Tempting Fate (2 page)

He chuckled and caught her hand, glancing out into the hall and then tugging her after him. “This way.”

She let him tow her down the halls, almost faster than she could keep up. The manor was so immense it had wings, and parts of it had stone floors as old as the foundations. She tripped, and he laughed, steadying her.

“Careful.”

“How do you find anything in this place?” She made him wait until she took her shoes off. The floor was uneven in this part of the building and she had no intention of coming off as a clumsy drunk before she got him into bed and could show him exactly how coordinated she could be.

“I spent all my summers here, as a child. By the age of five I’d crawled into every space large enough to accommodate me.” He grinned, ducking his head, his dark hair falling into his eyes. When he began walking again, it was a much less hurried pace. “Once
Oncle
René found us in the
coffre-fort
, Garrit’s idea, of course. Gave me the beating of my life for that.”

“The
coffre-fort?
” Her tongue tripped over the French, and she wished she’d studied it more closely in school. But who could have known Abby would marry a Frenchman?

“Mm.” He shrugged. “In the basement. It’s where we keep all the family, ah, heirlooms? Is that what you call it in English? Treasures.”

She laughed. “A castle complete with treasure?”

“
Oui.
” Jean led her down another hall, pitch black and windowless. “
Famille
is important to us, you see.”

He pressed a switch, and the lights came up. Mia’s mouth fell open at the faces that stared back. The walls were lined with portraits, dark-haired, dark-eyed men and beautiful women painted on canvasses taller than she was.

“This is your family?”

“
Oui.
” When he smiled, she saw the resemblance. Generations of DeLeon men smiled from their frames the same way. A touch of arrogance, a mess of confidence, and an incredible amount of charm.

She shook her head. Then she noticed the painting at the end of the gallery, a woman with brilliant green eyes next to a man who looked very much like Abby’s soon-to-be Father-in-law.

“My God!” The woman had exactly Abby’s eyes, and there was something about the line of her jaw, and her smile. “Look at that!”

”Hm?” Mia pointed and Jean looked up. “Ah.
Dame
Anessa.
Oui
, she is very beautiful.”

“She looks like Abby!”

He laughed. “Perhaps in passing. But I expect any woman Garrit married would look like someone of our ancestors. There are so many.”

Jean’s hand found the small of her back, propelling her gently down the hall. She glanced back over her shoulder once more at the portrait. The eyes really were uncanny.

“So odd! Do you suppose he realizes it?”

“
Non.
”

“How do you know?”

He smiled down at her. “I imagine he would have mentioned it. But we rarely come here, anyway.”

When they reached the other end of the hall, he turned the lights off, and the portraits disappeared back into darkness. He led her through another dark room and into a well-lit hallway on the other side. One of his cousins—and Mia couldn’t help but notice the man was only half dressed—called something to him in French, and Jean grinned, offering him a rather rude salute in return.

“If you were trying to impress me, you didn’t need to.” She tugged at the ends of his bow-tie, hanging loose beneath his collar.

“
Non.
” Jean pushed open a door to a large bedroom, at last. His eyes were almost black, though she wasn’t certain if it was the light, or the way he looked at her. Either way, it was delicious. “I lacked the patience to bring you the long way.”

She arched an eyebrow, not quite able to suppress a smile. “That wasn’t the long way?”

He smirked. “It is a very, very large estate.”

Mia dropped her shoes on the carpet, and let him take her directly to bed.

Two

Adam

Ah, the delightful disarray of a wedding. So many people coming and going, no one noticed an extra body, each assuming the man in question belonged to the other side of the family even without his particular talents of misdirection. Adam whistled as he walked down the long hallway toward the courtyard at the heart of the manor, complete with convenient directions for those poor English relatives of Eve’s, no doubt. Did these Lions think they had a monopoly on antique manor houses? As if England didn’t have its share of rambling estates, with eccentric passageways built by paranoid noblemen.

But then, Eve’s family
would
be the most pretentious of Frenchmen, with all that noble history behind them. Adam patted his coat pocket, but his gift was still accounted for. A lovingly preserved Golden Lion, the ancient currency of the DeLeon family and worth a small fortune in its weight alone, even if it hadn’t been historically significant. A peace offering, he’d decided, though even carrying the thing on his person, with its stamped
Mjölnir
on the reverse side, made him decidedly uncomfortable. Then again, the hair on the back of his neck had started prickling the moment he’d set foot onto DeLeon lands. It had to have something to do with that damned thunder god, and either way, he was going to find out.

The processional had begun to play, and Adam quickened his steps. Part of him couldn’t help but hope that she’d hesitate—that if he appeared at just the right moment, she’d call the whole thing off and realize the mistake she’d made.

Eve didn’t belong with these commoners, whether they carried her own much-diluted blood or not. Perhaps if they had been princes, kings, he might have understood. She should have been a queen, an empress in her own right, even if she refused to take her place as goddess at his side. But even so, stopping her wedding wasn’t his priority. Judging by her response to him at their last meeting, she was a stubborn thing, determined to have her way. Determined to believe herself in love.

And that was the rub, wasn’t it? The part that chafed more than any other. He had felt it, that love, warm and embracing, comforting and beautiful, and so full of light. But it wasn’t for him. It would never be for him. When she looked on him, when she met his eyes, everything inside her was cold and hard and dark.

So be it. He rubbed his chest, over his heart, and then he pushed open the door to the courtyard. If she was determined to marry this idiot Frenchman, that was her business, and he knew his own mind well enough to understand that he had little hope of persuading her otherwise. Not in this life, anyway.

Garrit’s gaze shifted away from his bride when Adam stepped out into the courtyard, though how he had torn his eyes from Eve when she was a vision in white, all innocence and beauty, Adam would never understand. The Lion’s eyes narrowed, his jaw clenching tight.

Adam smiled. At least he wasn’t the only one made uncomfortable by all of this. At least these fool Lions were just as much on edge as he was. Even if he’d given up on his original plan, that didn’t mean he had to tell
them
, and it would be much, much more fun to watch them squirm, wondering what he meant by all of this.

A meaty hand wrapped around his arm, and Adam jerked against it, turning back—

No.

The man—no, man wasn’t the word at all, was it? But he was immense. And Adam would have known him anywhere. He struggled harder against his grip, but the giant only bared his teeth, unmoved, unbothered, and his eyes blazed blue-white.

“Did you really think I’d leave her unprotected?” he growled.

Lightning, hot and white and burning through his veins, and still he was dragged back, like a ragdoll for all the good his fighting did him. He didn’t have the strength. He didn’t have the power. Not without Eve.

“It isn’t what you think,” he managed between twitches.

“Your motives don’t concern me at all,” the man snarled, all but throwing him into the corridor of the manor. “What concerns me is that you weren’t invited.”

Adam caught himself against the stone wall, struggling to right himself. If he could only reach Eve—they wouldn’t want to make a scene in front of Eve. By all rights, none of this should have been possible. But that meaty hand dropped heavily onto his shoulder again, hard and bruising.

And then everything went black.

Three

Mia

They were late to the wedding, but Mia didn’t care. It wasn’t like these things ever started on time, anyway, Abby’s least of all, with all these Frenchmen running on times like “later” and “mid-morning” or “late afternoon.” How Abby could stand it, Mia didn’t understand, and even Jean hadn’t known exactly what time the wedding was supposed to start, when she’d diligently asked, only shrugging before going back to kissing her neck. A moment later she’d been underneath him, and she’d lost track of the time all over again.

When she did find Abby in her dressing room, she’d had just time enough to fix her hair, and she knew she looked amazing, even if Luc didn’t so much as glance at her when she walked down the aisle. Mia lifted her chin and ignored him right back, glad she hadn’t wasted her time trying to attract him. She had been right about Jean, anyway; he did look even better with his clothes off, and she had been more than happy to let him keep her in his bed.

Garrit was very dashing in his tuxedo, though, and seeing him watch Abby as she began her march down the aisle with their father, Mia could understand exactly why she was marrying him. He was absolutely gorgeous, and he obviously adored her.

Mia sighed. If only she’d been able to talk Abby into putting on some makeup.

A man with ash-brown hair burst into the back of the courtyard. Garrit cursed, then half a dozen DeLeon men were on their feet, shouting in French.

An immense man appeared from nowhere, grabbing the ash-haired man by the arm. He jerked as if to free himself, but the second man hauled him back. The same behemoth she had noticed at the rehearsal dinner.

The stranger turned to look at his captor, his expression going from disgust to fear as he was dragged back out of the courtyard.

Everything had happened so quickly, and Garrit was halfway down the aisle toward Abby before Mia even realized he had moved.

Abby’s face went white and she collapsed.

“Abby!” Mia ran to her, dropping her bouquet, but Garrit had already caught her. He picked Abby up and shouted for his father.

Mia grabbed her hand. It was limp. “What happened? What’s wrong?”

Garrit glared at the door where the two men had disappeared. “
Je n’sais pas.
” Then he shook his head and glanced down at her. “Can you get the door for me? I should take her inside.”

She ran ahead, heaving on the heavy wood and grateful it wasn’t stone. Then Jean was there, helping her, and Garrit carried Abby through. René followed with Juliette and her mother and father.

“Who was that man?” she asked.

Jean’s lips pressed thin and his eyes darkened. She hadn’t realized he could look so fierce. “He wasn’t invited.”

“Is that all?”

He shook his head and followed the others inside. Mia had to skip to keep up with him.

“I was afraid I had laced her dress too tightly, but Abby was insistent that she could breathe without any trouble,” Juliette said. “I’ll never understand what women these days are willing to do for a silhouette.”

“That would do it,” Garrit’s aunt said. Mia hadn’t even seen her come inside. “Just too much excitement and not enough air.”

“Shouldn’t we call a doctor?” Mia’s father asked.

“Because she fainted?” Juliette laughed. “Poor Abby, I’m sure she’s embarrassed enough as it is. Why don’t we give her another moment and see if she’ll wake up on her own?”

The hulking man stepped into the hall from a side passage and Mia could have sworn his eyes flashed white. “Where is she?”

Juliette nodded to the room behind her.

“And just who are you?” Mia’s mother demanded.

The man’s jaw clenched, but Juliette placed a hand on his arm and smiled. “Lars Owen is a very close friend of the family. He’s trained to respond to these sorts of emergencies. Would you mind taking a look at Abby,
mon cher?
I’m sure it would put her parents at ease.”