The Warlock's Daughter by Jennifer Blake Read Free Book Online Page B

forever.”
    “Forever,” she repeated with light rising in her eyes and the soft, sweet echo of the word ringing in her mind along with her own preference.
    “A permanent union being clearly impossible, a few hours of pleasure is a risk for which the penalty may be too dear.”
    His eyes, she saw in the brightness of the many candles, were not actually black but a dark and mysterious green. Across them was a near-mortal wash of pain and distress. It gave her courage.
    “Only,” she said in quiet certainty, “if you value the thing will you lose too—dearly.”
    Renfrey watched her from across the room while his mind raced in cogent thought. He knew he had shown momentary weakness, knew it must be corrected. His decision was made and accepted between one breath and the next.
    The words even, he said, “You think I am concerned because I love you? I have admitted to being entranced, and might have been more, given time. But there is none available and my emotions are, in keeping with my kind, imminently controllable. I have a care for you now, but no more than I would take with any moderately pretty lady of the evening who happened to be weak, silly and supplicating.”
    The verbal blow was devastating, and meant to be. She had expected something of the kind, however, so did not permit him to see her flinch. Her eyes clear, her tone acid-edged, she said, “It's just as well then, don't you think, that I'm none of those things?”
    He tested that declaration, accepted it. When he spoke it was in answer to her thought rather than her words. “You are feeling combative? This is a duel no one can win, a challenge I must refuse. If you will change your clothes again, I will take you home to your aunt.”
    “Change?” she said with a lifted brow. “Oh, but I believe I've grown fond of this ensemble; it makes me feel quite—regal. In any case, it was chosen especially for me and I am convinced that it flatters.”
    “Keep it, then,” he said shortly. “Shall we go?”
    He was anxious to be rid of her. That was promising.
    “You know,” she said judiciously, “I don't think we shall. All these exertions have made me hungry, and it would be shameful to waste the midnight supper you so thoughtfully ordered.”
    He watched her for long, unblinking moments before he said in pleasantly conversational tones, “I could send you on a whirlwind.”
    “No doubt,” she answered at once. “Then who would be throwing a—what was the phrase? Oh, yes, a temper tantrum of the elements?”
    “ Carita —”
    The word, ragged at the edges, ground to a halt. He looked down at his hand that was curled into a fist. By slow degrees he opened it, forced a gesture of graceful acquiescence. “Yes. Well. By all means let us be adult and mannerly and civilized, at least in so far as we are able. You are hungry. So am I. Shall we dine?”
    “Sup,” she corrected him. “It's too late for anything else.” She paused, watching him, but if he recognized the allusion to his own declaration, he did not show it.
    They took their places at the table. Polite to a fault, stiff with decorum, they began their meal. Renfrey drank too much. It did not make him drunk, of course, but did incline him to morose self-judgment.
    He should have forced her to go. She might have fought him, but he had no doubt that he could have prevailed. To be constrained to sit and watch her, knowing that he had only to reach out his hand for her to come to him, was indescribable torture. It was perverse of him to be grateful for every minute of it.
    He loved the proud tilt of her chin, the determined set of her lips, the light of battle in the deep and rich sea-blue of her eyes. She had not given up; he knew that. He must and would counter every wile and stratagem she concocted, still he saluted her fiery spirit. Even as it gave him cold chills.
    By all the saints of this hallowed eve, but he wanted her. She knew it, because he himself had told her. In exerting