"Was it necessary to ... to..."
"Try to charm you? Rest a.s.sured, Diana, that was not all playacting. If I had not felt it crucial to avoid having my private life made public, I"d have done much more than take you to supper."
"Oh."
Bathory cleared his throat. "Yes. Oh."
There did not seem to be anything else to say.
Diana drifted into sleep soon after, and woke to the first pale light of day. She was still wrapped tightly with Bathory in the warm folds of his cloak. Her first thought was that she ought to be scandalized. Her second was that she was safe in his arms.
She felt more alive when she was with him. She"d not been this filled with energy since those giddy days right before she"d eloped with Evan.
The comparison gave her pause, but she chose to believe she was older and wiser now. She"d not repeat the same mistakes she"d made in the past. What harm, then, could there be in enjoying the heady pleasure of this man"s unique company?
When others began to stir, Diana realized that there was an unusual amount of activity outside the parlor car, too. A party of rescuers had arrived to finish the task of freeing the train from its prison of snow. In the end, it took a snowplow pulled by twenty-eight horses and hundreds of men shoveling in front of it, to get them unstuck, but by midday they were at last able to press on to Stamford.
At 1:30 that afternoon, the train pulled into New Haven. Diana was one of the last to step, gingerly, onto the platform. Her ankle was tender, but she managed with the help of a cane, the fancy one Charles Underly always carried. Jerusha had appropriated it for her.
The other pa.s.sengers milled about, most trying to make arrangements to go on to their original destinations. Bathory disappeared, but only long enough to hail one of the hotel wagons lined up at the depot.
"I"m taking you to the Columbia House," he informed her.
She knew the name. It was one of New Haven"s finest hotels. "I cannot afford to stay there."
"You"ll be a guest in my suite. With two separate bedrooms, you can be as respectable as you want to be."
"Oh, but -- "
"I feel ... responsible for you." There was a warmth in his tone that did nothing to dispel her uneasiness.
She fought it with banter. "Does that mean you"re willing to admit to all and sundry, and my readers, that you are a physician?"
"I am willing to do all sorts of things, if you agree to come with me."
When he looked at her that way, it was impossible to resist.
"All right, but I must send a telegram to my editor first."
"A precaution?"
"A courtesy."
But telegraph lines were down in that direction. A hand-lettered paper, posted next to the distinctive black and yellow metal sign of the Western Union office, gave no indication of when they"d be up and running again. Diana was not really surprised. After a storm so severe, it only made sense that communications were still disrupted.
"Diana!" Jerusha hurried towards her along the platform.
Toddy and Charles Underly followed after her, trailed more slowly by Lavinia Ross.
"Wonderful news!" Jerusha called. "The train can go on to Hartford. We leave in ten minutes, which means we can still make the last night of our stand." She engulfed Diana in a lavender-scented hug. "Will you be all right on your own?"
They both looked around for Damon Bathory. He had gone into the Western Union office. Diana could see him through its bay window, conversing with the man on the other side of the bra.s.s grill.
"I will manage, Jerusha." Diana forced a smile. Her friend"s cough was much improved, but both eyes and nose still looked red and sore. "You must take care of yourself and stop worrying about me."
When Charles Underly reached them, she solemnly handed over his cane.
"Can you do without?" Toddy asked. "Underly, give that back to her. You can always buy another."
Underly sulked. "I need my cane. You know it"s specially made."
Bathory interrupted, emerging from the telegraph office to take Diana"s arm. "She has me to lean on," he said. "She has no need of a cane."
Jerusha sent him a piercing look. "Can we trust you to take good care of her, sir?" They all turned to stare at him.
"It was her desire for a story about me that landed Mrs. Spaulding on this train in the first place. I am honor bound to make certain she gets back to New York."
"Good man," Toddy declared, slapping him on the back. "But, another word with you before you go?"
They stepped aside. Diana a.s.sumed Toddy meant to make one last attempt to persuade Bathory to give him dramatization rights to his stories. "Good luck to him," she muttered.
"Good luck to you," Jerusha said, and slipped a small silk purse into Diana"s hands.
She peeped inside and was astonished at the sum it contained. "I cannot take your money!"
"Consider it a loan, just in case you do not wish to let someone else pay your way. You have no means yet to return to Manhattan, and even if the tracks were completely clear, it is never wise to be entirely dependent upon a man"s charity."
Murmuring her thanks, and further admonitions for Jerusha to mind her health, Diana slid the purse into her leather bag. It was with mixed emotions that she watched her theatrical friends depart, leaving her alone in a strange city under the protection of the most compelling and dangerous man she"d ever met.
Chapter Ten.
Ben signed the register at the Columbia House with a flourish: Mr. and Mrs. Damon Bathory. It gave him an odd feeling to do so, but he forced his qualms aside. She had agreed to let him take care of her. What did one more small deception matter?
"I need to purchase a few things," Diana murmured as the bellboy collected their luggage, almost all of it Ben"s.
Reminded of the state of her wardrobe, he sent the bags on to their suite. The desk clerk provided the name of the best dress shop in the city.
"You need proper clothing if you don"t want to be gossiped about," he insisted over Diana"s protests as he hustled her into a cab.
"Far be it from me to create scandal," she agreed, "but a dressmaker needs time to sew clothing. I need a department store with ready-made fashions."
Reluctantly, he changed their driver"s orders, surprised to find that he had been looking forward to ordering a new wardrobe for her.
At first she would not look at anything more than bare essentials. "Too expensive," she complained when he pointed out a gown that would go well with her complexion, "and unnecessarily dressy."
"Let me buy it for you. It"s the least I can do."
"You are already doing too much. In fact, I insist on paying half the cost of the hotel."
"It is my fault you were on that train. My fault you"re stranded here now."
She started to say something, then changed her mind. She fingered the fabric of the dress. "A loan, then. To be repaid as soon as I return to New York."
"Yes. Fine." He"d have agreed to a good deal more just to see her in that dark green silk.
"I will need an address, to send you the money."
"Try on the gown."
The look she sent him over her shoulder as she carried it and another off to a changing room sent what remained of his good sense out the window. He scribbled on a piece of paper and had it ready to hand to her when she returned. A fict.i.tious street and number. In Buffalo.
To his disappointment, she did not model the silk, but did promise to wear it to supper in the hotel dining room that evening. She plucked the slip of paper from his hand, glanced at it, and tucked it into her bag, then was engaged by the sales clerk in a discussion of undergarments.
Diana"s pleasure at having free rein in the ladies" department made Ben realize how much he was enjoying himself. He liked buying pretty things for her. While she tried on a serviceable wool dress, he picked out a cameo brooch. And when she would have selected a plain brown coat, he talked her into a fur-trimmed, dark green garment.
"It is your color, my dear. It makes the best of your hair."
"You will turn my head with such flattery, sir," she warned him.
"I hope so, madam." He had, after all, every intention of taking her to bed that night and seeing that glorious hair spread out on a white pillowcase. A pity he could not arrange for green silk on their bed as well.
By the time they reached their suite and Diana closed herself in one bedroom with a hotel maid to dress for supper, Ben could think of little else but making love to her. Unfortunately that urge was accompanied by an inconvenient desire to tell her everything about himself. He even wished he had not been so quick to give her that false address.
As he changed into his own evening attire he wondered when his feelings towards Diana had gone beyond simple l.u.s.t. Dangerous waters lay ahead. No question about that.
He grinned at his reflection in the mirror. He"d always enjoyed taking a canoe through the rapids on the Kenduskeag in the spring. Giving his cravat a last pat, he went out to meet his fate.
She looked magnificent in the dark green silk, as he"d known she would. Her mahogany-colored hair had been twisted up in an elaborate knot. He looked forward to taking it down.
Ben removed the box with the cameo from his pocket, took out the brooch, and pinned it just at the center of Diana"s modest neckline. She shivered as his fingers brushed her neck.
Then her stomach growled, and shared laughter took them out of the suite and down to the lobby.
"One stop on the way to the dining room," Diana begged. "I want to try again to send a telegram."
The hotel housed its own branch office off the lobby, staffed by a Western Union telegrapher, a harried-looking young woman whose green eye shade was crooked.
"Still no direct contact with New York City," she informed Diana, pushing at the drooping elastic armbands that held her sleeves away from her wrists. The telegraph key at her elbow was silent, the only sound in the office the ticking of the clock on the far wall.
"Not surprising," Bathory said. "Shall we go in to supper?" He offered her his arm.
The waiter seated her, but when Bathory should have taken his chair, he sent her an apologetic look instead. "I meant to ask the telegrapher about incoming messages. Will you excuse me while I go back and check with her? I won"t be long."
He returned within five minutes, giving Diana just time enough to decide what she wanted to eat. He smiled at her, but a line of worry creased his brow.
"Is something wrong?" she asked.
"Nothing that can"t be fixed. But I should be asking you the same question. Is there some reason why you are so anxious to reach that editor of yours? Is there something ... personal between you and this Horatio Foxe?"
"He"s my employer. And I have been wondering, naturally, what he"s done about my daily columns since I"ve been gone. With this storm, he may not have been able to publish the newspaper at all."
"Is that all there is to your relationship?"
It took her a moment to understand what he was hinting at and when she did she couldn"t resist an enigmatic answer. "It is now."
"And before? Was he your lover?"
She couldn"t hold back a smile. He sounded as if he were jealous. "When I first knew him, I looked on him as an older brother."
Bathory eased back in his chair, his manner more relaxed than it had been. "You seem to have a plentiful supply of those. Or do you regard Nathan Todd as a surrogate father?"
"More like a jolly old uncle."
That forced a wry laugh out of him. "No doubt that"s why he took me aside this afternoon and warned me to behave like a gentleman around you. Just because you have friends who are actresses, he said, doesn"t mean you can be treated like a woman with loose morals."
Diana gaped at him. "Toddy said that?"
"That and more. He explained that, as Evan Spaulding"s widow, you were like family to his troupe, and that they looked out for their own."
At Bathory"s urging, Diana shared some of her favorite anecdotes about Toddy and Jerusha during the meal. And one or two that involved Horatio Foxe and his sister Rowena. He talked about his recent travels.
Diana sent him a shy smile as she toyed with the last bite of the chocolate trifle she"d ordered for dessert. She found it easy to imagine sharing a lifetime of meals with him and never being bored.
Abruptly, Bathory pushed his chair away from the table and stood. "Shall we return to our suite?"
She readily agreed, although she did feel a bit nervous about being alone with him.
"You"re favoring that ankle," he remarked as they left the dining room."
"It"s a little tender."
"Let me take a look at it," he insisted when they reached the small sitting room between their bedrooms. Diana obediently sank into one of the chairs.
He went down on one knee on the floor in front of her and lifted her foot until it rested atop the other knee. With a tender touch, he began to remove her boot -- she"d refused the offer of dainty evening slippers to go with the gown. He took his time over the b.u.t.tons.
She could always go back to asking questions, Diana thought a bit desperately. Conduct that interview. Had he not promised to cater to her every wish while they were in New Haven?
Then he swept away her stocking and touched her bare ankle and she felt the shock of that contact all the way to her womb.
All afternoon, all through their meal, he"d made her feel things she"d not experienced for a very long time.