Tonight You're Mine

by Carlene Thompson

  He lowered his face over hers, kissing her deeply. When he pulled away, she felt almost dizzy. “I love you very much, chérie. You believe that, don’t you?”

  She blushed. “I hope you do.”

  “You mustn’t hope. You must know.” His voice had deepened, and his eyes flashed. As exciting as Nicole found Paul’s intensity, sometimes it disconcerted her. She’d had several boyfriends over the years, but Paul Dominic wasn’t a boy. And he wasn’t just any man. He was brilliant, a musical genius, famous, wealthy. He was also the most dazzlingly handsome man she’d ever seen. Occasionally the force of his very being overwhelmed her young and relatively inexperienced psyche. Although she knew she was pretty and she’d always been popular, nothing in her life had prepared her for the larger-than-life whirlwind that was Paul Dominic, and sometimes this relationship seemed more like the dream of a teenager instead of reality. But it wasn’t. Her certainty of Paul’s love, as incredible as it seemed, had allowed him to become her first lover, and she knew she could never love anyone else as she loved this man.

  IN LOVING MEMORY OF MY FATHER

  Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgments

  One

  Candles flickered in the big room, their flames casting dancing shadows on the wall, their clean scent of vanilla filling the air. Nicole lay on the cool shining hardwood floor, her blond hair spread across a fringed tapestry pillow. Beside her a man rested in perfect stillness, holding her right hand. His eyes were open, but she knew he saw nothing in the room. His vision was fixed on a world created by the music.

  She closed her own blue eyes, letting the music flow over her. Rhapsody in Blue. Huge stereo speakers sent the sensual jazz classic throbbing through the room. On the recording, Paul Dominic, the man next to her, played the piano with all the expertise and passion of the world-famous virtuoso he was.

  Nicole felt Paul tense as he listened to the four-bar passage that bridges the long piano cadenza into the famous Andantino moderato melody. Then the music soared and Nicole’s own heart beat faster as the song moved into the development of the slow theme, trading off with the orchestra until the rhapsody was brought to its spectacular conclusion.

  Paul rolled toward her, propping himself up on one elbow. “So you liked it, chérie?”

  Nicole took a deep breath. “I loved it.” She thought she sounded like a breathless teenager and wished she had a critic’s sophisticated vocabulary to express her feelings. Instead, she reached up and touched the man’s black hair. “I can’t believe I’m with you, Paul,” she whispered. “I can’t believe I’m with a man who’s capable of playing such glorious music. To have that kind of talent…” She shook her head. “You’re a genius.”

  “I’m no genius,” he said with a self-deprecating laugh. “The music is one-fourth gift, three-fourths very hard work. Besides, I’m not as good as I should be.”

  “That’s not what the critics say. They say you’re the ideal Gershwin pianist.”

  He smiled. “You’ve been reading my reviews.”

  “Of course. I also know your concerts all over the world are always sold out.” She frowned. “What on earth does someone like you see in me?”

  His penetrating hazel eyes gazed into hers. “Do you believe in destiny, Nicole?”

  “I’m not sure I’ve really thought that much about it.”

  “I believe in it,” he said intensely. “I believe I was destined to come back to Texas and meet you again.” He touched a strand of her hair. “You were only seven when I first saw you in your father’s store, and I thought you were the most beautiful little girl I’d ever seen. You were sitting at your father’s finest baby grand piano playing ‘Down in the Valley.’ ”

  Nicole rolled her eyes. “One of my most requested numbers, very hot at family parties.” She laughed. “I’m surprised Dad let me actually bang out a song on that expensive piano. I have no musical talent, you know that.”

  “But you have feeling, Nicole. Your little face was so concenrated, almost rapt. It was one of the most touching things I’ve ever seen. I think I fell in love with you that day. Or rather, the woman I knew you’d grow up to be.” He grinned, the lean, aristocratic lines of his own face softening. “As for your father letting you play that piano, he could deny you nothing.”

  “Except you.”

  Paul’s expression sobered. “You’re only nineteen, a sophomore in college. I’m ten years older and I’ve seen a lot of the world. He’s just trying to protect you. He thinks you’re a temporary diversion for me while I’m here looking after Mother during this siege of pneumonia.”

  Nicole’s eyes darkened. “It doesn’t bother you that we have to sneak around to see each other? That we can’t go out in public to dinner or a movie, that he would be furious if he even knew I was here with you instead of studying at the library?” She held up the white rosebud he’d handed her as soon as she walked in the door this evening. “I can’t even take this home.”

  “It bothers me that we can’t be open about our relationship,” Paul said calmly, “but I understand it. Aside from my being older, your father always thought I was strange, even back in the days when I was a kid who used to haunt his music store.”

  “How could he have thought you were strange?” Nicole asked indignantly.

  Paul smiled. “I am strange. Ask anyone I went to school with.”

  “They didn’t understand a musical prodigy,” Nicole protested. “Not even Dad, although he had his own aspirations at one time. Maybe that’s his problem. Maybe he’s jealous of you.”

  Paul shrugged. “Whatever. Local opinions hurt at one time, but they don’t matter now.” He raised his arm and looked at his watch. “What does matter now is that it’s almost ten o’clock. Your parents will be wondering where you are.”

  “I wish I had an apartment,” Nicole fretted. “It’s ridiculous to be nineteen and still living at home. I hate it there.”

  “Soon you’ll be married to me and living in New York City,” Paul said. He rose with the fluid grace of a dancer, his strong, slender body outlined in the candlelight. He was dressed in black jeans and a black T-shirt, the slender silver and turquoise cross she’d given him for his birthday hanging on a chain around his neck, glinting in the light from the candles. He reached down and clutched her hand, pulling her lightly to her feet. “You should go home now before your father gets suspicious.”

  “I guess it is fairly late. I also have to stop by the library and get at least one book. If I come home empty-handed, he’ll know I lied about where I was this evening.”

  “You should have told me earlier.” Paul looked at his watch. “I’ll walk you out to the car.”

  A woman appeared at the door. Her dull black hair was pulled into a long braid and she wore a high-necked maroon dress. “Señor Paul, your mother asks for you,” she said in her Spanish accent.

&n
bsp; “I thought she’d be asleep by now.”

  “She was.” Nicole didn’t like the Dominics’ housekeeper, Rosa. The woman looked at Paul with flat black eyes and an expression of deep disapproval although her tone was civil. “Your music woke her.”

  Paul briefly shut his eyes. “I keep forgetting I’m not living alone anymore. Sorry, Rosa. Tell her I’ll be there in a minute.”

  “Very well, but you should hurry. The loudness of the music disturbed her. She rambles in French. I cannot understand her. I’m thinking she should return to the hospital.” Her words simmered with rebuke, but Paul either didn’t notice or chose to ignore her. His tone remained cordial.

  “Go back to her, Rosa. Tell her I’ll come after I’ve walked Miss Sloan to her car.”

  “That really isn’t necessary, Paul,” Nicole said hastily, annoyed with herself for being intimidated by Rosa’s unflinching stare. She’d caught fleeting glimpses of the woman’s teenage son around the house a couple of times, and she wondered if he were as cowed by his mother as she would have been. Probably. Only someone with Paul’s self-confidence would be oblivious to her perpetually reproachful manner. “Your mother needs you and my car is right outside.”

  “But not in the driveway.” Paul looked troubled. “I don’t like you walking around late at night by yourself.”

  “Now you sound like Dad.” She stood on tiptoe and kissed his taut cheek as Rosa slowly turned away, her face heavy with disdain. “I can make it safely across your front lawn and half a block away to my car.”

  They walked down the curved staircase. The Spanish-tiled entrance hall was empty, lit only by an antique Tiffany lamp throwing rich, luminous colors into the shadows. Paul said the house had been built in the 1920’s, bought in the fifties when Texas oil had brought the Dominics from New Orleans, and Nicole thought it resembled the Spanish mansion of a grand silent-movie star—maybe Rudolph Valentino’s Falcon Lair. She could picture him and his mysterious wife, Natacha Rambova, doing the tango across the tiled floor. A movie director couldn’t have chosen a more perfect home for a man like Paul Dominic to have grown up in. It suited his drama and elegance.

  Paul pulled her close to him. “Will I see you tomorrow?”

  “I’m not sure. I only have two classes in the morning, but I have to go to the Mission San Juan to finish my research. My paper is due Monday morning.”

  “Then I’ll meet you at the mission.”

  Nicole grinned. “Paul, the last time you met me there we spent all day wandering around taking pictures of each other and talking.”

  “It was one of the happiest days of my life.”

  “Mine, too, but I didn’t get a thing done. I only have two paragraphs of notes and no pictures without one or the other of us posing like tourists.”

  Paul smiled. “All right, my scholar. This time we’ll be very professional, I promise.” He held out his hand. “Deal?”

  She put her hand in his. “Deal. I’ll be there around one o’clock.”

  He lowered his face over hers, kissing her deeply. When he pulled away, she felt almost dizzy. “I love you very much, chérie. You believe that, don’t you?”

  She blushed. “I hope you do.”

  “You mustn’t hope. You must know.” His voice had deepened, and his eyes flashed. As exciting as Nicole found Paul’s intensity, sometimes it disconcerted her. She’d had several boyfriends over the years, but Paul Dominic wasn’t a boy. And he wasn’t just any man. He was brilliant, a musical genius, famous, wealthy. He was also the most dazzlingly handsome man she’d ever seen. Occasionally the force of his very being overwhelmed her young and relatively inexperienced psyche. Although she knew she was pretty and she’d always been popular, nothing in her life had prepared her for the larger-than-life whirlwind that was Paul Dominic, and sometimes this relationship seemed more like the dream of a teenager instead of reality. But it wasn’t. Her certainty of Paul’s love, as incredible as it seemed, had allowed him to become her first lover, and she knew she could never love anyone else as she loved this man.

  He released her from his embrace and kissed her lightly on the forehead. She handed him the white rosebud. “Put this by your bed tonight and think of me.”

  “I will,” he said, taking the rose and holding it to his lips. “Good night, my love.”

  She stepped out into the February night. Not until she’d reached the end of the front walk did he close the front door.

  The temperature had been in the low seventies during the day but now hovered around sixty. A breeze blew from the north, swirling her hair around her face as she walked south to her car. She pulled her jacket tighter, listening to the heels of her boots click on the road and the sound of the wind rustling the limbs of the live juniper.

  She hadn’t been worried about time when she was with Paul, but now she suddenly wondered if she could make it back to Trinity University, retrieve a couple of books from the library, and get home at a convincing hour. She had to be more careful, she told herself. If her father found out about her relationship with Paul, he would be furious.

  Still, he couldn’t keep her away from him. No matter what rules he set down, she would find a way to circumvent them. She loved her father deeply and didn’t like the idea of deceiving or defying him, but for Paul she would do anything. “You’re just not brave enough to be open about it,” she muttered. “Some fearless romantic heroine you are.”

  She reached her white Mustang. She never bothered locking the doors in this quiet upscale neighborhood and she hurriedly climbed inside. Fishing around in her purse, she found her keys and was inserting one in the ignition when a large hand closed over her mouth, jerking her head back and smothering her scream.

  “Visiting your boyfriend?” a razor-edged male voice asked in her ear.

  Panic raced through her, stopping her breath in a freeze response. While trapped air stretched her lungs, her legs spasmodically shot out, thrusting against the pedals of the car, smashing them to the floor. The car wasn’t running and nothing happened. Her hands clenched, nails digging into her palms, and her arms locked, bent at the elbows. Finally breath poured from her nose, easing the pain in her chest. Without thinking, she moved her hand toward the horn. Then she felt a cold blade against the side of her throat beneath her right ear, halting her hand in midair. “Do you know how easy it is to slice through the skin here?” the voice grated from the backseat. “Important vessel in the throat. What you call it? Juggler?”

  “Jugular.” Another voice. Oh God, Nicole thought in horror. There were two men in the back. “And don’t forget the carotid. It’s an artery.” The first man had a Spanish accent. This one didn’t and his voice was smoother. “Blood shoots like it’s coming from a fountain when the carotid’s cut.”

  “Ah, the Brain. Should’ve been a doctor.”

  Both men laughed hysterically. Nicole smelled wine. Wine and perspiration and cigarette smoke. Her heart was beating in slow, heavy thuds and she was now growing almost calm despite her terror. Slowly she reached for the door handle, but the knife pressed harder against her neck. “Are you stupid?” the one with the accent asked harshly. His voice was older than the other’s. The rough, sandpaper quality made it sound as if the vocal cords had been injured. “I will slash your throat if you try to get away,” he ground out. “Do you understand me?” Nicole’s hand dropped away from the door handle. “I asked you a question, little bird. Do you understand me?”

  Nicole moved her head slowly up and down while the other man broke into another spate of convulsive giggling. “Little bird? Where’d you get that? Some book of poetry?”

  The other laughed. “Sure. I read poetry all the time. You read poetry, little bird?” His face came closer to hers. She felt the stubble of his beard on his cheek and the cold metal of a hoop earring. He breathed rapidly, his breath reeking of sour wine and filthy teeth. “Sure you read poetry. The pretty college girl with the nice car. Daddy loves you, huh? Daddy gives his little bird whatever she wants.
She goes to the right schools. She wears expensive clothes. She reads poetry.” He snickered. “And still she sneaks off in the night to meet men. Fancy clothes on the outside, but a puta inside.”

  “But she goes to a rich man,” the other said, then hiccuped. “A rich man in a mansion. What else for her? No slumming with guys like us. No sir, not for her. When she wants a little action, she goes to her own kind.”

  How did they know she’d been to see a man? Nicole wondered inanely.

  “I want you to start your nice car,” the older one said. “I want you to pull away from the curb slow, understand?” Nicole managed another tiny nod. “You better understand ’cause you try anything and this knife goes in your throat. One slice, little bird, and you’re dead.”

  The blade of the knife was not so cold now. It had pressed against Nicole’s skin for over a minute, long enough for her to realize it was serrated and diamond-sharp. It was also held in a jittery hand tight with tension. One small tremor would split her skin. A stronger one would pierce blood vessels.

  Her fingers had turned icy. She realized she still clutched the keys, and she raised her right hand, fumbling as she tried to insert the proper key into the ignition.

  “Hurry up!”

  “Trying,” she mouthed against the callused hand covering her mouth.

  The big hand moved down to her chin, still holding her head backward in a viselike grip. “What?”

  “Trying.”

  “Try harder.”

  Blindly she fumbled with the keys on the ring. They jangled and slithered as if alive in her trembling hand. She tried one, then another. Finally the third slipped in the ignition. She turned it and the car started smoothly. She hadn’t shut off the radio and Queen’s “Radio Ga-Ga” boomed through the interior. The knife pushed dangerously against her throat and she gasped. “Turn that thing off!” the older one shouted.