Jane the mouse, her sister had always called her.
Jane inched closer to Astrid as a man wearing a toga slid past, using his proximity to trail his pudgy fingers down the length of her bare arm. Shivering, she tucked her arm close to her side.
“This has nothing to do with fear and everything to do with good sense.”
“Hmm,” Astrid offered in reply. Jane was uncertain, but the sound may have been in approval of the tea cake she chewed.
Jane propped a hand on her hip and glared at Astrid. “Don’t you find this all a little”—she groped for the right word—”unnerving?”
“Unnerving?” Astrid angled her head as if in heavy contemplation. Her dark eyes scanned the crowded ballroom before looking back to Jane. “Is that not a convoluted way of saying frightened?” Shrugging, she took another bite.
“Semantics,” Jane snapped, searching again among the throng for a glimpse of Lucy’s strawberry blond hair, convinced that talking to her wouldn’t be half so vexing.
Her gaze skipped over faces. Then she saw… something, someone, a profile of a man— a ghost.
Her heart jerked, a painful leap in her chest at the achingly familiar fall of brown hair over a wide brow. Dancers whirled in her line of vision. Gasping, she craned her head, leaned to the side, and tried to catch another glimpse. But he was gone. A name whispered through her head like the flutter of a breeze.
Shaking her head, she shoved the whisper from her head and resumed her search for Lucy, at last spotting her. The Viking trailed his hand down the arch of her neck, catching the fiery curl draped over her shoulder and bringing it to his nose. Even across the ballroom, Lucy’s cringe was visible.
Jane felt a pang of guilt knowing that tonight’s escapade was for _her _ benefit, so that she could experience a bit of freedom. And her friend endured that jackanape’s paws all over her.
“Good heavens,” she declared. “Enough is enough. We’re leaving.”
Turning, she set her glass of punch on a nearby table with a decisive thud. Standing on her tiptoes, she craned her neck to signal Lucy.
“Hello, my dears.”
Jane swung around and her heart shuddered to a painful stop.
The blood ran cold in her veins. Her mouth went slack as she stared into familiar features—thin lips set in a face bloated and fatigued from a lifetime of overimbibing. Had her thoughts somehow conjured this devil before her?
At his club, indeed. The wretch.
Astrid sputtered on her drink and reached for Jane’s arm.
“You all right there?” Desmond asked, patting Astrid’s back.
Nodding, Astrid pressed the back of her hand to her mouth, the fingers of her other hand tightening about Jane’s arm. Her eyes, wide and shocked in her cream-colored domino, collided with Jane’s.
Ever so slowly, Jane inched back a step, then another.
Astrid, as though sensing her intent, released her arm.
“Where are you off to, my dear?” Desmond snatched her hand before she could disappear in the crowd and shoved his face alarmingly close to hers. “Something dashed familiar about you.” His fingers stroked the inside of her arm in small circles. “Have we met?”
“No,” she rasped, heart thundering against her ribs.
His thin lips stretched into a leer. “Must be my heart recognizing its own match, then.”
Jane swallowed the bile that rose in her throat. “F—forgive me, but I was just leaving,” she managed to get out, relieved at the strangled, unfamiliar sound of her voice.
“You can’t leave without first granting me a dance,” he insisted, tucking her against his side.
She opened her mouth to object, and then closed it with a snap, too fearful that he would identify her voice. Stiff and silent, she allowed him to pull her onto the dance floor, trying to shrink into herself and make herself small, unrecognizable.
Through whirling figures, she caught a glimpse of Astrid’s dismayed gaze. Lucy soon joined her, and together they watched her with Desmond as though they witnessed some freakish exhibition at a carnival.
Desmond’s hand slid lower, urging her closer. Her stomach churned as he rubbed his cheek against hers, his fetid breath hot and moist in her ear.
“You are certain we have not met before?” her brother-in-law asked.
Did he know? Did he toy with her?
She swallowed hard and fast, heart hammering wildly in her chest, a caged bird desperate for escape.
Her voice emerged, strained and hoarse, thankfully still unrecognizable. “One’s identity is secret at a masquerade.”
“Ah, torment me then,” he said in a pouting voice that reminded her very much of any one of his daughters when they did not get their way.
“I’m sure I’ll work it out.” He maneuvered her more snugly against him, fitting her to him and rocking her against his pelvis, his reed thin legs sliding between hers. She closed her eyes in a long-suffering blink.
The irony of her situation left an acrid taste in her mouth. For over a year, she had managed to stay out of Desmond’s clutches, knowing he saw her as some sort of trophy to be won—his late brother’s wife to be bedded and conquered. And here she found herself, trapped in his arms at a courtesan’s ball. Instead of freedom, she suddenly felt caged.
With surprising nimbleness for a man who spent most of his time at cards and drinking, Desmond swept her from the dance floor and down a long corridor. Her feet slid over the slick marble, unable to gain purchase as he dragged her. She tried to peel his fingers from her wrist, but they clung like a creeping vine.
Her voice squeaked with indignation. “What are you—”
He pushed her against a wall, the bulge of his belly crushing her, his skinny knee shoving between her thighs through the many folds of her skirts.
His fingers traced her lips and the stink of fish and onions wafted to her nose. With a cringe, she recalled his penchant for using his hands while eating.
His touch changed, became urgent, fierce. He pinched her mouth, silencing her save for her hiss of pain.
“Enough. No more maidenly protests. Only one kind of woman would come here. I’m not going to do anything that hasn’t already been done to you.” His lips twisted into a semblance of a grin.
“Only I’ll likely do it better.”
Releasing her face, he grasped her wrists and forced them over her head, thrusting his h*ps against hers in an emulation of sex.
Tugging fiercely on her hands, she bit out, “Why don’t you release me and find someone who appreciates your efforts?”
His features twisted. “You’ve quite the mouth on you. Perhaps I’ll put it to better use.”
His hands tightened on her wrists until her hands grew numb and bloodless. She whimpered as he lowered his mouth to hers. Panic rose, swirling hotly in her blood.
Recognizing that her protests weren’t getting her anywhere, she decided to try another course.
However much it turned her stomach.
Meekly, she submitted to his kiss, suffering his fishy tongue in her mouth, allowing him to think he had won her over. After a moment, she broke free and murmured coyly, “You cannot mean for us to engage in a liaison here in the corridor?”
With a slow satisfied smile, he dragged her down the corridor. “I know a room.”
“Why not fetch us drinks?” she coaxed. “A bit of cheese? Fruit?”
He paused, blinking small, feral eyes at her.
“I find”—he swallowed to stop herself from choking on the words—”love play makes me famished.” Forcing her voice into a low, seductive pitch, she tempted him further. “And nothing loosens my inhibitions more than spirits.”
He stared at her lips for a long moment before blurting, “Rum punch, then?”
“Yes,” she agreed, nodding hastily, so relieved that she had convinced him to leave. “I’ll wait right here.”
With an obliging dip of his head, and one final lascivious look, he spun on his heels.
She was on the verge of moving when he spun back around.
“Don’t move from that spot,” he admonished. “I shall be watching to see if you return to the ballroom.”
Then he was gone, swallowed up by the throng of revelers edging the mouth of the corridor.
She had only a moment. Not enough time to plan a solid escape. With his warning ringing in her ears, she darted into the nearest room as if the soles of her slippers were afire, hoping to find a way out through a terrace door.
Once within the room, she shut the door and leaned against it, inhaling deeply as she attempted to still the wild beating of her heart. The door’s firm length at her back—a much-needed barrier to Desmond and the revelry beyond—offered some measure of solace, but she knew she couldn’t tarry.
It took a moment for her eyes to adjust to the room’s gloom. Once they did, it was to behold a scene primed for seduction.
A fire crackled in the hearth, casting entrancing shadows on the plum papered walls. Pillows were scattered about the room on the chaises and sofas. A great lambskin rug lay invitingly before the hearth. The brilliant fabrics gleamed enticingly in the firelight, the colors more vibrant than anything that decorated her home. Home. For all the years she had lived at the Guthrie townhouse, she had never felt she belonged, had never felt permitted to make her own mark.
Shaking off her thoughts, she looked to the far wall—and her heart plummeted. There was no terrace door. A single large window looked out at the dark night.
Hurrying forward she fumbled with the latch, only to find it wouldn’t budge. With a small cry, she slapped her palms against the window, pushing against the thick panes of glass as if she could somehow will the night to open to her.
“Blast!” Biting her lip, she considered her options.
If she left the room, she risked running into Desmond. Yet she could not remain here to be discovered. Her gaze landed on a pewter figurine of Lady Godiva riding n**ed atop a stallion with impossibly large genitalia. She glanced back to the window.
Heat flaming her cheeks, she lifted the figurine off the small lacquered table. With a growl of determination, she clenched her fingers around the cold pewter, its weight a solid comfort in her hand. Hauling back her arm, she sucked in a breath, deciding to smash her way to freedom through the window.
A voice stopped her, rumbling over the air and sliding through her to spiral in her belly like an infusion of spiced rum.
“I happen to know that there is a perfectly good door to this room.”
Chapter 4
Whirling around, Jane let the figurine slide through her fingers to thud at her feet. Its heavy fall mimicked the drop of her heart to the soles of her slippers as she gaped at the shadow of the man who shared her sanctuary.
She opened her mouth to tell the stranger exactly what she thought of men who lurked in dark corners and announced themselves in a manner that only produced terror in unsuspecting ladies.
But the words died on her lips as he unfolded his great length from a chair tucked in the room’s corner and stepped from the shadows. Her gaze narrowed on his face.
The face of a ghost.
Her hand flew to her mouth, doing a poor job of stifling her gasp. Nerves taut as a harpsichord string, she stared. Not a ghost. A man.
He wore no domino, had donned no disguise. A white scar, stark and livid on his swarthy skin, slashed the left side of his face, cleaving his top lip and disappearing into his mouth.
Even disfigured, his was a face she would never forget.
Her lips moved, but no sound emerged. She watched, horrified—elated—as he advanced on her with slow, measured steps. An invisible hand squeezed her heart at the sight of a face that had once been too beautiful for mortal man, a face left to the realm of poets and dreams. A face her memory had refused to release.
She stared at this new face of his. Scarred, hard-edged, unsmiling. A tremble snaked over her.