Spanish Serenade (20 page)

It was his silence, the loss of that bantering, caustic, vigorous voice, that troubled Pilar the most. It was as if the most vital part of him had been extinguished, for that voice was the reflection of the complex operation of his mind. That it might be stilled by his own will was infuriating; that it might not was insupportable. The strain of not knowing which was more than she could bear. It was that loss, finally, that compelled her to go forward.

It was late evening of what had been a perfect day. They had spent the best part of forty-eight hours in port in the Canary Islands, loading fruit and wine and Turkey carpets, plus another passenger or two. Then they had sailed with that morning's tide. The seas had been calm, the air balmy, and the breezes from the right quarter. There had been a red sunset that splashed rose and carmine, lilac and violet-blue and orange-gold across the western sky, and stained the water with opaline reflections. The last lingering flares of color shone through the open porthole of the cabin. They made pink gleams on the walls and dappled Pilar's arms and face with the iridescence of mother-of-pearl as she sat finishing her dinner, which had been brought on a tray. Refugio, who had already been fed the small amount of gruel he would take, lay propped on pillows, watching her. The refracted light, catching in his eyes, gave him a deceptive look of dazzled appreciation.

The light began to fade with the swift fall of night common to these latitudes. As shadows gathered in the cabin, Pilar rose from the table, picked up her tray and set it outside the door. Shutting the door panel, she locked it. As she turned away she began to take the pins from her hair. It uncoiled in a thick rope that slowly loosened, becoming a dark gold swath across her shoulders and down her back to well past her waist. Loosening it with her fingers, she moved to the corner washbasin.

She poured water from the can sitting ready into the basin, then washed her bands. Taking up a cloth, she wet it and squeezed it out, then ran it over her face and neck with slow care. Tossing back her hair, she put down the cloth, then began to unlace the bodice of her soft green silk gown with its open-fronted skirt.

There was a polished-steel looking glass above the basin, small but adequate for the purpose. Pilar kept her gaze on it as she spread the laces of her whaleboned bodice wide, then slipped her arms from the sleeves and lifted the gown off over her head. She tossed the gown onto a chair. Next came her decorative top petticoat of yellow silk embroidered in forest-green. She kicked off her shoes and peeled the stockings from her legs, then untied the tapes of her under petticoats before letting them fall to billow around her ankles. She stepped out of them with swift grace and draped them on the chair also. Clad only in her shift with its low neck, three-quarter length sleeves, and short length which barely covered her knees, she took up her washing cloth again.

Pilar had grown accustomed to making her toilette in front of Refugio; there had been no help for it since his injury. She had always preserved her modesty by taking care to draw one piece of clothing off only under the protective covering of another. She had also chosen times when she thought her patient slept, though sometimes she thought she heard a change in his breathing, which drew her attention, or else turned to find that he had shifted positions. When she looked, however, his eyes were always closed. Gradually, she had become used to his presence. Almost.

She didn't know if Refugio was watching now. He had not been asleep when she began, of that much she was certain. She felt exposed, as if her shift was transparent. The breeze from the open porthole blew the thin material against her so it outlined every curve. It dried the moisture left on her skin as the cloth passed over it, causing goose flesh from the coolness and the prickling of her nerves in anticipation of the moment to come.

Finally it was upon her.

Her heart swelled inside her, pulsing with a heavy, jarring beat. Her hands shook, and she could feel the slow burning rise of a flush making its way to her hairline. She swallowed hard. Quickly, before she could change her mind, she opened the neckline of her shift, slid it from her shoulders and let it drop to the floor.

She closed her eyes tightly, as if shutting out her own view would hide her nakedness. Doubt about the wisdom of what she was doing swept over her. If she stopped now, if she picked up her shift and skimmed back into it, she could pretend that letting it fall had been an accident. She could go on just as before; everything would be the same.

But what would that help, what would it prove? No. She had discovered the one small weakness in Refugio's armor, and she must pursue it. She must, or they might all be lost.

She bent her head so that the shining curtain of her hair slid forward, offering a degree of concealment. Behind it she reached to squeeze out the cloth once more. She ran it with minute care over her breasts and down her sides to her abdomen and thighs, which under their slender turns shimmered with dampness like palest alabaster. Moving in self-conscious grace, she lifted each leg, smoothing over the calves and ankles, bending to wipe even the soles of her feet. Her ablutions completed, she dropped the cloth and picked up her hairbrush. With lashes lowered, faintly quivering, she began to draw it through her tresses, removing the tangles, polishing the thick strands so they glowed with the sheen of old gold coins there in the gathering dusk.

When she was done, she put the brush down. She breathed slowly once, twice, then turned with precision and care. Lifting her chin, she walked toward the berth where Refugio lay.

He was awake, and he was watching.

Pilar, seeing his gaze upon her, faltered, with the blood draining from her face. There was rage and frustration in his eyes, and something more that had the look of hunger. It was the last that gave her the courage to take the step that brought her to the edge of the berth. She refused to look at him again, however, as she sat down beside him.

He recoiled from her in haste, retreating until his shoulders were against the bulkhead. His movement left her more room. She took it, because it seemed that if she did not lie down, she might well slide off the edge of the berth to the floor. Trembling in every fiber, she lowered herself to recline on the mattress. She turned toward him, supporting herself on one elbow, then swung her legs up and stretched out beside him.

For long moments neither of them moved or spoke. The breeze from the window flowed over them, ruffling the sheet that covered Refugio to the waist, lifting tendrils of Pilar's long hair so that they drifted toward him like delicately searching fingers. The bunk was so narrow that their legs touched from the thigh downward. The movement of the ship rocked them closer still, easing them together with a slow, plunging rhythm.

His breathing was harsh, the rise and fall of his chest under his bandaging rapid. Concern touched Pilar. With a frown gathering between her eyes, she reached out toward him, placing her cool fingertips on the pulse at the strong hollow of his throat.

He shot out his hand to catch her wrist in a bone-wrenching grip. His voice hoarse, grating with anger, he demanded, “Why?”

Triumph moved deep inside her, a counterpoint to the strained terror that gripped her. She had to moisten her lips before she could speak. “Vanity, what else?” she answered with more bravado than she felt. “What woman could resist the possibility of bringing a man back to life?”

“Try again. Try maudlin self-sacrifice brought on by pity in barrels, topped off with a layer of compassion.”

“Oh, no, I've discovered the price for pitying you already. As for the rest, I wouldn't dream of trespassing on your territory.”

His eyes narrowed. “I have my reasons for what I'm doing. They have nothing to do with self-sacrifice or compassion. Or with you.”

“But they must if I'm required to play handmaiden and nursing drudge, not to mention sleeping on the floor.”

“The floor is hard, as I have reason to know, but that doesn't explain what you're doing here beside me.”

“Will you accept curiosity?”

“You are here to try whether what you guessed the other night was right? You could have done that from across the room just now, if you had cared to look. Perhaps you are concerned for your safety? Surely you know that my men will protect you. Indeed, after watching and listening to them with you these last few days, I'm not sure they wouldn't protect you before me.”

“Maybe I object to being set up as bait with you?”

“In that case you should go elsewhere.”

“And leave you defenseless? How could I? Besides, you are supposed to be my protector.”

“So you play at being the mistress, all hovering concern and sympathy, while plotting to undermine whatever I might be doing out of sheer interference and juvenile revenge.”

She met his gaze without flinching, though the pounding of her blood in her veins made her feel ill. “You are trying to insult me so I will leave you alone. What is it you're afraid of? Is it what I might do, or is it just me?”

“Take care, cara. There may be more life than you bargain for left in me, and less judgment. I warn you that I have a headache like a Norse god's own hammer beating in my head, and inclinations that if turned to wind could blow this ship to Havana by morning. And I have never been more your protector than at this moment.”

“I'll take care,” she said, her voice low and soft, “if you'll rejoin the living.”

Refugio stared at her for long moments, while inside he felt the slow loosening of the bindings of his will. This sweet temptation was more than a man should be expected to resist. That he had scant strength to try was not due to his injury so much as to the long days of living close to Pilar. It had been purgatory to be so close, to watch her dress her hair while the movements stretched her bodice across the fullness of her breasts, to catch her delicate female scent as she brushed past him, to lie and listen to her soft breathing as she slept and know that to touch her was forbidden to him by every rule of decency.

She had breached those rules, deliberately discarding them. He understood the reasons she gave, but though he doubted they were the only ones, did not dare ask for more. What she was doing was not lightly undertaken, of this much he was certain. Nor could it be lightly dismissed, not without causing her great humiliation. She might be able to bear that; he could not.

It was possible he was weaker than he knew, else surrender would not have so potent an allure. He was defeated. He had known it from the moment she turned and walked toward him, the moment he realized that she had not forgotten he was there. Dear God, but the imprint of that moment would be burned forever into his mind.

She was magnificent in her determined seduction, lying there with conquered fear and some strange exultation in the dark and mysterious depths of her eyes. Her skin was like rare pink marble in the dying light of the day, her breasts as perfect as small sweet melons, her waist slender and sculpted as if to fit his hands, her hips gently curving with their own delicious symmetry, beckoning with every rise and fall of the ship. The rich, wild silk of her hair gleamed, enticing where it lay over her shoulder, shimmering with the quick beat of her heart. So enticing.

He drew a ragged breath, letting it out on a slow, soft sigh. Lifting a hand, he closed his fingers in the skein of her hair, winding the silken strands about his fist.

“Is it stalemate, then?” he whispered in aching tenderness as be drew her nearer. “I could also protect you by holding you naked in my arms. I could say it was to improve both our disguises, could I not? Did I warn you about my impaired judgment? I'm awash in sophistry and excuses and passionate good intentions, or else good, passionate intentions—”

The last word was smothered against her mouth. The touch of his lips was warm and a little dry from the fever, sweet and tender and rigorously restrained. He molded her mouth to his, tasting the moist honey, tracing the tender curves with the tip of his tongue while he released her hair and encircled her with his arms. With soft hesitation her lips parted under his. His grasp tightened and a shudder ran over him. Raising himself on the pillows, he shifted so she was rolled to her back. Delicately invading, he touched the small, sharp edges of her teeth with the tip of his tongue, then pressed deeper as if seeking the source of her sweetness.

Pilar strained against him, sliding her arms upward to clasp them around the strong column of his neck. Her breasts pressed against his chest, flattened on the hard planes and the rough swath of his bandaging. Fueled by urgent need and vestiges of the self-sacrifice she had denied, she felt the swift rise of ardor. It burned along her veins so that her skin seemed heated from the inside, glowing with awakening sensitivity. She curled her fingers into the dark waves of his hair with a soft murmur in her throat of confused and flustered desire.

She accepted his tongue, twining it with her own in sinuous exploration. Then, in growing boldness, she followed his retreat to taste the smooth inner surfaces of his lips. Lost in a wondrous blossoming of the senses, she felt time and place recede. All that was left was the descending darkness and the man who cradled her to him.

His hold loosened. For an instant she knew a fluttering disappointment, then her breath caught in her throat as she felt the open palm of his hand on the skin of her abdomen. He spanned its flatness, smoothing the firm, fine-grained skin in gentle circles before trailing his fingers inexorably downward toward the soft triangle at the apex of her thighs. At the same time, he bent his head and pressed the wet heat of his mouth to her breast.