Josette (31 page)

Another tap.

She drew in a heavy breath but couldn't find the energy to summon her voice and send whoever it was away. The snick of the door produced half a grin. She waited for some kind of remark that would initiate a conversation. The silence lengthened, then stretched out so long, it irritated her.

“What is it?” When she got no response, she turned.

Her heart beat a drumroll in her throat. She pressed her hips against the railing for support. Dear Lord, he'd returned! “Where's Alexia? Is she all right?”

“Indeed. She's asleep in my town house.” His voice rolled through the night, deep and husky.

“Have you returned for good?”

“No. The
Arabesque
sails again tomorrow.”

A sharp, sweet pain sliced open yet another piece of her heart. “Will you be taking Alexia with you?”

He nodded and, lifting his shoulder off the door frame, moved fully out of the bedroom and into the shadows on the balcony. It didn't matter that she couldn't see him clearly. She knew his features well enough in any light.

“Why in the world did you return?”

“She'll need a tutor while we sail around the world, so I returned to find one. She'll learn a lot more than books can give her in our travels, but she'll still need someone to teach her mathematics, that sort of thing. Might you have anyone to recommend?”

She stiffened. He was here to find a tutor? Good Lord, why not just cut out her heart and be done with it. She glanced over his shoulder, at the bed they'd once shared, her mind in a whirl. “I haven't the foggiest notion whom to recommend.”

Clouds cleared from the sky and moonlight poured down like a message from the heavens, illuminating his features. He followed her gaze to the bed, then back, and stepped forward. Raw lust smoldered in his eyes.

Her throat tightened and the air left her lungs. Her hand came to her breast as if the gesture itself might bring back her breath. His eyes followed her movement, then scanned her face as if he sought answers in her countenance. She turned her back to him and stared out at nothing again, trying to gather her wits.

“Have you ever swum in the ocean, Josette?” He'd moved close enough so that his voice was a deep, seductive rumble across her skin. “Have you ever sat beside a crystal-clear lagoon under a palm tree and drunk milk from so many coconuts you can't manage another sip?”

The fine hairs on her arms prickled and sent a shiver down her spine. Her belly heated, and her nipples tightened. A tangle of confusion and desire knotted her insides. “You know I have not.”

“Would you like to?”

She could feel his heat now, and heaven help her, she wanted to lean back against his chest and have him hold her in his strong arms. “What are you asking of me, Cameron? To become your daughter's tutor? I have a life here.”

He swept her hair off her shoulder and leaned to whisper in her ear, sending a thousand sparks shooting through her. “Do you, Josette? Have a life here? You have a house is about all I can figure.”

Enough of trying to think straight. She wanted this. Wanted him. Tomorrow she'd likely be sorry, but for tonight, she'd lie with him one last time. She bent her head to the side, exposing her neck. An invitation. “It must be sweltering in the tropics. Hotter than here. So why would you want to sit under a palm tree and sip on a coconut?”

His hand came to rest on her opposite shoulder as he settled his body against hers, the mass of hot energy running through her like lightning. His words vibrated against her throat. “On the other hand, the Alps are lovely this time of year.”

He ran his tongue along the curve of her neck. She hissed in a breath. “I cannot go with you when you leave, but we can give each other this night.”

“Tell me something, Josette,” he murmured, his voice a husky rasp. “Do you love me?”

Oh, indeed she did, but to speak the words aloud would only lure her into yearning for a future that could not be had. “What good would it do if I did?”

“Quite a lot, actually.”

He slipped her robe and gown off one shoulder, nipped at her skin, and turned her around to face him. “You love me. I know you do, but I need to hear you say it.”

He'd discarded his jacket somewhere and his sleeves were rolled. A glimpse of those muscular arms and she longed for his embrace. “What gave you that idea?”

He took a quick taste of her lips and then pulled back. “It took me three days at sea to figure out that I can't live without you—that I won't live without you—and about two minutes to realize you'd been sending the same message to me in ways that I was too stupid to perceive. Another two minutes and I had the captain giving orders to turn the bloody ship around.”

Her throat got tight and her lungs froze so she could barely speak. “You . . . you did?”

He nodded. “Tell me you feel the same, Josette.”

She opened her mouth, but no words came out.

He grinned. “I already know you love me, but I need to hear it from your own lips.”

“My own lips? That sounds like you've heard it from others.”

He nodded. “Alexia told me so.”

“And how would she know this?”

“My dear, did you not, the very night before Alexia and I sailed off, tell her you loved me and that your heart would break a little at my leaving?”

She scoffed. “I said no such thing.”

His hands, hot and large, grasped her shoulders. He peered deep into her eyes, momentary confusion washing through his. “Are you serious? You never told Alexia that you love me?”

“Not a word.”

He paused, his eyes searching hers. Then he lifted his chin to the sky and laughter rolled out into the night. “Why, that fibbing little scamp.”

“Shush, or you'll have my brothers up here.”

He lifted a brow as he lowered his mouth and lightly brushed his lips across hers. “Is that so?”

What did he mean by that? The silence struck her. “It's awfully quiet downstairs.”

His fingers slipped to her breast, their movement atop the silk nothing less than a heated, delicious message that went straight to her womb. “I kicked your brothers out of the house.”

She laughed softly against his mouth as his gentle fingers whipped up a firestorm in her belly. “So that was the ruckus. Obviously, they didn't go quietly.”

He kissed the corners of her mouth. “René left saying that under the circumstances, it was only fitting he locate Felicité and even the score.”

His other hand swept around to the small of her back and he moved even closer, surrounding her with his essence. “When I climbed the stairs saying I was going after a wife, I told René if he was off to do the same, then he had my blessing. I think that's when he changed his mind about getting even and hied off somewhere with Bastièn.”

“A wife?” Her heart stuttered in her chest. “I thought you said you needed a tutor for Alexia.”

“That, too.”

For a brief moment, an almost painfully shy smile touched his mouth. “You've bewitched me,
ma chaton
. You are the most genuine, uninhibited, and natural woman I have ever encountered. If you won't have me, I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart for what you have given me.”

“What did I give you?”

“You gave me the courage to care again.”

Her breath left her lungs. She planted her forehead against his chest to steady herself. “You're asking me to leave New Orleans forever, aren't you?”

He caressed her back. “Forever is a very long time, darling. Who knows what will happen five years from now? Ten? They say when one reaches one's winter years, a desire to return to one's roots grows strong. We were both born here, if you recall.”

“But what would become of Vivienne and Régine? I've taken care of them for years.”

“They can live here and enjoy your gardens while they cater to our shipping line's captains. Those men would be thrilled to stay in a fine home instead of yet another lonely hotel room. Think of how proud Régine would be of her delicious cooking. Your brothers have agreed that this is a good and flexible plan. They want to try their hand at experiencing a bit of life outside New Orleans, but they'd like a home to return to whenever they please.”

“You ask a lot of me if you seek an immediate answer to such a life-changing question.”

A subtle stiffening of his muscles told her she'd struck a chord. “Be my wife, Josette. Come along with me to places you've only read about. The house will be here if we should ever choose to return. Don't be the only one who refuses to find her wings. Come with us . . . come with your family next week on the first leg of our journey. After that, we can sit on the beach in Bermuda and watch glorious sunsets while we decide which ship we want to take and where.”

Could it be? Could she actually do this? She pulled her head back and looked up into eyes now filled with uncertainty. “I can't think straight. Those are all good and sound reasons, but somehow not enough to convince me.”

“Then let me give you the best reason. I love you. And I know you love me. We've been fools not to recognize it weeks ago. Marry me, Josette.”

His words pierced her heart, then shot straight to her brain, setting it abuzz. He deserved nothing less than the truth of what she was capable of doing. Her hands shook at the thought of exposing her secrets. Setting her trembling palms against his hard chest, she pushed away from him. “There's something I need to give you.”

His brows knitted as she swept past him and into the bedroom. She went to the glass-shelved étagère and to the box sitting on it. He followed along behind her and watched over her shoulder as she opened the container and removed the false bottom.

Lifting out his diamond stick pin, she turned and handed it to him. “Here. I stole this from you the night you bedded my sister for the first time. That's when I swiped your pocket watch as well. Before we go any further, I think you should know how deceitful I can be and what foolish things I sometimes do when angry.”

He held the pin in his palm, turning his hand a little so the light from the wall sconce caught the stone's dazzling facets. She waited in the dead silence, her heart pounding in her ears. Was this the moment he changed his mind and walked away? She wouldn't blame him if he did.

He kept his focus on the pin for a long while, seemingly fascinated by its brilliance. “You were quite the little thief, weren't you?”

“More than that,” she said, “I have been a liar, as well.”

He looked up, the sharpness of his glance stealing her breath. “How so?”

She had to wait a beat before she was able to respond. “I lied when I told you I didn't know about the voodoo doll.”

“So you did sneak in and place it on my pillow. You must have been truly angry with me to want me castrated and my heart bloodied.”

She felt the heat crawl up her neck and bloom in her cheeks. “You are wrong on both counts. That was a voodoo love doll. I made it when I was thirteen years old and with stars in my eyes. The strings on the heart had knots on the ends, meaning your heart would forever overflow with love for the maker of the doll. The circle of five pins in your . . . well, they were meant to make you want to father five children one day.”

Cameron lifted a brow. “I'll have you know, the sight of them had the opposite effect. What made you place it on my pillow after all this time?”

“I didn't. Alexia went snooping in my things and found the doll at the bottom of a trunk I had stored in the attic. She understood the voodoo ways enough to comprehend the doll's meaning. When I figured out how the blasted thing ended up on your pillow, I realized that Alexia wanted us together. I said nothing to either one of you because I didn't know what to do. I thought her wishes to be as foolish as mine had been at her age.”

“Perhaps yours were not so foolish, after all, my dear. Look where we stand today.”

“I don't know why I kept the doll since it caused me a great deal of pain. When I found out that Solange carried your child, I was devastated. I figured I had made that happen. I also believed that my manipulations had caused you to fall in love with her.”

Just saying the words sent a sharp pain lancing through Josette. She broke eye contact with Cameron and stared at the floor.

“My dear, you never cease to amaze me.” Cameron set the diamond stick pin on the shelf and grasped her shoulders. “Look at me, Josette.”

When she continued to stare at the floor, he curled a finger under her chin and lifted it, his amber gaze filled with a depth that startled her. “I never loved Solange. Trevor and I were wild youths, carousing day and night. By the time we managed to stagger into Madame Olympée's every night, our eyes were blurred and our brains were sotted. Had it not been your sister, it would have been anyone else the madame had presented to me. I'm sorry your sister died because of my careless behavior. Truly sorry. I would give anything to change that part of my life and have her walking the earth to this day, but I did not love her.”

Josette closed her eyes and pressed her forehead to his chest. “Dear God, Cameron. Solange did not die in childbirth. Odalie poisoned her well after Alexia was born.”

Cameron's body jerked. And then he stiffened. “You know this for a fact?”

“Vennard told me.”

“And you trust his word?”

She nodded. “I believe him, yes.”

“But it was because she gave birth to my child that Odalie poisoned her.”