A Rose at Midnight Read online

  Her fingers tightened in his hair, and he could hear her gasping cries as she sought her release. And suddenly he didn’t want her to come that way. He was selfish enough to need to be inside her, and he moved up, kneeling between her legs, taking her hands in his and pressing them down against the mattress as he filled her; slowly, inexorably, deeply.

  He’d planned to give her a moment to accommodate herself to his size, he’d planned to go slowly, but the moment he sank all the way in she convulsed around him, her body tightening, milking him, and he had no choice but to follow her, his control vanishing, as he drank in her choked cry of completion.

  He released her hands, wrapping his arms around her head, cradling her, his lips drinking in her tears as she sobbed beneath him. She tore at the heart he didn’t know he still possessed, but not for anything would he regret the last hour, the last day, the last weeks. If it was weakness, damnable, destructive weakness, then he no longer cared.

  The moment she regained a tiny bit of control she tried to turn away from him, even as she lay beneath him, their bodies still joined. “Let me be, Nicholas,” she begged brokenly. “Don’t torment me, don’t humiliate me further. Let me go away, I beg of you.”

  “I thought I explained this to you,” he said with great patience, kissing her eyelids. “You are not going away from me, ever again.” He smoothed the tear-damp hair away from her face with surpassing gentleness.

  “Don’t do this to me,” she cried. “Now of all times, don’t be kind. You know what I am, what I had to become.”

  “I know what you are,” he agreed, his voice low. “A very dangerous woman. Fierce, and brave, and terrifying. If I could let you leave I would, my love. But I can’t.”

  “Nicholas…”

  “Hush,” he said, releasing her body, moving to one side and gathering her in his arms. “Hush, now. All this weeping and lamentation is a waste of time. You can’t change the past, and all your thirst for revenge won’t help matters.”

  “Don’t be kind,” she whispered. “For God’s sake, Nicholas, don’t be kind!”

  “I’m never kind,” he said. “You should know that by now. I’m selfish and dishonorable, dissolute and wicked.” He smoothed her tangled hair away from her tear-damp face. “You should know that better than anyone.”

  “Nicholas…”

  “And to prove it to you, I’m about to make love to you again. Ignoring your righteous dismay, ignoring any wishes you might have in the matter, I’m going to start all over again and discover whatever it was you learned from all those hundreds and thousands of men you lay with on the streets of Paris.” His voice was gently mocking.

  “Don’t joke about it,” she said, trying to hide her face. Since she chose his shoulder to hide against, he found such a move entirely acceptable. “There were three,” she said in a very small voice.

  “Three hundred?” His deft fingers began working the taut muscles of her smooth, narrow back, kneading, stroking, feeling the skin grow warm and alive as one tension left and another began.

  “Three men. Or rather, two and a half.”

  He paused for a moment, careful to keep his voice free of laughter. “How did you manage to service two and a half men? I can’t quite comprehend the logistics. Not that you need explain. I’ve told you, it doesn’t matter how many men. I’m just curious.” His hands moved down to her small, rounded buttocks, pulling her closer to him.

  “There was the earl,” she muttered. “And M. Porcin, the butcher. But when Malviver wanted me to…” Her voice broke, and the tears stopped as she looked up at him. “I killed him.”

  “You always were a bloodthirsty wench,” he said amiably, pulling her legs up around his aroused body with deft grace. “Why did you kill this… Malviver, did you call him?”

  “He was the man who took me to Madame Claude’s,” she said flatly.

  “Well, it certainly seems as if he deserved it more than me,” he said, pulling her closer still, until he rested against her, newly aroused and needing her. “Did you use poison?”

  “I don’t understand you,” she cried, catching his shoulders. “How can you sound so amused by it all?”

  “Haven’t you learned by now, my angel, that you must either laugh or weep?” He brushed her still-damp face. “I think you have wept enough for one night.” And he sank into her, turning on his back as he went, pulling her astride him.

  She was astonished, hesitant at first, and tried to scramble away. It was obvious to him that her scarlet past had included very little, and he briefly considered all the things he would teach her. “Nicholas!” she said in shock.

  He schooled his powerful response enough to smile at her. “I believe it’s all a lie. You did spend the last decade in a convent. Be brave, ma mie. You might find you like it.” His long fingers tightened on her thighs, as she still tried to pull away. “Please,” he said.

  He’d never said please to a woman in his life. Somehow she knew that. She closed her eyes briefly, and her fingers tightened on his shoulders, but she made no more move to escape.

  She was an apt pupil. She caught the rhythm in no time, and the shyness vanished, leaving her glistening with sweat, trembling, taut with passion, learning to take her pleasure, and his. And when she came this time her cry echoed out over the still waters of the canal, mingling with his.

  She collapsed on top of him in an untidy little heap of satisfied female flesh. He tucked her against him, smiling as he felt the boneless exhaustion of sleep. The scrape on his chest stung, but he made no move to do anything about it. It was a small enough price to pay for Ghislaine. If need be, he would have let her hack off his arm in return for the hours they’d just shared.

  She was so small, so fierce, so strong, so vulnerable. He had never known a woman like her. He needed her, he who’d never needed a living soul. There was no way he was going to let anyone wound her again. He was bound to bring her enough pain as it was. It was in his blood. The least he could do was keep her safe from others who might choose to hurt her.

  He waited until he was certain her sleep was so deep that nothing might awaken her. He wanted to sleep too, wrapped in her arms, drinking in her scent, the scent of their lovemaking filling the room.

  But he had a more important task to perform. One that damned well wasn’t going to wait.

  Venice was like every cosmopolitan city. Gaming houses stayed open till daylight, parties lasted till breakfast. It took him three stops, but he finally found the Earl of Wrexham at one of the better gaming houses, deep in a game of faro.

  He must have felt Blackthorne’s shadow loom over him. He glanced up, and Nicholas noted he wasn’t cupshot. Not that it would have mattered. Drunk or sober, Wrexham was going to die. A duel with Nicholas Blackthorne would be one-sided, no matter what condition his lordship was in. It would simply make society happier if he was sober.

  “That you, Blackthorne?” he asked, looking up, his eyes bright with malice. “Hoping to see you again. I’ve an interest in your little ladybird. Unfinished business, don’t you know? What say we play for her favors? A hand of piquet? We could play for a night, for a week? Winner take all.”

  “I’m going to kill you, Wrexham,” Nicholas said in his smooth, pleasant voice.

  “Don’t be ridiculous, old chap. People don’t kill each other over sluts. Had a feeling you weren’t best pleased when I recognized the gel, but I’ve always had a good memory. Come on, old man, let’s share a drink…” He held a crystal wineglass toward him, but there was a faint shade of anxiety in his faded eyes.

  Nicholas took the glass in one strong white hand. “You’re absolutely right. Gentlemen don’t fight over doxies. But since the lady in question happens to be my intended bride, I think we might agree that the issue differs.”

  Wrexham looked frankly appalled. “By all means, old boy. Must have been mistaken. My apologies…”

  “Not good enough,” Nicholas said, and flung the contents of his glass in Wrexham’s florid face. />
  The room went still. Wrexham pulled a heavily laced handkerchief from his sleeve and mopped his dripping face. The color had faded, with good reason. He couldn’t apologize again, not after so great an insult, one witnessed by a gossipy group of his peers. He looked up into Nicholas’s face, and knew he was going to die.

  “I await your pleasure,” he said, his voice quavering only slightly.

  Nicholas had planned to finish the business quickly, savagely, returning to Ghislaine’s arms before she even knew he was gone. He’d done his best to exhaust her, her own tormented emotions had contributed their share, and he had little doubt she’d sleep late into the day. He’d lost count of the duels he’d fought, some of them for trifling reasons. He disliked a man’s coat, he disliked another man’s voice. He’d killed, of course, the late Jason Hargrove being one of those. None of the men he’d fought, none of the men he’d killed, had deserved to die as much as my lord of Wrexham.

  And therein lay the problem. Hatred blinded him. Rage weakened him. Savagery overwhelmed him. Venice was more relaxed about such affairs. If two English gentlemen wished to settle their affair of honor then and there, the tables were pushed out of the way, seconds were chosen, and the business commenced.

  There was no satisfaction in the one-sided nature of the battle. Even half-mad with rage, Nicholas suffered not even the slightest scratch. He fought like a man possessed, and his skill with the sword, always estimable, took on a new power.

  But Wrexham didn’t die well. It took too damned long, there was blood everywhere, and the damned coward wept at the end, his tears horrifying everyone.

  “Damned bad ton,” Hopton, an acquaintance of Blackthorne’s who’d offered to serve as his second, had murmured when it was finally over. “He was bad ‘un, we all knew it. Never thought you’d be the noble avenger though, Blackthorne.”

  “Amusing, isn’t it?” he said in a hollow voice, staring at the blood on his hands.

  His friend glanced back at Wrexham’s body and shuddered. “Not terribly,” he said. “Death, even a deserved one, never amuses.”

  Nicholas followed his gaze. “No,” he said. “It never does.” And he moved out into the Venetian dawn, with bloodstained hands, and bloodstained soul, to find absolution.

  Chapter 22

  The room was murky when Ghislaine awoke, a greenish-blue pattern of light dancing on the ceiling. She lay still in the bed, absorbing the warmth and softness of the mattress, absorbing the unimaginable feeling of well-being that washed over her. She was alone in the bed; a sorrow, but one that couldn’t overtake her sheer animal pleasure.

  She rolled over on her back, wincing at the unexpected discomfort between her legs, and stared at the pattern on the ceiling. The reflection of the canals outside, mixed with the light of dawn, made the room a shadowy, magic place.

  Except that it was the glow of twilight, not dawn, she realized when she pulled the heavy linen sheet around her body and walked to the window. She’d slept the day away.

  It wasn’t until she was sinking into a hot, scented bath that she looked down at her body. The dried streak of blood. The marks of his possession. She looked at her body, and she grew hot all over again. And she wondered where he was.

  The servants had been busy. More rooms had been made habitable, including a formal dining room, now scrubbed and gleaming. She dressed simply, in an ivory day dress that clung to her body and moved with grace. It was odd, she thought, curling up on a settee in the main salon. She ought to be wearing crimson. After the most erotic night of her life, she suddenly felt almost virginal again, as she hadn’t felt in more than ten years.

  Where was he? She wouldn’t, couldn’t believe he’d abandoned her, finally released her, after all her pleading. It would be vengeance indeed, to finally break through her defenses, only to cast her aside.

  He’d told her he’d never let her go, and she found she believed him. Even though he insisted he was without honor, she believed him. She would be with him forever. Or she would die.

  Taverner was worried. He insisted he had no knowledge of Nicholas’s whereabouts, but there was no disguising the anxiety in his swarthy, pinched face. That anxiety traveled straight to Ghislaine’s heart.

  The servants retired for the night. Taverner went out in search of him, though he insisted he was simply going for a stroll. Ghislaine wandered through the palazzo like a lost soul, waiting.

  It was past midnight when she went upstairs. The house was still and silent as she passed the door to her tiny room and headed straight for the master bedroom. The taper she carried cast little illumination, and she set it down on a table inside the door, reaching blindly for the candelabrum she knew provided most of the light.

  “Leave it.” Nicholas’s voice came out of the darkness.

  She wanted to weep in relief. She trembled for a moment, closing the door behind her and leaning against it. The one taper barely penetrated the shadows, and she could just see him, standing by the window, staring out into the starry night.

  “Have you been here long?” she asked.

  He turned and rested his back against the wall, and she could see the cool, mocking smile on his mouth, something she’d hoped never to see again. “Not long. He’s dead.”

  For a moment she had no idea what he was talking about. He was dressed in dusty black, his dark hair was tangled, and his face was pale with exhaustion and something far worse. “Who is?”

  “Wrexham,” he said. “I’ve avenged your honor, my dear. Now who will avenge the harm I’ve done you?”

  “You killed him?”

  “Could you doubt it?” He made an abrupt, airy gesture. “I’m a man who knows how to kill. I seem to be outdoing myself though—two men in less than a season. Don’t look so distraught. It was in a duel. Plenty of witnesses to attest to the fairness of the situation. We won’t be hounded out of Venice.”

  She could hear the despair in his voice, a despair she couldn’t quite understand. She moved across the room on silent graceful feet. And then she knew. Her wicked, heartless, half-mad Nicholas was human after all.

  She came to him, reached up, and took his face in her hands. “Nicholas,” she whispered, “I am so sorry.”

  He tried to jerk away from her gentle touch. “Sorry? Why should you be sorry? One more death, more or less, doesn’t make a whit of difference, and if anyone deserved to die, Wrexham was the man. His reputation was legion—you were neither the first nor the last of his victims, and hardly the most damaged. He deserved it. He deserved to die badly, to lie in his own blood and squeal for mercy, even as his life was draining away…”

  “Oh, God,” she whispered, sliding her arms around his neck. “Nicholas…”

  He pushed her away from him. “I find I’m not in the mood,” he said with a brittle laugh. “I’m not very good company right now. I kept away for as long as I could, but the amusements of Venice are not to my taste. I’ll relieve you of my presence…”

  She caught his wrist, halting him. “Nicholas,” she said. “I love you.”

  “Don’t,” he snapped at her, but he didn’t break free. “Don’t you understand? Haven’t I proved it, time and time again? I’m a monster, not worthy of love, not worthy of anything at all…”

  “I love you,” she said again, catching his other hand, pulling his arms around her, pulling his tall, tension-racked body tight against hers. “I love you.”

  He made a strange, choking noise, and dropped his head on hers. She felt the tremors shiver through him, and she held him, gently, as she would hold a wounded child, as she would have held her long-lost brother. And then the holding changed, and she moved her head up, and touched his mouth with hers.

  He let her kiss him. He started to kiss her back, but she restrained him, unfastening the bone buttons on his dark shirt and pushing it from his shoulders. She found the tear she’d inflicted in his flesh, and she ran her lips down the length of the long scratch. She kissed his shoulder, his flat male nipples; she ran h
er mouth down the corded strength of his belly, and then she pressed her mouth against the fierce swell of flesh beneath his breeches.

  He caught her shoulders, pulling her up close against him, and this time he kissed her, hard and deep, a kiss she answered. Her dress ripped as he tore it off her; his breeches ripped as she tore them open. She touched him, felt the silken strength of him, and he groaned, deep in his throat, pushing against her hands. His skin was smooth, hot, and she wanted him, needed him in ways only instinct told her. Before he could realize her intent she sank to her knees on the pile of scattered clothes and took him in her mouth. His hands dug into her shoulders, and he groaned again.

  “No, Ghislaine. God, yes… yes!” he said, unable to control himself, thrusting into her sweetly questing mouth. And then he caught her, pulling her up, up, into his arms, moving back against the wall, positioning her there before he filled her, shoving himself in deeply. She held on, her eyes tightly closed, absorbing his fevered thrusts, unable to do more than shiver in pleasure. He turned and leaned back, supporting himself against the paneled wall as he held her, her legs wrapped around his back, and lifted her, up and down, faster now, faster and faster, deeper and stronger, and his lips were pulled back against his strong white teeth, and sweat covered their bodies, and suddenly she exploded, her body shattering into a million pieces. She heard his cry, and she kissed him, drinking it in, as her body drank his essence.

  He managed to carry her over to the bed, collapsing with her on it, careful to support her weight as they fell. She wouldn’t, couldn’t let go of him. She felt lost, frightened, more moved than she had been in her entire life. It was as if he drained everything from her, will and power and anger and strength. She existed only for him. She cradled him in her arms, smoothing his long tangled hair, and she cried for him. And she could feel his own tears against her skin.

  It was a dream, an idyll, soon shattered. They spent days in bed, learning each other’s bodies, making love, having sex; with heat and passion, with sweetness and tenderness. They used the bed, the floor, the table, the hip bath. They did it standing up, sitting down, frontward, backward, sideways. He couldn’t get enough of her, drowning himself in her body. And she couldn’t get enough of him.