by Jane Feather
“Delilah?” whispered a familiar voice.
“Christian,” She lowered the paperweight to her side with relief. “You scared the—”
She was cut off as he vaulted into the room, accompanied by the loud crunch of splintering wood. It was followed by a crash somewhere below and a muttered oath.
He grimaced and rolled to a sitting position, gingerly patting his ribs.
“Are you hurt?” she asked, leaning over him.
“No, damn it, just fond of making an entrance.”
“Well, rest assured you succeeded. What happened?”
“The trellis broke. I should have known something would …”
“Broke?” she asked as he trailed off. She glanced out the window and back to him. “But now how are you going to get down?”
“Good question.”
“I have an even better one. What were you doing climbing up here at this time of night in the first place?”
He shrugged. “I was in the neighborhood.”
“Very funny. A pity you weren’t so clever earlier this evening.”
“I might have been if you had returned the letter in time for me to right matters.”
“Wrong matters, you mean. I was merely trying to prevent you from botching things further. Doing so seems to be your avocation. Besides,” she added, ignoring his glowering, “the letter was delivered to me. That makes it mine to do with as I please.”
“The hell it does,” he countered, glancing around and on his feet in one fluid movement as he caught sight of the letter where she’d dropped it.
He was fast, but Delilah was faster.
“Give it to me.”
“No,” she said, holding it behind her as she backed away from him. “I think you should leave.”
“I came for the letter and I’m not leaving without it.”
“Then I hope you’re prepared for a siege.”
He laughed. “A siege? A rout is more like it. Now do as I say and—” He stopped abruptly, his big, hard body going still as he succeeded in trapping hers against the wall. The impatience in his gaze abruptly gave way to something else, something far more dangerous.
As dangerous, Delilah thought uneasily, as the feeling surging inside her. A feeling both urgent and unfamiliar.
He ceased grabbing for the letter. Instead he placed his palms flat on the wall on either side of her head, making escape impossible even if she’d wanted it. Shamefully, Delilah realized she didn’t. She wanted something else entirely.
“Did you read it?” he asked, his deep voice sending a thrill along her spine.
“Every word. Did you mean it?”
“Every word,” he said.
Happiness washed through her. She could feel his warm breath on her face and sense the waves of heat and nervous energy coming off him. This is madness, she told herself. Mad and unthinkable and impossible. At the same time she couldn’t stop thinking about it, thinking that it wasn’t only possible, it was real. Breathless, she ran her tongue across her bottom lip.
Christian groaned and bent his head.
She whispered once. “We can’t.”
“We won’t.”
They did.
IT WAS like the first time for Delilah in many ways.
The first time she had stood in the candlelight and allowed a man to remove her clothing … all her clothing.
The first time a man had lavished her with touches and kisses in tender, hidden places on her body that until now had been unknown even to her. The soft underside of her breast and her inner thighs and the hollow at the small of her back all learned the power of Christian’s touch.
It was the first time a man had spoken to her in bed—words of desire, words of love, hungry, urgent, reckless words that made her pulse leap. The sound of Christian’s voice, blessedly familiar and at the same time possessing a rough new urgency, lent a sense of intimacy and rightness.
This was Christian … kissing her, touching her, turning her in his arms and covering her with his aroused body.
Christian … telling her she was beautiful, so beautiful he ached, so soft and hot he couldn’t wait. He couldn’t wait, he murmured it against her throat and breast, over and over, even as he held his desire in check and waited for her passion to rise and meet his.
Christian … the only man she had ever loved, loving her … twisting with her amidst a tangle of sheets … making her weep with inconceivable pleasure at the fury of her climax and finally his own.
“OH, MY,” said Delilah, still breathing heavily as Christian shifted his weight to his side. It was as eloquent a remark as she was capable of that moment.
“My sentiments exactly,” he responded.
Their gazes met and quickly skittered away. They rolled to their backs at the same time.
Christian stared at the ceiling and wondered what she was thinking. Possibly the same thing he was? That what had just transpired was incredible … unprecedented … inevitable. Destiny. He’d never had much use for the word, but damned if he didn’t suddenly like the sound of it.
WHAT WAS he thinking? wondered Delilah. That is, if he was able to think. She was certainly having trouble stringing her thoughts together. Every phrase, every sentence fragment that filtered through her mind, seemed to lead back to Christian. It was as if even though his body had withdrawn, his spirit filled her still. She felt bedazzled, invigorated. Terrified.
HE COULD always come straight out and ask her what she was thinking, he supposed. But Delilah was very good with words, too good. She might very well turn the question around to him and then what would he do? What would he say? No, he wouldn’t ask, that much was certain.
SHE WISHED he would say something. Anything. No, not anything. The right thing. The thing she wanted most to hear, that this night felt as wonderful and as right to him as it did to her. And that if she surrendered her heart to him as she just had her body, he would treat it with the same tender care. Say something, she willed him.
CHRISTIAN SLANTED her a look, mesmerized by her profile in the candlelight. “I never …”
“Nor I,” she said softly.
“That is, not often, at least …”
“That’s what I meant.”
“Of course.”
“Of course.”
Silence settled over them once more.
Damn, what was wrong with him? He’d felt a great many ways after lovemaking, but never at a loss for words. He was a little old to be tongue-tied around a woman.
He cleared his throat determinedly., “At least we’ve finally managed to solve your dilemma,” he ventured, more intent on the feel of her hip pressed to his than what he was saying. “If this does not sully your reputation around the edges, nothing ever will.”
“You’re overlooking one little detail, aren’t you? There were—thank heaven—no witnesses to our lapse into madness.”
He rolled to his side and succumbed to the urge to run his lips over the curve of her shoulder. “If this is madness, lock me away forever. As for the other little detail, it’s easily enough remedied.”
She reached for the sheet, eyeing him warily. “What are you suggesting?”
“Nothing bizarre,” he said. “Simply that we could always announce our attachment. I’ve been giving it some thought and it seems to me that no one in his right mind could expect you to become Remmley’s wife when you are pledged to be mine.”
“Your wife?” She gasped.
“It makes sense,” he said, managing to shrug as if his entire future were not riding on her response. “I have compromised you most outrageously after all and I am willing to do the honorable thing and marry you.”
“Oh, you are, are you?” She tossed off the sheet, flounced from the bed, and reached for her robe, her gaze an angry blaze. “Well, it so happens I am not willing. I have no intention of marrying a man simply because of a quick tumble and because he declares himself willing”
“What are you saying?”
“I�
�m saying I refuse your proposal, that’s what I’m saying.”
“I feel obliged to point out that I didn’t actually propose.”
“No, you didn’t. Perhaps if you had, my answer might have been different.”
“Are you saying that if I do propose you’ll accept?” He reached for his breeches and fumbled his way into them. “Are you?”
Delilah folded her arms and turned away. “Oh, I don’t know what I’m saying at this point.”
“All right then, I’ll say it. Marry me, Delilah.”
She tugged on the sash of her robe with a small sob. “I can’t.”
Christian reeled. “Why the hell not?”
“Because … because you’re you, damn you.”
“That’s not a reason. I’m the perfect man for you and you know it.”
“Ha! The perfect man to ruin me, you mean, not marry me. It would never work.”
“It worked fine tonight.”
“Marriage is more than falling into bed together.”
“I know that. I want more.”
She seemed not to hear him. She paced, her hands clenching and unclenching. “I’ve already explained to you that I vowed never to marry again.”
“Wrong. You said you vowed never to enter into a sham of a marriage again. I’m not proposing a sham. You have to know how I feel about you.”
“No, I don’t know, not really.”
“My letter—”
She cut him off. “A ruse. You said so yourself. I don’t want to hear otherwise,” she cried, covering her ears with her hands. “I can’t. It will only muddle matters more without changing anything.” There was a note of pleading in her voice, but her jaw was set as she dropped her arms to her sides. “I can’t marry you, Christian. Leave it at that, please.”
“You’d rather marry Remmley?” he demanded, his fury explosive. He knew that determined tilt of her chin all too well. It filled him with both an urge to shake some sense into her and a gnawing sense of impotency.
“I won’t marry Remmley,” she replied. “I’ll think of some way out of it. I always do.” She moved to her dressing table and turned back to him holding out the green bottle tied to the silk cord. “Go on, take it. You’ve earned it.”
“No. I haven’t. Not yet.” He ignored the bottle, desperation pressed like a blade against his throat. “You still need me, Delilah. Nothing has changed.”
“You’re wrong,” she replied. “Everything has changed. I’ve changed. I’m not a little girl any longer. I know what I want from life and I know how to get it. Do you recall what you said to Roger that night at the summerhouse?”
He shook his head impatiently. “No. Whatever it was, I didn’t mean a word of it.”
“You said to him, ‘Now we’re even.’” She tossed him the bottle. “Now we’re even, Blackmoor.”
CHAPTER NINE
THIS WASN’T THE first time he’d stalked from Delilah’s house in mortification and anger, nursing a heartfelt desire never to set eyes on the blasted woman again. That was as far as the similarity went, however.
Last time, despite the humiliating sting of her refusal, he had accepted that it was best for both of them and refused to regard it as a rejection per se. He’d escaped feeling both humbled to have been taken in by the little brat and relieved not to have blundered his way into a parson’s mousetrap. In time his embarrassment had faded, leaving only a memory that was like a loose thread, an unfinished sonnet, a possibility.
No longer.
Four simple words had put an end to all that sentimental rot. I can’t marry you.
Will not, she ought to have said. That was the truth of the matter, he thought, abandoning his bedchamber for the library, cognac bottle in hand. He drew the drapes tightly before sitting, in no mood for sunshine. He’d be willing to bet that her brother would not share her compunctions. Old Roger would be happy enough to see her wed to any reasonable prospect … even the Blackmoor Devil.
But she did not want to marry him. There was no possible way for him to interpret her words as anything other than pure, out-and-out rejection. I am not going to toss my heart under your bootheel a second time, she had said to him several nights ago. Then she had gone and trod all over his instead.
His eyes burned and it felt as if he’d been ripped with a blade from his throat to his gut. It hurt to breathe and to swallow, to sit and stand and move from one empty room to another. Hell, it hurt to live, he thought, dropping into a fireside chair and tipping the bottle to his lips. The glass had disappeared during his restless nightlong safari in search of a place in his own home where he might be free of Delilah’s memory. How was it possible, he wondered gloomily, for the woman to haunt a place she’d never set foot in?.
The answer, of course, was sickeningly obvious. Delilah was not stalking his home, but rather, his heart. He was in love with her. It was that simple. And that hopeless.
Groaning, he rested his head against the high chair back and closed his eyes. Through the dark web of his lashes his attention was snagged by a glitter from the mantel. Lillith’s damn bottle. He’d been so self-absorbed he hadn’t even bothered to look inside. Not that it mattered any longer. It was a little late for luck when the woman he loved wanted no part of him.
Still, he stood and reached for the bottle, uncurling the scrap of leather inside. The marks on it were faded and ornately scrawled and his vision at the moment could best be described as blurry. He had to squint and hold it close to the candle to make out the words.
To thine own wish be true. Do not follow the moth to the star.
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” he muttered. A worthless purchase if ever he’d made one. He raised the cognac bottle in the air. “To Lillith, who knows a sucker when she sees one.”
The scent of the fine fifty-year-old brandy made his stomach roil, a sure sign he’d had enough, he decided, putting the bottle aside and shaking his head to clear it.
To thine own wish be true. The words followed him around the room. Do not follow the moth to the star.
What was magical about that?.
To thine own wish …
The only thing he wished for was Delilah, to have her love him the way he loved her. Madly. Completely. Desperately. Exactly the way she claimed she wanted to be loved.
He loved her, and he’d never even had the chance to tell her so.
But he would, he decided suddenly, and with a surprising degree of clarity and determination for a man who’d had too little sleep and too much brandy.
He could do that much, at least. He would tell her he loved her and no self-doubts, no old crone, and no silly hex were going to stop him.
THE DINING room of Delilah’s townhouse was a whirlwind of noise and color, with bright streamers strung everywhere and a sign reading HAPPY 6TH BIRTHDAY, JANE hung over the sideboard. Nearby sat what remained of the cake Cook had prepared for the occasion. Neighborhood children, accompanied by their nannies, mingled with Jane’s playmates from the days before she and Dare and their aunt Esmerelda had come to live there. Everyone Delilah had expected to come was there. Everyone but Blackmoor.
Not that he’d been invited, of course. It was simply another of her irrational notions to hope that in spite of their angry parting last night, he might come back. If he did, it would prove … what? Delilah wasn’t sure, only that it would prove something very important and that it was not going to happen.
She had spurned Christian and he had retreated with all the grace of a bear with a wounded paw. No doubt by now he’d found some pretty bird of paradise to soothe his injured pride. That, she told herself, was what men like Blackmoor did. A smart woman would not care. She would put him from her mind and get on with her life.
Apparently, Delilah brooded, she was not quite as smart as she liked to think.
She was wise enough to recognize Blackmoor for the scoundrel he was, but not nearly wise enough to keep from falling in love with him. Not once, but twice. Once with a sixteen-year-ol
d’s impulsive näiveté, and now with a woman’s passion and strength. And that kind of love, she discovered, was not so easily denied.
In spite of her own dismal mood, Delilah had been determined that Jane’s party be a success and it appeared it was. All that remained was for Delilah to give Jane her final present and the children would spend the rest of the afternoon playing games. She might even steal a moment alone to give her poor smile a rest.
At a signal from her Dare left the room, returning shortly with a large bundle swathed in pink satin. Delilah moved aside the velvet hair ribbons and colorful toy tops Jane had been given to make room for him to stand the bundle on the table in front of his wide-eyed sister.
“Is this for me, too?” she asked softly, looking overwhelmed by the unprecedented fuss being made on her behalf.
“It certainly is,” replied Delilah. “Climb up on the chair so you can untie the ribbon and see what it is.”
Jane scrambled to obey, standing on her toes on the needlepoint chair seat to reach the ribbon.
“Now close your eyes,” Delilah told her, “and wish for something very special.”
“You wish with me,” Jane urged.
Delilah laughed. “All right. I’m wishing … I’m wishing … one, two, three,” she said, whipping the satin wrapping in the air with a dramatic flourish to reveal …
Blackmoor.
Exactly what she’d wished for. Not beneath the pink satin, but standing in the doorway, one broad shoulder propped lazily. His mouth was slanted in a familiar wry smile, but his gaze was open and warm and trained on her alone.
“A doll,” Jane squealed as she finally opened her eyes. “A doll that looks like me.”
“She does indeed look like you,” Delilah agreed, forcing her attention back to the child. “That’s how I knew the instant I saw her that she must be yours.”
“She can be my sister,” Jane exclaimed. “We can play together.”
Delilah smiled and bent to press a kiss to the little girl’s silky head. “That sounds perfect. Happy birthday, sweetheart.”