She patted Astrid on the arm, giving her a quick look full of meaning, and John looked away, pretending not to have caught the not so subtle glance.
He cleared his throat, nodding at Mrs. Chamberlain as she breezed by him. “Punch?” John asked Astrid, raising an eyebrow.
She blushed, but a small apologetic grimace accompanied it. “Subtlety is not my mother’s forte. But, yes, thank you, I’d love some punch.”
John chuckled. He had no romantic notions toward her, but Astrid was a nice girl. And she was pretty. She resembled Angelina a little bit with their father’s same almond-shaped eyes and high forehead. She would catch the eye of some other man someday soon, and that man would be lucky if she looked back at him, despite her dragon of a mother.
He led Astrid to the punch table, pouring her a cup and then making one for himself. “Happy New Year, Astrid,” he said, clinking his glass to hers.
“Happy New Year, John,” she said softly, taking a sip of her punch.
A man in a top hat and a black mask laughed, walking past with a woman in a red boa and a dainty hat that looked like it was supposed to be a cardinal’s plume. “I didn’t realize people were dressing up in costume.”
“Oh, it wasn’t on the invitation. My parents had a New Year’s Eve costume party many years ago, and some people still dress up as part of tradition.”
“Ah, I see.” John took another drink of the watery punch, wishing someone had spiked it or that he’d brought his own so it would be easier to endure the social triviality of this night.
All he wanted to do was push through this crush of people, and burst outside into the night air. He wanted to go to her. He wanted her so badly he ached with it.
Suddenly, as if his thoughts had conjured someone who looked like her . . . or rather, someone who moved like her, his eyes snagged on a woman in a high-necked, pale pink dress wearing a full-faced cat mask that also covered the top of her head. John attempted to shrug it off, to move his gaze away, but no, she definitely moved like his Angelina. He should know, he’d spent long hours reliving every moment with her, picturing over and over every stretch of her lean body, every gesture, every small twitch of her muscles. But Angelina would never have been invited to this party or any other. She was somewhere very close by, yes, but God, she was a world away.
“So, John,” Astrid said, and John pulled his eyes from the woman across the room, to look at Astrid who was biting her lip nervously. “I’ve ah, enjoyed having tea with you very much. I hope, well, I . . .”
John’s eyes moved back to the masked woman, Astrid’s voice fading. The woman reached out with her gloved hand and took a bite-sized piece of cake from a passing tray, holding a hand over her lower face, as she discreetly delivered the morsel under her mask. Her spine bent back very slightly as she lowered her hand, chewed and swallowed.
That small spine bend . . . it was the same way Angelina experienced pleasure, arching back into it, feeling it with her entire body— Holy hell. The sound of the party exploded in John’s head.
“John? Are you all right? Did you hear what I said?”
“I beg your pardon?” he muttered. John looked at Astrid who was staring at him, her expression a mixture of hurt and concern.
“I asked you if—”
“Forgive my rudeness, Astrid, I need to speak to someone.”
“Oh, certainly, I—”
John moved around her, trying to walk as calmly as possible to the woman standing by the window, the woman—no, not the woman. Angelina. His Angelina, and she was playing with fire.
His gut clenched and he bit back a curse, plastering what he hoped was a casual smile on his face as he walked past her. “Follow me,” he said softly so only she could hear. Then he moved past, exiting the room and walking down the hall where he glanced back once to make sure she was indeed following him and that no one else witnessed them.
He entered the library at the end of the hall, leaving the door open a crack. When she slipped in a moment later, he pulled her into his arms, closing the door and locking it with a quick turn of his wrist. “What in the hell do you think you’re doing?”
“How did you recognize me?”
He removed her mask and flung it aside, tightening the arm that still held her and released a harsh exhale. “I’d know you anywhere, don’t you know that?”
She stared up at him, her lips tipping sweetly. She placed her hand over his heart that was thundering in his chest, part fear at the risk she’d taken, part joy in having her in his arms when it was the very thing he’d been wishing for so fervently.
“I wanted to be near you, John. I wanted to dance with you and drink champagne. I wanted to taste one of those cakes my mama spent all day baking. And I saw the masks and I—”
John crushed his mouth to hers and her words became a breathless moan. Their sounds of pleasure mingled as their tongues twisted together, their kisses frantic and full of longing, full of the knowledge that there would be no dancing, no champagne, not for them. But there is this. Ah, there is this, John’s fevered mind told him. Even if it wasn’t nearly enough.
“I don’t want to hide,” she said, her mouth breaking from his, “not in a cave or a burrow. I want to live in the light, John.”
Oh, fuck. Fuck, fuck. This is madness, John thought. It was driving him mad, making him insane with the need to do something, to find a solution for them. But despite being unable to sleep for thinking about her, staying up late into the night just staring at the ceiling, he could envision nothing that didn’t risk her life. Her life, that was more precious to him than his own.
“Angelina,” he whispered, the word full of love and the helplessness he felt in his heart. He needed some time. What would they do?
He kissed her one final time, trailing a finger over her smooth cheek. “We’ll both drink that starlight you bottled up. We’ll shine for the whole wide world.”
Angelina let out a small laugh that didn’t hold much humor. “Only that isn’t real and you know it.”
John looked into her eyes, this woman who had rearranged his soul somehow. “Isn’t it?” All he knew was that he felt brighter, hotter when she was with him. He felt like he could do anything if it meant caring for her.
Angelina let go of him, bending to pick up the mask that had landed on the floor as she walked to the nearby desk.
She picked up a book and glanced at it, her shoulders bunching before she placed it down. When she turned, her expression was still troubled but she quickly replaced it with a smile. She opened her mouth to speak when a key jiggled in the lock and before either of them could react, Astrid burst into the room. Her eyes were wide and she looked from John to Angelina and then back to John, an arrested expression on her face as John’s stomach dipped. Oh God, no.
John moved to stand in front of Angelina, an instinctive protective maneuver, when the sharp sound of heels clacked on the hardwood of the hallway seconds before Mrs. Chamberlain joined her daughter.
She looked from one stricken face to another. “What, pray tell, is going on here?”
John’s mind spun. They would hurt her somehow—perhaps not physically, but they’d find some way to hurt her. He wouldn’t let it happen.
Astrid stepped forward, a brittle smile turning her mouth up. “Mama, I asked Angelina to fetch one of my masks from my room and deliver it. I wanted to surprise everyone.”
She walked to where Angelina was standing and held out her hand for the cat mask.
John could see that Angelina was trembling and it caused his muscles to tighten painfully with the need to go to her, but he knew it was better that he didn’t. “Isn’t that right, Angelina?”
John stared, ready to move should it be necessary, wondering what Astrid was doing. Was she covering for them?
“Yes, ma’am,” Angelina said, her voice whisper soft as she thrust the mask into Astrid’s outstretched hand.
Astrid took it, smiling that same thin-lipped smile as she turned back toward her mother. Mrs. Chamberlain narrowed her eyes at Astrid. “Was that really necessary, Astrid? Only the older people still carry on that tradition.” She looked at John. “What were you doing in here, John?”