Evening Star (Star Quartet 1)

Giana pointed the dinner knife at him. “Obviously I will not tell you, Mr. Saxton, any of my sources of information. As for my mother, I was glad to see how well she looked this evening.” She looked as if she would have continued, but the waiter returned, bearing a tureen of turtle soup.

Giana stared down at the soup and felt her stomach knot in protest. She watched Alex eat heartily, a look of pure loathing on her face.

“If looks could kill, I most certainly would be dead meat by now,” he said, grinning at her as he spooned up the last bit.

“Let up stop this ridiculous fencing, Mr. Saxton. It is obvious that it is your intent to blackmail me and my mother. What is your price? Do you hope the Van Cleve shipyards and ships will be turned over without a sou to you?”

He appeared to study her, turning her words over in his mind. “Do not deny me the upper hand, Miss Van Cleve,” he said. “Allow me my fencing time with you. It is to your benefit, I assure you, for it lessens my anger at you. I have cursed myself so many times during the past four years, cursed myself for not examining you myself in front of all the other buyers, stripping you naked and thrusting my finger inside you. You can still blush. How very charming.” He suddenly sat forward in his chair and tapped the tips of his fingers together thoughtfully. “Indeed, I was a fool, for likely I would have discovered that you were anything but a virgin even then. At fifteen years old, Giana?”

“I was seventeen.”

“Ah yes, I remember now your telling me that. You know, the only fact I bothered discovering about you, the famous Aurora Van Cleve’s daughter, was that you were in an exclusive young ladies’ seminary in Switzerland until you were seventeen. Surely you can imagine my surprise when I first saw you, the little harlot who had bested me. Was it your habit to travel to Rome during your holidays for your amusement? Rich young ladies, I suppose, do get bored and crave excitement. Your, shall we say, solution was most unusual. Perhaps you fell in with an unusual lover in Rome, Giana. Was it that disgusting old man I saw eyeing you at the Flower Auction, the one who forced my hand by bidding that outrageous amount for your nonexistent maidenhead?”

Giana closed her eyes against his words. “You have insulted me enough, Mr. Saxton. Only one thing you have said is true. I did attend Madame Orlie’s seminary in Geneva.”

“Ah, and you were not in Rome playing the harlot that summer? Do you plan to deny that?”

“You must believe me, it was all a ghastly mistake. I am not, and never have been, what you think. What can I do to convince you that I am not a harlot?”

“There is something,” he said, “only one thing you can do.”

Giana’s eyes flew to his face, suddenly hopeful.

“What?”

“You can give me your virginity.”

“Go ahead, Mr. Saxton,” she said as calmly as she could. “Vent your anger. Relieve your spleen, if you must, though I should prefer that you choke on it.”

“You will cease your insults and your playacting, Giana, though in all honesty you are really quite good. Perhaps even now you could have convinced me, my dear, but you see, I remember.” His voice became hard with cold anger. “It took me some time, but I finally remembered seeing you at Madame Lucienne’s. You were standing in the shadows behind a marvelously nude statue and a potted fern. You were wearing a blond wig that time, and it was long before the Flower Auction. You see, I was drawn to you even then. I wondered if you visited the Flower Auction each time it was held to pick the likeliest stranger for your plucking. How well you read my attraction to you. You were even certain that I, unlike some of the other gentlemen there, would not demand to examine you for your valuable maidenhead. No, my dear, aghast expressions and trembling denials will not do. I looked for you, you see, you and that old bastard, but I gathered you realized I wasn’t a man to take such blatant robbery quietly, and went into hiding. It was wise of you, for it would have given me great pleasure to thrash you within an inch of your life. There is much you owe me, Giana, and you may be certain that I will be paid in full.”

“Two thousand dollars,” Giana whispered. “I will repay you. You must believe me, it was not what you think. It was all a mistake.”

Alex gave a crack of rude laughter. “You will certainly pay, Miss Van Cleve, but I have no interest in the money.”

“You will stop talking to me like this, Mr. Saxton. You are being cruel and I will have no more of it. I have promised to repay you.”

“As I told you, Miss Van Cleve, you will most certainly repay me. I am quite used to getting value for my money. And when an adversary breaks the rules, I react in kind. So save your mewling protests, my dear, you but anger me.”

Giana stared down at her mutton, then raised a pale face and said unexpectedly, “You struck me. I was struggling with you because I was terribly frightened, even though you refuse to believe me.”

He did not reply immediately, seemingly intent on savoring the salmon. “It was then I discovered you have very lovely breasts, Giana,” he said, his eyes falling to her heaving bosom. “If your accomplice hadn’t been so efficient, I would have found out for myself that I held no virgin in my arms, but as it was, I discovered only that you were wearing undergarments. Such a nuisance to caress a woman wearing so damned many layers of clothes. But you have become even more beautiful in the years we have been apart. You have the body of a woman now. I have never preferred girls, no matter how skilled they are.”

Giana lurched to her feet, clutching her reticule. “I want to go home now. I will not listen to you any longer.”

“Sit down and try at least to eat some of your dinner. You are too well known to attempt racing out of here without my escort. Besides, you would not have come unless you were curious about what it is I want. I have not yet told you.”

Giana eased back down into her chair, eyeing him.

“I have come to a decision,” he said presently, as if discussing a business matter. “You asked me if I intended to blackmail you and your mother. I consider it a waste of my time, in general, to play at business with a girl, but your performance this morning piqued my curiosity. I will not blackmail you in our business dealings—indeed, I would find no amusement in that. I will tell you what I will expect of you tomorrow afternoon when you visit Kew Gardens with me. Do not again dress the dowd, Giana.”

She knew what he wanted now. He was simply gloating, amusing himself with her.

“Mr. Saxton,” she said, “I was in Rome four years ago, it is true, but not by my own choice. I did nothing, I swear it, nothing save observe.”

A thick black brow rose. “Ah, a young lady learning about sex by sitting in a brothel? An interesting finish to a girl’s education.”

“I did not wish to be there, you must believe me, and stop this nonsense.”