Moonlight Masquerade by Kasey Michaels

Congratulations on the successful conclusion of your little
expedition. Good evening, Christine.”
    Christine stopped in front of the wingback
chair, the fireplace at her back. She leaned forward slightly,
trying to make out his form in the darkened room. “Good evening
yourself, my lord Hawkhurst. Why didn’t we see you at dinner?”
    He sighed, fatalistically, as if he had been
expecting the question. “Why did I reject you? That is your real
question, isn’t it, Christine?” he inquired softly, almost kindly.
“Your entire posture speaks most eloquently of injured pride.”
    “As your retreat from me speaks most
eloquently of your fear of life, Vincent,” she returned, once more
letting emotion make a shambles of her best intentions, yet not
caring that she might be making a fool of herself. “Oh, Vincent,”
she cried, falling to her knees in front of him, her hands closing
convulsively on his thighs, “why? Today, in the garden, we were so
close. It was so wonderful, so very special. I thought we had
reached an understanding. Why are you doing this to me—to us?”
    His right hand, folded over his left in his
lap, tentatively reached out to her, then just as quickly withdrew.
“Do get up, Miss Denham,” he ordered coldly. “You are making a fool
of yourself.”
    Christine looked down at her own hands,
realized where they were, and immediately removed them, to sink
back on her heels. “Then you—you don’t care for me?” Her voice was
small, and injured.
    Vincent’s next words tore into her,
assaulting her with the force of physical blows. Even in the
darkness she knew that he was wearing the forbidding face she had
seen in his study. There was no trace of kindness in him now. “Care
for you? I care very much—for certain portions of you, that is. I
have been without a willing woman for a long time, Miss Denham. You
are not only young and beautiful, but you seem to be more than
usually ripe for the picking.
    “If you could be so kind as to lie on your
back for me, for instance, I would most certainly be appreciative.
I had thought my sad, tragic story would allow me to work my way
into your bed. I had not counted on arousing your infantile
affections as well. But, unfortunately, you are very immature, and
prone to romantic exaggerations which could only complicate matters
once I’d had my fill of you.”
    Another woman might have swooned. Another
woman might have jumped up and beat furiously at him, hoping to
return injury for injury, hurt for hurt. Yet another woman might
have quietly acquiesced, willing to take him on his own terms.
    Christine sat very still for a long time,
allowing the tears to roll unchecked down her cheeks, not caring if
he saw them. Then, just as the silence had grown nearly unbearable,
she spoke, her voice very small in the huge chamber, caressing him
with its tenderness, its compassion. “I suspect I might be falling
in love with you too, Vincent.”
    Hawkhurst bolted out of the chair, nearly
knocking Christine down as he reeled almost drunkenly toward the
fireplace, quickly, prudently, putting half a room between
them.
    “What am I going to do with you, woman?
Don’t you listen? Don’t you understand? I’m rejecting you, totally
and absolutely. I don’t want you. I don’t want you here, in my
house. I don’t want you in my life. Damn you, Christine, why can’t
you leave me alone?”
    Still on the floor, Christine turned her
upper body, supporting herself on her hands as she stared at him as
he was revealed in the firelight, glad to see that he was dressed
in only breeches and an open-collared white shirt, with the cloak
nowhere in evidence. She was stretching toward him, a supplicant,
begging to be heard. “You would do this, Vincent? You would condemn
us both?”
    “Condemn us? What would I be condemning us
to Christine? I would regain my hard-won peace, and you’d go off to
London to enjoy a successful debut. The condemnation, my sweet
infant, would be in