Devil's Embrace (36 page)

She was thoughtful on their carriage ride back to the villa.

“What did you think of the Genoese Christmas mass, Cassandra?”

“It was beautiful,” she said, breaking herself away from thoughts that did not seem to lead her anywhere. “I only wish that I could have understood what they said. But you know, it was so very different from—” She broke off, grinning self-consciously.

He patted her gloved hand. “One could tell that we are much together. I am able to finish your sentences for you.”

As Cassie removed her heavy black veiled hat, the earl
called to her from the drawing room. “Come have a glass of mulled wine with me, Cassandra.”

But it was not a glass of wine he handed to her, but a large box, wrapped in a bright red velvet ribbon. For a moment, she stood tongue-tied, staring at him and at the box.

“Merry Christmas, Cassandra.”

She took the box from him and laid it atop an ivory inlaid table. She felt a tug of excitement, for she dearly loved presents. She carefully parted the layers of silver tissue paper and lifted out the most exquisite gown she had ever seen. It was dark blue silk, of such a texture that it seemed to ripple like gossamer through her fingers. The stomacher was woven with gold thread, as were the full sleeves that flared out from the elbows. The skirt was yard upon yard of billowing rich silk. She hugged the gown against her breast a moment, unable to meet the earl’s eyes.

“It is incredibly beautiful,” she said finally, shyly gazing up at him.

“It is Venetian silk. Mr. Donnetti brought it back on his last trip.”

“May I try it on, my lord, now?”

“Certainly. I will await you here.”

When she reappeared some thirty minutes later, he stared at her, his breath suspended. The dark blue matched the color of her eyes, the golden threads, her hair. She danced lightly toward him, paused, and performed a pirouette. As a final step, she curtsied deeply before him. The neckline plunged low, in the French style, and her white breasts blossomed above it in rounded splendor.

“It suits you,” he said.

“Do you really believe so?”

“Most assuredly I do,
cara.
”

He was taken aback when she suddenly stepped toward him, rose on her tiptoes, and kissed him lightly on the mouth.

“I suppose it does feel more like Christmas now,” she said, and backed away from him quickly, in embarrassment. “Eliott was forever giving me the most unromantic and
practical kind—new fishing poles, the most scientifically proven baiting hooks and the like.” The light momentarily left her face, and he knew her thoughts were upon her family, Edward Lyndhurst, and undoubtedly the giant fir tree set up in the drawing room of Hemphill Hall every Christmas. He felt a knot of frustration, but managed to force lightness into his voice. “Would you like to join me now for dinner? Caesare was unable to come, as he was already promised elsewhere.”

“I would be delighted to, Anthony, but not just yet.”

He looked at her, a black brow raised in inquiry. Tentatively, she pulled a small box from a pocket in her skirt and shyly thrust it forward. “Merry Christmas, my lord.”

He felt the pleasure of surprise as he carefully unwrapped the square box. He opened it slowly, and stared a long moment at a gold ring. Carved in black jade in a circular setting was a small chess piece, a king.

“I hope you like it,” she said uncertainly, as he was silent overlong.

“I shall treasure it, Cassandra,” he said quietly, and slipped it upon his third finger.

She laughed nervously. “Since you beat me so regularly in chess, I thought your skill should be recognized. I designed it, and Scargill commissioned a goldsmith in Genoa.”

“You are very talented,
cara,
” he said. She looked up at him, and did not stiffen when he gently pulled her into his arms and touched his mouth to hers.

As the earl walked alone in the gardens, he admitted to himself that he was starting to plan Cassandra’s return to his bed as carefully as he had planned her abduction from England. His body ached for her, and he could not help himself. He frowned, his thoughts momentarily at an impasse. He resisted the urge to simply inform Cassandra that enough time had passed, that she was now going to wed him and be done with it. She had come to trust him over the past months, and he knew that she needed the undemanding companionship he had offered her. But he knew too that their relationship could not continue in the gentle limbo he had created for her. During the past several
weeks, he had found being in her company increasingly a trial to him, as his need for her grew harder to keep in bounds.

He looked up to see Liepolo, his master winemaker, approaching him. He forced a smile to his lips.

“All goes well with you, Liepolo?”

“
Si,
my lord. Marrina said that I might find you here. Forgive me, my lord, but I wanted to tell you that the grapevines you had shipped from France have arrived safely.”

“Excellent, Liepolo.” Although he did not care at the moment if the wretched grapes became wine or vinegar, he forced himself to comment appropriately on Liepolo’s plans.

“Wine!”

“What, my lord?” Liepolo asked, eyeing his master uncertainly.

The earl grinned widely and thwacked Liepolo on his stooped shoulder. “Forgive me, Liepolo, but I must leave you now.”

He turned and walked briskly away, leaving his winemaster staring after him.

The earl found Cassie seated in front of her dressing table, already gowned formally for dinner, brushing out her hair.

“Why do we not have our dinner here, Cassandra, on the balcony?”

She cocked her head at him and smiled. “If you like, my lord. Caesare has decided not to join us this evening?”

The earl omitted mention of the note he had hurriedly scrawled to his half-brother, postponing his visit. “He had to make other plans, unexpectedly, I understand.”

Cassie lowered her hairbrush. “In that case, since we are not entertaining, I shall not bother myself with hair pins.”

After Marrina served their dinner, the earl nodded his dismissal, and turned his attention to Cassie. He kept his conversation light and her glass filled with light fruity wine from the Parese vineyards. “Is not the full moon breathtaking, Cassandra?”

“Indeed it is, my lord,” she said, tilting her head upward.
The night was clear and myriad clusters of stars shined brightly in the black sky.

“It reminds me of some of the evenings aboard
The Cassandra.
”

She gave him a censuring look. “The dinners are better here, I think,” she said.

“I thought Arturo had a fine way with octopus,” he said blandly as he filled her glass once again.

“Octopus?” She gulped and looked suspiciously at the scallops on her plate. “You are a wretched tease, my lord,” she said, pursing her lips at him.

“Drink your wine, Cassandra, it will take the taste from your mouth.”

When Marrina returned to clear the dishes from the table, Cassie was seated beside the earl on the settee, her cheeks flushed and her eyes bright. She was saying, laughter lurking in her voice, “Really, my lord, your reading of Shakespeare’s sonnets leaves much to be desired. You must be more dramatic in your rendering.”

“Be patient, madam, one must accustom oneself to the poet’s high-flown phrases. More wine?”

She giggled and thrust out her empty glass. “I discover that I am liking your Parese wine more with each glass.”

He allowed her one more glass before he laid down the red leather tooled volume and turned to her.

She saw a look in his dark eyes, one they had not held in a long time. When he lightly touched his fingers to her cheek, she realized vaguely that it was desire she saw.

“I think, my lord,” she said slowly, “that you are trying to make me drunk.”

“But you are already in your cups, Cassandra.” He took the glass from her fingers and gazed at her ruefully. “ Actually,
cara,
it was my intent to make you only sufficiently drunk so that I could seduce you.”

She stared at him, her expression blank. “You want to make love to me?”

“Of course. Was not my selection of Shakespeare’s most moving sonnets enough of a clue to you?”

She looked away from him and whispered vaguely, the
wine slurring her words. “It has been so long. And I am afraid.”

“Afraid of me?”

She shook her head slowly. “More afraid of myself, I think, and what I would feel toward you, if we—”

“If we began to make love again?”

“Yes.”

“What you want and what you feel toward me is not something to fear,
cara.
You do not still fear that you will see me again as Andrea, do you?”

“I do not believe so. But I am afraid that I will feel nothing, save disgust for myself.”

“You did not tell me this before, Cassandra.”

She shrugged helplessly, and gave him a crooked smile. “I was not drunk before.”

He pulled her gently into his arms and held her. He felt her head loll against his shoulder, and cupped her chin in his hand, lifting her face to his. She closed her fingers over his, and to his delight, pressed her mouth against his.

He unfastened the row of tiny buttons over her bodice, and lightly brushed his palm over her breasts. She stiffened at his touch.

“Look at your breasts,
cara.
”

Unwittingly, she lowered her head and stared dumbly at herself. Her breasts ached and felt swollen, as if he had been fondling them.

His voice continued caressing and soft, yet he remained motionless, his eyes holding hers. Her fingers clutched convulsively at her bodice, gathering it beneath her breasts.

“You want me, Cassandra. It is time you admitted that to yourself.”

“I do not know what I want anymore,” she said, and pressed her cheek against his chest.

He cupped her chin again and looked into her eyes, wide with uncertainty. “I will show you,
cara.
”

He kissed her deeply, savoring the warmth of her mouth. He kept kissing her as he pulled her to her feet, leaving her only to ease her from her gown and undergarments. She was staring up at him, her eyes wide and questioning, but her body arched against him, as if with a will of its
own. He molded her against him and breathed in the sweet fragrance of her hair.

He released her a moment, silently cursing the time it took him to strip off his own clothing.

When he stood naked before her, it was she who held out her arms to him, her body taut from the ache within her and the thought of how he would, soon, bring her to unbearable pleasure. His hand moved downward over her belly until his fingers found her.

“You are exquisite, Cassandra.”

“So are you.”

He leaned his dark head down and let his mouth caress her breast.

“I want you.”

He clasped his hands beneath her hips and lifted her. “Wrap your legs about me.”

She grasped his neck to steady herself and obeyed him, though she did not really understand what he was about.

He lifted her easily, and she felt his fingers gently stroking her, and then parting her. He thrust upward and she buried her face in the hollow of his throat, whimpering at the agony of sensation he was creating in her. His hands molded her hips tight against him as he thrust into her. She tightened her legs about his lean sides to heighten her pleasure, and sought out his mouth. But the difference in their sizes frustrated her, and without thinking, she reared back against his arms, upsetting his balance. He fell onto the bed with a roar of laughter, and she sprawled atop him.

“So my lady wishes to be more conventional, does she?”

He pulled her upright until she was straddling him, her hips upon his chest.

He caressed and kissed her until she was on the edge of her climax before he lifted her hips and eased her down upon him.

He could not contain his own moans when he felt the rippling convulsions grip her body, and he dug his fingers into her hips and pressed her downward, hard against him. He was deep inside her but the pain she felt was
consumed by the waves of frenzied pleasure that ripped through her.

“Oh my,” she whispered at last, and sprawled her length on top of him.

He laughed softly and squeezed her tightly against him.

C
assie laughed and punched lightly at the earl’s chest as he lifted her from the copper bathtub. He heard a tentative knock on the dressing room door, and quickly drew a large towel around her. “A moment, love,” he said, shrugging into his dressing gown.

To Scargill, who was pacing restlessly to and fro in the bedchamber, he was less loving.

“I trust you have an excellent reason for this interruption,” he said curtly, closing the door behind him.

“It’s Daniele, my lord. He believes he has found that animal, Andrea.”

“Where?”

“In Riva Trigoso. Daniele sent one of his men to fetch you.”

“Damn, it is two days’ hard riding,” the earl said, rubbing his jaw. “Why does Daniele not simply bring him here?”

“His man says that Andrea is no longer alone and it will take some of your men to bring him back.” Scargill saw his master gaze with a furrowed brow toward the dressing room, and drew himself up. “I will go, my lord, and bring that swine back myself.”

“No, Scargill, it is my responsibility as well as my pleasure. How many men does Daniele feel we need?”

“If you go, my lord, not more than three others.”

The earl cursed fluently under his breath. Mr. Donnetti and
The Cassandra
would not return from Alexandria for several days. As much as he did not wish to, he would have to take three of the men from the Villa Parese.

“You, Rapallo, and Girolamo will remain here, Scargill, and stay with Cassandra. We cannot afford to take any
chances with her safety.” He looked away toward the dressing room. “Have the men ready to leave within the hour.”

Cassie became very quiet when the earl told her what had happened.

“I shall return—hopefully with Andrea—in five days, Cassandra, no more. I promise you.”

“I will go with you, my lord.”