Page 44 of Ondine

She halted in sudden wariness as he swore with great exasperation, left the door, and came for her, sweeping her from her feet—cobwebs and all—before she could do more than utter a gasp of protest.

“Laugh!” he prompted her.

“Laugh!”

“Aye, laugh! Slip your arms around my neck, gaze into my eyes as if they held you captive in a sea of adoration. Hold close—”

“I will not!”

“You will! And you will do so now!”

He strode back to the door. Ondine a carefree burden in his arms, tossing back his dark head and filling the evening with the rich and husky tones of a baritone laughter.

She tightened her grip around his neck lest she fall, and she stared into his eyes as he had commanded her.

She knew that they were to appear as if naught were amiss should someone see them; she knew that Warwick intended to move fleeting and eager.

She knew, too, that she was a consummate actress and more—a woman deeply in love with her husband, though he used her, willing with her heart to play this moment to the hilt.

“Warwick!”

He strode so swiftly! She was able to sound breathless, to giggle, to laugh as his quick tread brought them up the stairway.

They passed Jake, who warned Mathilda to leave the young earl and his countess alone. They passed Justin, coming along the stairway, who laughed in turn at their good humor, calling something to his brother about marital quarrels being worth those moments of bliss when they were resolved.

And then they were within their own quarters, where Warwick quickly set her down and hurried into the bath. With a sigh of relief he saw that it had been filled and steamed invitingly with water.

“Come!” he called to Ondine. “I’ll help you, since we dare not call your maid.”

Ondine followed him through, anxious—so anxious!—to rid herself of the cobwebbed clothing, yet wary as he stood there, for bending to his whim surely brought new misery to her soul. She had little enough pride left; little of dignity.

“Milord, I can help myself,” she told him pointedly.

“Milady, plague me not with such nonsense!” he snapped back impatiently, coming to her in one broad step and swirling her about so that he could set to the hooks and tiny buttons of her gown, and the laces of the corset bodice beneath it.

She stood rigid, somewhat desperate, for he conjured things she thought best buried and forgotten, sensations of the flesh that were made in Eden, but brought upon the heart and soul the scalding of an earthly hell.

Her thoughts had no import, nor did she have time to expand upon them, for it was surely with a quick and no nonsense approach that she found herself losing her garments.

“Nay!” she cried when he would touch her hose, clenching her teeth, lowering her eyes, and removing them herself—then plunging into what little shelter she could find in the steaming water.

When she looked up at last, she was surprised to find him still there, hands crossed over his chest, his expression somewhat bemused.

“Haven’t you something to do!” she demanded.

“I thought you demanded an explanation?”

“I do! But—”

Her voice trailed as he knelt down beside her, taking up the sponge and soap. She eyed him most warily; his expression was all innocence.

“Woman,” he murmured, casually sudsing the sponge, “be it diabolical or no, I married you. I know you, just as I know the movement of my hand, yet again and again you behave as if you’ve some secret which must not be divulged.

The secrets you hide, milady, are known, and so in such circumstances modesty is false. ”

“Give me the soap and leave me!” Ondine said, but, oh, it was not to be a sharp command, and even as she spoke, her words faltered. This was not an easy man to order about, and ever did it become harder, when it was her own sense she fought more than he!

He shook his head. “I think not. You need help with your hair.”

“I’ve done it many a time my—”

The last was caught in a gulp, for he had pushed her down beneath the surface, thoroughly wetting her head, and when she emerged, sputtering, his fingers had already worked through her temple, her nape, massaging her scalp with the most hypnotic touch.

She curled her fingers into her hands, desperately willing herself to be still, for he would complete his task, and she knew in her heart that if she moved, that if he touched her further, she would not gasp or revile him, but twist with the craving of his touch.

She did not look at him, but stared silently at the water, lashes downcast, form rigid, as he manipulated the long waves of her hair. She thought she heard him sigh. With disappointment? With weariness? She did not know. At last he spoke, and it was stiffly.

“That will suffice, I believe.”

She nodded and ducked her head, realizing that to vigorously rinse it would require her arms, and then she would need to release their hug about her breasts.

Yet there was no need, for he rinsed her hair with his fingers with the same fine expertise with which he had washed it, leaving her to wonder how many times he had performed just such a task, and for how many women.

He was done. He stood and moved to the closet for a towel, and as he sought it she quickly sought to scrub her flesh.

Of course he caught her in the act, but he stood silently and waited.

Blindly she stretched her arm far from her to reach for the towel.

He gave it to her, but when she stood, he was there, mesmerizing her as he wrapped it about her with the greatest care and tenderness, and if she did not know him, she might have sworn that there was a look of wistfulness about him as he touched her eyes.

But those amber eyes of his were at best enigmatic, and his gaze did not tarry upon her long.

He swept her into his arms again, completely wrapping her in the towel.

He carried her out to his own great chair in the music room and sat her there, finding the brandy and glasses in his desk drawer and pouring them each a portion.

She sipped it eagerly, realizing that she trembled from his nearness, and did so, too, from that chill of the graves beneath the earth.

He did not stay near her, but walked to the fire, sipping his brandy, staring into the blaze.

“Madam,” he said at last, “it was not with diabolical designs that I took you from the gallows, though it is true that I thought a woman condemned and facing death to be a finer bait than an innocent with nothing to fear but sheer acts of God.”

Ondine felt cold, very, very cold. “So, I am bait. For the creature who forced me to the tombs?”

He swung about, staring at her hard. “What exactly happened?”

She drained her brandy. Recall was difficult. She did not want to remember the graves, she wanted to taste more of life.

“I entered the chapel. Jake was with me, but I closed the doors. I wandered toward the altar. Once there, I heard a moan—”

“And you panicked?”

“Milord, I do not panic,” she said coolly. “I ignored the sound and set to my task; again it came. And when I turned, I faced a creature—”

“A creature?” he demanded skeptically.

“Aye!” she snapped indignantly. “A figure, capped and cowled and masked! And taloned!”

“Taloned?”

She heard the doubt in his voice, and gritted her teeth, yet the vision had come so clear to her that she trembled, and he saw that shiver in her ill-clad form.

Quickly he was before her, lifting her in his arms again, bringing her to the fire, before which he knelt.

“You are cold; your hair is wet.”

“It will dry quickly.”

“Go on. Talons?”

“Gloves, then, with talons attached!” Dear God, but it was difficult to think and speak!

Fear left her as the warmth and vigor of his body leapt to hers, yet a new fear began, for she could not forget how she had woken once, the spill of virginity between them, only to hear his apology, since he had assumed her a whore!

She stiffened in his arms, wanting only the truth between them now, loathe that she should love him while he scorned her, a gallows’ bride.

“Gloves, aye, with nail protrusions—lethal protrusions, milord.” She lifted her head, narrowing her eyes, not knowing that the fire gleamed within them, and all along the dancing length of hair that matched its golden glow.

“Someone intended me serious harm; I ran, and found then that I must back away. At Genevieve’s tomb I found that the flooring was no more; I fell through. ”

“To the tombs?” he demanded hoarsely.

“To the tombs. And, my lord, you should be aware that your lady’s casket has been opened!”

“Opened?”

“Opened, my lord! O-p-e-n-e-d!”

“I know the spelling!” Warwick flared. He set her down upon the floor; she groped to pull the towel about her, stunned as he left her, long strides taking him back toward the bath.

But he had not gone to the bath; he had traveled through to her chamber and returned quickly with her brush. Her shoulders squared as she felt him come behind her on his knees, take up her hair even as he spoke of the matter at hand, fingers gentle, voice as hard as the grate of the stone.

“I shall see to it immediately. And you will go nowhere unattended.”

“She was murdered, then. Genevieve.”

“Aye,” he agreed simply. The brush paused against her hair. “None believed it; not even the king. But I knew, for she did not fear me, nor despise me, and though frail, she was sound in mind.”

Ondine was glad her back was to him, for she tightened with a strange pain, a knife that twisted at the sound of anguish in his tone, at the gentle, tender love he had borne another. Oh, she did not envy that poor lady! She only sought the love.

“And so,” she said stiffly, “you married me, hoping that the murderer should strike again?”

“Nay!” he charged her impatiently, and the brush tore once again into her hair, not with cruelty but with impatience. He spun her about, eyes burning, searing deeply into hers with intensity and honor.

“I’d have no maid’s blood on my hands! Lady, if I did not think that I could preserve the life I bartered for, I’d not have taken it into my hands! I’d thought to watch, to trap, aye to bait, but never leave to danger!”

“I was near killed this night!”

“Never, never will it come about again, for never again will you be alone!” he told her fiercely and with warning.

“Why didn’t you tell me!”

“How could I know that you would fill the role if you feared all whom you met?”

“Then whom do you suspect of the deed?”

“No one—and many.” He rose again, running his fingers distractedly through his hair and pacing before her with the great cat’s energy she so often saw in him.

“I know, I know not,” he murmured, “only that murder was the truth. Hardgrave despises me; he well would see my house fallen forever. Anne is a jealous witch, yet murder seems not her style.”

“Your brother—your cousin. Are they among those you see as candidates for the deed?”

He winced, staring down curiously at his open palms. “My blood, my flesh. Nay! I cannot see it! But Justin stands to inherit if I leave no issue. And should Justin and I both perish, Charles knows I would have Clinton receive both land and titles, legitimized by the law.”

Ondine stared into the flames, frowning. “The whispers came from this house. How could Hardgrave—or Anne—be guilty?”

“Hardgrave’s land adjoins mine. He or Anne might well know more of the tunnels and rooms than I suspect.”

“Clinton, I assume, was never at court.”

“But assassins may be hired; life is easily and shamefully little more than the cost of a golden coin.”

Ondine fell silent again and then murmured, “Genevieve was not . . . disturbed by the ‘ghosts’ until she was with child?”

He stopped his pacing, stood still behind her. “Aye.”

“And so,” she whispered, “your announcement that I, too, was with child?”

“Aye.”

She could not help but shudder. He knelt at her side, grasping her shoulders.

“Lady, I swear by my life, by my name, by all honor, I’ll see you safe of this!

Safe—and freed that your life might be your own!

It was an oath I took unto God when we married, and here I swear it once again!

You will live; live that the years ahead—once to be sacrificed to the noose!

—will be my most eternal payment, along with whatever coin will let you lead the life you desire! ”

Coin! Oh, God! He offered her coin . . .

She wrenched from his touch and stood, proud and arrogant as she held the towel about her as though it were a cloak woven of gold.

“Milord, this is, I think, a debt evenly met. My life you did save; your mystery I will seek with all I may to bring to a close. Then, milord Chatham, as you’ve said, we will be quits of all in this life!”

She strode past him in cool fury; yet something of her manner must have stung his temper despite the passion of his vows. He caught her about the waist before she could leave, spinning her close into his arms.

“Even, milady? I wonder! For about you there are secrets, too, secrets deep and dark, and I wonder what it is that I abet in holding you close to my heart!”

“Wonder away, milord!” Ondine retorted, eyeing him quite regally, for well was her bargain met, or so she thought. “I am your ‘bait’; I will, with all my power, play your role. But then, milord, I say that you have had all of me that you will ever touch!”

She twisted from him and walked again, head held high. He watched her through the hallway of the bath; watched her enter her own chamber.

“Ondine!” The passion and the timbre of his voice swept through her. She felt a rage of fire consume her with that sound, and she turned, wary . . . tense . . . frightened, so frightened, deep within her heart.

For even then he closed the distance between them, strong, determined, alive with a sudden fiery temper aglow in his implacable gaze.