Anthony started toward her, his own boots making no sound on the thick Turkish carpet. He had never seen her at this hour of the evening, and it startled him that her hair was no longer pulled back in that hideous bun. Instead, it was gathered into a loose, thick braid that lay across her shoulder, honey-brown in the candlelight.
She was so absorbed in her book that she did not even look up as he came closer, a fact which began to irritate him when he stood right in front of her and she could not possibly fail to notice he was there.
Anthony waited several moments for her to acknowledge his presence, but she did not, and he grew tired of waiting. He had never been a patient man. He cleared his throat and spoke. “I would like to speak with you for a few moments. Please,” he added, when she did not respond.
She turned a page. “Our compromise was that I would work at a reasonable pace for the remainder of my stay. Since it is now dusk, my working hours are over. Could we please postpone this until morning?”
Yesterday, she would have jumped to do his bidding, like any other person in his employ, and Anthony began to wonder if perhaps he was having a very strange dream, a dream in which Miss Wade was no longer Miss Wade. Overnight, she had transformed into an impudent, recalcitrant sort of creature, who resigned her post without so much as a by-your-leave, dared to dress him down and call him inconsiderate, and who decided for herself what hours she would and would not work when there was so much to be done.
I am not your slave.
He smothered an oath under his breath.
Miss Wade glanced up at the sound. “Did you say something?”
That question made him realize he was just standing here like an idiot, when his purpose was to initiate a conversation. But damn it all, she was not cooperating. His plan was to make her life here so appealing that she would want to stay. So far, he did not think he was succeeding.
He watched her return her attention to her book, and he tried again. “I do not want to discuss your work. What is there to discuss? It is always exemplary.”
“Thank you,” she said as she turned another page, “but if your intention is to flatter me into staying, I would rather you save your breath.”
“Miss Wade, can you and I not make peace?” When she did not reply, he added, “After all, you are here for at least the next three months. Therefore—”
“Two months, three weeks, and three days,” she could not resist correcting him. “And there is no at least about it.”
He refused to be drawn into a petty argument. “And since we have a great deal of work to do, and the pace will become quite stressful, I would like the time that you remain here to be pleasant for both of us. I thought we might start with a bit of conversation.”
She hesitated for a long moment, but she did not refuse. Instead, she closed her book and placed it on the table beside her chair. After pulling off her spectacles, she set them aside as well. Then she put her feet on the floor, clasped her hands together in her lap, lifted her face to look up at him, and gave him her undivided attention. The moment she did, he forgot whatever he had been about to say.
She had beautiful eyes. This was the first time he could recall seeing her without those gold-framed spectacles, and it rather startled him what a difference their absence made to her face. Though her eyes appeared dark in the candlelight, he remembered their color from this afternoon—an uncommon lavender shade. Now, without those glass lenses to distort his view, he could see that her eyes were also large, deeply set, and surrounded by thick brown lashes.
He had never thought there was anything attractive about her, but looking at her now, Anthony was forced to revise his opinion. At this moment, bathed in candlelight, with loose tendrils of hair around her face and those big, almond-shaped eyes looking up at him, she seemed softer than she ever had before. Not pretty, exactly, but not quite so plain, either.
“Your grace?”
Her voice brought his attention back to the reason he was here. He sat down in the chair opposite hers and struggled for something to say, something innocuous and pleasant. “What are you reading?”
“A biography of Cleopatra.”
“Indeed?” He glanced at the slim red volume on the table. The gilded title stamped on its face glittered in the candlelight. “That particular account of her life is rather an indifferent one. If you really wish to make a study of Cleopatra, there is a much better biography of her somewhere about.”
“What is wrong with this one?”
“There is no real historical value to it. It is completely personal.”
“Yes, but that is what I wanted. I already know the history surrounding her. I wanted to know more about her as a woman.”
“I see.”
The ironic note in his voice did not escape her. She bit her lip and looked away. After a moment, she returned her gaze to his and said, “By all accounts, I mean…she was not beautiful, but she did have a certain…certain…well—”
“Sexual allure?” he supplied, rather enjoying the way her cheeks tinted a delicate pink at his words. God, Miss Wade was embarrassed. She was usually as placid as a millpond, but the past two days were making him wonder if beneath her unruffled exterior, there might be a woman after all.
She carried on valiantly, trying to sound quite academic and intellectual on the subject. “That, of course, but she must have had more than that. Something undefinable. A magical, captivating quality.”
“Is that what you wish to be, Miss Wade?” he asked. “Magical and captivating?”
She stiffened in her chair, suddenly as prickly as the outside of a chestnut. “Are you making fun of me?” she asked in her quiet voice.
The question startled him, for he’d had no intention at all of making fun. “No,” he answered. “I was not. I was simply curious.”
She did not seem to believe him, but she shrugged as if it did not matter and continued, “Caesar knew making Cleopatra his queen would not be a popular decision, but he had planned to do it anyway because he wanted her so much. He was murdered because of his passion for her.”
“No,” Anthony corrected, “Caesar was murdered because he was stupid. His passion for a woman was the catalyst of his death.”
“Perhaps, but for all that, his feeling was no less powerful. Then take Marc Antony. At the battle of Actium, he gambled everything to win Cleopatra’s kingdom back for her. Why?”
“Does it matter why? Marc Antony was as foolish as Caesar had been. Whatever his feelings, he should never have engaged in the battle. It was a futile attempt.”
“Futile? He nearly won.”
Before he could reply, a voice spoke from the other end of the room. “Begging your pardon, your grace, but Mr. Richardson says your bath is waiting, and your meal will be ready shortly.”
Anthony glanced up to see a footman standing in the doorway. “I shall be along in a moment.”
The footman gave a bow, then departed. Anthony returned his attention to the woman opposite him. “In war, Miss Wade, the fact that he nearly won counts for nothing. Marc Antony was a brilliant general, and he should have known he would lose at Actium. Octavian had marshaled all the forces of Rome against him. Reason dictated that he retreat.”
“But what makes you think reason had anything to do with it?” she countered. “He loved her, and that power she had over him went beyond his reason.”
He made a sound of impatience. “Trust a woman to bring emotion into an intellectual discussion.”
“Trust a man to denigrate the power of love.”
He folded his arms across his chest and leaned back in his chair. “Love should never conquer reason.”
“But it so often does.”
“With tragic results.”
“For Marc Antony and Cleopatra, perhaps,” she was forced to concede. “But not for everyone. Some people can be made quite happy by it.”
“In the short term, perhaps.”
He could tell his firm resolve in this discussion frustrated h
er. She lifted her gaze heavenward, clearly frustrated with him. “Oh, for heaven’s sake,” she cried, “have you never known anyone who was happy in love?”
A memory flashed through Anthony’s mind of the night he’d found his father dead, four empty vials of laudanum beside him. “Yes, I have,” he answered. “And the results were tragic.”
He found he was no longer in the mood for conversation. Abruptly, he stood up and gave her a bow. “Forgive me, but I must have that bath or it will get cold. Good night.”
He left her without another word.
First Viola, and all her uncharacteristically romantic talk of love. Now Miss Wade. Damn it all, love was not everything. Why did women always think that it was?
As much as Daphne had come to enjoy the lush, beautiful countryside of England, it did present its share of problems to excavation work, particularly in the reconstruction of frescoes. In the deserts of Africa, Palestine, and Mesopotamia, sand could be brushed away to reveal an intact, beautifully preserved wall painting, but in England and other damp climates, it was different.
It was bad enough that mud made unearthing the plaster pieces of a fresco a messy, difficult task. The damp soil in which the fragments had lain for sixteen hundred years tended to degrade the plaster itself, making Daphne’s job of reassembling fresco pieces into a complete painting much more difficult. Matching the color and design details of hundreds of crumbling fragments could take days of exasperating work. Some days, she found, were more exasperating than others. This was one of those days.
She had already gone through the baskets of fresco pieces the men had uncovered so far and sorted them into groups by the images painted on them. Now, using a tiny trowel, she was fitting and cementing the pieces back together. Like the floor mosaic she had finished repairing the day before, this piece of the bedchamber wall was painted with an image of Venus. Reassembling it was a bit like putting together a child’s picture puzzle, but the work was much more painstaking.
She was not accustomed to frescoes that crumbled so easily, and the task required all her attention, but she found her mind preferred to wander, taking her back to that very odd evening in the library a few evenings ago, when Anthony had tried to engage her in conversation.
Daphne remembered his words that he had known someone who was happy in love but with tragic results, and she wondered who he had been talking about. Himself, perhaps? That might explain his cynicism about marriage, she supposed, and his cold, logical approach to it. She forced such speculations out of her mind. She did not care whom he married.
Since that evening in the library, he had gone out of his way to thank her for each task she accomplished, added the word please to all his orders, and had an occasional chat with her about the weather and how the cooler temperatures this week must be making her work more pleasant. He sometimes mentioned the events of the day, such as England’s current overabundance of governesses, or the dullness of London and its environs during the autumn and winter months. He even had maids come by the antika every hour or so to see if she might like a cup of tea or other refreshment. He often sent workmen in to ask if she needed their assistance.
As if such things would make her stay. Since more money had not tempted her, he was now trying to prove to her that he was a considerate employer.
She gave a disdainful sniff. He was not a considerate employer. He was selfish and toplofty and had no genuine consideration for the feelings of others. He was cold as well, so cold that he would deliberately, in calculated fashion, pick a wife he would never fall in love with.
Yet, despite all that, she had fancied herself in love with him. Why? Daphne paused in her work, staring into space, thinking it over. What was it about him that she had loved?
She thought of Cleopatra, and she realized that women were not the only ones who could possess a sort of magical appeal that captivated others. Anthony had it too.
She thought of all the times he had looked at her in a way that made her feel special, singled out for his attention, as if she were the only person in the world at that moment. But it was only for that moment, only when he wanted something he knew was especially difficult or unreasonable, then he could bring out a potent charm that made her want to please him, no matter how hard it might be to accomplish. Once that objective was obtained, he was gone, leaving her dazed and flattered and not realizing he had ordered, not requested, something that would take her hours and hours of hard work.
She knew now that all those times when he had looked straight at her in that special way, he had been looking through her without seeing her at all, his only intent to get what he wanted. And yet, the other day when he had been trying to persuade her to stay, she had felt a momentary temptation to agree, just because he had asked it of her.
Yes, he had an inexplicable alchemy that could make a maid run off to the dairy for fresh butter at two o’clock in the morning without any resentment, that made Mrs. Bennington’s breath come faster just because he was talking with her about the state of the roads, that made plain, ordinary Daphne Wade feel like the world’s greatest beauty. But it was not real.
She took a deep breath and returned her attention to her work. She was wise to him now, and that magic wasn’t going to work on her anymore.
Daphne picked up a flake of plaster about the size of her palm and began smearing wet cement onto the back of the piece with her trowel, but the pressure of such a task was too much for the delicate plaster fragment. It broke apart in her hands, falling between her gloved fingers into pieces and dust, her fourth one of the day, another priceless piece of history ruined.
“Oh, this English mud destroys everything!” she cried, and threw her trowel aside, thoroughly exasperated. It hit the stone floor with a clang. That sound was followed by a low whistle, and Daphne turned her head to find Anthony standing in the doorway of the antika.
“Careful where you throw things, Miss Wade,” he said, and bent to pick up her trowel.
“Did I hit you?”
“No,” he answered, “but it was a near miss.”
Daphne watched him cross the room toward her. She could tell he had not yet started working on the dig with Mr. Bennington, for though he wore no waistcoat or neck-cloth, his shirt was immaculate, without a speck of dirt to detract from its snowy whiteness. Daphne was relieved that at least he was wearing it.
She hastily looked away. “I am gratified you are not hurt,” she said as he paused by her side.
“Why are you cursing the English mud?” He set her trowel down beside the bowl of cement on the table.
Daphne drew a deep breath and inhaled the sharp scent of lemon soap and, with it, the heavier scent of him. It flustered her, and she shifted her weight from one foot to the other. Did he have to stand so close? “It is nothing,” she said and reached for the trowel. “I am feeling rather cross today, that is all.”
“Cross? Now, I know I must be dreaming.”
She scooped up a dollop of cement. “I do not know what you mean,” she said and began to smear the adhesive on one of the small pieces of plaster she had shattered.
“I feel as if I have been lost these past few days in a bizarre sort of dream,” he continued, and moved away from her side.
Daphne drew a deep breath of relief, but she could feel his eyes studying her as he circled the table to stand on the opposite side. “It seems you are not quite what I thought you to be,” he said, “and I find that a bit disconcerting.”
Daphne fitted two pieces of fresco together and did not reply. She lifted her gaze a notch as she waited for the cement to adhere, watching him roll up his sleeves. As the white linen rolled back from his tanned skin, she could see the stria of sinew and muscle in his forearms, and his long, strong fingers. Warmth began radiating out from her midsection, and an image of him without his shirt flashed through her mind. She fought to focus on what he was saying.
“I find that my preconceived ideas about you are falling away, Miss Wade. One by one.”
The moment the words were out of her mouth, she wanted to take them back. She did not want to hear him utter flattering, false opinions of her because he wanted her to stay and finish his project. She returned her gaze to the plaster pieces in her hands and tried to throw herself back onto solid ground. “Never mind. I do not need to know.”
“I shall tell you anyway. I thought you were a meek and mild little miss, willing to run here and there and everywhere to do my bidding.”
You also thought I was a stick bug. Daphne did not make that resentful addition aloud, though part of her wanted to make him feel guilt and remorse for what he had said about her when he had not even known she was listening. “You were wrong.”
“So I was,” he admitted. “I am discovering that you are neither mild nor meek. In fact, Miss Wade, I have discovered that you have a temper, for you have no compunction about throwing tools when you are cross. Nor have you been hesitant to speak your mind of late. You certainly expressed your opinion of me quite eloquently two days ago. All of this after five months of quiet compliancy baffles me, and I cannot help but wonder at the reason for this change in you.”
Daphne’s entire body tensed at those words, and she vowed he would never find out. It would be too mortifying. She drew a deep breath. “I cannot think what came over me the other day. I do not usually speak so harshly.”
“I accept your apology.”
Daphne’s chin shot up, and she found that he was smiling at her. That alchemy at work. “That was not an apology,” she said emphatically. “I never apologize when I am provoked into giving an honest opinion.”
Anthony rested his palms on the table and leaned a bit closer to her. Laugh lines appeared at the corners of his eyes, though he did not smile. “Miss Wade, do you not know when you are being teased?”
Guilty Series Page 8