Page 37 of Ondine
Ondine was still engaged in pacing her chamber, cursing with every epitaph she had learned from the thieves in the forest, when the wooden door banged open so heavily and with such a ferocious slam that she froze, her blood seeming to chill and cease its flow, her muscles constricted like ice.
Warwick stood there, a great sleak silhouette.
And then he moved. Quietly, elegantly, with all the grace that belonged to the tenor of Charles’s court, he stepped into the room. He removed his great plumed hat, and with it in his hand he swept her a bow so deep that its mockery was doubled in its masterful execution.
The act complete, he tossed the hat upon the love seat. And then he reached for the door, closing it slowly so that it moved upon its old hinges, screeching in a way that sent spasms of terror along her spine, even as her mind registered the dangerous taunt in his manner.
When the door was closed, he leaned against it, arms behind his back as he surveyed her.
The candlelight flickered. Corners in the room were dark and mysterious; the glow of the flames played tricks.
Warwick still had not spoken; he just stared at her, and though his lip curled into the devil’s own taunting smile, no sign of warmth touched his eyes.
And in that dancing candlelight they were not at all the hazel she knew them to be; they were gold like a flashing coin, or perhaps yellow like a streak of sun.
They blazed like fire; perhaps like those of a wolf—a wolf that hunted at night, stalking and cornering its prey.
A handsome wolf, stark and powerful with the night—deadly.
Fear plunged into her heart, and then rising anger.
How dare he look at her so! How dare he—after his performance in the ballroom, dancing, smiling, laughing with that woman!
Dear Lady Anne, who touched him so possessively with everyone looking, knowing that their relationship was indeed intimate.
The gall of the man, lord or no! To come here and invade her privacy after his obvious interest in that slut!
Oh, how could he . . . and still she couldn’t help the feelings that invaded her, body and soul .
. . and heart. Dear God, but he was a striking man!
No plume, no lace, no elegance of the cavalier costume, could detract from all that was so very masculine about him.
She hated him then, that he could laugh so easily with Anne, that Anne could talk so covetously of him.
Yet even hating him, she could still feel a thunder shake her, a storm rage within her.
Cold blood sizzled, streaked through her to a mystical core.
What was it, she wondered desperately, that touched such a distant and primal level of her being?
When she saw him, her heart quaked and her limbs trembled and a secret excitement grazed hot and molten within her .
. . even now, when he stared at her so, now when she needed most to despise him, now when the very air warned of tension.
“So—you are in here,” he said at last.
He knew that liquor burned in his system; that he was alive with jealousy. He’d never felt like this, never been the victim of such a passion, or such a . . .
Love.
Behind his back his fingers tensed. The wine he had imbibed, silver chalice after silver chalice, had not eased the tempest in him, the brooding, aching, yearning tempest. It was true; he had fallen in love with her.
He, of all men, had fallen in love. With the scraggly wretch he had saved from the gallows.
Though she was not a wretch at all, as time had proved, but a vibrant woman, clever, mysterious—beautiful.
So very beautiful in the candlelight. Decked in nothing but white silk that lay against her: silk that fell to her feet in graceful lines; silk that could not hide the peaks of her breasts; silk that made him long to reach out.
And her hair, floating over her shoulders, down her back.
Gold and red, sunlight and sunset, a sea of fire.
And her eyes, as blue as the sea, seafire, haunting a man, so deeply that he could not live without her.
Love . . . aye, he was in love with her.
Bewitched, as if she were a mermaid, a goddess from the sea.
Nay, he could not love her! His soul cried in torment.
Yet neither could he shake that fever of fury and lust and .
. . love . . . that had brought him here.
By God’s blood, he would see those cool blue eyes sparkle for him as they had for Charles, he would hear her whispered words, he would be the one to lead the dance . . .
“And where would I be, my lord?” she queried, determined to speak as coolly, yet unable to keep the bitter heat from her voice, or her eyes from glittering, exposing the ire that simmered inside her like bubbling peat.
He arched a dark brow to her. His satanic smile remained in place, and he strode across the room to the fire, turning the logs with the iron poker.
“I’d thought, from your behavior, dear wife, that you might be elsewhere.
Plying further charms upon the king.” He set the poker down and turned to stare at her once more, still smiling in that pleasant, dangerous manner.
He leaned an elbow upon the stone mantel and continued.
“Like the other very beautiful but rather mercenary whores about court, I thought you might be waiting in line for your turn with the royal bed.”
She gasped at the viciousness of his softly spoken accusation, then her temper snapped, and blindly she reached for the nearest thing to throw. Unfortunately, it was nothing more lethal than a neatly embroidered pillow.
But that missile hit him squarely between the eyes, and to her amazement he staggered in his attempt to catch it.
She snapped at him furiously, “You’re drunk!
You’ve spent the evening whoring with your mistress, Lady Anne, and swilling wines with your grandly titled friends, and then you’ve the nerve to burst into my chamber with vile recriminations— out!
Get out of here! Go back to your precious and delightful Anne and leave me in peace! ”
He threw the pillow to the floor and hooked his thumbs into his waistband as he took a step toward her.
His face appeared hard and dark, his jaw twisted, yet still that crooked grin remained in place while the blaze burned deeper in the golden hearts of his eyes.
“Drunk, my lady—my pious, dignified, virginal wife? Ah, perhaps, ’tis true!
The sight of one’s legally wed lady—ever so chaste and pure in her husband’s presence—pouring herself over the body of the king like scented oil—”
“Pouring! How—” Ondine cut in, only to be interrupted in return, his voice rising.
“Aye! Pouring, leaning against His Grace, laughing, smiling, with those delectable cherry-red lips, and nearly placing the fruit of those voluptuous white breasts into His Majesty’s hands.”
“Oh! You are a liar! A drunken sod of a liar! You know nothing better than the sordid tactics of your tavern-slut of a mistress and so you expect the same from others! Well, go back to her, my great lord of Chatham! Go back—”
“And leave you to the pursuit of a royal affair?”
“You’re insane!”
“Mayhaps,” he said softly. “Ah, yes, mayhaps! Mad with curiosity about the little thieving guttersnipe I married. The ingrate who chooses to make a fool of me—with a man not only my king, but whom I have called the best of friends. Ondine . . .”
He left the fire and came to her. His fingers bit into her shoulders, naked beneath the slim barrier of silk. She did not flinch; she stared up into his eyes. Hers were alive with the heat of candle glow, alive and tempest-tossed with rage. “Get your hands off me!” she enunciated crisply.
“Why, milady, should I do so? Should the husband be denied that which is so freely given elsewhere? What is it that you seek? Nell looks to the king for money and a title; Louise gains in jewels and lands. Or are their depths to the workings of your fair mind that not even I have begun to see? Barbara Villiers claimed the king magnificently endowed for the art of love—is it nothing more than the passion that you quest?” His words slurred huskily; his hand moved from her shoulder, and his thumb grazed her cheek.
“Bastard!” she hissed. Her elegant fingers twined into a knot, and she slammed them against his chest with all her strength.
His words were so soft, so lulling, so touched with a huskiness that seeped into the soul, that she was fool enough to feel the hypnotism again—the damnable longing, the wonder . . .
“Oh! I do despise you!” She did not strike his chest again—he hadn’t seemed to notice. She slapped him squarely against the jaw, twisted from his hold, and raced to the door, opening it. “Out, my dear lord husband! You are drunk and insulting! Leave me be!”
His strides were long and sure when he approached her.
His fingers wound around her wrist, and she cried out a startled little sound as she found herself whirling back into the room.
But Warwick didn’t leave it; he closed the door once more.
The hinges did not squeal or groan; the wood shuddered with the force of the slam.
“What do you think you’re doing!” Ondine choked out.
“I wish a discussion with my wife,” he said quite softly, but the timbre of the statement was such that she trembled suddenly. Drunk he might be, but not so much that his mind did not remain sharp as a whip, and his demanding nature had not altered in the least.
“I’ve nothing to say to a wine-sodden whoremonger!” she snapped back defensively. Then the line of his lip became so grim she was forced to remember that its power upon her nerves was nothing compared to his steel strength against her far more meager frame.
“I believe, my love, that you’re the whore we’re discussing.”