Midnight Mistress (28 page)

“Perhaps. But it was worth it to me to prove that you cared.” She looked over the edge of the cliff at the rocky beach below. “I would say this cliff is quite as treacherous as that railing. If I were to walk along the edge … like this … I wonder if you would—”

Her sentence was cut short as the loose rocks slid away beneath her, and she started to pitch toward the edge. But before she was in any true danger, Connor grabbed her dress and yanked her back, pulling her so forcefully that they tumbled to the ground. They fell into a stand of heather that skirted the path, with Connor twisting beneath her so that he
broke her fall. He fell with an awkward “umph,” which he repeated when she landed on top of him.

“Idiot woman!” he growled. “I could have cracked my skull.”

“Well, perhaps that might have knocked some sense into it.” She pulled herself up his chest so that she was nose-to-nose with him.

“You are still a spoiled brat.”

“And you are still an overbearing bully.”

“Selfish chit.”

“Pompous know-it-all.”

“Minx!”

“Scoundrel!”

They stared at each other, four years of fury and frustration boiling within them. Then they poured that frustration into a burning caress, sating a need that could only be filled in each other’s arms. They tangled and rolled in the sweet heather, feasting on the carnal joys of taste and touch. For endless minutes they gave in to the love that had bound them as one beyond time, distance, and even truth. Then, groaning as if with the sound of one soul being ripped in half, Connor forced himself out of her arms and sat up, gazing out at the darkening sea. “This … cannot happen.”

“It already has,” she said softly. “It happened years ago. And you told the senhora that I was your
esposa
.”

“I did that—” Connor glanced back, then sharply turned his eyes again to the sea. The vision of Juliana lying in the twilit heather with a sprig of it in her hair was not a sight to cool a man’s blood. He thought resolutely of icy winds and arctic waters. “I did that to protect your reputation. The senora would have known you were more to me than a passenger when I insisted on staying in the room while you were recovering. I did not want her to think that you were …”

“Your lover?”

“My doxie. This is no romantic midnight tryst in your father’s conservatory, and I am no honorable suitor. We’re in
the middle of a war, Juliana. Any hope we might have had of a future died years ago.

“In a week’s time Raoul will return with my ship. A day or two afterward, officials will be arriving from Lisbon to take you home. You will go back to your life of wealth and privilege. I will go back to a life of—well, something less. We shall likely never see each other again.”

Juliana sat up and curled against his back, resting her cheek on his shoulder. “Then ’tis sensible that we spend what little time we have left together.”

Sensible? A sensible move like that would get her ruined and put him in torment. He was already going to have to spend the rest of his arguably short life doing his best to forget her sweet kisses. Anything more would drive him mad.

Stiffly he rose to his feet and pulled her up after him. “From this moment on I am going to do my best to avoid you. I suggest you do the same. Now, head back down the path, Juliana. I’ll follow a few paces behind. And God’s teeth, if you so much as try to look back at me I’ll see that the senhora locks you in your room until I’m gone.”

Juliana did as he asked. She walked down the path with her gaze dutifully ahead, never looking back. But though she appeared to follow his orders, her mind was whirling. She loved Connor, and he loved her, and unless something drastic happened, he would be gone forever in a week.

Years ago she’d let him walk out of her life, and nothing had been right since. She did not know what intrigues he was part of. She did not even really know which side he was working for. But she was certain of one thing. She was not letting the man she loved walk out of her life without a fight. She was going to make it as impossible for him to imagine living without her as it was for her to imagine living without him.

By the time she had reached the bottom of the path, she had firmly decided that she was going to seduce Connor Reed.

The trouble with seduction, Juliana thought bleakly as she walked along the beach several days later, is that if one were not familiar with the particulars, it’s damned difficult to find out about. Mrs. Jolly had taught her about the mores of London society. McGregor had taught her about running the Marquis Line. But when it came to making a man take her to his bed, she was definitely at sixes and sevens. There were no books to be had on the subject. The women in the village who might answer her questions did not speak her language. In fact, the only certain knowledge she had about the act was the rather cryptic suggestion of one of her finishing school teachers, who had advised her to close her eyes and think of England.

As she walked past the wharf, a few of the fisherman’s wives who were busy mending nets called out a greeting to her. She waved her hand in reply, returning their simple hello with honest appreciation. After the tangled intrigues of the
ton
and the equally complex maneuverings of the shipping
business, the uncomplicated friendship of these people seemed like a gift from heaven. They lived in harmony with the ocean, marking their lives not by balls and parties but by the ebb and flow of the tide. It was a hard life, but it filled Juliana with a peace and satisfaction she’d never felt in the well-appointed salons of Mayfair. In a way she could not understand, a part of her life would always be bound up in the sea. Just as a part of her soul would always be bound up in loving Connor.

Juliana’s thoughts ended abruptly as someone jostled her elbow. She looked over into the broad, grinning face of Senhora de Varzim. Still grinning, she pointed at the water.
“Marido.”

Juliana shook her head. “Pardon, Senhora. I do not understand.”

“Conn-air,” the lady replied, still pointing at the sea.
“Marido.”

“Oh, my, er, husband,” Juliana acknowledged. “Yes, he and Jamie went out with the other fishermen this morning to help with the catch.”
And to avoid me
.

The older woman nodded toward the ocean and began speaking in breakneck Portuguese. Juliana waved her hands. “ ’Tis no good, senhora. I cannot understand you.”

Hmphing, the signora tried again. With her right hand she tapped Juliana’s shoulder.
“Esposa.”
Then with her left hand she made a fist.
“Marido.”
She flung her two hands apart.

Juliana grimaced. “Yes, I suppose that is as good a way to explain it as any. We’ve had a bit of a spat.”

“Spat.” The senhora tasted the word, clearly finding it unappetizing. Once again she shook her right hand and then her left.
“Esposa. Marido.”
Smiling, she brought her two hands together in a motion so blatantly sexual that it made Juliana blush.

“Yes, well, that is all well and good. But Connor—my
marido
—is set against it.”

Senhora de Varzim looked out at the sea, clearly surprised.
Juliana gathered that the smart money in the village had been on the suspicion that she was the one responsible for causing Connor to spend his nights with the senhora’s bachelor sons. She raised her hands and made a bold, if embarrassed attempt at repeating the senhora’s coarse gesture. “My
marido
is …” She lifted her shoulders and glanced forlornly at the ocean. “He is set against it, senhora. And I wish I could make you understand, because I haven’t the first idea of how to change his mind.”

The senhora laid a finger to her cheek, then let out a bold laugh. Taking Juliana’s arm she hustled the girl back down the beach, all the while calling out the other women. By the time they had reached the senhora’s house, Juliana was surrounded by most of the village wives, all of them talking and laughing at a frantic pace. Juliana could still not understand their words, but their gestures and encouraging looks made their meaning clear.

Apparently Senhora de Varzim had made her and Connor’s reconciliation her pet project.

Something was going on. Connor sensed it the minute he stepped off the bean-cod and started unloading the day’s catch. The wives of the some of the men came to help with the nets, and paused to whisper in their husband’s ears. Soon the entire beach was buzzing with clandestine whispers, whispers that became noticeably silent whenever he approached. If he hadn’t known better, he’d have suspected the villagers of plotting with the French. But these fishermen were loyal Portuguese, and the tenacious people had spent too many centuries fighting to keep their little country free of Spain’s long shadow to lose it to a foreign tyrant. No, the plotting going on had nothing to do with Napoleon. And probably, he thought as he lifted the last of the heavy nets out of the boat and spread them on the frames to dry, it had nothing to do with him.

Tomorrow he would complete his mission. A few days
after that, his ship would return and he would leave this village. He’d say good-bye to the cheerful fishermen, the fragrant hills, the colorfully tiled houses, the savory food, the rich port … and Juliana.

During the day the hard, rewarding work of spreading and harvesting the wide nets had kept him too busy to think about her. But when the twilight fell and the stars came out, his heart and body would start to work against him, filling his mind with dreams of things that could never be.
If our lives had gone differently we’d be married by now, maybe even have a little girl like Pedro and his pretty wife. We’d be growing old together
.

Jamie’s cry cut through the regrets. “Captain, ya gotta come. There’s a party!”

Connor followed Jamie’s gaze down the beach and saw a bonfire being built at the edge of the sea. He frowned, trying to recall what saint’s day fell at the end of March, but none came to mind. Still, as he and Jamie walked toward the blaze there was no denying that some sort of celebration was going on. There was food everywhere, and glasses
aloirado
, the finely aged port wine that was the treasure of this region. He’d smuggled a case or two of it in his time. A glass was thrust in his hand. He took a sip of the amber liquid, letting its seductive sweetness curl over his tongue. It was some of the finest he’d ever tasted, as heady as lust and potent as sin, but it had nothing on Juliana’s kisses. Where the devil was she, anyway?

On the other side of the blaze, the unmarried girls served food and flirted with the young men. In their traditional colorful skirts and bare feet, they made an appealing picture, and Connor’s glum mood didn’t stop him from admiring the neat turn of ankle of one girl. Her face was turned away with her hair bound up in a scarf, but her crimson skirt swayed against her slender hips with an enticing grace, and her enchanting step almost reminded him of—

Connor dropped his half-full glass to the sand and
stormed to the other side of the bonfire. He gripped the red-skirted girl’s wrist and turned her to face him. “What the blazes do you think you are doing?”

“I was serving dinner, until you manhandled me,” Juliana answered as she shrugged off his grasp and moved to the next table. “There’s no need for rudeness. Take a seat and I’m sure that one of the women will serve you—eventually.”

“I’m not interested in the bloody food,” he stated, following after her. “I want to know why you’re dressed up … like this. ’Tis unseemly for a woman of your station.”

“Well, perhaps next time you kidnap me you will have the foresight to bring along a ballgown.” She turned away, her angry expression becoming a bewitching smile as she ladled some savory lamb stew onto the plate of a grinning young man. “Enjoy your meal, senhor.”

The young man’s grin crumbled to ash when he met Connor’s murderous glare.

Juliana moved to serve the next man, but Connor grabbed the dish from her hands and plunked it on the wooden table. “Will you listen? You cannot do this. Serving meals is a task for the unmarried women, and we’re supposed to be married.”

“Well, you are not acting as if we are!” She placed her fists on her hips, her expression every bit as stormy as his. “Your obvious indifference has caused a positive scandal in this village. Senhora de Varzim thinks we’ve quarreled. She was the one who organized this affair.”

Experience had taught Connor to smell Juliana’s plots a mile away. “And you had nothing to do with it?”

She lifted her chin haughtily. “Sir, you presume a great deal. Besides,
you
were the one who fabricated the story that we were married.”

“Yes, but
I
am not the one prancing about with bare feet and ankles. Nor am I wearing an outfit that shows … well, that barely covers … God’s teeth, Juliana, a woman of your
breeding should not be strutting around half-naked in front of all these men.”

“At least they are not acting like an overbearing, boorish husband. Honestly, Connor. If I did not know better, I’d vow you were jealous.”

Jealous? Hell, he was going to wring the neck of the next man who so much as looked at her. “Senhora de Varzim thinks we’ve quarreled? Fine.” He gave Juliana a swift peck on the cheek. “We’ve made up. Now go back to your room and change into something more—”