Glittering Promises (3 page)

Pierre had been humming, and I leaned my head against the high back of our shared chair and looked at him, guardedly, not wanting him to mistake tenderness and companionability for second thoughts. Once I had entertained the idea of marrying him. But it had always been a fantasy, some other girl’s tale, not my own. Because my heart had always been tied to Will’s. But if I hadn’t met Will McCabe? Certainly, turning away Pierre de Richelieu would have been the hardest thing I’d ever done. It was already difficult, even with my love firmly settled in my heart. Because Pierre was terribly…
dreamy
, as Lil and Nell often said in a breathy tone that matched the word. Handsome. Clever. Amusing. Refined.

“Is that a folk tune?” I asked.

“What?” he said, turning to me from his reverie.

“What you were humming. Is it a folk tune?”

“Yes, yes,” he said, giving me a soft smile. “Something my mother hummed to me as a child.” His eyebrows lifted. “I do not even know the words.”

“It’s lovely.”

His eyes moved from me to the third canal we entered. “There. Up ahead,” he said to the gondolier. “We’d like to pause for a bit.”

“Certainly.”

Pascal gave Pierre a long look.

“Don’t worry, my friend, don’t worry,” Pierre said, trying to tamp down my guard’s concern. “If Nathan Hawke wishes to get to us here, he’ll have to come through you, no?” Pierre smiled at Pascal and then looked over at me. “I don’t know whom he fears most—Hawke or me.” He laughed under his breath. “He thinks I might try to run off with you,” he said, nodding toward Pascal.

“Will you?” I asked with a sardonic smile.

“If you gave me half a hope, I would.” He took my hand, and I stiffened. He paused, and his light brows knit together. “Come now, Cora, you’ve more than made your feelings plain. Trust me, won’t you?”

I took a breath, studying his guileless expression. “All right,” I said slowly.

The gondolier edged alongside a small gate and called upward. An old man appeared on a small balcony, standing beside a table set for two right above the canal. They shared a word in Italian, and the man invited us up.

I paused. “Pierre, I’m not really hungry.” The farther we got from the palazzo, the more I feared that this was a bad idea. A very bad idea. Not because of Hawke. But because of Pierre. This was clearly his last attempt to persuade me to return to him, to turn away from Will.

“Nor am I,” he said soberly. “But come. Share one last glass of wine, a last moment with me. That’s all I ask.” He frowned. “Come now. Can you not give me at least this courtesy?”

I sighed, guilt overcoming my concern, and then took his hand, ambling out of the gondola and onto an old rotting pier slick with green moss. “Careful,” Pierre said, even as he slipped a little himself.

Pascal sought my eyes, silently asking me if I was all right. I gave him a firm nod. “We’ll only be a little while,” I said. Where could we go? I suspected what the men did—that the only way in and out of this tiny building was right here through this waterway entrance.

We moved up stairs so narrow that I wondered if Pierre would have to scrunch or turn sideways to get through. At the top, the ceiling lifted, and we turned left, walking through a cozy kitchen rife with the smells of supper simmering on the stove—heavily laced with garlic and oregano—and out to the small patio, where our host awaited us, proudly gesturing toward the cloth-covered table. He pulled out my chair, then helped me sit down. I glanced over the stone rail to Pascal, and the man visibly relaxed now that we were again within sight. I supposed I couldn’t begrudge his tension—our guards had been put through the paces, watching us. But I hoped all that would be soon behind us.

“You eat?” said our host, gesturing toward his mouth as if he was uncertain about the word.

“No, no,” Pierre said with a wave of his hand. “It’s far too early.
Solo un po’ di pane e vino
,
per favore
,” he said. I guessed he’d asked for only wine and bread.

Clearly disgruntled, the man looked to me, as if hoping I’d interrupt and demand a four-course dinner, even though it was only three in the afternoon. Then, hopes dashed, he left for a moment before returning with the bottle of wine and a basket of bread that he practically slammed on the table.

Pierre grinned as he watched the man depart, then he looked over at me. “Perhaps I might have picked a more genteel locale,” he said, picking up the bottle and uncorking it. He poured me a glass and then one for himself.

“No,” I said softly, looking out over the quiet canal, the water so still that there was hardly a ripple. Our gondolier had settled into our seat for a nap, his broad-brimmed hat tipped over his face, legs perched on the edge, even while Pascal steadily perused the area. “It’s actually perfect. A bit of respite after a very busy hour.”

“Indeed,” Pierre said, leaning forward across the table. He took a breath. “As you might suspect, this parting tears at me in a thousand ways.”

“Oh, Pierre, you’ve given me so much.” I impulsively reached for his hand and squeezed it. “I shall never forget you.”

“But you are certain that our parting is the right decision for us?” he said, gazing from our entwined hands to my face. A shadow of sorrow in his eyes made me hesitate a moment.

“I am,” I said, pulling my hand away. “If we’d met under different circumstances, Pierre, in a different time, a different place…”

“If we’d been different people,” he said with a humorless grin.

“No. And yes,” I said.

“And if there hadn’t been a William McCabe.”

“Most of all,” I said quietly, “if there hadn’t been him, too.”

He gave me a lopsided grin, covering me with a tender gaze. “I never did have a chance against him. Who would have thought it? A pauper beating me.”

I stiffened a little. “He’s far more than the amount he has in his bank account.”

Pierre nodded and took a sip of his wine, savoring it a moment before swallowing. He lifted his glass, as if toasting me. “And there it is again—why I am so madly in love with you, Cora Diehl Kensington.”

My mouth was suddenly dry, and it was my turn to take a sip. Never had he come out and said it. So matter-of-factly. Without flirtation. “Pierre, I—”

He lifted his hand to shush me. “Never have I met a woman who was not first taken in by a man’s bank account, or at least swayed by it. I want to win a woman like you. A woman who will see
me
for more than what I have.”

“You deserve such a woman.”

He took another sip and studied me, swirling the wine idly around his glass. “Tell me. Is there not some small part of you that believes you’re that woman?”

“Pierre…”

“Truthfully,” he said, giving his head a small shake, “with no worry about my feelings. Tell me that I hold not one part of your heart—not one tiny part—and I will leave and never bother you again. You can rest assured I will continue my business deal with Montana Copper so that your father cannot hold it over your head.”

My eyes met his, quickly.

“Oh, yes. I understand that your father can be quite ruthless. But my dearest desire is for you to come to me, Cora, on
your
terms. Not as a dutiful daughter with an eye toward business holdings.”

He reached across the table and took my hand again, lightly, in his. Something in his face, his demeanor, made me allow it.

“Pierre, I’ve told you. You honor me by your attentions, your pursuit. But my heart belongs to Will McCabe.”

“Understood. But you didn’t answer me,” he said, staring into my eyes. He covered my hand with his other one, again carefully, as if afraid I’d shy away. “I need to know that I have no chance whatsoever. That
I
don’t hold any portion of your heart, no matter how small.”

I paused, considering. Looked across the narrow canal to the neighboring building, where I saw drapes moving back into place, as if somebody had just been there, then disappeared. I shoved away the paranoid thought of Nathan Hawke following us here, somehow. It was impossible. It was only a nosy neighbor… I focused again on Pierre. How was I to answer his question in all honesty—without giving him undue hope?

“You pause,” he said, his voice little more than a whisper. “There is a chance for me.”

“No,” I said, finally pulling my hand from his and firmly placing it in my lap. I shook my head slowly. “It is Will who holds my heart, Pierre. I’m sorry. I paused because I care for you. I do. But it is Will that I love.”

He studied me, grief lacing his eyes. “I will honor your choice. But,
mon ange
…Cora. I must come to see you in Roma, before you leave for America again. I need to know then that nothing has changed and you are certain that—”

“No. Don’t come. I
am
certain, Pierre.”

“But does Will have it within him to withstand the pressures of your father? Of society? With your newfound wealth?”

“My father still holds the purse strings. Unless he relents, or my attorney is successful in his suit—”

“He will relent,” Pierre said. “Wallace Kensington is a gambler. He simply prefers to hold all the cards. You’ve dealt him a new hand he doesn’t care for. But more than anything, Cora, he wants you. To know you, and you, him. As a father knows a daughter.”

I sighed.
If only I were so certain of his intentions.
“I had all the father I ever needed.
Have
,” I belatedly amended, wondering how Papa was faring this day in Minnesota. How Mama was…

“Do you?” He sat back and twisted the stem of his goblet in his fingers in a slow circle. “In some ways, you seem to me a fine woman, grown. In others, but a girl. A girl in need of a father such as Wallace Kensington, particularly as you negotiate the ways of society. As well as the press…”

I frowned. “Will and I shall address those pressures. Together.”

“Is that what you want? From a man? How much of your inheritance will go to pay off his debts?”

“His uncle’s debts. Not his.”

“How much for his remaining education?”

“It matters not. Nor is it any of your concern.”

“Perhaps not to you. But it
does
matter,” he pressed. “A man does not favor being kept.”

I shook my head, my agitation rising. What he implied…that if I did come into wealth, that Will would somehow resent it… “We shall see it through. We’re strong, Will and I.”

“Strong,” he said, nodding and taking a slow sip of his wine. “For now. But I will come to Roma and call on you. Just to make certain that Will, or you, have not had a change of heart. Before a ship carries you across the sea again, I must know. I
must
know,
mon ange
,” he said, leaning forward, his eyes filled with passion and concern.

I shook my head, unable to stop my frustration. “You will not be welcome, Pierre.”

“No?”

“No.”

“But Cora…you did not say it. You could not promise me that I did not still hold a tiny corner of your heart.”

I stared at him. “You do not hold a piece of my heart, Pierre.” Suddenly I wanted to hurt him, to wipe out his smug, knowing tone. I was so tired, so very tired of men in my life thinking they knew more than I did about myself.

He leaned back in his chair, his hand lifting to his chest. He stared at me. “That, Cora, wounds me. That you would lie to me.”

I stared at him again, really angry now. “I…you…” But as I gathered my words, I knew I couldn’t lie again. He was right. While Will had my heart, while everything in me knew I belonged with him, there was still a tiny piece of me that acknowledged that if Will wasn’t in my life…if things were different…

It’d be impossible to summarily send Pierre de Richelieu away. Forever.

And then the doubts he’d planted in my head crowded in. Were the obstacles for Will and me too fierce to get beyond?

I pushed back my chair and rose, nearly upsetting the tiny table between us. “I’d like to return to the palazzo now.”

Pierre rose too. “As you wish,
mon ange
.”

“Stop. Stop calling me that,” I said, turning to him and laying a hand on his chest.

He looked down at my hand splayed across his chest, then back to my face as I tried to jerk away. But he caught my hand and placed it where it’d been, covering it with his own. “Ah, yes,” he said lowly. “You feel my heart. It beats for you alone. Can you honestly leave Italy forever without thinking twice about what I feel for you? And you for me, regardless of what you claim? Is there not a part of you, especially now, now that you’ve become a woman of means? A woman all the more suited to be with a man of means?”

Feeling the blush heat my face, I pulled away from him and hurried down the stairs, rushing so that I nearly slipped again on the dark-green muck coating the canal walk surface.

Because he was right. Pierre de Richelieu had managed to pinpoint every small chink in my armor, all the things that both drew me to him as well as the things that repelled me.

CHAPTER 3

~Cora~

We returned to the palazzo in silence. Will was waiting for us out beside the pier. He straightened as we came into view, and his look grew stern as he noticed my stiff demeanor and refusal to look Pierre’s way. As soon as we pulled up alongside the pier, I was rising, taking Pascal’s hand instead of Pierre’s, and then Will’s. I bustled in, and Will was right on my heels.

“Cora, what happened?” he said, grabbing my elbow and trying to pull me to a stop.

“Please, Will, I don’t care to discuss it. I have a dreadful headache. After I rest, we can chat.”

“Did he—”

“Will! Please!” I said, rushing up the stairs. He let me go then, giving me the space my soul was crying for.

I approached Hugh Morgan in the hallway, and he paused, waiting for me to pass. Curiosity loomed large in his eyes, and I could see him working to find the right words, seeing my agitation.

“Not now, Hugh…” I said, holding up a hand. I scurried down the remainder of the hall and slipped into my bedroom, narrowly avoiding slamming the door behind me.

I leaned my forehead against it, panting, wanting out of my hot, confining gown and corset…and using every ounce of my strength to keep from screaming that if I didn’t ever see another man in my life, that would be fine by me…