Chapter 7

“Go inside,” Cyrus told her minutes later, raising his voice again to be heard above the dry whine and crackle of the wind. “I’ll see to the horses.”

He held her horse steadily enough for her to get out of the buggy. She went up the temporary wooden steps at the side of his new house, where he had brought her. “Inside” was an arguably inaccurate term, since the house’s exterior walls hadn’t risen high enough to enclose even the first floor, but the building was in the dry, with flooring in place and a solid roof to hold off the coming rain.

Julia stood just inside, shivering a little even though the wind whipping her skirt was still hot. Thunder was booming almost continuously now, and lightning was forking through the leaden gray clouds, but the rain refused to fall.

She didn’t want to go deeper into the house, not alone. It seemed a bit eerie, shadowed by the roof high above and the darkening afternoon. Bare studs marked the placement of walls, windows, and doorways like bones without flesh. A temporary interior stairway snaked upward to disappear into the partially completed flooring of the second story. The darkly hulking shapes of half-completed fireplaces crouched here and there. Silvery pipes protruding from the floor and walls glistened as the vivid flashes of lightning touched them, and strands of electrical wiring threaded their way among the studs and beams of the wooden skeleton.

It was just a house, Julia told herself. It would be a magnificent house, she thought, when it was completed. And she didn’t feel an eeriness from it, she simply had a sense of strangeness inside herself that the unfinished building seemed to echo. Like her, the house was incomplete, the bare bones of something that needed flesh before it could become real.

Cyrus had disappeared with the horses; she had no idea where he’d gone. She waited, the peculiar ideas still filtering through her mind. Waiting? Yes. She’d been waiting for a long time. It had been hard, but she’d held on. She hadn’t been defeated, even though the battle had left her too weary to feel very much except pain and fear.

As she saw Cyrus come toward her, her feelings changed to fascination and longing that was almost painful. She saw him look up at her as he reached the steps, and wondered why he stopped so suddenly. He looked shocked, she thought.

Cyrus had been brooding as he’d hurried back to the house, trying to decide how to convince Julia to come to him. He didn’t want to force her, but at the same time he was absolutely determined she wouldn’t spend another night under Drummond’s roof. The man wasn’t only vicious, he was unstable; Cyrus had kept a close eye on him for weeks now, and he was convinced that whatever madness or sickness twisted inside Drummond’s mind was worsening rapidly.

He was beginning to betray himself, to voice political statements and opinions so grandiose and blatantly lacking in reason even his staunchest supporters had begun eyeing him uncertainly. Cyrus had subtlely pushed and prodded, gauging the response with care because he was wary of having his efforts to expose Drummond backfire into anything hurtful to Julia. The consuming fire inside Adrian, he’d determined quickly, was the burning of ambition, and Cyrus had worked to focus Drummond’s full attention as well as his full energy on the political aspirations that fed that ambition.

But during the past few days Cyrus had grown more and more uneasy. He couldn’t put a name to what he was feeling except to know it concerned Julia. And time. Time was running out, he realized. He couldn’t afford to wait until he goaded Drummond to expose himself publicly; he had to get Julia away from her husband, and quickly. So he had maneuvered to get Drummond out of Richmond, and he’d gone to talk to Julia.

He was grateful, now, that the storm gave him the opportunity to be alone with her, but he still didn’t know how to convince her to leave her husband. He was grappling with that problem when he took the first step into the house, looked up, and saw her.

The incomplete exterior walls of the house didn’t block the wind very well; fitful gusts were tugging at her dark skirt and white blouse so that she seemed in motion even though she stood still. She had lost her hat sometime during the drive to the house, and the wind made wisps of her fiery hair flutter around her pale face. Her wide eyes were dark and colorless except when lightning flashed, but then they came vividly alive with green fire.

When the truth hit him, it was like being paralyzed for an eternal moment, as if everything inside him stopped. Then his heart began to pound heavily in his chest and he felt dizzy.

He hadn’t questioned his own feelings very deeply because there’d been so many other puzzling and disturbing questions in his life since he’d returned to Richmond. He’d known he wanted her; the desire that had grown more intense with every passing day ached inside him now almost unbearably. He had known he wanted to help her, to ease her pain and take away her fear. He had even known she was important to him beyond those things, that she was somehow a piece of the “puzzle” his life had become.

He hadn’t known he loved her.

Now, in a moment so intense it was almost blinding, he knew. It was akin to knowing his heart was beating, a certainty that didn’t have to be examined because it was so irrefutable. She was part of him, and he’d never be whole, never be complete until she knew that, and believed it, as surely as he did.

Cyrus realized he’d stopped as though he’d run into a wall. Perhaps he had. The woman he loved was so physically and emotionally wounded, she might never be able to return his feelings even if she wanted to. Getting her away from Drummond would be only the first step: he would have to take many more slow and careful steps before Julia healed.

Cyrus drew a breath and continued up the steps, vaguely aware of the storm building all around them with an electric tension he could actually feel. If it didn’t rain soon and drain some of the storm’s fury, he thought, the lightning would grow more dangerous, and begin to touch off fires that would be deadly.

He reached Julia and took her hand gently in his. “We should remain near the center of the house,” he told her. “It will be safer.”

She allowed him to lead her deeper among the maze of fleshless walls and gaping doorways. She wasn’t so aware of the strange thoughts with her hand lost in his, but she was still aware of tensely waiting…for something. She didn’t know what it was, but she wanted it, needed it, and she didn’t know how much longer she could wait for it.

It was darker near the center of the house, and she felt the wind more than heard it. Only an occasional draft of hot air disturbed the stillness. Cyrus led her into what would probably be a parlor, with a rock fireplace half-completed blocking most of the light from the front of the house.

“Wait just a minute,” he said, squeezing her hand gently before releasing it. “I think there’s a lamp on the mantel block.” He stepped away from her and moved between several looming shapes toward the fireplace. There was a brief silence, then the scrape of a match, a blue-white flare, the smell of sulphur, and then the light of a kerosene lamp sent out a yellow circle.

Julia looked around. The looming shapes had become a wheelbarrow piled high with stones to continue building the fireplace, two corded stacks of lumber, and an open crate containing plumbing fixtures. There was also a smaller, empty crate, upended to form a table on which sat a second kerosene lamp, and a pallet of thick quilts.

Following her gaze, Cyrus said, “I’ve hired a watchman to keep an eye on the place at night; it looks like he’s been doing more sleeping than watching.”

“Were you worried about theft?” she asked, wondering why her voice sounded so hollow. Then she realized. The house, of course. Voices always sounded strange in a half-completed or empty building. Except for his voice. His voice was always curiously distinct no matter what tone he used.

“Lumber is valuable,” he said with a slight shrug. He decided not to explain yet another of his “whims,” especially since he hardly understood it himself, and since the last thing he wanted to do was add to Julia’s fears. He wasn’t worried about lumber being stolen. All he knew was that he felt the need to guard this house as strongly as he’d felt the need to build it.

Julia started nervously as a crash of thunder shook the entire house. She had the sensation they were more alone then ever before, cut off from the rest of the world by the angry but oddly protective force of nature itself. She tensed when Cyrus took a step toward her.

“You don’t have to be afraid of me, Julia,” he said quietly. As he had done on her previous visit, he shrugged out of his coat and folded it, then placed it on the smaller of the two stacks of lumber. “Come over here and sit down, please. We’re going to be here awhile; we might as well be comfortable.”

She obeyed the request, but her tension was heightened when he joined her with no more than a few inches between them. Searching for something to say, she finally asked, “Were you going somewhere? I mean, with the storm already so rough…”

“I was searching for you,” he replied.

Julia turned her head quickly to stare at him. “For me?”

He nodded, watching her intently. “I’d gone to the house to talk to you, and found Lissa very upset and worried about you.”

“You went to the house?” She was shocked, and a chill of fear feathered up her spine. “But, Adrian—”

“He’s attending a political meeting halfway across the state, and shouldn’t return before midnight,” Cyrus reassured her. “I made sure of that before I took the chance.”

“Even so,” she said unsteadily, “the neighbors…people will wonder.”

“They’ll think I went to see him, if they think anything at all. At least until—” He hesitated, then said, “I asked Lissa to pack a few things for the two of you, and to be ready to leave when we returned.”

“I can’t leave,” she said automatically, wondering why her mind felt so sluggish. Why couldn’t she think?

“Sweetheart, you can’t stay,” he said softly but with an intensity in his voice she’d never heard before. “It would be bad enough if Drummond were just a brutal bastard, but he’s more than that. He’s twisted. He could cross the line into insanity at any moment—if he hasn’t already. Even his closest friends are beginning to wonder about him, and he’s never betrayed himself to them before. The next time he gets violent, he could kill you. Or Lissa. Do you understand?”

Julia couldn’t look away from Cyrus, even though she felt terribly vulnerable. Words welled up and escaped without her volition. “He’d said he’d hurt Lissa if I left him,” she whispered. “That she’d never be safe from him. I thought if I could just hold on until Lissa was married, then maybe I could find a way out.”

Cyrus reached over to touch her hand. “You can’t wait that long. Julia, I know you can’t be sure I’m different from Drummond. I know you don’t trust me, can’t trust me right now, but I swear I would never do anything to hurt you. I’ll take care of you and Lissa, and I’ll make certain Drummond never touches her or hurts you again.”

“You don’t know him. He—”

“Sweetheart, I’ll keep him away from you if it takes a bullet to do it.”

Julia felt a shock, but a peculiar one. She didn’t doubt Cyrus was capable of killing another man if the reason were strong enough; what surprised her was his apparent determination to do whatever was necessary to protect her and Lissa. Just because he desired her? Could passion drive a man to such lengths? The endearment he’d used surprised her as well, and puzzled her a little. Did he believe she’d expect pretty words and phrases if she did go to him and become his mistress?

It seemed strangely out of character. From the very first he’d been blunt with her, often shockingly so. He had even once told her he wouldn’t offer pretty speeches or bedroom lies, and she had decided he wouldn’t find it necessary to resort to such tactics in order to get what he wanted. Yet he had twice called her sweetheart, his black velvet voice sober and gentle—and she had the odd feeling he wasn’t aware he’d done it.

“Julia?” In the lamplight his lean, handsome face held an expression of unusual anxiety. “I swear I won’t make you do anything against your will. I won’t force you in any way. But you have to let me take care of you. Please. Give me a chance to prove you can trust me.”

She swallowed hard, unable to summon even a flash of resentment this time at how easily he was swaying her. She wanted to give in to him, wanted to take the risk, no matter what it cost her. And it would cost her, even if he didn’t deliberately hurt her. Fleetingly, she thought of how shameful it would be, and how people would condemn her for living with a man as his mistress with her younger sister under the same roof, but then she wondered vaguely if he meant to set her up in an establishment of her own. Wasn’t that how it was done? She’d never heard of a man moving his mistress into his family home.

Not that it mattered where he meant to keep her. He was right about one thing at least—she had to leave Adrian immediately, before he could do something dreadful to Lissa. As for going to Cyrus, what choice did she have? There was no place else she could go. Besides, her body insisted she was his, and she was too tired to fight him anymore.

With a little difficulty she asked, “What did—did Lissa say when you told her?”

He smiled. “She just nodded. She trusts me, it seems.” His smile vanished. “But then, she trusted him too, didn’t she?”

Julia nodded jerkily. “He made sure she did. This summer though, she started to notice things. If I’d handled her questions differently, perhaps she wouldn’t have realized the truth, but I—I couldn’t pretend anymore.”

“She needed to know, sweetheart.” He hesitated, then said in a soft voice, “I wish you could believe you’ll be safe with me. I’ll do everything I can to make you happy, Julia, I swear it. Please, let me try.”

Looking back later, Julia often thought how odd it was that the storm broke at the same moment as her resistance. Even as she was nodding, she heard the heavy drumming of rain on the roof and felt a cool, damp breeze touch her cheek.

“All right,” she murmured, and the relief of simply making any kind of decision was almost numbing. “All right, I—I’ll leave Adrian. I’ll come to you.”

Cyrus lifted one of her hands and kissed it, smiling. His eyes were liquid, shining, and there was a note of fierce satisfaction as well as tenderness in his voice when he said, “You won’t regret it.” Then his gaze dropped to the hand he was holding, her left, and his smile faded slowly.

Julia had seen it too. A flash of lightning had reflected brightly off her wedding band. Very softly, she said, “A few days after our wedding, Adrian took the ring he’d put on me in church and replaced it with this one. He had it made too small. I can’t take it off.”

Cyrus studied her hand in silence for a moment, his face very still. The ring was tight on her slender finger, biting into the skin. The lamplight was barely strong enough to show him tiny scars on either side of her knuckle where flesh had been torn when the ring had been forced over it. It made Cyrus feel sick. How insane would a man have to be to do such a thing to his own wife?

“God damn him,” he said quietly.

To Julia, his words sounded less like a curse than an invocation, and one very deeply felt. She had the sudden, surprising notion that Cyrus possessed a rare, inborn conviction he wasn’t even aware of. He would seldom set foot in a church, she thought with a flash of intuition, yet he innately felt and understood the value of faith in a way few overtly religious men could come close to matching.

It seemed a strange trait for a man of his reputation, yet she felt certain she was right about it. For the first time, Julia began to wonder if she had any real understanding of the man he truly was. She stared at him as his dark head bent slightly over her hand, then tensed a little, her thoughts scattering when she felt him take hold of the ring with a light touch.

“It’s all right, sweetheart,” he said in a low voice. His fingers turned the ring slowly, then eased it painlessly over her knuckle and off.

“How did you do that?” she asked in surprise, knowing only too well how tightly the ring had fit her. She hadn’t been able to get it off no matter how hard she’d tried, yet he had slipped it from her finger as easily as though it had suddenly grown two sizes larger.

Cyrus held the ring for a moment, then slipped it into the pocket of his vest, saying, “I’ll get rid of it on the way back to Richmond; I don’t want it near this house.”

“You didn’t answer me.” She watched his face as he gently rubbed the mark the ring had left on her finger.

After a moment he lifted his gaze to meet hers. There was something a bit hesitant in his black eyes and, finally, he shrugged. “It didn’t belong on your finger. I didn’t want it there,” he said simply.

She managed a faint smile, although she felt unnerved by what he’d done. “And you always get what you want?”

“I’ve been lucky so far.” His free hand rose to touch her cheek, the long fingers softly caressing, and his expression tightened. “I want you,” he said huskily, and it was not quite a question.

Julia felt her heart begin to beat unevenly, and all the impossible sensations she’d tried to deal with these past weeks surged inside her like a rising tide she hadn’t a hope of mastering. Perhaps this was what she’d been waiting for, she realized dimly. To belong to him—if it was possible. He had taught her body to want him, and no matter what else she was uncertain of, she was sure of that much. She wanted him, and she had to take the chance. Whether it brought pain or pleasure, she had to offer herself to him.

She wondered briefly if he had put this price on her safety and Lissa’s, but dismissed the idea before it could cause her any pain. It didn’t seem to matter anyway.

“I—I want you too,” she said unsteadily, still shocked she could say those words to any man.

Cyrus made an odd, rough sound and leaned toward her. His mouth touched hers, very gentle at first but quickly hardening with desire. Julia felt herself being gathered into his strong arms, and for the first time she permitted herself to respond to him and to the hunger he had created inside her.

Her arms went up around his neck as her upper body molded itself to the hard contours of his, and her mouth opened eagerly to permit the kiss to deepen. She felt a burst of heat somewhere near the center of her being, and the force of it made her tremble. How could she feel this way? How could he make her feel this way? Her body seemed alive only when he held it, and she didn’t understand how it could be possible.

It was so strange, like her dreams, a restless, burning pleasure that was a growing ache inside her. An empty ache. The intimate touch of his tongue against hers soothed the ache and yet made it worse, and she wanted—needed—to be closer to him. The hunger he had brought to life in her body had some instinctive knowledge of its own, a certainty of ultimate satisfaction, and it demanded she reach for that.

She made a faint sound of protest when he lifted his mouth from hers and opened her eyes to stare up at him dazedly.

“Julia,” he said, kissing one corner of her mouth and then the other as his hand cradled the back of her head. The tanned skin of his face was taut and his eyes were burning, and his black velvet voice was low, a little rough. “I had a better place in mind for our first time together, sweet. But I don’t think I can wait for you any longer.”

The clean smells of new wood and rain, the shadowy, lamplit room, unfinished though it was, and the pallet on the floor all seemed perfect to Julia. There was so much newness in this place, such a feeling of vigorous beginnings. She no longer saw it as eerie. She wanted to lie with Cyrus where there were no bedroom memories of pain and humiliation.

Even to the storm outside replenishing the parched earth it was an ideal place for her to start afresh.

“I don’t want to wait,” she whispered.

He kissed her again, then murmured against her mouth, “You deserve better.”

She hesitated, then slid her hands down over his broad shoulders and reached for his tie. There was a part of her still capable of being shocked by the brazen action, but the compelling hunger she felt was too powerful to fight or deny, and she met his eyes steadily as she unknotted the cloth. “I don’t want to wait,” she repeated, beginning to unbutton his vest.

He was still for a moment, but when his vest hung open and she had reached the third button of his shirt he groaned softly and bent his head to kiss her again. He removed her dark tie by touch alone, then just as blindly worked to release the tiny buttons down the back of her blouse.

He drew her to her feet, shrugging out of his vest and shirt, allowing them to drop carelessly to the floor. Julia unfastened her skirt and let it fall, then fumbled at the tight cuffs of her blouse. Oddly enough, she didn’t feel at all the way she did while undressing in front of Adrian, a fact she hardly noticed at the time. All she was aware of was the need to rid them of the barriers of clothing. She had to be closer to him.

Still, a pang of nervousness shot through her when she saw his imposing torso. He was so big, so obviously strong. His strength had been noticeable under layers of clothing; without those civilized veils he was so starkly powerful it took her breath away.

And he was so undeniably male. Golden skin taut over hard muscles. A mat of thick black hair, almost like a pelt, covering the broad expanse of his chest, narrowing over his flat stomach. She wanted to touch him, and yet at the same time nagging little fears were pricking at her.

He could hurt her with such dreadful ease….And even though his desire seemed to her both strong and genuine, what if Adrian had been right about her? What if there were something in her that would destroy any man’s desire before it could be fulfilled? Would Cyrus turn from her, horrified and sickened, his skin clammy with disgust, when she caused his passion to wither? Would he find that ironically, fate had cursed him to want a woman he could never possess even though she offered herself to him?

Please, God, don’t let it happen. Not with him. I couldn’t bear it to happen with him.

For a brief instant Julia wanted to run to avoid discovering what could be an agonizing truth. But then he kissed her again, his fingers taking over the job of unbuttoning her cuffs, and the heat of her own response held the stinging fears and desperate anxiety at bay. She felt the blouse slip free of her, then her petticoat, and a slight tug as he unfastened her stockings and began working to release her corset.

“Damn these things,” he said, lifting his head reluctantly so that he could see what he was doing.

She helped him, more adept through sheer daily experience, and drew a breath in relief when the constrictive garment fell to the floor. “Fashion,” she murmured huskily, then gasped when he pulled her closer and her aching breasts were pressed to the hardness of his chest.

His lips were trailing over her throat, and she felt the vibration of his words when he muttered, “Fashion can go to hell.” He wrapped his arms around her and pulled her tighter against him.

Julia slid her arms around his lean waist, her fingers probing the smooth, rippling muscles of his back. She felt him removing pins from her hair until it tumbled freely below her waist, and then his hands slid down to guide her hips firmly to his loins. Her head fell back to bare more of her throat to his caressing mouth, a hot shiver going through her when she felt the shockingly intimate sensation of his hard manhood nestle against her softness.

That evidence of his passion reassured her, if only for the moment. He wanted her. He did. Nothing about her would change that. She tried to push Adrian and his bitter condemnation out of her mind, frantic to convince herself he’d been wrong. This was passion, not his frenzied, desperate fumblings in the dark. This was so incredibly pleasurable, fate couldn’t be cruel enough to take it away from her….

A little moan of stunned desire escaped her trembling lips, and she couldn’t breathe properly. The sensations were so acute, and she felt so vibrantly alive…so overwhelmed by something she couldn’t begin to control. Frightening. Yet wildly exciting. She was dizzy and felt drugged, feverish. Her breasts were throbbing, and the worst of the heat had settled deep in her belly, where it burned almost beyond bearing until she wanted to cry out some desperate, wordless plea.

It was difficult to think, but there was something she had to tell him, something he needed to know before he made her his. With her mind dazed and her body in the grip of these strange, maddening sensations, it wasn’t until he lifted her in his arms and carried her to the pallet that she tried to get the words out.

“Cyrus…” She caught her breath as his big hands glided down her legs, removing her stockings and shoes, and the warm touch affected her peculiarly. Her heart was pounding so rapidly she thought it might burst, and her entire body was quivering. Lying back on the quilts that were surprisingly comfortable, she forced her eyes open, not realizing until then that they’d been closed.

“What is it, sweet?” He was raised on an elbow beside her, looking down at her with eyes that were tender despite their burning. One of his hands brushed a strand of her hair away from her face, while his other hand lay, warmly heavy, over her stomach.

The last thing she wanted to do, especially now, was to bring up the subject of her husband, but she had little choice. She had a superstitious urge not to tempt fate by confessing the truth, terrified her own words would cause Cyrus to see whatever it was Adrian saw in her and make him draw away from her in aversion. Even the possibility sent a chill through her aching body.

She was glad she was still wearing her chemise and knickers; partially clothed she felt a trifle less vulnerable. But she was nervous, apprehensive, painfully embarrassed—and though her body still throbbed feverishly, she was so aware of the suspension of his caresses and her own terrible fears, she felt almost sick with dread. Her gaze skittered from his, and she said diffidently, “There’s something I—I have to tell you.”

Cyrus had kept a tight rein on the clamorings of his body, fiercely determined to make certain she would have nothing to regret in giving herself to him. But at her words an entirely new kind of tension clenched in him. The way she looked away from him, and sounded so anxious. God, she couldn’t be pregnant! He didn’t know if he could bear even the idea of Drummond’s child growing inside her body.

But as he looked down at her, so delicate and lovely, her beautiful face framed by bright hair tumbled loosely over the quilt, he knew he would bear it if he had to. He loved her. He leaned down to kiss her, then drew back. “Then tell me. You can tell me anything, sweet.”

She bit her lip, her eyes meeting his again, then took a breath and said softly, rapidly, “I—I’ve never—my marriage was never—consummated.”

It was the last thing Cyrus had expected, and for a moment all he felt was shock. “Drummond didn’t…”

Heat burned in her face, and Julia looked nervously away again. “He—he couldn’t,” she said in a stifled voice. “He tried, because he wanted a son. But he said it was my fault, that I made him ill.”

Cyrus gathered her into his arms and held her against him, still so shaken he could hardly think, but hearing in her voice the damage Drummond had done to her confidence as a woman. “Shhh. It wasn’t your fault, my darling.”

Her voice was muffled against his neck as she clung to him, but he heard the words all too clearly. “It did make him ill to touch me…it was horrible when he tried. I felt so ugly and ashamed. I didn’t want him to—to do that to me, but he was my husband, and I knew he had the right to, but he couldn’t. He couldn’t. And he said things to me that hurt worse than the strap….”

Cyrus held her tighter, his emotions chaotic. He hated Drummond for what he’d done to Julia, for her pain and for the healing that might take years. But he also felt an almost numbing surge of primitive pride and crushing responsibility. He, he alone would initiate this woman who was his heart’s desire into the mysteries and beauties of making love.

“It’s all right, sweetheart,” he murmured huskily, easing her back down onto the pallet.

“He said I was repulsive,” she whispered. Her face was white now, her eyes anguished.

Cyrus kissed her trembling lips very gently. “No sane man could say that to you.” He touched her cheek with tender fingers, and his soft words were fervent. “You’re so beautiful, Julia, so amazingly lovely. The first time I saw you, I couldn’t take my eyes off you. And I couldn’t stay away from you. You’ve haunted me, awake and asleep, every moment since.”

Almost against her will, she believed at least that he found her attractive and desirable. He had certainly pursued her with a single-minded intensity. Still, she had to force the difficult words out. “But passion can change, can’t it? It can…wither.”

Cyrus was certain she had never talked of this to anyone, and even though just the thought of Drummond in bed with Julia sickened him, he was determined her marriage not become a kind of Bluebeard’s chamber between them. Trust began with honesty; Julia had to believe there was nothing she couldn’t say to him, no subject she couldn’t discuss with him, no matter how painful it was to either of them.

He made his voice gentle but matter-of-fact. “My sweet, there are a number of reasons a man might be physically unable to make love to a woman even if he feels desire for her.” He hesitated, then said, “His sexual organ has to be erect to enter a woman’s body. You understand that?”

Julia half nodded, her face burning again with embarrassment. Since she’d grown up in the country, with animals about, she had at least a basic knowledge of the mechanics of reproduction, but Adrian had confused her about sexual relations between men and women in addition to everything else. Since he’d always attempted to take her in the dark, she hadn’t been certain what had gone wrong at first. Then she had realized he became aroused when he hurt her, but not when he tried to possess her. He hadn’t been able to enter her, no matter how frantically he’d pushed and prodded. Even when he seemingly aroused himself—she judged that by his changing voice and movements beside her—before touching her, his arousal had vanished as soon as he did touch her.

“I—I understand,” she murmured, unable to meet his eyes except fleetingly. “But you said—he might not be able to even if he wants to?”

Cyrus nodded. “Reasons like exhaustion or illness. If he’s upset about something that has nothing to do with her, and yet affects his own body. Or if he’s emotionally disturbed—like Drummond. His problems have nothing to do with you. Any man would find you desirable.”

Part of Julia’s mind was shocked by the conversation, but her painful confusion drove her to try to understand, and Cyrus didn’t appear to mind. “But when Adrian…when he tried, he seemed to…arouse himself without even looking at me, or touching me. In the dark. And when he did touch me, his passion just…died. How could it not be my fault?”

Cyrus hesitated, praying he could find the right words. He’d never been so conscious of how young she was, how terribly young to have such wretched questions. “His passion was empty. Hollow. It wasn’t the desire of a man for a woman; if it had been, touching you would have made it grow stronger. He isn’t normal, Julia. What he taught you of men is distorted, unnatural. You have to believe that, because it’s the truth.”

“Men don’t…beat women?”

“Normal men don’t,” he said flatly, his heart filled with pain because she should never have even imagined that question.

Julia hesitated, then said, “Sometimes he—Adrian makes me touch him. But not because the touch pleases him, or even arouses him. It’s to hurt me, to—to shame me. That’s why he does it. Do all men—”

“No.” Cyrus leaned down and kissed her gently. “Sweetheart, touching between men and women should be nothing but pleasure. I want to touch you because it’s a need inside me, because you’re so beautiful and I want to be as close to you as I can. I want to please you, more than anything, to show you how wonderful lovemaking can be.”

Almost without thinking she lifted a hand and touched his cheek with unsteady fingers. A little shy now, still uncertain, she said, “Before you touched me, I didn’t know I could feel desire. Or pleasure. I’m sorry to be so stupid about it, but there was no one I could ask—”

“God, don’t be sorry.” He kissed the inside of her wrist softly. “You can ask me anything, my sweet.” His smile was warm and gentle. “And you aren’t stupid, don’t think that. Just young, and even though you’ve seen more cruelty than anyone should, you’re innocent as well.”

Her fingers were stroking his cheek of their own volition, almost compulsively, and she loved the way his skin felt under her touch. “My mother never talked to me of such things,” she murmured. “I promised myself I’d talk to Lissa.”

“I hope you’ll be able to tell her a man can bring her pleasure with his passion,” Cyrus said quietly. “I hope you’ll be able to say to her that she never has to be afraid of a man who loves her.”

Julia was puzzled. Love?

Cyrus took her free hand and carried it to his chest, where she could feel the strong beat of his heart. Even as she felt the steady thuds, the tempo of them quickened, and his voice grew taut with intensity. “To make love to you isn’t just a desire in me, it’s a need. Do you understand, sweetheart? Not just passion. Love. I love you.”