Charon's Crossing (A Paranormal Romantic Suspense Novel) (14 page)

Matthew smiled into her eyes. "You misunderstood me, Miss Russell. The nations of the Old World have transplanted their fairest flowers here, to the New. And since you are, without doubt, the loveliest of them, so are you therefore the loveliest in all the world."

Catherine threw back her head and gave a peal of musical laughter.

"You are quick with words, Captain," she said, laying her hand lightly on his arm. "You must come and let me introduce you to my father. I am sure he will be delighted to make your acquaintance at long last."

* * *

"Delighted" was not the word Matthew would have used to describe Lord Russell's reaction to him.

Catherine's father was coldly polite but it was clear that he would never have invited a man like Matthew to dine at his table under more normal circumstances.

But these were not normal circumstances. The French ships that plied these waters were rich prizes but the Crown could not spare its own vessels to chase and capture them. British warships were busy blockading the French ports in the Bay of Biscay and in the Mediterranean, keeping imports from reaching Napoleon's armies on the Peninsula.

It was a situation that made for strange bedfellows. Or strange dining companions, Matthew thought, smiling to himself as he sipped an excellent glass of French wine and listened with half an ear to the breathy chatter of the woman seated to his right. She was a baroness, she was exceedingly beautiful and, as she'd made clear from the moment she'd laid eyes on Matthew, she was available.

But Matthew had eyes only for Catherine Russell. Every man at the crowded table did, for that matter. And she had eyes for all of them... but none for him.

What had happened to the promises he'd read in her eyes when they'd met in the entry foyer?

By the time dinner had ended and dancing had begun in the brightly lit ballroom, Matthew was half crazed with jealousy. Catherine laughed gaily at other men's jokes, she smiled at them and danced with them...

And ignored him completely. He waited until she was, for a brief instant, alone. Then he strode up to her and took her hands in his.

"You promised me this dance, Mistress Russell," he said.

Catherine looked surprised. "I believe you are wrong, Captain. I promised this dance to—"

Matthew had already swept her onto the dance floor.

"Do not argue with me," he warned, and when they danced past a pair of French doors, opened to let in the cool night breeze, he swept her through them and out into the darkness of the terrace. "Now, madam. Tell me why you have been deliberately ignoring me?"

"I shall tell you nothing, sir, for you are no gentleman to treat a lady thus."

"Nay." Matthew drew her deeper into the shadows. "I am no gentleman, Catherine. I am a man who takes what he wishes, and what I wish most is a kiss from your sweet lips."

Catherine laughed. "You must steal it then. But not tonight," she added quickly as he began to bend towards her. "I shall meet you tomorrow, in the rose garden."

Matthew nodded. He reached out and traced the outline of her mouth with his finger, gently parting it until he was stroking softly over the delicate, moist flesh inside her bottom lip.

"Tell me the hour, Catherine, and I will be there."

Oh, she thought, as he touched her, he was good at this game. She would not be able to toy with him as easily as she had toyed with so many others. That was good. The element of risk and of danger would add to her pleasure.

She looked into his eyes, smiled, and flicked the tip of her tongue against his fingertip. Matthew felt his body clench like a fist.

She was so beautiful. So seductive. And, by God, so innocent. It was a paradox but one he was sure he understood. She had felt the same lightning bolt as he; it was why she was almost swooning as she leaned towards him, why she sucked his finger into her mouth...

"Catherine?"

The harsh voice drove them apart. Catherine swung towards the doors that led back into the ballroom.

"Father!" Her smile lost its seductive tilt. She clasped Matthew's arm and drew him forward into the spill of light from the house. "How fortuitous! I was just about to go looking for you. Father, Captain McDowell is not feeling well."

Russell's close-set eyes narrowed. "Is that why you brought my daughter out here, Captain? So that she might keep you company in your illness?"

Matthew started to answer but Catherine's hand squeezed a warning.

"It was my idea, Father. We were dancing and all at once, the captain turned pale, excused himself and bolted for the doors." Catherine let go of Matthew's arm and stepped closer to Russell. "I suppose I should have let him go, Father, but then I thought, how would it look if I shunned my duty as your hostess and permitted one of your guests to stagger off and collapse unnoticed?"

A muscle clenched in Russell's jaw.

"You could have sent one of the servants after him, Catherine."

Catherine sighed and laid her head against her father's shoulder.

"Of course. How I wish I'd been clever enough to have thought of that."

Russell's expression softened. "Go on inside, my dear, and tend to our other guests."

She smiled and kissed his cheek. "Yes, Father. Good night, Captain McDowell. I trust you'll remember what I told you? Some tea brewed from cinchona bark will have you feeling better in no time. Why, twelve hours from now, you'll be fit as a fiddle."

Twelve hours from now? Matthew's eyes shot to Catherine's and she gave him an almost imperceptible nod. That was when she would meet him, then, on the morrow.

The speed with which she'd woven a tale to deceive her father, coupled with the ease with which she'd given him the hour of tomorrow's assignation, was dazzling. Matthew revised his earlier estimate of Catherine. She was not only the most beautiful woman he'd ever met, she was also the brightest.

He smiled politely, took the hand she offered him, and bowed over it as he raised it to his lips.

"Thank you, Lady Catherine. You have been most kind and I am indebted to you."

She smiled brightly. "It was nothing, Captain. But if you truly wish, you may repay that debt by being our guest at Charon's Crossing again soon. You can tell me all the latest gossip from the colonies."

Matthew knew nothing of social gossip. And he had flattened more than one fool who still insisted on referring to the American states as "colonies."
But, at that moment, if Catherine Russell had told him the moon was made of green cheese, he would not have argued...

* * *

A gust of wind, blowing in from across the sea, slammed one of the attic shutters against the wall of the house.

The book fell from Kathryn's hands. She jumped to her feet, almost totally disoriented. The shutter banged again, and she let out her breath.

Slowly, she bent down and picked up Matthew McDowell's journal. Landing face-down on the floor didn't seem to have harmed it any. She brushed it off carefully, shut it, and laid it on the rocker.

How long had she been reading, anyway? Long enough for the sun to have changed its angle in the sky. She had to lift her hand and tilt it towards the window in order to read her watch.

"Wow," she whispered.

What else could you say, when you found out four hours had passed in what felt like a minute?

The man wrote a heck of an interesting diary, she had to give him that much. Descriptive, too, she thought, and smiled.

Her smile faded. She remembered what he had written, that he had stroked his finger across Catherine Russell's mouth and she had parted her lips so she could taste his skin.

Kathryn felt the quickening beat of her heart. That was what had happened to her, last night. In her dream, Matthew had touched her mouth that same way. She could close her eyes now and still recall the eroticism of that moment, the heat of his fingertip moving across her lips, how she'd longed to do what the other Catherine had done, to draw his finger into her mouth and skim the tip of her tongue over it...

"Oh, for goodness' sakes!"

Enough already! The old book was fascinating. It was an interesting artifact and if she found the time, she'd probably pick it up again some afternoon. But that was all there was to it. The journal didn't have a damned thing to do with her or with her crazy dreams.

As for Matthew's grandiose description of himself as a lady-killer...

She laughed as she drew the shutters closed and locked them. Nothing much had changed, in two hundred years. Men still had mighty high opinions of themselves.

"You were probably a prissy old prude, Captain," she said.

She snatched up the flashlight and, without a backward glance, marched out the door and slammed it firmly behind her.

Silence filled the attic. Then a quicksilver light began to glimmer beside the rocker where the journal lay. The light moved swiftly towards the window and the shutters burst open, admitting fresh air and the natural light of the sun.

The light began to spin, slowly at first, then gathering speed until it became a whirlpool and the figure of a man appeared within its brilliant heart.

"A prude, was I, Catherine?" Matthew said.

He smiled tightly. The light began to shift and fade, as did he, until all that remained were dust motes, dancing in the fading rays of the sun.

Chapter 6

Kathryn was furious.

She'd been at Charon's Crossing for three days, and she had nothing to show for it.

No, she thought grimly, as she yanked a dustcloth and a spray-can of Pledge from under the kitchen sink, no, that wasn't true.

She had plenty to show for her stay. A clean kitchen, sanitized bathrooms, three broken fingernails and enough weird dreams to keep a New York shrink happy for the rest of his or her Freudian life.

"Damn," she muttered as she strode into the library.

This morning, she was going to dust the leather-bound books that lined the library shelves. Then she'd wax the furniture to within an inch of its life. And for an encore, she was going to drag all the Persian runners out to the terrace, spread them over the railing and beat the hell out of them with a broom.

Oh yeah. She was going to score a perfect 10 in housekeeping. Of course, that wouldn't change the fact that she'd scored a perfect zero when it came to doing what she'd set out to do when she'd taken a week out of her life and flown down here.

"Damn," she said again, and gave the closest books an angry swipe with the cleaning cloth. Dust erupted into the air. Kathryn jumped back but it was too late. Half a dozen explosive sneezes almost drove her back against the wall.

She flung the cloth to the floor, slapped her hands on her hips, and eyed the library as if it had turned into her own personal Rubicon.

What in hell was she doing?

She hadn't come to the island to turn into a housekeeper, she'd come to ready this miserable house for sale and to manage that, she was going to need help from an attorney who didn't pull a vanishing act, a realtor who gave a damn, and a contractor who really existed.

And she couldn't even tell anybody that, dammit, because her rental car hadn't turned up and her telephone might as well have been used for a doorstop.

Kathryn dropped down into the sagging depths of a flowered settee. Dust rose into the air but she ignored it.

Now what?

She lifted one bare leg, crossed it over the other, pointed her toes towards the ceiling and swung her foot from side to side.

As far as she could see, she had two choices. She could sit here like a lump and wait until Olive or Amos or the Invisible Repairman decided to put in an appearance. Or she could take matters into her own hands. It was, what? Five miles to town? Make that more like fifteen, along a road that twisted like a snake.

Well, so what? Surely, she wouldn't have to walk the whole distance. Once she went out the gate and down to the road, somebody would stop and give her a lift.

Kathryn smiled. She hadn't smiled much, the past few days, and it was surprising how good it felt.