Fascination -and- Charmed (74 page)

Justine’s hands went to her cheeks. “Do not torment yourself with these memories, Saber. It was so sad.”

“Yes,” Saber agreed. “My father was a great man and I’ve missed him terribly. But he’d made arrangements for your father to oversee things for me if anything happened—with Mama already gone and no one else to ask.”

“I know,” Justine said. She had grown pale and her face was strained. “So much sadness. You are very important to us, Saber. You always will be. Never think of yourself as alone or without a family. We are your family.”

“
You
are my family,” he said darkly.

“Let me get you a little port, Lady Justine,” Struan said suddenly, rising to his feet and going to a tray on which a single crystal decanter stood surrounded by glasses. “You have had far too much excitement for one evening.”

Struan poured the port and brought it to Lady Justine. He bent over her and waited until she took a taste and smiled up at him. “Thank you,” she said. “You are very kind.”

“I’ve ’ad too much excitement for one night, too,” Max said in his piping voice. “A little port would probably put me to rights.”

Struan eyed him narrowly and walked away. While his back was turned, Lady Justine put her glass to Max’s lips and tipped a sip of port into his mouth. By the time Struan had sat down once more, Max was smiling up into Lady Justine’s face with open adoration.

“I am a man,” Saber declared as Figerall arrived to deliver the cognac himself. The white cockerel Calum had encountered outside the salon scuttled in his superior’s wake with a food-laden tray.

“I am a man,” Sable repeated, signaling for Figerall to pour drinks. “And I expect to be treated as one. The time for some wet nurse to wipe my nose and tell me when I should and shouldn’t do things is past.”

He accepted a shimmering bubble glass half-filled with glowing amber brandy, promptly emptied it and held it out for more.

Plates of sandwiches and substantial slabs of fruit cake were placed upon a low table. Sugar-coated fruits were mounded on a three-tiered silver dish, and an array of sweetmeats had also been included, together with a variety of little tarts.

Before the servant backed away, Max slipped to the floor and sat with his feet under the table, eyeing the food with the avid concentration of any healthy ten-year-old boy.

At last the servants left, and Saber went to appropriate the entire decanter of brandy. This he set upon the mantel, above a fire that crackled in the grate.

“This is what I’m going to do,” he said expansively, refilling his glass yet again and waving the bottle around. When everyone else had declined, he set the decanter down and said, “Eat, boy. You look like a scarecrow.”

“Saber,” Lady Justine said crossly, “do not be unkind.”

“Why not? I’ve suffered enough unkindness for an army of boys—and men.”

A clear voice from the doorway captured everyone’s attention. “You ’ave not suffered it for my brother, sir,” Ella said. Dressed in a demure, high-necked white muslin gown and white satin slippers, she ventured a few steps into the room. Her black hair was drawn smoothly up at the crown and cascaded in loose curls around her shoulders. She blinked her dark, almond-shaped eyes slowly, and her heavy lashes made shifting shadows on high cheekbones. Calum decided he had never seen more perfect skin than Ella’s golden skin. He wondered, not for the first time, at the exact nature of her parentage.

“Ella,” Lady Justine said, “I thought you were long since in your bed, child. You must be exhausted.”

The unexpected crash of glass on granite made Calum start violently. He heard both Struan and Lady Justine exclaim.

Saber, his intensely blue eyes fixed on Ella, had let his brandy glass slip through his fingers to the hearth.

“I couldn’t sleep,” Ella said, as if nothing had happened, “so I looked for Max and found ’e wasn’t in ’is bed. It frightened me, so I dressed and came looking for ’im.”

There were, Calum decided, and not for the first time, far too many secrets about Ella and Max. To date they had even managed to avoid giving a family name.

“Didn’t mean to frighten you, Ellie,” Max said around a large mouthful of strawberry tart. “There was a fracas ’ere. ’Ad to go in search of reinforcements.”

Calum glowered at the boy. “You came to me with a pile of untruths, my boy. A more rigid man would suggest you be horsewhipped.”

“But you are not more rigid,” Lady Justine said, twinkling at him. “Obviously Max misunderstood what he heard and became agitated.”

“Max tells stories,” Ella informed them calmly. “You’d think it was on account of ’is very active imagination. It’s a great trial and a nuisance sometimes. But once you understands, learning to ignore him is a simple matter.”

Struan coughed, and Calum saw that he smiled at the girl like a proud…
father?
Dear heaven, Struan was beginning to persuade himself he really was parent to these two mysterious and very possibly hazardous creatures.

“Who is she?”

For an instant Calum wasn’t certain who had spoken. Then he turned to look at Saber—and felt his own gut suck in as if he’d been struck there. The Earl of Avenall stared at fifteen-year-old Ella as if he’d been brought into the presence of Venus.

Struan was the first to recover. “Ella, kindly take Max and ensure that he goes to his bed and stays there. Then retire yourself, please.”

“What right have you to send her from me?” Saber said to Struan without ever taking his eyes from the girl. “Your name is Ella?”

“Yes,” she said simply. To Max she directed a stern frown and told him, “You oughtn’t to stuff yourself so late, Max. You know ’ow delicate your stomach is.”

“Hah,” the boy scoffed. “
You
don’t know ’ow often my stomach ’as ’ad no reason at all to be delicate. You was lucky. While you were at Lu—”

“Enough!” Calum and Struan bellowed together.

“Don’t you dare shout at him,” Lady Justine said, getting to her feet and going to stand beside Max. “You stay where you are until you’ve had your fill. Boys’ stomachs can take a great deal. Boys require large amounts of food to sustain their considerable energy.”

Saber scoffed. “When did you become an expert on boys, Justine?” he said, although his attention still centered on Ella. “Should have thought the sewing of fine seams was more in your line of expertise.”

“Something tells me Lady Justine has made an acute study of the human condition,” Calum said swiftly, unnerved by his own rush of protectiveness toward the lady. “Unless I am much mistaken, she could well advise us all in matters relating to the care of children.”

A small, awkward silence followed—broken only by the sound of Max’s loud chomping.

“You flatter me undeservedly,” Lady Justine said, but she smiled gratefully at Calum.

“I don’t think he flatters you,” Struan said. “I think he speaks the truth, and I, for one, am certainly grateful for your help in the matter of—er—these children.”

“Do you ride?” Saber asked Ella, evidently oblivious to the discomfort he might have caused others in the salon.

Ella raised her pointed chin. “I ride very well, sir.”

“ ’E’s a lord,” Max said, using both hands to pop several sweetmeats into his mouth at once.

“I beg your pardon, my lord,” Ella said, and Calum thought she was considerably more responsive to handsome young Saber than a fifteen-year-old girl should be.

“Not much of a lord,” Max continued with bulging cheeks while lifting a piece of bread to examine the contents of a sandwich. “ ’E’s got an estate, but ’is cousin’s in charge of it, not ’im. Makes ’im testy, Ellie. A nasty temper ’e’s got. Threatening sort. The sort who creeps up on a body and pushes thistles down ’is back.”

“I
beg
your pardon,” Saber said, his mouth falling open.

“Stories, you see,” Ella said, as if that explained everything about her incorrigible brother. “Escapes into ’em.”

“ ’Is estate’s called Shillingdown,” Max said, studying a piece of fruit cake from all sides. “Don’t know where it is, but ’e’s going to try to get control of it. ’Is cousin’s—”

“
Go
to your bed,” Struan thundered. “At once!”

That got through Max’s dramatic muse. He brought his pale red brows down, regarded Struan anxiously and got to his feet. “I don’t think I can find me way to me bed,” he said, sounding querulous. “This is the biggest place I was ever in and—”

“Take him, please, Ella,” Struan interrupted. “Or are you also lost?”

“I’ll take them,” Saber said quickly, detaching himself from the mantel and going to stand over Ella. “Should you care to ride in the morning, Ella?”

“Saber,” Lady Justine said gently, rising to her feet, “we will pursue the question of riding when tomorrow comes. For now, I should like to take Ella and Max to their rooms myself. You stay and talk with Calum and Viscount Hunsingore.”

Lady Justine’s announcement brooked no argument, and the three men bade their good-nights to Ella and Max as the lady shepherded them from the room.

“I like my cousin,” Saber said after the little group had departed. “Justine, that is. She has always been very civil to me.”

“Charming lady,” Struan agreed. “Lovely, too. One wonders why so lovely a woman did not marry and have children of her own.”

“Don’t think the lame leg helped much,” Saber commented.

“If that was the only impediment, then the world is full of foolish men,” Calum said with enough vehemence to draw a warning stare from Struan. Taking his friend’s meaning, Calum forced a laugh. “But then, we know the world is full of foolish men, don’t we?”

Saber, apparently already disinterested in the subject of Lady Justine, turned to Struan and asked, “What is your relationship to the girl Ella, my lord?”

“Please, call me Struan. It seems we may be destined to know each other moderately well.”

“Struan,” Saber said agreeably, and waited expectantly for an answer to his question.

Struan cleared his throat and the clean-cut lines of his face became tinged with red. “The nature of the relationship between Ella and Max and me is somewhat delicate. May we simply agree to accept that I am responsible for them at present?”

“Responsible?” Saber’s handsome young face folded into a study in puzzlement. “What exactly does…” He paused, looking past Calum, and said, “Lady Philipa. Good evening to you.”

Calum turned in time to see Pippa, the tattered gray gown discarded in favor of a lavender silk, standing uncertainly on the threshold.

She said, “Good evening, gentlemen,” but looked at Calum.

He felt everything within him grow still. Overhead, candles flickered in a great chandelier, but the flickering felt distant, its light a gilded glow that hovered about the edges of the space he shared with Pippa, and only with Pippa.

Struan said something.

Calum could not make out the words.

Pippa’s dark blue eyes were luminous, her pale skin even paler than it had seemed before.

Her lips parted and she passed her tongue over their pink fullness.

His insides fell away. Where had the air gone? No air. No way to fill his aching lungs.

Saber said something.

Calum could not make out the words.

He walked toward Pippa, smiling. He knew he smiled because looking at her made him want to smile with everything that he was.

“Calum?”

He heard
her
voice. “Pippa,” he said. “Your eyes make the lavender silk a pale thing.” He knew he was indiscreet. And he did not care.

He was near enough to look down into her upturned face.

She reached up and pressed a finger to his lips, and he realized he screened her from Saber and Struan—and that she was warning him to be careful of what he said.

“I understand Max created a stir,” she said. The words were meant to allay suspicion of any bond between them, but her voice shook. “I passed Justine on my way here.”

They
could not see his face.
“You are beautiful,” he whispered.

Pink washed her cheeks. “I understand Max has a very large imagination for so small a boy.”

“He is ten,” Struan said loudly from behind Calum. “Not so small.”

“Beautiful,” Calum said, so very softly. “Your face is an angel’s face and your body makes my body ache with longing.

Her lips remained parted and her small breasts rose and fell rapidly with the shallow breaths she took.

“Sure you won’t have cognac, Calum?” Saber said. When Calum didn’t respond, he repeated his offer to Struan, who accepted this time.

“I only came to be certain everyone was well cared for,” Pippa said. She attempted to move away from Calum, but he stayed her with a single finger upon the shadowy place between her breasts. “I…I see that you are comfortable. And since I find I’m tired, I’ll bid you a good-night.”

“Good night,” Struan said.

“Later I shall come to you,” Calum murmured.

“What did you say?” Saber inquired.

Calum regarded Pippa’s mouth and held his tongue between his teeth.

“Calum said it’s late and he’s tired, too,” Pippa said, shaking her head slightly.

When she tried to take a step back from him, Calum quickly tucked his finger into the neck of her gown. “I believe I shall walk with Lady Philipa, gentlemen. She knows this labyrinthine monument better than I.” The warm flesh that rose against his skin brought his manhood to throbbing awareness.

The desire in her eyes was not a thing of his imagining. She was, as always, afraid of herself with him—but she wanted him nevertheless.

Would she still want him if she ever had reason to believe he had claimed her to thwart another man?
Would
he claim her to thwart another man? Was he, even now, drawn to her as much by what she represented as by…My God, what price would he pay to claim what had been stolen from him at birth—his soul?

“Thank you, Calum,” Pippa said. “I’ll be glad to make sure you don’t lose your way.”

He drew a deep breath. Oh, regardless of her efforts, the way would be lost here—very lost—and they would both find joy in the losing. Might they be spared pain in the wake of the joy? “Thank you,” he told her. “You will guide me. And for my part, I shall be your protector in the night, my lady.”