Dark Temptation

by CHASE, ALLISON

  ‘‘What is it? What happened?’’ She ran her fingers through his sodden hair, tarnished nearly russet by the rain. ‘‘You looked as though you were about to keel over into the water.’’

  ‘‘I’m all right.’’ His lips moved against her dripping hair. Then he released her and eased back a step. ‘‘And you? Did you . . . see it?’’

  ‘‘The hand?’’

  Head bowed, he nodded.

  ‘‘It was horrible. All of this . . . it’s like a nightmare.’’ Almost like the nightmare they had shared. A bout of shivering racked her, and suddenly she was against him again. His hands rubbed up and down her back, instilling the only warmth she could hope to glean from this wretched day. ‘‘Who are those men?’’

  ‘‘I don’t know. Villagers. Sailors.’’ He held her at arm’s length and scowled. ‘‘Why did you come? Why didn’t you do as I told you and stay at the tavern?’’

  Despite his stance, his tone, she felt the lack of true anger in his words. ‘‘Rachel took off running. What else could I do but follow?’’

  Pushing wet hair out of her eyes, she searched for her cousin. Most of the crowd had dispersed onto the road, slowly making their way into the village. The quay was nearly deserted. ‘‘Do you see her?’’

  He pointed, not toward the road, but down the wharf. ‘‘There she is.’’

  Half-hidden behind the stern of a neat little clipper ship, Rachel stood with her arms around a man. A shock of surprise went through Sophie. Her cousin’s black hair whipped bannerlike behind her as she pressed her lips to his, then laid her cheek against a broad chest clad in the dark woolen jersey and oilcloth coat of a fisherman.

  ‘‘That must be her Ian. I never knew he existed. She never gave so much as a hint.’’

  ‘‘Have you hinted at your acquaintance with me?’’

  The sharpness of his question startled her. ‘‘Of course not. But this is different. Poor Rachel, to feel she must keep such a secret from her family.’’

  ‘‘Yes . . .’’ His attention wandered over her shoulder to the road. Sophie followed his gaze, seeing nothing but the backs of the villagers receding from view. When she turned around, a steely glint had entered his eyes. ‘‘Perhaps they have reason to disapprove. Perhaps Miss Gordon would do well to stay away from the young man.’’

  ‘‘Why on earth?’’ Sophie searched his face. It was back again, that shuttered expression that kept his thoughts a mystery. Sophie shivered but tried not to let him see. ‘‘At least he arrived home safely.’’

  He nodded absently, his focus pinned somewhere beyond the quay. ‘‘I don’t suppose it would do any good to order you home?’’

  ‘‘No, it wouldn’t.’’

  ‘‘Come, then,’’ he said, and set off toward the road at a brisk pace.

  A somber gathering milled outside the Stormy Gull. Sophie followed Chad as he shouldered his way through the crowd, doubling back more than once as he seemed to search for someone. From listening to the scattered conversations they soon learned that, at Kellyn’s insistence, the bodies had been laid out in one of the upper rooms.

  ‘‘Grady!’’ Chad gestured to a man in the crowd, and Sophie recognized the red hair and unkempt beard of the man who had captained the sailboat that brought Chad out to the cliffs to rescue her.

  The man joined them, shaking his head sadly. ‘‘Milord. Miss.’’ His accent identified him as an Irishman. He offered a respectful nod to Sophie, but gave no indication that he recognized her, for which she was grateful. ‘‘This is a sorrowful day for Penhollow.’’

  ‘‘I heard some of the villagers speaking the Keatings’ names.’’ Chad lowered his voice as he spoke. ‘‘How could anyone believe such an atrocity could be the work of ghosts?’’

  The man ran a hand over his beard and shuddered. ‘‘ ’Cause o’ the way the bodies were found.’’

  Chad exchanged a puzzled glance with Sophie. ‘‘What do you mean?’’

  Sophie noticed heads turning in their direction. Grady noticed as well and shook his head. ‘‘I’ve said too much. Wait for Kellyn and the vicar. They’re sorting matters out now with the captain o’ the schooner.’’ He started to move away.

  Chad stopped him with a hand on his shoulder. ‘‘Someone’s got to notify the authorities.’’

  Grady hesitated, then nodded. ‘‘You’re right, mate. I’ll do it. Soon’s the weather clears, I’ll take me skiff up to Mullion and let the coast guard know.’’

  Just as he turned again to go, Sophie stepped in his path. ‘‘Do you have any idea who might have killed those men?’’

  ‘‘That I don’t, miss.’’ Again he made as if to leave, and Sophie placed a hand on his forearm.

  ‘‘These people. They seem grief-stricken, but not entirely shocked.’’ She leaned closer and asked in a whisper, ‘‘Has such a thing happened before? Often?’’

  An imperative hand closed over her shoulder, yet Chad said nothing as they both waited for the mariner’s answer.

  ‘‘Aye, but not like this. Not with this kind of warning attached.’’

  ‘‘What do you mean, warning?’’

  The mariner didn’t answer Sophie’s question. Hunching his stocky figure against the rain, he eased through the crowd and scurried down the road. Sophie followed Chad into the tavern. They met the vicar just inside the door, donning his overcoat.

  ‘‘Give them all proper burials,’’ Chad said to the other man. ‘‘I’ll pay the expenses.’’

  Sophie’s throat tightened. The vicar nodded his thanks.

  Near the hearth a handful of men sat wrapped in blankets, drinking steaming ale and passing around a bottle of whiskey. Kellyn stood quietly talking to them.

  ‘‘This is Daniel,’’ Kellyn said when Sophie and Chad crossed the room to her. She placed a hand on the shoulder of the sailor nearest her. ‘‘He captains the schooner. Dan, tell Lord Wycliffe what you told me.’’

  The sea captain took a swig from the bottle his neighbor thrust into his hand, wiped his beard and said, ‘‘We were out well before dawn this morn, but when the storm kicked up I decided ’twould be best to haul in the nets and put in. Those three we found—Randolph, Gregory and Peter—they were caught in the webbing.’’

  Chad’s handsome features hardened with something akin to pain. ‘‘Did you see any sign of their vessel?’’

  ‘‘No. The three of them manned a small sloop, sometimes with Gregory’s brother. We saw no sign of it, only the bit of wreckage we hauled in along with them.’’ Daniel gave a forlorn shrug. ‘‘But that could have been anything, from anywhere.’’

  ‘‘Can you estimate how long they might have been in the water?’’

  ‘‘I’m no physician, milord. . . .’’ Daniel traded looks with his companions.

  ‘‘The vicar thought three, maybe four days,’’ Kellyn interjected.

  Chad’s jaw worked, then squared. ‘‘I’ve one more question. I’m told this could not have been the result of a storm or an accident. Can you tell me how you know?’’

  Every man at the table gave a shudder. The captain tipped the bottle to his lips again. Then he said, ‘‘Because when we pulled them in, they were all three tied together.’’

  Chapter 12

  Sophie . . .

  Sophie bolted upright in the darkness, certain she had heard something, someone. A voice no louder than a whisper, yet one whose eerie echo shivered in the air around her.

  Had she dreamed it? Then she had felt it too—a chilly breath against her cheek, like that day at Edgecombe. The thought brought her fully awake. She trembled, gleaning neither warmth nor comfort from the coverlets. After a glance beside her to be sure she hadn’t disturbed Rachel, she slipped out of bed and went to the window.

  After today’s grisly developments, no wonder restless dreams thrust her from sleep. Those men . . . tied together. She shuddered. Meg and Jack Keating had used such brutal measures against their victims. But why would anyone nowadays emulate such c
ruelty? What could they hope to gain from it?

  Her gaze was drawn lower, and she gasped as movement on the beach caught her eye. A shadow. A glimmer of reflected moonlight. Pressing her forehead to the cool glass, she strained for a better view. Was she still dreaming?

  Silently she slipped through the house, tiptoeing past a slumbering Heyworth beside the cookstove. She was taking an awful chance, she knew. And she might be very much mistaken. But, tossing a cloak around her nightshift, she darted out the kitchen door.

  With only a hazy moon and the pale wash of the dunes to guide her, she followed the downward slope of the property to the beach. The rain had stopped and the winds abated, yet the sea remained a churning, foaming blackness. She looked up and down the sand in either direction and saw no one.

  A sense of foolishness rode fast on the heels of disappointment. With a shake of her head she started back—and collided with a wall of chest.

  A hand came over her mouth, muffling her involuntary yelp, but even as her heart exploded against her ribs, a soft but steadying warmth brushed her forehead.

  ‘‘Shh. It’s me.’’

  Relief coursed through her. Feeling weak, she nodded against the hand at her mouth, the lips heating her brow. He released her and stepped back. No wonder she hadn’t seen him standing among the dunes. He was dressed all in black—shirt, breeches, boots—a shadow crowned in gold.

  Desire poured through her at the sight him. Her knees wobbled as his hands framed her face. In the moonlight glinting off the water she saw the shock and grief of that morning etched in stark relief around his eyes, in the hard set of his mouth. Stretching tall, she pressed her lips to his in a kiss meant to tell him she understood, that she felt what he felt and welcomed it, no matter the pain.

  ‘‘I heard you call me,’’ she whispered, knowing even as she spoke the words that they could not be true. How could she possibly have heard him from all the way inside the house, over the roar of the waves and the keening of the wind?

  Yet, when she had looked out her window, she had seen him. Known he would be here, waiting for her.

  ‘‘Yes . . . perhaps I did call you.’’ His open fingers swept the hair from her face in a way that made her feel possessed. For this moment, at least, she was his. ‘‘I’ll admit I wished for you.’’ He pulled her close. ‘‘I wanted to feel you against me.’’

  His hands slid under her cloak, and as he took her in his arms his touch fired her flesh beneath her shift. Once more it seemed the man from the chapel had banished the aloof stranger. An insatiable ache grew, fueling a yearning to feel his lips follow where his fingertips traveled.

  ‘‘Sophie . . . you make me forget. Only you can do that.’’ Nibbling at her neck, he left a scalding trail from her ear to her shoulder. ‘‘Only you make me feel whole again.’’

  She pondered the meaning of that puzzling statement. Then her thoughts drowned in his kisses and the thrust of his tongue. Her senses became keenly attuned to him, to everything about him. The heat of his mouth. The musky scent of his skin. The hardness of male muscle against the softer places of her body. The solid pulse of his arousal against her thigh.

  ‘‘God,’’ he said as he dragged in a breath, ‘‘you feel so good. Taste so wonderful. But . . .’’ The pressure of his lips lessened; his body retreated a fraction. ‘‘Forgive me. I shouldn’t be—’’

  ‘‘No.’’ She tightened her arms and kissed him harder. Whatever he was about to say, she didn’t wish to hear it, not if it created so much as an inch-wide gap between them.

  ‘‘Sophie, this isn’t why I’m here.’’

  She lurched a step backward. Had she completely misread him?

  He caught her shoulders. ‘‘Don’t look like that. Do you think I don’t want you? Christ, I wish I didn’t. Wish I could erase you from my thoughts.’’

  The words cut. She started past him. ‘‘Then do so.’’

  ‘‘Damn it.’’ He caught her hand and drew her close again. ‘‘So help me, I will have you someday. Somehow. But not here, Sophie. Not on the ground, with sand in our hair and God knows where else.’’

  Surely her pride must have dissolved into their kisses or been sucked out to sea, because all she could think to say was, ‘‘I wouldn’t care.’’

  ‘‘Confound it, I would. I’d never forgive myself if I did that to you.’’ His mouth dipped, drank greedily of hers.

  The assurance did little to soothe her aching disappointment. If he hadn’t come here for her, then . . . ‘‘Why are you here?’’

  ‘‘I’m patrolling. Looking for the lights you saw.’’ The frothing waves tossed illuminated patterns across his face. ‘‘I believe a connection exists between the ship you saw that night and what happened today. The timing is too close for coincidence.’’

  She clutched the smooth cambric of his ebony shirt as the disturbing revelation of that morning tumbled back. ‘‘The Keatings used to tie their victims together before throwing them overboard. Especially Lady Meg, when she went on her rampage.’’

  ‘‘I know that, but this was the work of human hands, not ghosts.’’

  ‘‘Of course, but it seems someone is using the legend to frighten people. To keep them from searching out the truth.’’

  His hands dug into her sides. ‘‘Stay out of it, Sophie. It’s a treacherous game, hunting for smugglers. They’re too clever by half at covering their tracks and removing whatever or whoever stands in their way.’’

  ‘‘I’ve no intention of getting in anyone’s way. But if we—’’

  ‘‘Shh!’’ His hand clamped over her mouth. He tucked her to his side and lunged into the dunes, taking her with him in a small explosion of sand.

  She experienced only seconds of confusion before she heard what had spurred him to action: the swish and scatter of approaching footsteps.

  Chad did his best to cushion Sophie from the fall. Then he rolled to cover her, pinning her with his weight to prevent her from making any telltale movements. They lay in a depression between the dunes, camouflaged by weeds and shadow but by no means completely hidden from view. If their unexpected guest happened to turn in just the right direction, he might very well spot them. Only by lying utterly motionless did they have any hope of remaining concealed.

  Quicker than he would have thought, Sophie quieted her breathing and blinked her understanding up at him. Still, he dared not ease off her for fear of the shifting sands making too loud a hiss, especially when the intruder halted mere yards away.

  Chad could make out a tall, broad-shouldered figure with an unkempt pelt of black hair that reached below his collar. Sophie’s uncle. Chad had met him briefly at the tavern that morning, after Sophie and her cousin had set out for home.

  Barnaby Gordon stood at the edge of the splashing waves, hands on his hips, staring out at the churning water. Seconds ticked by.

  Beneath Chad the soft planes and hollows of Sophie’s body embraced his harder contours. Her cloak lay open, spread out on the sand. Despite the coolness of the night, heat gathered between them, coating her skin with a sheen that beaded in the valley between her breasts.

  Desire stabbed, all the more excruciating because he could do nothing to alleviate it.

  Her lips touched his ear, her voice no more than a sigh. ‘‘Who?’’

  In her position she could not turn without shifting her shoulders as well. He lowered his head until his nose submerged in her loose hair. ‘‘Your uncle.’’

  A furrow formed above her nose; she shook her head in a wordless query. In reply he retuned the gesture. He had no idea what brought the man outside, fully dressed, in the middle of the night to simply stare at the sea.

  He lifted his head for another look. The man braced his feet wide and raised a spyglass to his eye. His torso swung in a slow half circle that encompassed the black horizon.

  Raised precariously on his elbows above Sophie, Chad watched for several more minutes. It wasn’t until he felt her hips give an infinitesimal wigg
le that he realized his weight must be digging into her.

  He lowered his arms and came cheek-to-cheek with her. Perhaps that didn’t relieve the pressure sufficiently, for her mouth closed on the corner of his lips, her teeth digging into his skin with what felt more like a reflex than a deliberate attempt to bite him. He felt a whisper of arousal. Under any other circumstances . . .

  Gordon turned. Folding the spyglass, he slipped it into a trouser pocket and trudged back toward the dunes. Chad communicated to Sophie with an emphatic expression. She held her breath. Grains of sand kicked up by the man’s stride pelted Chad’s hair. Gordon couldn’t be more than two yards away. Chad dared not so much as flinch, even when one of those tiny particles lodged in the corner of his eye.

  The footsteps faded to a distant thudding. Chad rose up onto his elbows again, then eased off Sophie to crawl forward and peer around the dunes. The top of Gordon’s head bobbed out of view. Chad sat up and offered a hand to help Sophie do the same.

  Her relief breezed from her lips on a long but nearly soundless sigh. He kissed her. ‘‘You all right?’’

  She nodded.

  He rubbed at his eye, hoping to dislodge the irritating grain of sand. She shook out her hair and ran her fingers through it. Sand showered the ground. Hand in hand they made their way past the dunes.

  ‘‘Where is he going?’’

  Chad followed the line of Sophie’s outstretched arm. Gordon appeared to be skirting the house.

  ‘‘He’s heading for the road,’’ she said, and took off at a run.

  The only way to stop her would have been to call out, something he didn’t dare do. Chad sprinted to catch up, but even as his fingertips brushed her arm, she shook free and kept going. ‘‘Sophie, stop,’’ he hissed.

  ‘‘No time to argue. We don’t want to lose him.’’

  Damn the woman for being right. They kept the sheds between themselves and Gordon as long as they could, stopping to spy around each corner before hurrying to keep him in their sights. As they reached the front garden they saw him step through the gate onto the road.