Must Have Been The Moonlight (33 page)

“If it’s your pride that taunts you, then count this coup lost by force.”

Again he lowered his mouth to hers. He held her and kissed her. Her lips trembled, but her fingers relaxed. He was aware of the supple contrast of her body to each sinew and tendon of his, of the smell of peat, the scent of roses, his own lust. Her plaintive sigh touched her ears. He caught her lips and his hunger coiled low in his abdomen to knot with his need. The heat gathered in his groin and between her legs where he’d set his hand.

Let her be angry with him. He reached between them and
freed himself. At least it was passion equal to his. He slid one finger into the depth of her, parting her, exploring the musky clefts and shallow dips. Touching her was like touching fire. He groaned into her mouth. Her palms slid upward into his hair. For a moment his own limbs seemed weighted as she responded, taking from him the fight he waged. She pressed her forehead against his, then looked down at her limbs entwined with his, bringing his gaze to hers. “You are so beautiful,” she said.

Even in the dimness her gaze was a startling blue. Brianna’s eyes held his and did not turn away. The rhythm of her movements escalated his, and she cradled his face between her hands, and kissed his mouth. He had thought it impossible to feel more than he did. Then the power surrounding them took him, rushed over him until he couldn’t breathe within the roaring tempest, and, shoving his fingers into her hair, at last he groaned and poured himself into her.

Brianna opened her eyes. Her clothes still in disarray, she lay on her side beneath a blanket, her arm tucked beneath her head. Michael sat on a chair beside the bed. Already dressed, he was wearing his heavy coat, and leaning with his elbows on his knees as he watched her sleep.

Her cheeks flushed, she felt the corners of her mouth tilt. “What are you thinking?” she asked.

A shadow cooled the line of his jaw and contrasted with his eyes. She was reminded of the first time she’d ever seen him—tall and dangerous, in his long hooded robe as she’d met the soft glitter of those silver eyes. “I’m thinking that you and I are finished with separate chambers,” he said. “It’s time that you occupied yourself with your duty to me as my wife.”

Brianna sat up in bed. After a moment of struggling with her stays, she startled as he moved her hands aside and performed the feminine task with annoying familiarity and speed.

“If I can undo them, the least I can do is repair the damage before I go on my way.”

Brianna slapped his hands away and stumbled out of bed. “You are so cavalier,” she said in absolute confusion. “How can I even feel anything for you at the moment?”

He caught her hand and pulled her into his arms. She dared not meet the diamond sharpness of his gaze, but he tipped her chin and she was left wondering if she did not love him completely. Then he turned her around and finished hooking her gown. “Will you miss me then?”

“Probably not.”

He set her cloak on her shoulders and gently tended to the clasps. “That’s good because I won’t miss you either.” His arms flexed against the fine wool of his coat as he bent and gave her a kiss that curled her toes.

Later, huddled in her cloak, Brianna listened to Michael’s voice outside the carriage as he spoke to the driver. The sun had set and the wind had died. Then the coach jerked forward in a clamor of chains and harnesses and she caught herself. Michael remained a lone figure in the street. Pressing against the window, she watched the gently falling snow swallow her husband’s dark form.

A
s she had every morning for the past two weeks, Brianna awakened to the dreary sound of rain on her window and the undaunted patter of Gracie moving around in her dressing room. Only this morning a scream rent the air and Brianna shot straight up in bed. A tray crashed to the floor. Heart slamming against her ribs, wearing a diaphanous gown worthy of Aphrodite, Brianna raced through her dressing room into the salon before she’d remembered to grab her derringer. Gracie stood over the contents of a shattered teapot, steam still rising from the floor, and a lone frog calmly hopping its way toward the door.

“It touched my shoe, mum,” Gracie fretted, twining her fingers. “Startled the life out of me.”

A sigh of relief escaped from Brianna’s mouth. After rescuing the newspaper from the floor, she went to the wall and rang the bell, but a footman had already reached her door. Winded, he straightened to present himself.

She calmly handed the frog to him. “Please return him to the greenhouse.”

“Be grateful it isn’t summer or you’d have had worse,
mum,” he said. “Lady Amber ’as gone through a dozen governesses with what she finds in that place.”

Coupled with the prickly pinecones placed in Brianna’s bed a week ago, the poor frog hardly merited the drama. But Gracie was old, and Brianna had to take into account the possibility of heart failure should these incidents continue.

“And please send up someone to clean this mess.” Brianna shut the door.

“You shouldn’t have taken her ball, mum,” Gracie fretted.

“She was throwing it against my bedroom window.”

Lady Caroline had withdrawn to London after her hospital benefit and would not be back for another week. Though the baby had gone with her mother, Amber Catherine had not, as attested to the incident that morning and the feline that curled around Brianna’s feet.

Smiling to herself, Brianna picked up the cat and scratched behind its ears. He was a friendly orange tom with huge rolling purrs. They’d become close friends, mostly owing to a healthy stash of catnip Brianna carried around with her these days. She’d made sure that Amber’s cat followed her everywhere.

Walking to her desk, Brianna spread out the paper. Every day she scoured the various London dailies for any news of possible interest. She’d waited for letters. But Michael hadn’t written.

Alex had scribed numerous posts and mentioned that he’d been to see her and had spoken with Charles Cross. Caroline had written to Amber. Brianna noted that she was staying at her brother’s Grosvenor Square residence. But from Michael, she’d heard nothing.

The man who had taken such wicked delight in tormenting her in Cairo, who had encouraged her independence, defied her brother, and welcomed her boldness, now didn’t even seem to remember that he had a wife. She wanted to hate him at that moment. She wanted to hate him for taking away her independence, for his warmth, and for all the ways
he’d insinuated himself into her heart. She wondered why she tortured herself over him at all.

Brianna dressed and went downstairs. The library was the one place in the house that she’d found refuge since living at Aldbury Park. The books she’d been reading ranged from law to various legal cases ultimately presided over by the House of Lords. Because Michael would soon be taking his seat in parliament, she’d found such works fascinating.

But that morning after breakfast, Brianna merely propped her chin in her hand and stared out the large glass windows. As usual, she’d been the only one in attendance at her meal. An entire sennight of mornings had dawned cold, the skies bleak, the very air she breathed a chilly gray. Or at least it seemed that way as she stirred her tea and mentally went over her plans for the day. She was too busy to miss Michael.

It wasn’t until she’d read the society column two days later and saw the Duke of Ravenspur mentioned prominently as a guest at Lord and Lady Bedford’s spring soiree that Brianna decided not to read the paper anymore. Steeling herself, she closed the
Times
and left the room.

“My apologies, your Grace. But his grace’s orders were very explicit.” The stable master wiped his hands on a rag before hanging it on the stall door. He wore mucking boots that went to his knees.

Brianna laid her gloved hand on the mare’s long nose. She wore a simple blue muslin gown beneath her cloak. “I didn’t come here to ride, Mr. Freeman. Do not worry. I have no doubt the price of your disobedience to my husband’s royal edict.”

Once, that morning, she’d been prepared to fly to London. She wanted to ride to him wherever he was. For what? She wondered why she tortured herself at all. If Michael had wanted her there, he’d have brought her.

Drawing in a breath, Brianna lowered her hand from the mare. “Your granddaughter didn’t show up this morning at the lodge. Is she all right?”

“Don’t you know? The countess told everyone yesterday that if anyone returned to the lodge, she would have them all arrested for trespassing. I’m sorry, your Grace. I thought you knew.”

“No, I didn’t.”

Once back at the house, Brianna handed off her cloak and gloves to the footman and, holding her skirts, swept up the stairs. She had once cherished the hope that she and her mother-in-law could be close, but that had ended her first week at Aldbury.

Dr. Blanchard was leaving the countess’s suite as Brianna reached the rooms. “Good morning, your Grace.”

Brianna stopped him. “Is she ill?”

“Ill enough to discharge me, your Grace,” he said indignantly.

“You are not discharged,” Brianna said flatly.

“Thank you, your Grace.” He looked over her shoulder at the door. “She is in bed with her usual headache. You go in at your own risk.”

Brianna stepped into the rooms. With a quiet swish of her skirts she moved into the bedchamber. The heavy velvet curtains were drawn against the light. A lone lamp on a dresser beside the bed cast light on the occupant lying in bed with a rag over her eyes. Chamberlain sat beside the bed, his elbows braced on his knees. The two were talking.

“Is she all right?” Brianna asked.

The countess removed the rag over her eyes long enough to view her intruder with a groan and lie back on her pillows. “Did I not tell you that she would be up here,” the countess murmured. “Tell her I am ill and dying and wish not to be disturbed.”

Brianna arched her brow. “Tell the countess that I am standing in the room and she can tell me herself, for I am not leaving.”

“Tell her that she is insolent.”

“I’m still not leaving.”

With a sharp gasp, the countess struggled up on one
elbow. Fully dressed and bound like a sausage, it was no wonder she thought she was dying. Michael’s mother, with her classical facial structure, high cheekbones, and wide mouth, still held a hint of her past beauty, even as she glared at Brianna. “The lodge is mine,” she said flatly.

“His Grace agreed to handle the problem,” Chamberlain hastened to say. “Clearly, he chose not to do so. She paints at the lodge in the summer months.” His voice lowered. “The place is her refuge, your Grace.”

“Do not whisper around me, Chamberlain, as if I require a hearing tube. It is not a refuge. I only go there to escape here so I can paint in peace.”

Unfortunately, Brianna understood. The lodge’s very popularity through the Aldbury generations was evidenced by toys and other artifacts she found there. “Then you’re the artist?” Brianna had admired the woman’s talent so much that she’d hired the carpenter to frame the pieces she’d found. “There is a whole trunk of wonderful work in the cellar—”

“You did not find my work in a trunk.”

Brianna looked around the room and saw similar drawings hanging in frames on her wall. “The work belongs to his grace,” Chamberlain said. “From when he was younger.”

“James was forever doodling.” His mother lay back on the bed. “Drawing Spanish galleons and pirates. Such a fanciful boy. Gentle. His father disliked that immensely.”

Fanciful? Gentle? That the man known in Egypt as El Tazor had ever picked up a paintbrush shocked her. “What happened to him?” She straightened her shoulders. “I mean…you must have been very proud of his talent.”

A visible inhalation from the countess preceded a sigh. “If there is anything to be proud of, it is that he has survived his life this long.”

Brianna looked at the miniature galleon on the wall. “Why didn’t he join the Royal Navy?” She couldn’t help asking.

“Because his father expected him to join the navy.” The
countess removed the rag from her eyes. “Why did you say you are here?”

“What about you? What did you want him to do?”

“I was only his mother. One does not tell James to do anything.” She glared at Chamberlain. “One does
not
tell him that a bride would be chosen for him upon his return to England.”

Brianna found it unfortunate that the countess had lost the ability to laugh or smile—like everyone in this house—for otherwise she might have found humor in her own thoughts. As for Michael’s reason for marrying her in the first place, Brianna had already suspected the worst, and found it a moot fact.

After a moment she decided that what she had learned here today far outweighed her current work at the lodge. She would let that rest for now. “My maid is very good with herbs and can help you with your headaches.” Brianna didn’t know if the countess had heard the quiet words. “I’ll send her in here.”

Nodding to Chamberlain, Brianna turned to leave.

“You’ll be disappointed here,” the countess said, stopping Brianna at the door. “It takes more than a new wardrobe and etiquette lessons to make a duchess. Isn’t that what you told me, Lord Chamberlain?”

Brianna met the man’s gaze, and he suddenly became engrossed by some defect on his sleeve. As for the countess, she wasn’t going to get off the maternal hook so easily. Brianna knew that if she possessed one talent in life, it was that she could scale walls. At least if they weren’t too high. “Then perhaps it is time that you and I begin enjoying afternoon tea together,” she graciously offered. “And you can help me learn.”

Later, Brianna found herself in Michael’s room, her mood greatly dissipated and fragile as she stood over his bed. One would have expected a former artist to exist in ordered chaos. Unlike her room, cluttered with every monument and testament to her life from photographs to lacy doilies that
had once belonged to her grandmother, nothing of himself lined the walls or shelves—no piece of furniture had been moved. Her arms wrapped against her torso.

The curtains were open to the stars, and it seemed to Brianna as she leaned a shoulder against the window that she should not be missing Michael, or feeling remotely sympathetic about his upbringing or sorry for his mother, for it seemed that the countess could have displayed more backbone in defense of her son. But the past few months had taken its toll on her body and made her weak—so she did miss him.

Staring at the moon, she only remembered feeling this trampled once—when she’d fallen off the roof with her friend Rachel. But it was impossible to tell which made her feel worse.

Missing Michael. His family. Or two broken ribs.

“There’s someone here to see you, your Grace.”

Brandy in hand, Michael turned from his place at the window before he realized that he was not the one being addressed. Bedford’s butler had stepped into the smoky parlor and pulled Lord Bedford from a game of whist. With typical British impassivity, Michael returned his attention to the window. His reflection stared back at him like a shadow on ice, his shirt white beneath his waistcoat and jacket, pulling color from the glass. He could see over his shoulder as Lord Ware entered the room where a dozen of Bedford’s associates waited for him that evening.

Michael found the moon had again captured his gaze for no apparent reason, as it seemed wont to hide behind the clouds. He’d been in London over two weeks.

A sweep of the docks had begun three days ago near the point where Finley discovered the two dead men. The bodies had been exhumed from a pauper’s grave at Potter’s Field and reexamined after a scarab tattoo was located on the wrist of one.

“A spot of congratulations to you, your Grace.” Lord
Ware’s undersecretary stood eagerly beside him, smelling overwhelmingly of ale and not the least bit disinclined to complain that he’d lost a fortune to Bedford in whist.

The man’s eagerness faded when Michael turned. “In what way?”

“Your name was mentioned prominently at Lord Ware’s office today. It seems you have provided the first break in a case that has kept the government of two countries at heel for two years.”

Without reply, Michael drank from the brandy snifter. He’d done little but follow up on Finley’s information, a source that he owed to his wife. The real break in the case had come from the most unlikely of sources.

“Mr. Cross is here, your Grace.” The undersecretary stood aside, and Michael’s eyes locked on Cross standing beside Ware, handing his coat over to the butler.

Michael set down his brandy with the same aversion he’d felt when he discovered Cross in London. Not only did the man work for the Foreign Ministry; he was the chief adviser in Egyptian antiquities. He’d taken charge of the amulet Michael had given him.