Must Have Been The Moonlight (23 page)

Michael lifted a faintly ironic brow. “Neither are you.”

“True.” She leaned against the window, her eyes also looking toward home. “Christopher and I left England shortly after our marriage,” she said. “We did not leave on the best of terms with his family. I’ll be surprised if anyone shows to take me home.”

He set the cup down near a lamp at his hip. “Your husband wired his family before we left Alexandria. They’ll be waiting when we arrive. I’ll wager my inheritance on it. You’re part of their family. One of them.”

She laughed. “I suppose you can refer to the Donallys as
them
. They are a very tight-knit, earthy family. Protective of their own.” She leaned against the window. “Cairo in April is
no place to be when this baby comes. But it doesn’t make me feel any better to leave.” Touching her abdomen, she looked up to find Michael watching her. “Forgive my immodesty. I fear that marrying a Donally has corrupted all sense of propriety.”

Michael remembered a particular photograph caught by a particularly talented photographer of Lady Alexandra wearing only gauzy veils and a seductive smile. At the time, he’d been intrigued that she had somehow escaped the confines of her life. Now, he realized that it had been much more that he’d envied.

“I like impropriety, my lady.”

Brianna stopped just inside the grand salon, her gaze scanning the few people present. A small orchestra played music to an empty floor. Yule decorations remained scattered over the tables and draped across doorways, remnants of the celebration held here last week. Michael sat at the back of the salon, bent over a chessboard. She wondered what he thought about when he was alone.

He’d not been in the room when she finally crawled out of bed late that afternoon. She’d eaten with him at breakfast only because he’d forced her to eat; then she promptly fell back to sleep. Later, when she felt human again, she’d visited Alex and Gracie. Out on deck, one of the stewards told her that Michael had already fed the mare that evening.

“He’s sitting in front of the window, Lady Ravenspur,” the steward said as he pushed a food cart behind her.

She still wasn’t used to that name. As Brianna approached, Michael lifted his head. She wore a rose-colored gown. Her hair lay in glossy waves over her bare shoulders and down her back. Behind him, the gunmetal-gray clouds of yesterday had surrendered to the fading glow of a sunset. “I hope you haven’t eaten supper,” she said.

Brianna directed the steward to leave the cart. He stopped in front of Michael. “Is there anything else you need, your Grace?”

“That will be all.”

Still unused to being invisible by virtue of Michael’s presence in any room she shared with him, Brianna remained where she stood as the man walked past her. People talked to Michael in crowds. Acknowledged his presence with deference. Respected him.

His gaze made a slow pass over her. “The kitchens are closed. Did you coerce the cook to do your bidding? Or was it merely your smile?”

“Neither. I promised that you would write a glowing report of his culinary prowess to the captain. It seems he’s looking to advance his position to head chef, and the recommendation of a duke in his portfolio of endorsements is worth a bribe in gold.”

He ran his thumb over the queen in his hand. “Is that right?”

Brianna caught herself watching his hands. Behind her a quiet waltz played. Michael had removed his uniform jacket and seemed more vulnerable—as if he’d eliminated the protective outer layer that always surrounded him. Now, as she pondered her next words, she felt other things as well. Guilt. Regret.

Relief.

Like clockwork, she’d started her menses that afternoon. Her body never failed her in that regard. She would have to tell him. As much as she trusted that Michael had done the right thing by her, the tiny seed of doubt inside grew. Now that the real reason for the marriage was no longer an issue, he could be free of his responsibility to her. Or not.

“How are you feeling?” he asked.

“Alive.” She swept around into the chair. “Thank you for taking care of my mare. And checking on Gracie last night. That was very kind.”

His gaze followed her. “I’m a kind person.”

“No you’re not. I mean you are about some things. You can be charming when you choose. And you look nice. Your
uniforms are always clean and no one but you sees that it is. It’s true that we have differing expectations of marriage.”

“You’ve made me aware of that.”

Brianna brushed her skirt. There was so much that she didn’t understand about herself when she was with him. “I wanted you to know that there will be no baby.” She’d tried to make her voice sound level.

Brianna had half expected anger, disappointment, some recriminating comment that he’d ruined his life for naught. “I started my menses today…in case you were too polite to ask how I’d know.”

“I’m not that polite, Brianna. I assumed that to be the case.”

Despite herself, she felt her face grow hot. “We’ll be in England in a week. I’ll agree to an annulment. You can go your way, I’ll go mine.”

“Where is it that you want to go, Brianna?”

Daunted by his words but comforted by the authority he seemed to take over this matter, she dropped her gaze to the sleeve on the chair. She didn’t really want to go anywhere, but said the first place on her mind. “India,” Christopher had once been there, “the Himalayas.”

Michael was watching her, his expression unchanged, yet his eyes seemed less stark. “Don’t you think it’s insulting? We’ve been married three weeks and you want to leave me for the Himalayas?”

Despite herself, she almost laughed. “I’d think that you’d be glad to find yourself free to marry whomever your family wanted you to marry.”

“You don’t need to explain your feelings.”

“I do.” She cast her gaze to the wall. Deep sapphire watered silk draped the windows that overlooked the sea. The room was no longer gray with the passing day, but filled with a soft, luminous brilliance that came with candlelight and seemed to pick the silver from Michael’s eyes. “I don’t want an annulment.” She finally voiced the words she’d
come here to say tonight. “But neither do I want to find myself relegated to a shelf in your life. I want to know you. I want you to know me. It seems that we started out backward, upside down. Literally, on our backs.”

Michael continued to watch her over steepled fingers.

Even now, his presence consumed her. The novelty of passion, the intensity of her emotions, had proven to be an intoxicating paradox for her. She craved their physical intimacy, yet, she also needed the simple comfort of camaraderie that could last into the daylight hours. She needed to be in control of her emotions again.

“What we do in bed is very nice. More than nice. I like it a lot. But I want a chance to…” She wanted to know that she was important in other areas of his life. “I want what we have in bed out of bed as well.” She clasped her hands in her lap. “I want more.”

“Meaning…?”

“I’m asking that we go through the process of getting to know each other. Perhaps start from the beginning. The real beginning.”

“Then what? You’ll tell me if I pass your test?”

“This isn’t a test.”

She sat across from him as if the heat and intensity in his eyes didn’t burn her to an ember. She was illogical to the point of contrary.

Yet, sometime during the last few weeks, Michael had ceased to question what kind of woman he’d married. He knew what kind warmed his bed at night.

The kind that could sit between his knees and make him come with her mouth. An enchanting houri girl with eyes like heaven and laughter like moonlight that halted any thought remotely wholesome in or out of her presence.

For on an entirely higher level, he and Brianna were like two lions circling one another, equally matched in fight and spirit. There was passion beneath her pride.

Passion that had touched him when she’d stood up to the authorities and cleared him of murder, no matter the cost to
her future. Passion when she’d looked into his eyes with the fortitude to speak her vows for the sake of a child they might have made. Willing to take a chance on an uncertain future ahead of them. He wanted that woman beneath the fervor of her emotions that fueled the heart of her. Who could face down brigands in the desert—including him.

Who was unafraid to confront anything or anyone—except herself.

Which left him precariously balanced on new ground, aware that she’d twisted him into a pretzel without knowing how she’d managed it.

Instinctively, Michael knew if he did not grant her request, she would never ask anything else from him again.

“Do you play chess?” he finally asked.

Brianna blinked, unable to comprehend why he would ask her that.

“Maybe you’d care to wager for your position?”

She clearly didn’t trust the challenge in his eyes, but she wasn’t going to back away. “I wouldn’t wish to humiliate you, your Grace.”

“I’m glad to know that we are still of a like mind on something.”

She was beautiful, her hair lying in waves across her shoulders. She gazed at him with the realization that they shared a like mind on many aspects of daily life and behavior. None of that had really changed.

“What is it that you are playing for?” she asked.

Picking two pieces off the board, Michael leaned an elbow on the table and held out his closed hands. “You. In my life. No annulment. One week, I’ll court you.”

Her shining gaze rose to his. “Four.”

“One. And I can still touch you anywhere.”

“Two weeks.” Her voice was sounding oddly breathy. “We live in separate quarters.”

“One,” he said. “Separate quarters only when we reach England and only for the allotted time. But the rooms have to connect.”

“Did you really let Colonel Baker win at chess?”

He arched a brow. “You’ll have to play me to find out.”

Tension coiled between them. Brianna tapped his left hand. He turned his palm over. She’d picked her own color. No matter what anyone said, she would always think it better to go first.

“Have you played chess long?” Michael asked conversationally.

“Since I was ten. Ryan taught me.” She opened the game by moving a pawn. “Then I promptly beat him, and afterward he wouldn’t play me anymore.”

“Ryan is?” Michael rebutted her move with a like move.

“The youngest of my brothers. And you?”

He followed her next move with his bishop. “Chess and whist are the pastime of naval officers. I come from a family of admirals.”

She arched a brow. “Yet, you went into the army.” She seemed to study him with that thought in mind. Then she lowered her gaze. For a long time she merely stared at the pieces before moving her bishop. “Would you have married me if you weren’t returning to England?”

Michael moved his queen, and hesitated.

It took her a moment to register the action. He’d put her in checkmate. Just that fast. Queen, bishop, three.

They faced each other across the small table. She was waiting for an answer to her question. An answer that he didn’t know how to give, except the truth for what it was. Brianna would never believe anything less. His inheritance had changed everything.

But Brianna had changed even that.

“Never mind.” She folded her hands. “I know the answer to that question. We would have waited the three weeks or however long it took for my menses. Eventually you would have returned to the desert, and I would have met someone else. On some other continent, of course.”

She was wrong on so many accounts that he didn’t know where to begin. “There is one truth you should know,
amîri
.”
He rose. She came to her feet as he walked around the table. “I let you oversleep that morning your brother came to my quarters. I knew that after that night I couldn’t leave you in Cairo. There was no nobility in that need. No honor in my actions. My intent was simply to keep you.” His voice was oddly chilled compared to the heat inside. “So look at me closely, Brianna.” He slid his palm around her nape. “And tell me again that I would allow you to take another man in my place while I yet walk this earth.”

At first she just returned his stare. Then he saw the radiance in her eyes. “Do you know when I first thought of you in less than wholesome terms?”

They were suddenly in each other’s arms dancing to the quiet music. No one else was on the floor.

“When?” His voice was whisper soft.

“When I saw you undressed, shaving for the first time by the pond. When we were in Baharia. Everything about you was a shock to me,” she added with a careful smile. “It’s the only way I can explain my insane attraction to you, and everything that I did afterward.” She turned her face away and blinked back moisture. “Do you know when I realized how beautiful you are? Truly beautiful?”

Michael brushed the hair off her face. “When?” He spoke quietly in deference to her tender admission.

“Last night.”

He absorbed the simplicity of her declaration, unable to take his eyes from hers. She was deeply familiar in ways that left him searching his own heart for the depth of his feelings. He realized that it had been too long since he’d let anyone into this part of his life as completely as he’d allowed her. As a man who was accustomed to giving orders and having authority, he found the vulnerability unpleasant, his demons alive.