hair. Damn! What had he done? Why hadn't he given Nina what she wanted? A night of his time. What difference would one night have made?
He glanced out the window. The sky was growing light, changing from black to indigo. Antonina would have to go to ground soon, as would he.
Muttering an oath, he found a scrap of parchment and quickly wrote a list of directions, advising his servants that he had been called away in the middle of the night, leaving instructions that the crate in the basement was to be shipped to Paris immediately, along with his horse. He left enough money to pay for his passage, as well as a generous gratuity. As an afterthought, he invited his servants to take up residence in the castle until he returned, if they so desired.
With the last detail taken care of, he went below to seek his rest, confident that his instructions would be obeyed without question.
His last thought, as the darkness carried him away, was of Sara.
PART One Chapter Twenty
She was never going to see him again. Finally, after three long months, she had resigned herself to that fact. She had stopped looking for him in the audience while she danced, she had stopped searching for his face in the crowds that lingered outside the theater, she had stopped waiting for his knock at the door.
And she had told Maurice that she would marry him in the spring.
She glanced at him now as he donned his hat and coat. He was indeed a handsome young man, lean and fit from hours of dancing and exercise. The ballerinas in the corps de ballet eyed her with envy because she had everything. She was the prima ballerina. Her name was well known in Venice and London and Paris. And she was going to marry Maurice, the premier danseurof the company. Perhaps, one day, they would even form their own ballet company.
She walked him to the door of her apartment, accepted his kiss, bade him good-bye.
Closing the door, she leaned back against it and closed her eyes. She had everything she had ever wanted, so why was she so unhappy? Why did she have to force herself to smile when she was with Maurice? Why did his kisses leave her cold and unmoved?
Because of Gabriel. Always Gabriel. Forever Gabriel. He was out of her life, but he would never be out of her heart, and try as she might, she would never make it so.
"Gabriel." His name was a sob on her lips.
"Cara."
She whirled around, her heart climbing into her throat at the sound of his voice, at the world of tenderness in his endearment for her.
"Gabriel!" She stared at him, unable to believe he was there, that she hadn't conjured his image from the depths of her aching heart.
He wore black breeches, black boots, and a dark green shirt. His cloak fell from shoulders even broader than she remembered. His hair was the color of ebony, his eyes the dark gray of storm-tossed clouds.
The silence stretched between them.
She longed to run into his arms, to lay her head on his chest and cry out all the unhappiness of the past three months.
He yearned to hold her close, to assure himself that she was well.
But she was afraid of being rejected.
And he was afraid that if he touched her again, he would never, ever let her go.
And then she saw the aching loneliness in the depths of his eyes and knew she would risk anything, even the pain of rejection, to comfort him, if only for a moment.
And he knew that he had been fighting a losing battle since the moment he first held her.
"Cara."
Just that one word. That was all he said. But it broke the barrier between them. In less than a heartbeat, she was enfolded in his arms, tears of joy flowing down her cheeks. And he was murmuring her name over and over again, his loneliness banished forever by the sight of her tears - tears of love, of happiness, of acceptance.
He held her close for a long moment, feeling as though he had come home at last, and then he bent his head and brushed his lips across hers. And she melted into him, her arms stealing around his waist, holding him as if she would never let him go.
He kissed her again, more deeply this time, letting himself absorb her warmth, her sweetness.
"Ah, cara," he murmured, "if you only knew how much I've missed you."
"No