kidneys and ham, eggs and porridge and toasted bread. Psyche filled her plate and ate slowly. She was, in fact, quite hungry. She looked across the table at Gabriel, whose gaze had shifted; his expression hard to read.

  “What are you thinking?” She asked at last.

  “How my mother used to sit in that chair,” he told her. “She would have liked you–she would have loved you, I am sure of it.”

  “I am sorry I did not have the privilege of meeting her,” Psyche said, reaching across to touch his hand.

  Gabriel nodded, but he did not answer. In a moment, he said, “I have told the servants to summon your carriage.”

  “Are we going back to London?”

  He nodded. “The day is clear; we should be in the city by afternoon; I cannot think that Barrett’s gang can keep up an ambush for this long. There should be enough traffic to spoil their plans and keep us reasonably safe.”

  Psyche could not honestly say she was sorry to leave this sad, empty house. When she had finished her meal, she pushed back her plate, and the footman jumped to pull her chair out and allow her to rise.

  She nodded her thanks. “Should we–um–say our thank yous to our host?”

  “Our reluctant host?” Gabriel amended, his tone dry. “I suppose so.”

  With her hand tucked into Gabriel’s arm, Psyche walked by his side down the hall and to the study door, where Gabriel knocked.

  He waited for a moment, then opened the door. “We are leaving, Father.”

  Silence, then a noise that might have been a grunt. The wing chair was pulled up to the fire again, and the air in the room was too warm. Psyche thought
how much this bitter old man was missing, through his inability to love or accept his sons.

  “Thank you for your hospitality,” Gabriel continued, his tone polite.

  Still no answer; a coal popped in the fire, then Gabriel shut the door. Psyche was left with the image of the motionless man staring into the fire, a perennial scowl on his face, his form lost in the shadows. She had a moment of instinctive insight: somewhere deep within his heart of hearts, the Marquis must believe himself completely unlovable, totally without worth, to be so unable to accept any affection, any friendship even, from those who by nature’s law ought to be closest to him.

  She looked up at Gabriel and for an instant caught an expression of grief on his face, then he recovered his usual air of poised urbanity and lifted his brows as he saw her gazing at him.

  “I’m sure you are ready to leave this house,” he said, his tone dry.

  She nodded, but she pressed his arm as they walked to the outer door. Their chaise was waiting. Mrs. Parslip was there to curtsy and make her farewells. Regardless of the staring footman, Gabriel reached to hug the little housekeeper again.

  “It was good to see you, Mrs. P,” he told her. “You made me feel like a boy again.”

  The woman smiled. “I shall hope to see you again.” She took something from the folds of her apron and put a small object into his hands.

  Psyche couldn’t help but look–it was a miniature of the type that fashionable ladies often had painted of themselves. She saw a lovely, sweet-faced lady with soft brown hair who bore an obvious resemblance to the man beside her–Gabriel’s mother.

  Gabriel had to clear his throat. “Thank you, Mrs. P.” He was quite sure the housekeeper did not have his father’s permission for this gift, but it meant the world to Gabriel. The small portrait would mark the beginning of his newly-revised memories, the easing of old pain.

  Mrs. Parslip beamed and curtsied one more time as Gabriel handed Psyche up. He took his seat beside her. The driver lifted the reins and the carriage rolled smoothly forward.