Gaelen Foley - Ascension 02

by Princess

  “There, there, ma belle,” Philippe crooned, “don’t fret.”

  She sobbed once, cringing where she stood. She lowered her head, powerless to stop him as he pushed the ripped ends of her dress down to her waist, baring her upper body.

  This could not be happening, she thought. Not in her beautiful garden, the very heart of her safe, pretty, insulated world. Cheeks aflame, she bit her lower lip, fighting tears of rage. She tried to pull her waist-length hair forward to cover her breasts, but Philippe protested.

  “Non, non, chérie. Let us see what beauty God hath wrought.” With his left hand, he brushed her hair softly back again behind her shoulders.

  “You bastard,” Darius whispered.

  She could not bear to meet his eyes.

  Hands at her sides, she stood there shaking with humiliation and rage, exposed before the only man she had ever wanted. The only one who did not want her.

  Not so very long ago, she had loved Darius Santiago with a painful, adolescent ardor. She had tried to show him three years ago, the night of her debut ball, that she had grown up for him at last, was no longer a child; she had tried to show him that none of his women could love him as she did. But he had fled her and left the island, hurrying off on some new mission. Now he was witness to her humiliation, forced to view her body, the gift she had tried to give him—now, when it meant nothing.

  Just then the night sky flung down another swift cloudburst of cold rain. She flinched, then shuddered when the first drops struck her bare skin.

  She could feel a volcanic force of pure rage building from where Darius stood, but somehow the only thing she could focus on was her pride, her last defense. She held fast to it as if it were a tangible weapon. She lifted her head high against the crushing shame. Tears in her eyes, she stared straight ahead at nothing.

  Philippe laughed at her. “Haughty thing. Yes, you know you are stunning, don’t you?” he murmured, running one finger from the curve of her shoulder down her arm. She fought not to shudder with revulsion. “Skin like silk. Come and touch her, Santiago. She is exquisite. I don’t blame you—any man would have a weakness for such a creature. We can share her if you like.”

  At this, her stricken gaze flew to Darius, but then a cold shaft of horror spiked down her spine, for he was feasting his eyes on her bare breasts, his gaze devouring her nakedness.

  “Darius?” she asked in a pleading whisper.

  Philippe’s fingers flicked in eager agitation over the knife’s hilt, but his smooth, sure voice held a note of triumph. “Come and taste her. No one needs to know. Really, after all you’ve done for your king, isn’t she the least you deserve?”

  Finally, Darius looked up from his intimate perusal of her body. She caught the flash of white teeth in his cold, wicked smile. He began sauntering slowly toward them, and directed his question to Philippe. “What do you suggest?”

  Her very mind choked. Images exploded in her memory of the last time she had seen Darius, six months ago. As usual he had ignored her from the moment he set foot in the palace, but that day, she had opened the door to the music room in the middle of the afternoon to find him ravishing one of his many lovers against the wall. His loose white shirt had been hanging from his shoulders, brown chest bared, his black breeches clinging upon his lean hips as the woman with her skirts hitched up fumbled to undress him. When Serafina had opened the door, he had looked over and held her shocked gaze for a second.

  She still remembered the smoldering look in his eyes as she stood in the doorway, mouth agape, eyes wide. She remembered the mocking smile of seduction he had sent her before she slammed the door and fled. It was quite the same as the one on his scarred lips now.

  “I’ll hold her for you,” Philippe said.

  “Oh, she wouldn’t fight me,” he murmured. “Would you, angel?”

  Her cheeks turned crimson. She lowered her head, heart pounding madly. Trembling violently, she could not bear to look at him as he stalked toward them.

  She swore to herself this was part of a ruse. She was the Princess Royal! Darius would never—never.

  But he was unlike any man she knew, this Spaniard with his terrible beauty. She could neither predict nor manage him as she did the others. She only knew that he feared nothing and that, for all his loyalty to her father, he obeyed no law but his own.

  One slow, relentless stride after another, he came to stand perhaps three inches away from her, so close his chest nearly brushed her breasts. She could feel him breathing against her.

  She was trapped between the two tall, ruthless men, her breath jagged, her exposed skin racing with shivers, hot and cold. He was going to touch her at any moment, she knew. Cheeks blazing, she wanted to die for shame of the perverse desire he wove into her fear. Usually she was quick-witted, but at the moment she was mute, staring brokenly at a silver button on his coat right at her eye level.

  She could not think of a single thing to say to try to save herself, could not find her voice to invoke her father’s name, nor her fiancé’s—in this moment, she could not even picture Anatole’s face. Terror wiped her mind blank, and Darius filled her senses—fierce, elemental.

  His nearness, the sheer male force of him, overwhelmed her. Her nostrils were filled with the clean, musky scent of him, mingled with the smell of horses and leather, the exotic spice of the cheroots he was always smoking, and the coppery taint of blood. She could feel the heat radiating from his powerful body, feel the thrumming tension coiled in his hard, sinewy form.

  Then it all happened at once. He seized Philippe by the throat and knocked her out of his grasp. Philippe’s blade flashed, stabbing at him. He ducked back, grasping Philippe’s right wrist while Serafina went stumbling, landing on her hands and knees near the edge of the courtyard. Pulling the remnants of her bodice up over her shoulders with shaking hands, she immediately scrambled about face to see if Darius was hurt. The fountain partly blocked her view. There was a clatter of metal.

  Philippe cursed as his weapon went skittering across the bricks. He lunged after it. Darius kicked it away and laid hold of him. Flailing wildly, Philippe tore free and bolted.

  Darius was upon him. He grabbed Philippe by the back of the collar and hurled him around, throwing him down onto the flagstone, blocking the exit.

  She looked up in dread when she heard the whisper of metal, and saw Darius’s ebony-handled dagger, the slim elegance of the blade kissed by moonlight.

  Oh, God.

  When Philippe threw up both hands to ward off the first blow, Darius’s dagger slashed across both his open palms.

  Serafina turned her face away, but she heard every dragging second of their fight, every gasp and choke and low curse as Darius savaged him.

  The cicadas screamed. She longed to run. When Darius swore in some unknown language, she opened her eyes and saw him lift his dagger in both hands for the final cut, saw his beautiful face alight with savagery.

  Don’t.

  She squeezed her eyes shut tight as the knife plunged straight down like a bird of prey. Philippe’s scream was short, followed by a silence.

  Then she heard only the breeze blowing through the junipers. She became aware of the sound of a man’s fierce panting. She felt like she was going to throw up.

  It dawned on her with sudden hysteria that she had to run. She had to escape from here, get away from him at once before he came to sate the lust she’d read in his stare. He was the deadliest man in the kingdom and he was out of control, reduced by rage to the law of his boyhood—the law of the streets.

  Never taking her eyes off him, she shoved to her feet in one jerky motion as Darius raked a hand through his hair, pushing his forelock out of his eyes, a black, demonic shape against the lesser dark of night. A second later, he wrenched his knife out of Philippe’s breast.

  She watched him, wild-eyed, clutching the silk remnants of her bodice together as she inched sideways along the perimeter of the courtyard. She ignored the prickly branches raking the tender
skin of her back. He was blocking the only exit, but she would claw her way through the thick hedge if she had to.

  Darius rose from Philippe’s lifeless body. He took a handkerchief from the pocket of his impeccable coat, the cotton pearl-white in the dark. Wiping the blood off his hands, he paused and suddenly turned, giving the body a vicious kick in the ribs.

  Serafina let out a small scream, taken off guard by his swift, tempestuous movement.

  Darius looked over at her, staring harshly at her for a second, as if he were only just remembering she was there.

  Then he stood very still, panting, a tall, silent figure looming in the darkness.

  “What are you doing?” His voice was unnervingly quiet.

  Trapped in his steady, piercing gaze, she froze.

  “Jesus,” he muttered, closing his eyes for a second.

  She said nothing, gathering her torn dress tighter against her in both sweating palms as she calculated the odds of successfully running past him.

  He heaved a sigh, shook his head to himself, then went and splashed his face under the cold bubbling fountain. A moment later, he walked toward her, slipping off his black jacket.

  She shrank back against the bushes from him.

  He held out the coat, offering it to her.

  She didn’t dare move even to take it, didn’t dare take her eyes off him.

  He had killed three men all in a night’s work, he was known to do indecent things to women in the middle of the day, he had stared at her breasts, and then there was the other matter, more troubling still, that eight years ago she had been marked with this man’s blood.

  It had happened in the city square on her twelfth birthday, when someone tried to shoot the king. She had been standing there smiling at her birthday festivities, holding her papa’s hand, when the would-be assassin attacked. And Santiago, this beautiful madman, she thought, dove into the path of the bullet, his hot, scarlet blood splashing her cheek and her new white frock.

  Since that day, deep down in a primal, illogical place inside of her that responded to things like the warmth of fire and the smell of cooking food, deep down in her blood and bones where she was not princess, not political pawn, but simply woman, she knew she belonged to this man.

  And the most terrifying thing of all was that she sensed he knew it, too.

  His intense, fiery gaze softened slightly under his long lashes.

  She couldn’t stop shaking.

  Again, he offered the coat.

  “Take it, Princesa,” he said softly.

  Without warning, her eyes brimmed at his gentle tone.

  His long lashes flicked downward, as if he had no idea what to do with her.

  “I’ll help you,” he said reluctantly, holding out the coat so she would only have to slip her arms inside the sleeves.

  Hesitantly, she let him put it on her like a child.

  “I thought . . .” she began. She bit down on her lower lip, unable to finish.

  “I know what you thought.” His voice was low, fierce. “I would never hurt you.”

  Their stares locked, clashed, both wary.

  She was the first to drop her gaze, astounded by her own unfamiliar meekness. Her ex-governess would never have believed it. “Didn’t—didn’t you need him alive?”

  “Well, he’s dead now, isn’t he?” he said in weary disgust. “I’ll manage.” One fist propped on his hip, for a moment he rubbed his forehead.

  “Thank you,” she whispered shakily.

  He shrugged and walked away, returning to the fountain.

  Finally, now that she saw the danger truly was past, all the strength drained from her. Tears overtook her, blinding her. She sank down where she was, collapsing slowly in a heap on the bricks. Wrapping his jacket tighter around her, she sat, braced her elbows on her bent knees, and held her head in both hands, fighting tears for all she was worth.

  I will not cry in front of him, she thought fiercely, but a moment or two later, she succumbed. She couldn’t help it.

  When she sobbed aloud, he looked over in surprise. Frowning, he came back to her, standing tall above her. She could not summon any sense of pride, she just cried, sniffled furiously, and brushed a tear off her cheek with the back of her hand, unable to look up beyond his shiny black boots with their cruel, silver spurs.

  He crouched down, searching her eyes. “Hey, Princess. What’s this? You trying to ruin my night?”

  She stared at him in amazement. Ruin his night?

  She jumped when he reached out toward her, but he merely offered her a neatly folded handkerchief, producing it out of nowhere with a bit of Gypsy sleight of hand.

  After a moment’s hesitation, she accepted it, remembering as she dried her eyes how she used to think he was magic when she was a little girl, for he could pull a gold coin out of her ear and make it vanish again.

  He studied her, the arrogant smirk on his lips at odds with the troubled look in his eyes. “What’s the matter? You scared of me now, like everyone else?”

  Her answer was a single, shaking sob that came all the way up from her lungs.

  The smirk faded. “Hey, come on, little Cricket. This is me,” he said more gently. He looked almost shaken. “You know me. You’ve always known me. Since you were this big, yes?” He held up thumb and forefinger about an inch apart.

  She glanced at his hand, then met his eyes uncertainly.

  It was a half-truth. All her life he had been there, in the shadows, but no one really knew Darius Santiago. He would not allow it. Indeed, he saved his most scathing mockery for those who tried to love him, as she had learned.

  Twenty years ago, just before she was born, her parents had taken Darius off the streets, a feral boy-thief who, by an act of valor, had saved her mother’s life. In thanks, Papa had made him a royal ward, raised him as his own son—insofar as Darius’s magnificent pride would permit him to accept what he viewed as charity. From the time she was old enough to realize that she was something of a disappointment to her parents, a firstborn daughter rather than the hoped-for son and royal heir, she had found an ally and protector in her fellow outsider, the half-Gypsy boy whose only friends, it seemed, were the horses of the royal stable.

  He lowered his long, thick lashes, and his voice was softer. “Well, it’s all right if you’re scared of me now. I don’t blame you. Sometimes I even scare myself.”

  “You killed them,” she whispered. “It was horrible.”

  “That’s my job, and yes, sometimes it is horrible,” he replied. “I am sorry you saw it. You should have closed your eyes, Your Highness.”

  “I did. I could still hear.”

  He bristled. “The man insulted your honor. He got what he deserved.” He rose and walked away.

  Holding her head in one hand, her elbow braced on her knee, Serafina watched him stalk off across the courtyard, his broad back and narrow waist snugly fitted in his black waistcoat, his enormous arms draped in full, white sleeves.

  Now I have o fended him. He was an acutely sensitive being, she well knew.

  “Come, Your Highness,” he said, remote. “It’s going to be a long night. The French have a few more spies planted in the palace. I don’t know who they are yet and I’ve got to catch them. Until I do, we’ve got to get you out of here immediately.”

  She heaved a sigh and climbed to her feet, her legs still shaky from her ordeal.

  Darius waited for her by the fountain but he still would not look at her, closed within himself. Hands on his hips, he lifted his finely sculpted face and assessed the brooding night sky. The watery moonlight slid down his high-boned cheeks, kissed his bittersweet, beautiful mouth with its golden glow.

  When she joined him, he turned from her to lead the way. “First we’ll have to go see your father. He’ll assign someone to take you into hiding—”

  “Darius, wait.” She laid a hand on the broad curve of his arm. “I didn’t mean—”

  “Time is of the essence, Your Highness.” He pulled a
way.

  As he stepped beyond her reach, her hand slid off his arm. Glancing off his shoulder blade, her fingertips trailed through an invisible patch of warm, slick wetness on his black waistcoat.

  She froze. Slowly, she turned her palm upward.

  “Darius,” she breathed, staring down at her bloodied hand.

  “What?”

  “You’re bleeding.”

  She heard his low, cynical laugh as he struck a sulfur match on the stone grotesque of Pan, lighting a cheroot.

  “Who gives a damn, Serafina?” he said bitterly under his breath. “Who gives a damn?”

  With careless grace, he flicked the still-burning match into the fountain and walked away as its bright flame winked out.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Only one thing remained for a man of honor whose life had become a living hell: a glorious death. At the moment, Darius Santiago longed for it.

  She was afraid of him, yes, with good reason, he thought bitterly. She was the only pure thing he had ever known, gentle and innocent as daylight, and now she had seen him kill like an animal—kill, and relish the killing.

  He had taken such pains to shelter her from the darkness of himself—and now this.

  As he walked away from her, Darius simmered with self-directed fury, shaken and unnerved yet again by the maddening, heavenly creature. He could not wait to be rid of her and on his way again so he could resume pretending she didn’t exist.

  To see her was pain.

  Often, far away on his missions, he imagined that if he could just see her, be near her, smell her, he would bask in an ecstasy as on some narcotic drug, but, of course, it was not so. That was merely the illusion that had sustained him for the past year or so, on his downward spiral. Now he saw the truth. Every moment in her presence was torture because she was everything he needed, and he could not have her.

  He could not have her. That was all he knew. But soon he would find release.

  Urgency thrummed inside his veins. He had to get out of here, away from her. As soon as possible, he’d be on his way. He had walked away from her three years ago, on that starry April night when she had slipped her arms around his neck, kissed his cheek, and whispered that she loved him— absurd!—and he would walk away again tonight, just as soon as he’d seen her to safety. Even now, he was walking away, fleeing what he most desperately craved.