Tempted By the Night (16 page)

He backed away from her. “You wished for what?!”

“To know all your secrets,” she repeated. That wasn’t the entire truth, but given the outraged look on his face, and the frisson of fear running down her spine, she stilled her tongue from telling him the rest.

Besides, she wasn’t ready to reveal hers. Not anytime soon.

“How could you wish for that sort of thing? Why, discovering a man’s secrets could take a lifetime.”

A lifetime?
“Oh, dear,” she whispered. “I hadn’t thought of that.”

“Apparently not,” he shot back, his hand swiping through his hair. He paced back and forth in front of her.

Hermione drew back her toes for fear of having them trod on. “In my defense, I believe I only meant to learn the important ones.”

“Such as?”

“Well, I would have thought discovering who you are, or rather what you are, and well…” Her cheeks grew hot again and she tripped over her tongue as she tried to say it. “Being with you…in your…”

“If you are going to make these wishes, you better damned well be able to say it. Sex. We were having a tumble, a bit of fun.”

“Yes, that,” she replied, the sting of his blunt words leaving her tiffed.
A tumble?
Of all the cheek! She’d have this wretched ring on her hand for the rest of her life if that was all she garnered. “I would have thought that would have done the trick, but it is still on tight.” She held out her hand to him, but then remembered he couldn’t see it.

Meanwhile, the earl paced about the room.

Hermione retreated behind the chair. “I don’t understand what has you in this state.”

Rockhurst whirled around, finger wagging anew. “You wished yourself into my life. Without my permission.”

“You didn’t seem to mind a little while ago,” she shot back, her temper getting the better of her, “when you were
tumbling
me.” Hermione tried to stop herself, but she was in a pique now. “And if you would but look at it from my point of view, this is entirely your fault—”

“Is this about your demmed slippers again
—”

“Oh, bother my slippers
—”

“I’ll buy you an entire shopful,” he finished, his hands waving in the air.

Hermione eased around him and gathered up her gown and boots. “Perhaps it would be better if I left,” she offered. Then she made the mistake of brushing past him.

“Oh, no,” he said, catching hold of her. “No, you aren’t going anywhere. Not until sunrise. Until I know all your secrets, my little mistress of the shadows.”

All her secrets? That would never do. For then he’d
discover who she was, and Hermione couldn’t bear that. To see the disappointment on his face? To no longer be his “Shadow”? His minx. But merely Lady Hermione Marlowe, and one of
those
Marlowes to boot.

No. She wasn’t about to reveal anything. Not yet. So she tried to shake herself free, but he wasn’t letting go.

Rather, he towed her over to a chair, where he dropped down into it, and then pulled her into his lap. Up against his chest, right there where she would have to spend the rest of the night looking directly at his lips—knowing full well what they were capable of doing to a woman.

And when the sun came up, she could only guess his reaction.

Lady Hermione Marlowe? I beg your pardon for ruining you. How will you ever forgive me? Perhaps by doing me the honor of becoming my wife?

That was about as likely as her becoming a scholar.

Biting her lips together, she thought as hard as she could to come up with some way to escape him. If only he would fall asleep…she stole a furtive glance up at him and found him staring moodily into the fire. And, unfortunately, wide-awake.

If I could slip away and steal the key from his jacket.

She glanced around the shadowy room but couldn’t spy where his jacket had landed when he’d flung it off. Just before…

He’d kissed her so ruthlessly…teased her until she’d…

Hermione’s face flamed to life. Gads, she needed to concentrate on the problem at hand, not continue wool
gathering about the earl’s prowess…in other matters. But it was rather hard to think of anything else when he persisted on holding her bundled up against his hard chest…perched atop his lap and his hard…

She shuddered again.

“Cold?” he asked.

“No,” she told him. Quite the contrary.
Oh, why didn’t I listen to Quince and just stay home and play casino.
That’s it. Cards. They always made her mother sleepy. “You wouldn’t happen to have a deck of cards, do you?”

“No.”

“Any books?”

“I would have thought you were tired of reading.”

“Well, I cannot sit here all night atop you like this,” she blustered, wiggling in his lap to emphasize her point.

“I should have killed you when I had the chance last night,” he muttered.

“Excuse me?” she said, a ripple of outrage running down her spine.

He turned to face her. “I said, ‘I should have killed
—’”

“Yes, yes, I heard you the first time. But you can’t kill me.” She crossed her arms over her chest and wished he could see the self-assurance she’d pasted on her face. “Need I remind you what the Covenant says?”

“Not more Podmore!” He shook his head. “Utter fabrication!”

“Thou shalt not use your power to harm your fellow kith and kin,” she quoted.

“None of my ‘kith or kin’ turn up invisible,” he
pointed out. His sarcasm landed as sure as the arrow she’d shot at Melaphor.

“Podmore says that in the Legend of the Paratus
—”

He got up and dumped her quite unceremoniously on the floor. “One more word about that idiot, and I
will
kill you.”

She crossed her arms over her chest. “This bickering is getting us no closer to solving my problem. If you are such an expert on these matters, why don’t
you
tell me the Legend of the Paratus?”

“Tell you
—”

“Yes, why not? Perhaps if you tell me the tale, it will give me enough information to end my wish.” Hermione pressed her lips together, knowing full well that her wish would only come true once he knew all her secrets, but what she really needed to do was find some way to end all this talk of killing.

Especially killing her.

“If I knew everything about the Paratus, at the very least it might loosen the ring up a bit.”

“Yes, perhaps,” he growled, pacing about in front of her. “But you sit there,” he said pointing at the ottoman beside the chair.

“In the darkest days of England’s history, there was a champion who rose above all others,” he began.

“The first Earl of Rockhurst?”

“Yes,” he said.

“The first Paratus?” she asked, her hand coming to rest on his sleeve.

The moment her fingers touched him, a spark ignited inside him.

What was it about this prattling little minx that had his blood racing every time she touched him…or he touched her?

Rockhurst paused and slanted a long glance at the ottoman where she sat. “Do you want me to tell the story, or do you want to?”

“Oh, so sorry,” she said, pulling her hand back. “Please, continue.”

He regretted the loss of her touch, but continued anyway. “Thomas of Hurst was his name—”

“As in Rockhurst,” she said.

“Yes, well, the ‘Rock’ part came later.”

“And Thomas, which is your given name, is it not?”

“Yes.”

“But no one calls you Thomas.”

This stopped him, for it was true. No one had. Not even his Aunt Routledge, not even Mary. It had been so long since he’d heard his Christian name, he’d nearly forgotten he possessed one. “No. No one does.”

“Oh,” she whispered.

And then she was silent, as if pondering this point, so he continued, “As I was saying, Thomas gained vast lands and wealth with his skill at the blade and jousting.”

Even before he took a breath, she was embellishing the tale anew. “And he ruled over the people in his domain with great care and honesty. A nobleman and a hero in every sense of the word.”

He glanced over at her, quirking a brow.

“Oh dear! I did it again.” Her hand returned to his sleeve and squeezed his forearm. “I’m afraid I have a fondness for French novels. And the hero is always just and honest, and so I assumed…” her dithering stopped, and there was a moment of silence before she said, “I won’t do it again. I promise.”

He didn’t believe a word of it. “Do you talk through the opera as well?”

“Never,” she said. “Well, not unless there is someone there worth mentioning. Or some really truly odious
gown. Or someone has a lady of questionable virtue in his box, or just the other night when Lord Boxley brought Miss Uppington to meet—”

Rockhurst closed his eyes. This could take all night.

“Heavens, I’m prattling. I think it is because I am so nervous.”

“Nervous? About what?”

“Because I’ve never been alone with a man before,” she admitted.

There it was. The truth if he’d ever heard it. “I’ve never spent the night with an innocent before,” he replied.

“I’m not completely innocent,” she pointed out. “We did do that bit in the bed…and then you did that…”

He could hear the blush in her words that betrayed her as the innocent she was. And a little part of his anger with her melted, for he’d loved hearing the surprised gasp when she’d reached her pinnacle.

His hand twitched to touch her again, and he wondered if she’d cry out with the same delight a second time…or a third…

Oh, what the devil was he thinking? He tugged his wrapper on tighter and wished he had his trousers on as well. And his short sword and cross-bow.

God save him from innocents! Wasn’t that his mantra and always had been. This was exactly why he’d always avoided the London Marriage Mart. For fear of being entangled in some scandal with one of them.

Mayfair misses were possibly more dangerous than derga. With their wide eyes and fluffy lashes and come-hither glances.

And this one, oh, she was really dangerous. She’d done it all with nary a glance.

Yes, a lot of good his lifelong avoidance of such creatures had done him. Now that he was so completely entangled, he hadn’t the least idea how to get rid of her…other than the obvious one.

“Yes, I recall what happened,” he said, doing his best not to. He waited for a moment to see if there were going to be any more interruptions, but when there was still only silence, he continued.

“Then one year whispers reached Thomas’s ears that there was a rival who claimed he was the greatest warrior in the kingdom. These tales continued to flow into the valley where Thomas lived, and every troubadour and traveler who passed through told of a man whose unholy power in battle could not be beaten.”

Her hand eased back over to his sleeve, and he paused. For a moment he recalled as a child climbing into his mother’s lap at precisely the same moment in the story. Then he shook off that long-lost memory and continued.

“And as this terrible fiend swept through England, he killed many good men, ravaged their lands and…and…” Rockhurst faltered to a stop. Should he give her the version his mother told him or the one his father had shared when Rockhurst had been old enough to understand?

“And?” she prompted.

No reason she didn’t deserve the truth. Might even bring her to her senses.

Or scare the ring off her finger.

“If there were no women and children in the room, the troubadours would tell the rest of the story. That this foul beast would beget the daughters and servants of their victims with children too vile to be allowed to live past their first breath.”

Her fingers tightened around his arm. “Melaphor,” she gasped.

“No, it wasn’t Melaphor. But a derga,” he said without thinking.

“Not a derga!”

He glanced over at her. “You know what a derga is?”

“Well, I’ve seen a picture of one. But I hardly know what one is besides being terribly ugly.”

“You were close when you thought it might be Melaphor. A derga is a cousin of Melaphor’s, if you will. They are ancient messengers from Hell.”

“I take it their messages aren’t always good.”

“A derga’s message is never good. They are portents of death.”

“Jiminy!”

Rockhurst resisted the urge to smile at this mild oath. There was one more clue she hadn’t had a Bath education.

Thank God, he mused, having no doubts that such an upbringing would have ruined her quirky views and spontaneous outbursts.

“And these derga are worse than Melaphor?” she was asking.

He shook his head. “Not worse, just different. A derga lives to kill and bring destruction. Melaphor wants that and power. The power to rule.”

She shivered. “Who would have ever thought such a thing possible?” Then a few moments later, she urged him to continue, “Please go on.”

“So Thomas—”

“Being a good and just hero—”

“Who’s telling this story?”

She shifted atop the ottoman. “You are.”

“Yes, I am.” He slanted a slight smile at her. Demmed chit. She was getting under his skin. He furrowed his brow and got back to the tale at hand, “So Thomas…being a good and just hero—” he couldn’t help but add for her benefit, “—knew he must defeat this villain, so he sent out a challenge and journeyed to meet his enemy.”

“That was terribly foolish.”

Rockhurst shook his head, for he swore he hadn’t heard her correctly. “Foolish? If you haven’t forgotten, there was a monster terrorizing the countryside. Thomas would have had to fight him eventually.”

“Well, yes. But wasn’t Thomas worried about his wife and children and all that begetting?”

“I don’t think he had any children at that point. Or a wife.”

“No wonder he was less than sensible,” she told him. “
Maman
says men have no sense until they have a wife to guide them.”

He really needed to make sure he avoided her “
maman
.” She sounded like a twin of his Aunt Routledge. Rockhurst closed his eyes and shuddered at such a possibility. “Where were we?”

“Thomas was being less than sensible.”

“Yes, lucky fellow without a wife to guide him.”

“Is that why you’ve never married?”

This time Rockhurst pulled his arm free from her grasp and turned completely to face her. It was a little disconcerting to talk to someone who was invisible, but then again, most of his life was a series of disconcerting events, so it wasn’t all that out of the ordinary to him. “Do you want to hear this story or not?”

“Of course,” she told him. “But I also want to know why you’ve never married. Is it because you don’t want to be sensible, or are there other reasons, like the ones Melaphor said.”

You haven’t mated yet…And I will take great pleasure in killing her, if only to see the pain it will cause you for denying me what I want.

Rockhurst glanced at the fire, trying to force out the words of denial.

I don’t care a whit what Melaphor says. I’ll marry when I damn well want to.

But there was too much truth in that sly, evil creature’s threats for Rockhurst to ignore them. For them not to have haunted his dreams since the first time he’d taken a woman to his bed and realized the risk he’d placed her in.

How many of his ancestors had died thusly? At Melaphor’s hands or at the hands of the derga, with the last thing they heard being the cries of their doomed wives and children?

No, all the riches and lands and power that were the Paratus’s by right came at a very high price.

“Are you afraid if you marry,” she whispered, “that Melaphor might
—”

Rockhurst swung around. “He’ll never!”

“Of course not,” she gasped. “I didn’t mean to imply
—”

They sat for a moment in that strained silence. Melaphor would never harm the wife or child of another Paratus because Rockhurst had no intention of ever marrying.

Not that he could easily do so even if he were so inclined.

The Paratus didn’t just dance about Society and choose his bride from the most comely or the richest of offerings. He made his decision slowly, deliberately, looking for a woman from one of the ancient lineages, the old families, who with every passing century were growing smaller and fewer in numbers.

But there was something about that shared heritage that carried with it an innate understanding of duty and obligation that went well beyond one’s own life.

The various Countesses of Rockhurst had carried the fierceness of warriors in their blood, that, if need be, gave them the strength to fight when necessary.

Ruthlessly and without hesitation.

The image of the bolt from his cross-bow flying out of nowhere jolted him back to the present.

Lucky shot, that
, he told himself. But still, he glanced anew at the ottoman.

“Where did you learn to shoot a cross-bow?”

“Me? I don’t know how to shoot a cross-bow.”

“Then why did you pick mine up last night?”

“I don’t know,” she said, faltering a bit. “I was so scared, I just did. I suppose I thought it might be like archery.”

“You shoot?”

“A little,” she demurred. And, as she had when describing how she looked, he knew she wasn’t telling the entire truth.

He leaned back in his chair. “Miss Burke has quite a reputation for having a deft hand at archery.”

“She cheats,” the woman beside him huffed.

“You’ve shot against her?” Nothing but silence greeted his question, and he smiled slightly. Another clue, another chink into her mysterious identity. One he’d uncover the moment the sun rose over the horizon.

Her slight hand and warm fingers returned to his sleeve and pulled him out of his solitary musings. “You don’t have to tell me why you haven’t married,” she was saying. “I think I understand.”

And God help him, he knew she did. That in itself sent a shiver through him, as if awakening some long-dormant place in his heart. Hadn’t his own father’s last advice been to find a woman who understood?

A woman pure of heart with the fire of passion in her eyes.

And he didn’t need to see
this
woman’s eyes to know they could burn with desire.

“Where was I before you interrupted me?” he asked hastily.

“I didn’t—”

Cocking a brow at her, Rockhurst didn’t need to utter another word.

“Well, perhaps I did. Yes, yes, I suppose so. Now where were we? Oh, yes, Thomas was traveling to meet his certain death.”

Because he hadn’t a wife…
he could almost hear her adding.

“Yes, poor Thomas,” he agreed. “He arrived outside the gates of London and pitched his camp near a stream.”

“A stream?” she asked, sitting up. “Which stream?”

He shook his head. It was the sort of detail his cousin Mary would find compelling and necessary. A bluestocking would declare imperative. “How could that be important?”

“I think it is very important,” she said with a huffy little breath.

“Are you sure you aren’t a bluestocking?”

“I thought we agreed—”

“But I still don’t see how the name of the stream is important,” he said, folding his arms over his chest.

“It is important to me.”

Nonsensical chit! But nonetheless, he told her, “Walbrook,” just to avoid another roundabout argument. “They were to fight near Walbrook.” He waited for her to answer, but only silence greeted him. So he took this opening as a gift and continued on in good haste.

“Word of the impending battle had drawn so many spectators that the field looked more like a summer fair than the life-or-death struggle that would settle the fate of England.”

“Wouldn’t they be worried that they may be eaten or begotten if Thomas lost?”

He had to imagine she hadn’t been to a cock-fight or bear-baiting matches. “I believe the spectacle of it all outweighed their common sense.”

“Harrumph.
I wouldn’t have gone,” she told him.

“You followed me into the night,” he pointed out.

“I hardly knew what to expect.”

“I suppose it was the same for the people who came to see Thomas fight. Besides, I believe their faith in him outweighed their fears.”

“I hadn’t considered that. Then again, I knew you would win last night,” she told him.

He sat back. “You knew?”

“Of course,” she said.

“However would you
know
such a thing?”

“I just did,” she told him. “I cannot explain it. I just knew.” She nudged him with her elbow. “Do go on. I believe you are getting to the good part.”

I just knew.
She couldn’t have just known, not unless…

He ignored the shiver that ran down his spine and went on with his story. “On the eve of the battle, Thomas knelt in his tent to pray, for he had seen his enemy and knew in his heart his fate was dire. But rather than flee as his vassals urged him to do, he vowed to stand and fight and prayed that Carpio would be true.”