Out of the Blue (A Regency Time Travel Romance) (22 page)

He felt her nod her head and he took a deep
breath, knowing that they were about to take a giant step forward,
yet not knowing if they were moving toward a greater happiness or a
yawning abyss. “I want you, Cassandra. I want to be with you, I
want to love you, for as long or as short a time as we are
allowed.” He moved his hand so that she could tip back her head and
look at him. “Is that selfish? Am I asking too much? Or am I right,
and do you want me as much as I want you?”

He watched as a single tear escaped her eye
and slowly traveled down her cheek. “For as long as we have,
Marcus,” she said just before he drew her completely into his
embrace.

“Marcus, you won’t believe who I saw on
Bond—well, hullo! That’s Cassie I see behind you, isn’t it? Have I
interrupted something? Sorry. I’ll just close the door and go away
again. Pretend I wasn’t here. And I didn’t see anything, honestly I
didn’t. No. Not me. And if I did, I certainly wouldn’t tell your
aunt. Not Corny. Not at all. Wouldn’t want to be anywhere near when
that lady flew up into the boughs. Well, I’ll be off now—”

Marcus, whose back had been turned toward the
door, released Cassandra but held her close to his side as he
turned to see a red-faced Peregrine standing just inside the room.
“Come in, Perry,” he said smoothly, doing his best to ignore
Cassandra’s giggle. “We have no secrets from you. At least not
until I can remember to lock my door.”

Peregrine advanced into the room and flung
himself into a nearby chair. “Well, I suppose not, Marcus, old
friend. Dashed difficult keeping secrets if you’re going to be
playing April and May all over the house, where just anybody could
walk in on you. Hullo, Cassie.
Um—
pretty gown.”

“Thank you, Perry,” Cassandra said politely,
moving away from Marcus but still holding his hand and not breaking
contact with him until she stepped out of his reach. “Now, if you
gentlemen will excuse me? I believe I’ll go to my chamber for a
while. I have some thinking to do.”

“Thinking?” Peregrine shook his head. “Is
that all you people do? Think? No, I suppose not—considering what I
just walked in on. Isn’t that right, Marcus? Not that I’ll breathe
a word of it, you understand. What are you going to be thinking
about, Cassie? Did Marcus tell you about the reception at Carlton
House tomorrow night? You aren’t thinking you won’t go, are you?
That would be a pity, seeing as how Marcus has already decided to
let you wear his mother’s pearls. You did say the pearls, didn’t
you, Marcus? I’m sure it was the pearls.”

“Perry,” Marcus asked wearily, “aren’t you
thirsty? I’m convinced I’d be thirsty if I had talked only half as
much as you have since entering this room. Why don’t you fetch
yourself a drink?”

Perry looked from Marcus to Cassandra, and
then back at his good friend. “Why don’t I go drown myself, you
mean,” he said, pushing himself to his feet. “Sorry, Lassie. I
didn’t mean to spoil the surprise. But you will go, won’t you? You
said you were dying to see Prinny.”

Cassandra’s smile did something very strange
to Marcus’s equilibrium, filled as it was with a mixture of
happiness and sorrow. “I suppose I’ll go, Perry,” she answered,
“although suddenly, seeing the Prince Regent just isn’t all that
important. Is it, Marcus?”

“Not important?” Perry exclaimed, nearly
dropping the wine decanter. “Well, if that don’t beat the Dutch.
For weeks you’ve been beating me over the head, pestering me to get
Marcus to take you someplace, and now that he is willing to take
you, you say it ain’t important. Women! No wonder I’ve decided
never to marry. A wife would have me running straight to Bedlam
within a fortnight. Stap me if she wouldn’t.”

Cassandra walked over to Peregrine and kissed
him on the cheek. “I’m sorry, Perry. Of course I’m delighted by the
prospect of seeing Prinny. As a matter of fact, I’m so delighted
that I think I will take special care not to tire myself anymore
today with lessons, or playing cards with you and Aunt Cornelia
after dinner. No, I’ve decided to be a good little Regency miss and
take a warm bath after my meal and then go straight to bed at ten
o’clock, so that I’m well rested for tomorrow night.” She turned to
look meaningfully at Marcus. “Don’t you think that’s a good idea,
my lord?”

The minx! She had as good as invited him to
her bed, although, thankfully, Peregrine—just then downing a glass
of wine—remained happily unaware of that fact. Marcus looked past
his friend and smiled at the woman he loved, the woman who loved
him—even if neither of them had as yet said the words. “I think
that is an excellent idea, my dear. So good, in fact, that I
believe I shall do much the same thing. The Season is not yet three
weeks old and I’ve already had too many late nights.”

Her blush delighted him as Marcus watched
Cassandra sweep out of the room.

Perry replaced his empty glass on the table,
frowning as he, too, watched her go. “Leaving me to spend the
evening losing all my money to Corny, are you? Plays a wicked game
of cards, your aunt. Oh, no. Thank you for the warning, Marcus. I
believe I’ll be off now, to have dinner at my club. You can tell
Corny I’ll be very,
very
late!”

Marcus waved his friend on his way, then took
up his seat behind his desk once more, no longer interested in
theories, or guidebooks, or possible disasters. His entire mind was
concentrated on moving the hands on the mantel clock until they
reached the hour of ten.

~ ~ ~

Cassandra was able to reach the privacy of
her bedchamber before breaking down, throwing herself onto the
satin coverlet, and muffling her sobs with one of the pillows. Her
hands shook; her stomach felt queasy after holding her emotions in
check for so long—putting up a front of courage for Marcus,
exhibiting a bravery and an optimism she didn’t feel.

Marcus was in danger. Terrible danger. She
hadn’t even thought to doubt him, to ask to see the guidebook for
herself in the hope of disproving his statement that he would die
on the last day of May unless, together, they found some way to
change history.

But they would find that way, she tried to
assure herself. Deliberately cutting her tears short, she slipped
from the bed and dashed cold water on her face. Why else would she
have traveled back in time, if not to save the man she loved—the
man she hadn’t known even existed until a little more than a month
ago?

After drying her face she put down the towel
and wandered over to a window. She pushed back the drapery and
looked out over the Square. How she had come to love this place,
this mansion, this Square, this hustling, bustling city, this
glorious time in history. If it weren’t for the fact that her
parents must be beside themselves, wondering where she had
disappeared to, she wouldn’t ever want to go back. “Although I’d
have to find some way to invent Coca-Cola,” she thought out loud,
turning away from the window. “And Twinkies. And Dove bars. Lord,
yes, definitely Dove bars.”

She shook her head, wondering why she
couldn’t keep her mind on the subject. It certainly was an
important enough subject. She would have to take this one step at a
time. “One—Marcus is supposed to die the last day of May.
Two—Marcus believes I may have been sent to help him avoid that
death. Three—I either go back to my time on the last day of May,
mission accomplished, leaving a healthy Marcus behind, to live out
the rest of his life without me, or, God forbid, Marcus dies and
I’m either sent back to my time anyway or I’m left trapped here,
with Marcus gone.”

She pressed her hands to her cheeks and they
came away wet with her tears. “Four—no wonder I’m still
crying!”

Locking the door to the hallway, Cassandra
pulled a chair over to the armoire and reached up to feel about for
the pack of cigarettes and the lighter she had stolen from Marcus’s
study and hidden behind the raised, ornamental wood carving. The
time had definitely come for a healthy—or unhealthy—infusion of
nicotine to the brain, a sort of jump-start to her thinking
processes.

A flick of her lighter and a deep breath sent
the smoke into her lungs and the nicotine into her bloodstream. It
hit her brain cells in a short, satisfying seven seconds—at least,
according to an article she had read a while before, that was the
accepted progression of events. Unfortunately, it took only one
more drag and about fifteen seconds for the chemicals to hit her
stomach, and once more she felt the light-headedness and queasiness
she had experienced that first morning in Marcus’s study. She felt
as if she were back behind Feinstein’s Bakery, turning green as she
tried to inhale one of her father’s unfiltered Pall Malls.

This time she fought it, finishing one
cigarette and quickly lighting another, the ashes deposited in the
washbasin she must remember to empty out the window before Rose
found them. As she smoked, she thought about Marcus and his
admission that he loved her. Well, not that he loved her. Not
exactly. He had said that he
wanted
her. That was close
enough for now, because she wanted him, too, and had wanted him, it
seemed, forever.

She butted the second cigarette in the
washbasin and returned to the bed to lie on it, a small smile
playing at the corners of her mouth. He would come to her tonight,
after everyone else was sleeping, and they would begin their
future. It was only April. They had time; they had lots of time.
Between them, they’d figure out a way to save Spencer Perceval, and
then they’d figure out a way to save Marcus. That wasn’t theory;
that was
fact.
Because he wasn’t infallible, her dear,
handsome, desirable Regency scientist and gentleman of the world.
He wasn’t infallible, because she, Cassandra Louise Kelley, had
absolutely no intention of losing the man.

Not now.

Not on the last day of May.

Not ever.

T
he clock at the
head of the stairs struck the hour of eleven. Cassandra sat in the
middle of the large bed, propped against a half dozen pillows, and
furtively watched the closed door to the hallway. She had carefully
set the scene with a few strategically placed candles, a small fire
burning in the fireplace, one of the draperies drawn back to allow
a spill of moonlight to fall across the bed. But now it seemed so
staged, so artificial—like something out of an old Bette Davis
movie—that she had gone from nervous excitement to just plain
scared.

Dressed in a lovely white nightgown trimmed
with fine Mechlin lace and sheer enough to have come straight out
of a Victoria’s Secret catalog, she had felt marvelously seductive
when she slipped between the sheets to await her “lover.” But an
hour’s wait, now more than an hour’s wait, had found her rethinking
her fantasy.

Perhaps she shouldn’t be
in
the bed
when Marcus entered. That was sort of pushing things. Perhaps she
should be seated at her writing desk, a paisley shawl all but
falling off her shoulders, a pen in her hand, as if she were
writing a letter, or some lines of poetry?

Or she could be sitting at her dressing
table, brushing her hair. Then Marcus could enter—dressed in his
banyan, which was what Regency types called their bathrobes—and
come up behind her, pull back her hair, and plant a kiss on her
exposed neck. No. She didn’t have enough hair to carry off that
particular scenario.

One thing was certain, She couldn’t stay in
this bed, like some sort of sacrificial lamb or some sort of
predator awaiting her prey. Throwing back the covers, she slid to
the edge of the mattress, her nightgown hiked up near her hips, and
began searching the floor for her slippers. She would go to the
window, the one with the pulled-back draperies, and stand staring
through the panes at the stars. That would be romantic, without
pushing the point.

“Where the hell are my slippers?” she
questioned aloud in exasperation, hopping from the bed. She dropped
to her knees and began searching under it. Candlelight might be
romantic, but she sure could use a flashlight. With her rump
pointing skyward, she stuck her head under the bed frame and
extended one hand, sweeping it back and forth over the bare
floorboards. “Damn it—what did they do, go for a walk?”

At the slight squeaking of an opening door
she froze, her hand just closing around one of the elusive
slippers, and she became embarrassingly aware of her undignified
position. Dropping her forehead to the cool floorboards, and
thankful that the bed ruffle covered her head, she mumbled bleakly,
“Marcus?”

“As a matter of fact, yes,” came the
deep-throated, obviously amused answer from somewhere behind her.
“However, if you’re looking for me under the bed, I have to tell
you that I’m not there. Or have you changed your mind, and are you
in the act of hiding from me?”

She lifted her head from the floor, then
softly banged it against the wood three times. “Dumb, dumb,
dumb.
Oh, God—I’m such a klutz!” she murmured before
carefully backing out from under the bed ruffle and slowly getting
to her feet. “Hi there. I lost my slippers—but I’ve found one of
them—see,” she said brightly, much too brightly, giving him a small
wave with the hand holding the slipper before wrapping her arms
around her body, trying to pretend she wasn’t standing directly in
front of a small brace of candles whose light had undoubtedly
turned her nightgown into little more than a revealing veil of
cobwebs.

“Congratulations, my dear,” Marcus answered
as she dared to look at him, seeing that he was indeed dressed in
his nightclothes, a deep burgundy silk banyan tied tightly at his
waist. He looked so good. So big. So handsome. He held out his hand
and she automatically placed the slipper in it. “I think we can
dispense with your search for its mate, don’t you? Unless you plan
to go for a stroll?”