His One-Night Mistress
Sandra Field
CHAPTER ONE
GLITTERING. Dazzling. Magnifique!
Lia d'Angeli edged toward the wall in the vast foyer of the hotel, whose floor-to-ceiling, gilt-scrolled mirrors reflected what could have been a scene from one of Louis XIV's revels. Her fingers tightened around her invitation with its elegant gold script, an invitation given her just yesterday by her Parisian friend Mathieu. "A masked ball," he'd said with his charming, lop-sided grin. "I can't go, malheureusement. Take some handsome young man, Lia, eat, drink and dance your heart out." His grin took on a satyr's edge. "You could try ending up in his bed – -you're far too beautiful to have the reputation of a nun, chérie."
Mathieu's endearment Lia took with a grain of salt; he was known for romantic dalliance in every district of Paris. But his advice – -at least some of it-she fully intended to take. Eat, drink and dance. Yes, she'd do all three with pleasure. But she had come to the ball alone, and she intended to leave it alone.
Alone and anonymous, she thought with a sigh of pure pleasure. Her fame was new, and not altogether pleasant. But this evening she wasn't Lia d'Angeli, the brilliant young violinist who'd burst on the international scene by winning two prestigious competitions within six months of each other. No, she thought, glancing sideways at herself in the nearest mirror and feeling her lips curve in a smile. She was a butterfly instead, flirtatious and enigmatic, fluttering from partner to partner with no intention of being pinned down by any one of them.
Her costume consisted of a shiny turquoise bodysuit that faithfully outlined her breasts, hips, gently incurving waist and long, slender legs. Jeweled turquoise sandals were on her feet. Flaring between arm and thigh were her wings, folds of delicate chiffon, turquoise and green. But it was her mask that made the costume. Like a helmet, it covered her high cheekbones, revealing only the darkness of her eyes, and hiding her tumble of black hair in a glimmer of sequins and exquisite peacock feathers. She'd carefully smoothed turquoise makeup over her cheeks, her chin and her throat; her lips were a luminous gold.
An outrageous costume, she thought with great satisfaction. A costume that freed her to be anyone she wanted to be.
No one here knew her. She planned to take full advantage of that, dance her heart out and leave by midnight. Just like Cinderella.
Her eyes ranged the crowd. Marie Antoinette, the Hunchback of Notre-Dame, a cardinal worthy of an El Greco portrait, a sexy dancer from the Moulin Rouge. All masked. All strangers to each other. And perhaps to themselves, she thought with a tiny shiver of her nerves.
She shook off her sudden unease, making her way to the doorman and presenting her numbered invitation. A uniformed official was whispering something in his ear; the doorman waved her into the ballroom impatiently, scarcely glancing at the calligraphy on the card as he added it to the stack beside him. Lia slipped past him quickly; she'd worried a little that there might be some objection to her having Mathieu's invitation rather than one in her own name. A good omen, she thought lightheartedly, and tucked herself around the corner out of his sight.
The ballroom was alive with the lilt of an old-fashioned waltz, although by the look of the sound equipment the music wouldn't be that sedate all evening. More mirrors adorned the sapphire-blue walls, while sparkling gold chandeliers were suspended from a ceiling painted with more chubby cherubs than there were springtime lovers in Paris. Against the far wall long tables with immaculate white cloths held a feast that even King Louis wouldn't have scorned. White-jacketed waiters circulated among the crowd, holding aloft silver trays of wine and champagne.
And then she saw him.
Like herself, the man was standing with his back to the wall, surveying the crowd. A highwayman, cloaked and booted, a black mask making slits of his eyes, a black hat with a sweeping brim shadowing his features.
No costume in the world could have hidden his height, the breadth of his shoulders or his aura of power, of command, of complete and utter self-control. An aura he clearly took for granted.
A man who took what he wanted. A highwayman, indeed.
He, like her, was alone.
As another of those chills traced the length of Lia's spine, his gaze came to rest on her. Even across the width of the huge ballroom, she felt his sudden, searing focus; his body stilled, like a bandit's when he sights his victim.
She couldn't have moved to save her soul.
The butterfly pinned to the wall, she thought crazily, her heart racing against her rib cage. She'd been frightened many times in her life; it was part of the striving for excellence that had driven her for as long as she could remember. But pre-concert nerves, for all their terrors, were at least backed by the sure knowledge of her own technical accomplishments, and by the inner certainty that, once again, she could overcome those nerves.
This terror was different. She felt stripped, laid bare, exposed. All because a stranger had chanced to look at her. A man she'd never seen before – -of that she was sure – -and need never see again.
Ridiculous, she thought, gathering every vestige of her courage to fight an assault unlike any she'd ever known.
Assault? The man hadn't even touched her.
In a flare of defiance Lia gestured to the nearest waiter, took a glass of red wine from his tray and, with a mocking salute to the man across the room, raised the glass in a toast.
He swept off his hat, revealing a crop of untidy, sun-streaked blond hair, and bowed to her from the waist, a courtly gesture that brought an involuntary smile to her lips. Then he straightened and started toward her across the wide expanse of floor.
In total panic she heard a male voice say in clumsily accented French, "Voulez-vous danser avec moi, madame?"
A British soldier from the Napoleonic wars had inserted himself between her and the highwayman. Quickly Lia put her wine down on the nearest table and said, in English, "Thank you, yes."
"Cool-you speak English," the soldier said, put his arm around her and with a certain flair eased her among the other dancers. He waltzed with a competence for which she was grateful, and didn't seem to require much from her in the way of conversation, for which she was more than grateful. From the corner of her eye, she watched the highwayman be accosted by a group of curvaceous chorus girls, then extract himself with a remark that left them all giggling. She said breathlessly, "I'd love to get a closer look at the orchestra – -can we go that way?"
The soldier obediently whisked her to the opposite end of the room. The waltz ended, followed by a rhumba. A clown with a garish red slash of mouth cut in; automatically Lia followed the rhythm, her diaphanous wings fluttering as she raised and lowered her arms. The clown was superseded by a dignified gentleman who could have emerged from the pages of a Jane Austen novel.
As the two-step came to its predictable close, another partner loomed behind the elderly gentleman. The highwayman, his black cloak swirling. Lia's nerves tightened to an almost intolerable pitch, even though from the first moment she'd seen him she'd known this meeting was inevitable. "My turn, I believe," he said pleasantly, yet with an edge of steel underlying a voice as smooth as brandy.
Lia smiled at her partner, thanked him and turned to face her opponent. For opponent he was; of that she was in no doubt.
She could have refused to speak to him. But pride had always been one of her besetting sins, and besides, weren't challenges meant to be met?
Before she could even open her mouth, he said with that same steel edge, "You've had your fun. Now it's my turn."
She'd see about that. Raising her chin, Lia said with rather overdone politeness, "It's very warm in here, isn't it? I'd love a glass of champagne."
"What's your name?"
"Subtlety certainly isn't yours."
"I don't believe in wasting time."
"Mine or yours?" she demanded.
"Mine."
"Then perhaps you should find yourself another partner."
"Oh, I don't think so," he said.
"So tell me your name," she said, fully expecting him to refuse.
"Seth Talbot. From Manhattan. You're American as well."
Her home base was a tiny apartment in Greenwich Village. She said coolly, "I was born in Switzerland, Mr. Talbot," and with equal aplomb gestured to the nearest waiter, who presented her with a crystal flute of champagne. She raised it to her lips, feeling the bubbles tickle her nostrils.
"So you take what you want," Seth Talbot said softly.
"Is there any other way?"
"Not in my world. I'm glad we understand each other."