She was bending over a tank, stirring furiously with a stick, when she felt the imprint of a kiss, startling as a snakebite, stabbing the cool nape of her neck. She whirled on her heel, caught too quickly unawares to mask her resentment, or to bite back the furious words that leapt to her tongue.
'Don't do that!' All the heat and frustration of the day exploded into her words. 'I'm not a mere thing to be mauled and played with at your whim, I'm a person, and I'll thank you to treat me as such !'
Brut stepped back with a soundless whistle and stood rocking on his heels, examining her flushed, rebellious face with narrowed eyes. 'Hardly the response one expects from a loving fiancée,' he rebuked mildly. Then with a sudden, heart-rocking grin he confused her utterly. 'Are you aware of the small army of freckles marching across your brow and down the bridge of your pert little nose?' He reached out as if impelled to trace their progress, then, remembering her earlier reaction, changed his mind and thrust his hand deep into the pocket of his slacks.
Instinctively, her hand lifted to shield her face. 'Yes, I am aware of the hateful things,' she muttered brusquely, 'each summer I hope they won't appear, but invariably they erupt at the first hint of sunshine.'
'I'm glad they do,' he returned gently. 'On you, they look adorable.'
The quivering she dreaded erupted inside her, a deep yearning to respond that was the worst of the many agonies imposed by their farcical engagement. 'I read somewhere that you Frenchmen have an unlimited capacity for gallantry and that you indulge it on every occasion,' she snapped, too hot, bothered and untidy to continue with pretence. 'Why bother to waste your compliments on a drudge?'
His jaw tightened, yet his tone remained mild. 'Can't you recognise good old-fashioned courtship, chérie?'
To her dismay, tears flooded into her eyes. Unnerved by the gentle censure, she swung away to hide the tell-tale sign of weakness, expecting hard fingers to fasten upon her shoulders.
But he surprised her by remaining where he was, content to bridge the gap between them with a quietly-spoken yet compelling request.
'You have worked long enough for one day, Chantal. Leave what you are doing and get changed—I am taking you for a drive.'
It was typical of the man that he should choose such forceful words, to command rather than to invite, to say 'I am taking you' and not 'Would you like to come?' yet even so she experienced an unfamiliar sensation of being cosseted—for the first time in her life she was being led instead of leant upon.
'I can't.' Immediately she voiced the refusal she realised how much she wanted to go. 'Peter and Louis are relying upon my help.'
'I rather expected they might be,' his tone was dry, 'which is why I've brought along two of my estate workers to give them a hand. Even you, my spirited, red-haired Saxon, cannot claim to achieve a better output than two men. I will listen to no more of your arguments, I insist,' he placed silken stress, 'that you put down that stick to which you have become so attached and come with me!'
Smothering a shameful surge of relief, Chantal gave in to his dominance. Half an hour later, freshly bathed and dressed in a dress of springtime yellow, bright as crocus, spiked with leaves of green, she relaxed with an unconscious sigh of pleasure into the passenger seat of his luxurious car. She sensed his glint of satisfaction as he activated the controls that set the monster purring down the mountain road, but kept her eyes averted in the hope that he would not sense the lethargy that would make her easy prey to his will.
'Firstly, we will call in at the Château,' he surprised her by saying. 'I am having the main suite of rooms redecorated and would like you to choose the colour scheme for our bedroom.' Unaware of the shock to her senses, he continued smoothly, 'After that, I will take you on a tour of the grounds—they are looking beautiful at the moment, fresh, green, and bursting with new-born life. Would you like that?'
'May we ...' she gulped. 'May we take a walk first of all?' The coward in her shied from sharing with him the intimacy of a bedroom, even though the excuse he had given for the visit was pure fabrication. 'It's such a glorious day it would be shameful to waste even a minute of it.'
'Even though sunshine is bound to increase your taches de rousseur?' he teased.
'Freckles may be the bane of my life, but I've learned to live with them,' she countered stiffly.
'I look forward to the day when I, too, may be permitted to enjoy such intimacy,' he admitted softly, directing her a smile that warned of a patience that was almost exhausted, the smile of a male temporarily tamed yet anxious to toss off his bridle of restraint. Her head jerked erect, sensing the presence of a predator. She could sense, smell, almost feel the current of vibrancy emanating from the man sitting relaxed in his seat with the smile of a victor playing around his mouth. In her highly sensitive state she would have scrambled out of her comfortable trap had they not been travelling so fast. As it was, she had no choice but to remain seated, striving to retain a look of cool composure in the hope that he would not guess that inwardly she was cowering.
He drove along the avenue of plane trees, round to the back of the Château, then parked the car outside an empty stable. Much against her will, he insisted upon taking her hand to guide her in the direction of a park that began as a garden and merged into woodland without any visible line of separation. Naturalness combined with grandeur was the dominating impression she gained as they strolled past a rush-fringed lake, hidden garden temples and across smooth lawns that splintered into woodland with such suddenness that before she was aware how it had happened she found that they had become isolated within a dense mass of trees, silent except for the occasional rustling of small animals in the undergrowth and the song of feathered tenors calling their mates. Sunshine penetrated the foliage, strewing dappled coins of gold along their path. Springy moss cushioned their footsteps as, still hand in hand, they penetrated farther into the wood, beckoned onward by the silvery tinkling of a hidden stream, sharing without words a sense of peace and tranquillity seldom encountered outside the womb.
Lulled into a false state of complacency, Chantal did not become aware of her folly until, with a flourish of triumph, Brut urged her forward into a clearing carpeted white with heavily scented flowers, lily of the valley, their fragile stems drooping beneath the weight of tiny bell-shaped flowers that were the symbol of purity.
'La combe de Junon!' he introduced her, pulling her into the path of glittering sunshine. 'Are you familiar with the legends of mythology?' When hesitantly she shook her head, he proceeded to enlighten her. 'Juno, goddess of light, was said to occupy an important part in the ceremonies of marriage and its consequent effects. Under many different titles, she was professed to watch over the arrangement of marriages; to conduct the bride to the house of her husband to ensure that she crossed the threshold; unknotted the bride's girdle, then later supplied protection to the pregnant wife. The lily,' he stooped to pick a flower and handed it to her, 'was long ago dedicated to the goddess Juno, which partly explains how this dell came by its name.' His teeth flashed white in a grin. 'There is a second, local legend attached to this dell. As Juno was known to be the goddess of light she was also, by derivation, goddess of childbirth, for the newborn baby is brought into the light. Childless couples travel for many miles just to make love within this magic circle and, if gossip can be believed, not one of them has yet found the journey unrewarding. Recently, an even more startling discovery has been mentioned—I speak from hearsay, you understand, never having tested out the theory I cannot vouch for it authenticity—according to the young bachelors of the area, the magic works just as well for couples lacking marital status.'
Chantal sought relief from unbearable tension in brittle flippancy. 'And is that the reason why you have brought me here—to test out a theory, one born of men without morals?'
Suddenly he jerked her into his arms. 'A Frenchman is first and foremost a man,' he clenched angrily, 'despicable, perhaps; weak, maybe, but always thoroughly human ! But I am beginning to w
onder if you are human, Chantal.' He shook her vigorously. 'Life for me these past weeks has been a long, tormenting hell, the hell of hope when you have melted against my heart, then the hell of despair when, even as my arms are holding you tightly, I sense your mental retreat—like candle smoke you drift through my fingers—and when in desperation I try to force you to respond I feel I am making love to a woman without substance, that my kisses are being blocked by a barrier of ice. Something is missing between us, Chantal ! Why do you hold back, the chemistry will work for us, if you will allow it?'
Chemistry! Of course, to the Marquis, making love would be a clinical exercise. Physically, he could be aroused, so much so that at times the extent of his passions had kindled within her a response that was frightening, but always she had managed to retain sufficient sanity to remind herself that passion used as barter was worthless. He wanted her land and was prepared to cheat in order to get it—Trésor d'Hélène in exchange for meaningless words and worthless kisses !
Accusations trembled on her lips, the impulse to scathe, to storm, to scoff, was almost irresistible, but for Peter's sake it had to be subdued. Employing a deceit that was shamefully familiar, she melted against him and with her bright head resting against his heart, she murmured :
'I'm sorry, Brut, if I've been unfair to you. I have no right to allow personal worries to intrude on our relationship.'
'Personal worries ...?' He tightened his grip, completely hoodwinked. 'Everything we have, we must share, my love; your worries are mine. Tell me what it is that is troubling you.'
She dropped to her knees in a riot of flowers and when he sat down beside her she snuggled close, sighed, then in a soft, pleading whisper, admitted, 'It's Peter—he seems to have become infatuated with Nicole, and she's encouraging him. He ... he's even gone so far as to mention marriage.' She twisted round in his arms, her green eyes troubled. 'He's too young, Brut, and it will be many, many years before he's able to support a wife !'
He threw back his head and laughed. 'Are you telling me that I have been made to suffer the torment of the damned simply because of a young man's first love affair? Oh, ma petite!' he rocked her tenderly, 'when will you stop playing the protective mother so that your chick might develop wings? Dismiss him from your mind,' he urged softly. 'In time, Peter will develop in acordance with what is expected of him, but meanwhile he needs to experiment if he is ever to become emotionally mature. I remember my own first love affair,' he chuckled beneath his breath. 'She was a gypsy girl, one of a family who comes here every year to help gather in the harvest. She was voluptuous, vivacious, and very available. For a whole month I barely left her side, she taught me all that a young man needs to know,' he mused, 'and when the time came for her to leave I was convinced that my heart was broken. She still comes regularly to do the picking,' he digressed in order to kiss a freckle on the end of her nose, 'and now possesses blackened teeth, a thickened waistline, and a brood of dirty, ill-mannered children, yet still I feel a fondness for her—the sort of fondness a man always cherishes for the woman who initiated him into manhood.'
Though she had no illusions about Nicole's ability to survive, Chantal could not resist a prod. 'But what about your cousin's feelings, aren't you concerned on her behalf?'
'Nicole?' For a second she almost believed that he was as indifferent as he sounded. 'You need have no fears, that her emotions will become involved, chérie. When that young woman marries she will be guided by her head, never by her heart.'
Chantal's own heart responded with a twist of pain to the cynical observation, stated with such certainty because he and his cousin were both of the same mind. Impelled by an impulse to be assured, to hear her suspicions confirmed by his own words, she took advantage of his mellow mood by pressing, 'Hortense tells me that you French don't always consider love to be a necessary part of marriage. Is she right? Would you marry if you were not in love?'
Tensely, she waited, burying her head into his chest so that it rose and fell in rhythm with his heart. She felt the imprint of his lips against her hair, and was surprised by the huskiness of his tone when, after a considerable silence, he admitted, 'There are times when I think I would have preferred to have been spared the emotional upheaval described as being in love. Loving takes away one's self-sufficiency because it involves a longing always to be with another person, a need to consider their wellbeing before one's own, a desire to be intimately and exclusively absorbed.' He tilted her chin until he was able to gaze deeply into her wondering eyes. Silently, he held her glance and she began to quiver, her emotions unbearably stretched by his masterful technique of seduction. He looked so solemn, his blue eyes so darkened with feeling, she almost fell into the trap of crediting his hoarsely whispered words with sincerity. 'When I am with you, mon ange, I feel deeply grateful for being allowed to share in the most dramatic and mysterious experience known to man !'
Her skirt had ridden, unnoticed, above her knees. Denied obstruction, he slid the palm of his hand along the length of her cool thigh, jerking her into fresh awareness of the danger she had sensed earlier. But the warning came too late to apply a brake on the emotions of a man who found her innocence irresistible, whose impulsive demands were crying out to be met—now !
Crushing her deep into the riot of fragrant blossoms, Brut cradled her within the crook of his arm, seemingly intent upon kissing each freckle in turn, his lips progressing along the soft curve of her cheek, across her brow, down the bridge of her pert nose, murmuring soft assurances to soothe the fear that had sprung into her eyes. Gently, his light caressing touch roved the curves of her body, igniting beacons of fire at the tip of every rioting nerve, draining her of strength, of the will to resist.
'Relax, my startled fawn,' he breathed against the tender hollow of her throat, 'there is no need to fear the pleasures of love. Je me consume pour toi! Darling Chantal, prove to me that you love me!'
The demand jerked her to her senses—man's oldest ploy, used since the days of Adam—if you love me, give me your body !
She stiffened in his arms so that despite the heat of passion, despite the euphoria created by the strong fragrance rising from their bed of crushed and broken flowers he became aware of her cold withdrawal.
'What's wrong, mon ange?'
The urgent question enraged her, coming as it did from a man who, not content to trick her out of her inheritance, wanted her body as well. It called for great effort of will to employ the use of strategy. Directing him a deliberately sorrowful look, she reproached quietly :
'It is because I love you so much that I cannot allow myself to make such a mistake,' she lied. 'You value only what is unique, Brut. In your house full of treasures there is not one piece of cracked porcelain, not one precious wood carving that carries a blemish, not a single item that is not beautiful, flawless and unmarked. On the day that I enter the Château as your bride,' she whispered, 'I want to feel certain that I am cherished above all the treasures that you possess ...'
CHAPTER ELEVEN
'WHERE is Monsieur le Marquis taking you today?' Hortense enquired.
'To visit the cellars.' Chantal's reply was absent, her mind busy with the problem of what to wear.
'Très bon! You will enjoy that.' When Chantal made no reply Hortense's tongue clicked with annoyance. 'Sometimes I suspect you do not appreciate the extent of your good fortune, mademoiselle, do not fully realise how rarely one encounters a man who is so thoughtful and kind. In this region, it is common for most men to place a hard-working wife first in their priorities, yet the Marquis is always insisting that you take plenty of rest and even sent two of his own men to work permanently with Peter and Louis once he discovered that, although the announcement of your engagement had the required effect upon the locals, the news came too late to prevent all the best workers from promising their services to other vineyards. Next year they will be queuing at our door,' she promised grimly, 'then it will be our turn to be choosey !' Her face brightened. 'What a handsome brideg
room the Marquis will make! Have you noticed, mademoiselle, how many tall, fair-haired, blue-eyed men there are in Champagne? They are descendants of the men of the north—the original inhabitants of Champagne.'
'Really ...?' Chantal was still preoccupied. What to wear on outings with Brut—that had become more and more frequent since the day of their traumatic clash in the woods behind the Château—was now not merely a problem but more of a dilemma. The contents of her wardrobe consisted of a few outfits so well worn they were on the verge of looking shabby. Brut was always so immaculately and tastefully dressed she was beginning to feel ashamed of being seen in his company. Not that he ever seemed to notice any deficiencies in her dress, quite the reverse, in fact, for whenever they were together his absorbed, attentive eyes never strayed from her face. She found the experience unnerving. He had accepted her ultimatum, but as he was perfectly well aware that her promise would never reach fruition, she suspected that he was holding himself constantly on the alert for any sign of weakening on her part. Quite by accident, she had hit upon the one challenge he could not ignore—since it had been made plain to him that she was unavailable he began to desire her desperately !
The outfit she finally decided upon was a sundress made of cool, cream cotton with knife-pleated skirt, a strapless bodice and a small bolero to shrug over her bare shoulders if the weather should become cool. A narrow, tan-coloured belt—almost the shade of her hair—made her waist look tiny and drew Brut's attention the moment she stepped inside the room into which Hortense had shown him.
'You look delicious—good enough to eat,' he greeted with a smile, showing typical male ignorance of outdated fashion, 'like a creamy sundae with a nut on top.' He lowered his head. 'May I be permitted a bite of the cherry?' he quirked, his eyes fastened upon ripe red lips.
Champagne Spring by Margaret Rome Page 11