Velvet Lightning (19 page)

A world she could visit. A world she could never call her own.

Nothing had changed, she thought, feeling tension creep back, dragging fear and pain with it. If anything, it was worse now because she knew she could never have what Marc Tyrone wanted to give her, and yet she couldn’t end this between them, couldn’t send him away. Couldn’t stop loving him, needing him.

“Are you going to be all right?” he asked quietly.

She looked down at him where he stood beside the buggy, and her heart lurched. “I have to think,” she murmured, knowing it wouldn’t do any good.

“About what? About us?”

“You won’t let it end, will you?”

His jaw tightened. “No. I love you, Catherine. And you feel something for me, I know you do.”

She looked at her gloved hands holding the reins. “It doesn’t matter what I feel.”

“It matters to me!”

Catherine began to lift the reins, but stilled when his hand reached out to catch hers. “Please, Marc—”

“At least I’ve won that much,” he said huskily. “Maybe I stole it, but it’s mine. I can’t be just Tyrone, your secret lover. Not anymore. Marry me, Catherine.”

“Don’t!” Perhaps hearts couldn't break, she thought, but they could hurt as if they’d been shattered into pieces.

“I said I would. Marry me.”

“No. I can’t.”

“Is it because you can’t love me?” His voice was very steady, controlled.

She felt the hot pressure of tears, and stared down at the hand covering hers. “I can’t marry you. Please don’t ask me again, Marc.”

“You won’t even tell me why?”

She shook her head silently.

He racked his brain to think of some way to reach her. He didn’t want to hurt her, and God knew he didn’t want to add to the fear he could feel in her like something dark and cold, but he was going mad not knowing what was wrong. And the helplessness of not being able to do anything at all ate at him.

“Will I see you again?” he asked finally, defeated.

She lifted her gaze, staring straight again. A queer little smile that was pleasure and pain curved her lips. “I . . . don’t think I can give you up.”

“Catherine—”

“Do you have a gun?” she asked abruptly.

“Of course I have a gun.” He frowned, conscious of a sudden chill.

“You should keep it with you,” she said in a faraway voice.

“Why, Catherine?” He made his voice flat and calm.

She pulled her hands away and took a firm grip on the reins. “I have to go. I—I have to think.”

He was forced to step back when the buggy moved forward, and he stood there in the grove staring after her. I? he thought, bewildered.
I'm in danger?
He shook his head and muttered, “Goddammit,” because he couldn’t focus his thoughts.

Finally he went back to his own buggy, where his horse waited patiently. He untied the animal and got into the carriage, and headed into town to tell his men to return to the ship.

She believes I'm in danger
.

The men were waiting inside the hotel. He took Lyle and a few others in the buggy with him; the rest cheerfully walked. He drove the buggy back to the harbor, responding absently to Lyle’s occasional comments, then watched the men take one of the longboats and begin rowing out to the ship. He turned the buggy around and set off toward his house at a brisk pace that was the horse’s idea rather than his own.

She’s
afraid
I’m
in danger.

Had that been it all along, he wondered. He could feel his mind groping, feel scattered thoughts and impressions that refused to complete an image in his mind. Frowning, he drove to his house and stabled the horse.

He had missed his lunch, and so had Catherine. He hoped she ate something; he was worried about her slight loss of weight. More, he wished violently that she’d let him take care of her.

“An early dinner, Captain?” Sarah asked brightly as he came into the house. She was standing in the foyer with a dustcloth in one capable hand; she was a middle-aged woman with quiet eyes and an unobtrusive way of taking care of him when he was on the island and under her gaze.

“Please,” he said, distracted.

“I’ll have it ready for you in an hour or so.”

“All right. Thank you.” He went into his study, feeling restless and uneasy. Something Catherine had said ... or was it something that finally clicked in his mind?

The house was very quiet. He wandered over to the window, looking out at lengthening shadows, at approaching night. When Sarah called him, he went and ate his dinner without tasting it, but not forgetting to compliment her cooking—which, in truth, was excellent.

He returned to his study. Paced. He took his gun from the desk drawer, cleaned and reloaded it, but left it lying on the blotter as he resumed pacing. It was dark, and Sarah came in silently to put on the lamps, then went away again.

He called her Kate
, Tyrone thought suddenly, bothered by that. Her father had called her Kate, and she’d gone white. It had to mean something. What did it mean?

I won’t be held up by the town as a whore.

But that wasn't it; that had never been it. Catherine, accepting the slights and insults of the town, had cared no more for her reputation than Tyrone cared for his. Yet she had insisted on secrecy, was panicky at the threat of being found out, was cold to him in public, as if there were danger even in being seen talking to him on the street.

Do you have a gun?

He forced himself to think. If she were afraid for him, had been afraid all this time not of any danger to herself but of a danger to him . . . and if that fear had grown recently because he had changed, had begun to love her, had begun to demand more of her. An end of secrecy . . .

She wouldn’t marry him.
I can't
.

The threat to him was because of their relationship. He was in danger because he was her lover. And it was real danger, deadly danger, because nothing else would frighten her so deeply. She was desperately trying to push him away from her because she felt certain that someone could hurt him, perhaps kill him. Because of her. Because he loved her.

Tyrone stopped pacing, staring blindly at nothing. That had to be it. He didn’t understand, not completely, but he thought that he could, now, give his enemy a face.

That was when he heard the frantic knocking at his door.

Catherine put the horse away and went into the house. It was silent; her father was still away. She went upstairs and changed out of her velvet dress, trying not to think despite her words to Tyrone. But she couldn’t stop, of course.

Stepping into a dark skirt, buttoning a white blouse, she thought of scarlet satin, and found herself smiling, feeling a sad, sweet understanding. She wondered how old he had been when the “sultan’s bed’’ had been installed. Still young enough, she thought, to carry the vivid memory of a thin, worn mother and rats in a cold shack at night. So, wanting to surround himself with luxury, with sensuous fabrics and the brightest color he could find, he had bought the ornate bed. And if he was, now, older and wiser and inclined to view his younger self with a kind of wry mockery, then that was natural.

But she hurt for that younger Marc Tyrone. And she hurt for the man who still felt the bitter prick of conscience, even after all these years, for his own part in a senseless war.

Dear God, she loved him.

Feeling tired and terribly alone, she went back downstairs. The house was still silent. She went into the kitchen and began preparing dinner, vaguely aware of lengthening shadows. It was almost dark when the meal was ready, and she felt the first uneasy twinge of worry.

Where was her father? He should have been home by now. Could he have come in quietly while she was busy in the kitchen?

She went back through the house, lighting lamps, and felt a surge of relief when she noticed that his study was bright, a soft glow spilling through the doorway.

“Father?” She went into the room, and got as far as his desk, when she suddenly went cold. She could feel her heart hammering against her ribs, feel hot bile rising bitterly in her throat.

Her mother’s portrait had been horribly slashed with a knife, utterly and ruthlessly destroyed.

Catherine heard a faint sound behind her and whirled out of instinct, throwing up one arm to protect her face. But she wasn’t quick enough, and the flat-handed blow caught her with the full force of his arm, knocked her over the corner of the desk and onto the floor. She tasted blood, felt the stab of agony just beneath her ribs, where the edge of the desk had gouged into her. Tears of pain blinded her for a moment, and as she blinked them away, her face began to throb angrily from the blow.

“Father .. .”

“
Stop saying that!
” he roared.

“Father, please—it’s Catherine.” She didn’t dare get to her feet, and fought to keep her voice steady.

“Catherine is just a child,” he said in a shaking voice. “You stop bringing her into this, Kate!”

“I’m not Kate,” she whispered, but he wasn't listening. He no longer had the knife he had used on the painting, but that was a small mercy since a pistol was jammed inside his belt.

It had never been this bad before. He’d never hit her before, never really hurt her. And he was terrifying in looks. His face was heavily flushed, his eyes wild and glazed, and a trickle of drool escaped his lips.

She was terrified. “Please.”

“Please, what, Kate? Please let you go to your
lover?
”

Oh, God, she thought numbly. “No, I don’t have—”

“You went out to his ship today, didn’t you?”

“No!”

“I
saw
you, Kate!” He was standing over her, shaking violently, and one hand kept plucking at the pistol under his belt. “I came home hours ago, and I walked out to the harbor. I saw your buggy, and his, and I waited in the woods.”

She wiped the trickle of blood from her mouth, tried to think. “It was just a . . . visit,” she said desperately. “I wanted to see the ship, and—”

“With all the crew in town? I saw them too. You were alone with him on the ship, Kate. You let him have you! I know you did, you let him crawl between your legs and—”

“Stop it!” she cried. “I’m not your wife!
I’m not Kate!
”

He was beyond hearing.

“I knew all along,” he muttered. “I saw that night at Lettia’s party. I saw you look at him. With your eyes wide and your lips parted, looking at your lover as if he could have taken you right there in front of us all. But you told me it wasn’t true, goddamn you! You lied to me!”

“No!”

He giggled suddenly, his wet lips twisting obscenely. “I got him though. I got him back for looking at you like he did, like you belonged to him.”

Catherine caught her breath on a jolt of fear. “What did you do?” she whispered.

“I killed his horse.” Lucas snickered softly, eyes bright and hard with remembered enjoyment. “That pretty chestnut of his. I pushed it over the cliff behind his fancy house. That’s where I caught that chill, you know. Beating Tyrone’s horse until it went over the cliff.”

She almost retched. “Oh, God.”

“But it didn’t stop him. It didn’t stop you from going to him, did it, my sweet Kate?”

“Stop. Please stop.” It had never gone this far before, had never lasted this long or been so violent. And he had never before armed himself. Her frightened eyes flickered to the gun he was plucking at, gently toying with. It was loaded, she knew. She swallowed hard. “Please.”

“It didn’t stop you.” He was staring down at her, and his voice was bewildered. “I thought it would, but it didn’t. You just kept smiling and lying, and going to him like a bitch in heat!” His voice began rising again, shaking. “How long, Kate? How long has it been going on?”

“Don’t.”

“Months?
Years?
”

“You have to calm yourself, please!” But she knew it wasn't any use, knew that this time he was beyond her reach.

“Do you know where I went after I left the harbor, my darling Kate? I went looking for your secret meeting place. I knew there had to be one, and nearby. I knew you’d gone to him on those so-innocent little walks of yours.”

Catherine flinched from the thick disgust in his voice, and swallowed the wild protests that were trying to choke her.

“I saw it, Kate!” His glazed eyes were hot, feral. “Your pretty little lovers’ cottage in the woods. I saw the bed, smelled the lust— Oh, Christ, how could you, Kate? How could you let him have you, let him take you like some street-corner whore?”

“No!”

“Admit it!” His voice shook frenziedly, and his hand suddenly gripped the butt of the pistol. “Goddamn you, you lying, cheating, heartless bitch—
admit it!
”

Instinctively, trying to stem the tide of his fury, Catherine accepted the role of erring wife. Anything, she thought desperately, to stop this here and now. Anything to save Marc. “All right,” she said unsteadily.

“I admit it. But it won’t happen again, I promise you.”

He went very still. But he didn't let go of the pistol. “You’ve promised before, Kate,” he said almost sadly.

“I—this time I mean it. I do.” She took a deep breath. “We can . . . we can go away. Leave the island. We can go somewhere new. We can start over.”

“You’ll just do it again. Just find another lover. Another bastard like Tyrone to warm your bed.” “No. I swear I won’t.”

“You'll leave him? Come away with me?”

“Yes.”
Anything to save Marc.

His bright, hot eyes narrowed, and then he laughed bitterly, a terrible sound. “No, you won’t.”

“I swear!”

“Lying bitch.” He was muttering now, and his eyes had moved restlessly away from her face. “I’ll have to get him. I will. I’ll get the bastard.”

“No!” Catherine pushed herself up from the floor, ignoring the screaming pain in her side, conscious of nothing except the overwhelming need to stop him. She tried to grab his arm, throwing all her weight against him.

But he threw her off as if she weighed nothing, slamming her back against the desk with an ease that was terrifying. He waved the pistol in the air, laughing softly, grinning at her. “I’ll get him. I’ll get him this time, Kate.”