Candace Camp (27 page)

By the time she reached the ground, several of the male bystanders had jumped into the fight, pulling the two men apart.

“Here, now! Stop that!” one burly gentleman said as he and his companion wrapped an arm each around Anthony’s arms, pulling him away.

“Good Gad, sir, there are ladies present,” another man expostulated. He had pulled Dario away, and his hand was still on Dario’s arm.

His hold was too loose, as it turned out, for Dario whirled, pulling a pistol from inside his jacket, and grabbed Eleanor by the arm, pointing the pistol at her head.

Everyone froze, staring at them in horror.

“Stay back, all of you,” Dario told them.

“Damn you, Paradella, you won’t get away with this,” Anthony snarled, jerking his arms from his captors’ now-slack hold.

“Won’t I?” Dario asked insouciantly. “It seems to me that I have a very good chance of it.”

“Dario, how could you do this?” Eleanor asked.

“My dear, you must know that I have no desire to harm you,” Dario replied. “And as long as Lord Neale and the others let me go, I will set you free, don’t worry.”

“You killed Edmund!” she exclaimed. “How could you have done that? He was your friend.”

“It grieved me,” he told her with great sincerity. “It was the hardest thing I’ve ever done. But I could scarcely let him tell everyone, could I? He had found out about me, you see. I had foolishly tried to talk him into letting me see the list, and it made him suspicious. I did not realize it, but he had me followed, and he learned that I was meeting the count in secret. Being a gentleman, he offered me a chance to explain myself. I wrote that I could not meet him, so that no one would know I was with him, but then I intercepted him on his way to the docks.”

“And you killed him,” Eleanor finished bitterly. “Because he was foolish enough to trust you.”

“Oh, he was not that foolish. He balked when we got to the boat. I had to knock him out and throw him in. Then I sailed out and threw him overboard, left the boat and swam back to shore. I have always been a good swimmer.”

“You are a monster!” Eleanor cried, her eyes filling with tears of rage. “I despise you.”

“Nevertheless, my dear, you are coming with me,” Paradella replied.

“Never.”

“Unless you prefer to die,” he responded flatly. He began walking backward, his eyes on Anthony, the gun pointed at Eleanor’s head as he pulled her with him.

Eleanor cast a quick glance at Anthony. She knew that he would be waiting for a chance to rush Paradella, just as he had done yesterday with the count. She must offer up some distraction that would give him the chance to do so.

She dragged her feet, making Dario jerk and pull her along. Her resistance clearly irritated him, for he burst into an angry spate of Italian, but he did not take his eyes from Anthony or his gun from her head.

They reached the nearest balloon, where the operator stood staring at them, openmouthed, like everyone else in the crowd. The balloon was filled and moored by ropes tied to stakes driven into the ground.

“Get in,” Dario told Eleanor curtly.

“Into the basket?” she asked in surprise.

“Yes, of course. We are going to take a little trip.”

She sidled through the narrow door, Dario edging in right behind her. The man who stood beside the balloon goggled at them in astonishment.

“Sir, what are you doing?” he cried. “That is my balloon. You cannot take it up yourself!”

“Dario, please. Think! You cannot operate one of these things, can you?” Eleanor cried.

“I will have to,” he replied.

“Damn it, Paradella!” Anthony roared, striding toward the balloon. “Let her go! You have made your escape.”

“I think not.” Paradella smiled. “I may need Eleanor yet.”

“No! No!” the balloon operator yelled, pulling at his hair in his agitation. “You will wreck it. You don’t know how to operate it. Please, sir! Please!”

“Unfasten the ropes,” Dario commanded. When the man hesitated, he lifted the gun higher, pressing it flush against Eleanor’s temple. “Unless you wish to see this lovely lady die in front of your eyes, undo the ropes.”

Moaning and fretting, the man did as he was told, unfastening first one rope, then another, working from side to side. All the time he kept up a running plea with Dario not to go up in the balloon.

Eleanor could sense Dario’s impatience. If she could just distract him even more, it might give Anthony the opening he needed. He was edging closer, and so far, Dario had not noticed. In any case, time was running out for her. She had to do something now.

“Dario, please,” she said, putting as much distress in her voice as she dared. “Let me go. We will let you leave, I promise, if you will just let me out of this contraption.”

“I cannot,” he told her curtly.

“But you don’t understand,” she wailed. “I cannot go up in this! Please. I am terrified of heights.”

“Don’t be absurd. You are the least terrified woman I have ever met.”

“You have not seen me in the right situation. You know I never went onto the roof of the Mustellis’villa, even though everyone said the view was spectacular.”

“No, I did not know it.”

“Well, it is true. I detest the mountains. That is why Edmund and I never went to the Alps.” That was not true, of course; the reason had been Edmund’s shortness of breath. But with any luck, Dario would not know that.

“You will survive it.”

“No, I don’t think I will!” Eleanor cried, turning her head toward Dario as much as she dared. “Please, Dario. All of us have something that we dread. I cannot go up in the air in this thing!”

“Please, sir, listen to her!” the man who was undoing the ropes yelled.

He had unfastened over half of them, and the balloon jerked upward, tugging at its moorings. Eleanor shrieked, and the man jumped forward. Dario, startled, whipped the gun around toward the balloon operator. Eleanor threw herself against Dario, grabbing at his gun hand. He jerked his arm upward as she hit him, and the gun went off.

At that moment Anthony vaulted over the side of the basket and punched Dario in the face. Dario staggered back, coming up hard against the opposite side, and Anthony went after him, landing a hard right to Dario’s stomach. But Dario turned so that the blow glanced off his side, and he hurtled forward, ramming his shoulder into Anthony and knocking him backward.

The basket was rocking crazily under the force of the two men’s bodies slamming into it, and Eleanor was thrown down to the floor. She could hear shrieks from the crowd, and the agitated voice of the balloon owner over them all.

She struggled to her feet, grasping the side of the wicker basket, and as she straightened up, a rope gave way. All three of them went sliding as the basket tilted. Eleanor slammed into the side, the impact knocking the breath from her. Beside her, Anthony hit the wall, as well, and Dario landed against him.

Dario struggled, trying to lift Anthony and push him over the side. Anthony pulled back his arm and landed a powerful punch to Dario’s jaw. At that instant, the last rope holding them to the ground popped free, and the balloon rose precipitously.

Dario staggered backward under the force of Anthony’s blow and the sudden movement of the basket. He hit the side with a sharp crack, and the top rail of the basket snapped and fell off. Dario reeled backward, flailing his arms.

Eleanor gasped and reached for him, as did Anthony, but it was too late. Dario went over the side and fell to the ground.

“Oh, my God!” Eleanor twisted and looked down in his wake.

Paradella lay sprawled on the ground twenty feet below them.

“Is he dead?” Eleanor gasped.

Anthony came up behind her, wrapping his arms around her and looked down. “I cannot tell. I’d say his leg is broken, but I think he is moving his hand. The crowd will hold him, I’m sure.”

Eleanor let out a breath of relief and leaned against Anthony, holding on to him tightly. “Thank heavens you managed to hit him.”

He gave her a squeeze. “Only because you distracted him. You were the one who knocked the gun away.” He kissed the top of her head. “You are going to have to stop doing this, you know. I shall be gray before my time if you keep having guns held to your head.”

“Believe me, I would rather not, as well,” Eleanor answered.

She glanced around her and down at the ground, still receding from them. “What are we going to do now?”

“I don’t know. I don’t suppose you know how to operate a hot air balloon, do you?”

“No, I cannot say that I do,” she responded. “One does something with these bags on the side, I presume.”

“Mmm. I think you throw them over if you want to climb higher. To avoid trees and hills.”

“Or church spires,” Eleanor commented, looking down at the city below.

He glanced around. “Yes. Well, I think we are above everything at the moment. The question is whether there is a way to steer this thing.”

“And how one comes back down again.”

“I’m not sure that will be a problem.” Anthony looked up at the balloon swelling above them. “I think perhaps that shot that went off when you hit Paradella’s arm went through the balloon.”

“What?” She looked up, alarmed. “You mean air is escaping through it?”

“I believe so. I also believe the leak is growing a little larger as time passes.”

“Oh dear. Well, I suppose it will come down sooner or later then. Hopefully slowly rather than all at once.”

“That would be my preference, as well,” Anthony responded dryly, then chuckled and pulled her into his arms again. “Ah, Eleanor, life is never dull around you.”

“It is glorious up here, isn’t it? The children would love it. We must take them up sometime.”

He smiled. “There is no one like you, my dear. Now…since we are up here all alone with nowhere to go and no chance of doing anything until we come down, I think it is time that you answered my question.”

“Your question?”

“You wound me,” he replied. “I asked you to marry me before we started on that mad chase.”

“Oh.” Eleanor looked down.

“What? Have I mistaken your feelings?” He tipped her chin up to look into her face. “Do you not wish to marry me?”

“Anthony…you are speaking in the heat of the moment. You cannot have thought…The things that made me wrong in your eyes for Edmund are still true. How can I have been too low-born to be his wife and yet be satisfactory as a countess? You know I cannot.”

“You are more than satisfactory to be
my
countess,” he responded. “Eleanor…I told you that I feared you were an adventuress, out to fleece Edmund. I did not care that you were an American or that you were not an aristocrat. I was wrong. Please do not hold that mistake against me.”

Eleanor looked at him, hesitating. Everything inside her longed to say yes, but still she held back. “I do not want you to wake up in a month or a year or ten years and regret that you married me.”

“I could never regret it. I frankly cannot imagine life without you.” He took her hands in his and looked earnestly down into her eyes. “My dearest Eleanor, I have looked back on my behavior when you married Edmund, and I realize that I was a boor and a fool. But I know that deep in my heart what made me, in the fiercest way, try to discourage you from marrying Edmund was the fact that as soon as I saw you, I wanted you for myself.”

Eleanor gave him a skeptical look. “What?”

“It is true. When you walked into that room, I thought you were the most beautiful woman I had ever seen. I wanted you so much at that moment that it hurt. I didn’t want you to marry Edmund. I didn’t want you to marry any man. I would have liked to sweep you out of that house and take you home to my bed. It is why I never visited you and Edmund. I did not want to see you with him, to know that you were his wife, forever forbidden to me. It would have been torture. I love you.”

“Anthony!” A dazzling smile broke across Eleanor’s face, and she flung her arms around him. “I never thought I would hear you say it. I love you, too.” She pulled back and gazed tenderly up at him. “Yes, I will marry you.”

He bent his head and kissed her, a long, slow, delicious kiss. At last he raised his head.

“Well,” he said, smiling. “I suppose we had better figure out how to land this thing.”

“In a minute,” Eleanor responded, cupping her hand at the base of his neck and pulling his head down for another kiss.