Part 18 (1/2)
”What are you doing?” he whispered, sitting up.
Her head might have turned toward him, but he could not be sure.
”I heard noises outside.”
”What do you see?”
The curtain closed. ”Three riders. One went inside briefly, I a.s.sume to wake the innkeeper. Then they continued on.”
s.h.i.+vering, Simon threw off the covers and moved to the grate. ”I doubt anyone would go to such trouble for directions at this time of night.”
”My thoughts exactly.”
”Could you hear them? Were they French?”
There was a brief flare of light as she lit a match; then the wick of a single taper took over the illumination. ”I think they were English.”
He frowned into the flickering fire. ”Perhaps I should wake Maria.”
”No need. They rode forward, not backward. Whatever they are looking for, it has yet to be found.”
As heat began to radiate outward from the grate, Simon stood and faced Lysette. She looked tired, and a crease marred the side of her lovely face. She wore her cloak over her chemise and clutched it to her chest with white-knuckled fingers.
He gestured toward the bed. ”Fine. Let's go back to sleep. I am still sore from that blasted carriage and could use a bit more time on my back instead of my a.r.s.e.”
Lysette nodded wearily and sank into the chair she had been reading in earlier. ”Bonne nuit.”
”b.l.o.o.d.y h.e.l.l.” Scowling, he asked, ”Did you fall asleep there?”
She blinked up at him. ”Oui.”
”On purpose?”
”Oui.”
Simon ran a hand through his hair and prayed for patience. ”I do not bite or snore or drool. I mean no offense when I say that I have no interest in tumbling you. The bed is perfectly safe.”
”The bed may be,” she said, watching him impa.s.sively, ”but I have some doubts as to whether you are.”
He opened his mouth to argue, then threw up his hands. ”Bah! Rot in the chair, then.”
Freezing, he hurried back to the bed and crawled between now-cooled linens. Curling into a ball, he prayed the warmth of the renewed fire would reach the bed soon.
”Curse you,” he grumbled, glaring down the length of the bed at her. ”I t would be much warmer if there were two of us in here.”
”You have more reason to want me dead than alive,” she pointed out in a far too reasonable tone.”At this moment, truer words were never spoken,” he snapped. ”The only reason I am not strangling you is because killing you would rob me of your body heat!”
Her pretty lips thinned primly.
”This is ridiculous, Lysette.” He sat up, too frustrated to even attempt sleep. The impracticality of sleeping in the cramped wing chair after a long day of travel was so out of character for her. She was faultlessly practical, as was everyone who lived by their wits. ”Why would I kill you now, when I have not before?”
She shrugged, but the way her gaze darted nervously belied the careless gesture.
Heaving out a long-suffering sigh, Simon once again tossed back the covers and stalked toward her. When she wielded a knife from between the edges of her cloak, he was not surprised.
”Put that away.”
”Stay back.”
”I am not attracted to you,” he reiterated slowly. ”And even if I was, I have no need to force myself on an unwilling woman.”
Lysette frowned suspiciously. ”I am fine in the chair.”
”Liar. You look exhausted, and I cannot afford to drag you along while I attempt to clear Mitch.e.l.l's name. You must carry your own weight.”
She bristled at that. ”I will not be a burden.”
”d.a.m.ned if you won't after a night spent sleepless and frozen. You will become ill and useless.”
Pus.h.i.+ng to her feet, she said, ”I can take care of myself. Go back to bed and leave me in peace!”
Simon opened his mouth to argue further, then shook his head instead. He once again climbed between the sheets and turned his back toward the other side of the bed. A few moments later, the taper was extinguished. Shortly afterward he heard delicate snoring.
Faced with a deepening puzzle, Simon lay awake for some time.
Amelia studied the masked man in repose beside her and wondered how deeply he slept.
”We will wait until the sunrise to remove it,” Montoya had said earlier.
”Why not now?” she countered, desperate to see beneath the now intrusive barrier. Her heart was smitten and her body no longer innocent.
But what they shared could be no more than infatuation-it could not be love-if she did not see all sides of him.
”I want nothing to mar this evening,” he had explained, withdrawing from her body and moving to the washstand behind the screen in the corner. He'd returned with a damp cloth and washed between her thighs, then cleansed himself before joining her in the bed. ”In the morning, I will bare myself to you, strengthened by the memories of a blissful, perfect night in your arms.”
In the end, she had reluctantly agreed, unwilling to be at odds with him over the matter of a few hours.
With his back to the headboard and her body curved to his side, he had asked her to share a beloved memory from her past. She had chosen a tale about Colin, relating how she had conquered her fear of heights by climbing a tree during a game of hide-and-seek.
”He pa.s.sed below me several times,” she said, her cheek resting over Montoya's heart. ”I half hoped he would find me quickly, because it was frightening clinging to that limb, but the desire to surprise him was too great to give myself away.”
His hand caressed up and down the length of her back. ”You wanted to win,” he corrected, laughing that low, deep laugh she had adored from the moment she heard it.
”That, too.” She smiled. ”When he finally forfeited, I was so pleased with myself. Colin spent his allowance on a new ribbon to mark the conquering of that fear.”
Montoya sighed. ”He must have loved you a great deal.”
”I think he did, although he never told me. I would have given anything to hear those words from him.” Her fingers sifted through the hair on his chest.