Page 31

"Think of me as a mystery, then," Elliott whispered.

"A mystery soon to depart."

"The night is not over yet, and in your presence, dear Michel, I feel miraculously restored."

Astonishing. Could he really go again?

When Elliott threw him on the bed, Michel had his answer.

He thought suddenly of the statues of bare-breasted women that were part of the hotel's facade. They were only a few stories below them now, those statues, their arms spread like wings. For the first time inside this grand hotel, Michel felt as if he were literally supported by those bare-breasted stone women and their brazen and sensual courage.

*

It was not the first time he had walked home with the sunrise, smelling of another's skin. But it was the first time he had done so with a heart this heavy.

So he wasn't surprised it took him so long to notice the footfalls behind him.

It was their speed that finally drew his attention.

By the time he looked up, the woman

was walking directly beside him. She looked neither drunken nor disheveled. A jeweled clip held her golden hair in a precise bun atop her head, but her corset seemed loose beneath her blouse; her gored skirt made it appear as if she was ready to spend the morning dipping in and out of shops. But the shops wouldn't be open for hours. Indeed, only the faintest blush of dawn kissed the harbor's waters.

There was something off about her shoes. They were hard, durable, designed for something other than a leisurely stroll.

"I trust you had a pleasant evening with the Earl of Rutherford." She had a perfect British accent. It was the night for them, apparently.

"And who are you, mademoiselle?" he asked.

"Someone who notices things as well as you do, Michel Malveaux."

On another night, he would have sought to charm her, to seduce her. To channel her curiosity into a sensual experience she would then wish to keep secret. This would in turn keep anything she might have witnessed between him and the earl a secret as well. This was how secrets worked. But his departure from Elliott's room had left him shaken and raw. To say nothing of the fact that he was utterly exhausted by the man's insatiable desires.

"If you will excuse me, it is quite late, and I have no desire to discuss my evening at this time."

In an instant, she had seized one of his wrists. Her grip was powerful, astonishingly so. And the eyes he suddenly found himself staring into were as blue as the Earl of Rutherford's.

"Whether or not it's early or late is a matter of some debate, wouldn't you say?" she asked. "And depends largely on how one has spent the hours preceding this one."

It was not the first time he had been threatened. Customers had pulled knives on him, menaced him with empty liquor bottles. But always he had managed to find a way to charm them. This woman, on the other hand, possessed a focus and a malice that was neither drunken nor desperate nor lecherous. And so Michel saw only one choice: to lie.

"Regardless of the hour, my evening was my own. I do not know who this Earl of Rutherford is and I wish you to release my hand at once."

She did nothing of the kind. "And yet, when I first said his name, you expressed no confusion. You only asked me what mine was."

"And you have still not told me. Please let me go."

He yanked his wrist free from her grip. She released it with a smile and a pronounced withdrawal of her own hand. Both gestures suggested she could have easily maintained her grip no matter how much he struggled.

"I am merely passing through," she answered, and he saw it was no answer at all. "But you are local, and you have a reputation to protect." She practically sneered when she said the word reputation.

"There is a code here, mademoiselle, but apparently you are unaware of it."

"Is there, now?"

"Yes. Those who are passing through have no power to besmirch the reputations of those who remain. That simply isn't how it works in Monte Carlo."

It was utter nonsense, this claim. A shrill complaint from a wealthy visitor to one of the hotels could get him banned for life. The prince himself might escort him to the border should his behavior in any manner threaten the flow of tourists to this little paradise by the sea. But the woman before him seemed impressed by his confidence, if nothing else. Perhaps a bit of the earl's fearlessness had rubbed off on him.