The Passion by Donna Boyd Read Free Book Online

until she heard the carriage pul up before the front door and, peeking out of her window, saw him enter the house alone. She knew then that this was to be the night.
    She slipped the knife out of its hiding place and waited, clutching the weapon to her bosom, the eternity of an hour to make certain he was abed.
    Then, with a tread as soundless as hours of practice could make it, needing no light to guide the path that was etched in memory, she made her way down the stairs and through the corridor that led to the master's chamber.
    There she paused with one hand on the latch and the other fiercely clenching the knife in a high position against her breast, her heart pounding with triumph and excitement and the certainty of the moment that had come at last—and also with dread of what she might find beyond that door. Would it be the monster, crouched in waiting with its glinting eyes trained upon her from the darkness? Or would it be the beautiful young man, peaceful in his sleep and never guessing it would be his last? Perhaps he wouldn't be asleep at al . Perhaps he had heard her outside the door and was prepared to spring upon her the minute she stepped through. Perhaps he wasn't even inside, and she would have it al to do again another night.
     
    Then do it she would, she resolved, but she couldn't stand in dry-mouthed fear outside his door another moment. With a silent turn of the wel -oiled latch, the door swung open and she stepped inside.
    No monster awaited her.
    He lay naked and sprawled atop the covers, his limbs silvered in the moonlight that spil ed from the open window. One leg was bent slightly toward the other, his hands loose at his sides, his rich hair with its enchanting pale streak fanned out upon the pil ow. His chest was firm and oddly devoid of hair, as was his entire body, even beneath his arms and that place low on his abdomen where al adults had hair. His sex was pink and half plumped upon one thigh. His face was turned to the side, his lips parted in deep and even breaths. Tessa could smel the wine as she approached; wine and musk and the sharp evergreen scent that seemed to be his signature. Odd, but she had never noticed the smel of a man before and cal ed it pleasant. But then M.
    Devoncroix was no ordinary man. He was not, in fact, a man at al .
    It was with this assurance— he is not a man, he is not —that Tessa gripped her courage and stepped even closer, clenching the knife as though it were a lifeline rather than an instrument of death. She stood over him. Stil he did not arouse from his alcohol stupor to notice her. So he is not , she thought a trifle smugly, perhaps as magical as one would think …
    But he looked magical, lying there atop the rumpled covers with his strong, lean calves and his smooth, open palms, like something an Italian artist might have sculpted. Magical, lovely, vulnerable. Look there, the way a strand of satin hair was drawn across his face and fluttered with each breath, and yes, was that not the pulse of a heartbeat visible in the strong vein of his throat? Alive, vital. Beautiful.
    She remembered his smile, the gentle grasp of his fingers on her chin. He had soft hands, like an aristocrat, but strong, like a craftsman. His touch was nothing like she had expected it to be.
    Tessa's heart felt bruised from the power with which it flung itself against her rib cage, and the knife was slippery in her hand. Not a man, she reminded herself fiercely. Not a man but a monster, a kil er…
    Tessa crossed herself awkwardly with her right hand, then closed both hands around the hilt of the knife. She could do this. She had spent her entire adult life preparing for this moment.
    She fixed her eyes on the smooth swel of his breast muscle, the gentle rise and fal of each breath, the firm outline of ribs beneath, the satiny sheath of skin. She raised the knife, and saw the blade shake, pulse, throb in rhythm with her heart. A glint of moonlight on steel, the warmth, the almost