by Laura Parker
Merlyn shook his head scornfully. “Hardly! I’ve never been caught. I was condemned for the murder of a young woman whose bed I’d just quit.”
Cassandra’s spirits plummeted. “You murdered a woman?”
A grimness tightened Merlyn’s mouth. “Does it spoil your appreciation of our night together to think you bedded with a murderer?’
A tremor shook Cassandra as she jerked her head in denial. “Yes—no! It changes nothing!” she cried.
Merlyn gazed at her, into her honey-brown eyes bright with tears and a soft mouth that trembled in fear, and a strange sensation flowed through him. He realized with a heightening of the feeling that he was blushing!
For more than thirty-two years he had used his wit and callousness as a weapon and shield against the world. He’d forgotten there were still vulnerable souls abroad. He reached into the pouch near his seat and withdrew a silver flask. “Drink a little of this brandy. You’re shivering.”
Cassandra took the bottle and put it to her lips. The liquid warmth spread quickly from her mouth to her belly as she swallowed a small mouthful. “Thank you,” she murmured.
Merlyn watched her cheeks flush with color, not knowing what to say. When she handed the bottle back to him he took it without a word.
“You have my jewels. Will you take us to London?” she asked, more determined than ever to reach the safety of Nicholas’s arms.
“You’d best settle the lad, he’ll soon make himself sick with crying,” Merlyn suggested. His grin revealed a set of surprisingly healthy teeth. “Don’t play the coy maid on my account.”
The maddening tone of his voice scraped her raw nerves and Cassandra snapped back, “You can hardly imagine that I would—would—”
“I don’t see that you’ve much choice,” he returned, still in good humor.
Cassandra debated a moment, gnawing her lower lip in indecision. It was a mistake. Merlyn moved with such speed she had no chance to evade him. He lunged forward suddenly, reaching around her, and tugged loose her lacings. Hard strong fingers separated her gown and grazed the sensitive flesh of her spine, leaving her gown hanging from her shoulders.
“Feed him, confound it!” he muttered.
Cassandra lowered her eyes from his face, not wanting to see its violent strength. Taking a deep breath, she reached up to slip her right shoulder free of the gown. A shiver that had nothing to do with the coolness of the night traveled across her bare skin as she carefully pulled her arm free, exposing a fully rounded breast. It was all the encouragement Adam needed. One tiny hand, pink and wriggly as a starfish, came up to grasp at her bosom as his small mouth began rooting hungrily.
Only when Adam’s wails gave way to coos of contentment did she look up again at Merlyn, a cold, forbidding anger in her dark eyes. To her amazement, she saw that he had turned his head away. Her eyes moved over him. She had forgotten that there was a beauty in his rugged features and how his hair lay in ebony curls at his temples and nape. Against the stark whiteness of his shirt, his skin was bronze. And how large he was. The coach was so small their knees touched. All that she had forgotten.
But there were other things she had not forgotten, things that had brought instant recognition. She shivered, remembering the hands that moments before had held her close and the lips that had claimed hers with such assuredness. What did he want of her? She choked down her fear and looked down at Adam. Whatever it was, she would have to meet it. Behind her lay certain separation from her son, perhaps even death. Ahead lay …
Merlyn did not lift his gaze until he was certain both child and mother were engrossed in one another. The deep red and gold highlights in the mahogany mane framing her shoulders were richer than he remembered, beckoning him to run his fingers through the silky strands tangled by the wind, but he did not touch her. Instead, he contented himself with looks. He could not believe he had found her, not quite, though he had held her against him, felt her breath on his cheek, heard her dearly remembered voice. How could he not look upon her in wonder after a year’s fruitless search for her? Her lips were pouted now and a small frown marred the smooth expanse of her brow. Her thoughts were troubled ones.
“So, too, are mine,” he murmured softly as his eyes fell with new intensity on the child sucking impatiently at his mother’s breast. The pearly luster of her naked breast reminded him of the kiss they had shared and he tore his gaze away.
His gaze went back to her face, its gentle contours a familiar companion of his dreams. For a year he had searched for her, hoping against all odds that she might be found. To stumble upon her tonight with a child in her arms, that was one thing he had not made plans against.
The thought brought a deep scowl to Merlyn’s features. A scant week ago he had chanced to meet Nick Briarcliffe in one of the many gaming halls of London. He had been drowning the bitter anger of another night’s fruitless search for Cassie. Perhaps that had attracted Briarcliffe, for he quickly learned that their moods matched. Sullen and angry, Briarcliffe let slip that the wife he’d never bedded had given birth to a child and that his father intended to set the bastard up as his new heir.
His own suggestion that Nick steal the boy was a bad joke, meant to make light of another man’s woes. When Briarcliffe nodded and asked him to find a suitable man to do the job, he’d replied that a discreet inquiry might be better. For a hundred pounds he offered to go to Briarcliffe as Nick’s spy.
Merlyn grunted softly. He was nearly always in need of funds. To offer his services as a spy seemed a small thing at that moment. The results were no business of his. Until now.
Again his gaze moved over the babe. The black silky curls and lashes were vivid swathes of color against his dewy fresh skin. A child. His child.
Now he noticed another sight that made a smile stretch his features. It winked at him from the third finger on her left hand, the finger he had placed it on himself. His talisman, his emerald and sapphire ring.
Merlyn reached instinctively to touch it but drew back when she flinched. He looked at her in surprise. “You would rather not admit that I am alive. That makes me curious. Why should you wish your child’s father dead?”
He paused, watching with no satisfaction the confirmation of his statement in her blush. His voice was harsher when he continued. “If you believe I care that you entered into a plot to fleece Nick Briarcliffe of his inheritance, you’re wrong. I’m acquainted with the hardship of a life without funds or protection. And I’ve learned how to change that. You see before you Merlyn Ross. Yet an hour earlier I was the Comte de Valure in your eyes. Give a man a velvet coat, hide his dark locks with a wig, and he takes the form of a nobleman. The world accepts it. Arrogance, like manners, can be learned. An accent is the skill of the lowliest thespian. I’m a thief because it pleases me to be so.”
The smile he gave her was both cocky and tender, and Cassandra felt an unwanted urge to smile back but did not.
“Perhaps we’re more alike than you’d care to admit. Our victims are the nobility, those who can well afford to lose what they have through no effort of their own. I frightened you needlessly a moment ago when I might have told you the truth. I killed no one. You see, with honesty, we could deal well together, Cassie.”
He leaned forward and plucked his ring from her finger with a touch so light she would not have realized it had she not seen him do it. “But you would pretend that you’re a marchioness, and I am happy enough in your company to oblige you in making a fool of yourself. But know this, Cassie. When all is said and done, you belong to me.” So saying, he dropped the ring back into her lap.
Cassandra said nothing. The shell of calm she had used to buffer the shocks of the night was shattered. He thought her a schemer and a fraud, a woman who had sold her child for money. Closing her eyes, she willed away the vision of Merlyn Ross. If he had been welcome in her dreams, he was not in reality.
Yet before them lay London and all the hours and days between.
> Chapter Seven
Cassandra stirred under the pleasant sensation of a kiss. The gentle tug of teeth on her lower lip drew a shivery sigh of pleasure from her. Her eyelids fluttered but refused to open. It was a dream, of course, but one that she was reluctant to give up. To be surrounded by a cocoon of love, enfolded in protecting arms that sent ripples of desire through her, had been a dream often repeated in the last months. The difference this time lay in the intensity of her response. When warm palms traced the outline of her naked breasts, communicating the sweet sensation of desire, she arched herself against the pressure as her nipples hardened. Her breath quickened as warm caressing lips closed over hers once more.
The deep chuckle in her ear was another new facet of the dream, and for a moment Cassandra stiffened. Then she was being lifted and laid on her back. The odor of leather and the sway of a coach surprised her, but before she could wonder at these additions she was caught against the hard expanse of a naked male breast. The sweet firm warmth of his body overlay hers. Stroking and kissing, he seemed to envelop her vibrant flesh in a need as urgent as her own. The spicy scent of vetiver blended with the earthy exotic perfumes of their bodies as Cassandra experienced the lingering touch of his tongue in the hot silky hollow of her mouth. Flesh and spirit blended, absorbed and distilled into a single essence.
Blazing above the pulsating, shimmering, swelling, peaking beauty of their union was her lover’s gaze, the glorious, magical, translucent flames of emerald and sapphire.
Oh yes! her heart cried. There’s such magic in your touch. This is love … is what I seek and cannot find!
The carriage swung wide to avoid a boulder in the road and Cassandra was jarred awake. Eyes wide in surprise, she met the gaze of Merlyn Ross. So intense was his blue-green stare that, flushing, she lowered her eyes to her gown. She was fully clothed, but that was not entirely reassuring. She was lying within the circle of his arm, his chest a pillow for her head. Had he kissed her, or was it all a dream?
Number 20 on St. George’s Street at Hanover Square was ablaze with lights when the coach carrying Merlyn and Cassandra rolled into the London avenue.
“It seems your husband is entertaining,” Merlyn voiced in irritation when their coach had halted on the opposite side of the square.
Cassandra stirred, brushing the sleep from her eyes with one small hand. “Ooh,” she breathed as every muscle in her body protested movement, reluctant to pull away from the broad chest that offered her a comfortable pillow each night as she slept. In spite of this intimacy, they had spoken little after the first night, the meals they shared in wayside taverns the only respite from the punishing ride of the coach.
For a moment she lay still, enjoying the warmth that enfolded her, but when his statement played back through her thoughts she bolted upright. “We’ve reached London? So soon?”
Merlyn smiled and adjusted Adam, who slept in his left arm just as she had in his right. “Do you know you’re beautiful when you’ve just awakened, Cassie? Were your dreams so sweet?”
Cassandra turned away from his knowing smile, feeling the color bloom in her face. She could almost believe he had read her thoughts. Looking out the window, she saw the broad facade of the great town house which boasted three full stories of red brick, a dozen front windows, and a hooded doorway of new design.
“Nick lives in grand style, don’t you agree?” Merlyn prompted.
Cassandra turned back to him and then her head swung again to the window. “Nicholas lives here?” Suddenly uncertain of herself, she edged back from the window until she was in the shadow. “I had no idea,” she exclaimed softly.
“No idea at all, Marchioness?” Merlyn returned in mock surprise. “I find that odd, yes indeed. You boast to be the wife of the man who owns that house.”
Cassandra gave him a quick, angry look. The spell between them was broken. How could it be otherwise? “I never said I had been to Nicholas’s London residence.” She leaned forward to look out again. “Perhaps you should leave us here to find our own time to enter. If my husband is entertaining, he certainly would not wish me to be seen by his guests in my present condition.”
“Not at all,” Merlyn returned calmly and reached to unlatch the coach door. “If your husband is half as eager as you believe him to be to feast his eyes on you, then your ruined gown and unbound hair will only serve to augment his pity.”
“He’ll think me the rudest sort of beggar,” Cassandra protested, looking down on the soiled, wrinkled mess that had once been a ball gown. Days earlier she had shed the impossible whalebone paniers over which the gold silk had been draped, and several of her petticoats had been sacrificed as Adam’s diapers. “I have some pride.”
“That I’m beginning to believe,” Merlyn answered brusquely. “But you will understand that I am eager to collect the reward due me. And, of course, to see you to the safety of your loving spouse’s arms.” Merlyn pushed her gently to the open doorway. “After you, Marchioness. I will care for little Adam.”
Cassandra hesitated, a knot of fear growing in her middle. She had dreamed a thousand times of what it would be like to walk into Nicholas’s home, to find him seated at his dinner, or alone in his library with a brandy and a book. Never had she imagined that their reunion would take place within the view of strangers.
A hand, warm and compelling, came up and rested on the bare skin of her slender neck. “You don’t have to do it, Cassie. I’ll believe that you were married if it will make you happy. But come away now. Come with me.
Cassandra turned her head so that his face came into view. He again wore the disguise of the comte, yet the wig, patch, and fresh powder could not hide from her eyes the disturbingly masculine lines of his true features. His gaze made her teeter on the brink. The deep sapphire eye seemed to speak what he could not, forming the thoughts on the surface of her heart.
Stay with me. This man you call husband is the stranger. Could he love you as well as I? Remember our night together, my words of love. Remember my kiss. One word. One glance will save you from what lies before you.
Cassandra turned her eyes away from his compelling gaze, her emotions a turmoil of fear, panic, repulsion … and desire. Even now, she thought desperately as she recorded her body’s response to the warmth of his voice and his touch. Even now, in sight of her goal, so dearly sought and so dearly paid for, she could hear a faint voice in her mind urging her to relent, to go with the enigmatic stranger beside her who made her dream such dreams as perhaps no woman had ever had.
“I can’t,” she whispered so softly that he did not hear her. What she felt for Merlyn, born in the brief hours of a single night, could not sweep away the hope of true love that had made her life bearable these three years. She knew nearly nothing of him or even if he could be trusted. He was an escaped prisoner, a thief. What more she could not imagine. It was no life for a child. “I can’t,” she said louder, shaking off his hand. “I have a husband. It is not a lie. And there’s Adam. He needs the protection of a decent man.”
Merlyn recoiled from her as if she had spat on him. She did not see the look of hurt and humiliation her words had caused, and too quickly it was gone. She did not want him. The thought thundered through his head, thickening his pulse with pain. He who had loved and searched and longed for her for nearly a year had been rejected out of hand, and for what? A debauched wretch who claimed the title of marquess.
The heavy pounding of his heart shook him. Until the night she had shared his cell at Newgate he had never known the meaning of the word love. And yet he was certain that because of it, she had left his side with the seed of his life taking root within her. Yet now she would deny him as not good enough for his own son.
His gaze switched to Adam, his expression grim. The child’s cap of black hair and dark blue eyes were as true examples of his claim as any that could be offered. Did she expect Briarcliffe to simply accept the babe, knowing he was another man’s handiwork?
Merlyn snatched the latch and the door swung open. Then he turned to her, his face only inches from hers as he said, “Go, Cassie, and be damned. You’ve whored for me. I’ll not begrudge your husband his turn. But you’ll not take my son with you!”
A hand in the small of her back propelled Cassandra out into the cobblestone street. In disbelief, she heard Merlyn cry “Drive on!” and the carriage door slam shut behind her. Even as she gained her balance and turned toward it, the coach lurched forward to the crack of the coachman’s whip and began rolling down the street.
“No! Wait! Don’t!” Cassandra cried, a feeling of unreality so strong in her that she could not believe that the coach was gaining speed, leaving her running behind. The thundering of her heart overshadowed her running footsteps, and then, incredibly, the coach made a swing into a narrow dark lane and was gone.
“Oh, God!” she whispered in the eerie quiet after the coach was out of sight. He’d stolen her child!
She did not see the rider cantering through the square nor hear him until his surprised shout startled her as he came too quickly upon her in the dark. A splash of muddy water kicked up by the passing horse dampened her stockings, and for the first time she realized that it was raining, a cold misty drizzle too fine to hear.
“You! Girl!” the rider called after her as he slowed his mount. “What do you think you’re about?”
Afraid that he might stop her, she turned and ran toward the Briarcliffe house. Now more than ever she needed Nicholas’s help and protection. She had the presence of mind to know she’d be turned away from the front door and ran toward the terrace instead. After a moment she found the gate in the wrought-iron fence that guarded the grounds.
The quiet of the street with its elegantly fronted houses contrasted sharply with the traffic at the rear of the garden. Here the steamy heat from the kitchen hung in the air like earthbound clouds, reflecting the kitchen fires and lighting the yard.
