Judith Ivory (17 page)

Adrien knew, however, that his grandfather was carefully monitored in Paris; Claybourne had several men who watched in shifts. It would not be an easy matter getting him out. Especially since the feisty old grandfather didn’t
want
to be helped out of his homeland. Adrien fretted over this. He still had not come up with any plan, short of kidnapping, that would move M. La Fontaine from his beloved Paris.

Alas, Adrien was beginning to fret over everything these days. Though for now it worked, he didn’t know how much longer his crazy juggling act was going to hold things together. Philippe de La Fontaine remained
unharmed. Claybourne was appeased. All summer now, Adrien had been throwing him old information, inconsequential details to help lend credibility to the notion he was infiltrating the “madman’s little group.” Meanwhile, Adrien and his little band continued. Since May, they had brought out sixteen people in a total of five runs. French officials were screaming. Yet even their warrant admitted how little they knew. And Claybourne—Adrien had to laugh—Claybourne was so enthralled with pursuing this phantom, he completely failed to recognize his quarry in Adrien who sat across from him at every meeting in which they discussed the matter.

Edward Claybourne, that very afternoon, had paraded a diagram in front of Adrien. A diagram that pinpointed, retrospectively, every raid as well as every port from which the escapees were known to have exited. Adrien was aghast. The drawing virtually drew a picture of the areas where he was most at home in France; his old haunts in Paris, then out into Normandy. But what had the clever English minister made of this near-portrait of his “madman”? Why, he patted himself on the back for remembering and being able to “convince” Adrien to help. To help capture whom? Adrien himself. Adrien remained stupefied at the blind logic of it. He was eliminated as a suspect because he was “a lecher, a corrupt and wholly undisciplined wastrel.” Then he was applauded for being the only man suitable to go after “a virtual genius in foreign sabotage.” Claybourne couldn’t see that someone who was so different from himself in private life could be just as astute in another vein. But for now, this meant that Adrien was getting away with the charade—as precariously balanced as it might be. He would hold on to that.

Christina heard Adrien coming up the stairs. She recognized his footsteps. Just as she had recognized Thom
as’s voice among those who had left just a few minutes before.

It was not very nice of Thomas, she thought, to come and go without so much as saying hello. But it was also not unusual these days. Thomas preferred to avoid situations that spoke of her position as Adrien’s mistress.

The door opened. Adrien did not seem surprised that she was still up.

“It’s quite late,” she said.

He glanced at his watch as he was taking it off. “Three,” he murmured.

She readjusted her dressing gown to better cover herself. “Did you win?”

“Pardon?”

“At cards. And how did Thomas do?”

He glanced at her, gave her a thoughtful look. “No,” he said. “Neither of us won.”

“A shame.” She paused. “I want to talk to you.” She patted the bed beside her, the empty space awaiting him. “Don’t undress yet. I really want to talk.”

He came over, undoing his cravat and the high buttons of his collar. He sat on the edge of the bed, facing her. Then he reached and touched her cheek. His very blue eyes looked out of his dark face with a seriousness, a wistfulness that made something go limp inside her. Her resolve quivered, mewed to be let out of this, to put it all off just one more night….

“Adrien,” she began, “before you go, we must speak very clearly to each other. Very honestly.”

He laughed. “Christina, I would be afraid to speak to you any other way.”

“Good—”

“Do we really have to talk now? I’m so tired.” He leaned forward, then shifted his weight. It always happened so easily—he pulled her under him and took a deep breath. As if he might hold it, submerged, for a hundred years.

He let it out in a groan. Her dressing gown had come open. He kissed her breasts, opening the gown further, kissing downward toward her waist.

“Adrien—” She tried to make her laughter light. “I thought you were tired.”

“Not that tired.” His hand reached over her to the oil lamp. He turned the valve. The light dimmed, guttered, then popped out. Darkness. Except for the brightness of a three-quarter moon coming through their window.

“Adrien.” She put her hand directly over his mouth to stop the next onslaught. “I want to have a clear understanding before you go. I don’t want to make you angry, and I don’t want to make you feel cornered. But I have to know. We only have four days to wade our way through this. We have to start now.”

There was a deep sigh in the dark. He rolled off her, then sat up on the edge of the bed, facing the window, silhouetted in the moonlight. There, by the bedstead, he poured brandy. A generous slosh, by the sound of it.

“You can’t,” she said, “evade the question I asked you this evening forever.”

“And what question was that?”

“Do you love me?”

He laughed, then took a drink, tilting his head back and downing the entire glass. When he spoke, his voice was a murmur. “I am more involved with you than I’d like to be.”

“That’s not love.”

He turned. His face was in shadow. Hers, she knew, would be in full light. “No, it’s not,” he said.

She bit her lip. “I see.”

“No, you don’t. I am very cautious with you, Christina. Because I like you. Do you imagine I’ve never said those words before? I’ve thrown them around rather liberally. And reaped all the benefits those words trade on—”

“But you didn’t need to trade them with me?” she said. “Since ‘all the benefits’ came without them.”

“Christina—” He leaned toward her. “I care about you. More than I want to—”

She gave him a shove. “Don’t. How can you touch me so tenderly, then talk to me in such platitudes. ‘I care about you.’ Honest to God, Adrien. You make me feel like a visitor, and an unwelcome one at that. Someone you must carefully not offend—”

“You are, in a sense, Christina. I’ve not included a woman in my life, regularly, on a daily basis that is, in a very long time. Part of me comes to this, this closeness you want, kicking and screaming. It frightens me the way you look at me, the way you are curious about me. And it frightens me even more that I’m so fascinated with you, I put up with it.”

He stood up. As if this settled the matter. He raised his arms, his shirt over his head. The rest of his clothes went. He poured another glass of brandy before he came to bed.

Christina sighed. She never got precisely what she wanted out of him. “I think,” she said, “you have just told me that you won’t say you love me because, quite possibly, you don’t. And that I am supposed to feel flattered and singled out for this honor.”

He laughed. “That’s it. Approximately.”

“Lovely.” Only she wasn’t quite so dissatisfied as she pretended. She recognized in his hesitancy, in his careful, circumscribing words that there was a genuine admission. Anyone this cautious was on unfamiliar ground; she was different from the others. The joy in this knowledge was odd, discordant. But she took what was available….

She watched him in the moonlight. He was looking out the window, sipping the brandy; stark naked. She could not look even at this silhouette without being stirred. The wide shoulders, the long curve of back
ending in the small, tight buttocks—almost nonexistent, less buttocks than taut, muscular extensions of his thighs…Christina lay back and waited. She anticipated his joining her in bed, his touching her….

“Here. Try it again. It’s better the second time.” He had turned to offer her brandy. She shook her head. He brought it closer. “Go on. I think you might need it.”

She smiled. “No. I’m fine.”

“I have something else to tell you that might put your independent little nose out of joint. Take the brandy.” She took the glass, held it for him as he slipped under the covers with her. “Besides,” he said, “I might be in the mood for a little revenge for all the infernal talking you’ve subjected me to.” She could feel his smile, its warmth; then, literally, his teeth. He bit her neck.

“Stop it.” She laughed. “Here, you drink this.”

He didn’t take the brandy, but nudged forward to lay his cheek on her breast, his arm across her. “I have to tell you what I’ve just done. At the card game. One of the reasons I wanted to go. I had the opportunity there to ask a favor of a friend, a man I would trust with my life. His name is Sam, Samuel Rolfeman. I have asked him to look after you while I am gone, as a kind of bodyguard.”

“I don’t need a bodyguard.”

“It’s an extraordinarily lovely body, Christina. I think you do.”

“Adrien. I love your being worried about me—” The stupid word,
love,
popping out of her own mouth, distracted her. She blinked, couldn’t remember what she had wanted to say. She frowned. “That was very presumptuous of you.”

“Christina. I am genuinely concerned—”

“And I am genuinely appalled—”

“Then be appalled. Better that, than mauled or dead. I don’t trust that bloody idiot you married.”

“Richard wouldn’t hurt me!”

“A woman alone is vulnerable.”

“For godssake.” She shoved the brandy back toward him. “Set this down. I don’t want it.”

He took the glass, pulled back the covers, opened her nightdress and poured the Calvados directly over her.

“Ai!” She scrambled to wipe, to stem the flow. “That’s cold! Are you insane—?”

He took her wrists, pulled them over her head, and continued pouring. Until only jarring, rude little droplets were all that was left to spatter from the upturned glass. The brandy ran. Her nightclothes caught what ran down her sides, over her ribcage and hips. It was wet, warm. Tingling.

“Are you quite satisfied?” she asked primly. “You can let go, now that you’ve had your fun—”

He didn’t seem finished with his “fun.” He held her firmly. Then, very leisurely, he leaned down to the neat indentation of her navel. He ran over it with his tongue. “You are strong-willed,” he said between licks up her belly. “Resilient. Capable. And delicious—
mmm
—But you’re not very strong.”

She tried to pull in her belly, elude the touch of his mouth. But all struggles were in vain. She had never realized how physically powerful he was. He had her body easily pinioned, while he was relaxed, free to do as he pleased…. His tongue made a spiral around the tip of her breast.

She jerked. “Ah! Adrien! I’m going to smash you with the first thing I can lay my hands on. Let go of me!”

He gave a throaty chuckle. “Not until you admit a woman can be a little vulnerable.”

“What?”

“Say it.” He lay full length on top of her, smoothing his body into the wetness of her skin until a kind of suction was formed between their bellies. “
Mmm,
you are heavenly,” he laughed, “wiggling and wet.”

The feel of him made her a little dizzy. “And you—you are making a thorough mess—”

“Which I’m going to clean up. Personally.” He reached out and retrieved the entire bottle of brandy. “But I am going to make a bigger mess if you don’t admit it.”

She hedged. “Admit what?”

He laughed, rose up on one arm. And poured.

Christina screamed and squirmed. “Ah! Adrien. For goodness’ sake!” The fumes rose into her eyes, her nose. She was getting a regular bath in the apple-fragrant liquor. “Oh, you filthy, wicked…”

“That’s getting you nowhere.” He reduced the flow from the bottle to a thin stream over her belly. She writhed. Then, slowly, the little stream moved lower. A thin rivulet ran between her legs.

“Ai!” It burned, but the alcohol evaporated quickly—leaving behind the warmest, most indecent sensation. “All right!”

“I’m vulnerable,” he coached.

“I’m vulnerable.”

“And I need a little protection.”

She was put out at this addition, but gave in quickly rather than get another dousing. “And I need a little protection,” she said. “From beasts like you, at least.”

He let go, laughing as he sat up.

Christina flew at him, pounding, hitting him, pulling, scraping her nails. “Oh, you beast! You miserable, smug—” Words failed her: “I could—I could—”

He withstood it, bracing his weight against the attack, then slowly pinning her back. Once more he lay on top of her. Except this time he seemed to have a more serious intent. He quieted her fulminations by kissing her. Hard. Deep. Letting the barrage of blows die of their own accord. Christina found her poor hands open, hovering above him in confusion. There was no playfulness now to his lovemaking. She could feel him,
solid against her thigh; his whole body moving, preparing…. Sensation clouded everything. All reason. Reality. She could have sworn, distantly, there was noise, a pounding…. Or it was perhaps just her heart. She caressed him, groaned as he touched her breasts, as he drank from her skin the smell of flavor, the tang of apples….

There was a rapping. It seemed almost as if at their door. But it was a sound from another world, so far off. Adrien’s breath was right there in her ear. His hips lifted. And he pushed forward, the heat of him filling her; there seemed not a space anywhere he did not occupy. Not in her body, her mind…She let out a soft groan. And the pounding of her heart became a banging. A banging at the door. Not ten feet away.

A voice called. “Open this door! I know you’re in there!”

“Who the blazes—” Adrien twisted toward the door.

Then it all happened so quickly. The door crashed open. Light, a lantern, swung huge shadows into the room. Adrien scrambled to put himself and Christina under the protection of covers. A heap of bedclothes hit her. But something else, a huge, hulking figure, hit Adrien.

There was cursing, the grunts and gasps of desperate effort. The bed shook from the struggle. Christina cringed—and her fingers brushed against the forgotten brandy bottle. The covers were thrashing, the mattress rocking; it was reflex. Her fingers closed around the neck of the bottle, then she brought it down hard over the head of the attacker. With a slump, the commotion in the bed grew still.