The girl gave her a fleeting smile of gratitude, but kept her own regal poise as she gave a little bow in return. “I am fully aware of who you are, madam la comtesse,” she said with a meaningful look. “And I am delighted—no,
privileged
—to make your acquaintance. My name is Haydée, and I am the ward of the Count of Monte Cristo.” Her voice was dulcet and lightly accented.
Ward, indeed
, Mercédès thought; but she held her emotions at bay. She had no right to judge or to make assumptions, despite the fact that Monte Cristo had treated the girl like anything but a ward. Nevertheless, her fingers curled into her gloved palms as she recalled how
he
had reacted when faced with
her
lover.
By now the other mademoiselles had fled the room, and the two women were left alone.
“You are very kind,” said Haydée, glancing at the door as it closed behind the last billowing skirt.
“It was nothing,” Mercédès told her, keeping her voice cool and steady. How she wanted to ask Haydée . . . so many things!
How she wanted to scratch at her almond-shaped eyes and tell her to stay away from Monte Cristo.
“They are young and cruel, as girls often are, and I do not believe that such incidents should go unnoticed,” Mercédès said instead.
Haydée was still looking at her. “So you are the one,” she murmured, her attention sharp and interested as it swept over her.
Mercédès raised her brows in surprise. “I am?”
The girl’s look was calculating—but not in a cattish way. More of a contemplative one, as if some light were dawning over her. She gave a little nod and then a small smile, as if making a pleasurable decision. “His Excellency and I are not lovers, madam la comtesse.”
If she would have claimed her nose were blue, Mercédès couldn’t have been more surprised. But she retained her composure and allowed a little tilt to her own lips. “Is that so? He takes great pains to promote that misconception.”
“That is true, but in private he calls me his daughter and treats me thus.”
Suddenly realizing she’d found an ally in whatever competition there was between herself and Monte Cristo, Mercédès grasped the young girl’s arm and gave it a little squeeze. “Thank you for telling me that, for whatever reason you chose to do so.”
“My reason is pure selfishness, madam, if I may be so bold.” Her smile was charming and Mercédès marveled that Monte Cristo had not fallen under its spell. But she had no reason to disbelieve Haydée, and so she smiled back.
“Whatever the reason, you have provided me with information that I may find very useful.”
“I’ve no doubt you will, madam. And the sooner you do, the more appreciative I will be. Now perhaps it is best if I go, for Ali will be pulling his hair out. Or,” she said with a dimple, looking more like a child than ever, “he would be if he had any hair to pull.”
With a curtsy, Haydée swept out of the room with the air of a princess, leaving Mercédès to her thoughts.
They weren’t lovers.
She smiled at herself in the mirror, noticing as she always did that little crooked tooth on top that marred an otherwise perfect spread of teeth and full red lips. She hated the way it dipped into her lower lip, almost like a little fang, when she grinned. But Edmond had thought it charming; he said it made her beauty real and accessible. Perfection, he claimed, would have been much too daunting.
Was that why he hadn’t bedded Haydée? Or was she lying? But there was no reason for her to lie. Mercédès quickly dismissed that thought.
She mused over their conversation for a few moments longer, then, with a start, realized she’d left Monsieur Hardegree waiting for her.
However, when she came out of the retiring room, it wasn’t Hardegree who waited. It was Monte Cristo himself, leaning indolently against one of the gallery’s half pillars, all of which lined the long room and were painted to depict the Greek gods and goddesses.
She lifted her chin when their eyes met, even as her heart gave a little leap and her palms dampened beneath her gloves. Had he been there long enough to suspect that she and Haydée had met? Even if he had . . . he wouldn’t expect them to have the conversation they did.
Wondering why it mattered, why she shouldn’t confront him right now, Mercédès nevertheless kept her gaze steady as he stepped toward her.
“Your husband asked me to escort you,” Monte Cristo said, offering her his arm.
She briefly considered not accepting it, but realized there would be no purpose in doing so, and besides . . . she wanted to touch him. And for him to touch her. Because she knew that, whatever he’d done in the gazebo, however he’d left her, he still wanted her.
God knew, she still wanted him—though she would die before admitting it.
“Did he?” she asked, sliding her fingers around the solid warmth of his arm. He immediately shifted, pulling his elbow tight to his body so that her gown was crushed against his side and his trouser leg brushed her skirts. His close presence was overpowering: dark and strong, nearly vibrating with command. “How amusing, for it was Monsieur Hardegree who was my escort.”
“Perhaps your toilette took too long, madam,” replied Monte Cristo, “and he became weary of waiting for you.”
“Ah, yes,” she mused, stealing a glance at him, now quite certain that it was Monte Cristo who had suggested Hardegree’s defection. “After waiting for a very long time, and without any word, one might begin to suspect that the one for whom one waits has found more exciting delights, and is never to return. And then whatever should one do? Spend the entire . . . evening . . . waiting in the gallery, only to find that the other wasn’t about to return after all—and learn that one has missed the production?”
His beautiful lips tightened but he kept his gaze cool when he flicked it sharply at her, then away. “If one vows to wait, one should stay true to his—or her—word . . . and trust that the other will return as promised. After all, what is mere
entertainment
in contrast to one’s
oath
?”
Mercédès felt a sudden wave of sadness and grief, but she didn’t show it. Until she learned what he was after, why he was really here—and what had kept him from her for years—she would give no explanation for her choices—choices for which he obviously blamed and despised her.
But he clearly had known who she was when he approached her a decade ago as Sinbad. That, she could not excuse.
“And so you believe, monsieur le comte, that one should never give up hope that the other might reappear? Regardless of all evidence to the contrary, and any other occurrences that might arise to upset the situation?” She bumped against his side purposely as she looked up at him, making her eyes wide and guileless, and her lips part slightly.
“Above all, fidelity to one’s word,” Monte Cristo replied.
Mercédès was silent for a moment, contemplating her next response. The play had started again and the fashion watchers and gossipmongers had returned to their seats. Only an occasional couple or gentleman passed the two of them as they strolled along . . . and she realized, after looking around, that Monte Cristo had guided them beyond the gallery and the theater entrance to the side of the building.
“Fidelity to one’s word,” she replied thoughtfully. “Thus, above all, honesty and honor. I must concur with you in that.
Honesty
and
honor
, monsieur le comte.”
He looked at her, his dark eyes delving into hers as if to read a deeper meaning. She saw that they had reached the dark alcove where the side staircase, used by ladies’ maids and footmen, made a landing between the second and third floors.
They paused, and he swept her into his arms—just as she’d suspected he would, for there was little pretense in regard to their passion for each other.
Monte Cristo’s embrace was strong and bold, and he crushed her between his body and the plastered wall. She slid her arms eagerly around his neck, feeling the warmth of his skin beneath the thick locks brushing his collar. His mouth swooped down on hers, no longer drawn hard and firm, but supple and demanding, pulling an immediate response from her even as it snuffed out her breath. She pressed up against him, her gown crushed and wrinkled between their hips as he drove his tongue into her mouth, his fingers curling into the jut of her shoulder blades.
Her eyes closed as she gave herself up to the familiar sensations shooting through her, curling in her middle, and twinging between her legs. The warm, slick stroke of his tongue and the urgent scrape of his teeth; soft, molding lips by turns sensual and coaxing to tight and harsh. The heat from his body and the scrape of wool sleeve over her delicate skin, the smell of Edmond mixed with that of Monte Cristo: slightly smoky and musky and citrusy, tinged with the aroma of wool and starch.
His leg pressed between hers, parting her thighs beneath the scads of fabric from her gown and crinolines, pushing boldly into the softness of her quim. Mercédès moaned softly against his mouth as she increased the pressure against his thigh, shifting her hips slightly in a little rhythm. Her head tipped back, the top of her coiffure catching in the rough plaster of the wall as he moved to kiss the generous expanse of skin exposed by her low bodice.
Warm, soft lips nuzzled into the hollows of her throat as he gathered her up closer, his knee sliding deeper between her legs, burrowing into the froth of skirts, her feet now on tiptoes as she kept her balance.
Edmond.
This was Edmond; this was how he had made her feel, how he had made her body hot and tight and needy.
When he tugged at the line of her bodice with impatient fingers, Mercédès battled herself back to reality, pulling from the deep place filled with strokes and licks and nibbles, and forced her eyes open. There was no one about. The area was dimly lit and quiet but for the gentle rasp of their breathing and the rustle of clothing.
Though her brain was fuzzy, and her body cried to be released—undressed, skin to skin with the man before her, filled and stroked and wooed until it peaked—she remembered what had happened last time. And the thought of being left half clothed in a theater was a chilling effect that helped to clear her mind.
Opening her eyes, she saw the top of his dark head as his tongue slipped down into the warm cleft between her breasts, followed by the gentle bite of his lips on the inside of her cleavage. Her nipples were hard, surging under the confines of her corset, and Mercédès gave a little shrug so that they would brush up, over it.
Then she reached boldly for the placket on his trousers, smoothing her hands under his coat and over the stiff brocade waistcoat beneath. Monte Cristo startled at her movement, but when she found her way beneath the long tails of his shirt to the hot skin and rough hair, he pulled back, straightening in front of her. His knee edged out from under her throbbing sex, relieving some of the pressure there and sending a little chill over her body from the loss of his warmth.
But Mercédès’ hands were busy down in the heat inside his trousers, and as her fingers came together over his flat belly and the indent of his navel, she reached up to kiss the side of his neck. Musky warm and salty, rough from the beginnings of stubble, and starchy-smelling from the crisp folds of his neckcloth, it was that frightening combination of Edmond Dantès, Sinbad, and Monte Cristo. She shoved her hands farther in, bringing him closer to her so that their bodies were nearly flush again. Combing her nails through the wiry hair that grew thick, and then down and around to cup the heavy, burning cock straining there.
He gave a quiet sigh, nearly a moan, and she swore she felt him surge in her hands. Blindly, she pulled apart his trousers so that her movements weren’t restricted, and as her fingers slid along that glorious length of cock, over the bold veins and velvet skin, she found the softness of its head. With a little squeeze there in the warmth of his trousers, she pulled back the skin and traced the edge of that head, over the most delicate veins there beneath, and felt him gathering up beneath her touch . . . felt the little sticky drip from his cock’s tip, and the tensing of muscles in his powerful thighs as she pressed against them, and the little sizzle as his seed moved up along the pounding erection.
If she had doubted his response to her before, she no longer did. Mercédès wanted nothing more than to drop to her knees in front of him, and take that long red-and-purple cock into her mouth and suck until he begged for mercy . . . shouted her name and admitted who he was . . . .
Her own sex was wet and ready, and her breasts tight beneath his hands, which had at some point begun to crush them behind her corset and gown. Their mouths met and she kept her fingers close around him, stroking arhythmically, unwilling to let him go, to release him, loving the feel of that solid cock in her hands . . . and knowing she held it, and him, in her control.
She cleared her mind again, remembered who she was, where she was . . . who she was with. She tightened her fingers around him and paused. Pulled away from his mouth enough to whisper, “By all that is right and fair, I should end this now.”
He stilled beneath her, then captured her mouth again, holding her head with both hands. Grinding his lips against hers, he forced hers open in a rough, angry kiss—at once acknowledging her statement, and forcing her to respond with her own passion.
Mercédès kissed him back—she could never refuse it—and kept her hands tightly over his cock as it swelled and throbbed in the heat. She pulled her face away, looking up into his countenance, dark with shadows and fury, and said, “But I won’t.”
And she gave two sharp tugs on his ripe cock, felt him gasp and then shudder in an unexpected release. He surged in her grip and the hot, sticky seed splurged over her hands and into his drawers. She swiped her fingers over his shirttails and stepped away, breathing heavy, her body still humming, but satisfied, knowing she’d one-upped him here.