Out of the Dark (5 page)

Lucien was lost in that moment. What’s more, he had the sense to know it even if could not help himself. It was a supreme irony, he thought, that after all the wiles and traps avoided over the years he must succumb to a female who not only had no use for him, but who actually despised him.

A part of it was the challenge she represented, yes. But far greater was the invisible effect she exerted on his imagination and his emotions by her rare courage and spirit. These were things he had felt as he looked into her face the night before. They had only been reinforced as he watched her protect and defend the maligned wild creature that had come among them.

She was magnificent yet warm and human with it. He felt her attraction as a silent, irresistible beckoning. Like the great black cat he had wanted to move in as close as possible to her, to kiss her hand, even to eat from it, and never again to stray beyond the radius of her incomparable smile.

Madness.

She wanted nothing to do with him. She might have accepted his aid the one time, but she had no use for his hand or his kiss. He wondered what it would take to make her want them. And him.

There was nothing he had ever desired in his life so much as he wanted now to come close to her wildness, to be touched by it and to answer it with the release of his own unfettered passion.

A low rumble sounded behind him. The hair rose on the back of his neck as he recognized the sound. He had noticed moments before that the panther had left the clearing, fading into the woods. He turned with slow deliberation now to face the beast that had circled around to stalk him.

“No, Satan!”

It was Anne-Marie who had issued that sharp command. She came toward them at a run, with a hectic wash of color across her cheekbones and laughter warring with concern in her eyes. As she met his incredulous frown, she stopped abruptly and dropped her skirts about her ankles. All expression died from her face. She lifted her chin.

Silence descended as they stood in a frozen tableau. For a single instant Lucien felt unendurably foolish as he and the boy James were held at bay by the panther while Anne-Marie stood with her hair floating around her and surveying them like a queen disturbed in her private quarters.

In dawning chagrin, he recognized the reason for her humor as his brain began abruptly to function again. He spoke with resignation. “Your pet, I presume?”

“You might call him so,” she answered cautiously.

“I’m delighted to hear it since I have no wish to be his noonday meal.”

She smiled, a slow blossoming. The words soft, she said, “He doesn’t eat his defenders.”

Lucien felt as if he had received a great and long-coveted honor. And standing there, he vowed that he would have the lady also.

He was not proud, nor was he overly scrupulous. He would win her, no matter how long it took. No, nor what means he must use to achieve it.

“Did I do right,
Mam’zelle
?”

It was young James who asked it, an anxious frown on his face as he looked up at her for reassurance. Concern for the boy’s feelings released Anne-Marie from her preoccupation. She would not have had him bring this particular man to her here for the world, but she could not let him know it.

Speaking almost at random, she said, “Yes, yes, you did fine.”

“You want him then?” the boy insisted.

She saw the flicker of brief enjoyment in Lucien
Roquelaire’s
eyes. Unbelievably flustered, she lifted her hands to her hair, catching its fullness to wind it hastily into a knot at her nape; this she held with one hand while she searched in her pocket for her pins. Head bent so she need look at neither man nor boy, she spoke to James. “Never mind. You had best return to the house before you’re missed from your kitchen duties.”

As the boy moved off with reluctant steps away, Lucien spoke. “I regret the intrusion if it upsets you, and apologize for it. Regardless, I would not have missed this revelation. Tell me how you tamed my namesake.”

“He isn’t—that is, he was named long before—” She stopped as she saw the amusement in his eyes and realized explanations were unnecessary. Drawing a deep breath, she said instead, “You may have escaped Satan, Monsieur, but you run a much graver risk by showing even a slight interest in my welfare. My stepmother will leap at once to— In short, if you are found here alone with me, you will be compromised.”

“Is that all it would take?” he inquired with a lifted brow.

“I don’t speak in jest.” The words were sharp.

“I am aware,” Lucien said with fleeting irony. “We have met, your stepmother and I.”

“Then you can see it would be advisable for you to go at once.”

He smiled. “I seldom follow advice. Besides, I believe it’s too late to avoid a certain amount of speculation, and you can’t expect me to leave until you have explained.”

“About Satan? It happened much as you might suppose.” She moved away from him to a huge red oak nearby where she turned to lean her shoulders against it with her wrists crossed behind her back and her hands flat on the cool bark.

“I imagine he was an orphan,” he said as he restored his sword cane to its sheath. Resting it on the toe of his boot, he waited for an answer.

“I heard him crying from the house and found him here. Hunting the big swamp cats is considered great sport, you know. Often it’s a female with kits that is killed.”

“But most animals rescued in that fashion return to the wild; there is no help for it. How is it you retained your Satan’s fidelity?”

“I found him here in this place nearly two years ago, and here he remained. I joined his den, you might say, bringing food, making him warm and comfortable in familiar surroundings instead of taking him back to the house. He grew away from me, of course, especially this winter while we were in New Orleans; I had hardly caught a glimpse of him this summer. He is so much larger I was not sure it was he when I first saw him last evening. But he came, I think, because he was hurt and hungry and still looks to me for safety and comfort.”

“Wise animal,” Lucien said. “You have been tending his injury this morning?”

She nodded. “The paw was not as bad as I feared. I cleaned it and applied a salve, but I believe he has licked it all away.” She paused. “Monsieur
Roquelaire
—”

“I would be honored if you would address me by my given name.” The look in his brown-gold eyes was steady as he awaited her reaction.

“Monsieur
Roquelaire
,” she repeated with some emphasis. “We are not close acquaintances, nor are we likely to be. I was just going to say that you are free to go, now that you have paid your duty visit. Please don’t let me keep you.”

“And what if I prefer to be—kept?”

An odd fullness pressed against her throat so that it ached. She swallowed with difficulty. “There is no obligation to continue with your gallantry, sir. I am suitably grateful for the effort you have made, but I’m sure you have duties elsewhere. I bid you a good day.”

His smile was wry. “I understand you want to be rid of me, but if I go now, will you permit me to call on you again in more formal circumstances?”

“I have warned you of the consequences.”

“And the warning was duly registered. If I should dare to brave your dragon of a stepmother, is it possible you will see me?”

She opened her mouth, but had no idea what she meant to say until a single blunt word emerged. “Why?”

His expression turned wary, though it was a momentary lapse. “You are an unusual young woman, and I would very much enjoy the opportunity to further our acquaintance.”

“You mean I am an oddity you wish to inspect at greater leisure.”

“I mean,” he said deliberately, “that I am intrigued by you. The leisure to become acquainted seems the next step.”

“Toward what object?” she inquired.

Exasperation crossed his face, and he ran a square, competent hand through his hair, leaving it ruffled. “What do you expect?”

“I can’t imagine,” she said in clipped tones, “which is the reason I am asking.”

“Suppose I said matrimony.”

“Impossible.” She closed her lips tightly upon the word.

He eyed her with the stiffness of distrust. “Impossible to believe, or impossible to contemplate?

“Both,” she snapped, turning her head away from him to stare out through the trees.

He took a swift step that brought him within arm’s length. “What if I could convince you I mean what I say?”

“Then I will tell you plainly that I have no high regard for a rake as a possible husband.” She turned back to him with a defiant stare. “A man who will keep me with child while he spends his time drinking, gaming, and pursuing other women is not my idea of bliss.”

A shadow crossed his face, and its darkness lingered in his eyes. “You don’t want children?”

“I would be delighted,” she said scornfully, “if they could be brought into the world by a father who truly cares for their welfare—or else without a man at all.”

He tilted his head. “What of the pleasures of the marriage bed? I would not mention such a topic to a lady ordinarily, but your comment did glance upon it.”

“A trifling matter,” she returned with a flare of color on her cheekbones. “At least, it appears so to me compared with the outcome of it. As my father’s housekeeper these last few years, tending the
birthings
in the plantation quarters has fallen to my lot. More than that, I watched my mother give birth year after year, burying pieces of her heart with the stillborn infants, all for lack of consideration in her husband. Then her few living children died one by one until only I was left, and I was not enough to hold her. And within weeks of removing the widower’s arm band from his sleeve, my father set another woman in her place.”

“I am to be denied because your father was not worthy of the woman he married?” He reached out with apparent aimlessness to brace a hand on the tree trunk beside her.

Blinking as if she had not considered that possibility, she said, “My father wasn’t—that is, he is at the mercy of his male nature.”

“No,” Lucien said with finality. “It isn’t the nature of a man to use his wife without regard for her health and comfort, or to fail in supporting her. That excuse is only a convenience for a weak man.”

Her chin came up. “You know nothing of the matter!”

“I know,” he said, leaning closer, “that my wife will have nothing to fear from me—that the spacing of children or their advent is something we will agree upon between us. I know that if sorrow must come, she will not face it alone. I know that there is more to marriage than pain and terror; there is also comfort and pleasure and peace, and the abiding grace of love.”

The gaze she turned up to him was stark with some deep longing. It was also brief. Sweeping her lashes down like a final curtain, she said, “Fine talk, but you are still a murderer.”

“A duelist, when pressed,” he corrected. “And you are a woman who has never been kissed, much less suffered—or enjoyed—the marriage bed. So how can you judge the state, or a prospective mate, when you have no idea what you will be missing?”

“I don’t want to know!” she began.

But it was too late. He leaned closer to circle her waist with his arm and pull her against him. Then his lips came down on hers.

Stunned disbelief held her motionless while her heart shuddered into a faster rhythm and heat radiated in waves through her body. Her senses reeled with the concentrated fervor of the contact. His lips were smooth and warm and sweet. Beneath them, hers tingled as if they were swelling. Her brain felt as if it were on fire and her blood pulsed through her veins with frantic, fantastic life. Never had she known such expanding, rampaging wonder.