The Curse Of Beauty

by Anne Ireland

  THE CURSE OF BEAUTY

  ANNE IRELAND First Published by Amira Press Baltimore, MD21216

  Copyright July 2010 Anne Ireland (Linda Sole)

  Cover Art by Anastasia Rabiyah July 2010 Cover used by permission of Yvette Lynn/Amira press

  Rights returned to Linda Sole 2012

  Now republished by

  Linda Sole Publications

  No part of this book may be reproduced or shared by any electronic or mechanical means other than by permission of the author Linda Sole

  No characters in this book relate to any actual person living or dead other than as a historical reference.

  Chapter One “Yes . . . please . . . oh yes . . .” A breath of air touched her body, so light that it was barely a whisper, but it set a flame winging through her veins, carried in her heated blood to the very center of her feminine essence. She ran her tongue over soft pink lips, arching her back as the desire raged and the pleasure reached the point where it became almost unbearable.

  “No . . .” The whimper of distress left her. “Do not abandon me . . . please not yet . . .” He had given her so much, but she wanted more. So much more! She wanted to feel him moving inside her, filling her with his thrusting rod, bringing her to a shattering climax. “I love you . . .”

  “My precious darling,” the man whispered and bent his head, his tongue laving the deep rose nipples that peaked at his touch. His hand caressed the length of her thigh, seeking out her sweet, moist center with the tip of his finger, stroking her. She gasped and arched, inviting him to take her. “One day . . . one day we shall be together always. You will be mine, completely and forever.”

  “Do not go,” she begged and reached out to him, but she touched only air. Once again he had gone, leaving her bereft. She moved restlessly in the silken sheets, her body soft and pliant as she begged for love. She arched her back, lifting her hips to meet him, moaning in need, flesh still tingling from the touch of his lips and tongue—but he was not there. He was never there. He gave her pleasure, but she could not touch or hold him.

  Angelina woke from her dream as the candle flickered and went out. She gave a cry of despair, feeling the ache of loss as she understood that he was no longer with her. He had left, as he always did after arousing her to such a burning need that she cried out with the pain of loss. Nothing could assuage the conflagration his kisses had aroused. She moved her hand between her thighs, seeking the moist, silky center of her essence, which he had pleasured with his clever tongue, but knew that her fingers could not ease the hunger he had aroused once more. She smoothed her hands over her fevered body, cupping breasts that mourned the loss of his caress. Her flesh still tingled with the ecstasy he had given her, reliving the wonderful sensations his loving had aroused, and she longed for the fulfilment he had so far denied her.

  It was a dream, only a dream. Angelina groaned with frustrated need as she realized that the lover who gave her so much pleasure at night was a figment of her imagination. Married at sixteen to a man four times her age, she had learned to find the cure for her loneliness in dreams. She had recently become a widow, and it was since her bereavement that her dreams had taken on a vivid sensuality.

  “Why must I always be alone?” Leaving her bed, Angelina reached for the lace peignoir that lay where she had dropped it on an elegant chair made by the great Thomas Chippendale himself. She shrugged on the beautiful garment over naked flesh as she crept onto the window seat and gazed out to watch the dawn stretching its fingers of blood red through the sky. Her long midnight-black hair tumbled down her back in a riotof curls and waves, her rosy lips swollen with passionate kisses. Beneath the lace of her peignoir, the full curves of her breasts still peaked with urgent need. Yet she needed to turn her thoughts to other problems.

  Her father had arrived the previous evening. Sir James had received an offer of marriage for his widowed daughter, and once again he was preparing to sell her to the highest bidder.

  “Beauty such as yours is a curse.”

  Startled, she glanced round, for the words had been clear, as if the speaker stood behind her. It was true. Angelina had longed for a Season, to be presented to the Prince Regent, swept away on a tide of pleasure and adulation as the toast of the year. Instead, she had been sold to a man who had taken her maidenhead without one kiss and suffered a seizure the very next morning. Though very ill, Lord Henry Marshall had not died for two years. Tied to his sickbed, Angelina had been almost a prisoner in his country mansion—and he had left her a mere pittance. Everything else was to go to a distant cousin. She had already been told she must leave.

  “You must marry again,”Sir James had said the previous evening as they dined together. “I have received a generous offer. This time your settlement will be worthy of you.” Angelina knew it was the best solution to her problems, and yet her mind returned to the dream. It was a strange dream, for she was not in her own time. At the beginning, she was wandering in the dark passages of a medieval castle. She was alone and frightened, haunted by shadows and impending danger, and then he came to her and took her hand, and she went with him.

  Every night the dream was the same. She lay in silken sheets in a huge bed, and he was with her—her lover. His face was not clear, though she knew it was beautiful and strong. She thought his hair was the color of sunlight, and his eyes were blue. A sigh issued from her lips as she felt again the tingling between her thighs and the pleasure he had given her.

  He had such wonderful hands, firm and slender, strong like the rest of him, yet gentle as he stroked and touched her, caressing her body in a way that had her begging for more. His tongue was even more skilled than his hands, tantalizing her, teasing her full, sensitized breasts until they seemed on fire with need and a raging desire that consumed her. Yet each night she awoke at the same point.

  Why did he never posses her? Why did he never take all that she offered?

  “What is your name? Who are you?” Angelina asked the question she never asked in the dream. In her dream she knew him. She knew that she was loved with such passion—such desperation—that it almost frightened her. Why was her lover so desperate? Whydid he not take her and carry them both to the heights of pleasure? She moved her tongue over soft, moist lips that tingled from his kiss, her body keening his loss. How she wanted him here with her, in the flesh. To see him and touch him . . .

  Tears trickled down her cheeks as the light began to strengthen. Soon she must leave with her father for the Marquis de Sancerre’s house in the North of England. Angelina had not asked her father if the marquis was young and handsome. She expected nothing. Dreams were sweet, but life was harsh. No doubt the marquis would be much like Lord Henry.

  “Oh, my love,” she whispered, her throat tight. “Why do you not claim me? Take me with you . . . please. Take me to wherever you are.” She dashed away her tears. “Who are you? Why do you come to me only in dreams, and why do you leave me? Please tell me . . .”

  “My name is Raphael, and the time approaches when you must choose. Choose truly, and you will be mine completely.” Feeling a warm breath at the nape of her neck, Angelina cried out, her body tingling as she felt the desire curl hotly through her body. It was as if he were with her in her bed, his mouth sucking at her nub, making her arch and whimper with pleasure. Her limbs dissolved with dancing heat, her lips parting, moist and sheened. She was on fire with sensual need, and her feminine juices dampened her inner thighs.

  He was here. She could not see him, but she felt his presence, her body responding as it did in her dreams. Her lips parted as she felt a touch so soft that it was merely a whisper, her breath swift as she panted with pleasure.

  “Where are you? I cannot see you. Stay with me. I love you. I need you.
” “I have loved you for six hundred years,” the voice seemed to whisper close to her ear, hoarse with passion and the torment of centuries.“I have searched for you, been driven to despair and haunted by the curse . . . and now I have found you. Only you can break the curse, my love . . . but you must choose.”

  “Tell me what to do.” Angelina whirled round, looking for him, but the room was empty. She was alone, as always. Was she going mad? Had her mind cracked beneath the strain of her unhappiness . . . or had he really been here, her tormented lover?

  “I shall choose you,” she vowed to the empty room. “Tell me what I must do, and I shall choose you.”

  “Do your duty, but when the time comes, you must choose.” He had gone. Angelina felt him leave her, felt the room empty of his presence. For one moment she was bereft, but then a tiny seed of hopetook root. He was real, she was certain of it now, but prevented by some terrible curse from coming to her.

  “I shall choose you,” she said again, and smiled. His name was Raphael, and one day he would come for her. * * * * “Dear heaven, I did not think it would be such a forsaken place,” Sir James said as the carriage drew to a halt in front of the ancient castle. Built of gray stone, it seemed to rise out of the cliffs upon which it was built like some ugly monster, misshapen and forbidding. “Forgive me, daughter. The offer was made by Lord Samuel, and I believed him when he said his cousin was a decent, God-fearing gentleman who needed an understanding wife.”

  Angelina looked at her austere surroundings and shivered. The castle watched over the sea and was a relic of medieval times, when it had been a fortress against the invading hordes of Norsemen who often attacked the coastal villages. One tower stood apart from the main house. Almost a ruin, there was something sinister about its brooding presence.

  She shivered in the cool breeze, wishing that she could go back to the house she had left, and the bedchamber where she had dreamed of her lover in the lonely nights. “Perhaps it will be more comfortable inside,” Angelina said. She looked at her father’s face and sighed, seeing his doubts. “I must do my duty, father. You know I have no choice. You signed the contract in London, and if you were to withdraw, you would have to pay a fine, which you could not afford.”

  “I do not deserve you,” Sir James said, and for a moment she thought he would weep. “It pained me to give you to Lord Henry, but I owed him a gambling debt I could not pay.”

  “Did you also owe the marquis?” “I have never met him, daughter,” her father said. “His cousin, Lord Marcus Samuel, approached me in London at White’s club one evening. He told me that his cousin, the Marquis of Sancerre, had been traveling for some years. He wishes to return to England and take a bride. Having heard of your exceptional beauty, and that you had been recently widowed, he wondered if I would be prepared to accept the marquis as your second husband.”

  Angelina wondered how much Lord Marcus had offered her father to sign the contract, but she did not ask. She still cared for him despite having despaired of him and his gambling years before.

  “I shall not reproach you,” she said.

  She had to do her duty however hard it was—but in her dreams she would escape to her lover’s arms. “Be brave, my love. It will not be long now . . .”

  Angelina felt the kiss at her nape. It was all shecould do to stop herself crying out, for the touch ofhislips sent a riot of sensations racing through her body.

  “Are you cold, daughter?” “It is cold out here,” Angelina said, her hand trembling slightly on his arm, though she was far from cold. She was burning up with desire! “We must go in. We should not keep the marquis waiting.”

  * * * * “What do you mean the marquis is not here?” Sir James demanded, a note of anger in his voice as he looked at the man who had met them in the hall. Tall, pale-complexioned, with dark brown hair and grey eyes, he was a handsome man, elegantly dressed in pale buckskins and a blue coat. “I have brought my daughter all this way to be married—and now you tell me the marquis is not here. Is he reneging on his bargain?”

  “Certainly not,” Marcus replied smoothly. “My cousin has been unfortunately taken ill and cannot travel for a week or two. He has asked that the marriage goes ahead by proxy. The wedding will take place in the morning, as arranged, and the Lady Angelina will be my cousin’s wife before you leave the following day.”

  “I see . . .” Sir James frowned and looked at his daughter. “Are you willing to be married by proxy, Angelina? It is not what I expected, but I daresay it is legal.” “I assure you that it is perfectly legal. In the olden days, it was often done,” Marcus said and smiled at Angelina. He took her hand, bowed, and kissed it. “I am to stand in for my cousin, lady. May I say that your beauty surpasses anything we had heard. Raoul is a fortunate man.”

  “Raoul?” Angelina’s heart sank, for she had hoped it might be something else. “Is that your cousin’s name?” “It is one that he uses for official business. Of course he has many names and many titles. This castle is just one of the estates he owns, both in England and abroad. Raoul is very rich. I was surprised that he asked for the wedding to be here. I am afraid that there will be but a handful of guests at the reception. In London there would have been many, for everyone is curious to meet him.”

  Angelina stared at him. “Is he not well known in society, sir?” “My cousin does not choose to mix often in company. He will, on occasion, pay a fleeting visit to one of his homes, but he has not often been in England. I understand he is popular in Paris and Rome, but for some reason we do not often see him here. I myself have met him no more than twice. We communicate by letter, and I am proud to be his trusted representative in England.”

  Angelina was silent, but her mind was busy with disturbing thoughts. Was the marquis hideously scarred? Was he a monster in feature or form? He must surely be disfigured in some way, or he would not hide himself away from society. Her heart sank. She had endured one wretched marriage. Was she now doomed to another?

  Yet she recalled the kiss as she stood outside the castle. Raphael wanted her to be here, and she knew that without his visits, even in dreams, her life would be empty. She lived only for the sensual pleasure she had discovered in his arms. Would he come to her tonight? She could hardly wait.

  “Very well, I shall do as your cousin asks,” she said. “Thank you for your welcome, sir. I should like to go to my room now if you please.”

  “Yes, of course. We dine in an hour—if that is time enough?”

  “It will be ample time.”

  Marcus clapped his hands, and a woman dressed in black came in answer. She looked at Angelina, her mouth drawn into a thin line.

  “Mrs. Macintyre,” he said, “please take the Lady Angelina to her chamber and make sure she has everything she needs.”

  “Yes, my lord.” The woman inclined her head to Angelina. “Will you come this way, ma’am?” Angelina followed her up the narrow staircase. The room in which Lord Samuel had received them was warm and comfortable, pleasantly furnished, and with a huge fire burning in the hearth. However, away from that room, the castle seemed gloomy and cold. By the time she reached her chamber at the end of the gallery, Angelina was shivering.

  “These are your apartments, my lady,” the housekeeper said. “If you need anything, you should ring. It is my advice that you should not go wandering about alone, especially at night. The castle is old, and like a warren in places. You could easily get lost, and there are certain places that might be dangerous—avoid the old tower at all costs, for you might fall to your death.”

  “I see . . . thank you,” Angelina said. She went into the first of the rooms and was delighted to discover that it was as well furnished and comfortable as the room downstairs. There were pieces of furniture here that must have come from France, gilded armchairs, magnificent cabinets, and a chaise longue piled with soft cushions. “This is quite perfect, Mrs. Macintyre. Thank you so much for putting me here.”

  “These are the rooms reserved for the mistress o
f the house,” the housekeeper replied. “The marquis’s rooms are just next door—though the dressing room is locked your side, and you have the key. If I were you, I should keepit locked at night, my lady.”

  Angelina stared at her. It was on the tip of her tongue to reprimand the woman for her loose tongue. Yet something held her words. Was she being warned? Something in the housekeeper’s expression seemed to warn of danger. Were Angelina’s suspicions true? Was that the reason the marquis had asked his cousin to purchase a bride for him? She feared that it must be so. In the morning she was to be married to a monster.

  Angelina felt the cold sweep over her. How could she bear life in this place if there was no love for her? As the housekeeper went out, leaving her alone, she went through to the bedchamber, and then her heart stood still. The bed was huge, a four-posted affair . . . It was the bed from her dream, or its double!

  Angelina’s heart pounded as she looked about the room. In the dream she saw nothing but the bed, for the room was in shadow, but at this present time, the chamber was furnished with elegance, and charming, lit by many candles. She was not certain, but she thought the room was different in those earlier times . . . bare stone walls, which had been covered with wood panels in the centuries between, for comfort, and far more furnishings.

  Yet she was sure the bed was the same. Her heart raced as she approached the bed and turned back the sheets. They were silk, as in her dream.

  A frisson of pure sexual pleasure played along her spine. She was to sleep in the bed where her lover had taken her when she was escaping from . . .her husband. Now where had that thought come from? For a moment a picture flashed into her mind. She saw a young woman dressed in a long, flowing gown of white, her midnight-black hair falling to her waist in shining waves, and knew it was she. She was running through the castle, and behind her a man pursued with a drawn sword.

  “Adulteress, you shall die!”he shouted. Angelina shivered with fear. In a moment he would catch her and kill her. She saw a picture of herself lying on the ground, unseeing eyes staring at something in the distance, her white gown soaked with the pool of blood that had stained the stone flags about her. What was that terrible sound? It was like a wild thing howling . . . the hound of hell or some fearful creature, trapped or in terrible pain. She looked round fearfully, but the sound had gone, and there was nothing to see—yet she sensed something evil had happened in this place, a tragedy so awful that a restless spirit walked its halls.