Pure Sin (4 page)

In the following days Flora found Adam Serre much on her mind. Despite the bustle and activity of packing for their journey to the Absarokee
¹
villages, evocative memories of the night at Judge Parkman's keenly affected her concentration. Normally so efficient that her father had long ago relinquished the organization of their expeditions to her, she found herself duplicating lists, forgetting simple tasks, conducting interviews for needed staff with a curious disregard for replies. All because she would suddenly see Adam's smile in her mind, or remember the feel of his hard body or the sensation of his warm mouth on hers, and any continuity of thought would abruptly cease.

On more than one occasion her father remarked on her unusual abstraction.

"There's just so much to do, Papa," she would evasively reply, forcing her mind back from heated memory, aware of the true reason for her preoccupation. Equally aware that such ardent infatuation was a novelty in her life. She'd never been so intensely attracted to a man. As a beautiful woman familiar with male adulation, she'd long ago acquired the habit of casually dealing with lovesick suitors, earning herself the sobriquet Serene Venus within London's elite society. Her affairs of the heart were conducted with playful nonchalance, detached from excessive
feeling—unlike her current tempestuous emotions apropos the hot-blooded Comte de Chastellux. With him an overwhelming, irrepressible lust impelled her. She smiled, thinking how appropriate the word in conjunction with a man so skilled, so spectacular in stamina, so reckless that he made love in dangerous proximity to a houseful of guests. Her smile widened as she sat at the small
bonheur-du-jour
in her sitting room, the lists before her forgotten. She was looking forward to summer on the Yellowstone.

In the days since Adam had returned to his ranch, he took unalloyed pleasure in the tranquillity of life without Isolde. Always a devoted father, he and his daughter Lucie became inseparable. She rode with him when he surveyed the horses in the summer pastures or observed the training runs of the thoroughbreds. Perched on his lap or shoulders, she kept him company at the daily meetings with his men and household staff. With the carte blanche of a favored child, she added her voice to the scheduling discussions, her interruptions politely accepted by her father, his replies always calculated to bring forth a happy three-year-old smile.

From Adam's first day back from Virginia City, Cook's menu had been adjusted to cater to a child's palate, and dinner was served again unfashionably early so Lucie could join her father. After dinner, in lieu of the former de rigueur period of the last few weeks in the drawing room, when a sulky or querulous Isolde had presided over the tea table, Adam and Lucie went directly to the nursery and played together until Lucie's bedtime.

No one had seen Adam so happy in ages.

Like the old days before his marriage, everyone close to him observed.

But beneath the surface a private distraction compromised this life of unruffled well-being, for persistent visions of Flora Bonham continued to tantalize him. He found himself dreaming of her at night, the scenes invariably those of unrestrained passion, and he'd taken to rid-ing out after Lucie fell asleep, avoiding his bed and the searing images. The cold night air helped, and the wide, quiet expanse of moonlit countryside. He felt free from all impediments in the untrammeled, limitless land, one with nature under the star-studded sky, absolved from intemperate desire. And later in the foothills on the northern boundary of his holdings where he always rested his horse, he'd gaze down on the darkened plain with a satisfying sense of accomplishment. He could see for miles, all the rolling country lush with green grass, enough for his herds, for those of his clan, enough to see the horses through the winter. After years of hard work, his ranch was thriving, becoming profitable, his racehorses were acquiring a reputation on the racetracks here and in Europe, and if the persistent greed of the cattlemen pressing the borders of his property didn't develop into an all-out war, he could build a contented, peaceful life here for Lucie and himself. -

Always more cool-headed after the hard ride, his restlessness and hunger for the earl's daughter having dissipated, he was able to dismiss the intoxicating dreams as impractical illusions. Flora Bonham was just a hotter-than-hell female, lush, voluptuous, sensual—but best forgotten. He didn't need any complications in his life.

With travel uncertain due to flooding spring rivers, George Bonham had allowed ample time for the trip north to Adam's ranch. But the weather had cooperated—so much so, that not only did the earl's party arrive without mishap or delay—they arrived one day early at the ranch on the Musselshell.

Only to find their host absent.

He was out tracking some horses stolen from his eastern herd, they were told by his housekeeper as a full retinue of staff came out to greet them. But Adam was scheduled to return for his meeting with the earl, Mrs. O'Brien explained in a lilting Irish brogue, and in the meantime, she finished with a beaming smile and a bobbing curtsy, they were entirely welcome.

Adam's home was handsomely situated against low foothills covered with dark pines. One of the many streams flowing into the Musselshell ran through the grassy meadow in front of the house. Orchards had been planted to the west, the chartreuse tracery of new leaves like feathery down from a distance. The mansion, built of native stone, was vast in dimension; the exterior sprawling with terraces and verandas; the roof, moss-covered slate, verdant green in the cool shadow of the pines; the whole framed by two spiral-staired turrets reminiscent of Blois. A solid French chateau in the wilds of Montana.

They met Lucie soon after their arrival, when she pulled her reluctant nursemaid into the drawing room where Flora and her father were having tea. "I'm Lucie," she informed them with a smile, standing just inside the doorway, her large dark eyes surveying them with childish candor. "This is Baby DeeDee," she added, lifting up the porcelain-faced doll she held by its golden hair. She spoke English with a faint French accent "Papa's gone," she declared with an emphatic shake of her shiny black ringlets.

The young maid, obviously embarrassed by her charge's intrusion, tried to pull her from the room, but Lucie shook her hand free. Breaking away, she ran across the broad expanse of pastel carpet in a flurry of yellow muslin, came to a skidding stop before the tea table, pointed at a strawberry crane cake with a chubby hand, and said, "I'd like that, please."

Flora handed her the cake without hesitation, instantly sealing their friendship, and when she went on to ask the young girl to join them for tea, Lucie's sudden smile reminded her of a similar quirked grin.

Lucie had her father's eyes too, very dark, heavily . lashed, riveting in their beauty, and his same directness of speech. Sitting very straight on a Louis Quinze chair upholstered in coral satin, her short legs barely reaching the perimeter of the cushioned seat, beaded moccasins incongruously peeking out from under her dainty muslin skirt, she proceeded to entertain them with a child's-eye view of
ranch life in Montana Territory while she systematically demolished the tray of sweets. Her vocabulary was precocious for her age, though Flora quickly realized a surfeit of personal staff no doubt accounted for her language skills. The drawing-room doorway had quickly filled with hovering nursemaids.

"I'm almost four," she said when asked her age, holding up the proper number of fingers. "How old are you?" she inquired pointing a whipped-cream-covered finger at Flora and her father. When she heard their ages, she thought for a moment before declaring, "I think Belle-mere and Maman are like that. But Maman went to France to live with Bellemere. She hates the dirt, Papa said. And we don't have pav-ed streets," she went on, pronouncing the word with two syllables. "I like my pony Birdie, and I've never seen a pav-ed street. Have you?"

"The city I live in has many paved streets, but I like the country too," Flora replied. "What color is your pony?"

"She's a paint. My cousin Raven taughted me to ride. Do you want to see her? Birdie likes cookies." Grabbing a handful of cookies, she'd already begun sliding off her chair.

George Bonham politely declined the invitation, preferring a peaceful brandy and a cigar after their long ride, so Flora went alone with her small guide. Lucie brought Flora up to the nursery first—because she needed her riding boots, she said with the seriousness of a well-learned injunction—and after exchanging her moccasins for boots, she proceeded to introduce Flora to all her nursemaids—who were hovering now in a different locale; her favorite toys merited introductions as well. She was enchanting like her father, Flora thought, charming with ease as she took Flora in tow, and, beginning with Birdie, gave her a grand tour of the ranch, the countryside, and the spacious house.

The progression of the tour was informal, dictated by Lucie's schedule and fancy, and in the process of looking for Lucie's misplaced riding quirt the next day, Flora found herself standing in the doorway of Adam's bedroom.

A sudden heat raced through her senses, uncontrollable, heedless of circumstance, and she wondered at her loss of restraint. It was only an empty room, she told herself, an austere chamber with hardly any indication of the man who inhabited it. But she felt the hot sensation regardless of the monkish atmosphere, as if Adam were standing before her, reaching out to touch her.

Lucie was chattering at her side, tugging at her hand to guide her within. And as Flora stepped over the threshold into the room, she was struck by his fragrance. It pervaded the large chamber, subtle, seductive; his skin and hair smelled like this—of pine and mountain sage, with undertones of bergamot.

"See," Lucie was saying, and Flora shook away the overpowering weight of fragrant memory. "That's me."

A small pastel portrait on a gold easel held a place of honor on a bedside table, and an exquisite rendition of Adam's daughter smiled up at her. The polished wood surface was otherwise bare, as was the matching table on the opposite side of the oversize mahogany bed. Her gaze dwelled for a moment on the plain white seersucker coverlet crisply tucked under the pillows and around the mattress, the corners almost military in their preciseness, and she found herself jealously wondering how Isolde looked against such pristine purity. She'd seen Isolde's room yesterday when Lucie had brought her in to show off the shiny green eyes on the gilded swans decorating her mother's bed; Flora had taken note of the fashionable Winterhalter portrait over the mantel of a delicate woman with flaxen hair and a sultan's ransom in diamonds adorning her bosom. Adam had married a very beautiful woman.

Isolde's rooms were ornamented lavishly in swathed silk and gold tassels, gilded stucco work shimmering on the woodwork, the walls richly covered in rose damask. The suite was filled with pillow-strewn furniture upholstered in pale silks, expensive porcelains and bric-a-brac in lavish array adorned every tabletop, small gold-framed paintings of bucolic landscapes covered the walls. The scene was reminiscent of a stage set, a rococo palace. Or an expensive bordello.