Shades of the Wind (3 page)

Nyria stopped, turned and fixed Catherine with a steely stare. The light from the

lantern cast a sickly yellow tint to her flawless complexion and highlighted the darkness

of her suddenly hostile eyes.

“Do not insult us by comparing Anubeion with those other Outlander abodes, Lady

Catherine.” Her lips twisted scornfully. “The master does not invite strangers into his

home. When we have guests, they are of his own kind. They gather here for a reason,

not some frivolous pretense!”

“His own kind?” Catherine echoed. “What do you mean his own kind?”

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Shades of the Wind

The housekeeper’s head snapped around as though someone had called her name.

She shuddered—causing the lantern light to flicker wildly against the wall for a

moment—then bent her head as if in disgrace.

“It is getting late,” Nyria whispered. “You should bathe before I bring up your tray.

Tomorrow will be time enough to answer your questions.” The housekeeper turned

back around and started up the stairs again.

“Where is my room?” Bahru questioned in an irritable tone. “I am tired and need

my rest.”

“Through this door, milord,” Nyria said, stopping at the first door along the hall.

She opened it and Bahru disappeared inside, shutting the door in the housekeeper’s

face.

“He’s very weary,” Catherine apologized for her fiancé’s rudeness.

“It was a long journey,” Nyria agreed, though her eyes held a spark of malice.

Catherine wanted to ask again what Nyria had meant about his own kind but knew

the subject was closed for the moment. Lifting up her skirts, she shook her head with

exasperation and followed the housekeeper as quickly as she could.

“Which room is His Grace’s?” Catherine asked as they passed several closed doors

along the landing.

“None of these,” Nyria answered quietly. “His suite is downstairs.” She cast

Catherine a quick look. “At the back of the house.”

“What about your room?”

Nyria stopped before one of the many doors and took out a key to unlock the

portal. “My room is near the master’s.” She opened the door. “In case he should need

me during the night.”

“Then shouldn’t Lord Bahru—”

“He is where I am putting him!” the housekeeper snapped. Her eyes were live coals

burning into Catherine.

Catherine blinked at the woman’s outburst but didn’t respond. Instead, she pursed

her lips together and moved past Nyria. Despite her irritation at the housekeeper’s

attitude, she was pleasantly surprised with what she found behind the locked door.

Olabishi followed her inside.

“I will see to Lord Bahru’s meal then send yours up,” Nyria said. She turned her

attention to Olabishi. “You, come with me.”

Olabishi looked to her ward. There was a strange look on the mute woman’s face

and her hands appeared to be shaking.

“I’ll be fine, Ola. I know you’re tired,” Catherine said. “Tomorrow will be time

enough to unpack.”

After a moment’s hesitation Olabishi signed goodnight to her companion then left

the room. Nyria closed the door behind their exit.

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Charlotte Boyett-Compo

* * * * *

Her room was sheer delight, Catherine thought later as she lay soaking in the

oversized copper tub. The water was just right and had been sprinkled lavishly with oil

of lavender. Fleecy bubbles lay like lamb’s wool on the surface of the scented foam and

tickled Catherine’s nose as she scooped them up in her hands and inhaled their

delightful aroma. Beside the tub, a fire snapped and sizzled in the hearth and the room

was flooded with the bright, shadow-chasing glow of three lanterns and a fat,

sputtering candle that smelled richly of bayberry. Draped over a low brass stand beside

the fireplace was a thick, plush towel being warmed by the flames. On a rosewood

stand to the right of the tub was an ornate brass tray which held a three-piece pewter

tea service and a delicate porcelain cup and saucer. The rich aroma of orange-flavored

tea vied with the oil of lavender to perfume the room.

Catherine’s gloomy mood—brought on by Nyria’s odd behavior—was slowly

dissolving with every pass of the fleece rag over her tired, aching body. She looked

forward to the promise of supper and the softness of the feather mattress on the brass

bed across the way.

“Ring when you are through with your toilette,” Nyria had told her, “and I will

bring up your supper.”

After her bath, Catherine put on her robe and tugged on the bellpull beside her bed.

She barely had time to braid her hair before there was a light knock on the door and

Nyria entered with a tray.

“I will unpack your belongings,” Nyria said.

“That isn’t necessary,” Catherine said. “I—”

“It would be my pleasure, milady,” Nyria interrupted, though her tone suggested

otherwise.

“As you wish,” Catherine said.

The Khirbetti housekeeper—now silent and seeming oddly chastened—padded

about the room unpacking Catherine’s belongings and putting them away in the ornate

armoire. Only once more did she speak before taking her leave. She had held up

Catherine’s nightgown of soft mauve cotton.

“He will like this,” Nyria whispered, stroking the delicate lace along the neckline

and tugging gently at the pink ribbons that held the bodice together.

“I beg your pardon?” Catherine stammered, staring wide-eyed at the housekeeper.

Surely the woman didn’t think she, Catherine, would ever let her husband-to-be’s

employer see her in her night clothes! No respectable woman would!

Nyria looked up from the nightgown and stared at Catherine. There was loathing

and jealousy in the housekeeper’s cold glower. Without answering, she laid the

nightgown on the bed and turned to go, firmly closing the door behind her.

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Shades of the Wind

A shiver of apprehension went through Catherine and once more she wondered

what she had done to cause the woman’s obvious dislike. If she feared Catherine would

usurp her position in His Grace’s house, she could rest easy on that score.

* * * * *

Nyria scratched lightly at her master’s door then entered. The man she worshipped

more than any god was unbuttoning his shirt as she came to stand behind him.

“They are settled in?” he asked.

She slipped her hands to his shoulders to pull the shirt from him. “You will not like

the new taricheutes,” she commented.

“Why is that?” he asked.

“He is arrogant and conceited. He speaks as though he is the center of his universe

and thinks of no one other than himself,” Nyria answered. She lovingly folded the

white linen shirt and set it aside, waiting for her master to take off his loose-fitting

trousers.

“What of the woman he is to wed?”

Nyria’s face hardened. “She has no backbone and allows the taricheutes to

intimidate her.”

Her master looked around at her, one dark brow crooked. “In what way does he do

that?”

Shrugging as though it was of no importance to her, Nyria rolled her eyes. “He

insults her and she allows it. He treats her as a second-class citizen, milord, and she

tolerates his abuse without speaking her mind. She is an insipid woman and I fear she

will be of no use to you.”

“We’ll see,” the prince of Anubeion said. He shoved the pants from his lean hips

and stepped out of them.

Nyria bent over to retrieve the white linen garment and folded it with care. “There

is another with them.”

“Ah yes,” he said. “The
duena
. I am told she won’t be staying with us long.”

“She is a mute like Jacob.”

“I know,” he replied. “She has led a hard life, Nyria. Be kind to her.”

Nyria inclined her head at the command. “Lord Kaelin has sent word that he will

be here tomorrow.”

Her master nodded absently and walked over to his bed. He threw the covers aside

and stretched out, his head cupped in the palms of his hands. His hot gaze was locked

on Nyria.

“Undress for me, pretty one,” he said in a husky voice.

Nyria had been waiting all day for that order and she reached up to pull the turban

from her head. Thick, gleaming black hair spilled from the turban to lie heavily along

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Charlotte Boyett-Compo

her back, dipping down to the curve of her hips. She took her time unbuttoning her

blouse for she knew he enjoyed the anticipation. Her eyes were locked with his and she

could see the passion rising in his golden depths.

Peeling back her blouse to reveal the heavy globes of her breasts, she inched her

skirt downward a little at a time, the elastic waistband sliding provocatively over her

shapely hips.

“You are a beautiful woman, Nyria,” he complimented her, his cock nodding in

agreement.

“I am what you have made of me, milord,” she said.

No undergarments touched the black woman’s satiny skin. She kept herself ready

for those moments when her master would beckon. Her perfumed skin, the shining silk

of her hair, the lithesome length of her limbs pleased him and she wanted it to always

be that way. His desire for her completed her.

“What does the taricheutes’ betrothed look like?” he asked, breaking Nyria’s

concentration for she was running her hands down her smooth flanks.

“Why do you bring her up now, milord?” she asked, her lips pressed into

petulance.

He shrugged. “They tell me she looks like my sister. I was just curious.”

“The white woman wishes she were as pretty as your honorable sister,” Nyria

stated. “She is pale, short and has no breasts to speak of.”

“Really?” he drawled, and held his hand out to her. “Not like your wondrous orbs

that beckon a man’s lips to suckle?”

She came to him, kissed his hand and then climbed upon his bed, straddling him,

her knees digging into the mattress to either side of his hips. From years of being this

man’s mistress, she knew what he wanted, what he needed and just how long he would

wait. She cupped her breasts as he trailed his hand up and down her taut thigh.

“Do I please you?” she asked, pulling at her nipples, rolling them between her

fingers.

“You know you do,” he said huskily. The scent of her called to him and he turned

his hand to cup her sex, slipping his middle finger into her hot sheath.

Nyria threw her head back, her long hair sweeping against his knees and thighs.

Her movement thrust her breasts forward so his heated gaze fell to them and he

reached up with his free hand to run his fingers down one turgid peak. She trembled

beneath his touch—as she always did—and bent forward to place her lips to the hollow

at his throat.

He buried his hands in her lush fall of hair and cupped her scalp, closing his eyes to

the flicker of her tongue at the base of his throat, her lips pressing gently against the

hollow where his flesh throbbed with the rhythm of his heart. The points of her breasts

grazed along his chest, the combined heat of their bodies bringing forth a fine film of

perspiration.

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Shades of the Wind

“I want you to be nice to her, Nyria,” he said.

She lifted her head and looked down at him. “Is that an order, milord?” she asked,

her eyes flaring with anger.

“It is,” he stated, and let his hand fall to her neck. He drew her face to his and

slanted his mouth across her full lips, nibbling at the lower one until she opened her

mouth to him and he could insinuate his tongue into the warm recess. He licked at her

lips, stabbed deep with his tongue, sweeping it across her upper teeth—easing her for

he could feel her rage building. Her hands were at his waist and he could feel her nails

digging into his flesh. It was her way of punishing him for bringing another woman

into the home they shared—something he had never done before.

Nyria caught his tongue between her teeth and bit down just hard enough to make

his eyes narrow. She held his gaze for a moment longer then released him. She cried out

as he grabbed her upper arms and flipped her over so she was lying beneath him, his

knees pushing her thighs wide.

“You want to play, little pantheress?” he cooed, grinding his lower body against

hers.

“I am your woman,” she said, lifting her chin. “You need no other.”

He smiled, but it was a cold, calculated smile that could chill even the coldest heart,

and when he spanned her long, elegant neck with his hand, there was nothing playful

or gentle about the promise coming from his hard stare.

“Don’t dictate to me, Nyria Moustafa,” he warned her. He tightened his grip on her

neck. “And don’t presume things you have never been promised.”

Nyria lifted her legs and wrapped them around his hips, imprisoning him as she

pressed her damp sex to his. She squeezed him hard between her locked legs. “There is

nothing the white woman can do for you that I can not do a thousand times better.” She

ground herself against him. “Remember that when you look upon her pale, comely

face.”

He was hard and hot and a tiny drop of moisture clung to the tip of his cock. He

was ready for her but she was too eager, too sure of her control over him so he did not

thrust into her as every instinct cried out for him to do. Straining though he was—

heavy and throbbing and just as eager as she—he paused there above her, staring down