by Anne Stuart
"If I were going to talk with dead Irishmen I'd probably prefer Yeats or Synge and not some adulterous politician. And I have absolutely no desire to slap you."
His smile was brief and disbelieving. "Don't you, now? Why should I find that hard to believe?"
"Maybe because you know that most people who meet you end up wanting to clobber you," she suggested helpfully.
"Not most people. Most women."
"And you meet so many in your current lifestyle?"
He laughed, and the sound was soft and surprisingly pleasant in the stone passageway. "True enough." He turned and moved onward, and she followed him, wishing she still had his hand to hold on to.
He stopped in front of a heavy steel door and handed her the lantern. There were at least three different locks, all of recent vintage, and she watched in fascination, peering through the darkness.
The door opened with a satisfyingly sepulchral creak, and he took the lantern back from her, holding it high to light their way. The bright flame had died back a bit, providing a weaker flicker of light, but it was enough to illuminate O'Neal's treasure trove.
"Oh," Katie said, halting in the midst of the room and staring around in astonishment.
"Disappointed?" O'Neal murmured. "Were you expecting Blackbeard's pirate hoard?"
She shook her head, momentarily silenced. She had expected something out of a pirate movie—chests of jewels and gold spilling all over the place, cutlasses and skeletons in artful array.
This was like a curator's room from a museum. There were gold pieces, certainly, and piles of jewelry. There were also bright brass spyglasses, shards of pottery, ancient instruments barely damaged by their sojourn in the depths of the sea. Without thinking, she bypassed the pile of jewels that glowed dimly in the light and went to touch an ancient stoneware jug, adorned with pale blue hummingbirds.
"This is beautiful," she said, stroking it with loving hands. Beside it lay an ancient telescope, still shiny despite its immersion, and she picked it up with reverent care. "These things are amazing."
He was watching her with an odd expression on his face, but she'd accepted the fact that there was no way to tell what he was thinking. "You're interested in antiques?"
"I'm fascinated by things people actually used." she said, setting the brass tube down again. "I like to think about their lives, their cares, who they loved, who they hated."
"People wore jewelry, too."
She glanced over at the glittering pile of gold and gems. "I suppose so," she said. "My ancestors were decent, hardworking common folk. I think they were more likely to care about a good plough than a string of pearls."
He set the lantern down on the table and picked up one of the strands. They were like nothing she'd ever seen before—a shimmering, luminous gray-black that seemed to glow with a life on its own.
"And you're more interested in an old telescope than a strand of the finest, rarest of black pearls?" His voice was soft, seductive, as he held them out to her.
She wished she could deny their appeal, but she was, above all things, honest. "They're beautiful," she said, making no effort to touch them. "I'm surprised they survived in the ocean."
"Don't be silly, pearls come from the ocean in the first place. It only makes them glow more brightly. These aren't as lustrous as they should be, of course."
"Why not? They look utterly magnificent as they are."
"Pearls are unlike any other jewelry. They need to be worn. They pick up a sheen and luster from a woman's skin. When they lie in darkness, untouched, their glow fades."
"They don't need a woman's skin," she shot back. "You're not going to tell me that estrogen makes them shiny—I won't believe it. Why don't you wear them?" She was being deliberately cranky. She wanted those black pearls. They were huge, sumptuous, frankly erotic, and she wanted them lying next to her skin, taking her warmth, glowing with her life. And she would have died rather than admit it.
O'Neal merely smiled faintly. "They're not my style. Turn around."
"Why?"
"So I can put them on you. I told you, they need to be worn."
"Not by me." It was getting darker and darker in the windowless stone room, and she couldn't figure out why. He'd set the lantern down by the door, and no one had come near it.
"By you," he said, and put his arms around her neck.
She couldn't escape—he'd already lifted up her mass of hair and begun fastening the string of black pearls. His hands were cool against the warmth of her skin, but the pearls seemed to be alive, vibrating, hot, against the soft, vulnerable skin of her neck.
She held her breath, she wasn't sure why, sneaking a look up at him out of lowered eyes. He was so close she could see where he'd nicked himself shaving that morning, she could see the faint gold flecks in his sea green eyes. She could feel the warmth of him, the heat of his body, the softness of his breath, and if he didn't hurry up she'd probably pass out from lack of oxygen…
He stepped back, and she let out her breath with a strangled gasp. "Very nice," he murmured, surveying her with lazy interest. "They suit you."
She couldn't stop herself from touching them. They rested against her vulnerable throat like rich black grapes, and for a moment her fingers curled around them, tempted to rip them off. It was more than a necklace. It was a claiming, whether he knew it or not. And she was afraid to be claimed.
"I can't…" she said, but her voice came out with no more than a whisper.
"They'll die here in the darkness," he said. "Untouched, unwanted, their light will go out and they'll be lost forever. Take them."
He wasn't talking about the exotic black pearls. She wasn't thinking about the pearls when she reached out her hand to him. He flinched, as if afraid of her touch, but he didn't step back, and her fingertips brushed the long dark hair away from his cheek.
The darkness closed down about them like a trap as the lantern flickered and went out. A moment later the door slammed, and they were sealed inside the stone room, like lovers in an ancient tomb.
Katie stumbled back, away from him, in sudden panic. "What happened?"
"The lantern went out. I can't imagine why—Mrs. Marvel always keeps them filled and trimmed." He sounded slightly bored.
Boredom was the furthest thing from Katie's mind. She felt as if she were suffocating, shut in the dark and damp with a stranger, and she forced herself to take a deep, calming breath. "I bet you're the kind of date who always ran out of gas on the way home." She managed to make her voice caustic.
"This isn't a date," he said, "and I don't play games."
It was just as well the place was pitch-black—even someone with his unexpectedly strong night vision wouldn't be able to see the hot blush that rose to her cheeks.
"I thought I heard the door slam," she said.
He was moving away from her with unerring grace, deftly avoiding the tables in the darkness. She could hear the useless tug at the doorknob, followed by his muffled curse.
"We're locked in." His voice was flat, unemotional.
"How could we be? You had the keys…"
"I left them in the door when we came in."
"That wasn't particularly clever of you."
"I've been a bit…distracted these past few days." His voice moved across the darkness, touching her.
"But surely you knew there was a chance the door could slam shut? Gravity or the wind or…"
"There's no wind down here," he said. "And the door is hung perfectly—it stays where it's supposed to, unless it has a little help."
"What do you mean by that?"
"I mean someone locked us in here. Someone tampered with the lamp. Maybe one of your ghosts?" He didn't bother to keep the faint contempt from his voice.
"They can't," she said.
"Really? You're an expert on ghosts, I presume?" he countered.
"Not really. I just don't think they're capable of actually touching things. I think they're more of a shadow, or a dream. Not something
physical."
"That's unfortunate. If the ghosts of my family were haunting this place I'd think they'd be likely to help me out of here if they were capable of doing so.
"Not if they knew you really well," Katie muttered, unable to resist.
He made no sound, and there was absolutely no reason why she thought he was smiling at her snotty crack. She just had the strong sense that he was.
"The Marvels will realize we've disappeared and come after us," he said, and his voice was closer than it had been before. She hadn't heard him approach in the inky darkness, and she jumped, startled.
"Did they see us come down here?"
"Mrs. Marvel doesn't miss much."
"But if you didn't lock us in here, and the ghosts didn't, doesn't that somehow suggest that the Marvels are the ones who locked the door?"
"Why would they?"
"Don't ask me!" she said, and her carefully squashed down nervousness was bubbling up into her voice. "But there's no one else here, is there? No crazy wife locked in the attic?"
He was standing only inches away—she could feel him there—but he made no effort to touch her. "No crazy wife in the attic. Who did you think you were, Jane Eyre?"
"You do a pretty good imitation of Mr. Rochester," she retorted. Don't touch me, she thought desperately. Please don't touch me.
"You're a romantic," he said, and in the darkness his voice was cool and unemotional. "I'm not a gothic hero, and you're not a beleaguered governess."
"Of course I'm not," she said sharply.
"And you aren't in love with me."
"Of course I'm not," she said again, hoping she sounded thoroughly horrified. "I don't even know you, and what I know I don't like."
"Exactly," he said.
"As long as we understand each other," she said, sounding exactly like a Victorian governess.
"We do," he said.
"Then I think I'll just have a seat on the floor and wait for the Marvels to rescue us…" She'd barely begun to sink to the hard stone when his hands found her, caught her in the darkness and hauled her up.
"The floor is wet," he said flatly. "The sea is coming in."
She froze. Entirely aware of his hands still on her arms, entirely aware of his body so close to hers. "How could that be?"
She felt rather than saw him shrug. "I'm not denying there's a bad storm out there," he said in a distant voice. "Bad enough that there's a storm surge, and water is coming up higher than usual."
"How high? Is it going to fill this room with us inside, unable to escape?"
"You've seen too many movies. There's barely an inch of water on the floor, and it would take hours and hours for it to come all the way up. By then the Marvels will have realized where we are."
"Unless they put us here in the first place."
"Why would they do that? Willie may be a little off, but there's no harm in him. And Mrs. Marvel is an absolute paragon of stern New England rectitude. She's totally incapable of evil."
"No one's incapable of evil," Katie said in a small voice.
He said nothing. A moment later he dropped his hands, and she heard the faint, telltale slosh of water as he stepped back from her. "Maybe you'd better climb up on one of the counters," he said.
"I thought the water wasn't going to rise that high before we were rescued."
"It isn't. But you said you wanted to sit down, so the safest, driest place for that is the counter." Before she knew what he was doing his hands had gone around her waist and he'd hoisted her up with a muffled grunt, setting her down on the solid wood counter with a decided thump.
He didn't move away. It brought her up to his level, and she realized that at some point she'd steadied herself by putting her hands on his shoulders. And she hadn't let go.
She jerked away, and something went crashing to the floor behind her. "I'm sorry," she gasped.
"Don't be." His hands left her, and his voice was strained. "I'll go wait over by the door and see if I can hear anyone coming."
Without thinking she reached out for him, catching the soft, loose cotton of his shirt in her hands. "Don't," she said.
"There's nothing to be afraid of." He sounded almost unnaturally calm. His hands covered hers, pulling them away and setting them back on the counter. And then he moved away, swiftly, as if he was trying to escape from her.
She pulled her legs up, wrapping her arms around them, thoroughly rebuffed—and glad of it, she told herself. For heaven's sake, the man was acting as if she'd made a pass at him, when all she'd wanted…all she'd needed…
She didn't know what she wanted or needed. The sunlight, maybe, when she hadn't seen the sun in days. Her freedom, away from this dark, haunted place.
But away from this place would be away from O'Neal. And annoying, high-handed, infuriating as he might be, she didn't want to walk away from him.
"Tell me about my sister." His voice was so quiet, carrying across the room, that for a moment she wasn't sure she'd heard him speak.
But he had, and she knew without asking what he wanted to know. "She looked pretty," she said in a very gentle voice. "She looked happy. Almost peaceful, and yet…"
"And yet?" he echoed, his voice strained.
"Slightly naughty. Like someone with a secret that she was just dying to share. Like she wanted to tell me something." She peered toward him in the darkness, but she couldn't even see his shadow. "I thought you didn't believe me."
"I don't. I'd still prefer to hear your fantasies are pleasant ones."
"For my sake, or Fiona's?"
There was a sharp intake of breath, almost pained sounding. "For both of you," he said.
She closed her eyes, and for a moment she could almost see Fiona in the darkness, standing there watching them, an expression of supreme annoyance on her pale, youthful face. Don't just sit there, came a voice inside her head. Do something.
Katie opened her eyes, banishing the image from her consciousness. This tiny, locked room was crowded enough with the two of them—she didn't need any bothersome ghosts in there as well. She'd get along without an adolescent girl's helpful determination.
A crash sounded from the far wall, followed by the sound of breaking glass.
"What the hell was that?" O'Neal demanded roughly.
"I don't—" Something went sailing past her head, barely missing her, and she let out a shriek, leaping off the counter. Directly into two inches of rising seawater.
"It's getting deeper," she said in a panicked voice.
"Yes."
"We're going to die," she said.
"No." He was there, touching her, and she started to pull away, when something hit her directly between the shoulder blades, hit her hard, and sent her falling against him, so that he had no choice but to catch her, no choice but to put his arms around her. No choice but to put his mouth against hers.
And she was lost.
Chapter Eleven
« ^ »
He shouldn't be kissing her, and he knew it. Just as he knew there was no way he was going to stop once he'd started. She tasted of coffee and wine, she tasted of cinnamon and honey. And she was warm in the dank cold of the tomblike room. Warm and vibrant and alive. He could feel her heart pounding furiously against the soft material of her dress, and he reached a hand up between them and pressed it between her breasts, against her heartbeat, trying to draw the feel of it, the sound of it, through his skin into his very heart.
She didn't want to be kissing him, either, and yet she put her arms around his neck and clung to him. Maybe she was frightened of the rising water or the noises in the room. Maybe she was frightened of him. It didn't matter. All that mattered was her warm, soft body pressed up against his as the water crept higher and higher.
He should back away, and he knew it, but his hands wouldn't release her, his mouth wouldn't let go. He wanted to breathe her very breath as well, he wanted to pull her into him and absorb her like a warm blanket of love and compassion.
He moved his
mouth away from hers, just for a moment, and her voice was small and pained. "Please don't," she said. But her hands clung to his shoulders tightly, and she rose on tiptoes and pressed her mouth against his, ignoring her own plea for mercy.
He could have stopped. She wanted him to stop, he wanted to stop, and it would have taken so little to step back, set her away from him, retreat to a corner and await rescue or drowning, he didn't give a damn which.
It would be the wise thing to do. To relinquish what he could never have. But the room was too dark, the night too cold, and she was more temptation than he had ever held in his entire life. And he couldn't let her go.
He caught her face in his hands and tilted it up to meet his. Her mouth opened willingly enough, but she seemed startled when he used his tongue, thrusting inside the warm sweet depth of her mouth, seeking some kind of haven. She liked it, though. He could tell by the faint, sweet sound she made, by the shiver that ran through her body, by the way her hands clung to him.
He wanted her. No matter how crazy and dangerous it was, he wanted her. Wanted to lie with her, sleep with her, make love with her. To taste every part of her body, to make her weep with pleasure.
He could feel the water, lapping around his ankles now, icy cold from the depths of the sea. He should probably be concentrating on a way to escape the storeroom, rather than kissing this totally inconvenient and annoying woman, but right then there was nothing he would rather do. The door was solid steel, the locks were burglar-proof, even if he'd ever acquired the dubious skill of picking locks, and the room was so far beneath the main floor of the house, with solid layers of rock between, that shouting for help would be a waste of time and breath.
He could survive under water for a relatively long time, but Katie would die. Of shock, hypothermia or drowning. One of those would carry her off. Carry her off as his family had been carried off, drowning in the black depths of the ocean.