Page 71 of A Dark and Stormy Knight
“Gold.”
Chapter 15
Prudence barely tasted her pasta. Instead she chewed on a puzzle, determined to uncover just what secret her husband was keeping from her.
She studied him across a private garden table behind what was possibly the most charming Italian café in the city, and contemplated everything he’d been in his exceptional life.
An urchin, a thief, a crack shot rifleman, an exhibitionist, a knighted war hero, an officer of the law, a vigilante,anda venture capitalist with interest in an American gold mine worth a fortune.
And, quite possibly, a liar.
Not about the gold, which was both startling, fascinating, and wonderful. But about what came before.
His childhood.
He’d left something out of that story, she was certain of it. As he’d spoken of his time at St. Dismas, she could feel him jumping over the graves of long-buried emotions, ripping up their headstones to pretend they’d never existed at all.
What a complicated man she’d married. Possessed of dichotomy between a heart capable of such unequaled valor, gallantry, and courage tied to a mind bedeviled by skepticism, enigma, and for lack of a gentler word, fear.
It was a word he would toss away and spit upon if she accused him of it. But if she boiled the amalgamation of his wariness, mysteriousness, and protectiveness down to a reduction as thick as the wonderful sauce anointing her pasta. She was certain she would find fear the main ingredient.
Not a fear of death or danger. His nocturnal vocation was evidence of uncommon bravery in the face of death.
So, what terrified this bold and daring knight? What drove him to hide himself, his past, in the shadows?
What had been done to him?
Or…what had he done?
“You’re not eating,” he prompted over a sip of his coffee. “If it’s not to your taste, we can go elsewhere.”
Jostled from her thoughts, Prudence picked up her utensils again and crafted herself an especially delicious bite. “No, it’s marvelous. I was just lost in thought.”
“Oh? About what?” He ate like he did everything else, she noticed, with correct and decisive efficiency. He’d been served a dish of pasta stuffed with meats, cheeses, and savory herbs in a voluminous red sauce, whereas she’d instantly selected the butter and white wine reduction over Capelli d’Angelo.
“I was thinking you’re the one who needs to eat more,” she said.
“I’m consuming a veritable mountain of food right now.” He gestured to his plate. “In fact, if we keep this up, I’ll need to have my trousers refitted.”
Hardly. He was filling out a little, but the extra portions seemed to simply fuel the production of muscle rather than storing anywhere unsightly. “Yes, but, before I started prevailing upon you to take me to all these wondrous places, it was the perception around the house that because of your punishing schedule, you’re woefully undernourished. Beyond that, you barely sleep.”
She’d noted that in the past week his skin had gained a bit more color, and his cheeks filled from rather gaunt to merely sharp. He’d been eating better, but the smudges beneath his eyes remained, and the lines of constant strain, of ever-readiness, still etched into the chiseled handsomeness of his features.
His utensils stilled in his pasta and he stared down at the food with a queer little smile that vanished as quickly as it appeared. “I’ve heard officers complain for years about their wives nagging them to stay home more often. To take better care of their health.”
She bristled a little until he graced her with a look so tender, she might have melted into a puddle beneath her chair.
“I always envied them.” The glint in his eye dazzled her more than the sunlight fragmenting off the spray from the little garden fountain. Their round table was large enough to hold their meals, but only just, and it precipitated them sitting in such a way that their knees often brushed. An embarrassment of hyacinth, calendulas, and lilac blossoms cosseted them from the din of diners inside, creating a lavish, intimate oasis of their own in the middle of the world’s largest city.
“Well, Lady Morley,” he said around a circumspect bite of bread. “My lack of slumber is entirely your fault. Before you tempted me to your bed at all hours, I’ll have you know I managed quite well to wedge sleep into my schedule.”
“I suppose I shall lock you out of my bedchamber, then,” she sighed as if it were a great shame. “If only because I care for your health.”
He nudged her knee in challenge. “Don’t you dare.”
She laughed flirtatiously before a note of uncertainty pricked at her. “I know you live two very important lives but…would you possibly consider…devoting a few nights to staying at home?” she ventured.
You could sleep with me,she didn’t say. Because he hadn’t yet. He would leave her in the night, beholden to his self-proclaimed duties as the Knight of Shadows. Upon his return, he’d sleep in the room down the hall from her. Her breath trembled in her throat enough that she had to tug on the high neck of her gown. “I know I don’t have the right to make undue demands, but once the baby comes—”
