Dear Impostor (26 page)

          “I am going to show him my newest watercolor,”
Circe continued.

          Gabriel knew that his brows had risen. Tellman’s
expression changed, too. She looked at her charge in surprise. “But, Miss Circe–”

          ”We shall have some tea in a moment,” Circe
said, her voice calm. “Would you like to see my painting?” She turned back to
Gabriel.

          He nodded. “Very much.”

          What had made her decide to grant him this
token of her trust? He wasn’t sure, but he rose and followed her to the far
side of the room, where her easel stood beneath the largest window. Its glass
panes revealed the back courtyard with its carriage house and stables and two
large oak trees. The water color was covered with a cloth. Circe lifted it and
stood back, waiting in silence for Gabriel to inspect her work.

          He was prepared with words of praise and
encouragement, as one would give any hard-working and hopeful student of the
art, but the prepared sentences faded from his memory when he saw the picture.

          He observed a park with trees in the
background, and houses glimpsed beyond the budding branches. Early crocuses
poked their heads through the grass, glimpses of yellow and white brightening
the greenery. The sky was a soft blue streaked with patchy clouds. It was a
simple scene, but light seemed to glint from the paper, and he could almost
feel the movement of the wind that stirred the leaves of the trees and bent the
grass.

          It was so far from the usual childish drawing
of a schoolroom miss, so much more even than many of the landscapes he had seen
framed on the walls of the big houses he had once frequented, that he stared
for long moments in silence.

          Circe spoke first, her tone tentative. “You
don’t like it?”

          “I think it’s remarkable,” he said with total
honesty. “Circe, you have a gift that is–that is unique.” No wonder Psyche felt
compelled to find Circe qualified instructors. This kind of talent needed to be
succored, encouraged. He doubted that Circe would give up her art without a
struggle; but if the insensitive Percy should become the child’s guardian, if
Percy should wear down Psyche’s resistance and force her to agree to
marriage–no, it would never do. Not just for Psyche’s sake, but for Circe’s,
that marriage must be prevented. Gabriel was determined to do anything he could
to prevent Percy from ruining two lives.

          “I look at this scene, and I feel that spring
is coming,” he said slowly, gazing down at the paper. “The whole picture speaks
of an awakening, of unfurling flowers and budding trees and freshening skies,
and most of all, of hope returning.”

          Circe was pink with pleasure. “Yes,” she said
seriously. “That is indeed what it is about. You do understand. Perhaps when it
is finished, I will give it to you, to hang on your wall.”

          He was unexpectedly moved. “I would treasure
it, indeed,” he told her. “Although I’m not sure I will have a wall to hang it
on, at least for a while.”

          “When you and Psyche are married–” she began,
then paused and glanced at Tellman, who had taken her usual seat in the other
corner of the room. Circe lowered her voice. “Sometimes, I almost forget it’s
all in play.”

          “Yes,” he agreed, forcing his face into an
easy expression–this child was altogether too fey for his comfort–he must not
allow her to see that he could easily slip into this daydream, too, and enjoy
it altogether too much.

          The door opened again, and Psyche looked into
the room. Her expression immediately changed when she saw Gabriel.

          Repressing a quick flicker of guilt, Gabriel
kept his expression impassive.

          “Ah, there you are,” Psyche said, making a
quick recover. “I would like to speak with you, Lord Tarrington, in private.”

          “Of course,” he agreed, rising and making his
bow to Circe. “I have enjoyed our chat, Circe. Thank you for showing me your
water color.”

          It pleased him to see Psyche’s grimace of
surprise, although she mastered her expression quickly. He followed her out of
the room.

          “You didn’t plague Circe to show you her
work?” Psyche demanded, looking worried. “She’s very selective about who views
her paintings.”

          “She offered,” Gabriel answered, not trying to
disguise his annoyance. “I would not harass your sister, my dear Miss Hill, nor
do I enjoy being considered a threat to small children.”

          She had the grace to color. “I beg your
pardon. I didn’t mean–”

          ”Your sister has extraordinary genius,” he
added. “I understand now why you are so intent upon finding her the instruction
that her talents call out for.”

          Psyche nodded, then hesitated a moment in the
hallway. “Come with me,” she said. “If you have seen her latest work, I think
you should see more.”

          Not sure why this sudden change of heart,
Gabriel followed Psyche up the steps until she came to the attic at the top of
the house. Mystified, he watched her enter a cramped attic room and when she
gestured, he came after her. She moved to a table and pulled out a portfolio
from a stack of papers and boxes and untied the ribbon that bound it together.

          “These were painted after the death of my
parents in a hot air balloon accident.” Her voice was controlled, but he could
see the effort it cost her in the tightening of her lips.

          He moved closer to see, and even in the dim
light from the small window at the end of the attic, he saw that these pictures
were darker, in both color and mood, than the one he had viewed in the
schoolroom. He picked up the first and glanced at the next one, and the next.
These scenes showed lowering black clouds hanging over grim bleak landscapes of
barren hills and empty lowlands.

          “I see,” he said after a long silence. “She
has come a long way.”

          “And I do not wish to see her hurt again–”

          ”Farther, perhaps, than her sister,” he
finished.

          Diverted from the cautionary warnings she had
meant to repeat, Psyche frowned at him. “What do you mean?”

          “I mean, dear Miss Hill, that you have the
same anger and hurt inside you, and you have had no method of relieving those
poisons. Your sister at least has her painting. You have only the
responsibilities of looking out for your sister, and the irksome task of
fending off the noxious Percy.”

          He saw something in her face waver, and then
the sheen of moisture in her eyes.

          “I–you are very perceptive, for a gamester,”
she said slowly, blinking back the tears. “I suppose it comes from reading your
opponents, seeking to determine their moods and weaknesses from across a card
table so that you may best them.”

          Her tone was almost insulting, but he ignored
it. He would not be distracted this time. “Does no one understand you, dear
Miss Hill?” he asked, keeping his tone light with some effort. “I regret that
you have borne so much alone.”

          She bit her lip, and the gesture made him
reach forward despite himself. He put his hands on her shoulders, only to
support her, only in a brotherly gesture of support–oh, hell, why lie to
himself? He didn’t feel the least bit brotherly toward the cool beauty, no
matter how genuine his sympathy for her plight.

          And she knew it. She glanced up at him, her
blue eyes wide with alarm. “I didn’t bring you to this secluded apartment
for–that is, you must not misconstrue my motives–”

          ”Oh, your motives are pure enough,” Gabriel
told her. “And you have hidden your passion deep beneath that floe of ice. It
may confound the rest of the world, but I see through it, dear Miss Hill.”

          “Will you stop calling me that,” she said.

          But this time, she didn’t back away; they were
only inches apart, and he could detect the rise and fall of her breasts–hidden
beneath the primly styled dresses she habitually chose– and the pulse jumping
in the vein in her temple.

          “What shall I call you, then?” he teased. “Psyche,
dearest, beloved?”

          “You don’t–don’t have to carry your role to
such an extreme,” she argued, but her voice trembled, and they both knew that
she was breathing quickly. Hell, so was he.

          “It’s no role, and for once in my life, I am
not pretending.” He leaned forward. The shock of lips meeting was like the
spark of a tinder box, and he felt a tremor run through his body.

          Her lips were soft and luscious. She shut her
eyes and he saw the pulse in her temple jump. For a moment, she stood very
still. Then beneath the hard, sure pressure of his kiss, her lips parted, and
he could taste the sweetness of her mouth, the smoothness of her tongue as he
taught her what a kiss should be.

          He shut his eyes, too, and forgot the dusty
attic around them, forgot the killers that awaited him somewhere on London’s shadowed streets. He forgot–almost–everything except the way she stood in his
arms, not quite leaning into him, but not rejecting his embrace.

          When at last she pushed him away, she was
trembling. “I–You can’t–I am not one of your light women, sir!”

          But he had learned to read women long ago, and
he saw the uncertainty in her eyes.

          He grinned at her. “I’ve had my fill of light
women, my lovely Miss Hill. I’ve had high born ladies and low, I’ve had
sun-kissed beauties on tropical beaches who were happy to share my embrace. I’ve
never forced a woman in my life, and I would not do so now. But at present I
find I have a hunger only for an Ice Princess with a heat beneath her primness
that she may keep concealed from the world, and even from herself, but not from
me. Who, my lovely Psyche, is pretending now?”

          She had to pull away, she had to put this
arrogant libertine in his place; hadn’t he just admitted that he had loved many
women, had seduced them, most likely–no, be honest. The way she felt just now,
the strange yearnings he induced–those women had likely thrown themselves at
his feet, begged for his kisses.

          If Psyche had had no shame, she would have
done the same. The tiny scar at the edge of his mouth, the way his brow
furrowed when he narrowed his eyes, the keen blue-eyed gaze with which he
seemed to look into her soul–Psyche felt a hunger she had never suspected, a
melting pain low in her belly that made his firm, sure kisses almost impossible
to resist.

          Just for one moment to lay aside all the
weight of responsibility and decorum–strange, she had never considered her
sense of propriety a burden before–but just to escape it all and relax into his
arms. If he kissed like this, what would his further caresses be like?

          Shocked at herself, Psyche drew a deep breath.
But Gabriel gave her no time to reconsider.

          He leaned forward again, and this kiss lasted
even longer, sent her heartbeat even faster, till she felt as breathless as if
she had run up four flights of stairs. He pulled her further into his arms, and
the hardness of his body, the firmness of his thighs as they pressed against
her own softer limbs–she had never been this close to a man. Even in a dance,
there was a proper distance between the partners.

          This was like a marriage bed would be, and if
their sham engagement had been real, on that night of wedding bliss even the
thin muslin of her skirt or his fashionably tight-fitting trousers would not
separate them. There would be only warm skin against warm skin, and she would
know how his hands would move across her body, accelerating this tumult of
emotion inside her to new and dizzying heights.

          A clatter from below–had some servant dropped
a pail?–pulled her out of this forbidden fantasy. Psyche jumped, and then
forced herself to step back.

          “I can’t–I mustn’t–” she stammered, then
turned toward the doorway. “I’m needed below stairs.”

          He didn’t hold her back, as she half-feared he
might, didn’t protest, but his dark blue eyes gazed at her with a knowing that
made her blush. He knew her feeble excuses for exactly what they were. This was
not a man you could easily deceive.

          Psyche hurried out of the attic, ignoring a
red-faced maid on the next landing who was wiping up spilled tea and collecting
shards of china. Psyche continued till she was in her own bed chamber. There
she shut the door and leaned against it. She found that she was still breathing
fast.

          Why did this one man, this gambler, have this
effect on her? She had encountered good looking men before, charming,
well-spoken men before. She was familiar with all the most accomplished flirts
of the Ton. But no one else had ever affected her like this, she admitted
ruefully in the safety of her solitary chamber. No one.

          That wicked twinkle in his lapis blue eyes,
the grin that he didn’t quite allow to lift the corners of his well-shaped
lips, the slight arch of his dark brows, the hard-muscled arms that had held
her so tenderly–oh for heaven’s sake! She would
not
think of him.