Read Online Clandestine by Julia Ross - Free Book Online Page B

really only a goddess of flowers—”
    â€œNo, she was a woman in love.” He glanced up, apparently deadly serious. “Why else would she sow a path of white petals as she walked?”
    â€œI don’t know.” Her stomach contracted into a knot of trepidation in the face of his intensity. “I don’t know what you mean.”
    â€œNever mind! These particular tales are damnably obscure. How did you ever come across them?”
    She clutched the stem of her wineglass as if it were a talisman. “When I was a girl, I did nothing much else but read. I had access to a wonderful library.”
    He gazed a little ruefully at the feast on the table. “Then you must know that in Arthur’s court no one may embark upon the banquet until some miracle has been performed.”
    Sarah stared at his cleanly boned hands, lovely and lean, as he set the plate back down.
    â€œWhat kind of miracle does it take?”
    â€œI’ve no idea.” He smiled and stepped closer. “I only know that I’m starving—and that one wayward sheep is still caught in your hair. Stand still!”
    His fingers smoothed past her ear. Hot awareness flooded. Her pulse launched into its wild race, that deafening, hot surge of desire in the blood. Every strand of red hair leaped into vibrancy.
    His throat ran cool and strong to mesh smoothly with the flexing muscles of neck and chest. The shadow of fleeting dimples still marked his cheeks.
    Yet his gaze was shuttered, the fire banked, as if he felt nothing but this careful courtesy.
    Far more than she had ever wanted any man, Sarah wanted Guy Devoran. His intelligence. His company. But most of all his lean, virile body and clever mouth, his lovely hands and wicked tongue.
    She wanted to know him as a wife knew a husband. No, more than that! As a mistress knew a lover—
    A long-buried fear crashed through her defenses. However heady, it was madness to allow such feelings. Young gentlemen had never been serious in their attentions toward her. That kind of interest had always only been Rachel’s—
    The wineglass slipped from Sarah’s fingers and toppled, spreading glistening chaos over the supper table.
    â€œMy cousin! I’m only here because of Rachel!”
    Face hot with embarrassment, she grabbed a napkin and tried frantically to mop up the mess.
    As if burned, Guy Devoran strode away to the fireplace, then whirled about. “Leave that, please! You’re not a maid who must clean up spilled wine.”
    Sarah dropped the cloth and faced him. “No! When my mother died, Rachel’s parents raised me as if I were their own child. I owe the Mansards everything. But now that their orphaned daughter so desperately needs my help, I dance away the evening, while you—”
    â€œGo on, Mrs. Callaway!”
    Her anger sustained her, though she felt almost faint. “There’s no reason for us to discuss the romantic tales. They were my secret passion. Rachel was never interested in them. Nothing about Olwen and Culhwch will help us to find her. What’s really going on here, Mr. Devoran? Are you testing me in some way? Do you still doubt my honesty, or—”
    â€œGod, no! It’s not that!”
    â€œThen what are you hiding—you and Lord Jonathan? Why did you think you needed a parrot to play watchdog? Why bring me up here to this private room? What do you dread telling me, sir? That you won’t help me, after all? That—”
    â€œNo!” He paced to the window. “I wished only to set you more at ease, so that you would trust me a little further.”
    â€œTrust you with what, sir? With my integrity? So that I should forget why I came here? And thus allow us both to overlook my awkward pleas on Rachel’s behalf? I recognize that I had no right to demand your assistance and I’m sure that you don’t—”
    His fist struck the folded wooden shutter, making it boom.