Rendezvous (9781301288946) (28 page)

With a quick movement she placed
herself in his way. "Monsieur le Comte," she said, sweeping him a
brittle curtsy.

He started, the muscles in his face
working, making a great effort at keeping his features impassive.
"Madame Carrington."

"How astonished I am to see you here in
Paris. I thought you had gone back to Merevale." She had not meant
her remark to be an accusation, but somehow it came out that
way.

"Egremont is no longer mine, madame,"
Jean-Claude said "Although the first consul has been gracious
enough to pardon emigres, lands were only returned if they had not
been sold off. Unfortunately for me, that was not the case." He
could not disguise his bitterness or his pain.

"Jean-Claude, I am so sorry. I didn't
know." She touched his hand, but he flinched from her.

"Still so unforgiving?" she cried. "How
long, Jean-Claude? I know I once did you a great injury, but how
long will you continue to curse me for it?"

"I believed we had settled that issue
years ago, madame." The coldness in his voice struck deep into her
heart.

"Nothing was ever settled," she said.
"You refused to listen to me."

His gaze skated past her to the door.
"Your husband awaits you, madame. You'd best be going."

Belle gritted her teeth, beset by a
desire to lash out, to hurt him as he was hurting her. "Sinclair is
not my husband. I only live with him."

Jean-Claude's eyes widened with
shock.

"You should not be so surprised," she
taunted. "What more would one expect from the lowborn bastard of an
actress?"

He flinched, and Belle knew that she
had drawn blood at last, but she took no satisfaction in it.
Blindly she turned, seeking the door and the support of Sinclair's
strong arm.

White-lipped, Jean-Claude watched her
go. He saw Carrington wrap Isabelle's cloak about her, noted with
agony the tenderness conveyed in the simple gesture. Carrington,
her lover. The knife Belle's words had plunged in Jean-Claude
twisted. Despite all the bitter recriminations he spoke against her
in his heart, he did not want to believe that she was capable of
playing the harlot in any man's bed.

Whore? It was not a word he could bring
himself to apply to Isabelle. In spite of her background, her
deceits, he knew that some part of her remained innocent,
untouched.

There had been such longing, such
genuine sorrow in her lovely face when she had reached out to him a
moment ago. He rubbed his hand where she had caressed him, her
touch so butterfly soft. He thought he would have given anything
not to have pulled away.

It would have been better had he never
seen her again. Better still if he had not returned to France at
all, trembling once more on the brink of events that portended to
sweep beyond his control.

And yet he had a debt to repay, to his
ancient family name, to his son's heritage, to the gentle king whom
Jean-Claude had failed. In a future so fraught with danger and
uncertainty, he had no business to be thinking of Isabelle at
all.

But her image persisted, her words
echoing through his mind. "Sinclair is not my husband." Isabelle
had not married again. No matter what else she had said in the heat
of her anger, one fact remained. She had bound herself to no other
man. Despite the bleakness that was his life, for the first time in
years, Jean-Claude Varens felt a thread of hope.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

The ride back from the Tuileries was
accomplished in silence. Belle retreated deep within her hood,
still deeper within the confines of herself.

When they reached the apartment,
Sinclair saw that she meant to bid him good night in the
antechamber and turn to go upstairs without another
word.

He gently caught her arm. "Belle,
please stay a moment. I'd like to—"

"I know. We have much to discuss. I
want tell you all about what happened with Bonaparte. But I am so
tired. We can talk about everything in the morning."

Sinclair frowned. From her shuttered
expression, he knew that ‘everything’ was not likely to include
Jean-Claude Varens. He found something strange about the Comte's
sudden reappearance and was still disturbed by the possibility of a
link between Varens and Lazare.

But one glimpse of Belle's pale face
and Sinclair couldn't bring himself to mention the man's name again
tonight. Her shoulders sagged with fatigue, her eyes beset by a
kind of defeated weariness that appeared to run soul
deep.

He stepped aside and permitted her to
retreat up the stairs. As he watched her solitary figure trudge
toward the shadows of the landing above, Sinclair was reminded
curiously of Chuff, how he had held his younger brother's hand to
help him brave the hobgoblins waiting in the dark. Sinclair wished
he could do the same for that proud, lonely woman as she vanished
up the stairs to battle with her own demons.

He cursed, consigning Jean-Claude
Varens to the bottom of the Seine. Astonishing what havoc that
stiff-necked nobleman could wreak upon Belle. When Sinclair had
returned to the reception salon with her cloak, he had seen her
speaking to Varens.

It had been obvious that they
quarreled. Belle had been angry, but the anger had been quickly
replaced with devastation. Sinclair could not understand it. Bold
enough to flirt with a dangerous man like Bonaparte, capable of
snapping out commands to a half-mad dog like Lazare, and yet Belle
could be crushed by one unkind word from Varens. What hold did that
somber man possess over her?

Sinclair could think of only one—love,
the once and forever kind. For all her cool exterior, Belle was an
intensely passionate woman. When she chose to love, it would be for
always, and Jean-Claude just happened to be the man who had stirred
those feelings inside of her.

"I came into your life years too late,
Angel," Sinclair murmured sadly.

Belle had told Paulette not to wait up,
but the woman hadn't listened. She bustled about the bedchamber
full of questions about the reception. Had Belle met Napoleon? What
had happened? Did Belle have any more idea of what her plans
were?

Belle was of no humor to
answer questions or to listen to Paulette's bright chatter. As soon
as the woman helped Belle out of her gown, Belle dismissed her to
her own bed. Paulette’s eyes narrowed with annoyance, then her
mouth twisted into a smirk. "But of course,
chérie
. If there are any other
services you want performed, you can always summon Monsieur
Carrington."

Belle did not reply to this pert
comment, all but shutting the door in Paulette's face. She leaned
up against the barrier listening to Paulette retreat down the hall.
Then she exuded a wearied sigh. Her mind felt numb from the
bewildering whirl of events that had taken place that evening. She
could not allow herself to think about any of it.

Belle pushed away from the door and,
with motions that were instinctive, gathered up her gown. She
smoothed out the folds, then put it away and returned her slippers
and chemise to the wardrobe drawer before donning her nightgown.
After removing the pearl netting, she brushed out her hair with
rhythmic strokes, then rearranged the things on her dressing table
until they lay with their customary mathematical
precision.

It was as though by restoring order to
the room, she hoped she could restore order to her mind as well,
but it was not working. A montage of scenes from the reception
whirled through her brain: the heat of Sinclair's gaze as he had
handed her from the carriage, the uneasiness of being questioned by
Fouché, the brief interlude with Napoleon, her sense of triumph
which had faded with the sight of Jean-Claude, the grim
confrontation that had followed, Sinclair's tormenting question,
"What the devil is he doing here in Paris?"

How she longed to be able to answer
that, even if only for herself. That reception at the Tuileries was
the last place she would have expected to encounter Jean-Claude.
Had he come to plead for the return of his estates, or to seek his
fortune with the new government? Neither action sounded like the
proud Comte de Egremont. Jean-Claude had ever been a man of
principle. Although he supported some goals of the Revolution, he
had remained fiercely loyal to the Bourbon kings. To think that he
might at last be capable of sacrificing his notions of honor
brought Belle real pain. The Revolution had robbed him of so many
of his dreams, and she had helped. She had always been able to
console herself that at least Jean-Claude had been spared his
pride.

A shiver coursed through her, and she
noticed that the fire on the grate was dying, a chill settling over
the room. She must abandon these miserable thoughts and seek out
her bed. Time to face what she most dreaded, the extinguishing of
the candles.

The elaborate bed looked empty and
uninviting. Over large, it might have been a state bed for a queen,
the gauzy white curtains stirring eerily in the draft, a fit place
to be laid out to die.

Belle tried to close her mind against
the grim thought. This night would be no better than last. She
faced another lonely vigil in hell. She was already so
cold.

The sound of someone stirring in the
next room carried to her ears, Sinclair, preparing for bed. She
must take care not to disturb him tonight with her pacing. Belle
ran her fingers over her chilled flesh. She could not help
remembering how warm, how strong Sinclair's arms could be, what
fire his kisses had spread through her body.

Her eyes tracked to the door connecting
their chambers, the thought rising unbidden that she need not be
alone tonight. Sinclair's voice echoed through her mind, "If
anything is troubling you, Angel, feel free . . ."

Only a few steps, a door separated
them. What would Sinclair do if she came to him? She had read
enough of want in his eyes. She did not think he would send her
away.

She glided forward like a sleepwalker,
only staying herself when her hand encountered the hard reality of
the doorknob. No, how could she? She had tried passion a time or
two before as an opiate to her pain. It could be as effective as
laudanum, but the aftereffects of making love without love were
more bitter. And she had nothing but passion to give. Hazarding
one's life was one thing, but her heart- she could never do that
again.

But the thought persisted that with
Sinclair, this time would be different. There would be no regrets.
Yet when she tried to turn the knob, her hand fell away, her
courage deserting her.

But to face the prospect of that lonely
bed, the nightmares, was equally impossible. She fetched her shawl
instead and swirled it about her shoulders. She knew of a bottle of
brandy that had been left below stairs in the kitchen When all else
fails, seek out Mama's tried and true remedy for heartache, she
told herself bitterly. She would sit by the window and get quietly
drunk.

The clock had just chimed quarter after
two when Sinclair thought he heard a noise downstairs. He went to
investigate, still clad in his shirtsleeves and breeches. He had
been unable to sleep in any case. Attempts to read a book had
proved futile. The silence from Belle's room had seemed to roar in
his ears.

How he sensed that she also was not
asleep he could not have said. Nor even why he stalked so
fearlessly downstairs, not in the least apprehensive of whom the
intruder might be. Somehow he already knew.

The antechamber was dark, but light
emanated from the drawing room. Through the half-open door,
Sinclair could see a fire crackling upon the hearth, a candle left
lit upon the mantel. But when he peered inside the chamber, he
discovered Belle ensconced on the side of the room that remained
cold and uninviting, where the wind rattled the glass of the tall,
latticed windows. She huddled upon a wing-backed chair, an Indian
shawl flung over her nightgown as she sat staring past the
draperies. Silhouetted by the moonlight, her golden hair appeared
spun from its beams, her eyes hollowed by shadows as foreboding as
the night itself.

Although she started at Sinclair's
entrance, she did not acknowledge his presence. Her breath stilled
as though she waited to see if he would go quietly away and leave
her prey to her night terrors, to fight on alone as she must have
done so many times.

"Not this time, Angel," Sinclair
murmured to himself. "Curse me, hate me, try to shut me out. But I
cannot leave you alone tonight."

He crossed the room silently. She did
not look toward him even when his shadow fell across
her.

When she spoke, her voice was calm.
"Good evening, Mr. Carrington."

"Perhaps you should say good morrow. It
must be nearly half past two."

"Is it?" She leaned closer to the
window pane, tipping her head back. "It looks nothing like morning
to me. But then, the sky always seems to me much darker over Paris.
There have been times I would have sworn dawn would never break
here again."

Sinclair frowned at the sight of a
tripod table propped near her elbow, bearing a half-empty glass of
golden-colored liquid. He wondered if she was drunk. But as he
examined the bottle of brandy, he saw that it had hardly been
touched.