The Whispered Kiss

by Marcia Lynn McClure

  Coquette paused, daring to glance at Valor. It was as she thought; the angry amber of his eyes was perfectly affixed to her. He wore a rather self-satisfied expression as well—as if to say, You can fool me not longer, for I see you are beginning to acknowledge the shallow nature of your family.

  “Read on, milady, do,” he said. “These letters always interest me.”

  Coquette sighed and continued, her own annoyance at her family’s shallow nature thick in her veins.

  “I speak now of something that has been pressing quite heavy on my mind since first you left, Coquette.” Coquette paused, surprised by the sudden change of the letter’s tone. “I do not feel at ease as Father, Dominique, and Inez do…about your leaving to marry the Lord of Roanan. In truth, I believe them to be so entirely consumed by wealth and in seeking after their own possessions and pleasure that I consider them to have utterly forgotten your sacrifice. Without your willingness to go to Roanan, thereby saving Father from literal murder, we girls would be penniless, helpless, and alone. How can they go on and on about money, possessions, and position when you have away to marry a complete stranger? Though I imagine and tell myself this stranger treats you better than he did Father, that your beauty alone would keep him in constant awe of you…I worry. Are you truly well, Coquette? In your letter to me you wrote of—” Coquette ceased in her reading, not wishing to read aloud to Valor what was next in the letter.

  “Go on,” Valor said. “Read on. What did you speak of in your letter to your sister?”

  “Nothing of consequence,” Coquette said. She blushed then, knowing full well he would mock her if she read on.

  He held out his hand to her, however, and demanded, “Give it to me. I will finish it for myself…and for you.”

  What choice had she? Either read the contents herself and be humiliated or allow Valor to read them and be humiliated. She chose the latter, for it was somehow easier. Slowly, she handed the letter to him. As he took it, his fingers brushed against her own. Unexpectedly, her flesh broke into goose pimples. She had the sudden urge to leap from her chair and throw herself into his arms. It was entirely disconcerting that one slight and unintended touch should so affect her.

  Valor cleared his throat, obviously unaware of Coquette’s senses suddenly coming alive, and began to read. “In your letter to me you wrote of this Lord of Roanan…of this man who threatened to kill our father. You wrote he is the handsomest of men…even as handsome as your Valor was, though I am difficult in imaging any man being more comely than Valor.” Valor paused in his reading. “Perhaps I may come to like Elise again after all,” he said, an amused grin spreading across his face.

  “Give it over to me,” Coquette said, suddenly overly humiliated at his reading the letter. She reached for the letter. He simply pushed his chair backward so she could not lay a hand on it.

  “Nay. I must continue,” Valor said, still smiling. “You write he is good to his townspeople and those of his household and that he has not harmed you in any way. You write of being anxious to produce an heir that he may be glad of having you, Coquette. And yet he threatened to kill Father, and I am led to wonder…how can you so willingly succumb to this man’s beauty and position? For you are not like Dominique, Inez, and I. Ever you have longed for Valor and Valor alone, and I cannot fathom that you—”

  “This was meant for me! Not you!” Coquette cried, bolting from her chair and snatching the letter from his hands. He frowned at her but remained sitting as she folded the letter, tucking it into the bodice of her gown.

  “Do you really suppose that if I wanted the damnable letter, I would be too timid to take it back from you simply for where you have cached it, milady?” he asked.

  “Why shouldn’t I lie to them?” Coquette asked, ignoring his inference. She was hurt he would mock her attempt to champion him in the eyes of her worried sister. “Why shouldn’t they live in peace…thinking I am happy and hopeful?”

  “Because they do not deserve it!” Valor said, rising to his feet. “This good sister, perhaps,” he said. “But the others, no. And especially your father. Has the man no conscience? You do not own pure knowledge of what passed between him and me. I assured him of your misery and unhappiness at my hand. And still he sent you to me.” He paused, his eyes narrowing as he added, “As I knew he would.”

  “You would have killed him!” Coquette argued. “Stand before me now and tell me you would give your own life for the sake of protecting your daughter’s happiness.”

  “I would give my own life for it,” he growled. “I would easily have taken a villain’s sword to my guts rather than see a daughter sent to such as your father understood you were to endure!”

  “And what great horror have I endured, milord?” Coquette asked. “Fear? Anxiety? Perhaps. But what other than that? What other? For even I know, for all your threats and implications…even I know it is impossible that I carry your heir.”

  “What?” Valor breathed, his face draining of color.

  “I have learned well of deceit at your hand, milord,” Coquette said. “The turn of the chalice has proven to me you are not but threats and deceit.”

  “You know nothing of what has passed between us!” he roared. “Simply for the sake of my drinking from the wrong chalice—and, yes, I admit to asking Victoria to brew it for you. I cannot fathom how it came to me instead of you. Yet you have no knowledge of what passed between us or what did not!”

  “But I do, milord,” she said, “for you told me yourself. You spoke the truth from your own lips the night the chalices were turned.”

  Valor commanded his expression to remain unchanged, though despair and defeat inwardly consumed him. He had spoken to her after drinking the tonic. He had, and as he had feared, he had confessed the truth to her—that he had not endeavored to have her as he implied. Vengeance attend me now, he thought.

  “And so I spoke the truth of it to you, did I?” he growled. “I spoke to you that you could not possibly now carry my heir. And did I tell you why? Did I tell you why I have not touched you, even though the law would find me just in doing so?”

  He watched as the triumphant determination on her face vanished, confusion in its wake. He knew in that moment he had withheld some knowledge from her at least.

  “No, milord,” she admitted.

  He was somewhat surprised she had admitted it. The beast roared within him then, the vengeful, hateful, heartless beast. “What reason do you give then?” he asked her. “What reason would I have for keeping from you these past weeks when an heir is the only possession I desire that I do not already possess?”

  “I know not, milord,” she said. He watched the hurt brim in her eyes, even as her self-worth and confidence diminished. She was thinking he did not find her pleasing, that she did not evoke masculine desire in him. He winced, knowing the pain such thoughts would induce, for he had felt similarly when she had chosen her father’s will over his love so long ago. Beast he was, yes—but he would not have her think she was not beautiful or was unwanted by him.

  “I own hatred for your father, this you know,” he told her. His mind fought frantically for something, something to assure her of his desire for her without revealing the true reason for his keeping from her. It came to him then, and he said, “As much hatred as I own for him, I own far more wanton lust for you. But to satisfy my desire for you would find your father victor over me.”

  “What?” she exclaimed.

  He felt relieved somewhat at her blush, for it told him she believed he found her beauty desirable.

  “You speak in riddles,” she said.

  “What vengeance would I gain by having you?” he asked. “Even I, beast that I am in your eyes, even I who have stripped you from your beloved father, from your cherished sisters…yet even I would not use intimacy as a means to revenge.”

  Coquette felt her brow pucker into a frown. She did not understand him. He spoke in riddles, roaring broad threats that remained only threats, never seeing fr
uition.

  “But you told me…you told me you wanted nothing from me save the birthing of your heir,” she said. “And yet you keep from me. How does it keep your vengeance strong…your keeping from me?”

  “I told your father I would have an heir by means of you,” Valor said. “After you arrived here, I came to find he kept this from you. I told your father, and this I have said before to you, though in not the same words as I used with him…I told him I would have my heir of you no matter what manner of treatment it may cost you. I…I told him once my heir was born, I would put you off as I would an old dog. Did he tell you these words I told him, milady? No. When he told you that you must away to marry a stranger to save his life…did he repeat the heartless words I spoke to him?”

  Suddenly Coquette felt dizzy. “No,” she whispered. “In truth, he did not even tell me you wanted a wife simply for want of an heir. Only you told me that the first night I came to Roanan.” Her father had misled her. She thought she understood why—to ease the task she faced, marrying a stranger to save his life. Still, he had misled her.

  “Denying myself you keeps my vengeance strong,” he told her then. “Strong and steadfast. At least for the time being, for I did not deceive you when I told you I will have my heir, milady. It is only I must wait until my vengeance finds conclusion.”

  “Yet what conclusion can this vengeance find?” she asked.

  Valor’s heart began to hammer as he saw the tears in her eyes, tears of pain. He winced, knowing the pain was borne not only his own deceit of her but of her father’s as well. Long he had wanted her to know what a coward, what a selfish coward, her father was. Yet now, as the pain of the knowledge glistened in the moisture of her emerald eyes, he regretted it.

  “What conclusion can this vengeance find, milord,” she repeated, “when my father is not aware of it?”

  “What?” Valor asked.

  “He writes of joy, happiness, wealth, and satisfaction. What vengeance will come to you when he does not even seem to consider that giving me to you was any loss at all? Further, I have assured my family of my well-being. Therefore, what vengeance have you had?”

  A tear traveled over her lovely cheek, and he felt he might drop to his knees and beg her forgiveness.

  “Who then do you seek to harm with this vengeance you speak of, sire?” she asked him. “Is it the merchant Antoine de Bellamont, who wounded your pride three years previous by refusing you my hand? I do not think so. Rather…rather I think your vengeance is looking to me.”

  Valor wanted to shout, No! No! It is your father I hate! He merely provided the means that I might own you. To at last own you: that was my true undertaking.

  Still, the wounded, hateful beast in him could not speak the words. Instead he said, “You are wrong, milady. You are wrong. And in that you may be assured it is your father I loathe. I will…I will allow that he should know you are miserable. For in your infinite misunderstanding of me, yet your point in that is clear. Therefore, I will review every letter you send in response to those of father and sisters. You will no longer be allowed to lie to them about your happiness…rather, your lack of it.”

  “And what then, sire?” she asked, another tear traveling over her beautiful cheek. “After you have made my father as miserable as any man can be, what then of me?”

  Too wise she was. She knew his riddles were woven to distract her. He could no longer attempt to weave a web of confusing words—offer no further feeble reasons for keeping from her. He had loved her once and as such respected her, yet he could not confess this as his reason for protecting her innocence. Twisted as it was, she could not know he yet longed to be her champion in some small regard.

  “Then there will be no more turning of chalices, milady,” he told her, “for I am desirous of an heir—an heir to be born of you. When I am well certain of your father’s destruction, Victoria’s blessed tonic will not save you by any means.”

  She was glad of his words, hopeful in his threat, for there was something unspoken in the sound of his voice. He meant her to know he desired her and that his vengeance was not to her.

  Suddenly, Valor reached out, pulling her into his arms and kissing her with such a ravenous nature of passion to all but consume her. Confused and in the deepest pain of mind, still Coquette melted to him. She could not fathom Valor’s reasoning in his deep hatred for her father, yet he had assured her of his desire for her, of his vengeance aimed at her father and not herself. This knowledge, coupled with the realization her father had sent her to a stranger while possessing a threat she would be maltreated, stripped her of any rational thought, and she wanted only Valor.

  Driven, moist, and warm, Valor’s kiss threatened to force consciousness from her with its passionate demand. Yet it seemed to Coquette she could not quench her thirst for his kiss, the feel of being held in his arms. Perhaps he felt no residual memory of love for her, but in those moments she cared little for it, for she loved him. Even for his hatred of her father, for she understood it somehow; even for his harsh words, for she remembered the softness, the tenderness, of his words the night the chalices had been turned. In those moments, she thought, Better to be in the arms of a tormented beast than in longing for Valor and living in Bostchelan with another who deceives.

  Suddenly Valor released her. “Write to your sister and answer how you will, excluding any high praise of me or my character. Then write to your father and tell him of how badly I treat you. Tell him I beat you with some regularity, and we will see what comes to pass…the fruition of my full vengeance or your full enlightenment.” He turned then, storming out of the room and leaving Coquette’s mind and body reeling with conflicting thoughts and sensations.

  Coquette’s thoughts were then made clear. She would write to Elise. She would write to her father as well—she would bait him and see what his reaction would be to a knowledge she was being ill-treated. Yet even as she planned to test her father, to dangerously involve herself in Valor’s vengeance, she knew—she knew she preferred life with the beast who was once Valor to life without him. In those moments, the entirety of Coquette’s soul became his—though he may never know it.

  “Is there anything you require, milord?” Godfrey said upon entering the great hall to see the Lord of Roanan sitting in shadow.

  “I require respite, Godfrey,” his lordship responded. “And I fear you cannot gift me that.”

  “Perhaps you might find respite in milady, milord,” Godfrey ventured, “if his lordship would but allow it.”

  “Respite?” Valor roared. “Respite? At her hand? Why, Godfrey,” he chuckled, “have you lost your wits? Milady gives me nothing, save anxiety and frustration.”

  “But I believe that is your choice, milord. Not hers,” Godfrey said. He was on tender ground, he knew. Godfrey had stood silent, watching the young Lord of Roanan endure the conflict raging within him.

  Godfrey had friends—many secret friends—and through one of these secretive friends, he had recently learned the truth—the origin of his master’s grief. With a knowledge of Valor’s pain of the past, Godfrey far better understood the beast in him—though he would not reveal his knowledge, nor understanding, to his young master. Further, he understood the conflict rampant in his mind and body—to own the one woman he had ever loved, yet love her too perfectly to wholly own her, to loathe her father with such pure loathing and yet struggle in allowing the girl to believe her father was yet honorable.

  “My choice, is it?” Valor asked, the fight and strength suddenly gone from him. “What would you have me do, Godfrey? I know you well enough,” he said then, his eyes narrowing with suspicion. “I am certain that by some means you have come to a full knowledge of the past—that you know I was once in love with Coquette de Bellamont, that her father refused me her hand.”

  “I may know something of it,” Godfrey admitted. Godfrey had learned long ago it did not bode well to play at pretense in Valor Lionhardt’s presence.

  “Then you know sh
e chose her father over me. I loved her once, and she chose that fool over me. What fool would I then be to allow myself…to allow myself to have her in any regard, to allow any emotion to drift toward her?”

  “Pardon, milord,” Godfrey said, “but only a fool would not have milady.”

  “She yet chooses to believe his lies, Godfrey,” Valor sighed.

  “And you do not tell her the whole truth of it,” Godfrey said.

  “And crush her spirit more than I have already?” Valor mumbled.

  “Perhaps it is in your power to restore her spirit, milord,” Godfrey said. “Forgive me, but it seems her spirit was crushed some years ago.”

  “Unlike the beast here before you, she appears well enough in spite of it,” Valor said.

  “She chose a different path, milord,” Godfrey said. He was angry himself then. The utter stupidity of it all was too much. “Take her, milord!” he growled, slamming his fists on the table before Valor. “Enough of Victoria’s tonic and your misguided honor! Reach out and take her for your own, milord. Beat down the walls between you! She only keeps herself guarded because she believes it is what you want!”

  “You would have me choose villainy over honor? That is the choice I own, Godfrey—honor or villainy. Which would you have me choose where milady is concerned?” Valor growled in return.

  “Have you not chosen both in a manner?” Godfrey asked. “Your honor is somewhat misguided, for you refuse to make her truly your wife out of respect for her innocence while you simultaneously withhold the truth from her concerning your dealings with her father and your own feelings!”