Guarded Heart

by Jennifer Blake

  "I'm sorry," she said, and turned her head to press her lips to the tortured flesh.

  She didn't mean to absolve him. It felt that way regardless, a kiss of benediction that banished pain. His throat ached, and his heart swelled so his rib cage could hardly contain it.

  Reaching for her skirt hem, he lifted it, gathered its fullness, piled it and her petticoats in her lap. He ran his palm over the silk of her stockings and the firm contours they covered, brushed over the lace of her garters and higher, until he could slip his fingers between the open edges of her feminine split pantaloons, until he could brush the skin of her inner thighs that was more silken still. Invading with exquisite care, he sought the small, hidden triangle of curling hair and the soft folds within that were silkiest of all.

  Warm and moist, swollen and tight, her flesh was like the holiest of grails, her fine curls the most amazing of treasured fleeces. Gently questing, he captured the center of her with the heat and firmness of his palm, plundered it with delicate thoroughness yet near mindless need, fingering the small bud of her femininity that swelled under his ministrations while she moaned into his mouth.

  His breath rasped in his chest, his back and side burned with the strain he placed upon them; the stitch line stung with the perspiration that seeped to the surface of his skin. Still he would not stop, could not until he had probed deep inside her moist heat, until he felt her stiffen, shuddering on a gasping cry before she turned boneless in his arms.

  Resting his forehead against hers, breathing in ragged difficulty, he held her until the tripping, stumbling rhythm of his heart grew calm again and sanity came to mock him with the crucial question of just what he had done. Yes, and who was more the victim, the lady or himself?

  He released her with the creak of reluctant muscles, then straightened her crumpled skirts, brushing them into place again. "Forgive me," he began.

  "No. There is nothing which requires..."

  "I don't regret the past few minutes," he said, his voice not quite even, "only the need to end them. Nathaniel will be returning. Who he may bring with him, not even I can guess."

  "Oh. Indeed."

  She stirred, uncurled her fingers from the tight grasp she held on the lapel of his dressing gown, making a small, oddly touching attempt to smooth the brocade she had crushed. She sat up then. Her eyes met his for a long instant while wild rose color bloomed across her cheekbones. Such vulnerability, such doubt and confusion lay in their depths that compunction washed over Gavin in a hot wave. He touched his tongue to his lips. "Perhaps we should talk, cherie, about these secrets we all keep."

  "No, don't. I'm not sure I can, not now."

  Her lashes flickered before she turned her head away. Grasping the arm of his chair, she levered herself erect without touching him any more than was necessary. She shook out her gown while he watched, touched her hair, tucked in a few stray hairs. Gathering her dignity around her like a beloved shawl, she stepped away to what must seem to her a safe distance.

  What had just happened changed nothing for her, he saw that clearly. Why he had expected that it might, he could not have said, though he was still disappointed. "I am grateful," he said evenly, "for the company at dinner. You must come again."

  She did not look at him as she answered, though her color deepened, even touched the tips of her ears which gleamed, beguilingly, through the curls that spiraled around them. "Perhaps I will, since it has been so instructive. You are ever the consummate tutor. It may be you will have another lesson for me."

  His brows drew together over his nose. "I did not mean to mock you."

  "Did you not? It turned out that way nonetheless. I will remember, never fear."

  He was left with nothing to say while she went quickly from the bedchamber. He sat quite still for long moments while her footsteps faded. Then, clenching his teeth against the drawing ache of his stitches, he poured more wine and sat turning the glass, frowning into the fire. By the time Nathaniel returned, the wine bottle was empty and the crystal stem lay in shining, sharp-edged pieces on the marble hearth.

  His self-appointed valet-cum-nurse came to kneel before him, picking up the broken shards of crystal. Intent on the chore, he asked, "You have an accident or a tantrum?"

  "Either way, a replacement is owed Madame Herriot."

  "And Madame Faucher, what is owed to her?"

  Gavin directed a hard stare at the back of the boy's head. "What do you mean?"

  "She looked upset when she came outa here. Yeah, and like she'd been in a hurricane."

  "No one else saw?"

  "Happens not. I was sitting down in the courtyard. "Don't much like cheese and nuts, so was having a smoke while Madame Herriot and the others got done. Monsieur Nick was at dinner, you know, and Madame Juliette."

  "I am obliged for the information. But you were speaking of Madame Faucher."

  "Saw her goin' along to her chamber as if the fiends of hell were after her. So what went on up here?"

  "Nothing of importance or that the lady did not invite."

  "You certain-sure?"

  It was a question that had exercised his mind without results during these past several minutes. "Any error can be founded in a truth. How then can we be certain of anything?"

  "You can."

  "Your faith might be touching were it not so damning."

  "You are." Avoiding his gaze, the boy moved away to the bed where he began to straighten the covers.

  "Chivalric and morally pure as a young knight of old. What a pity the lady doesn't know she has a champion. Though how you learned your attitude toward women while living on the street is more than I can see."

  "I learned it from Madame Lisette and Madame Juliette along with a tad more grammar. Yes, and from you." Nathaniel returned to stand in front of him, straight and tall with the firelight behind him. An unlikely avenging angel, but an effective one. "Are you ready?"

  "As ever." Gavin used the arm the boy offered to hoist himself from the deep chair, accepting its support as he eased toward the bed. Settling on the mattress, he closed his eyes.

  A short time later, he dismissed his helper to his adjoining chamber for an hour or two of the privacy they both required. The boy's words remained with him, however, routing the healing sleep he might have managed.

  What if Nathaniel was right and he was wrong? What if he had misjudged Ariadne? He had condemned her on scant evidence. It could be mere coincidence that she was closely connected to Francis Dorelle. That she had refused to allow him to dispatch her enemy for her could be a matter of pride rather than because it was physically impossible for him to challenge himself.

  What if she did not want him dead? What if all she had offered with his dinner had been companionship with no trace of seduction in it?

  If that was all that had been in her mind, then he had insulted an innocent lady and led her down the path toward corruption. He had taken her kisses and her sighs and turned them into something he could not bear to look upon.

  If he was wrong, then he owed her an amende honorable with whatever weapon she might care to choose. There must be a way to discover if it was required. He had only to find it.

  It was a quest at which he could not fail for the consequences were much too grim. He would meet the lovely Ariadne on any ground she preferred, if that was the way it must be, but his heart shrank inside him at the thought of facing her with nothing to prevent injury to either one except a few layers of linen and his best intentions. Sterling objectives on his part had not, in the past, prevented tragedy.

  He was still staring into the cream-colored sunburst of cotton fabric that lined the tester above his bed, when a knock came on the door. It was brisk and totally without diffidence. To guess who it heralded was easy, given Nathaniel's report of the dinner guests.

  "Come."

  Nicholas Pasquale, with the prerogative of a half brother, had already advanced three long steps into the bedchamber. Glancing around, he found a straight-backed chair agai
nst the wall that he pulled forward, then turned and straddled. "Still wrapped up in sheets and nightshirts, I see," he said, crossing his arms over the back and giving Gavin a thorough appraisal. "Nothing like the care of a female household to keep a man flat on his back."

  "You wound me," Gavin said in mock protest. "Malingering is the last thing I would attempt under such strict supervision."

  "Yes, I'm sure Madame Faucher is formidable, though we all know Maurelle has nougat for a heart. If she had not, you would be elsewhere. And complaining about it."

  "Is that how you see the lady, as formidable?"

  A wry smile curled Nicholas's mouth as he shook his head. "The description is Juliette's. She was most impressed with the report of her generalship in getting you loaded and hauled here from the dueling field."

  "But she doesn't care for her?"

  "Oh, that doesn't follow at all. Madame Faucher may be lacking the gentle disposition of my lady wife, but Juliette admires her prodigiously, having no prejudice against ladies who know what they want and do their utmost to get it. Beneath my Juliette's smiles and willingness to please lies a will of iron, I do assure you. She merely prefers using sweet reason to have her way."

  "Which you prefer to allow, being no more eager for a fight."

  Laughter leaped into the rich brown of his half brother's eyes. "It's so much more...pleasurable that way, you see." He sobered. "Are you malingering, in truth, or have you some fever or putrefaction of your wound to keep you here?"

  "Neither. It's a question of will and wiles."

  "So I suspected. Juliette believes you have some veiled purpose of a Machiavellian nature that may rebound on your head."

  "Being something of a conspirator herself, according to her husband, she won't reveal this suspicion?"

  "Doubtful, I should think," Nicholas said, the smile fading from his eyes. "She believes in signs and portents, you know, so feels Ariadne Faucher has been sent to lead you from the labyrinth of your own dark design, a savior like her namesake."

  The Greek myth had not been far from Gavin's thoughts since meeting Ariadne. It was not surprising to hear someone else had made the association. "I am no Theseus of old, hanging onto a piece of thread for my salvation."

  "You must argue that with Juliette. Still, I would not say she is wrong. I learned better months ago."

  Gavin let it pass, but the image would not leave his mind. It remained while he told his half brother, his only real confidant in the city, something of what he intended, also while he asked, again, after the black stallion from Caid's stable that he had ridden in the duel. It was there as they spoke of the latest developments concerning the annexation of Texas as a state, principally the addition of Southern-born John C. Calhoun to President Tyler's cabinet as Secretary of State following the death of former Secretary Upshar in the calamitous explosion aboard U.S.S. Princeton while it was being inspected by the president's delegation. Calhoun seemed certain to sign any annexation treaty presented to him, but it was questionable whether the senate would approve it with the Mexican government declaring that as tantamount to a declaration of war.

  If this last event came to pass, as had long been expected in New Orleans, then the legions that tramped back and forth every week in the Place d'Armes would finally march away, courage high, down the long road to Mexico.

  Gavin was not anxious to see war happen. In the first place, the exodus of these would-be soldiers would leave the Passage de la Bourse extremely quiet. Then he had no particular wish to see the men he faced on the fencing strip in his salon buried in Mexican sand or returned to the city in a preservative bath of raw rum. As for going himself, this was not his country, therefore loyalty did not require it nor intelligence recommend it.

  When Nicholas, his concern and curiosity satisfied, went away again, Gavin returned to his perusal of the tester above his head. His thoughts were not on war or its possibilities, however, but on Ariadne as a Greek goddess, daughter of the sun god Helios of Crete, gowned in flowing white draperies over unconfined curves and with her hair drifting in a dark cloud around her. Imperious, tempting and possibly kind, she seemed to beckon. But if she had a life-preserving thread to offer, she kept it hidden. And it was impossible to see what lay behind her smile.

  Goddesses, insofar as he remembered from his study of their stories while learning his Greek and Latin, were not known for their mercy.

  Twenty-Two

  It was on her return from a fitting with Madame Pluche for her mourning wear two days later that Ariadne saw Sasha for the first time since the duel. He approached her on the street just outside the dressmaker's house, tucking his cane under his arm and sweeping the banquette with his hat as he bowed to her and her companion, Madame Zoe Savoie. "What a joy it is to see you, my Ariadne," he said when greetings had been exchanged and the requisite pleasantries broached and dismissed. "I so longed to come to you before I go, to explain this affair with the Englishman and my conduct which must seem unforgivable. But you surely see how it is, the difficulties, when he is there in the same house."

  "Yes, of course," she said to deflect what could be embarrassing excuses. "You really are leaving?"

  "With the greatest reluctance, you may be sure. My dear one, only say you will join me for the return to France. I shall be the happiest of men in spite of my disgrace."

  "My plan has always been to remain here through the saison des visites, as you know. I'm sorry, but I cannot change it at a moment's notice." She tried to keep the coolness from her voice but wasn't sure she managed.

  "Because of the events on the dueling field, yes? I know not what came over me, I swear to you. It was madness, I think, because the Englishman seemed so certain of having you."

  "Did he indeed?"

  "He spoke so slightingly, with such calculation, during the exchange which led—"

  Madame Zoe, waiting until that moment with a look of determined patience on her face, reared back her head as she spoke in interruption. "You are certain of that, monsieur? It does not sound like the Monsieur Blackford that I know."

  Sasha barely glanced at her. "You were not there, madame. I was, to my eternal regret."

  "But it was you who forced the duel upon Gavin, you who sought him out at his atelier for that purpose. Those who were there say you gave him no choice except to issue a cartel, and used references to Ariadne to achieve it."

  Ariadne had guessed something of the matter, but this was the first time she had heard it confirmed. Madame Zoe, as the sword masters called her, being on terms of friendship with them and their wives, doubtless had sources of information denied to her.

  "The heat of the moment, as I said before," Sasha proclaimed with a wave of his hand, as if brushing away an annoying fly. "The exact words I do not recall, merely that the exchange grew so insulting it could not be endured."

  "But it was Blackford who challenged you," Madame Zoe insisted with lifted brows. "I believe it must have been he who heard something which required redress."

  "Really, madame," Sasha began.

  "Never mind, the thing is finished and can't be undone," Ariadne said, overriding his protests as she held out her hand to him. "All that is left is to wish you godspeed on your journey and good fortune on your landing."

  "You are kindness itself, as always," he said taking her fingers and lifting them to his mouth, his lips hot through her glove. "It may be I will give myself the pleasure of taking a more formal leave of you before I sail. When is it that Monsieur Blackford removes to his lodgings?"

  "As to that, I can't say. He was most grievously injured."

  Sasha gave a disparaging shrug. "I barely touched him, I'm sure, and the flow of blood makes these things appear worse than they are in fact. Besides, men of his stripe heal with astonishing ease."

  To argue was pointless and might make it appear her concern was more personal than it should be. "You must do as you think best."

  "I shall, madame, never fear," he said, his pale blue gaze hooded.
Releasing her, he tipped his hat and nodded a farewell to Madame Zoe. He strode away down the banquette with his shoulders back, swinging his cane forward like a weapon with his every stride.

  "A dangerous ass, that," Madame Zoe said as she stared after him, "but an ass all the same. You would think one of his canes had been shoved up his—but never mind."

  "Do you think so?" To Ariadne, he seemed merely pompous and overly fond of having his own way.

  "Those who do not see themselves and events as they are, who can't recognize that others may have a different view, are always dangerous. They so often must force matters to conform to their desires, removing anything that stands in their way."

  "Or anyone? Sasha tried that and discovered it did not work."

  "That doesn't mean he won't attempt the same again."

  A shiver feathered down the back of Ariadne's neck as she considered how unfit Gavin was as yet to face another such threat. Abruptly, she was glad beyond words that Maurelle had insisted he recuperate at the town house. Not that his life was so important. No, it was simply that she wanted no other injury he might sustain to be upon her head. If that seemed a bit ridiculous in light of her vowed intentions, then she could not help it. It made a difference in her mind.

  "Perhaps I am wrong," Madame Zoe said as she adjusted the long bottle-green shawl she wore, throwing an end over one shoulder with theatrical aplomb. "We must hope so, yes? If we cannot feel that joy and pleasure will always triumph over death and destruction then we might as well all slit our wrists and be done with it."

  Beneath her flamboyant manner and sense of fashion, the diva was a wise woman, Ariadne reflected. Not so long ago, she might not have seen it, or, seeing, appreciated it. What had changed? She thought it might have something to do with the easy manners and laissez-faire attitude of the New Orleans French Creoles. Or maybe the change was in herself, she didn't know. She was glad of it, regardless.

  "What say you to a pastry to take the sour taste from our mouths, chère?" Madame Zoe nodded toward a pâtisserie with its blue and gold window decor just down the street. "I feel the need of a creme coronet, and there are tables on the sidewalk so we can't be accused of plying the oldest trade by seating ourselves inside without a male escort."