A Regency Captain's Prize: The Captain's Forbidden Miss / His Mask of Retribution. Margaret McPhee
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turned to Molyneux in appeal. ‘Lieutenant, I would dearly like to climb that hill and watch the sunset. I would not wander from the route, which is clear and within your view from this position. I give you my most solemn word that I would not try to escape and that I would return to you here as soon as possible.’ Her voice raised in hope as she willed him to agree.
‘I am sorry, mademoiselle…’ his voice was gentle ‘…but Captain Dammartin…’ His words faltered and he started again. ‘I would be very happy to accompany you in your walk up the hill, if you would permit me. The sunset does indeed look most beautiful.’
She gave a nod of her head. ‘That would be most kind, Lieutenant.’
‘Then we should go quickly before we miss it,’ he said.
Josie smiled and wrapped her cloak more tightly around her and pulled her hat lower over her ears.
Together they walked up the hill by the camp side. And when the slope grew steeper, it seemed perfectly natural that Lieutenant Molyneux should take her arm in his, helping her to cover the ground with speed.
The summit was flat like a platform specially fashioned by the gods with the sole purpose of viewing the wonder of the heavens. Josie and Molyneux stood in awe at the sight that met their eyes. Before them the sky flamed a brilliance of colours. Red burned deep and fiery before fading to pink that washed pale and peachy. Great streaks of violet bled into the pink as if a watercolour wash had been applied too soon. Like some great canvas the picture was revealed before them in all its magnificence, a greater creation than could have been painted by any mere man. And just in the viewing of it, something of the heavy weight seemed to lift from Josie’s heart and for the first time since Telemos she felt some little essence of peace. Such vastness, such magnificence, as to heal, like a balm on her troubled spirit. Words were inadequate to express the beauty of nature.
Josie stood in silent reverence, her hand tucked comfortably within Molyneux’s arm, and watched, until the sound of a man’s tread interrupted.
Josie dragged her eyes away from the vivid spectacle before her to glance behind.
Captain Dammartin stood not three paces away. His face was harder than ever she had seen it, his scar emphasised by the play of light and shadows. He looked at where Josie’s hand was tucked into his lieutenant’s arm, and it seemed that there was a narrowing of his eyes.
‘Lieutenant Molyneux, return to your duties,’ he snapped.
‘Yes, sir.’ Molyneux released Josie’s hand and made his salute. He smiled at her, his hair fluttering in the breeze. His eyes were velvety grey and sincere and creased with the warmth of his smile. In the deep green of his jacket and the white of his pantaloons tinged pink from the sky, he cut a dashing image. ‘Please excuse me, mademoiselle.’
‘Immediately, Lieutenant.’ Dammartin’s voice was harsh.
The Lieutenant turned and hurried away, leaving Josie and his captain silhouetted against the brilliance of the setting sun.
‘I have tolerated your games long enough, Mademoiselle Mallington.’ The colours in the sky reflected upon his hair, casting a rich warmth to its darkness. The wind rippled through it making it appear soft and feathery. It stood in stark contrast to the expression in his eyes.
All sense of tranquillity shattered, destroyed in a single sentence by Dammartin.
‘Games? I have no idea of what you speak, sir.’ Her tone was quite as cold as his.
‘Come, mademoiselle,’ he said. ‘Do not play the innocent with me. You have been courting the attention of my lieutenant these days past. He is not a lap-dog to dance upon your every whim. You are a prisoner of the 8th Dragoons. You would do well to remember that.’
Shock caused Josie’s jaw to gape. Her eyes grew wide and round. It was the final straw as far as she was concerned. He had kissed her, kissed her with violence and passion and tenderness, and she, to a shame that would never be forgotten, had kissed him back—this man who was her enemy and who looked at her with such stony hostility. And she thought of the blaze in his eyes at the mention of her father’s name. He had destroyed everything that she loved, and now he had destroyed the little transient peace. In that moment she knew that she could not trust herself to stay lest she flew at him with all the rage that was in her heart.
‘Must you always be so unpleasant?’ She turned her face from his, hating him for everything, and made to walk right past him.
‘Wait.’ He barked it as an order. ‘Not so fast, mademoiselle. I have not yet finished.’
She cast him a disparaging look. ‘Well, sir, I have.’ And walked right past him.
A hand shot out, and fastened around her right arm. ‘I do not think so, mademoiselle.’
She did not fight against him. She had already learned the folly of that. ‘What do you mean to do this time?’ she said. ‘Beat me?’
‘I have never struck a woman in my life.’
‘Force your kiss upon me again?’ she demanded in a voice so cold he would have been proud to own it himself.
Their gazes met and held.
‘I do not think that so very much force would be required, mademoiselle,’ he said quietly.
She felt the heat stain her cheeks at his words, and she wanted to call him for the devil he was, and her palm itched to hit him hard across his arrogant face.
His grip loosened and fell away.
She stepped back and faced him squarely. ‘Well, Captain, what is of such importance that you must hold me here to say it?’
‘What were you doing up here?’
‘Surely that was plain to see?’
His eyes narrowed in disgust and he gave a slight shake of his head as if he could not quite believe her. ‘You are brazen in the extreme, Mademoiselle Mallington. Tell me, are all English women so free with their favours?’
Josie felt the sudden warmth flood her cheeks at his implication. ‘How dare you?’
‘Very easily, given your behaviour.’
‘You are the most insolent and despicable of men!’
‘We have already established that.’
‘Lieutenant Molyneux and I were watching the sun set, nothing more!’ Beneath the thick wool of her cloak her breast rose and fell with escalating righteous indignation.
‘Huddled together like two lovers,’ he said.
‘Never!’ she cried.
Anger spurred an energy to muscles that had not half an hour since been heavy and spent from the day’s ride. All of Josie’s fury and frustration came together in that minute and something inside her snapped.
‘Why must you despise me so much?’ she yelled.
‘It is not you whom I despise,’ he said quietly.
‘But my father,’ she finished for him. ‘You killed him and you are glad of it.’
‘I am.’ And all of the brooding menace was there again in his eyes.
‘Why? What did my father ever do to you, save defend his life and the lives of his men?’
He looked into the girl’s eyes, the same clear blue eyes that had looked out from Lieutenant Colonel Mallington’s face as he lay dying, and said quietly. ‘Your father was a villain and a scoundrel.’
‘No!’ The denial was swift and sore.
‘You do not know?’ For the first time it struck him that perhaps she was ignorant of the truth, that she really thought her father a wondrous hero.
‘No,’ she said again, more quietly.
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