Jane Feather - Violet

Julian raised an eyebrow. “I can't believe that,” he drawled. “There are no more secrets, no more illicit little plots percolating in your devious mind? You'll have to forgive me if I find that hard to credit, Violette.”

“Oh, there's one secret,” she said dully. “But only one, and you might as well know it. I love you. I love you so much it hurts. And I'll never love anyone else in the same way.”

Her hands fell to her sides. “There, now,” she said. “That's all of it. I've tricked you, and I've used you. I've lied to you, and I've rearranged your life to suit my own purposes. I forced you to leave Spain, and I'm the illegitimate daughter of a Penhallan and a robber baron. But I love you with my heart and soul, and I'd give my last drop of blood if you ever needed it.”

She stood up. “But of course you won't ever need it, so I'll go now. And you need never fear that our paths will cross again.” Turning from him, she began to walk back across the sand.

“You omitted to mention puking all over my boots in that catalog of wrongs,” Julian said.

Tamsyn stopped. She turned slowly. “I suppose you're entitled to that,” she said. “Entitled to mock. Why should you believe in my love? Anyway, it's a poor thing. I know it can't excuse or make up for what I've done to you.”

“Dear God,” he said. “I'm assuming this extraordinary show of humility was brought on by that drug Penhallan gave you. I trust its effect isn't permanent.”

It was too much! All Tamsyn's sorrow and weakness went up in a puff of smoke. She was not going to walk out of his life a broken reed. Colonel, Lord Julian St. Simon was going to have something else to remember her by. “Oh, you despicable bastard! You are an unmitigated cur!” She swooped down, grabbed a handful of sand, and threw it at him. Darting sideways, she picked up the empty cognac bottle. It flew through the air and caught him a glancing blow on the shoulder, before rolling onto the sand.

“Diablillo! Virago! Termagant!” Julian taunted, grinning as he ducked one of Gabriel's boots.

“Espadachin! Brute! Bully! Unchivalrous pig!” she hurled back, searching for another missile. “You can't even accept an apology gracefully!”

Julian dived for her, bringing her down onto the sand. He felt extraordinary, struck by a blinding epiphany. He'd been reborn in some fashion, his hurt and anger vanished in the mists of incomprehension. It no longer mattered how or why this had all started. What mattered was the now. She loved him. He did believe her, every word of her declaration. He believed it because he knew it was how he felt himself He'd fought the knowledge… he'd been fighting it for weeks… and now he'd lost the battle. She was a lawless, unethical, manipulative, illegitimate half-breed, no possible wife for a St. Simon, and he didn't give a damn.

Scissoring her legs with his own, he pinned her arms above her head, subduing her with his weight. “When did you decide you loved me?”

“Weeks ago,” she said, lying quiet now beneath him, reading the light in his eye, a trickle of incredulous hope beginning to seep into her veins. “But I knew you didn't think you could love me in the same way, although I knew that you did… and I was hoping that when we were together in Spain, maybe you could learn to look into your heart. But I still had to deal with Cedric… it was something I felt I had to do… for Cecile, and for my father. But I gave up my big plan to ruin him publicly, because then you'd have known the whole story, and I thought you'd be unhappy to discover how I'd been deceiving you.”

“Unhappy, eh? You're a mistress of euphemism,” he declared with a wry quirk of his lips. “But maybe you can find a euphemistic explanation for blackmail? Just to enable me to live with it, you understand.”

“It wasn't blackmail, it was restitution.”

“A little better. Keep trying.”

“The diamonds were my mother's,” she said quietly, and finally told him the full story. “It was only justice,” she finished.

“Only justice,” Julian mused, his body still pinning her to the sand. “I suppose I can live with that. A woman with a fine sense of justice, not a blackmailer at all.” He nodded judiciously. “Yes, I think I can live with that.”

“You're very heavy,” Tamsyn said. “I don't want to puke all over you again.”

Julian with a muttered exclamation promptly rolled off her.

“I have to go back to Lanjerrick.” Tamsyn sat up.

“My sense of justice hasn't been appeased… and Cesar is still there.”

Julian got to his feet and pulled her up. “Then let's pay your uncle a visit.”

“You don't have to come with me.”

“Oh, but I do,” he said. “I too have a very fine sense of justice.”

“You don't mind too much that I have Penhallan blood?” she asked hesitantly as they climbed the path to the cliff top.

“Oh, I hardly think so,” he responded with a dry smile. “Your kinship with a murderous viscount is probably the most respectable thing about you.”

Cedric was in the library, cradling a brandy goblet, morosely awaiting the return of his nephews, when there came a violent hammering on the front door. He sat up abruptly, listening to the servant's footsteps on the marble tiles, the sound of the bolts being drawn back on the front door.

Then the library door was flung open, and Julian St. Simon stepped into the room, Celia's daughter behind him.

“The cretins bungled it,” Viscount Penhallan said wearily. “I might have known they would.” He gestured to the decanters on the sideboard. “Help yourself to a drink.”

“I wouldn't risk it in this house,” Tamsyn said tartly. “Oh, there's no fear with the cognac, or the port,” her uncle said, leaning back in his chair, regarding her through narrowed eyes. “Did you kill them?”

“No.” Julian poured himself a glass of cognac. Tamsyn helped herself to an apple from a fruit bowl. “Not all Penhallans are murderers, uncle.” She scrunched into the apple. “Where's my horse?”

“That magnificent beast is in my stables,” he said. “I congratulate you, he's a superb animal.”

“A present from my father,” she said through a mouthful of apple. “I told you Cecile made a good marriage.”

“So you did.” He turned his head against the cushions and let his gaze rest lazily on St. Simon. “So how can I help you, St. Simon?”

“All in good time,” Julian said calmly, leaning back against the sideboard, long legs stretched in front of him, casually crossed at the ankle. He took a critical sip of his cognac.

“I've decided you can keep the diamonds,” Tamsyn said. ''I'm going to do what my father would have wanted and tell the world every last detail of your infamy… including what you tried to do to me. I couldn't do it before because the colonel didn't know the whole story, but now he does…” She paused, catching Julian's raised eyebrows. “You do agree that I must do this, don't you?”

“Who am I to question the baron's wisdom and wishes?”

“If you really don't wish me to… if it will involve you in scandal, then I won't,” she said slowly. “I'll just settle for the diamonds instead. But that would be blackmail, and I know you don't approve of that.”

“Blackmail?” he queried, his eyebrows disappearing into his scalp.

“Restitution. I forgot that was what we're calling it,” she said lamely.

“And a fine sense of justice, if you recall.” “Yes, that too.”

“So you're going to do what your mother threatened to do twenty years ago?” Cedric held out his empty glass toward Julian, who pushed himself away from the sideboard and brought the decanter over to him. Cedric nodded his thanks. “Is that so?”

“Yes.”

Cedric inclined his head and took a deep draft of brandy. “Then if we've concluded our business, perhaps you'd get out of my house.”

“Certainly.” Julian put down his glass and walked to the door. “But just one more thing… a mere formality, but one should observe the proprieties, as I'm sure you'll agree.” His smile was sardonic as he offered his host a small bow. “Since it appears that you're Tamsyn's nearest male relative, however much she might regret that fact, I suppose I must ask your permission to pay my addresses to your niece.”

“So long.as you don't expect me to walk her down the aisle,” Cedric said equably. “You may both go to the devil for all I care.”

“Thank you, sir.” Julian bowed again. “Come, buttercup.” He swept her out of the room ahead of him.

“Do you really wish to marry me?” Tamsyn demanded in a fierce whisper as they crossed the hall.

“Apparently,” he said affably. “Unless it's simply my social conscience that insists I make an honest woman of you… but, then,” he added thoughtfully, “I probably shouldn't set my sights too high.”

“Cur!”

“Brigand!”

Madrid. Christmas 1812

A LIGHT SNOW WAS FALLING, A FINE POWDER SETTLING ON the winding road approaching the city across the plain. The wind sharpened and a gust lifted the carpet of snow, sending it in a rolling drift toward the gates.

The corporal outside the guardhouse shivered and turned up his collar. He stuck his head into the frowsty warmth of the guardroom. “Looks like someone's coming, sir.”

The lieutenant turned from the charcoal brazier where he'd been warming his hands and stepped outside. A small group of horsemen was approaching, white wraithlike figures in the drifting powder.

“Spanish saddles,” the lieutenant said, clapping his hands together. “Looks like the brigadier's lady. I'd know that horse anywhere.”

The four horses surged out of the snow and drew rein at the guard post. Two of the riders were unremarkable, but a third was a giant oak of a man astride a massive, raw-boned stallion. Beside him rode a small figure astride a magnificent milk-white Arabian.

“Good evening, Lieutenant.” The Arabian's rider spoke English in a faintly accented female voice that made the corporal stare.

The lieutenant, however, showed no surprise. “Evening, ma'am. You're just in time for the Christmas ball at the duke's headquarters. Started about an hour ago.”

“Perfect timing.” Tamsyn flashed him a smile. “I hope you're not on duty all evening.”

“I drew the short straw,” he said with a rueful chuckle. “But the lads will bring us some Christmas cheer later.”

“Who was that?” the corporal asked as the four riders rode on into the city.

“The brigadier's lady,” the lieutenant said. “Oh, but of course, you're a Johnny Raw. Only been out here a couple of weeks, I was forgetting.”

He went back into the guardhouse, stamping the snow off his boots. “Lady St. Simon,” he elaborated as the corporal followed him. “She rides with the partisans, acts as liaison between them and the commander. The big chap's her bodyguard, goes by the name of Gabriel. Watch out for him if you catch him in his cups. Mostly he's as gentle as a lamb, but when he's had a few, he's a devil.”

“Brigadier, Lord St. Simon's wife?” the corporal said in astonishment. “A partisan?”

“That's right.” The lieutenant was enjoying the' man's amazement. “Quite the pet of the regiment, she is. Reckon we'll all be glad to see her back.” He chuckled. “She should have reported in four days ago, and the brigadier's been worried sick-makes him a right martinet.”

Brigadier, Lord Julian St. Simon was at this moment trying very hard to be polite to his partner in the quadrille. The ballroom in the large mansion occupied by the Duke of Wellington was hung with greenery wilting in the oppressive heat. The warmth from the fires blazing in massive open hearths at each end of the room was augmented by myriad candles flaring in branched candelabra. The scent of perfume and pomade and ripely overheated flesh was almost overpowering as the officers of the Army of the Peninsular and their ladies forgot the privations of summer campaigning and enjoyed the social pleasures of winter quarters.

Julian, however, was not enjoying himself, despite the fact that his partner was one of the belles of the regiment. The Honorable Miss Beazley, well aware of the reason for her partner's monosyllabic conversation, was understanding and kept up a light flow of undemanding small talk, occasionally reminding the brigadier of a step in the elaborate dance when he became more than ordinarily absentminded.

The clock had just struck nine when the double doors to the ballroom were flung open, letting in a draft of refreshingly cold air from the hall. There was a whirlwind rush of movement as a small figure hurtled across the dance floor.