Divine Fire by Melanie Jackson Read Free Book Online Page A

and office was only a doorway wide.
    “Good. I couldn’t let you come all this way—and in such bad weather—and not take you out for a proper meal.” He was still smiling, still looking vaguely amused.
    “The car will be here at six-thirty,” Karen reminded them as she departed.
    “And speaking of the reasons for me coming all this way…” Brice set her cup aside once Karen left the room.
    “Certainly, let’s speak of that. But have a scone first. They’re wonderful. Do you like clotted cream?”
    “Yes, actually, I do,” Brice admitted. “But perhaps we should—”
    “Excellent. And try the lemon curd. It’s made fresh and is absolutely ambrosial.”
    Brice’s stomach squawked again, and she gave up trying to resist the pastry’s lure. Nothing had gone as planned today and she hadn’t much dignity left anyway. Damien might as well see her eat like a starved wolverine. It would make an interesting sidebar in his column if he decided to write about her visit.
    Their hands touched as he offered her the dish of lemon curd and she felt the now familiar electricity and then a small moment of vertigo. Brice pulled back. She blinked twice and the room stilled.
    Hunger—that had to be it. And travel lag. And weariness. She hadn’t slept well the last couple of days, being plagued with dreams of terrible storms and screams in the cold darkness.
    Probably, once fortified with some stick-to-the-ribs food, she would be more up to the task of being sly and subtle when she asked about Byron’s memoirs. Just now she didn’t have the weight to step into the ring with her opponent, and she was just barely awake enough to know it.

Chapter Four
Shall I tell you what renders love dangerous? It is the sublime idea which we often appear to have of it.
—Letter from Ninon de Lenclos to Marquis Sévigné
Man’s love is of a man’s life a thing apart. ’Tis a woman’s whole existence.
—Byron, Don Juan, canto I
Critics are like children who can whip horses but not drive them.
—Molière
It is true from early habit, one must make love mechanically as one swims. I was once very fond of both, but now I never swim unless I tumble into water. I don’t make love until almost obliged.
—Byron (letter, September 10, 1812)
    The snow that greeted them when they stepped out of the limousine still felt like laughter, but Brice thought it had taken on the quality of something closer to sly and sinister hilarity now that the day was dying and the sun burying itself on the western horizon far beyond the city. There was hardly any time to worry about this strange feeling, though, because Damien whisked her indoors before more than a handful of seconds passed.
    The ceiling of Di Serrano’s was high and beamed, lending the room a warm feeling in spite of its size. Torchères of stained glass shed softly colored light on the linen-clad tables and rough plaster walls where vases of elegant calla lilies were mounted in ornate brass sconces. In the background a pianist played softly. Brice couldn’t place the tune, but it wasn’t “That’s Amore.”
    There wasn’t a wax-covered Chianti bottle or red-and-white-checked napkin in sight either.
    “It’s ‘Viens, Mallika’ from Lakme ,” Damien murmured, inclining his head, answering her unspoken question and proving that he was, in some circumstances, very much the mind reader he claimed to be.
    His warm breath made Brice shiver.
    They were shown to a table near a large window that looked out on the street filling steadily with snow. She knew it would change quickly, but for now the world looked pristine and untouched even with the street ablaze with Christmas fanfare. And it was dazzling. The city’s already formidable collection of lights had been augmented with lavish seasonal displays, and the cold air made the light sharper than diamonds.
    Damien took over the task of seating her, but he allowed the man he called Antonio to whip out the brocade napkin with a practiced flick