How To Host a Seduction (22 page)

Again, and again.

His body gathered and tightened, built with the amazing, gut-wrenching intensity he felt only with her, each stroke making his control slip a little farther from his grasp.

Ellen's breath clashed with his, her low moans—or maybe they were his—mingling with their kisses, as she levered herself with her arms, raised up on tiptoes to meet his thrusts, her sweet bottom slapping softly against him, the erotic sound echoing through the misty night. Then her sex seized up around him as she reached climax. His body exploded.

Grasping for the railing, Christopher used his arms to bracket her before he inadvertently collapsed and sent them both sprawling to the ground. His heart thudded. His thighs shook. He breathed harder than if he'd swum across the bayou, dragging Ellen and the boat behind him.

He'd never felt so damn good.

“Christopher?” Leaning back, she arched her neck until they stood cheek to cheek. “Can we see each other again after we get home? It's not marriage, but will you let it be enough?”

He laughed, a broken sound. “It's enough, love.”

Louis Armstrong Airport

E
LLEN HOISTED HER GARMENT BAG
over her shoulder, waved goodbye to Olaf.

“Take care.” He shot her a dazzling smile and Ellen decided he'd make the perfect hero for Susanna. “You're sure you don't want me to tell you how the mystery wraps up?”

“No, thank you,” she said, for the fourth time since they'd left Félicie Allée. “If you do, you'll rob Lennon and me of a perfectly good reason to spend four hours on the telephone.”

Christopher and Lennon had both insisted on driving her to the airport, but Ellen had refused their offer, a combination of guilt for making them miss valuable sleuthing time and a need to avoid prolonging the goodbyes. She'd intended to call a taxi, but when Miss Q had pulled rank and offered Olaf's services, she'd had no choice but to accept. The woman simply didn't know the meaning of the words “no, thank you.”

With a final wave, she moved with the traffic inside the airport to begin her long wait to the ticketing counter. Her dad had finagled a last-minute commercial flight, and Ellen was almost sorry. Private travel arrangements to Washington, D.C., would have expedited her passage through the
airport security process. She'd likely have been in the air in less than half the time.

Which would have given her less time to brood about leaving.

She was brooding all right, big-time. She wasn't ready for her vacation to be over. Not yet. She'd gotten caught up in the mystery and the missing pieces still nagged at her. She and Christopher were so close, she could feel it.

Maybe she should have just let Olaf tell her how the story resolved and put an end to her suspense. But that would have meant accepting that her part in solving the mystery with Christopher was over. She wasn't there yet, either.

Denial, a truly amazing thing.

Stepping into the long line at her airline counter, she inclined her head in greeting to the mom with the spiky red hair in front of her, opening a bag filled with coloring books, handheld video games and other items to entertain her two girls during the wait.

Propping her garment bag by her side, Ellen decided the fact that the captain and Felicity weren't getting a happily-ever-after only exacerbated her need to solve the mystery. After all, they'd been in love. Those letters…that sort of passion deserved a happily ever after.

She and Christopher deserved it, too.

Maybe that was the real source of her discontent. She'd counted on vacationing until Monday morning, which meant they should still have two full nights to make love before giving up the sort of round-the-clock closeness they'd shared at Félicie Allée. Two nights to prove how much she loved him, before she was back to paying close attention to her comings and goings and how they might be interpreted.

Unless, of course, she married him….

But marriage after six months—three of which they hadn't even spent together? Ellen shook her head. She had to abide by the conventions. Or face the consequences of which her whole family would partake.

She had to play by the rules.

Just like she had to leave today. Her mother was receiving a presidential award, a huge honor…

Mom has received other awards.
…it was understandable that she wanted her family around her…

Would Mom really miss her this once?
…but the press would comment on the missing daughter…

So what? She deserved a life, didn't she?

Yes!

Ellen stared absently through the crowd surrounding her, discontent building as she came face-to-face again with the unpleasant fact that she was the only one holding herself back.

If any of her authors ever put a manuscript on her desk with a heroine who didn't believe in romance heroes and always played it safe, Ellen would have deemed the heroine unworthy of the hero's love, probably unworthy of revisions, too.

Who wanted to read about a heroine who was too scared to take risks? A heroine who let
the one
get away?

Better yet, who wanted to
live
that way?

Okay, technically she wasn't letting Christopher get away. She'd hear from him as soon as he returned to New York. They'd work out some sort of timetable….

But romances were supposed to have happy endings, damn it.

She didn't want a timetable. She wanted to fall asleep tonight in Christopher's arms. She wanted to wake up to
his hot kisses or to him serving espresso and beignets with those dimples flashing.

She wanted a damn happy ending.

I let myself believe it would all work out, and it did.

“Come on, lady. Move it!”

The irritated voice jolted Ellen from her thoughts and she gazed at the scowling man behind her.

He pointed at the ticketing counter. “Your turn.”

Ellen issued an automatic apology, which did nothing to erase his scowl, before she moved to the counter. The clerk smiled, a rather pleasant smile, she thought, given the sort of nonstop chaos the tighter airport security measures inspired.

“Your ticket, please.”

As she handed over her ticket, the poster above the clerk's head caught her eye.

A sleek white cruise ship cutting through turquoise water.

“Ma'am?” the clerk asked, but Ellen didn't reply.

She was too busy remembering the article about a cruise ship heiress in the office at Félicie Allée.

“Ma'am? Is there a problem?”

No problem at all.

Ellen had just found the missing piece to the mystery.

“I'm sorry,” she said, lifting her garment bag from the floor. “I've changed my mind. I won't be making this flight.”

The ticketing clerk stared as if she might be a bomb about to detonate, but before she could comment, Ellen slipped away from the counter and headed back toward the drop-off area.

Finding a reasonably quiet corner to hide from the flow of noisy arrivals, she dug through her bag for her cell phone, pressed the speed dial.

Her dad picked up on the second ring. “Hello, honey, what's up? Not a problem with the flight, I hope.”

“No, the flight's fine, Dad. But I won't be able to make it home for Mom's award.” The declaration came surprisingly easy, which could only mean she'd made the right choice. “Nothing's wrong, so please don't worry. It's just that I'm right in the middle of something important right now. I really can't cut my trip short. Not even for two days.”

“What's this all about? You're sure everything's all right?”

“I promise. I'll explain everything when I get back to town. I just have a commitment to fulfill. I hate missing Mom's acceptance, but I hope you'll both understand, and trust me. Everything's fine. It's better than fine, in fact. It's great. Please just kiss Mom, tell her I'm very proud of her and not to worry. I'll be home in two days.”

“Does this have something to do with Christopher?”

“Yes.”

There was a pause on the other end, then he asked, “Are you happy?”

He was worrying, anyway. She could hear it in his voice. And she loved him for it.

“Yes.”

“He's a very good man, honey. You know how we feel. Nothing has changed.”

“I do know. Thank you.”

“Well, I'll see you at home on Monday,” he said. “We'll talk then. In the meantime, enjoy the rest of your trip.”

“I love you, Dad.”

“I love you, too, honey.”

That was it. He'd obviously known she hadn't reached this decision lightly, and while he might not yet understand
all that her decision entailed, he trusted her to work things out.

The entire process of placing her needs above her family's had taken less than five minutes from start to finish. Lightning hadn't struck. Her dad still loved her. His main concern had been for her happiness.

All the torment over the past few months suddenly seemed ridiculous and unnecessary. She'd been talking herself out of living, to avoid the conflict of her needs and her duty.

This wasn't what her parents wanted for her.

This wasn't what
she
wanted.

Just because she took the left turn instead of the right didn't mean she'd disappointed the people she loved. Yes, she'd made mistakes, but real strength lay in learning from those mistakes and in learning to forgive herself.

Maybe the torment had been necessary, after all.

Let the spin doctors spin. That was what her mother paid them for. Christopher was worth fighting for.

Ellen returned the phone to her purse and headed outside to hail a taxi. But she'd barely made it to the curb, when the sound of a blaring horn caught her attention. She glanced up to see a sleek gray limousine maneuvering toward the pickup ramp. Unable to contain her smile, she waited while it pulled to a stop directly in front of her. The driver's door opened and Olaf stepped out, looking just like a hero from another century in his cutaway jacket.

“And to what do I owe this pleasure?” she asked.

“Miss Q told me to make a few passes, just in case your travel arrangements changed.”

“She did, did she? How very thoughtful.”
How very perceptive.

After circling the limousine, he took her garment bag. “A taxi back to Félicie Allée would cost a small fortune.”

One she gladly would have paid.

“Thanks.” He opened the door and she slipped inside the cool interior. But before he'd closed the door behind her, inspiration struck.

Ellen took a deep breath and gave in to impulse. “Olaf, would you mind making a pit stop before we head back? I need the services of a good jeweler. I assume you know one around here?”

He shot her a dazzling grin. “I do, indeed.”

“Then, if you wouldn't mind…” She sank into the plush seat feeling…
liberated.

Just a few hours later, Olaf dropped Ellen off in front of Félicie Allée with the promise to return her garment bag to the garden suite. She wasn't worried about her clothing, though. She had a wardrobe filled with costumes, one of which she'd soon be donning to hunt down Christopher and share her surprise.

During the drive back, she'd asked Olaf's permission to search the office, and he'd granted her request with a jauntily delivered “The entire plantation is fair game.”

Although he hadn't said anything else, Ellen got the impression he approved her request and that feeling fed her excitement. She entered the hall, considered finding Christopher, but as the hall and the office were both empty, she decided to follow up her idea first.

Ellen headed straight to the wall with the newspaper clipping. It was a brief society piece dated June 1820, a small, innocuous-looking article she was surprised she'd even noticed.

Jack and Félicie Lovett.

Julian and Felicity Lafever.

Goose bumps peppered down Ellen's bare arms. It
had
to be them—which meant the captain hadn't murdered Felicity for revenge or money or by accident. He hadn't murdered her at all. He and Felicity had staged her murder, arranged for her corpse to disappear and left Louisiana to live happily ever after.

It fit perfectly. If the captain had approached the governor on that fateful weekend to ask his permission to marry Felicity and was denied…if defending New Orleans in battle and receiving a presidential pardon weren't enough to make the governor accept him what else could the captain possibly have done to prove himself worthy?

If the governor still intended to force his daughter to marry the mayor's son, then the captain would have only had two choices: let the woman he loved marry another man, or stage her death and sweep her off to a new life in California.

A hero would never give up the woman he loved.

Just like Christopher hadn't. Even though she'd been blind. Even though she'd never given him any reason to hope she'd change her mind. He'd believed enough for the two of them.

Ellen laughed aloud. Here she and Christopher had been thinking that Félicie Allée had been named after the cap
tain's mother—some French variation of “happy Allie.” But now that she thought about it, naming the plantation after his mother didn't make sense. She'd died long before the captain and Brigitte had relocated to Louisiana. The captain had been building the plantation while falling in love with Felicity.

She glanced up at the article again. Félicie Lovett.

Félicie must have been the captain's nickname for her, and Lennon's mother had said the translation of
allée
meant “path.” Félicie's path to the man she loved. A path she hadn't been afraid to take, because she was a heroine worthy of her hero.

Ellen folded her arms across her chest, hugging herself and rocking back on her heels. She had to go find Christopher. He'd know what happened next. Did they present their theory now to Miss Q and Olaf? Or should they wait until the denouement, which wouldn't take place until tomorrow night?

She needed to know because she wanted to take him back to the garden suite and spend the night proving she was very,
very
grateful he'd never given up hope for them.

Ellen glanced back up at the framed article and smiled. Right out in the open for everyone to see. Harley's notion about hiding clues where people would overlook them as obvious had been right on target.