The lower gardens it would be, then. Shivering in the cool darkness, Vivien slipped past the gate and confronted Gerard. In the blue wash of moonlight, his face was as pale and formless as blancmange. He was average in height and build, his hairline beginning an inevitable recession to the top of his head. Vivien studied him, thinking that if she had indeed been lovers with this man, she should remember something, anything about him. However, the sight of his face and the sound of his voice had not summoned any ghosts from the void of her memory.
He made a move to embrace her, and she drew back at once.
Gerard laughed low in his throat and shook his head admiringly. 'Vivien, you tease,' he murmured. 'You're as splendid as ever. God knows my eyes have missed the sight of you.'
'I won't stay long,' she replied, forcing herself to pout prettily. 'I don't want to miss a word of gossip at the ball, as I've been away from town much too long.'
'Where have you been the past month? Come, you can confide in your old friend.'
'Are you my friend?' she countered softly.
'If I am not, then you have none.'
Unfortunately that could very well be true. Tilting her head, Vivien affected a coquettish pose, twirling a stray tendril of hair around a slender finger. 'Where I've been is none of your concern, my lord.'
He paced in a half circle around her. 'I believe there are a few questions I'm entitled to ask, pet.' 'You have five minutes. Then I will return to the ball.'
'All right, then, let us begin with the subject of our dear friend Morgan. What is he to you? Surely you can't have accepted him as your latest protector--or have your standards fallen so low since last we met? Oh, I suppose he has a primitive appeal for some women...but he's a commoner. A thief-taker, for God's sake. What sort of charade are you playing at?'
'No charade,' she replied with veiled contempt. How dare this soft-waisted, indolent creature insult Morgan's lack of blue blood? Oh, Morgan had his faults, to be sure...but he was a hundred times more of a man than Gerard could ever hope to be. 'He's an attractive man.'
'An oversized ape,' Gerard scoffed.
'He amuses me. And he can afford my tastes. That is enough for now.'
'You're much better suited to me,' Gerard remarked quietly. 'And we both know it.' His obsidian gaze swept over her with ill-concealed greed. 'Now that the problem that separated us is apparently resolved, I don't see why we can't resume our former relationship.'
Problem? What problem? Vivien stifled a leap of curiosity behind a delicate yawn. 'You talked to Morgan about me,' she said idly.
Apology colored his tone. 'I thought you were dead, otherwise I wouldn't have said one word to the bastard.'
'Did you confide in him about our 'problem'?'
'Of course not. I wouldn't tell a soul about it, and besides...in light of your disappearance, I feared it would cast me in a rather suspicious light.' He paused and asked almost sheepishly, 'How did it end, by the by?'
'How did what end?'
'Don't be obtuse, darling. The pregnancy, of course. Obviously you've miscarried, or perhaps deliberately...' He stopped uncomfortably. 'After much reflection, I admit I was wrong to refuse to acknowledge the babe, but you know the relationship between my wife and me. Her health is delicate, and the knowledge of your pregnancy would have distressed her too greatly. And there is no proof that the child was mine.'
Vivien turned away, her mind on fire.Pregnancy . She had been carrying a child. Slowly her hand crept to her flat abdomen, and trembled as it pressed there. It couldn't be true, she thought frantically. Oh, dear Lord, if she had been pregnant, what had become of the child? A series of hot and cold shivers rippled through her as she mulled the possibilities. It must have resulted in miscarriage, because the alternative was not something she cared to contemplate.
She closed her eyes, squeezed them tight in horror. She wouldn't have aborted the babe...would she? The hows and whys of the question flew around her like attacking birds, pecking and shredding until she flinched.
'I see,' Gerard said, reading her obvious discomfort and deducing that she had indeed deliberately terminated the pregnancy. 'Well, no need to blame yourself, darling. You're hardly the mothering kind. Your talents lie elsewhere.'
Her lips parted, but she couldn't produce a sound. In her guilt and pain, she could only focus on one overwhelming fact. Grant must not find out. If he knew what she had likely done, his contempt for her would know no bounds. He would despise her for eternity...but no more than she would despise herself.
'Vivien.' Gerard's voice penetrated the desperate whirl of her thoughts. He approached her from behind and grasped her gloved arms, his hands sliding in a downward caress. 'Vivien, leave Morgan and come back to me. Tonight. He's only flash gentry. He can't do for you what I can. You know that.'
Poisonous, angry words flooded her mouth, but somehow she held them back. It would be best not to make an enemy of him...He might eventually be of further use to her. She turned a tremulous smile on him. 'I'll consider it,' she said. 'However, don't expect me tonight. Now...we'll go back to the drawing room separately. I won't embarrass Morgan by appearing there with you.'
'One kiss before we go,' Gerard demanded.
Her smile lingered teasingly. 'But I couldn't stop at one, darling. Just leave, please.'
He caught her hand and squeezed, pressing a kiss to the back of her glove. As soon as he walked away, Vivien's smile disappeared. She passed the backs of her fingers over her cold, sweaty brow and fought the urge to cry. Taking a separate path from Gerard's, she wandered back to the manor house.
Consumed by regret and bitter fear, Vivien paused by a thick hedge bordering a massive stone statue of Father Time. A welcome breeze fanned over her. She felt feverish, dazed, and she knew she had to compose herself before entering the drawing room. She did not want to face the crowd inside, and she especially did not want to face Grant.
'Harlot.' A man's hate-thickened voice darted through the silence, causing her to start. 'I won't rest until you're dead.'
Stunned, Vivien whirled in a circle, searching for the source of the voice. Shadows danced around her. Her heart thudded with sickening speed. The sound of footsteps caused her to bolt like a frightened rabbit. Grabbing handfuls of her skirts, she let out a muffled sob and raced up the stone steps, stumbling, scrambling toward the lights from the manor. Her foot slipped on a patch of moisture, or perhaps a stray leaf, and she fell heavily, banging the front of her shin on the edge of a step. Crying out in pain, she gathered herself to run again, but it was too late--a pair of arms had already begun to close around her.
'No,' she whimpered, flailing out in selfdefense, but she was firmly restrained in an iron grip.
A harsh voice rumbled in her ear, and it took several seconds for her to recognize the familiar sound. 'Vivien, be still. It's me. Look at me, dammit.'
Blinking, she stared at him until the panic cleared from her vision. 'Grant,' she said between hard spurts of breath. He must have seen her from the house, and started for her the instant she panicked. Sitting on the stone steps, he held her, his dark face only inches from her own. The moonlight shimmered over the long plane of his nose and threw shadows from his thick lashes down his cheeks. Vivien clutched at him in shivering relief, her arms wrapped tightly around his neck. 'Oh, thank God--'
'What happened?' he demanded curtly. 'Why did you run?' She licked her dry lips and struggled to speak coherently. 'Someone spoke to me from behind the statue.'
'Was it Gerard?'
'No, I don't th-think so--it didn't sound like him, but I don't--Oh, look!' She pointed as a dark shape moved past the statue and disappeared around the hedges.
'That's Flagstad,' Grant muttered. 'One of the Runners. If there's a man in the area, he'll find him.'
'Shouldn't you be chasing after him, too?'
Grant toyed with one of the pinned curls atop her head that had come loose, and tucked it gently back in place. Suddenly a caressing smile touched his lips. 'Are you suggesting I leave you alone?'
'No,' she said immediately, her arms tightening around his neck. 'Not after what he said to me.'
His smile vanished at once. 'What did he say, Vivien?'
She hesitated, sharply aware of her own need for caution. Nothing about the pregnancy must be
