He followed the man with his eyes until he was gone, dragging his friend with him. ‘Did you know about this?’ Haviland turned to Alyssandra. ‘Was this what you came to tell me?’ His tone accused them both—she and Julian. His earlier speculations seemed foolish now. She had not come to tell him about a child. His stomach knotted. Now that his mind had time to think it through there was room for conspiracy; she’d not been frightened by their approach, she’d not been in any danger. Her struggles, even her bravado with the blade later could have been for his benefit, an attempt to absolve her of any complicity. He spat the last words at her, advancing until he gripped her shoulders, his eyes narrowed. ‘Or did you come to lure me out?’
‘I knew nothing about this!’ Alyssandra cried indignantly, trying to shake off his hands. His words cut her cruelly. There was so much to think through it was hard to get her thoughts sorted; Julian had attacked Haviland and—mon dieu!—Haviland accused her of being part of it. ‘How could you think such a thing? If I was part of it, why would I have pressed him for a name? I would have sent him off before he could expose Julian’s plot.’
She shoved at Haviland’s chest, her anger starting to replace her shock. He stank of alley garbage, his immaculate clothes ruined, and she’d been so very frightened for him. All she wanted to do was hold him, even with the stench, to reassure herself he was unhurt. How could she want a man who doubted her loyalty? She could only rail at him.
‘How dare you! How dare you question me after what you put me through?’ She gave her emotions full vent. ‘I felt real terror when that man drew a sword against you.’ She’d also known a fierce primal thrill in seeing Haviland advance on him, showing him no quarter. ‘And when you fell.’ Her anger broke, her voice trembled. She’d only had a few seconds to act. She’d not thought about the implications, she’d simply grabbed up the sword and done her part. ‘I wasn’t about to stand by and watch you die in an alley. Does that sound like I was Julian’s accomplice?’ Yet she understood she was asking him to believe her on very little evidence. She had her secrets. She could not truly blame him for believing the worst. He was a worldly man.
She tilted her chin up in a show of defiance, locking eyes with him. Perhaps it didn’t matter if he believed her. She was sending him away regardless. She just hadn’t imagined it happening this way. She’d rehearsed her speech on the way over and nowhere had she written in that script ‘alleyway’ or ‘smell of rubbish’. Maybe, too, her pride was at stake. She didn’t want him remembering her this way, with doubt and cynicism. There were other memories, better memories, to take with him when he went.
His eyes softened, his hands dropped from her shoulders and he sighed. ‘You’re right, of course. Forgive me?’ His mouth opened and then compressed into a grim line. ‘No, I won’t make excuses for my conjecture. I will simply apologise.’
He bent his head to hers, foreheads touching, and they stood that way for a long while in the privacy of the alley. She’d sought him out today to let him go and now she wanted nothing so much as to keep him close. At last she spoke, saying the only thing a girl could under those circumstances. ‘Haviland, will you do something for me?’
‘Mmm? Yes, anything.’ She could hear the laughter in his voice. ‘I believe I’ve told you that before.’
‘Good. I need you to take a bath.’
They made their way back to Haviland’s apartments, heads held against the stares they acquired. Haviland looked atrocious and smelled worse. A few ladies even put handkerchiefs over their noses as they passed. But Alyssandra stared them down while Haviland laughed and called her a tigress. She didn’t care. Haviland was unharmed and that was all that mattered. Other things would matter later, but for now this was enough.
* * *
‘We were attacked by ruffians,’ Alyssandra said curtly, meeting the eyes of his travelling companions when they entered the front parlour.
‘Lovely cologne, Haviland,’ the one called Nolan teased, but Archer, the one she remembered from the soirée, rose without remark and called for a bath.
‘I’ll have the tub set up in your room, Hav. Shall I tell Renaud to attend you?’
‘No, I’ll see to him.’ Alyssandra was brisk and efficient, marching Haviland across the room, trying to pretend she didn’t see the looks exchanged between his two friends.
‘Are you sure you aren’t hurt, Hav?’ Nolan called to their retreating backs. ‘Seems like you might have lost your balls.’
‘We’re ignoring you!’ Haviland answered as they slipped into his room and shut the door behind them.
‘Your friends care for you.’ Alyssandra helped him out of his coat and bent to work on his boots. A valet would have the devil’s own time getting them polished after today’s events.
‘We’ve been together a long time.’ Haviland let out a sigh as the boots came off. ‘Since we were boys in school, actually.’ He flopped back on the bed. ‘This may be the last time we all go gallivanting together, our last great adventure before...’ His voice trailed off. She knew what he was thinking. Before marriage came to each of them and they took up the responsibilities of husbands and fathers and, in his case, heirs. She tugged at his hand. ‘Up with you, before the water cools.’
The tub had been set up in front of his doors leading to the garden and it made a fairly romantic picture with the white-gauze curtains billowing softly in the afternoon breeze as a backdrop. Haviland stripped out of his trousers and sank into the water with a grateful sigh. ‘That feels nice.’
‘This will feel nice, too.’ Alyssandra picked up a cloth and the bar of soap and began to scrub, heedless of the water soaking her dress. The muscles of his arms rippled under her hands where they passed over him. He lay back, giving her free access to his chest and lower. She washed the most intimate parts of him, stroking him with the warm, wet cloth, feeling him come alive in her hand.
‘I dare say my own baths aren’t nearly this exciting,’ Haviland drawled when it became clear they were heading for a wet conclusion.
She leaned forward, pressing a kiss to his mouth. ‘I should hope not.’ She rose from her knees then and held out a thick towel. ‘Shall we get you dry?’
‘And then we’ll get you wet, unless you’re wet already?’ Haviland’s hot eyes raked her, and heat pooled inside her as he rose from the tub, all dripping, muscled male. He could turn her to a puddle with a simple look. She would miss that when he was gone.
‘You’re a naughty man, Haviland North, for all your outward show to the contrary,’ she teased, kneeling to dry his legs and work her way up.
‘An honest one.’ Haviland choked out the words as she wrapped the towel about his phallus and stroked.
‘There, that should hold you long enough to get you on the bed.’ She could see he was disappointed, that he’d harboured hopes of her using her mouth on him. ‘Maybe later.’ She gave him a wink and worked the back of her laces free until her dress gaped about her. ‘I want you inside me first.’
Her dress fell, and Haviland swept her up in his arms. ‘And so you shall have me.’
This was better; having him over her, having him in her, her legs wrapped about him, holding him tight. It was far better than the threat of the alley, the fear of losing him, the hatred of his doubt. She slid against him, encouraging him with her body. She didn’t want to leave this room. She wanted to stay locked inside for ever, where Julian Anjou’s jealousy couldn’t reach them, where the outcomes of tournaments wouldn’t dictate their futures, where they had no secrets between them. There were no secrets in sex, in this bed.
In these moments she could forget what she’d come here to do. She could forget that a suitable lady waited with his estates in England as part of his duty, or that she could never have him because she owed her brother her loyalty above all else.
He came into her hard, and she moaned her desire, her desperation, to hold on to this feeling for ever. ‘I don’t want to give this up.’ Recklessly, she spoke the words out loud before
she could take them back. ‘I want every spring afternoon in your bed and every autumn night.’
‘And the winter? The summer?’ Haviland nuzzled her neck and nipped at her ear, his body still warm and joined with hers, neither of them in a hurry to part.
She stretched into him. ‘I’ll want those, too.’
The magic of the afternoon was taking them both, washing away the fear and doubt of the alley as assuredly as the tub had washed the grime from his body. ‘I meant what I said last night about leaving it all.’ He pressed kisses down the column of her throat, slowly, randomly. ‘If I win the tournament, you can have them. We can have them.’
She put a finger to his lips. ‘Shhh. Don’t talk about it. Don’t jinx it.’ She shifted beneath him, and he rolled to his side. She felt the absence of him too keenly.
‘Then perhaps we should talk about other things.’ Haviland’s hand caressed her hair, his touch as soft as his voice at her ear. ‘Such as why Julian would go quite so far as to hire thugs to attack me in an alley and how is it that you held a man at sword point with the efficiency of an expert who had done it before?’
Alyssandra drew a deep breath. The moment of truth had come. But which truths to give him?
Chapter Nineteen
‘Julian and I quarrelled over you. He sees you as a threat at the tournament.’ All true, if vague. ‘My brother hosts this tournament every two years. For the last two tournaments, Julian has been the one to win the coveted prize of facing Antoine in the finals. It’s a great coup for our salle, to have our senior instructor do so well.’ The first time, Julian had actually faced Antoine. It had been just a few months before the accident. The second time, it had been her behind the mask.
‘He’s grown complacent, then? He expects that spot will always be his?’ Haviland chuckled.
‘Just the opposite, I think,’ Alyssandra said seriously. Julian could not be taken lightly. But if Haviland did take him lightly, it was her fault. She could not tell him everything. ‘I think he’s had a taste of success and wants more. He sees possibilities, but he also sees how fragile the string is they hang by.’
Haviland’s arm shifted from about her and he rolled to his side, facing her. ‘Anjou grows ambitious. But for what? Or is it for whom?’ Something primal and fiercely male flickered in his eyes. ‘I’ve asked you before. You were not forthcoming, but I did not press because the nature of our relationship did not necessarily require it. But things have, ah, progressed since then. What is Julian Anjou to you?’
‘He is my brother’s friend. He’s not forsaken Antoine since the accident. He’s kept the salle running. I do not know how we could have managed without him.’ But another phrase leapt to mind, too, without prompting: secret keeper. She’d understood that for a long time. But it wasn’t until now, with Haviland beside her, that the phrase took on a different meaning. Before, it had been a term that connoted loyalty, if nothing else. One who kept another’s secrets was loyal, trustworthy, a protector. But the reverse was also true. Secret keepers had power, leverage. They could just as easily be destroyers as protectors. That was what Julian had become with his threats this morning—a destroyer. One word and he could bring down Antoine’s work of a lifetime and she’d given him the power to do it.
‘Do you feel indebted to him, then?’
‘No.’ That, too, was true. ‘Julian had been a junior instructor at the salle under my father, even though he’s older than Antoine by several years. But he was a hard worker and very talented. My father’s death was very sudden and a bit sensational.’ She paused, wincing.
‘You don’t have to tell me,’ Haviland soothed.
She probably didn’t, but she would. ‘I shouldn’t mind, it’s been eight years now and all is well. The brief scandal has passed. He was duelling over his mistress on a bridge. When I say on a bridge, I mean on the very rim of it, the railing, the wall’s edge. My father was famed for his balance, and that was part of the challenge—to duel on a strip no more than ten inches wide. He fell and drowned. It wasn’t here in the city, of course, but news like that travels with all haste.’
She shrugged. ‘Antoine and I were young, only twenty. But Antoine was already a champion. The question was whether or not being a champion was enough to keep the salle open. Would instructors stay under Antoine’s leadership? Would pupils stay? Would new ones come? That was where Julian stepped in. For the first three years, it was Julian’s leadership that saved us. Instructors were willing to follow him and he convinced them that Antoine was worth following as well. It helped, of course, that Antoine won several tournaments and developed a reputation of his own.’ She sighed. ‘Does that explain what Julian is to me?’ She didn’t know how much more truth she could give him.
‘I suspect Julian disagrees with you on the owing piece.’ Haviland studied her with consideration.
‘He’s been made senior instructor. He is literally the face of the salle since Antoine can no longer perform that function,’ Alyssandra protested.
‘That’s well and good but it’s you he wants, it’s you he believes he’s entitled to.’
Alyssandra looked down, unable to meet his gaze. ‘I know he thinks that, but he’s not entitled to me. I’m not available to him.’
Haviland lifted her chin. ‘Is that why you quarrelled this morning? Did Julian send men after me because of the tournament or because of you?’
‘Perhaps both.’ She would never be able to sell the lie at close quarters. ‘He knows our association did not end that day in the park.’
She watched anger light Haviland’s eyes like a flame travelling a fuse. He understood the implication. ‘The bastard had us followed,’ Haviland ground out. ‘I should call him out.’
Alyssandra could think of nothing worse. She pressed a hand to his chest. ‘That would solve nothing except to bloody you both and call my brother’s attention to things he need not worry over.’ The very last thing she needed was Antoine dragged into this. He would insist on marriage if he knew. She didn’t want Haviland to recognise that. At this point, Haviland would think that played into his hand perfectly. ‘Promise me, whatever happens between us, I want it to be our choice, a choice made just between the two of us.’
Haviland picked up her hand from where it lay on his chest and brought it to his lips. ‘I promise.’ Perhaps it was unfair to have manipulated him, when she knew full well how much he valued a sense of his own freedom of choice. He would not deny her the same, at least in theory. He might feel very differently about that once he realised what her choice would be, what her choice could only be.
‘Does this mean you’ve thought about what I said last night? I had hoped when Nolan told me you were here that you’d come because you had.’ Hope flickered briefly in his blue eyes. She hated to disappoint him.
‘No, I came to warn you, and, as I recall, we promised not to speak of those things until after the tournament,’ she reprimanded lightly. She was only buying herself time, but it would be enough time for him to rethink his choices.
Haviland sighed in resignation. ‘I will hold you to that promise. We will talk about it. Nothing can be decided until we do and I am not a patient man. If you won’t tell me that, then tell me how is it that you are so skilled with a sword?’
His tone had turned playful, a sign that he felt the danger had passed—Julian had been explained to an acceptable extent. Haviland could understand misguided passions and male jealousy. She’d spun that tale well and it was full of truths even if it omitted others like the power of the secret Julian held and what he’d threatened to do with that power.
What he didn’t understand was that this new question he asked was the more dangerous one by far. It represented the heart of the secret. Alyssandra moved her hand down his body, finding his phallus already beginning to stir again and closed her hand around it. She gave him a coy smile. ‘Is it so hard to believe a fencing master like my father would not train his daughter, too?’ She could tell him that much.
; ‘I trained alongside Antoine when we were growing up.’ She matched her words to the rhythm of her hand on him so that he wouldn’t want the story to go on too long. ‘My father felt a girl should know how to defend herself.’ But that was as far as his enlightenment went. A girl, no matter how talented, could not compete, could not train at the salle with the other fencers. She would always resent him for that limitation as much as she loved him for the other. ‘I still train with Antoine.’ Another truth that would lead to a misconstrued conclusion. She was starting to understand one didn’t have to lie to create subterfuge.
‘Really?’ Haviland seemed impressed. ‘Perhaps you and I should train together some time.’ She could tell from his voice his attentions were drifting away to other pleasures. That was probably for the best since the only response her mind could seem to make was we already have.
* * *
‘You’ve failed? Two of you against one in an alley and a man taken by surprise at that?’ The two men, already giving every appearance of having been beaten to pulps, stepped backwards, giving Julian space as he took a vicious swipe with his sabre, slicing through the fabric of a stuffed dummy in one of the salle’s training rooms.
He was to give a sabre lesson in a few minutes, the last one of the day, although he was hardly in the mood after hearing the news. He would have enjoyed handing them a beating if they weren’t so battered as it was. To begin with, they were late. He’d expected them much earlier. That had been the first sign they’d fallen afoul of trouble. How long did it take to deliver injury in an alley? Fifteen minutes? They’d been gone since noon and it was nearing six. Anger pulsed through him. These idiots had failed in their very simple task! He took another swipe, enjoying the satisfaction of their fear.
Rake Most Likely to Rebel (Rakes On Tour Book 1) Page 16