Stormfire (89 page)

"I'd be surprised if Catherine picked a fight without provocation. She's determined to make the best of this marriage."

Madeleine laid a hand on his arm. "Heavens, I'm not accusing her! I just thought you'd like to know. After all, you'll be leaving shortly, and she'll have no one to turn to if something is seriously wrong." She squeezed. "Of course, servants do exaggerate. It's probably nothing. After all, they did make up the fight in the usual way."

Sean abruptly displaced her hand. "I'm not interested in the Amauris' intimacies."

"No, naturally not," Madeleine murmured. "I daresay in that area the bride is deliriously happy."

Ignoring the glint in his eyes, she rose and wandered over to the decanter of absinthe, fabric whispering against her thighs. "As I recall"—-she smiled as if to herself—
"Raoul
is extremely well-endowed." She turned. "But I've been talking too much. You've hardly touched your food."

"I'm more interested in bed now."

"But of course. How thoughtless of me."

Culhane crossed quickly to her. Catching her chin up in his hand, he said roughly, "No, Leine. You're thinking all the time." Pushing her against the sideboard, he kissed her so brutally she thought her neck would snap.

*
   
*
  
 
*

For a week, Napoleon had been no more than polite, Catherine mused as her coach moved away from the
Tuileries.
Perhaps obviously pregnant women did not appeal to him and she would have a few months' reprieve before he demanded her surrender. Maybe he would even discover another mistress. But as she glanced idly at the surrounding debris of the Carrousel, which was being demolished to make way for Napoleon's new design for central Paris, she knew she was building false hope. He was merely giving her time to get used to him, taking special care to be charming. He must know she found the situation revolting. Yet, perhaps he enjoyed anticipation.

Well, she was not anticipating. In the past week, she had become the consummate whore, capable of feeling nothing but contempt for the husband who took her over and over, finding increasingly perverse ways to excite her because he sensed her abandoned response was exactly that: a body abandoned of soul and passion. Only
Raoul
could change the course of their lives together, but even if he made the decent choice, she could never love him. His threat to Sean was too stark. She would cooperate until she could retaliate. God, what black thoughts to mingle with the first lovely hints of spring.

She ordered the driver to turn toward the Seine. At the
Pont
de
la Concorde, she signaled him to stop. As she walked along the sunlight-dappled river, the vehicle trailed her.
Parie
skies were blue, trees dotted with tender nubs of green. Clots of wildflowers stubbornly poked up in the excavation for the Place
de
la Concorde. As barges and water coaches ferried cargo and passengers under the bridge, vendors paraded the
quais
with Marseilles
langoustines.
It was a long time before she had breathed enough clean air to face the house on
Rue Royale
again.

"I lunched with your brother-in-law today,"
Raoul
said casually as the butler placed a bowl of soup on his plate.

"Oh?" Catherine returned with equal calm. "I trust he's well?"

"Quite. In fact, when I asked him to join our cadre tchembourti match this Sunday, he agreed."

"But he has no ponies," she objected.

"He's ordered that magnificent black of his brought from Ireland. Of course, the animal is too big to be used in tchembourti, but I offered the use of a string from my stable."

"That was civil of you," she said dryly. "I didn't know we kept a stable of sufficient size to accommodate two players. You
are
playing in the match?"

"I wouldn't miss it."
Raoul
took a sip of his wine. "I keep most of my racers and ponies near Longchamps. They've won a tidy sum this month."

He smiled to himself as he envisioned his teammates' reaction when Culhane joined them. They would not challenge the Irishman at the match in deference to a brother officer, particularly because they believed Amauri ignorant of Javet's insult to his bride. Too, some of them probably thought Javet had been out of line. No, he was not worried about a scene, but he had not expected Culhane would have the audacity to strut in front of a pack fairly panting for his blood. A good thing the Irishman could take care of himself; he would not have enjoyed calling off the pack.

Mounted on Mephisto, Sean spotted Catherine in the crowd assembled for the match. Even among many beautiful women who strolled with their gentlemen about the fringes of the playing field, she was extraordinary. The day was chilly, and despite the change of season, Amauri had insisted she wear a dramatic, high-necked black dress with a cashmere shawl fringed in sable tips draped over one shoulder. A large opal-and-diamond pin secured a peacock aigrette to a turban cloche which covered her hair. One gloved hand held a heavy sable muff; in
thè
other was looped the leash of a cheetah, which sat tensely on his haunches as horses uneasily minced around him- She was a vision out of Omar Khayyam, her incredible bone structure and oblique eyes drawing attention from all over the field.

As she turned away from a small group of officers and ladies, Catherine saw Sean almost at the same instant, and for a moment, the world dropped away to leave a harsh silence. Need unmasked. Later, neither knew who moved first: Catherine, who left the crowd; or Sean, who urged the black to follow her across the tawny field speckled with shoots of new grass. It was unwise and they knew it. They were too conspicuous, the First Consul's newest mistress and the notorious killer reputed to be the father of her unborn child. Yet, as irresistibly as lunar tides, they were drawn, one to the other.

Away from the crowd, Catherine looked up at Sean in his Cossack-style tunic with team colors banded on his arm. She lifted her hand, letting the sable slip down her arm in a black glossy fall. Leaning down from the saddle, Sean touched her fingers with his lips, then reluctantly released them.

"You look tired, love," she said softly as she let her hand drop to stroke Mephisto's neck.

"You look beautiful." Sean's lips twisted in a slight smile. "There's little resemblance to the greasy urchin of Liverpool."

She laughed huskily. " 'Tis fickle, y'are. You said I was beautiful then, too."

"You were," he murmured, then harshly, "I miss you like hell."

Her eyes glimmered too brightly for a moment, then Mephisto, exasperated because she had stopped stroking him, stepped forward and nudged her. The nervous cheetah backed, fangs bared. Its leash dragged on Catherine's hand and Sean's hand slipped toward his knife. Catherine turned. "Sit,
Salomé."
The cat obeyed edgily.

"That's quite a house pet," Culhane commented with a frown.

"Raoul
likes me to make a display. He gave
Salomé
to me a few days ago. She's quite tame." Her voice lowered. "Too tame. She's afraid to be dangerous."

Sean caught the faint inflection. "And how are you, Kit?"

She soothed the cheetah, her heavy lashes hiding her eyes. "As happy as can be expected. The life of a general's wife is a busy one, thank God." She looked up and smiled suddenly. "With my social schedule, our child should be a
natural
dancer. He was tapping his toes in time to a polonaise at the Russian ambassador's the other night."

Sean laughed, his release what she had hoped, but somehow the boyish note in his mirth stabbed her to the heart. "Your team is moving onto the field, Sean. Hadn't you better join them?"

He reluctantly nodded. "I have to switch horses." His voice lowered. "Wish me luck?"

She slipped a crumpled four-leafed shamrock from the heel of her glove and tucked it into his. "I found it in the garden this morning."

"More cognac,
chérie?
Your hands are like ice," Amauri asked his bride solicitously as they rode back into the city.

"Yes, please." He poured and she sipped gratefully, then thrust her free hand deeper into her muff. Reclining like a skinny dog on the opposite seat, the cheetah watched them.

"How did you like the match?"
Raoul
inquired.

"It was wonderful. Your cadre played beautifully, and with such vigor. They deserved to win."

"That Georgian cossack officer who showed us the game last year rode with even more vigor, just as brutally as Culhane. He said that in Tibet and Afghanistan, tribesmen use enemies' heads for balls. From watching him on the field, one would think Culhane is a savage! Doesn't he play at anything?"

"If he weren't a fighter, he'd be dead."

"Well, he broke Rodier's shoulder with that damned playing stick."

"Rodier was blocking his shot," she replied placidly.

"That's no excuse."

"Rodier deliberately interfered with his shots all through the match; so did some of the others. Sean might have scored at least three more goals if they'd let him alone."

Amauri scoffed, "The man isn't God. He's never played the game before. How can you blame his misses on others?"

"If Sean were God, Ireland would be free and I wouldn't be married to you," she said bluntly. "I know what I saw.

The others in your cadre ostracized him after the match. You and Grouchy were the only ones who spoke to him."