A strange kind of peace flowed through her as she lay there with Dominic, and at first
she was confused. What
was
that feeling? She had never known such a moment of warmth and contentment, as if
that was exactly where she was meant to be. The restlessness that always seemed to
drive her onward was gone. She felt him press a soft kiss against her skin, and she
smiled.
But that rare, shimmering moment was suddenly shattered when there was a burst of
loud laughter outside their
rickety sanctuary. Dominic sat up, his whole body tense as he looked toward the door.
Sophia heard the patter of footsteps running over grass, a shriek as someone was caught
in the game that she had forgotten. An inexplicable sadness came over her as she felt
her time with Dominic dissolve around her like a bubble. She pushed herself to her
feet and straightened her rumpled gown as she turned her back to him.
She heard the rustle of cloth as he pulled on his discarded clothes. His booted footsteps
sounded on the wooden floor behind her, and she closed her eyes as he moved close
to her. She knew she should leave and slip back into the party, but a part of her
wanted only to cling to this moment. She felt his hands brush lightly over her shoulders,
and she pressed back a sob at the touch.
He gently swept the loose hair off her neck and smoothed it back into the combs that
had held her coiffure in place. He didn’t say anything, but his touch was careful
and tender, and Sophia was glad he didn’t say anything. She was afraid she couldn’t
speak, or that she would start crying and embarrass herself in front of him. He was
the last person she wanted to see any weakness.
“I should go,” she said.
She felt him nod. He pressed one light, fleeting kiss to the nape of her neck and
let her go. Without looking back, she tiptoed to the door and peeked out at the sun-washed
meadow. For an instant, the light dazzled her eyes, but she could hear the laughter
and shrieks.
“Sophia…” Dominic said. She held up her hand, still afraid she might shatter if he
apologized now.
He said nothing else, and she slipped out of the hut, letting the door squeak closed
behind her. She saw a group
just at the top of the hill, the women running as the men chased them, a flock of
bright butterflies in the sunshine. She made her way toward them to slip into their
midst, but part of her desperately wanted to run back to Dominic and that one fleeting
moment of peace she had found in his arms.
T
he smell of sweat and blood hung thick and choking in the humid air. Dominic could
hear the rabid shouts and cries, the howls of derision and encouragement, but it all
seemed very far away. All he could see were his opponent’s eyes, dark and feral beyond
the pall of smoke that hung between them. All he could feel was the rush of pure exhilaration
through his veins, bringing the pulse of raw, real life.
That feeling of being alive had been hard to find lately, no matter where he looked
for it. Onstage, in women’s beds, in alcohol—all the places that once gave him pleasure
held no spark for him now, and hadn’t for a long time. Only here, with the noise and
the blood, the pain, could he almost grasp it again.
Here—and when he was with Sophia. When he touched her, smelled her perfume, had sex
with her, it was like life again. Pain and pleasure mingled until he couldn’t tell
one from the other. He only knew he wanted her, needed her, in a way he never had
anything else before.
And he hated that feeling. He couldn’t want a Huntington, not after a lifetime spent
hating them. He couldn’t let tender emotions take over his life, not with Sophia.
So he had come here, to this dingy, dark basement under a cheap gin-joint in Pigalle.
Here there were no rules, no veneer of civilization, only pure instinct. Only pain
that made him feel alive again for a moment.
Dominic slowly circled his opponent, his fists up as he studied the man’s every movement,
every flicker in his eyes. So far the man was something of a disappointment. He was
a huge, hulking bargeman off the Seine, far outweighing Dominic, and from what Dominic
had heard, he had something of a reputation on the Paris fight circuit. Dominic had
looked forward to taking him on, but the man had no strategy, no speed or grace. None
of the challenge that would offer a real escape.
The man gave a great roar and ran headlong at Dominic. For an instant, Dominic was
caught off-guard and staggered back, but he regained his lithe footwork and let loose
with a punishing flurry of blows. His opponent could not keep up, and at last he went
reeling and fell to the floor amid a roar of derision.
Dominic stared down at his fallen opponent. A mountain of rock-hard muscle laid flat
and unmoving on the sawdust-covered floor. Such a pity; it had been over much too
quickly.
As the crowd surged around him with a roar, Dominic laughed. Coming here tonight had
been meant to banish something inside him that had been plaguing him ever since he
had sex with Sophia, yet it still lurked there. That dark need that could never be
banished no matter what he did, that had only left him when he was inside her.
He broke free of the tangle of people and spun toward the bar. The barkeep slid a
generous portion of cheap gin in front of him, and Dominic drank it down in one
swallow. The burn of it revived him, but it still couldn’t put out that fire inside
him. He gestured for another.
“Better be careful,” he heard Brendan say. “You’ll ruin that pretty face of yours,
and the ladies won’t chase after you anymore.”
Dominic glanced over at his brother. Brendan lounged on one of the bar stools in his
shirtsleeves, a half-full glass in front of him. He rarely imbibed much in places
like these and never fought, even though he had once had quite a fierce reputation
for it. He just watched, silent and unreadable, as if he waited for something.
In the smoky darkness, Brendan’s scars could hardly be seen. But Dominic knew they
were always there, an outward manifestation of something dark and hidden in his brother’s
soul. Neither of them could ever be content. It was part of what made them St. Claires.
“It hasn’t stopped
your
success with the fair sex,” Dominic said. He gestured with his glass at one of the
barmaids, a buxom blonde in cheap red satin who had been sending Brendan coy smiles
and lingering glances all night.
Brendan shrugged. “I do have other talents. But you won’t if you keep letting yourself
get pounded like that.”
“I’m not the one passed out on the floor.” Dominic gestured for another gin. The numbness
hadn’t come over him yet, but he hoped that soon it would. Maybe then he wouldn’t
keep seeing Sophia’s face in his mind, her eyes closed as her head arched back in
pleasurable abandon.
“Not tonight maybe. But your next opponent may very well be more skilled than that
behemoth. If you were to kill yourself doing these things, the rest of us would never
hear the end of it from our mother. You are her favorite darling.”
Dominic laughed. “No, indeed. That would be James, and it’s a good thing we sent him
home before he got into any more trouble.”
“Paris seems dangerous for impressionable young men,” Brendan said.
And not-so-young men who shouldn’t be impressionable any longer? But Dominic knew
it wasn’t Paris that was making him crazy. It was Sophia Westman.
He tossed back the last of his gin. “I think I might try Madame Brancusi’s tonight,”
he said.
“After what happened with James?”
Dominic shrugged. “They say her girls are beautiful and highly skilled. Perhaps if
I spend enough money there, she will be in a forgiving mood. She is a businesswoman,
after all.”
“Perhaps, if that Lord Hammond isn’t there. I didn’t trust that man.”
And neither had Dominic. The St. Claires were often unscrupulous in their business
dealings, but they did have hearts. Hammond’s eyes had been the coldest Dominic had
ever seen. “He won’t be.”
“Then I’ll go with you,” Brendan said as he reached for the last of his drink.
“You have no need of Madame Brancusi’s girls tonight,” Dominic answered, gesturing
toward the barmaid.
A rare smile flickered over Brendan’s scarred face. “She does have some rather—interesting
attributes. But you don’t seem to be in any fit state to be wandering the streets
of Paris alone.”
“I don’t need a nursemaid, Brendan. Stay, enjoy your barmaid. I will see you at the
theater tomorrow for rehearsal.”
“I don’t trust that look in your eyes.”
“Think I might get into some trouble?” Dominic laughed as he reached for his coat.
“Damn it, I do hope so.”
He left Brendan to his pretty barmaid and made his way up the stairs to the public
rooms above the basement. It was slightly cleaner there, the air free of the thick
tang of blood and sweat, but it was no less noisy. A band played a boisterous polka
as couples galloped across the floor, fueled by the music and the cheap gin. No one
looked twice at his bruised face; it was late and the night’s merriment was reaching
its deafening, drunken crescendo. It was all fun now, but Dominic knew places like
this, and he knew how quickly the laughter could cross over into violence.
He considered staying, but he had had his fill of fistfights for the night. It was
time for other distractions. He ducked past the knot of people blocking the front
doors and made his way out into the street. It was a colorful neighborhood, teeming
with drunken, shrieking people reeling along the walkways together, light spilling
out of windows and doorways, prostitutes beckoning from alleyways. But Dominic turned
at the end of the street and found a quieter, narrower lane, one where people usually
sought more clandestine pleasures. Tonight it was nearly deserted, even more so when
he got near the river.
Suddenly he heard a click on the pavement somewhere behind him. It was a small thing,
a tiny sound that fell in the nighttime quiet like a raindrop in a pond. But he was
still on edge after the fight, and every sound echoed around him.
He kept walking, never breaking his stride, but his
fingers tightened into fists and he smiled. If anyone wanted to rob him tonight, they
had best be ready for a brawl, because he had no intention of going down easy.
As he turned the corner, he glanced in a shop window and caught the ghostly reflection
of a black-clad man several feet behind him. A knife gleamed in the man’s hand. Dominic
suddenly spun around and saw the flicker of surprise on the man’s bearded face just
before Dominic’s fist shot out and caught him on the jaw. He staggered back and crashed
into the wall.
But he recovered quickly, and with a roar, launched himself at Dominic. He was a big
man, bulky with muscles and fat under a rough wool coat, but Dominic was used to fighting
such men, just like his opponent in the gin-joint. They tended to rely on their sheer
size, while years of stage sword fighting and acrobatics had taught Dominic speed
and agility. He ducked out of the way as the man’s meaty fist shot toward him, and
he came back with a blow to his opponent’s midsection.
His blood was still up after the fight in the gin bar, and he knocked his attacker
to the ground. But as he turned to leave, a group of men came running around the corner.
This is not good
, he thought wryly, just as the first man reached him and felled him with a hard blow
to the jaw. More blows rained down as Dominic fell to his knees on the pavement, but
he felt only the first of them as darkness closed around him.
Sophia sat straight up in bed, her heart pounding. For an instant, she was completely
confused, caught halfway
between dreams and waking, and she didn’t know quite where she was. Not in her girlhood
chamber in her father’s house, with its abundance of frills and ruffles; not in one
of the endless shabby hotel rooms she and Jack called home. She was lost.
Then she drew in a deep breath and watched as a ray of fading gaslight from the street
outside fell across the bare wood floor, and she remembered. She was in her little
apartment at La Reine d’Argent, and it must be very late indeed. It felt as if she
had just fallen asleep, exhausted after chasing out the last of the drunken customers
and seeing Camille and Count Danilov off to a late supper, but the night was still
deepest purple-black outside. Not yet near dawn.
What had awakened her? Sophia rubbed her hand over her face and tried to chase away
the last cobwebs of her dreams. Had it been some nightmare? She had thought those
bad dreams would be gone once she was safe, away from men like Lord Hammond and in
charge of her own life. Or had she forgotten something she was supposed to do, something
important?
Or was she just thinking about that day in Montmartre with Dominic yet again? Memories
of it had come back to haunt her in the days since then, usually when she least wanted
them. Least wanted to remember how much she had loved his body over hers; how much
she wanted to see him again. She knew he was still at the Theatre Nationale, but he
hadn’t appeared again at the club.
“Oh, just go back to sleep,” she murmured. She lay back down and rolled onto her side.
Her worries would surely keep until morning.
A sudden pounding noise from downstairs made her sit
up straight again. Someone was at her door, and the cold pit of feeling deep in her
stomach told her it was not good. Only ill could come to the door so late at night,
a lesson she had learned too well in her life with Jack. As a knock echoed again,
Sophia slowly slid out of bed and reached for her dressing gown. As she slid her feet
into her slippers, she opened the drawer of her bedside table and took out the small
pistol Camille had given her.
Holding its reassuring, chilly weight balanced in her hand, she crept down the stairs
and paused to light a lamp on the landing. There wasn’t another knock, and Sophia
half-hoped whoever it was had gone. That it was merely some confused drunk stumbling
past. But somehow she knew that wouldn’t be the case tonight.