Midsummer Moon (31 page)

"
Merlin.
"

The word came sharply above the soft splash of water. She jerked upright. Her feet slipped, and she landed backward with a splash in the deepest part of the pool. Surprise and the dress hampered her; by the time she came up, she was gasping for air. Something hauled at the back of her dress—she choked and staggered and found her feet on the smooth marble floor, and twisted around to see Ransom in his sopping shirtsleeves.

He gripped her shoulders and shook her. “In the name of God,” he shouted, “what do you think you're doing?"

Merlin went limp and morose in his hold. She might have known that even the smallest rebellion would be unsuccessful.

"Nothing,” she said sullenly. “It's no business of yours."

"The devil it—” He stopped short, and let go of her. White linen clung to him wetly, outlining the shape of his torso in the last light of evening. The starch had melted from his collar; his lace jabot drooped on his chest. He expelled a deep breath. “Merlin,” he said, in a voice that shook amidst the slosh of water. “When I saw you there, with that dress floating out, I thought—” He drew his hand down his face, wiping water. “God, you gave me a fright."

"Why?” She turned away from him, pushing wet hair from her face. “Are you afraid I might ruin your fountain by trying to find out how it works?"

"Is that what you were doing?"

"No.” She ducked as a spray of water passed. “I didn't get a chance."

"Tomorrow I'll have it turned off. You can take it apart and see everything you want."

"Tomorrow I won't be here."

"Merlin,” he said, and there was quiet anguish in his voice.

She put her hand on the golden fin, feeling tears rise. The spray passed again, a gentle ripple and a mist on her cheek.

He touched her arm, below the sodden puff of sleeve. She barely heard him above the water's light gush as he said, “I'm sorry."

"You burned it."

"I'm sorry,” he repeated. “Will you let me explain?"

She twisted, sloshing water, staring up at him through the mist that had begun to rise. “How could you explain? It's gone."

His face was a contrast of paleness and shadow. In the twilight, his deep brown hair and eyebrows looked black, dusted with fine droplets from the lazy arcs of water that passed rhythmically over their heads. He looked at her, a long, strained look, and closed his eyes. “No. I can't explain. Not so that you would understand."

Her lips trembled. Through a blur she saw his arm move, lifting a thin sheet of water as he touched her cheek. His fingers drifted down her throat, sliding on warm liquid.

"I love you,” he said. “I wanted you to be happy."

"Happy.” Her throat worked in a sob. “How could I be happy in this place? How could I be happy with you?"

"Oh, Merlin,” he whispered.

"Why?” she cried. “I don't know why you ...
keep
me ... here.” Her voice had gone squeaky and out of control. The words began to rush in gasps of fresh despair. “I don't know why you ... took away ... everything I've worked for all my ... life. I want to go home, I—hate you! Oh, I want to go ... home!"

He caught her shoulders. “You can't go home. Not yet."

"I
can.
Why not? I can't stand it here!"

"You'll have to wait—for a while, at least.” His voice had grown gruff. He gave her a little shake that set water gurgling at her waist. “You're still in danger. You can't go now."

Desolation welled up in her. She leaned back against his grip, her fingers sliding on his wet sleeves as she pushed at him for release. “I can't wait. I'll forget. I won't be able to remember everything."

"You can't leave."

"I'll forget,” she wailed, straggling harder. “All my notes, all my drawings. You
burned
it all."

"Merlin—"

"
Let me go!
Let me go; let me go.” She fought him, blinded by tears and water. “I hate you. You burned it. It's gone. It's gone ... and I tried so ... hard! I was ... so ... close...” Her voice disintegrated, tearing apart into huge, choking sobs.

He was stronger than she was; his arms came around her shaking shoulders and drew her close against him. He kept saying her name, over and over, rocking her and holding her, his embrace sure and gentle, offering solace that no one in her life had ever offered.

He pressed his cheek to her hair. Through the racking sobs he stroked her. He hugged her until she leaned on him, crying harder, crying suddenly for all the times she'd failed and there'd been no one there to hold her, no one there to whisper what he did: that it would be all right; that he was there; he was there; that he loved her.

She finally held herself away, her breath short and hiccoughing. “Now I can't...” She swallowed and then moaned, pressing her wet forehead to his chest. “Now I ... can't even ... hate you."

"Good,” he murmured, and kissed her hair. “Good."

"But what will I do? What will I do? My flying machine...” A sound of grief came from deep in her throat. “Oh—what will I do without it?"

"Investigate fountains?” he offered. “Invent electric carriages?” He tilted her head back between his palms. The hard planes of his face were softened, hopeful. “Make love to me?"

She closed her eyes, leaking tears.

"You're my wife.” His lips moved over her skin, tasting the mingle of fountain and salt, touching the tender skin beneath her lashes with his tongue. She could hear the fountain spin lazily around them. It splashed like gentle weeping into the pool.

"You tricked me."

"I was wrong. I was impatient. I was scared a little, Merlin. I was afraid you wouldn't remember—that you wouldn't have me."

"I don't remember. Not much. I remember"—she hesitated, ducked her head—"when you came. I remember that. I remember saying I couldn't marry you."

His hands cradled her chin. Warm water caressed her where his body moved against hers. “Do you remember when I said I loved you?"

"How can you say you love me?” She pulled away. “How can you say that when you burned my aviation machine?"

"Merlin, it had crashed. It was ruined."

"And all my notes. Everything.” She looked up at him, trying to find the malice in his face that might explain that betrayal. “As if you wanted to be sure I can never build it again."

There was no trace of spite in his expression; there was only a kind of pain, and behind it, a stubborn answer to the question “Why?” He pressed his forehead to hers. “I want you safe. I want you alive. It won't fly, Merlin. It never would have."

"It did!” She jerked back away from him, coming up against the marble curve of the fountain. “Woodrow said that it did."

"It got off the ground. And it crashed. Don't you remember?"

She shook her head miserably. “No. And that's the worst of all—that I flew and I can't remember it! I remembered you, and coming here, but after that everything goes to bits and pieces, and I don't remember flying at all, or even how I did it."

"The thing fell apart in the air."

"Woodrow said it was deliberately weakened."

"Woodrow is twelve years old. Merlin, I'd thought I could let you do it—that you could build the thing and I'd hire someone else to test it. But having seen what happened...” He gripped her arms and frowned. “It's a death sentence, to put a man in a machine like that and tell him to fly."

"It's not. And how do I know
you
didn't change the steel screw to a copper one, if you hate the idea of flying so much?"

"Me!” He grew taut, crowding her back against the fountain. “Are you mad? Do you think I would risk—” His voice broke, seemed to fail him for a moment. His fingers closed hard on her shoulders. “God, do you suppose I give a damn whether the thing worked, except for your sake? Do you know what I felt when I saw you lying there under that wreck?” He leaned on her suddenly, taking her mouth in a bruising kiss that Merlin could not push away. “I want you,” he said in harsh answer to her struggles. “I want you. I won't lose you again."

She grew still, panting, not nearly strong enough to break his hold and knowing it. He bent and pressed his mouth to her throat, his warm tongue mingling with the water that slipped from her hair. Her wrists were trapped, pinned by his hard fingers against the marble, sliding slowly downward on the smooth film of water until their hands dipped together into the pool.

"Do you remember this?” he said against her skin. “Do you remember what it's like to have me love you?"

Merlin let out a sharp breath, feeling his body come against her through the layers of water and clothes. He was warmer than the water. She shuddered with it, with the sudden contrast of evening air on her sodden dress and the liquid heat that flowed around her and pressed into her.

"Ah, Merlin...” He buried his face in the curve of her shoulder and throat. “Don't be frightened. Let me love you."

She made a helpless sound, wanting this and not wanting it. She remembered—oh, yes, it was easy to remember what his loving was. The night had come down, but his white shirt glowed against the dark garden, defining his shape the way the sound of falling water defined a circle that enclosed them.

The muslin gown drifted and flowed about her. As her resistance softened he let go of her hands and gathered it up, tugging free the ribbon beneath her breasts. The tight bodice came loose. He pushed the filmy sleeves off her shoulders and down under the water, sliding his hands over the linen chemise that still clung to her body, kissing her bared shoulder. An ardent sound came from low in his throat, a masculine note of excitement that sent response shivering through her.

She lifted her hands to his shoulders. But he pushed her back against the smooth stone, fumbling at each tiny bow that held the wet chemise closed across her breasts. The linen garment came free and followed the gown, leaving her skin to slide uncovered in the warm lap of water at her waist.

"Are you cold?” he asked in her ear, when she trembled under his hands, under the sensation of the polished marble at her back and his palms against her naked hips beneath the pool.

She shook her head, feeling dreamlike, there and somewhere else at once, as if her body was his while her mind had gone far away. He moved back suddenly and an instant later pulled his shirt over his head in a cascade of white cambric and shimmering droplets. He let it go. It floated, a light roughness at her waist. He came to her with water coursing down his face and between their lips as he kissed her.

Merlin covered his hands at her hips and slid her palms up the slick length of his arms. Near his shoulders she paused, encountering the rough width of damp linen pinned around his upper arm.

In the darkness it was a pale slash, catching the first dim glow of moonlight above the wall. Merlin touched it, frowning. Remembering.

The place and moment came back to her clearly—another dusk gone to darkness with him, and blood flowing free instead of water.

Her fingers slipped over his glistening skin, following the curve of muscle that swept upward in a fine arc of living flesh to his shoulder—perfect harmony of form and strength. As beautiful as the symmetry in a curving wing. As precious.

"Ransom,” she whispered in the ripple of water. “I have to leave, but...”
I love you, I still love you.

She did not say it. The words came from nowhere, out of memories too hazy to make sense.

Liquid murmured as he took her in his arms. “You won't leave. I won't let you."

She did not argue with him. There would be this night to keep when he wasn't there. This memory; this time with him when his intensity and his power did not try to crush her dreams, but flowed and blended with them the way the fountain poured into the waiting pool.

She closed her eyes as he caught her mouth hungrily, pressing her back against the stone. She wanted what he wanted. For now.

Ransom felt her yield, felt her body go soft and willing as she arched to fill the space between them. His own responded instantly. He was already on a violently ascending edge with the provocation of water and darkness and her sleek, warm, naked shape that had teased and withdrawn and teased again—all unknowing, all that unblinking innocence of hers that accepted his outrageous overtures as if it were the most conventional thing in nature to be undressed and ravished in a garden fountain.

It was why he loved her, he thought recklessly. Because he'd always wanted to take his wife in a fountain, and never before known it.

The moon cleared the wall behind him, pouring cool light over her face as she tilted it back under his caress. Her lips parted in naive pleasure. The tiny motion sent him soaring: the sharp edge of passion hit its limit like metal searing glass, diamond-hard, pouring sparks into his bloodstream and heat through his brain.

He groaned, regretting the formal silk breeches that kept him from touching every inch of her and too impatient to get rid of them. And then, moving against her, pulling her down with him as he went to his knees with his hand between them for a hasty instant to free himself, he found the smooth material was an added sensation—water and silk and her skin like no silk ever made by the hand of man.

He slid between her legs, with his knees braced where the fountain's base curved into the marble floor. Water, moonlight-silver, lapped high at his chest and covered the tips of her breasts. He held her on his thighs, put his forehead against the base of her throat, and pushed into her.