“I’ll tell Lissa it’s the heat,” he had said, smearing ointment over the raw welts on her back. He always did that, and Julia thought it was because he enjoyed touching the marks he’d made on her flesh. “I’ll tell her not to disturb you. And if she does come in here, tell her you’re feeling exhausted and want to be left alone. Do you understand, Julia?”
“Yes.” She understood only too well. And when her sister had visited her briefly, she’d been able to smile and say that it was only the heat, she’d be better in a day or so, and Lissa wasn’t to worry. She had been careful to make certain Lissa saw nothing to betray the lie.
It would have been a dreadful shock if she had. Lissa thought Adrian was perfect. It was another of his deliberate little torments directed at Julia: weaving his charming spell so completely around innocent Lissa. Julia had considered telling Lissa the truth, but couldn’t bring herself to do so. It was not to spare Adrian but Lissa…and perhaps Julia herself.
Julia had had her own illusions shattered, and that wound had been the deepest of all; she didn’t want to see the pain of it in her sister’s eyes. See the dreadful knowledge of what a man could do to a woman. Teach Lissa what fear really was and teach her how terribly vulnerable she could be. And there was another reason she made certain Lissa suspected nothing—because of what Adrian had promised to do. There was no place Julia could go, no one she could turn to with even a faint hope of protecting her sister. Or herself. She had no money of her own, no friends who would take her and Lissa in if Julia dared to leave her husband.
And who would believe what she’d suffered at his hands? The scars on her body were faint, the result of her wedding night and those first few weeks when his rage had been totally out of control. Since then, he had used the strap or his hands and left no permanent marks on her. Not visible ones, at least.
She was his wife, she belonged to him. No one would question his right to punish her—and she doubted there were many who would even believe he did.
Trapped.
Julia went into the kitchen and spoke with the cook, automatically taking care of the details of supper tonight and the coming party. She’d become proficient at dividing her thoughts and attention, and one corner of her mind now worried at the awareness that she couldn’t hope to avoid Cyrus Fortune much longer. There was a concert the following night Adrian had insisted they would attend, with a buffet dinner afterward, and Julia had a strangely certain feeling Cyrus would be there.
At the charity dance, his stare had been bold, and he hadn’t hesitated to hold and kiss her in the park where anyone could have seen. How would he behave when she appeared on the arm of her husband?
The very thought terrified her. Adrian was always alert to how other men looked at her or spoke to her, though from his charming and attentive facade no one had guessed what demons of jealousy and possessiveness burned inside him. But she knew. She knew the price she would pay if Adrian caught even a glimmer of the naked desire in Cyrus Fortune’s eyes.
She was also very much afraid her own feelings would betray her, even if Cyrus didn’t. His kisses had affected her in a way she still couldn’t quite believe, and being in his arms had felt so…right. Desire. He had, with the first touch, taught her body to feel desire. Her body, that had learned in agony to fear a man’s strength, had swayed toward his in mute need and without fear. She found it incredible, and couldn’t understand how it was possible.
But a moth seemed to feel no fear, she thought, as it was drawn to the flame that would destroy it.
Like all the women before her, she was bewitched, helplessly in thrall to a black velvet voice and heated black eyes, and what she felt about it was bitter resentment and pain. Another man who could control her with his force—even if his was a different kind of force. Another man who could make her do things she didn’t want to do, feel things she didn’t want to feel. Another man who wanted to use her to satisfy his own needs no matter what it cost her.
She managed to get through the evening, though watching Adrian smile at Lissa over the chessboard and tease her made Julia’s stomach sicken and churn. For the first time, she wondered if she might be wrong in hiding the truth from her sister. Perhaps for Lissa’s own protection she should teach her what men could hide beneath charming smiles. Perhaps innocence was something else that cost too much.
Julia was still undecided when they went to bed that night, but the morning brought the only decision possible. Whether Lissa did or did not deserve to know the truth, Julia decided that her sister’s ignorance of what was going on was her safeguard. If she knew, she’d confront Adrian, and that was the one thing Julia had sworn to herself would never happen.
Adrian left for his office at the usual time, already looking wilted and irritable from the heat; Julia dreaded the mood he’d be in by the time he came home. Lissa helped around the house during the morning, then went out shopping with two of her friends. Julia tried to keep busy, but two days of steady work had accomplished everything necessary for the party, and by early afternoon she found herself at loose ends.
For the first time, the house felt hot to her, smothering almost, but she was still wary of venturing out in public for fear of encountering Cyrus. She considered and discarded an impulse to walk in the garden; there were no shady spots out there, and most of the midsummer flowers had been burned dry by the unrelenting sun, so it would hardly be a pleasant walk. Without really deciding to do so, she went to the stables in back of the house.
It was relatively cool inside the wide hall and very peaceful. Only the faint sounds of movement from the drowsy horses disturbed the silence. The men who cared for the horses were absent, so she was alone with them. Lissa had taken one of the carriages and a driver, giving in to Julia’s suggestion because of the heat; Adrian had taken the other this morning, planning to send his groom and stableman to look over some horses due to be auctioned the following day.
For a few minutes she wandered from stall to stall, speaking softly to the horses and stroking satiny necks. Out of the house she felt more peaceful, though it was a tenuous peace easily disturbed. The shock of his voice shattered it.
“The horses are comfortable with you. I thought they would be.”
She whirled around, staring in alarm. “Are you out of your mind?” she whispered.
Cyrus Fortune stepped out of the shadows, smiling faintly. “No one saw me come in,” he said, knowing why she was so disturbed. “No one ever has to know I was here. The grooms will be gone for hours yet, and Drummond and your sister as well.”
Julia took a step back as he came toward her, but there was no way for her to retreat farther without cornering herself in an empty stall. She felt emotionally cornered. “Leave me alone,” she said shakily, control demolished along with peace.
Cyrus stopped immediately, a little more than an arm’s length away, and his smile faded. In the dimness of the barn hall, his black eyes were liquid. “Are you afraid of me, Julia?” There was surprise and something else in his deep voice, something she could have sworn was anxiety.
Her laugh sounded a little wild to her own ears, and she wondered dimly if she had finally crossed the line into madness. “Afraid? Whatever I say, you won’t stay away from me. Shouldn’t I be afraid?”
“No. I won’t force myself on you, if you’ve that in your mind. I want you willing.” He still sounded surprised.
She closed her eyes, struggling to regain some control over her emotions. “I don’t want an affair, can’t you understand that? Please, just leave me alone. I won’t…I won’t break my marriage vows.”
After a moment he said, “You’re trembling.” He reached his hand toward hers, and when she flinched he said sharply, “I’m not going to hurt you, Julia.”
His tone caused tension to stiffen her body and her gaze to fall, but she didn’t flinch again when he took her hand, and she didn’t struggle or protest when he led her partway down the barn hall, where there was a rough wooden bench outside the tack room
door.
“Sit down,” he said.
It was only when she immediately obeyed that abrupt command that Julia realized what living with Adrian had done to her. Cyrus was angry. When she’d heard the emotion in his voice, she had felt an almost smothering panic and dread, an anxious need to find out what he wanted or what she’d done wrong so she could somehow satisfy him. It had become a compulsion to yield to an angry male voice, to submit instantly without question or even another word. To do anything in an attempt to avoid pain. Her recognition of the frightened, helpless response made sick shame writhe inside her, hot tears burn behind eyes taught never to shed them, and kept her silent as she sat on the bench with her head bent and her hands folded tightly in her lap.
He went down on one knee, careless of his trousers, and his big hand covered both of hers. She wasn’t wearing gloves, and the heavy warmth of his hand made an odd little tremor go through her body. His was a gentle touch without force. His voice, no longer angry, was the familiar black velvet when he said softly, “Julia, look at me.”
Instantly, she raised her gaze to meet his. His eyes narrowed briefly, and then he leaned over and kissed her.
She had been trying desperately to withdraw from him, to retreat into herself as she’d learned to do, but at the first touch of his warm, hard lips that escape was lost to her. His black eyes were burning, and she closed hers to shut out the awful temptation to lose herself in the fiery dark pools. This time she felt no shock except the shock of desire.
Everything but that faded out of her mind. The fear and anxiety, the sick shame at what she’d become, and all the memories of pain at the hands of a man were overwhelmed by the emotions and sensations this man made her feel.
He kept one hand on the back of the bench near her shoulder and the other gently holding both of hers, and made no attempt to draw her into his arms. His mouth was a potent seduction, moving slowly and sensuously on hers. His tongue glided between her lips in a caress that made a hot shiver ripple through her body, and she could no more resist him than she could resist her next breath. When her mouth opened to his touch in instinctive need, he accepted the mute invitation and explored deeply in a small possession so searingly intimate it seemed to brand her in a place Adrian had never been able to touch.
Responding was as natural as one beat of her heart following another. Julia wasn’t aware that she was kissing him back, that her lips had softened and trembled in need, that her tongue touched his shyly and with hunger, and she never heard her own throaty little moan of pleasure.
His mouth hardened for an instant, but then he drew back to look at her, and murmured huskily, “Is that anything to fear?”
Julia opened her eyes slowly, feeling dazed and hot. Her lips were throbbing, her whole body was throbbing, and when she looked at him she knew only one thing: if she alone were at risk, she would give in to him without another word of protest. But it wasn’t only she.
“Yes,” she whispered, her throat aching.
His lean face tightened a little, but his voice remained soft and husky. “Do your vows mean so much to you?”
“Shouldn’t they?” That reply was a mistake, and she knew it when he smiled slowly.
“When a woman answers a question with another question, then she’s saying no. It isn’t your vows stopping you. I know you’ve found no pleasure with Drummond, and I know you want me. I can be discreet, if that’s what’s worrying you. No one ever has to know we are lovers.”
Julia swallowed hard, fighting to resist the lure of his beguiling voice. She barely managed to infuse her own voice with dry sarcasm. “Did you make such a promise to all the others? If so, I can certainly judge the worth of it.”
His smile died. “That was different.”
“No.” She looked at him steadily. “No different. You were right about one thing; I prefer honesty to lies. Don’t make an empty promise you have no intention of keeping.”
“I don’t make empty promises.”
She heard a touch of his earlier anger sharpen his voice, and it made her nervous, but she forced herself to continue. “Shall I tell you the names of the women you’ve been with since you came back to Richmond? At least one of them told me quite bluntly herself.”
“Anne Butler,” he said flatly.
“Yes.”
“She was the only one, Julia. The only one I slept with since I returned.” Slept with, he thought, was an inaccurate term in addition to being euphemistic. He had never “slept” with any woman, and none had spent more than an hour or two in his bed.
Her steady gaze wavered slightly. “That isn’t what I’ve heard. Gossip—”
“Gossip seldom has it right.”
She shrugged and looked away. “Even so, you can’t deny how quickly word of your affairs spreads. Perhaps the others didn’t care about that, but I do.”
“Stop saying the others as if the path behind me is littered with them,” he said roughly, and tried to rein in his temper when she darted him a quick, wary look. In a quieter voice he said, “I’m not a lecher, whatever you’ve heard.”
Julia shrugged again. “I’m not an adulteress.”
He was beginning to hate the sound of that word, and it had never bothered him before. He was also more baffled than he’d ever been in his life. Both frustration and worry were eating at him. She didn’t love her husband—he was growing to hate, too, the word husband—she didn’t care about her vows, and she wanted him. Was it really only a fear of public censure that made her refuse him? Whatever it was, he couldn’t seem to find a way around it. He didn’t want to hurt her, but surely, finding pleasure in his arms wouldn’t hurt her.
Despite his efforts, his voice had roughened again when he said, “If I kissed you again, would that matter? If I unbuttoned your blouse and opened it, touched you the way I ache to touch you, would you remember you’re married? If I carried you to a pile of hay over there and pressed you back into it and lifted your skirts, would you be able to stop me?”
She looked at him, her green eyes appearing strangely blind, her lips quivering in a twisted smile when she whispered, “Probably not.”
His hand tightened over hers. “It’s what we both want, Julia, what we both need.”
“I can’t.” She held her voice as steady as she could. “And if you—if you really do want me willing, then you have to believe I mean what I say. I won’t betray my husband.”
Cyrus rose to his feet with such an abrupt motion that she started and then looked at him nervously as he took a couple of steps away from her. His big, powerful body seemed unusually stiff, either through tension or pure anger—and it was the latter possibility that made her apprehensive. She couldn’t see his face; he was standing in the center of the barn hall gazing toward the house. It wasn’t until he spoke in a very low voice that some of her anxiety eased.
“Do you realize you’ve never said my name? Will you at least do that much, Julia?”
“Cyrus,” she murmured.
He sighed. “If I wasn’t so damned sure this was tearing you to pieces…but I am sure. I’m also sure if I did seduce you, you’d hate me for it.”
She wondered if she would, but didn’t voice the question.
Cyrus turned to look at her. He was smiling faintly, but his facial expression was a bit grim. “If I catch Drummond near the edge of a cliff, I’m going to push him over.”
“There aren’t any cliffs nearby,” she said, trying for lightness because she was sure he didn’t mean what he’d said.
“No, I suppose not. And I suppose it’ll do me good to face the fact that I can’t always have what I want. But I won’t pretend I like it.”
Julia didn’t know how to answer, and so she said nothing.
“You don’t have to worry about meeting me in public, and I won’t try to see you privately. Whatever I feel, I’ll keep to myself.”
“Thank you.”
He bowed from the waist, a gesture that was only partly mocking. “I know how to be
a gentleman, even if I wasn’t born one and never bothered to try to be one until now.” He paused, then added in a voice more serious than any she’d heard from him, “Julia, if you ever need anything, any kind of help, then please come to me. I won’t ask anything in return, I promise you. Just know you can trust me, and count on me if you’re ever in need.”
“Thank you,” she repeated, shaken.
He gazed at her, an odd look of hesitation crossing his dark face, then shook his head as if to throw off a disturbing thought. “Will you attend the concert tonight?” he asked in his normal tone.
Julia was grateful the barn hall was dim, because she was afraid of what he might see in her eyes. “Yes. With Adrian and Lissa.”
Cyrus nodded. “I had meant to go, but I believe I won’t. And I’ll send my regrets to your party as well, if you wish.” When she started in surprise, he added, “Your husband invited me yesterday.”
Unnerved, Julia couldn’t help wondering if Adrian was merely interested in Cyrus because he was wealthy, or if he had some suspicion— No, ridiculous. Unless someone had seen her walking with Cyrus in the park? She didn’t know, but the possibility was there.
“Julia?” Cyrus’s voice was gentle. “Shall I send my regrets?”
Her thoughts whirled, then settled with a leaden feeling of dread. If Adrian did intend to cultivate an acquaintance with Cyrus for political reasons, he wouldn’t let a social refusal stop him; if he was suspicious, he wouldn’t rest until he could judge for himself if there was any reason to be. Either way, the party was a hurdle she had to get over.
She cleared her throat. “No, of course not. If Adrian invited you, he’ll expect you.”
“I don’t give a damn what he expects,” Cyrus said. “Will it ruin your pleasure if I come?”
It had been so long since Julia had thought of a party with pleasure that for a moment she could only look at him blankly. Then she shook her head. “No.”