Jo Goodman (25 page)

Pale as salt now, Jonna concentrated on the portrait of Lord Fielding. His expression did not soften. She imagined he could have watched the hanging without flinching. She, on the other hand, had only to think about it and her knees threatened to buckle.

Mercedes was watching Jonna closely, gauging her reaction. "When Ponty left Weybourne Park for Boston he told us he wanted to make his own way, but he'd been doing that for years. From the time he was twelve he'd lived by his wits on the London streets and had managed to avoid the fate of Marie and Jimmy. I don't think he was ever arrested until he was a young man."

"I never knew how much to believe in that regard. There were rumors that he had been in prison."

"Several times, I think. Colin never shared any of this with you, even after Ponty began working at Remington Shipping?"

"No. For months I didn't know there
was
any relation between the two of them."

"That would have been at Ponty's request," Mercedes said. "Colin's not ashamed of his brother or anything Decker's done. After all, it was Decker's stealing that brought us together." She caught Jonna's questioning glance. "Oh my! Colin has been much less informative than I thought. Whatever does he write you in those long letters?"

Jonna found she had it in her to smile. "In one way or another they're mostly about you. He writes about his life at Weybourne Park, managing the property, the politics, the taxes. He speaks fondly of your cousins and lovingly of your two little girls. I know about the thoroughbreds he is raising and crop rotation, but he failed to mention that you were expecting another child."

Amusement made Mercedes's gray eyes bright. "That's because he's hoping for a boy and the less said about it, the better."

Jonna watched Mercedes's hand linger lightly on her swollen abdomen. "You're the lens through which he views his life now, and there's little he writes that doesn't reflect your influence. Oddly, it doesn't take anything away from who he is. He seems a richer person for it. I never thought I would say this about Colin, but I find I can state it with complete certainty: He is truly, deeply happy."

It meant a great deal to Mercedes to hear this from Jonna. "He's not alone," she said.

Jonna nodded. "Yes, I can see that." Her next thought was left unspoken as that very happy man entered the gallery.

Colin eyed the two women suspiciously. "Dare I hope you're comparing me favorably to the ancestral line?"

"We weren't talking about you at all," Mercedes said, taking immediate exception. She looked at Jonna for support. "Really, why do men think that if women are engaged in conversation, it must be about them?"

Jonna's expression was carefully neutral. She found she very much liked Mercedes. "I suppose it's because they think they're so terribly interesting."

Colin held up his hands, palms out. The gesture was less to ward off his wife's advance and more in the nature of complete surrender. He kissed the cheek that Mercedes offered him and placed one arm around her back. "Would you mind keeping Decker company while I show Jonna the grounds?"

"The grounds?" Mercedes asked. "Colin, everything is knee deep in snow."

"She's a Boston girl," Colin said.

Mercedes protested. "That doesn't mean she has ice water in her veins."

Not any longer, Jonna thought. And not for some time.

* * *

Jonna sat at her vanity and idly pulled a brush through her hair. The maid who had drawn her bath and offered to assist with the bedtime rituals had been dismissed. The reflection in the mirror and in the black-leaded panes of glass was Jonna's lone figure.

Outside it was snowing again. Had Jonna moved to the window and peered closely through the white curtain of flakes, she would have seen that the trail she and Colin had made crossing the gardens was disappearing. Their path to the stables and their ride along the southern wall of the property was similarly being obliterated. The evidence that they had passed by a hunting lodge or paused in the clearing in front of it was also gone. The white woods would not give up the route they took. All traces of the time spent with Colin that afternoon were being erased everywhere but in Jonna's heart.

There, those hours in his company were deeply engraved, not for what she'd learned about him or his brother, but for what she'd learned about herself.

She put the brush down. Her face was lightly flushed, but her skin was cool. She stared at her reflection. It was no beauty she saw looking back at her. The oddly colored eyes were too frank, the jaw too defined, the mouth too wide. Drawing her hair over one shoulder, she began to loosely plait it.

Colin and Mercedes were gone now, though not before they had extracted a promise from Decker and Jonna to visit Weybourne Park. Jonna wished they would have stayed the night. It would have made it harder to set out on the course she had planned, perhaps impossible. In Colin's eyes she had been like a younger sister. Jonna had to accept that he might never see her as a woman grown.

She stood. Behind her on the bed was her robe, but she didn't put it on. Her feet were bare, and when she stepped off the carpet the wooden floor was cold. She picked up the lamp from the bedside table, adjusted the wick to give her a sliver of light. Her nightshift was plain white linen, and the hem brushed her ankles as she walked to the door. The material caught the draft in the hallway, flickered with the same motion as the lamplight.

Had it not been for Mercedes's tour that morning, Jonna would have had no idea where Decker might be found. They had come across his bedchamber as they were going from room to room. Jonna had been startled by the proximity to her own chamber, but Mercedes, if she'd noted it, was kind enough not to comment. Jonna had reasons to appreciate Decker's arrangements now, though she didn't believe he had made them for her convenience. She doubted he was expecting her.

In that, she was wrong.

Decker's hair was still damp from his bath. A few strands of it curled darkly at the nape of his neck as he knelt in front of the fireplace. Orange and red flames seemed to dance across his glistening shoulders. He was wearing only a pair of drawers, and they rested low on his hips. There were two small dimples at the base of his spine. Jonna was narrowly caught staring at them.

Decker rose slowly. "I thought I might see you tonight," he said.

That gave her pause. It was not only that he had anticipated her, but that he did not sound particularly pleased that she had proved him right. "Should I go?"

"No." He motioned to her to shut the door. "Not now. Not before you've said what's brought you here."

"You don't know?" she asked. He seemed to know everything else.

He didn't answer her. Instead he picked up his dressing gown and shrugged into it. He belted it, then pointed to the wing chair in front of him. "Are you going to hover there where it's cold or come closer to the fire?"

Jonna did not mistake his words for a real welcome. There was nothing inviting in his tone. The lamp trembled in her hands as she crossed the room. Decker relieved her of it before she sat down, then placed it on the mantel. "Aren't you going to sit?"

"I'm comfortable standing, thank you." His words were clipped, and there was no characteristic amusement in his eyes. They were ice blue now, and they pinned Jonna back in her chair.

She cleared her throat. She had not given any thought to what she actually might say, nor to how it might sound. "It has always served me in business to speak directly," she said. "May I do so now?"

"Is this business?"

"Yes," she said. "Yes, it is."

He made a small flourish with his hand. "Then by all means..."

Jonna started to come out of her chair, but Decker motioned her back. She felt the disadvantage keenly. "It's occurred to me that a man may have a mistress," she said. "Society hardly blinks an eye at the convention as long as the thing's managed discreetly. I thought there might be instances where the reverse is true. I mean, that a woman might take a lover. If the woman is wealthy then she could provide for him, set him up in a residence or even a business, and the two might reasonably agree on what favors would be exchanged. He would be faithful to her, of course, as long as they were each satisfied with the arrangement. In the event that was no longer the case, then either of them would be free to leave. He would have some settlement placed upon him, and she would have his assurance that he would not speak of this particular association with her to anyone."

There was a small lift to Decker's mouth, but his smile had an icy edge to it. "And I thought you just came here because you've finally realized you can't have my brother."

Jonna's head snapped back. "What?"

"I expected that seeing him with Mercedes would make your heart bleed," Decker said coldly. "I didn't anticipate it would open that tight little Yankee purse." He couldn't resist adding, "The one you carry on your wrist
or
the one between your legs."

Jonna shot to her feet. Except for her glittering violet eyes, there was no color in her face. She stared at him for a long moment before she turned to go.

Decker caught her elbow. "Never say you're leaving."

She tried to shake him off, but he held her fast. "I intend to do exactly that," she said. "Let me go."

"Don't you want to hear my answer?" he asked. "Although you didn't strictly ask a question, did you? It was more of a proposal, nevertheless one deserving of a response. Do you know what mine is?"

"Go to hell," she said tightly.

There was no humor in his curt laugh. "No, that isn't it, though it probably should be." This time when Jonna tried to loose herself she was twisted in Decker's arms and brought flush to his taut frame. Only a hairsbreadth separated his mouth from hers. "Yes," he said. "My answer's yes."

Decker closed the distance between them, crushing her mouth with his. It was not so much a kiss as a first volley on the field of battle. Jonna's entire body jerked in reaction. The movement didn't free her, but made her intimately aware of the shape and power of the man who held her. Her arched back flattened her thighs against his, and Decker thrust his hips forward so she cradled him.

Jonna's breath came shallowly as Decker lifted his mouth. She couldn't turn in his embrace. The arm at the small of her back was like an iron bar, and the fist he made in her hair tilted her face toward his. He watched her, his blue eyes burning cold as he took in her pale complexion and the flushed, swollen line of her mouth.

Decker bent his head slowly, tugging on her braid and exposing her throat. His lips settled on the curve of her neck, and he tasted her skin with the edge of his tongue. Her pulse beat frantically against his mouth. He touched the hollow of her throat, the underside of her jaw. His lips sipped her flesh. His teeth caught the delicate gold chain at her neck, and when he pulled the ivory pendant was lifted from between her breasts.

Jonna felt as if her heart were being torn from her chest. She caught the necklace in her palm and closed her fingers around it. Her lips parted around the word "no," but it was a soundless protest. Decker let the chain drop, and when he looked at her again triumph edged his cool smile.

He caught the corner of her mouth as she tried to turn her head. His tongue traced the closed line of her lips, not pressing, merely learning their shape. He moved on, grazing her cheek, her temple, then lower to the sensitive hollow behind her ear.

Decker released Jonna's braid, and she didn't move. His fingers slipped around her throat. He kept her head tilted upward with the lightest pressure of his thumb. Then even that was taken away. His hand drifted to the small buttons at the neckline of her nightshift, and he began to unfasten them.

Jonna released the pendant when Decker's hand brushed hers. She didn't push against his shoulders or try to slip from his grasp. Her arms dropped to her sides and she closed her eyes.

Parting the material, Decker's mouth found her exposed shoulder. His hand slipped over her gown and cupped her breast. His thumb made a pass across her nipple, and he felt its rise through the fine cotton nightshift. Jonna was arched over Decker's arm as he began to lower her to the floor, his tongue making a damp trail from her shoulder to her breast. His teeth caught the material first, then her nipple. He felt her shudder.

Firelight glanced off her hair. The carpet was under her knees now, and the fireplace was at her back. Decker opened a fourth button, then a fifth. Jonna's nightgown slipped completely off both shoulders, trapping her arms at her sides. When Decker's mouth closed over her breast this time, there was no damp and abrading material between them. His lips were on her skin, his tongue laved the swollen tip of her breast, his teeth worried the hard bud.

Where firelight licked her skin Jonna was warm. Where Decker did the same she was warmer. His hand slipped under her gown and stroked her flat belly. Each pass brought his fingertips closer to where her thighs were pressed tightly together; each pass forced a fractional parting.

Decker lifted his head from her breast. This time when he touched her cheek with his lips he tasted the salty wetness of Jonna's tears. They pooled at the underside of her dark lashes like beads of dew then slipped soundlessly over her cheeks. He found one at the corner of her mouth and kissed another away before it fell.