Must Have Been The Moonlight Page 19

  In a daze, she felt the steel pull of his fingers wrapped around her wrist. Her eyes snapped up. His grip was not brutal but she knew she’d not be able to pull away until he chose to release her. “Why are you really angry?” He touched his mouth to her temple. It was hot and burned a knowing path down her throat. “What exactly are you afraid of? Me?”

  “Yes!” She’d wanted to rail at him, but the word came out in a barely audible rasp.

  Even if he did have the right to plan the rest of her life, had he considered how she’d survive married to an aristocrat? “I can never be a duchess. You must know that. No amount of pride can overcome our class difference. You would only find a reason to dislike me after a while.”

  “Is that what all of this is about?” He laughed, pulling her tighter within the circle of his arms. She glared at him. It wasn’t fair that she couldn’t resist him, and had already proven herself exceptionally easy. “Do you know what the third son of an earl is? A commoner, Brianna.”

  “How can you not understand?” No matter what Michael called himself, he’d still grown up with the Aldbury name. “I grew up fighting the entire caste system your name represents. Lady Alexandra’s father nearly ruined our family. I’m Irish, Michael.”

  “None of which stopped you from coming over here last night.”

  “The possibility of a child between us must surely be remote. It’s not worth ruining both of our lives, Michael. Wait if you must.”

  Someone pounded on the door, and Brianna nearly jumped out of her sandals. Michael eyed the intrusion with malice.

  The pounding came again. “Major Fallon?” They heard a heavily accented voice through the thick door. “We must speak with you.”

  “Who is it?” Brianna whispered.

  Michael walked with long strides to the bedroom window and peered through the blinds. Two men wearing the special uniform of the khedive stood on the street below, holding the reins of a half-dozen horses. Brianna leaned around him. “Are those Omar’s men?”

  Struggling with the leather strap on her sandal, she hopped behind him into the office and watched as he pulled his gun off the shelf where he’d placed it last night. “What exactly happened to you last night?” she asked.

  “I tried to see Omar.” He spun the cylinder on the revolver. “Afterward, my men and I were attacked.”

  “You couldn’t tell me this last night?”

  “And ruin the whole mood of your seduction? Trust me, you were a far more pleasing weight on my mind. Stay out of sight.”

  Brianna grabbed his forearm. “Why don’t you stay out of sight, and I’ll answer the door? I can tell them they are at the wrong apartment.”

  Reaching behind him, he tucked the gun in his waistband, and grinned. The pounding on the door became more insistent. “That’s why we get along, Brianna. You have a sense of humor that defies logic.”

  “Oh!” She snatched her hand away. He caught her wrist and yanked her against him, her furious breath leaving her in a rasp. “You’re bloody impossible, Michael Fallon. How could you not tell me that someone attacked you?”

  He grabbed a gentle fistful of her hair and pulled her head back to look into her eyes. “Would you miss me if I were gone?”

  She tried to look away. Michael tightened his hand on her nape, and her eyes snapped to his. His gaze burned with white-hot intensity. Pressed to the hardened length of his body as she was, she didn’t even try to break his grip on her wrist. They stared at each other, suspended in light and sound; then haltingly he lowered his lips.

  “You and I are not finished with our conversation, amîri.”

  The last person Michael expected to see on his porch when he opened the door was Christopher Donally, his hands shoved in his pockets, pacing the narrow enclave. Michael shifted his gaze to the man who had been pounding on his door. Wearing the green and scarlet uniform of the palace guard, the captain was braced with his hands behind his back. Halid leaned against the stone wall that divided the stairs. Michael noted that he was unarmed.

  Donally spoke first. “You’re a difficult man to find.”

  “Are you here to protect me?” Michael asked pointedly. “Or to see me arrested?”

  “Omar’s dead,” Donally said, straight to the point.

  “Dead.” The word was a statement, an undigested response. Incredulity. The captain shifted, putting an end to any illusion that he was there on anything other than state business. “Since when do they send the Public Works minister to act as constable?” Michael asked.

  “Sir Christopher was with me when the captain arrived at the ministry office this morning, Fallon effendi,” Halid said.

  “I’m here because my wife has a great deal of fondness for you, Major,” Donally explained, “and understands the justice system as well as you and I. Halid seems to be the only man in Cairo who knows where you live, and he thought it prudent to cooperate.”

  Michael shifted his unblinking eyes to the captain. Making a decision, he reached behind him and carefully withdrew his pistol. He handed it grip first to the captain. “Tell thy men to stand down,” he said in the vernacular, moving to allow Donally and Halid to pass through the doorway.

  The captain hesitated, but he dismissed his men before entering Michael’s quarters. Folding his arms, Michael leaned with his back against the door and took all three men into his gaze. “Couldn’t this interview have waited until I came into the ministry this morning?”

  “You were at Omar’s residence last night,” Donally said.

  “Omar wouldn’t see me.”

  “And you could not break into his residence and hold a gun to his head this time?” the captain queried. “Do you recognize this weapon, effendi?” He unrolled a thick cloth. A blood-smeared knife thunked to the table. “Omar was found early this morning stabbed to the heart. The last time he was seen alive was last night at eleven o’clock. Where were you?”

  Shaking his head, Michael looked away in disgust. The authorities were going to pin the murder on him. Christ…Omar was dead. It wasn’t the first time he was innocent of something of which he’d been accused. He focused his next statement on Donally. “Do I seem like an idiot who would leave a murder weapon in my victim?”

  Leaning his hip against the table, Donally folded his arms, his eyes stark in the shadows. “I’d hoped that you were not.”

  “You were attacked last night,” the captain said, seizing the conversation again. “You must have been very angry. Angry enough to seek revenge.”

  Disgusted with the captain’s peremptory tactic, Michael cocked a brow. “What makes you think that Omar was responsible for the attack on my men when he is supposedly innocent of such deeds?”

  The man’s dark eyes faltered. “I only assumed—”

  “That he would try to kill me?”

  “I assumed that you would presume it was he, effendi.”

  “Last night I was too concerned about getting my men to an infirmary. I didn’t notice my knife missing. Yes, I’d been to see him before that, but as witnesses can attest, he was alive when I left.”

  The captain’s spine notched. “Can you prove where you were last night at eleven?”

  Michael was growing increasingly annoyed, and when he set his fists on his hips, he looked intimately deadly to anyone who knew him. He hadn’t gotten to his apartment until nearly midnight.

  “It’s a legitimate question, Fallon,” Donally said.

  “I wasn’t alone,” Michael finally replied.

  “No one assumed you were,” Donally said.

  The man didn’t know the half of it.

  Shit!

  He squeezed his eyes shut and pinched the bridge of his nose.

  Movement behind Donally lifted his gaze. Brianna stood in the doorway to his bedroom. She’d found the turban and had managed to wrap her hair. But there was no mistaking the curves on her body, no mistaking that she was a woman. Long, sooty lashes, clearly a Donally trademark, framed her huge eyes. They’d frozen him wi
th their intensity.

  After today, every bloody person in Cairo would know she’d spent the night.

  The captain turned abruptly, as did Halid, who had sat down at the table.

  The captain, clearly startled, moved forward. Donally’s arm slapped out. “No,” he rasped.

  “Major Fallon was here all night,” she said, chin high.

  “Jaysus, Brianna,” Donally whispered.

  “I got here before eleven.” Her chest rose on a sudden inhalation, and the constriction in Michael’s gut tightened. “I would have preferred that you didn’t find out this way, Christopher. I’m sorry.”

  “You are Donally Pasha’s sister?” the captain asked. Even he had the intelligence to back down a step.

  Her eyes touched his. “I couldn’t let them take you away.”

  Then, before Michael could think of something relevant to say, Donally turned with a growl, “You son of a bitch!” A fist swung directly into Michael’s jaw—a glancing blow because Michael had seen the move coming and reacted instinctively. Christ, the man hit like a bloody rock. Michael figured he owed the brother one requisite, lucky, son of a bitch hit. After all, it was no less than what he’d have done had the circumstances been reversed. But Donally wasn’t finished.

  “Stop it!” Brianna shouted as Michael’s legs hit the back of a chair and he stumbled flat on his ass, legs spread. Brianna knelt down beside him. “That’s enough, Christopher,” she furiously admonished. “I wasn’t dragged here. I came of my own free will. On my own. Uninvited.”

  “Spare me the details, Brea.”

  “He’s not going to fight you. Are you, Michael?”

  Rising to his elbow, Michael pressed the heel of his hand against his bloodied lip. He could barely see straight. “You hit like a bloody Irish crag, Donally.” For a man who spent too much time behind a desk, he wasn’t the least bit soft.

  “Welcome to the family, Fallon.” Donally stood braced, feet spread like some avenging archangel. “And I don’t care who you think you are.”

  “Oh bother, Christopher.” Brianna got to her feet. “Spare me your masculine indignity. We’ve already discussed the matter. I’ll tell you the same as I told him. I’ll make my own decisions about my life.”

  “You have no focking idea about your life, Brea—”

  “You have no room to preach morality to me,” she said, wagging a violent finger at her brother. “No room at all! I’m past the age of majority. You cannot tell me what to do. I will be the only one who says whether I shall wed. As of right now, both of you can go to the devil.”

  Peering through one eye, Michael rested an elbow on a knee and dabbed at his lip. Fireworks still danced behind his eyelids. He was resilient, but the better part of valor was prudence, and he knew when to keep his mouth shut.

  Donally turned to the unfortunate captain, who had yet to move. “Do you have any more bloody questions for my sister?”

  “No, Donally Pasha.”

  Donally swung open the door, fully expecting his sister to precede his exit. “I expect that I’ll see you sometime today, Fallon?”

  Casually, Michael saluted in affirmation. “I expect I’ll be meeting your solicitor?”

  Brianna glared fire at her brother, then turned her head, her expression direct. “I won’t be there,” she said flatly.

  He let his gaze travel over her slim form. Michael knew her well enough to know that she’d meant what she said. Hell, he could almost believe she’d added murder to her list of his sins.

  “I think you have made a most wise choice, effendi.” The captain chuckled as if he alone were responsible for laying Michael on his backside. If the bastard were two steps nearer, Michael would have kicked his feet out from under him. “She is preferable to a cold cot in detention, yes?”

  “Do you have any other suspects in Omar’s death?”

  “He is no longer your problem, yes?”

  Hell, the look in Brianna’s eyes told him differently. “Why don’t you let me decide that?”

  The captain moved to the door. “The man who killed him knew the private quarters of the palace. I suspect now that it was one of his own, which would account for your knife. Omar dealt only one way with those who failed him. The attack on you failed. Perhaps someone did not wish to die so easily this time. They did our khedive a favor, I think. And thanks to the beautiful houri in your bed, you are no longer suspected of the crime.” The door shut behind him.

  In the silence, Halid walked over and handed Michael a handkerchief for his mouth. “That went very well, do you not think, Englishman? She is a woman in love if I have ever seen one.”

  Michael snatched the cloth. “Do you think?” He remained on the floor, testing the injury on his tongue. “What was Donally doing in the office this morning?”

  “His men found two abandoned camps in the desert. Omar’s death suggests the possibility that perhaps we are witnessing a fight from within. He was an evil man, effendi. It is over for you now.”

  Michael didn’t answer, and only looked up as Halid opened the door and chuckled. “If I were to ever ask an Englishman for counsel about women, it would not be thee, effendi.”

  Michael didn’t waste his breath on a caustic response, merely threw away the handkerchief in disgust, welcoming the silence that followed Halid’s facetious departure.

  Without changing, Michael washed his face and poured a glass of bourbon. He stood in the doorway of his room and looked at the bed. Omar’s murder afforded him no sense of triumph, and he felt muddled by the turn of circumstances. It seemed that, without even knowing how it happened, one part of his life had abruptly ended just as the other was about to begin. Halid was correct on both accounts.

  His job was over.

  And he didn’t know a hill of beans about women—except he wanted this one. Whether he’d planned it this way or not, he only knew that Brianna’s days of climbing out of balcony windows were over.

  Chapter 13

  Brianna’s life as she’d known it was over.

  Her character lay in tatters, the pall like a shadow weighing down her shoulders. Hearing raised voices outside, she slipped into a wrapper and, still damp from her bath, she walked to the open doors to her balcony. The argument was coming from Christopher and Alexandra’s bedroom across the terrace.

  “Maybe I should go down there,” she said.

  “And maybe you best be stayin’ out of sight, mum.” Gracie waddled about the bedroom, picking up Brianna’s clothes. “The whole household went into hiding since your brother brought ye home. ’Tis a shame, it is.”

  Brianna tied the wrapper at her waist. “I can take care of us, Gracie.”

  “And maybe I’m not thinking about myself, mum. Even if I won’t be receivin’ another invitation to the consulate.”

  Brianna turned back into her room, walked to her dresser and found a comb.

  “You’ve a kind heart, mum. Most of the time. When you’re not on one of your tangents.” Gracie wagged the sandal in her hand. “But there’s no accountin’ for the truth that you’re young and have a lot to learn in life. No one is going to be forgiving of you this time.”

  “Don’t you think I’m aware of that?”

  She was to blame for the discord between Alex and Christopher, having publicly embarrassed her brother and Lady Alexandra. Brianna knew enough about the machinations of society to recognize that she was in trouble.

  “Oh, my poor wee dove.” Gracie seemed to sense her distress, and took Brianna into her arms. “What a fix you’ve gotten yourself into now. Major Fallon will do the right deed by ye, mum. He’ll not leave you to be picked clean by the vultures. Your brother will see to that.”

  “Really, Gracie,” Brianna attempted to dissuade her faithful servant from killing her with such an optimistic outlook of her future. “I swear, I’m going to perish just considering his goodwill.”

  It had taken an insufferably long time to get from Michael’s apartment to the house this morning. The
silence between her and Christopher had been the worst to endure. He’d barely spoken, except to confirm that Omar was truly dead, stabbed through the heart with Michael’s knife. He’d not questioned whether she lied about being Michael’s alibi, and Brianna had not divulged it. When they got to the house, Christopher had sent for his solicitor. Brianna didn’t have to ask him why.

  She knew she hadn’t been thinking rationally that morning when she stepped forward and gave Michael an alibi. Terrified for his safety, she’d acted impulsively, the thought that he might be guilty never occurring to her. Christopher hadn’t seen what Omar had done to Colonel Baker. Hadn’t seen the devastation to the caravan or listened to the screams of people dying. She only knew that Michael was not like Omar.

  By now, Michael had no doubt rethought his proposal to her. If it could be called that. Wisdom would force him to see that he was a peer of the realm, for goodness sakes. What could she ever bring to a marriage like that? It seemed that fate surely had a haughty laugh at her expense.

  Brianna padded up a set of narrow stairs that led to her darkroom. This was her sanctuary, her livelihood, and she breathed in the familiar scent of collodion and silver nitrate that clung to the air. No photographs hung from the string draped laterally across the room. But she would change that. She needed to replenish her plates and magnesium flares. She wasn’t helpless or dependent on anyone to make her happy. She could take responsibility for her own actions.

  She’d been the one to compromise herself, completely and utterly without Michael’s help. Had she not arrived at his quarters in the first place, she would not be in this position. Nor would he.

  Yet, had she not been with him last night, Michael would most likely have been arrested. It was strange how fate always seemed to play out between them. Her own conduct showed that she trusted him.

  Brianna’s gaze fell on Stephan’s picture. She lifted the frame off the shelf and sat in the chair that backed against the only table in the room.

  It hurt just to breathe. She’d once been captivated by the fairy tale of romance and happy endings. She’d believed in forever, believed that someone could love her quirks and her dreams. Could love her.