He was watching her as if he knew the madness in her thoughts.
She should excuse herself, apologize, turn and run away before she lost her wits entirely—
But the music shifted into a new and wilder dance, and Charlotte didn’t leave.
“I think I can manage, even without my skirts,” she said, and then flushed deeper at her own words.
He nodded gravely. “Shall we try?”
He took her bare, gloveless hand. Warmth ran up her arm, beneath her uniform jacket.
“Your hair,” he said. “It’s brown.”
“I’m sorry?” She blinked at him, half-dizzy from the heat that rose from his skin.
“It’s nothing,” he said. He shook his head. “Forgive me. It’s only . . . I’d always wondered what the true color was.”
“Oh.” Charlotte took a quick, almost airless, breath, fighting the impulse to step even closer. “Are you . . . surprised?”
He closed his eyes briefly. She saw a muscle work in his jaw. “You always surprise me, Baroness,” he said, and swept her into the dance.
Chapter Twenty
Friedrich hurried through the side door of the Bagatelle and closed it behind him, shutting out the music and the lights. He felt his way up the stairs in darkness, his own breath loud in his ears.
If Sophie saw him sneaking around the edges of her ball, she’d throw a fit. But he couldn’t help it.
He had to know. He had to see for himself what had been left in the dance hall, after the flames and the pits of darkness. He stretched his face tentatively, and the burned skin stung, proof that he hadn’t just gone mad or dreamed the whole thing in a drunken haze.
He came to a halt in front of the dance hall door, breathing hard. The door handle was cool against his sweaty palm. He twisted it and pushed the door open.
Whispered voices cut off abruptly. Two dark figures spun around to face him, backlit by a single lantern.
Bloody hell. Friedrich’s mouth went dry. They had no faces!
No. They were only wearing masks—dark masks that covered their faces entirely. His shoulders sagged in relief. He waved cheerily and let the door fall closed behind him.
“Sorry to intrude,” he said. “Only wanted to take a look around—didn’t realize anyone else would be here right now.”
One of the figures turned and strode to the unlit far corner of the room, slipping quickly into the all-encompassing darkness. The other stepped forward, his vast cloak flinging rippling shadows onto the smooth, unmarked floor.
“Only wanted to look around, Brother Friedrich?” he purred. “And what exactly were you looking for?”
Friedrich stumbled backward. His mind gibbered frantically: Oh God oh God oh God . . . It offered him no help.
“My—my—my handkerchief?” he finally offered. “Couldn’t find it anywhere, so I thought—I thought I might’ve dropped it here the other night?”
“Your handkerchief?” The figure advanced on him inexorably. “And the honorary Lieutenant von Höllner, living off the generosity of his wife’s princely lover, couldn’t afford to replace a single handkerchief?”
“Well . . .” Friedrich glanced desperately around the great, shadowed room. No scorch marks, no pits—it didn’t even look the same size anymore!—and no scraps of cloth for him to snatch.
The figure held out his cloaked arm in a gesture of generosity. “Look your fill, Brother Friedrich. In fact, I’ll aid you in your search. What color was this famous handkerchief?”
“Ah . . . it doesn’t matter. Truly.” Friedrich fumbled behind his back, hunting for the door handle. “It’s probably just fallen under my bed.”
“No doubt.”
“So I’ll be off then,” Friedrich said. His fingers closed around the door handle. “Sorry to disturb you. Have a good eve—aah!”
He leapt backward, flattening himself against the door. “What the hell is that?”
Red eyes glared out at him from a cloud of smoke in the corner of the hall. It drifted closer, watching him, until a low voice rapped out from the darkness at the far end of the room, and it came to a halt. Friedrich shuddered at the look in its eyes as it pulled back.
The masked figure turned to follow Friedrich’s trembling finger.
“That?” He shrugged. “I wouldn’t worry about that . . . not anymore. Think of it as a mere illusion, set to trap the unwary.”
Without any wide, billowing skirts to act as a shield between them, Carlo found himself tinglingly close to the Baroness each time the steps of the dance brought them together.
Around them, priests danced with Greek goddesses and Harlequins with sorceresses. Dancers filled the wide lawn before the Bagatelle and filtered off through the pathways of the formal gardens that spiraled out around it, separated by tall hedges.
The Baroness laughed softly.
“What is it?”
Carlo breathed the words into her ear as they met between the lines of dancers. She lifted her hand and pressed her palm against his in burning symmetry.
“It’s only odd,” she said, “that we met scarcely a week ago. I feel . . .” She cut herself off.
“I know,” Carlo said. Pressure built behind his chest. He fought to recover his hard-learned courtier’s detachment. Remember who she is. Who you are. But she did not look the unapproachable, noble lady now, as her breech-clad legs moved close to his. The masks lent too much freedom. Freedom to fantasize the impossible . . .
Carlo breathed in the scent of her rich brown hair and let it dizzy him.
Behind him, he heard a half-familiar voice. But when the steps of the dance turned him away from her to look in that direction, all he saw were masks and shadows.
“Don’t worry,” Lieutenant Esterházy whispered. “No one will recognize you.” He grinned beneath his half-mask, flashing strong teeth. “Even if they did, what then? My cousin doesn’t dictate whom I bring as partner to his masquerades.”
Anna hesitated a moment longer at the edge of the crowded lawn, smoothing down the folds of the black domino he’d brought her. Through the eye slits of her mask, shapes and colors seemed oddly thrown out of proportion, and even the sounds seemed more intense than usual. The glittering jewelry of the ladies and the gentlemen alike, the bewildering array of masks, the laughter, the music . . .
“Come, Fräulein!” He took her hand and led her into the mad whirl.
Anna had never danced in such exalted company. She found herself stumbling with excitement and fear. She shouldn’t be here, would never be allowed to be here, pretending to be one of them—but Lieutenant Esterházy swept her through the ball, grinning and confident, and it became an exhilarating game.
After a panicked moment at the beginning, Anna recognized the steps of the country dances, though they were set to strange, exotic music, a world away from the tunes she’d heard in the servants’ hall back in Saxony. She stumbled once against Lieutenant Esterházy, thrown by a sudden, unexpected shift in the rhythm, but it didn’t matter. Everything she said made him laugh. His eyes never left her face. She felt herself to be different and strange—exalted beneath the intensity of his gaze.
Between each dance, he clicked his fingers for more wine, more, more!—until she was dizzy and reeling half-against him with laughter and confusion in the shadows of a tall hedge.
“I think . . .” She took a breath and looked up at his eager face, scant inches from her own. “I think I ought to sit down, lieutenant. Or perhaps . . .” She blinked and put one hand out to steady herself against his shoulder. “Perhaps I ought to go to bed?”
“Not yet.” He leaned over her, holding her shoulders with strong, warm hands, his gaze intent. “Hasn’t this evening been wonderful for you, Fräulein? As it has been for me?”
Anna blinked up at him. The dizziness was starting to blend into nausea. “Wonderful,” she said weakly. “Very wonderful. But I ought—”
“To come back with me. To my bed.”
“What?” She frowned, trying
to make sense of his words through her fogged brain.
He kissed her. His warm tongue eased open her lips and swept inside. She staggered. When he pulled back, he was grinning.
“It will all be wonderful,” he said. “I promise. My cousin is very generous to me. I can be generous to you, too. Jewels, money—anything you want. I’ll take good care of you, Fräulein. Anna.” He kissed her again, more thoroughly.
Anna’s head whirled. Generous . . . She remembered Madame Zelinowsky’s gentle, leading words during the rehearsal, days ago. “It’s never a bad idea to have supplementary plans for your career . . .”
Then Herr Pichler’s bitter words sounded again in her ears: “You have an Esterházy to reel in.” And his pale, ravaged face as he said it—
“No!”
She jerked backward, pushing Lieutenant Esterházy away.
He stumbled. “Is something wrong?”
“I can’t,” Anna said. “I’m sorry—I’m so sorry . . .”
She backed away. Tears clogged her throat as she glanced back at the glittering company of aristocrats and princes. She should never have put on that mask.
“What are you talking about?” Lieutenant Esterházy caught her hand. “Anna, please—”
She pulled away. “I can’t be your mistress,” she said. “I just can’t!”
Heads turned at her raised voice. High, tinkling laughter sounded behind her.
Anna spun around and plunged down the pathways of the garden, back toward the musicians’ quarters and reality.
Friedrich found Anton sitting slumped outside the Bagatelle, his mask discarded on the grass by his feet.
“Bad luck?” Friedrich asked. He’d been wandering through the gardens himself for almost two hours, trying to dismiss the memory of those hateful red eyes.
Anton snorted. Friedrich sat down next to him, stretching his legs out on the grass.
“Want to go to the tavern and talk it over?” Friedrich paused. “It is her, isn’t it? That singer, the little blonde one—”
“Yes, damn it!” Anton slammed his fist onto the grass. “I don’t understand it. She was all ready, and then . . .”
“Changed her mind? Well, fickle women, eh?” Friedrich sighed. He’d had to duck behind three different hedges tonight to avoid Sophie. “There’ll be another. There’s always the leading lady—”
“She’s a cow. Von Höllner, I’m serious about this one. I offered her everything. Jewels, money . . .”
Friedrich frowned, trying to concentrate his memory. “Well . . . She’s a little young, isn’t she? She looks young, anyway. Maybe she’s not interested yet in—”
“She’s a singer, for God’s sake! An actress. That’s their whole career, finding men to take care of them. And I was ready to do it, too.” Anton shook his head. “It’s that actor. Pichler. The one who’s always watching her. He’s the reason she said no. I’m certain of it.”
In the distance, Friedrich saw Sophie and the Prince approaching. On their way to order the fireworks to be set off, no doubt. It was always the climax of these outdoor evenings.
Friedrich scrambled to his feet. “I have to go,” he said. “Are you coming? We’ll go out to the tavern and find you a pretty serving wench to flirt with. You’ll feel much better.”
Anton shrugged and stood up. “Fine. I’ll come.” His look darkened. “But I’m not giving up.”
Somehow, they had spun further and further away from the central lawn, down well-lit garden pathways, into shadows. They had been dancing for hours. Charlotte never wanted to stop. If they stopped—when they stopped—she would have to take off her mask and transform back into the dreary Baroness von Steinbeck, proper and decorous and dull. She couldn’t bear it.
Recklessness shot through her as she looked up into Signor Morelli’s dark eyes. She felt every shift of his gaze, every breath he took. They’d left the safe, protected lines of the group dance long ago, abandoning it for a private version, newly invented, shockingly free and unorthodox in its intimacy. If anyone saw them, they would cause a scandal. But Charlotte didn’t care.
Her legs moved swiftly through the turns of their improvised dance, free and lithe in her close-fitting breeches. She stepped closer to him with every turn. Her fingers brushed against his, sparking warmth down Charlotte’s hand. And his. She could swear it. If she were truly as wild as she wished she were, tonight . . .
She took a breath, and watched his eyes follow the rise and fall of her chest beneath her military jacket. Just for tonight. For one masked night, she could experiment with being wicked, just as Sophie had suggested. People were expected to misbehave at masquerades, weren’t they?
They came together in the steps of the dance . . . and this time, instead of laying her palm flat against his hand, she dared to twine her bare fingers around his.
He sucked in a breath that sounded hoarse. “Baroness . . .”
They were dancing in the darkness now, the music and the laughter growing faint behind them. Only a few lonely Chinese lanterns were laid out this far from the Bagatelle to light their way. The rich, verdant smells of the garden and the greenery filled her senses.
“Signor?” she murmured.
He stopped dancing. Slowly, cautiously, he set his right hand against her waist. The heat of his fingers, both shocking and enticing, warmed her skin through the cloth of her military jacket. He gazed down at her searchingly, as if trying to read her mind.
Charlotte’s quick breath pushed against her chest. Cool night air played against her hair and her cheek, beneath the mask.
The music ended, far away. Applause filtered through the distance. Regret lanced Charlotte. She loosed her fingers from his.
“Forgive me,” she whispered. “I only—”
Her voice dried up as he caught her withdrawing hand in his. He shook his head.
“I believe I could forgive you anything, madam.”
Her heartbeat had become a thrumming motion, pushing her forward, toward his warmth. She moistened her lips.
“And I you. Signor.”
He released her hand to slide both arms around her waist, as cautiously as if she were made of glass. She set both hands against his shoulders, devoid of shame, and pressed herself forward, wanton, craving—
Noise exploded overhead, and Charlotte leapt back.
Fireworks rained through the darkness above them, exploding riotously in glorious purple, green, and red, and Charlotte began to laugh helplessly, in amazement and rue. Signor Morelli laughed too, his face open in pure happiness for the first time since she’d met him.
His back was warm and strong against her hands, his hands against her own back as he pressed her close against him. His mouth felt like heaven. Like his voice. Warm and searching and exactly right. Charlotte wanted to devour it.
He loosened her laboriously tied cravat. She tossed it aside, impatient to be rid of the constriction, and his warm mouth moved away from her lips, tracing a path down her naked throat. Charlotte gasped and grabbed hold of his shoulders to keep her legs from melting beneath her. She closed her eyes, savoring the blissful chaos, the unfamiliar, ecstatic whirl—then opened her eyes again, as more fireworks exploded overhead, to let the color and the marvel of it take a part in her pleasure, too.
His long fingers stroked underneath her coat, down the side of her bound breast. Charlotte bit back a moan.
“Lotte!” Sophie’s voice was nearly a scream.
Charlotte jerked around, gasping, holding onto Morelli’s arm for balance. Sophie stood at the turn in the path, staring at them, her mouth a wide open “O” of shock.
Sophie closed her mouth and opened it again. “Lotte, what do you think you’re doing?”
Charlotte staggered back. The night air suddenly felt cold, like ice water against her sweat-streaked skin. “I was—I only—”
Signor Morelli let out a choke of laughter. “Surely you don’t truly need to ask, Frau von Höllner?”
“You—!” Sophie dismiss
ed him with a glare and turned back to Charlotte. “I’ve been looking for you everywhere! We are to lead the last dance, Niko and I. I thought—I assumed—Lotte, you ought to want to see it!” Her face screwed up in rage and hurt.
Charlotte took a deep breath and straightened her jacket. Her cravat was lost to her, hopelessly tangled in the branches of the hedge. She felt sick at the look in her sister’s eyes.
“Forgive me, Sophie. I was—”
“Look at you! Look at the state of you! What were you thinking?” Tears glimmered in Sophie’s eyes. “Lotte, how could you!”
How could you? It was the echo of her mother’s words, all those years ago . . . the last time she’d ever dared try to step off her path, risking shame for her family and ruination for herself.
Signor Morelli stepped forward, angling himself between Charlotte and her sister. She put a hand on his arm to turn him back.
“Baroness—”
“It’s all right,” she whispered. “I should have—I cannot . . .” She shrugged helplessly, miserably.
His arm was warm beneath her hand. She remembered, all-too-vividly, how it had felt pressed against her back, holding her so urgently close as they’d kissed—
“Please,” he whispered. The word sounded raw, as if he weren’t used to saying it.
But it had been a different woman kissing him. A woman in a mask, disguised, set free of responsibilities and cares. A woman without a family to consider.
Charlotte stepped away from him, swallowing down bitter pain. The masquerade was truly over.
“I’m coming now, Sophie,” she said. “See?”
She followed her younger sister out of the garden, leaving Signor Morelli standing alone.
ACT THREE
Chapter Twenty-One
The four royal carriages rolled up to Eszterháza at noon the next day. Carlo watched them from the window of his bedroom.
Dinner had been put off until five o’clock, for the sake of the court’s late night at the ball. And early-morning Mass . . . Carlo’s lips twisted. Sunday or no, he doubted that it had been well-attended, even by the most pious of His Serene Highness’s court and family. Dancing and drinking until the early hours of the morning left little energy for prayer for even the most determined. Or the most virtuous . . . Carlo’s smile dimmed.
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