Mine Till Midnight

  His mouth broke from hers, exploring her shoulders and chest with hot open kisses, as if he were intent on tasting every part of her. He caressed her stomach with the backs of his fingers, teased his thumb around the rim of her navel … his hands clever and sublimely gentle. He had not entered her yet, but she already felt him at the center of her, the pulse, the pleasure. You inside me … She reached for him blindly, her limbs folding around him.

  He resisted with a silken laugh, playing, stretching her limbs out and spreading her wide beneath him. His mouth dragged over her, sucking and teasing, and between her thighs she went absolutely wet. He touched her with his tongue, delving with the tip until he found the sensitive place that throbbed so exquisitely. The muscles in his arms bulged as he slid them beneath her legs, making a cradle of her hips. She struggled a little, not in protest but supplication, shivering with each swirl and glide of his tongue.

  Dazed and aching, she felt herself lifted in the darkness, his hands arranging her, closing on her legs. He made her kneel over him, pulling her hips down, pushing them back and forth in a gentle rhythm. His mouth was on her again, and she groaned helplessly as she was rubbed repeatedly across the heat and wetness and the tender flicking tongue. His teasing fingers slid inside her, and she began to pant with ecstasy, sensation wrapping around on itself—

  A knock at the door shattered the voluptuous quiet.

  “Oh, God,” Amelia whispered, freezing.

  The knock repeated, more urgent this time, along with Poppy’s muffled voice.

  Cam took his mouth from her, his fingers slowly withdrawing from her clenching flesh.

  “Poppy,” Amelia called out weakly, “can’t it wait?”

  “No.”

  Amelia clambered off Cam, her nerves throbbing viciously at the abrupt halt to their lovemaking. Cam rolled to his stomach and uttered a soft curse, his fingers digging into the bedclothes.

  Lurching around the room as if she were on the deck of a tossing ship, Amelia managed to find her robe. She pulled it on and fastened a few random buttons down the front.

  She went to the door and opened it a mere two inches. “What is it, Poppy? It’s the middle of the night.”

  “I know,” Poppy said anxiously, finding it difficult to meet her gaze. “I wouldn’t have—it’s just—I didn’t know what to do. I had a bad dream. A terrible nightmare about Leo, and it seemed so real. I couldn’t go back to sleep until I made certain he was all right. So I went to his room, and … he’s gone.”

  Amelia shook her head in exasperation. “Bother Leo. We’ll look for him in the morning. I don’t think any of us should go chasing after him tonight in the dark and cold. He probably went to the village tavern, in which case—”

  “I found this in his room.” Poppy held out a slip of paper to her.

  Frowning, Amelia read the note.

  I’m sorry.

  I don’t expect you to understand.

  You’ll be better off this way.

  There were another few words, scratched out.

  I hope someday

  And at the bottom, once again,

  I’m sorry.

  There was no signature. No need for one.

  Amelia was surprised by how calm her own voice sounded. “Go to bed, Poppy.”

  “But his note—I think it means—”

  “I know what it means. Go to bed, dear. Everything will be all right.”

  “Are you going to find him?”

  “Yes, I’ll find him.”

  Amelia’s artificial composure vanished the moment the door closed. Cam was already yanking on his clothes, tugging his boots on, while Amelia lit the bedside lamp. She gave the note to him with trembling fingers. “It’s not an empty gesture.” She found it hard to breathe. “He means to do it. He may have already—”

  “Where is he most likely to go?” Cam interrupted. “Somewhere on the estate?”

  Amelia thought of Laura’s spectral face in the window. “He’s at Ramsay House,” she said through chattering teeth. “Take me there. Please.”

  “Of course. But first you may want to put on some clothes.” Cam gave her a reassuring smile, stroking the side of her face with his hand. “I’ll help you.”

  “Any man,” she muttered, “who wanted to marry into the Hathaway family after this should be shut away in an institution.”

  “Marriage is an institution,” he said reasonably, retrieving her gown from the floor.

  * * *

  They rode to Ramsay House on Cam’s horse, whose long-stretching canter covered ground at near-frightening speed. It all seemed part of another nightmare, the rushing darkness and gnawing cold, the feeling of hurtling forward beyond her control. But there was Cam’s steadfast form at her back, one arm locking her securely in place. She feared what they would find at Ramsay House. If the worst had already happened, she would have to accept it. But she was not alone. She was with the man who seemed to understand the very warp and weft of her soul.

  As they approached the house, they saw a horse grazing disconsolately over patches of grass and gorse. It was a welcome sight. Leo was here, and they wouldn’t have to go scouring through Hampshire to find him.

  Helping Amelia to the ground, Cam took her hand in his. She held back, however, as he tried to pull her toward the front door. “Perhaps,” she said tentatively, “you should wait here while I—”

  “Not a chance in hell.”

  “He may be more responsive if I approach him by myself, just at first—”

  “He’s not in his right mind. You’re not going to face him without me.”

  “He’s my brother.”

  “And you’re my romni.”

  “What is that?”

  “I’ll explain later.” Cam stole a quick kiss and slid his arm around her, guiding her into the house. It was as still as a mausoleum, the chilled air scented of smoke and dust. Exploring the first floor silently, they found no sign of Leo. It was difficult to see in the darkness, but Cam made his way from room to room with the sureness of a cat.

  There came a sound from overhead, the squeak of shifting floorboards. Amelia felt a quake of nervousness, and at the same time, relief. She hastened toward the stairs. Cam checked her, his hand tightening on her arm. Understanding that he wanted her to go slowly, she forced herself to relax.

  They went to the staircase, Cam leading the way, testing each step before allowing Amelia to follow him. Accumulated grit scraped beneath their quiet feet. As they ascended, the air turned colder, and colder still, driving needles into her bones. It was an unholy chill, too bitter and ghastly to have come from a temporal source. A coldness that dried her lips and made her teeth ache. Her hand tightened inside Cam’s, and she kept as close to him as possible without tripping him.

  A feeble frosted glow came from a room near the end of an upstairs hallway. Amelia made a sound of distress as she realized where the lamplight was coming from.

  “The bee room.”

  “Bees don’t fly at night,” Cam murmured, his hand coming to the back of her neck, sliding across her nape. “But if you’d rather wait here—”

  “No.” Summoning her courage, Amelia squared her shoulders and went with him down the hall. How like Leo, perverse wretch that he was, to hole up in a place that scared her witless.

  They paused at the open doorway, Cam partially blocking Amelia from view.

  Peering around his shoulder, she gasped.

  It was not Leo, but Christopher Frost, his lean form gilded in lamplight as he stood before an open panel in the wall that contained the bee colony. The bees were subdued but far from quiet, millions of wings beating in a thick, ominous hum. The stench of exposed wood decay and fermented honey hung thick in the air. Shadows pooled on the floor like spilled ink, while the lamplight twisted and writhed at Christopher’s feet.

  At the swift intake of Amelia’s breath, he swiveled and pulled something from his pocket. A pistol.

  The three of them froze in a dark tableau, whi
le a sting of shock ran over Amelia’s skin.

  “Christopher,” she said in bewilderment. “What are you doing here?”

  “Get back,” Cam said harshly, trying to shove her behind him. But since she was no more eager to have Cam in front of the pistol than herself, she ducked beneath his arm and came up beside him.

  “You’ve come for it, too, I see.” Christopher sounded astonishingly calm, his gaze flicking to Cam’s face and then Amelia’s. The pistol was steady in his hand. He did not lower it.

  “Come for what?” Bewildered, Amelia stared at the gaping hole in the wall, a rectangular space at least five feet tall. “Why have you made that opening in the wall?”

  “It’s a sliding panel,” Cam said tersely, not taking his gaze from Christopher. “Made to conceal a hiding place.”

  Wondering why they both seemed to know something about Ramsay House that she didn’t, Amelia asked blankly, “A hiding place for what?”

  “It was designed long ago,” Christopher replied, “as a place for persecuted Catholic priests to conceal themselves.”

  Her bewildered mind tried to make sense of things. She had read about such places. Long ago Roman Catholics had been hunted and executed by law in England. Some of them had escaped by hiding in the homes of Catholic sympathizers. She had never suspected, however, that such a place had been incorporated in Ramsay House.

  “How did you know about…” Finding it difficult to speak, she gestured stiffly to the cavity in the wall.

  “It was referenced in the private journals of the architect, William Bissel. The notes are now in the possession of Rowland Temple.”

  And now, Amelia thought, after two centuries, this hiding place had been revealed … with a colony of bees in residence. “Why did Mr. Temple tell you about it? What are you hoping to find?”

  Christopher glanced at her with amused contempt. “Are you pretending ignorance, or do you really have no idea?”

  “I can guess,” Cam said. “It probably has something to do with a bit of local lore concerning hidden treasure at Ramsay House.” He shrugged a little at their curious glances. “Westcliff mentioned it once in passing.”

  “Treasure? Here?” Amelia scowled in disgruntlement. “Why has no one mentioned it to me before?”

  “It’s nothing but unfounded rumor. And the origins of the supposed treasure aren’t usually mentioned in polite company.” Cam sent Christopher a cold glance. “Put the gun away. We’ve no intention of interfering.”

  “Yes we do!” Amelia said irritably. “If there is some kind of treasure at Ramsay House, it belongs to Leo. And why are the origins of it so unmentionable?”

  Frost answered, the gun still trained on Cam. “Because it consists of tokens and jewels given by King James to his lover back in the sixteenth century. Someone in the Ramsay family.”

  “The king had an affair with Lady Ramsay?”

  “With Lord Ramsay, actually.”

  Amelia’s jaw slackened. “Oh.” She frowned and rubbed her frozen arms through her sleeves in a futile effort to warm them. “So you think this treasure is here in one of Bissel’s hiding places. And all this time you’ve been trying to find it. Your offer of friendship—your regret for having abandoned me—that was all a sham! For the sake of some wild-goose chase.”

  “It wasn’t all a sham.” Christopher gave her a scornful, vaguely pitying glance. “My interest in renewing our relationship was genuine, until I realized you had taken up with a Gypsy. I don’t accept soiled goods.”

  Infuriated, Amelia started for him with her fingers curled into claws. “You aren’t fit to lick his boots!” she cried, struggling as Cam hauled her backward.

  “Don’t,” Cam muttered, his hands like iron clamps on her body. “It’s not worth it. Calm yourself.”

  Amelia subsided, glaring at Christopher, while increasing cold chills rippled through the air. “Even if the treasure were here, you wouldn’t be able to retrieve it,” she snapped. “The wall is filled with a hive containing at least two hundred thousand bees.”

  “That’s where your arrival turns fortuitous.” The pistol was trained directly at her chest. He spoke to Cam. “You’re going to get it for me … or I’ll put a bullet in her.”

  “Don’t you dare,” Amelia said to Cam, gripping one of his arms in both of hers. “He’s bluffing.”

  “Are you going to risk her life on the possibility, Rohan?” Christopher inquired almost diffidently.

  Amelia struggled to hold on to Cam as he disengaged his arm from her grasp. “Don’t do it!”

  “Easy, monisha.” Cam gripped her shoulders and gave her a little shake. “Hush. You’re not helping.” He looked at Christopher. “Let her leave,” he said evenly. “I’ll do whatever you ask.”

  Christopher shook his head. “Her presence provides an excellent incentive for you to cooperate.” He gestured with the pistol. “Get over there and start looking.”

  “You’ve gone mad,” Amelia said. “Hidden treasure and pistols and skulking about at midn—” She stopped as she saw a shimmer of movement, of silvery whiteness, in the air. A rush of biting cold swept through the room, while the shadows congealed around them.

  Christopher seemed not to notice the abrupt drop in temperature, or the dance of translucent paleness between them. “Now, Rohan.”

  “Cam—”

  “Hush.” He touched the side of Amelia’s face and gave her an unfathomable glance.

  “But the bees—”

  “It’s all right.” Cam went to pick up the lamp from the floor. Carrying it to the open panel, he held it inside the hollow space and leaned in. Bees began to settle and crawl over his arm, shoulders, and head. Staring at him fixedly, Amelia saw his arm twitch, and she realized he’d been stung. Panic tightened around her lungs, making her breathing quick and shallow.

  Cam’s voice was muffled. “There’s nothing except bees and honeycomb.”

  “There has to be,” Christopher snapped. “Go in there and find it.”

  “He can’t,” Amelia cried in outrage. “He’ll be stung to death.”

  He aimed the pistol directly at her. “Go,” Christopher commanded Cam.

  Bees were showering onto Cam, crawling over his shining black hair and face and the back of his neck. Watching him, Amelia felt as if she were trapped in a waking nightmare.

  “Nothing’s here,” Cam said, sounding astonishingly calm.

  Now Christopher seemed to take a vicious satisfaction in the situation. “You’ve hardly looked. Go inside and don’t come out without it.”

  Tears sprang to Amelia’s eyes. “You’re a monster,” she said furiously. “There’s nothing in there, and you know it.”

  “Look at you,” he said, sneering, “weeping over your Gypsy lover. How low you’ve fallen.”

  Before she could respond, a blue-white burst of light filled the room in a noiseless strike. The lamp flame was extinguished in a freezing blast. Amelia blinked and rubbed the moisture from her eyes, and turned in a bewildered circle as she tried to find the source of the light. Something shimmered all around them, coldness and brilliance and raw energy. She stumbled toward Cam with her arms outstretched. The bees lifted in a mass and flew back to the hive, the blue light causing their wings to glitter like a rain of sparks.

  Amelia reached Cam, and he caught her in a warm, hard grip. “Are you hurt?” she asked, her hands frantically searching him.

  “No, just a sting or two. I—” He broke off with a sharp inhalation.

  Twisting in his arms, Amelia followed his gaze. Two hazy forms, distorted in the broken light, struggled for possession of the gun. Who was it? Who else had come into the room? Not a heartbeat had passed before Cam had shoved her to the floor. “Stay down.” Without pausing, he launched himself toward the combatants.

  But they had already broken apart, one man tumbling to the floor with the pistol in his grip, the other running for the door. Cam went for the fallen man, while the air crackled as if the room were filled wi
th burning Catherine wheels. The other man fled. And the door slammed shut behind him … although no one had touched it.

  Dazed, Amelia sat up, while the fractured light dissolved into a faint blue radiance that clung to the outlines of the men nearby. “Cam?” she asked uncertainly.

  His voice was low and shaken. “It’s all right, hummingbird. Come here.”

  She reached them and gasped as she saw the intruder’s face. “Leo. What are you—how did you—” Her voice faltered at the sight of the pistol in his hand. He held it loosely against his thigh. His face was calm, his mouth curved with a faint wry smile.

  “I was going to ask you the same thing,” Leo said mildly. “What the devil are you doing here?”

  Amelia sank to the floor beside Cam, her gaze remaining on her brother. “Poppy found your note,” she said breathlessly. “We came here because we thought you were going to … to do yourself in.”

  “That was the general idea,” Leo said. “But I went to the tavern for a drink on the way. And when I finally got here, it was a bit crowded for my taste. Suicide is something a fellow likes a bit of privacy for.”

  Amelia was unnerved by his tranquil manner. Her gaze fell to the pistol in his hand, then returned to his face. Her hand crept to Cam’s tense thigh. The ghost was with them, she thought. The air had turned her face numb, making it difficult to move her lips. “Mr. Frost was treasure-hunting,” she told her brother.

  Leo gave her a skeptical glance. “A treasure, in this rubbish pile?”

  “Well, you see, Mr. Frost thought—”

  “No, don’t bother. I’m afraid I can’t summon any interest in what Frost thought. The idiot.” He looked down at the pistol, his thumb gently grazing the barrel.

  Amelia wouldn’t have expected a man contemplating suicide to appear so relaxed. A ruined man in a ruined house. Every line of his body spoke of weary resignation. He looked at Cam. “You need to take her out of here,” he said quietly.

  “Leo—” Amelia had begun to tremble, knowing that if they left him here, he would kill himself. She could think of nothing to say, at least nothing that wouldn’t sound theatrical, unconvincing, absurd.