Stephanie Laurens - The Ideal Bride

“Caro knows what it is.” Michael rose, as did the others; he glanced at them. “I’ll go and ask.”

Devil clapped him on the shoulder as they turned to the door. “If it’s anything potentially damning, let us know.”

Michael nodded.

Lucifer opened the door—just as Honoria swept up. She halted in the corridor, her hazel eyes noting each one.

“Good afternoon, gentlemen.” Her tone was all grande dame. “And what have we here?”

Devil smiled. “There you are.” Surreptitiously, he prodded Michael in the back.

Michael moved forward, through the door; Honoria stepped back, allowing him into the corridor.

Devil efficiently ushered Gabriel and Lucifer through the doorway—into freedom. “I was just on my way to tell you our news.”

Michael glanced back as he, Gabriel, and Lucifer retreated down the corridor; the look on his sister’s face was disbelieving in the extreme.

Her “Indeed?” was incredulous.

As they turned into the front hall, they heard Devil’s answering purr, “Come in, and I’ll tell you.”

They could imagine Honoria’s “ Humph !” but an instant later, they heard the click of the study door closing.

Pausing on the front steps, they exchanged glances.

“I wonder how much he’ll tell her,” Lucifer mused.

Gabriel shook his head. “That’s one question on which I wouldn’t like to wager.”

Michael agreed; with a grin, he saluted them, then strode down the steps and headed for Upper Grosvenor Street. Turning his thoughts to his mission, his grin faded.

“Breckenridge.” Michael stood before Caro, his face impassive as he looked down at her.

She blinked up at him. She was seated in an armchair in the parlor, one of Camden’s diaries in her hands. About them the house was peaceful, basking in the late afternoon sunshine.

He read her surprise in her eyes—she didn’t try to hide it. He’d walked in, nodded a greeting, shut the door, and baldly said, “Breckenridge.”

Some of the tension eased from his shoulders. Glancing around, he moved to the armchair facing her.

The last time she’d seen his face, it had been dawn and his expression had been slack with sated passion. Calmly shutting the diary, she inquired, “What about Timothy”?“

Her use of the name touched a nerve, but Michael suppressed his reaction. Grimly stated, ‘You said Breckenridge was an old and trusted friend of Camden’s, that their association stretched back to when Breckenridge was a child.“ He met her gaze. ”What was the basis of the connection?“

She raised her brows, waited…

It was like a shield being reluctantly lowered; she could almost sense his deliberation, the subsequent conscious submission.

“We were checking the bequests in Camden’s will.” He explained the information Gabriel and Lucifer had gathered, Devil’s report on Ferdinand’s movements, and his own lack of success in learning what it was the Portuguese were after, or why.

She listened without comment, but when he outlined their reasoning that the attempts on her life might in some way stem from Camden’s collection, she went to shake her head, then stopped.

He saw, waited, then raised a brow back.

She met his gaze, then inclined her head. “While I can’t dismiss the notion that someone might be motivated by a piece in Camden’s collection, I can and do assure you that I can be absolutely certain Breckenridge is not in any way involved— either in anything illicit to do with Camden’s collection or with the attempts on my life.”

He studied her face, searched her eyes, then somewhat bleakly asked, “You trust him that much?”

She held his gaze, then reached out, threaded her fingers through his and squeezed. “I know it’s not easy for you to accept or understand, but yes, I know I can trust Breckenridge that much.”

A long moment passed. She saw in his eyes his decision to accept her reassurance. “What,” he asked, “is or was the nature of the connection between Camden and Breckenridge?”

“It’s ‘is’—the connection continues. And while I know what it is, I’m afraid, much as I wish to”—she let her eyes show how much she wished, that it wasn’t because she didn’t or wouldn’t trust him that she felt forced to say—“I can’t tell you. As you’ve discovered, the connection is a secret, concealed from the world for a multitude of good reasons. It’s not my secret to share.”

She watched as he digested her answer… and decided he had to accept it. Had to respect the confidence she wouldn’t break, even for him. Had to trust her to be right.

Refocusing on her eyes, he nodded. “All right—it’s not Breckenridge, then.”

Her heart swelled; she hadn’t realized his simple acceptance would mean so much, yet it did.

She smiled.

He sat back in the chair, slowly smiled in return. “Where have we got to with the diaries?”

She couldn’t simply change her mind and say yes, she would marry him. Not after last night and all she now understood of both herself and him.

They sat in the parlor a few feet apart and read more of the diaries; while part of her mind followed Camden’s accounts of social gatherings, the rest followed a different tack.

Ever since she’d woken that morning, languorous and exhausted in the rumpled disaster of her bed, she’d been reassessing, reevaluating— hardly surprising given the tectonic shift in the landscape between them that the night had brought. That Michael had wrought. Quite deliberately.

She’d tried to tell herself he hadn’t meant it. That he couldn’t really not care.

One glance at the bruises circling her thighs, the lingering evidence of the intensity that had gripped him, had brought the power that drove him, that when they were together caught her and drove her, too, forcibly to mind.

She’d felt it, experienced it, recognized it; she knew it wasn’t fabricated or false. Indeed, gripped by it, it was impossible to be false, to play false, not between them. She believed in it—that between them that power existed, simply was. Replaying his words, the fervor, the certainty with which he’d made his declarations, she’d come to believe in them, too.

He’d made no subsequent reference to his decision. It seemed to have become a part of him; he clearly felt no need to try to convince her further. He’d told her all he needed to. All he had to.

All she needed to know.

Glancing up, she watched as he turned a page and continued reading. For a long moment, she studied his face, him, drank in his strength, the reliability and steadfastness that was so much a part of him one hardly noticed, then looked down.

There was still something missing in their equation. She and he were in unknown territory; neither had been this way before. She didn’t know what it was that had yet to manifest between them, yet her instincts, instincts she was too experienced to ignore, assured her there was something more. Something they yet lacked that they needed to have, to find, to secure if their relationship, the relationship they both wanted and needed, was to thrive.

That last was now her aim. By freeing her to make her own decision, he’d given her the opportunity to get everything right. More, he’d revealed how important it was to him that their relationship was strong and well founded.

So she wouldn’t let herself get swept away—she would grasp the chance he’d created. She’d wait and keep searching until she found that vital piece; he’d given her the strength to stand against the tide.

They’d gone down to report to Magnus and were climbing the stairs to change for dinner when Hammer strode into the hall. Glancing up, he saw them.