The Diamond Slipper (31 page)

“It might get better,” she said vaguely. “Let’s not talk of it anymore, it’ll only depress us.”

“Oh, very well,” Toinette agreed, stating with another lightning change of subject, “I am determined that I shall not acknowledge Madame du Barry.”

“Why ever not?”

“She’s a whore. The empress would never permit such a one at court and I don’t see why I should be insulted by her presence.” Toinette looked proudly at Cordelia and she was suddenly her mother’s daughter.

Cordelia could see that Toinette was going to get herself into trouble. “The du Barry is the king’s favorite. By slighting her it could be said you were slighting the king.”

Toinette shook her head, her pretty mouth taking a stubborn turn. “She is an immoral woman and the king is living in sin. He cannot make confession while he keeps a mistress, and it’s my God-given duty to help him change his ways.”

Cordelia stared incredulously. She knew that Toinette could take strange notions into her head and become obsessed by them. She knew that the empress had imbued all her children with strong faith and religious conviction. But Maria Theresa, despite her high moral tone, was also a pragmatist. Such foolish opposition to the king would make Toinette a laughingstock.

“I think you should consider this very carefully,” she said. “There’s more to this than simple immorality.”

“I know my duty,” Toinette stated, folding her lips
together. “I know what my faith requires of me. I will not acknowledge that vulgarian whore.”

Cordelia sensed she would get no further at this point. Perhaps during the wedding celebrations over the next few days Toinette’s attitude to the king’s mistress would not be noticed.

“Madame, it is time for you to dress.” Countess de Noailles appeared unannounced.

Cordelia rose to her feet. “I’ll see you later, Toinette.” She kissed her, then stepped back and dropped a low curtsy. “I beg leave to depart, madame.”

Toinette chuckled, much to the countess’s disapproval. “You’re supposed to curtsy three times to the future queen of France.”

Cordelia did so, backing out of the dauphine’s presence. Her eyes, alight with mischief, held Toinette’s, who adopted an arrogant tilt of her head, until her ever ready laughter got the better of her.

Cordelia, thoughtful but still smiling, left the royal apartments. She glanced around the thronged hallway, where courtiers gossiped and servants scurried. She could see no sign of Monsieur Brion. He had said that since she presumably had not yet learned her way around the palace, she could summon any flunky to escort her back to the prince’s apartments on the imperial staircase. Was it safe to suppose that for this moment she was out of her husband’s observation? Surely he wouldn’t have spies in the crowd. It was worth the risk.

But could she remember the way? It would have been easier if she’d walked it herself, but Leo had carried her. On the way to his apartment, she had been almost unconscious, and on the way back, she had been aware only of his arms around her, his closeness, her mind and body filled to overflowing with the memories of his bed.

She made her way through the throng to a footman standing at the foot of a staircase. He bowed as she approached him.

“Do you happen to know where Viscount Kierston is lodged?”

“On one of the outside stairs, madame.”

“Can you be more precise?”

The man’s eyes sharpened. He had no idea whom among the hundreds of unfamiliar wedding guests he was talking to, but his service at Versailles had taught him to smell out an intrigue. “I could escort you, madame.”

“That will not be necessary. Just give me directions.”

She listened attentively. It sounded relatively straight-forward, and if she became lost, she could always ask someone else. With a nod of thanks, she disappeared into the crowd, leaving the curious footman to his speculations.

Once Cordelia had left the state apartments, she found herself traversing long marble corridors, climbing wide, shallow marble staircases, meeting only servants and the occasional hurrying courtier. Everyone at Versailles seemed to be in a tearing hurry, which, given the vast distances they had to travel and the frequent events they were required to attend, was perhaps understandable.

By the time Cordelia reached the staircase where Leo’s apartment was situated, she felt as if she’d walked miles, but she’d recognized certain landmarks on the way and was certain she could find her way back to her own apartments.

Cordelia raised her hand to knock on the narrow wooden door, then decided against it. Boldly, she lifted the latch and pushed open the door. The room was empty. She stepped inside, closing the door quietly behind her. Then she took a deep breath of relief. For the moment, she was safe from prying eyes. She looked around the small chamber with a sense of wonder. Everything was just as she remembered it. The room was filled with Leo’s presence. She could almost smell his own special scent in the air. She touched the bed, the pillow, looking for the indentation of his head, his body, remembering the crispness of the sheet against her back as he held himself above her.

She opened the armoire and stroked his clothes, taking secret guilty pleasure in the feel of the garments that had touched his skin. She rested her cheek against a velvet coat that she remembered him wearing at Compiègne.

“Cordelia, what in the devil’s name are you doing here?”

She jumped, spun round. Leo stood in the door.

“What’s happened?” He kicked the door shut behind him and came toward her.

“Nothing.” She ran to him, flinging her arms around his waist. “Nothing’s happened, but I had to find out if it was real. Did it really happen? Do you really love me, Leo?” She looked up at him, her head tilted against his breast. “Tell me I didn’t dream it all.”

“You didn’t dream it all,” he said wryly. “But you shouldn’t be here, Cordelia.”

“No one saw me.” She released his waist and stood on tiptoe to kiss him. “Prove that it wasn’t a dream, love.”

The passion in the sapphire depths of her eyes was purely erotic, and Leo felt his bearings slip. She came into his embrace with a little sigh, her face lifting for his kiss, her eyes wide open, her lips parted eagerly, a soft flush on her cheeks.

He took her mouth with his, felt her lean into him, yielding every muscle and fiber to his hold so that if he dropped his arms from around her, she would sink to the floor.

He bore her backward to the bed. She fell in a tangle of skirts, her arms around him, pulling him down with her. She wouldn’t release his mouth, her hands clasping his head as she drank greedily of his mouth as if it were a goblet full of the sweetest hippocras.

He grabbed her wrists behind his neck and broke her grip as he pushed himself up onto his knees. She lay beneath him, her skirts lifted in a tent on the wide hoop. She gazed up at him, her tongue moistening her lips, her eyes wild with excitement, her cheeks pink. He threw her skirts up to her
waist, baring her long creamy thighs encircled by lace-edged garters, the thick curly bush at the base of the smooth white plane of her belly, the sharp pointed hipbones, the tight whorl of her navel.

He feasted his eyes on the sight as she lay ready and waiting, her hips shifting eagerly, her thighs parting to reveal the faint dew of arousal on their satiny inner slopes.

Her fingers were busy on his britches, unbuttoning him, as he knelt above her, her breath coming swift and hot from her parted lips. His hard flesh sprang forth. She enclosed him in her fist, holding him, feeling the blood pulsing in the thick corded veins. Her thumb brushed over the tip of the shaft where the moist drops of his own arousal gathered. She smiled up at him, raised her hips, and guided him inside her. It was as if she had always known how to do this.

The current of joy at their joining leaped through them, so explosive they both cried out. Leo held himself above her, his weight on his flat palms; his mouth came down on hers, stifling their cries. He moved slowly within her, trying to prolong the moment yet knowing it was hopeless. There was too much spontaneous excitement in this coupling and no way he could control his own arousal let alone Cordelia’s rippling convulsions of pleasure.

“No … no,” she whispered urgently against his mouth, sensing that he was going to leave her. “Stay with me.”

He wanted to stay forever in the heavenly chamber of her body. He wanted to feel her joy against his flesh as his own burst from him. But caution prevailed. He kissed her again, holding himself on the edge of her body as the wave broke over her, then he withdrew from her just as his own climax ripped through him. He fell heavily upon her, tossed and tumbled in the sea of sensation, his heart beating wildly against his ribs so that Cordelia could feel its pounding against her bosom as if his heart was trying to break through flesh to join with hers.

She stroked his hair, her eyes closed on a warm red darkness. She was at peace, as if she had come home. Her body’s
pressing hunger had been for the moment assuaged, and the love she felt for this man had found expression. And she knew with the deepest joy that his for her had been contained in the loving of his body.

Slowly, Leo raised his head, pushed himself back onto his knees, and looked down at her.

She smiled impishly. “I think I’m learning this business very quickly, don’t you?” She raised her arms above her head and a ray of sunshine caught the serpent bracelet encircling her wrist. The diamond slipper glittered against her white skin.

He took her wrist, turning it over as he examined the bracelet. The serpent who tempted Eve. Eve who tempted Adam.

But Leo had bitten the apple with full knowledge of its consequences, and now this woman was in his heart. He would love her and he would protect her.

“What are you thinking? You look very stern.” Almost shyly, she touched his mouth.

He smiled. “I was thinking of the burdens of love,” he said lightly. “Come, get up and tidy yourself. You must leave quickly.”

Cordelia swung herself off the bed, straightening her skirts. She tidied her disordered hair in the mirror. Her skin was translucent, her lips reddened, her eyes glowing. “I do look wanton,” she said in some awe.

Leo came up behind her. He placed his hands on her shoulders and looked into her eyes in the mirror. “You must not take risks, Cordelia. Do you understand me?”

“I won’t take unnecessary risks,” she promised. “Did you find somewhere safe for Mathilde?”

“She’s with Christian at his lodgings in the town,” he said shortly. “I will contrive a meeting for you later.”

“You’re cross again,” Cordelia accused, turning from the mirror. “I hate it when you’re vexed with me.”

“Then do as I tell you,” he said as curtly as before. “You are a very frustrating child.”

“No child,” she said with another impish chuckle. “Children don’t know what I know.” She reached up to kiss him again. “Children can’t do what I can do.” She whirled to the door, blew him another kiss over her shoulder, and vanished, leaving him shaking his head at empty space.

Chapter Sixteen

M
ICHAEL WAS WAITING
for her when she returned to their apartments. “Just where have you been?” His face was dark and she felt the barely controlled threat behind his words. It was not difficult to heed Leo’s warning. However much she was prepared to defy Michael, she couldn’t bear him to strike her again.

She curtsied politely. “I was summoned to the dauphine, my lord. As I told you.”

“You left the royal apartments over an hour ago,” he stated, coming toward her. “I sent a footman to inquire and to escort you back here. He was told you had already left.”

It seemed she was always to be under observation. “After I left Her Highness, I went for a walk in the gardens, sir. There was no time to view them yesterday.”

Michael didn’t know whether to believe her or not. She was looking a little disheveled, her hair looser than it should be, the ruffles on her sleeves turned back. “You are untidy, madame. It does not suit my pride for my wife to be seen abroad looking as if she had slept in her clothes.”

It was such a wonderfully apt comparison in the circumstances that Cordelia wanted to laugh despite herself. However, this situation did not warrant amusement. “The wind was brisk, sir. And when I realized that I had been out over-long, I hurried back. I imagine that’s why I’m somewhat disordered.”

Despite her politeness, her formal curtsies, Michael was not convinced that he had finally subdued her. There was something beneath the surface of those brilliant blue eyes that disturbed him.

Elvira had taught him to be alert to all the tricks and wiles
of a beautiful woman. To know that when they plotted deceit, they were at their most innocent.

“If you would excuse me, sir, I’ll go my bedchamber to tidy myself.” She executed another perfect curtsy.

Michael regarded her coldly. She looked up and met his gaze with a stare as unflinching and penetrating as his, and he knew he’d been right. She was far from subdued.

“Go. We leave for the opera in half an hour.” He turned away with a contemptuous gesture of dismissal. Cordelia went into her own bedchamber to summon the hapless Elsie.