Enchanting Pleasures (41 page)

“I’d rather not,” Quill said with great patience. “And this is my dream.” He shrugged to himself. After all, she was only a creation of his imagination. He slipped his hands under her body and caressed her breasts. She panted, little ladylike pants.

“You’re rather wonderful, Gabby o’ my Dreams,” Quill murmured. He was having trouble talking. But he wanted to hold on to the moment—to the dream. His dream wife was inexpertly moving against him. “Although you’re just as clumsy as my wife,” he told her.

“Be still,” he growled, and he grabbed her hips so hard that his fingers left white marks. He thrust forward hard. He let himself get swept away. She gave a faint scream, and little gold flames jumped from her body.

He closed his eyes at the end, afraid that she would blind him, his angel wife.

Q
UILL WOKE UP
with a raging thirst and a most unpleasant taste in his mouth. He swung his legs over the side of the bed, walked to the table, and poured a glass of water. In mid-gulp, the details of his dream flooded back into his mind. He paused for a second and then grinned in silent appreciation of his own imagination. No wonder he was so thirsty. He poured another glass of water and savored it like fine wine.

Just as he finished drinking, he heard a rustle in the bed and turned around. Gabby was sitting up, her hair tumbling around her shoulders. “Good morning,” Quill said, with a faint pulse of guilt. It would be a rare day when he could give his wife as much pleasure as he had given his dream Gabby.

“You don’t have a migraine!”

He raised one eyebrow as he poured some more water. “And why should I? I think I drank a bit too much port last night, but migraines do not spring from an excess of liquor. Would you like a glass of water, my dear? It tastes unaccountably good.”

“It does?” She sounded dubious.

Quill put down his glass with a click and walked over to the bed. He bent over and kissed her lightly. But one touch wasn’t enough, so he sat down and ran his hands through her hair. “Let’s start over,” he whispered. “Good morning, my wife.”

Gabby’s cheeks turned rosy. “Quill, do you remember last—how do you …” She trailed off.

“Do I remember?”

“Last night, you and I—”

“Oh, Lord,” Quill said, chuckling. “I dreamt about you all night, Gabby. Did I caress you in my sleep?”

“Actually—”

He pulled her forward and Gabby lost hold of the coverlet she was holding to her neck. “I say!” he said, truly startled. “My beautiful wife is sleeping without her night rail!”

“Well, you—”

Quill groaned. “Oh, sweetheart, you must have felt as if I were attacking you. I truly apologize. I’m a beast. What happened?”

His wife was looking down at her hands. He pushed her curls back over creamy shoulders. “I like you without clothes. Perhaps I will pretend to be dreaming every night and disrobe you in the middle of the night.”

“Quill!” But the reprimand didn’t have its usual force.

“What’s the matter?” he asked, suddenly chilled. “Did I frighten you, Gabby? I’m so sorry; I can’t remember. But I assure you that this has never happened before and won’t happen again.”

“I know that,” Gabby said, almost inaudibly.

“What?”

“I said, I know it won’t happen again,” she replied.

Quill was lost. “What won’t happen?” He wasn’t terribly interested. “Perhaps I should make recompense for my impoliteness during the night.” His hand rounded the curve of her breast and he shifted her onto his lap. Gabby barely managed to clutch the sheet to her waist.

She swallowed. She had promised herself that she would deceive Quill only once, by giving him the medicine, and that afterward she would confess. And leave the house without protest if he sent her away.

“I don’t know why it is,” Quill was saying, his voice growing slightly hoarse. “I can’t seem to think about anything but you, Gabby.” He pushed her backward and she was laid out before him, beautiful, generous curves. “Why don’t we talk later, hmmm?”

“Quill—”

But his head was bent over her breast and she gasped into silence, her protest dying in her throat. Passion rose instantly, turned her legs to water. But guilt beat an opposing rhythm in her heart. Should they make love? Then he would realize that Sudhakar’s medicine had worked—perhaps he would think his injuries healed on their own.

No. The deceit would lie between them for their whole life. She would never be able to make love to him without thinking of it.

“I have to speak to you,” she said, pushing his dark head away from her.

“So serious,” Quill said, wicked lights dancing in his eyes. “Wouldn’t you rather—” And he smiled his devil’s smile.

“Yes—no!” Gabby scooted backward on the bed. “We made love last night,” she said bluntly.

He gaped at her, dumbfounded. “No.” But his tone was not certain.

“We did.”

“But,” Quill said slowly, “I don’t have a headache. I thought—it wasn’t a dream?”

“No.”

“That doesn’t make sense.”

Gabby’s heart ached as she watched his brows knit together. She loved that scowl and his certainty that every puzzle had a logical explanation. She saw the moment that the truth dawned on him, the way his face grew rigid as he realized his wife’s betrayal.

She pulled farther back on the bed, just a fraction of an inch. Then she steadied herself. She had been
right
. Not right in her methods, but right in the outcome. They made love over and over during the night, and he was pain-free.

Quill’s eyes had turned the color of an icy ocean wave. “You drugged me,” he said flatly. With a sudden lunge he leaned forward and pulled the sheet from her hands and flung it away. As Gabby gasped in protest, he pushed her roughly on her side. There on her hip was a bluish bruise, the shadow of Quill’s passionate hold from the night before.

He pulled back without a word. Had she thought his eyes were green? They were black. Gabby’s heart was bursting in her chest. This must be what it feels like to be dying, she thought numbly.

“Sudhakar’s medicine is potent,” Quill remarked. He had himself firmly under control now, she could see that.

Gabby nodded.

“What are the ingredients?”

“I didn’t—I don’t know.”

“You don’t know.” There was a chilly pause.

“Sudhakar gave it to a young man who injured himself falling from a tree,” Gabby whispered. “Whenever the man bent over, he suffered from a headache. The medicine cured him.”

“When did you give that medicine to me?”

“After dinner, in your port.”

Quill stood up. He realized for the first time that he was naked as well. “That was quite a performance you put on last night.”

Gabby willed herself not to cry. He had the right to be angry. “You had to engage in the movement that causes migraines.” Her voice came out in a wisp.

Quill’s eyes narrowed again. “That seems very odd. Why?”

“I believe that the medicine soothes the injured part of the brain,” Gabby said awkwardly. That sounded better than Sudhakar’s talk of putting one’s brain to sleep.

He was slowly working it through. “The patient takes the medicine and then performs the activity that brings on migraines. So the medicine has healed my concussion?”

“The medicine soothes that part of the brain—” She faltered, unable to make sense of the connections between injured limbs and injured brains.

“And if this medicine had not agreed with me, Gabby. Would I be lying in that bed, unable to move at all?”

“Oh, no,” she said eagerly, meeting his eyes. “There are no ill consequences when it doesn’t work.”

“What else did Sudhakar say about it?”

Gabby bit her lip.

“What else did Sudhakar say about the medicine?” Quill’s words were evenly spaced, although she felt as if he had shouted them.

“In some situations, it is a dangerous poison,” she mumbled. She looked imploringly at Quill. “But he promised that there would be no ill consequences, even if the medicine didn’t work. And it did work.”

But he was turning away, pulling on a robe. “So you gave me a dangerous poison,” he said. His voice sounded almost disinterested. “You must have been desperate, Gabby. Was it worth it, last night?”

She didn’t pretend not to understand him. Tears were falling hotly on her hands. “I couldn’t stand to see you in pain.”

“But you felt no guilt when you lied to me, Gabby? When you gave me a medicine that may well have killed me?” He turned around, and she shivered at the look in his face. “When my mother bought such a drug, at least she graced me with the decision whether to take it.”

Gabby’s voice was strangled. “You would have refused!”

“That is correct. I would not have taken it.”

“I had to,” she whispered. “I couldn’t see you suffer.”

“Somehow you seem to have missed the fact that I abhor deceit, Gabby.” His tone was almost genial. “So I ask you again: do you think last night was worth it?”

In his face she could read the ruins of her marriage, as clear as day.

But he continued, relentless. “As I recall, I believed you were an angel. Quite a joke under the circumstances. Did you laugh? I don’t remember you laughing.” His voice was as sharp as the prow of a ship cutting through fog.

“I love you,” Gabby managed to say.

“I forgave my mother because she bought the potion out of love,” he said. He had no need to continue.

“You destroyed our marriage because our relations weren’t enough for you? Or was it because you wanted me to be more…more manly?” For all his control, he was practically speaking through clenched teeth.

“That wasn’t it!” Gabby cried. “I couldn’t see you in pain. I couldn’t bear it!”

“We had previously made love without my incurring a migraine, if you remember,” Quill pointed out. “Therefore I can only believe that you found the experience inadequate.”

Gabby couldn’t answer.

“I won’t be furnishing you with any further experience,” he said gently. “You know that, don’t you? I will never be able to trust you again, and no marriage could be successful in those circumstances.”

Gabby pulled herself together. She had to make herself clear, and then she would leave. “I will not try to change your mind, but I want you to understand. Sudhakar assured me that the medicine would not injure you. Given that, I decided that lying to you was justified.”

“Justified!” Quill spat. “God, you are such a smug little thing. Justified lies! To your husband! Were you lying when you said you worshiped me, after we consummated our marriage?”

But she was battling tears again and couldn’t answer.

“Of course, that was before you realized just how much my injury was going to affect your daily life,” Quill remarked.

“No! That isn’t it. I won’t have you saying such cruel things!” Gabby had suddenly found her voice. “I never lied to you about important things.”

“Only
when justified.”
His voice had a savage ring to it.

“I never told you a lie as awful as the one you told me,” she retorted.

Quill folded his arms and regarded her. “And what lies have I ever told you, Gabby? I should warn you that I pride myself on my truthfulness.”

She raised her chin. “In that case, you should not have lied to me about the reasons you wished to marry me. You said that you loved me.”

Quill suddenly remembered a few details from his so-called dream of the previous night.

“I apologize,” he said finally. “I did lie to you.”

But Gabby was gratefully allowing anger to dull her grief. “You lied to me at one of the most sacred moments in life,” she spat. “You forced me to give up a man whom I loved, whom I wished to marry, and to marry you instead.”

“I forced you—”

“You and your brother schemed behind my back,” she said. Her eyes met his, and there were no tears in them now. “You were correct, last night. I
am
a romantic. I thought you loved me. I foolishly believed your lies, and so I jilted my fiancé. Of course, he was lying, too, since I gather he found me too fat to marry. Fool that I am, I even believed you when you said that I was beautiful.”

Quill opened his mouth, but couldn’t think of anything to say.

“At least I lied to you for your own good,” Gabby said. “I would never have tricked you into a loveless marriage. I wouldn’t have been able to stand the shame.”

“It is not a loveless marriage!”

She shrugged. “It is no longer a marriage at all, according to you.”