When his fingers pulled at the gauze of her dress, searching for the flesh beneath, hurt etched itself into every smooth plane of her face. He gripped her corsage and looked to rend her bodice in two. Finally he met her gaze, and, as if taunting her, he pulled, creating a tiny rip where her dress covered the valley between her breasts.
"How do you want it, Aurora," he whispered, "rough or easy?"
Her gaze never wavered. "You know the way I want it, Vashon."
His eyes met hers and a look passed between them, her own expression fraught with supplication and pain. But now she no longer harbored any hope of reaching him. Her fate was to endure this night, then leave him, forever chained to only the memory of the man he might have been.
"Look away," he told her, his voice husky and low, her unwavering gaze finally appearing to unnerve him.
"I cannot," she whispered, hardly able to hold back the tremor in her voice.
"Why?" he demanded, his agitation growing, only promising more brutality.
"Because I—" A tear finally fell. She wiped it and saw no more reason to hide. "Because I might miss the man I love, Vashon. And you see, I see him so rarely."
As if she'd stabbed him with a knife to the gut, he pulled back, his expression filled with horror. Cold, violent rage then filled him, and she thought he might even slap her, but instead, with just as much violence, he righted himself and pointed to the door.
"Get out of here. Never show your face to me again. Do you hear?"
With a great, heart-wrenching sob she scrambled to her feet, her hand clutching her ripped bodice. "Vashon," she begged, as unwilling to be sent away as she'd been unwilling to be raped.
"Get out. You'll sail on the Resolute in the morning."
"Please, no," she began, but he stopped her with one deadly look. When she saw nothing before her but fury and ice, she blinked back her burning tears and stumbled to the door, her only thought that God was just as cruel as John Phipps portrayed Him to be.
Chapter Twenty-five
That night rain came and Aurora watched it fall with Koonga asleep in her arms. In the islands, the rains were gentle and brief, daily cooling and replenishing the tropical earth. A nighttime rain was generally viewed with trepidation, for hurricanes could rake clean islands much bigger than Mirage. But Aurora only dared the rain to come down harder, only begged for the wind to blow with more force. If a hurricane was brewing this night, she prayed for it to come. And if instead the sun was destined to shine in the morning, then she prayed not to see it.
The louvers clattered with the force of the wind, but this night nothing seemed too fierce for her. There was no gust angry enough, no rain cool enough to take away her sorrow. Desolate, she hardly felt the spray as the rain pelted against the open windows of her room. Only when Koonga stirred did she step away.
The Star of Aran was now a curse to be uttered only when the most foul phrases had been already used. Thinking about the jewel, she laughed bitterly and wiped the rain off her tearless cheeks. Twice now she'd been abandoned for that vile emerald. Twice her hope for love had been destroyed by the greater lure of that stone. Now suddenly she couldn't wait to get her hands on it. She wanted to clutch the wretched thing in her palm and see if all her pain had been worth what she'd paid for it. And then she wanted to drop it into the ocean, an ocean as green, fathomless, and cruel as Vashon's eyes.
But until then she had nothing to comfort her but the hard little ache where her heart had been. And even destroying the Star wasn't going to take that away.
She took a deep breath and hugged the slumbering monkey to her breast. Benny would most likely come for Koonga tomorrow. She doubted he and the monkey would come with them on the Resolute; Vashon would hardly provide for her and Flossie on their returning voyage as well as he'd done on their outgoing one. Placing the creature on a pillow on the recamier, she was further saddened by the thought of how empty her days were going to be without Koonga's homely little face and amusing chatter.
A knock on the door startled her out of her melancholy state. For some reason her heart leaped at the thought that it might be Vashon, but she knew only too well he didn't knock.
"Yes?" she whispered to the closed door.
"Missa! Missa! Come quick! Is big diremma!"
She opened the door and found Tsing holding a sumptuous candelabra. In the lamplight his face appeared unusually excited.
"What is it?" she asked, becoming alarmed.
"Vashon go crazy! He go crazy! Come quick! Is big diremma!"
"But what has he done?"
"He lip up map and order more blandy! Map expensive, missa!"
"He can afford another map . . . so he's getting drunk, is he?" she asked irritably.
"Yes, missa! Come quick! Make stop!" Tsing pulled on her hand but she drew back.
"What makes you think I can do anything? Why have you come for me? Has he sent for me?"
"No, missa. But you make stop, I know it!"
"Vashon is a grown man, Tsing, and if he should desire to get drunk, there's nothing I can do."
"Missa! Missa! Rook!" He held out his long graying rattail braid. The end was sharply hacked off. "He thlew knife at me, missa! He say, 'Get blandy and get out!' and when he see no chop-chop, he thlew knife!"
"What a villain!" she exclaimed, touching the end of Tsing's braid. "Why, you should vow never to work for him again!"
"Oh, no, missa, he never done before! Is big diremma! You make stop, missa!" He pulled her out the door and down the passage.
"But I really don't know what I can do, Tsing," she implored as he beckoned her back to Vashon's apartments. "I don't have anything to do with this."
"No, missa, is not so! When Vashon thlow knife, he say ru tlying to kiwr him and he not ret you!"
She stopped. "Me trying to kill him? That's absurd! Why, he has gone mad!"
"Take, missa!" From a nearby commode he took a tray laden with decanters and thrust it into her hands. "Ru take, missa. Me want keep lest of head."
Before she knew it, Tsing had knocked on the doors.
When the answering growl came from within, the doors were opened and she was pushed inside. Before she could look back the doors were soundly shut behind her.
"Leave it and get out," Vashon said in the dimness.
Aurora looked around and saw only one sparse candle lit on his desk. Next to it lay the map that he'd so ruthlessly torn up.
"I said—"
"No, don't throw another knife. It's not Tsing," she said hastily.
She saw a dark figure rise from a settee. "I thought I told you—"
"Yes," she interrupted, "but you frightened Tsing so much he refused to return and fetched me instead."
"And you should have had the prudence to be frightened also."
She looked at the shadowy figure looming in the foreground. Behind him the rain thundered down through the shuttered windows. She couldn't see his face, but she could see the sharp silhouette of the stiletto in his hand. He was terrifying, but she'd rather die than run from him again.
"I have the prudence," she said slowly, "but, unlike Tsing, I possess the faith that you won't hurt me." In the darkness she groped for a table. When she found one, she set the decanters down, only to feel the stiletto pressed against her breast.
"I see I've somehow failed to impress upon you the exact evil of my nature."
She smelled the brandy on his breath. His other arm slid across her bosom and he held her back against his chest.
She lowered her eyes. Her nerves felt as if they were on fire. She'd personally witnessed men run screaming from his presence with Vashon in such a temper, but she did her best not to show her fear.
Taking a deep breath, she felt the tip of the stiletto dig into her tender flesh. She forced herself to ignore it. Licking her lips, she said, "How odd that you should think to harm me, Vashon. Especially when Tsing tells me it's I who's out to kill you."
"You are trying to kill m
e," he stated as if he were completely rational.
"How am I doing that? I have no weapon."
"You have a weapon. The most dangerous weapon. This." He slid his hand to where her heart pounded wildly against her ribs.
Frightened and yet strangely exhilarated by his words, she answered, "But you must know, Vashon, with that weapon, I can win only if you let me."
He lowered the stiletto and wrapped her own palm around its handle. "Then thrust this into my back and let's be done with this agony. Or are you waiting for Josiah Peterborough to do it for you?"
She released her hand and the stiletto clattered to the floor. "You're drunk. You're talking madness. I won't listen to you."
"I'm not so drunk that I can't see what's going to happen."
"And what is going to happen?" she asked calmly. "First," his hand lifted to her chin, "you're going to kiss me."
"Indeed? Not ever again, I vow—"
He turned her around so swiftly her neck almost snapped.
"Oh yes, you will kiss me," he whispered, "and after that sweet pleasure, we'll find my bed and there we'll stay for a very long time."
She struggled from his hold and backed toward the door. "Tsing was right. You're quite out of your mind."
"Ah, but there are worse things than madness." He reached out and gripped her waist. "Chastity, for example."
"No, Vashon! I didn't come here to be abused further!"
He pulled her into his arms. His hands cupped her delicate face and he looked at her so hungrily she gasped.
"I know why you came here, Aurora," he said. "You've come to destroy me with this love of yours. To make me fall for your artless little seductions until I no longer protect myself."
"Love or death, Vashon, it doesn't have to be one or the other," she cried out, all the emotions she held for him washing over her again like a baptism.
"You're asking me to commit suicide! To destroy myself for you!"
"No! I care for you! But I want you to have a life worth living! And if you can't love, what kind of a life will that be for you?" She suddenly sobbed.
"I've forgotten how to feel that way," he growled, hopelessness woven all through his voice. "I can never feel that way again."
"You could remember. I know it," she whispered.
"You speak with such authority," he said cynically.
"I speak with my heart, Vashon."
They faced each other, their gazes locked, both cast in a silent battle of wills. But just when she felt she would rather throw herself from the Seabravery than lose this battle again, he rasped, "Then show me."
She looked at him, not sure what he wanted.
"Show me," he repeated, this time more softly.
She searched his eyes and saw his terrible longing. "How? How can I show you?" she barely whispered.
"Begin with a kiss."
Trembling, she glanced down, unsure she could do it. But desperate for him and desperate for happiness, she tilted back her head and pressed a kiss on his hard, forlorn lips.
It was an awkward kiss, and when it was was over, she wondered whether he would laugh at her. He'd hardly responded, not even when she artlessly raised her hand to caress his unshaven cheek.
Still his gaze didn't leave her.
"Say it," he insisted with a whisper. "Say it and this time I won't send you away."
She was being the worst kind of fool. He was not the man for her. They could never build a life together. It was as impossible as a marriage between a lamb and a lion. This was sure to destroy her happiness rather than build it, but she could go no other way. Her feelings for him carried her along like a flood; a finger in the dike could hold them back no longer.
"I love you, Vashon," she admitted. "And the tragedy is that I cannot stop myself."
Her last words were barely discernible, yet he seemed to have heard them anyway. He grabbed her into his embrace as a dying man grasps at new life. His mouth clamped on hers, and he picked her up in one desperate motion. When he'd taken her to the bed, he fell back with her in his arms and everything she'd wanted, everything she'd dreamed of, seemed suddenly within her grasp.
He kissed her, hungry for her lips, hungry for her touch. She braced herself up on his chest and thought to pull back, if only to catch her breath, but he wouldn't permit it. His tongue burned upon hers, and his touch scalded wherever his hands chose to roam. His caress worshipped her: the curve of her back, her sweet, sumptuous derriere, her narrow waist, enticing beneath its thin drape of gauze.
She gazed at him in wonder as he undressed her, as he gently released each hook to reveal the apricot-tinted flesh beneath. Staring into those hungry green eyes, she knew what he wanted, and this time, she ached with the need to give it to him.
Slowly her hand touched his naked chest. Her fingers slid through the mat of dark hair and she reveled in the feel of him, so hard and unlike herself. Yet when he did likewise, taking both her bare breasts in his palms, the sensation jolted her back, frightening her with its boldness.
But he wouldn't allow her to retreat anymore.
"I want only abandon now, Aurora," he murmured against her hair. His hands moved up and he easily filled both of them, luxuriating in her generous flesh. Before she could protest again, his arm curved around her waist and he pulled her down onto him, crushing her soft bosom into the warm macadam of his own, and taking her lips in a long, needful kiss. His hand combed lovingly through her gilt-red tresses, then slid lower to press her hips close to his.
She whispered like a prayer, "I love you." He answered with another aching kiss and rolled atop her, pausing only to search deep into her gaze.
He must have found what he sought. With a sudden, fierce desire he possessed her, and before his lips came down to take hers one last time, he groaned with satisfaction when she whispered, "I love you, I love you," until she could speak no more.
The night rode on. The rain dwindled to a flash in the western sky, yet inside the chambers there was no other world but the whispers and sighs, kisses and caresses of their lovemaking. Twice she'd fallen asleep in his arms, and twice she'd awakened to his touch, their passion renewing itself like a kindled flame, each union outshining the glory of the last.
Finally when the lone candle sputtered in its wax, and the sun's first light burned through the mists of Mount Soufriere, peace settled upon them like a warm, soothing surf. Vashon lay against Aurora, his cheek on her belly, while she sat against the pillows, lightly tracing the tattoo on his muscular back. This morning even the dragon didn't bother her. Peterborough had stolen the Blackwell title from him. She could now understand the rage that had driven Vashon to do such a thing to his body.
"I should probably get back," she murmured, heartsick from the thought of leaving him.
"No, Sleeping Beauty, stay," he said, putting his hand possessively on her hip.
She smiled softly at his new nickname, then grew warm with the thought of what he'd done after he'd last awakened her with it. "But will the servants not be bewildered to find me gone?"
"Tsing will realize you're here."
She grew silent, disturbed by the prospect of having the servants know she was with Vashon all night, unhappy with her need to comply with propriety.
He raised himself on his arms and picked up her locket lying on the sheets. She blushed, unable to recall when the chain had broken.
Dangling it before her, he said, "I wasn't able to figure out the rhyme."
"I thought as much when I saw what you did to the map." She hesitated. "But you don't need the Star, Vashon, surely you realize that. You're rich beyond most people's imagining. You can afford to leave Peterborough alone."
He nodded. "But even if I end my fight with Peterborough, he will not end his with me. Especially not now, while I have you."
"Give him the locket then."
"It's not as simple as that."
She could feel him tense. Softly, she said, "My love, he cannot find Mirage. H
e'll never find us. We'll stay here and start a family and never wander—"
He drew away and rolled on his back, staring morosely up at the bed's dark canopy. "If he's diligent, he can find Mirage. It's not wise to underestimate him. And there are things you still don't know, Aurora. For instance, the curse."
"What curse?" she whispered.
"I don't hold that it's true, but the Star possesses a curse. 'Whosoever shall have it, their enemies shall die.'
It's written in The Chronicles of Crom Dubh, an ancient manuscript held at Inishmore Castle . . . where the Star originated."
"But if you don't believe this curse, then why do you even entertain it?"
"Because Peterborough believes it. He's been superstitious all along about killing his own brother. When he gets the emerald, I know he'll trade one superstition for another. He'll see me die even if he finds he has to force himself to have a hand in it."
He looked at her and brushed the strands of hair out of her eyes. "But I fear for you, Aurore, more than I fear for myself. So you must promise me, on everything that you hold dear, you will do what I tell you. I must keep you safe, no matter how difficult that may be."
"Just don't demand that I be sent away. That I shall never do."
"Peterborough is a danger while I have you," he repeated.
"What are you saying?" she asked. His tone disturbed her.
"I'm saying," he answered slowly, not meeting her gaze, "that you must do what I tell you. No matter what that is."
She shook her head, panic already rising in her breast. "Don't ask me to leave. Don't take me to your bed and then cast me aside."
His jaw hardened, as if he'd made a decision, a decision he knew she wouldn't like. "You have another life to return to, Aurora. It was wrong to snatch you from it. I've got to make it safe for you to return to London. I see that now."
Till Dawn Tames the Night Page 31
