She heard Miriam call after her, “Sydney, where on earth are you going? Aren’t you going to dress for dinner?”
She heard, but didn’t take the time to answer.
* * *
The evening quiet of the lagoon assailed her. The water, usually turquoise, had been shaded to amethyst by the evening light. Brilliant emerald ferns trailed down to the banks, and here and there wild orchids nestled. And in the center of all the beauty, the black swans of Charron sailed the bejeweled waters with confident serenity.
From a distance a bell rang. Three times it sounded, clear and true. And a remarkable thing happened. The swans began to stir. Breath lodged in Sydney’s throat with anticipation, and her heart began to pound. One by one the swans raised their silver-tipped black wings and lifted into flight. A rush of wind from their wings fanned her face. They circled over her head once, then in glorious unison took off across the red-gold sky in the direction of the other side of the island.
She took deep, calming breaths, letting her body absorb the excitement of what had just happened. It was hard for her to believe, but at long last she had seen the black swans fly, and it had been every bit as wondrous as she had dreamed it would be. Their beauty and grace in flight had been a sight she would never forget.
But what about the bell? she asked herself. It was as if they had risen in flight in response to the bell. Could that be? And where had the swans flown?
She pondered what she had seen as she made her way back to the hotel. In the lobby she passed Sai. Just as he did every time he saw her, he bowed ceremoniously and moved silently on.
Miriam, on the arm of her Robert, waved. “There you are, dear. Do join us for dinner.”
“Thanks, but I’m not hungry.” Aware once again of that vague aching of her head, she gave a small laugh. “Actually, I’ve got a headache.”
“But that’s terrible! Go to your room and have a nice lie-down. It’s the very best thing, I find. I do it quite often, isn’t that right, Robert?”
Her husband, a corpulent but pleasant man, nodded. “Quite right. Rest a bit, and then you’ll be ready to give the casino a go.” He rubbed his hands together. “I’m feeling lucky tonight, and I’m thinking of trying a spot of blackjack. I’m burnt out on roulette.”
Miriam rolled her eyes. “I should hope so. Robert dropped five thousand dollars last night. That’s at least two Diors.”
Robert ignored Miriam. “Maybe some of your luck will rub off on me, Sydney. I’ve never seen such a player. You haven’t won a fortune, but you’re certainly working on it!”
Miriam tugged on his arm. “Come on, Robert. Can’t you see that Sydney is dying to get up to her room? Try a cool cloth on your forehead, dear. Works wonders.”
As Miriam began to lead him away, Robert raised his hand. “See you at the tables later on, Sydney.”
Five
Once in her room. Sydney took Miriam’s advice and lay down, but she couldn’t get her mind off the swans. To have finally seen them fly had been an extraordinary experience. But as excited as she was, she knew that perhaps no one else would have been as deeply affected as she by the sight. Very few would understand.
She was tempted to pick up the phone and ring her sisters. They would understand, but she also knew exactly how they would react. Addie, with her otherworld ways, would say acceptingly, “Of course. I told you you’d see the black swans fly one day.” And Manda, with her exuberance for life, would demand to know if she had followed the swans. But to follow the swans, Sydney first had to know where they had gone.
And she knew only one person who would know that.
In spite of the persistent throb in her head, Sydney rose and dressed in a strapless sundress made of a lightweight, clear gold silk. Without bothering about stockings. she slipped on a pair of golden brown high-heeled sandals. Hastily she pinned her hair up, then let herself out the door.
But when she reached the black stainless steel doors of the lift to Nicholas’s quarters, she realized that she had no idea how to get the doors to open, since there wasn’t a conventional button. Then she remembered that this was a private lift, and the two times she had been to Nicholas’s suite, someone had taken her. The first time it had been Mike. The second time it had been Nicholas himself.
Now what? she wondered. In frustration she hit the wall with the palm of her hand.
“Tell me what that wall has done to you, Sydney, and I’ll have it punished immediately!”
Sydney wheeled at Mike’s voice. “O-o-oh, thank goodness, Mike. I’m so glad to see you. H-h-how do I get up to Nicholas’s suite? Is he there?”
Mike looked at her with concern. “Whoa, there. Slow down, sweetheart. Is there something wrong?”
She shook her head. “N-N-Nicholas. Is he up there? Can I see him?”
Mike fished in his pocket, brought out a key, and inserted it. The door opened. “Heaven wouldn’t be enough to help me if I tried to stop you, honey. Go right on up.”
Inside the lift Sydney leaned against the back wall and shut her eyes. She was being incredibly stupid, she told herself, running to Nicholas like this. But she had the urge to share with him the fact that she had actually seen the black swans fly. And she had a nebulous feeling that he had answers she needed. The problem was, she wasn’t sure what the questions were.
“Sydney? What’s wrong?”
Her eyes flew open to find Nicholas standing in the open doorway of the lift. Casually dressed in black slacks and a black silk shirt, and outlined by the dimly lit room behind him, he seemed to epitomize darkness, and she wondered if there was any light In him. Then she remembered the tenderness he had shown the baby bird.
“I—I—I just wanted to see you. Is that all right?”
“It absolutely is.” He came to her and took her hand. “But you don’t look well. Come, sit down.”
She followed him to a level of the room she hadn’t been to before, where there was a large lounging couch, extra deep and long. He waited until she was seated. “Now, let me get you something to drink.”
She placed her hand on his arm. “No, please, stay.”
Casting her a strange glance, he sat down beside her. “Sydney, are you all right?”
“I’m fine. I just want to talk to you.”
“About what?”
“Nicholas, I saw the swans fly just a little while ago!”
He smiled gently, indulgently. “Is that what all this is about?”
“You told me I should go down to the lagoon at sunset, because you knew I’d see the swans fly, didn’t you?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“I thought you’d enjoy it.”
“I did. But where were they going? And why?”
He stuck a cigarette between his teeth, lighted it, then sat back to regard her thoughtfully a moment. “They flew to the other side of the island.”
“I know that,” she said impatiently. “I could see. But where exactly and why?”
“There’s another lagoon over there. They stay until dawn and then fly back. A couple of years ago one of the guests of the hotel became irate because he had lost rather heavily at the gaming tables that evening. He had too much to drink and wandered down to the lagoon, where he decided to take his anger out on the swans. He killed one.”
She gasped in horror. “I don’t understand. How could anyone kill something so beautiful?”
“Men don’t always respect beauty, nor do they always respect life.”
Absently she rubbed her temple. “I suppose that’s true. And you’re telling me that because of man’s occasional disregard for beauty and life, the swans have to fly every evening to the other side of the island for safety.”
He exhaled a stream of smoke so that it clouded the air between them. “That’s right.”
She gave a funny little laugh and rubbed her temple again. “It’s odd, but when I was growing up on Killaroo, I never imagined that such wondrous creatures could be threatened by dan
ger.”
“Nothing on this earth is safe from danger, Sydney.”
“I suppose not, but it seems that if there were any completely safe place to live on earth, it would be this beautiful island.”
“Do you have a headache?”
She looked at him in surprise. “I’ve had one all day.”
He ground his cigarette into an ashtray and held out his hands. “Come here.”
Without thinking, she did as he asked, shifting closer to him.
He swiveled around on the sofa until he was leaning in the corner, and he pulled her back against him. “You’re much too tense. Sydney. Don’t worry about the swans’ safety. They’ve found a place where they know they can be safe.”
“I’m not worried about the swans. Really. I was just curious.”
“So now you know. And there’s no reason to worry about anything else either.”
One by one he pulled the pins from her hair until it hung in a wild, glorious tumble around her head. It felt good, she admitted, to have the restriction of the tight pins gone.
“You have beautiful hair, Sydney. Why do you insist on wearing it up?”
Before she could answer, before she knew what he was going to do, he spread his fingers and began combing through her hair, again and again, until gradually she started to relax and her back curved naturally against his chest and her hands lay open on her lap.
Combing her hair with his fingers was an exquisitely intimate thing for him to do, she thought. And this from a man who had ordered his life to avoid intimacy.
“Nicholas?”
“Ummm?”
“The other night I asked you why you kept yourself apart from people. You never answered me.”
“I know.”
His voice came to her very softly, as if he were immersed in the way her hair felt as his fingers ran rhythmically through it. Her pain was vanishing, but still she lay against him, absorbing his heat. “You don’t like anyone to get too close, do you?”
“You can get as close as you like.”
It seemed to her that the temperature of his body suddenly went up. “W-w-why won’t you answer my questions directly?”
His hands cupped her bare shoulders with a slight pressure. “Relax.”
“Th-th-then tell me, why do you keep yourself apart from people and from life?”
He remained silent as he worked his fingertips in tiny circular motions up the sides of her neck, spiraling ever higher until his fingers were rotating across her scalp.
Finally he said, “The answer to that question is probably so complicated. I’m not even sure I know. Life takes a lot of twists and turns, and ten years ago mine took a major one. I lost my best friend, a man I loved more than a brother. And a woman I admired and respected has suffered undeservingly ever since.”
Slowly his fingers circled the crown of her head. He reached her forehead, and there drew long, smoothing strokes from the center out to her hairline, where he ended up tracing small ovals on her temples.
She waited, wanting him to say more, but all he said was, “It’s been a long ten years for me. Wounds close, Sydney, but sometimes the pain remains.”
“I’m so sorry,” she said, wanting immediately to comfort him.
“It’s not your sympathy I want.” All at once he shifted to the left and turned her around so that she faced him and was lying across his lap. She looked up at him and was entrapped by the way the candlelight played over the angles and planes of his dark face. “What I do want, though,” he murmured, “is everything you’re capable of giving and then more.”
Why, oh, why did he have to say things like that? Sydney wondered with despair. Tonight he had told her a small bit about himself, allowing her to catch a glimpse of vulnerability in him. And he had soothed away her headache. All in all, he had managed to ignite in her all kinds of emotions, both physically and mentally, that she didn’t know how to handle.
But he didn’t even give her a chance to try. Over the golden silk of her dress, his hand cupped her breast, and heat flared in the pit of her stomach.
“If you’ll let me, Sydney, I can reach inside you and touch all the places that will set you free.”
Tension ebbed out of her as a soothing sensuality entered. She closed her eyes and listened to his voice, low and exciting.
With a slight pressure under her breast, he pushed so that the ivory-toned softness of her flesh mounded high above her strapless dress. “I like you in this dress.” he whispered. “I like the way your breasts give the bodice its shape. And I like the way the neckline dips, giving me a glimpse of the shadowed valley between your breasts....”
As he spoke, the thumbnail of his other hand traced up and down the line of her zipper. “... And I like this zipper, because it makes it so very simple for me to undress you...”
The sensual tingle of the zipper as it rasped against her skin mesmerized her so that for a moment she wasn’t even aware that he had unzipped her dress. But then each of his fingertips stroked down her spine to her waist, and her dress slowly fell away from her.
“... so that I can touch you just as I’ve wanted to, completely and unreservedly, ever since that first night I saw you. That night I wondered what velvet would taste like.”
He bent his head, fastened his mouth over her nipple, and began to suckle. Potent emotions stirred and moved within her, and heat flowed through her veins so hot and thick she was afraid she might suffocate.
When at last he lifted his head, her eyes were drawn inexorably to his mouth. “Velvet tastes like rich sweet cream,” he murmured.
His thumb grazed across the tight bud. A wash of intense pleasure flooded her, and in response she tightened her hands into fists as a means of reminding herself to retain some control. But he didn’t let up.
“... cream poured over fresh flowers.”
A deep sigh escaped her mouth right before he claimed her lips in a searing kiss that soon had her arching against him in frantic need. His tongue in her mouth incited an urgency in her; his hands on her skin created a fire. She was losing her fight for command over a steadily growing passion.
Over and over again he kissed her, until her hands had unfolded from their fists and were clinging to his shoulders. The muscles beneath the black silk of his shirt rippled and bunched as his hands smoothed over her skin, raising sensitivity and desire.
“Let go of that control of yours, Sydney, and let me show you how it can be between you and me.”
He overwhelmed her with his power. He mystified her with his darkness. And, Lord help her, she thought, but she wanted him.
“You are so beautiful, so sweet. I want to taste you again,” he whispered, arching her away from him so that his mouth could find her nipple once more.
Sensation flowed, resistance ebbed, desire threatened to take over. With his lips at her breast he was altering reality, and at the realization, a small cry left her mouth.
What was she thinking of? she asked herself. She was on the verge of giving herself completely to this exotic, mysterious man, of exceeding a boundary she herself had set. A new emotion assaulted her, and she recognized it instantly as fear.
She had gone almost to the edge with him. If she let him take her past that edge, what would be there waiting for her? She had no way of knowing, and that was what frightened her.
Her first instincts about him had been right. The man was danger personified. He was like his namesake, Charon, the dark, mystical figure in Greek mythology who had power over men’s souls, ferrying them to the other world across the River Styx. She had the distinct impression her soul could be in peril.
She pushed away and shakily pulled up her dress, covering her nakedness.
“What is it?” he asked, his voice a husky whisper that beckoned her back into his arms.
She rose and zipped her dress. “I—I—I can’t go through with this, Nicholas. You’re asking too much.”
Although his chest showed the exertion of his trying to get
his breathing under control, he studied her very calmly. With deliberate movement he reached for his cigarettes and lighter.
“Believe it or not, Sydney, I don’t want you to do anything you don’t want to do.”
Her skin still felt the imprint of his hands. Her body still shook from the response to his lovemaking. She wanted him, and she was tired of fighting him. Still, she lashed out. “I—I—I find it hard to believe you’re considering me.”
He smiled faintly. “Perhaps you’re right. Perhaps I am a selfish man. I don’t know. I’ve never really thought about it before. But you see... sometimes when I’m with you, the possibility exists for me that night can be turned into day and the pain can be forgotten.”
She stared at him in disbelief. “Th-th-that can’t be true.”
“It is. You have your own very special power, Sydney.”
She shook her head in denial. “N-n-no. It’s not true.” Like steel to his magnet, she wanted desperately to go back into his arms. It was he who had the power. “I think I’d better leave now.”
“Tomorrow night, Sydney. I’ll see you again... tomorrow night.”
She had no answer.
* * *
Sydney spent a sleepless night, tossing and turning. She knew that she could very well be about to fall into a trap from which there was no escape. With every encounter, Nicholas drew her closer and closer toward completely surrendering to a desire that would surely whirl her away into a world where there would be no control and very little light.
But there would be passion, she reminded herself over and over again until she was nearly writhing on the bed like a cat in heat. And there would be Nicholas. To some women, those two things alone would constitute an overabundance of riches. But she knew she needed more.
By morning she had decided. She had to leave the island. There was no alternative.
Hastily she dressed and packed. Then she reached for the phone and waited while she was connected to the opal field of Deadman’s Ridge and her sister, Manda.
Sydney, the Temptress (The Delaneys of Killaroo) Page 7