The Sometime Bride

by Blair Bancroft

  The major opened the now well-oiled hinges and hasp, then paused as he crouched at the balcony’s edge. His eyes met hers. With a brief rueful smile he dropped over the side of the balcony and was gone.

  Tonight Cat was queen of the Casa Audley. Reigning sovereign of the gaming rooms. Darling of the allied officers, the Portuguese card players, the staff. Of Lucio and Marcio Cardoso. Of Blanca. And Thomas. Tonight she was a woman grown, celebrating her seventeenth birthday with a hundred best wishes, a small mountain of gifts, and too many glasses of champagne.

  It was a wonderful world. Beautiful. It did not matter that, for the third year in a row, Blas was not there to share the occasion. The major was undoubtedly back in France. Blas could follow him for all she cared. Straight to the heart of Paris. Into the arms of Napoleon himself.

  Someone handed her another glass of champagne. Cat’s green eyes sparkled over the bell of the glass, dazzling the young Portuguese officer who had brought it to her. As she sipped, Cat flirted outrageously, quite spoiling her air of sophistication by dissolving into giggles. “I cannot help it,” she apologized to the gentlemen surrounding her. “It’s the bubbles, you see. The more I drink, the more they tickle my nose.”

  Thomas looked up from the faro table at the sound of male laughter. He had long been accustomed to Caterina’s ring of admirers, but tonight he thought perhaps . . . Her laughter trilled above the appreciative murmurs around her. Her smile was too bright, her eyes glittered. It took only the lift of Thomas’s eyebrow to summon Marcio to his side.

  In no time at all Cat found herself out on the courtyard walkway heading toward the stairs. “I did not say goodbye to everyone,” she protested. “We did not see the old gentlemen in the Port . . . Portu . . . in the card room.” She stopped abruptly. “I did not say goodnight to Papa. I must go back.”

  Her determined steps jarred to a halt as Marcio tightened his grip around her shoulders. “He knows, Catarina,” he assured her. “Believe me, Don Tomás knows you have gone to bed. And you can apologize to the old gentlemen tomorrow.” Resolutely, he turned her back toward the stairs.

  Catarina moved forward a few steps . . . and stopped. “Marcio,” she said in a very different voice, “why does he always miss my birthdays?”

  Marcio had no need to ask whom she meant. “The war, Catarina,” he chided. “You know it is the war.”

  “No, I do not. The war keeps him here. On the Peninsula. Without the war he would not be here at all. He would be back in his precious England. He does not love me, you know. He loves the war. But me, no.”

  Her beauty dazzled, even in the pale light of the moon. Catarina was mistaken. No man could fail to love her. “You are not thinking clearly, Catarina. You have had too much champagne and are imagining things.”

  “He does not want me. The last time he was here . . . “ Cat’s lower lip quivered into a pout. “He does not want me. Believe me, I know it.”

  Of her own accord Catarina started up the stairs, murmuring to Marcio as they climbed, “You are right. I have had too much champagne, but I know what I know. When the war is over, he will leave me. Thomas says I will be a widow. And go to London.”

  At the top of the steps Cat paused, her small hands gripping the gallery railing as she gazed out over the shimmering moonlit beauty of the courtyard. “I do not want to go to London, Marcio. I do not want to be a widow.”

  “Of course you do not,” Marcio comforted, “nor will it happen. Blas will never leave you.” But men did such things. Throughout the history of the world men made war, men made love, men went home to the lives they led before. “Come, Cat,” Marcio coaxed, gently lifting her fingers from the railing. “Life will look better in the morning.”

  “I think not, but going to bed is a very good idea.” With docile resignation she allowed him to walk her to her door. He would, she knew, light her candle and inspect the room, as he had done each night for the two weeks since Major Martineau’s unexpected invasion of the Casa Audley.

  This night’s perusal of the room startled a quickly stifled gasp from Marcio’s throat. Cat, intent only on sinking into the haven of the chair before her dressing table, crossed the room without noticing anything unusual at all. Marcio, a smile broadening rapidly into a grin, said a brief goodnight and backed out the door, closing it softly behind him.

  Through eyes brimming with tears Cat stared blankly at the forlorn face reflected in her mirror. Idiota! It was fortunate Blas was not here to see what a weak little fool she was. To discover she cared so much when he cared so little.

  She wiped away her tears, blew her nose, then set to cleansing her face with a sweet-smelling herbal lotion. The champagne-induced euphoria and succeeding despair had settled into dull pervading depression. Wearily, Cat removed the pins from her hair. Golden red strands cascaded over the white silk of the gown she had worn for her wedding. It was a magnificent dress. She cherished it. Which is why she wore it for all special occasions. Sometimes, like tonight, she thought it was all she had left of her sometime husband.

  With a sigh Cat pushed herself up from the chair and began to work on the long row of buttons down her back. She never expected her maid to keep the late hours of the gaming rooms and had long since become adept at getting out of her gowns. After only a few minor contortions, Cat was once again fighting a rush of tears as she carefully hung her husband’s treasured gift in the wardrobe. Her chemise she left puddled on the floor. After all, Juana must have something to do, must she not? Completely naked, Cat walked toward the bed where the long-suffering Juana always laid out her nightgown.

  Through all the days and months of heat, cold and discomfort, the frustration of attempting to bend men to a will other than their own, Blas had frequently imagined lying in his wife’s bed, loving in his wife’s bed; but he had never conjured anything as erotic as watching from that haven of comfort while his wife unpinned her magnificent hair, cleansed her face and wiggled, so enticingly, out of her clothes. Nor of the perfection of her nakedness haloed by soft candlelight. He could not have improved on this welcome home if he had orchestrated it himself.

  As Catarina approached the bed, her nightgown rose out of the curtained darkness and fluttered down into a heap on the floor. A voice sounded from the shadows: “Don’t bother. You won’t need it.”

  Cat leaped back to her discarded clothing, snatched up her chemise. She clutched it to her body, shielding herself from rapacious eyes. Between the shadows and the voluminous hangings draped around the bedposts, she could see almost nothing of the source of the voice. Warily, she took a step backwards, then another before coming up hard against the wardrobe door. The carving on the solid mahogany bit into her bare buttocks, jarring her into reality.

  She felt clear-headed but knew it could not be so. She had definitely had too much champagne. Major Martineau was not here. Don Alejo was not here. Most certainly, Blas could not be here. This glorious moment was undoubtedly conjured by the dearest desire of her heart. The gown had simply slipped off the bed. The voice, a fantasy from better times. Catarina squared her fragile shoulders, started back toward the bed. She did not, however, drop the chemise.

  A ghost rose from the shadows. A solid black-haired ghost. Wearing nothing but the dress shirt he wore in the gaming rooms. The dress shirt he wore for the private game he played with his wife. Had played. A very long time ago.

  Neither gratified nor amused by the resurrection of their game, Catarina snapped, “You are not here. Go away!”

  “Damn it, Cat,” said the apparition. “I’ve traveled a week to get here and must travel a week to get back, and all you can do is tell me I’m not here?”

  He took a small step forward.

  “I have had too much champagne,” she declared. “You are not real.” She peered at the partially shadowed form. “I think,” she amended.

  After a moment’s hesitation, Cat took a tentative step forward.

  Without a word he moved again, playing out the drama. The apparition w
as no longer hidden in the shadows, but close enough for her to see the candlelight reflected in the amber eyes, the sensuousness of his full lips. Near enough to smell the scent of him. Of Blas. Only Blas.

  The champagne must have been very strong. “You are a figment of my imagination,” said Cat stubbornly. “You cannot be real.”

  He took another step forward.

  As if drawn by a magnet, Cat took the final step, coming to rest a scant inch from his chest. Nostrils quivering, pulses racing, they breathed the scent of each other, choked on the certainty of reality, knowing that from this moment the outcome of their game would never be the same.

  In that instant Blas changed the rules. His hand moved up to caress the red-gold strands of hair, her cheek . . . her lips. Suddenly she was pressed to every inch of him, the all-too-solid, fully aroused maleness of him digging into her belly. Her nerveless fingers dropped the chemise, leaving only the shirt between them.

  “Do I feel like a figment?” Blas inquired fiercely.

  Cat had never thought to be angry with her beloved for more than a woman’s customary exasperation with the ways of men, but this was not to be borne. She had wanted, longed for, prayed for this moment for years. But for him to come to her like this, blithely expecting her to fall into his arms after he had so cruelly rejected her only three weeks earlier . . .

  She moved her hands up to his chest, shoved with all her might. Startled, Blas released her, eyeing her with amazement. Cat picked up her chemise, swiftly wiggled it over her head. Feeling not quite so vulnerable, she faced him squarely.

  “How dare you come to me like this?” she demanded. “Is seventeen such a magic number you must wait until now? Was I not old enough three weeks ago? Come, husband, speak to me. Why am I desirable now when three weeks ago you would not have me?”

  Speechless, Blas ruffled his hand through his hair and looked at her as if he had just been attacked by a kitten. In actuality, he was thinking very fast. “I rejected you?” he murmured, stalling for time.

  “You know you did.”

  “Sometimes . . . sometimes I find it difficult . . . “ Bloody hell, he couldn’t think of a reason. Excuses were the farthest thing from his mind. “I–uh–sometimes find it difficult to break away from a character I’ve been playing. I fear Don Alejo is a slippery fellow, an idiot who does not properly appreciate his treasure of a wife.”

  “No doubt he had his eye on another woman at the time.”

  “No! Damn it, Cat, don’t be difficult.” Definitely not the glorious reunion he had planned.

  “Me? Difficult?”

  “I’m sorry,” Blas shouted. “Whatever I did, I’m sorry. I was mad. It was a mistake. I’ve crossed Portugal and half of Spain to be with you. Come and be my wife!”

  “I am very tired of sorry,” said Cat distinctly. She marched past him to the bed where she dropped the chemise to the floor and made a show of donning her nightgown. She climbed under the covers, ostentatiously pulled them up to her chin. “Goodnight,” she said to her husband. And rolled into a ball, presenting him with her back.

  Bloody, bloody hell! What a mull he’d made of it. He was making more progress with the guerrilleros than he was with his wife. Which wasn’t saying much.

  A tiny smile replaced his frown. The time was only shortly after midnight. There was a long night yet to be lived.

  Chapter Thirteen

  For Blas stealth and deception were a way of life. It never occurred to him this was the moment for truth. He had come home with but one thing on his mind and, by God, he was going to have it.

  He skinned the long shirt over his head, dropping it with a gleam of amusement in his eyes on top of his wife’s crumpled chemise. Two long strides, a puff from his powerful lungs, and the single candle winked out. The room settled into welcoming darkness.

  If only his transgressions were so easy to erase.

  After a journey across hundreds of miles of summer-wracked Iberian plains to reach his wife’s side, Blas accomplished the final few feet to the bed with the agility of a homing pigeon. Gingerly, he crawled in on the opposite side of the wide bed from Cat’s cocoon of covers. He kept his hands carefully to himself. The infinite possibilities, the anticipation of this new game, intrigued him, dissipating his anger and frustration. This was a game he was going to win, and he fully intended to enjoy it.

  Though Cat did not move, not so much as a tiny wiggle to flex the muscles bunched into a protective fetal ball, Blas knew she could not be asleep. Cupping his hands behind his head, he stretched his long naked inches full length beside her. He, too, remained motionless. Silent. Except for a long sigh which was a calculated blend of exasperation, frustration, and mournful longing. A sigh produced with the skill a professional actor might have envied.

  A quarter of an hour. Half. Cat’s muscles were screaming their outrage. The sheet was tickling her nose. The devil! She absolutely had to move. Now. This minute! She batted away the sheet, pushing it down beneath her chin. Defiantly—she was, after all, admitting Blas had won this round—Cat uncurled her feet and stretched her legs, keeping them as far from her husband’s side of the bed as possible.

  Still Blas did not move. But out of the darkness beside her Cat heard a tune. His soft baritone humming the exceedingly naughty song he had been singing the first time she saw him, rattling over the cobbles in an ox-cart loaded with casks of wine. He was a Bad Man, her Blas. How could he use such a precious moment as a weapon against her? Cat’s face crumpled into a mask of pain. She turned farther onto her side, presenting her husband with nothing more inviting than her stiff back.

  The tightness in her stomach must be the champagne, she told herself. This awful gripping something that refused to go away. This fluttering, demanding pull towards the unknown. It had to be the champagne. Why then was it so much like the wondrous burgeoning excitement she felt when they played their daring game? That flood of feeling that must be teased and teased and ultimately controlled until one of them finally gave in. Not to the demanding waves of sensation but to reality. Breaking the spell by running away.

  Cat stifled a gasp as warm fingers feathered across her skin. On the soft mound of one buttock, a place where even Blas had never touched her before. Her body skyrocketed into panicked sensation. As his fingers traced small circles against her soft vulnerable skin, Cat clamped her jaws shut and remained frozen to the bed. After a series of butterfly caresses, the fingers climbed to the small of her back. She thought she would go mad. Cat tensed, gulped a lungful of air. But never moved. This was merely a new wrinkle on a well-known game. Her only defense was control.

  His caresses remained light and teasing, until he reached her shoulders. At the base of her neck he moved into a different rhythm, kneading and pulling at the knotted cords of her shoulders and neck. Tears of frustration stung her eyes. He had no right to be so good at this. To be able to bring such exquisite pleasure. To drag such feelings from her when she wished to be a woman of marble. But of course he had had a great deal of experience. On how many women had he practiced these wiles?

  Eyes tight shut, Cat concentrated on fanning her jealousy while his lips followed the movement of his hands, tickling her nape, her back . . . When his mouth reached that incredibly sensitive area at the base of her spine, she nearly raised right off the bed. Nearly. Never, never would she let him know what he was doing to her.

  Blas swore to himself with considerable fluency. In Spanish, Portuguese, and basic Anglo-Saxon. He might as well be caressing a woman of stone atop a sarcophagus. Undoubtedly, stronger measures were called for. Yet . . . he had hurt her once. In mind and body. And he was not going to do it again.

  At least she had not run screaming from the room. Blas grinned, struck by the absurdity of Cat ever doing such a thing. No matter what he did, she would never leave him. Persistence was the only key to unlocking the prize. His Cat was a worthy opponent.

  In one lithe movement he tipped her over onto her back and shoved the bedcoverings d
own to her toes. A long finger to her lips shut off Cat’s sharp protest. Wordlessly, their eyes sought each other through the gloom. Blas loosened his grip on the soft silk in his hand, ruthlessly repressing the violent need which had brought him to the brink of stripping his young wife bare. A vision of the night he returned from La Coruña rose up before him. He had taken the virginity of a young woman he had sworn to protect. He would douse his arousal in the courtyard fountain before he would repeat the sin of that night.

  He should leave the Casa, return to Spain.

  He wouldn’t, of course. He had waited for this moment too long. She was his wife. Wed and witnessed in a proper Anglican ceremony, the ancient words sounding through the cozy parlor of the old farmhouse, joining them together. Irrevocably.

  There was nothing anyone could do to part them. Not the laws of church or state. The war. His parents. Thomas. Cat was his. Even if she still seemed to think they were playing the Game with only frustration at its end.

  But when he reached for the hem of her nightgown, he found his hand gripped in the velvet vise of fingers half the size of his own. Blas groaned her name aloud. “Damn it, woman, it’s you I want, not a handful of silk.” Instinctively, he held her down as she tried to roll back onto her side.

  “Beast!” she hissed. “Go away, I do not want you.”

  “Oh, yes, you do.” In the next instant Cat found herself naked, flat on her back with her husband’s face buried in her belly, blowing kisses into the navel which had given her life. She thought she might die of it. He had no right to touch her in such treacherous places.

  Of course he did. With my body I thee worship . . .

  With a long series of nibbled kisses and warm breaths Blas worked his way up her body, varying his path to coax each rosy nipples to a peek. Though they were as tempting as they were succulent, he kept on moving. His quest ended with Cat’s ear. He blew soft puffs of life which radiated through her, melting the marble into soft earthy clay open to the master’s touch.