13. Chapter 13
Chapter 13
"Youth is wasted on the young." Bernard ShawHenrique paced the beach, fists on his hips, waiting for the princess. Isabel climbed out of the bathing machine. With her color high, the princess-turned-virago tossed her wet hair, lashing it against his chest, and spun past him in the palace’s direction. The maid emerged from the striped canvas tent, gave him a startled, disapproving look, and sped after her mistress.
Henrique followed. What had he done? Luis should call him out. Henrique would not hesitate to pummel any bloke who dared the same with his sister. All was fair in the quest for pleasure. But crossing the line with a maiden? But all the chemical reactions he knew couldn’t match the explosion of Isabel’s kiss, an Amazon princess who knew what she wanted. He avoided self-deceit, and he would not start fooling himself now. The jolt coursing through him when their lips met had produced more electricity than a voltaic battery. A battery? Who was he fooling? Isabel hid enough passion beneath her flannels to light up an entire village.
And his lame attempt to justify himself? Flung it right back at his face. Still, should he be less than honest? All he offered was attraction, desire. Hot lovemaking and pleasant friendship when this journey ended. He rubbed his chest and exhaled. He couldn’t trust himself around her anymore. The plan to escape Comillas took on a new urgency. His ill-begotten function as an escort needed to end before he did something both would regret.
Isabel hastened her steps along the graveled path leading to the palace door. He could tell she didn’t lace the stiff corset, no doubt wanting to leave his presence with all haste. Her long strides emphasized her lean curves, a fresh reminder of treasures he couldn’t explore.
A cold bath and a bottle of port would be in order. He would have dinner in his own room. He needed space. By the look of her, she would thank him for the courtesy.
Canastra sauntered out of the palace, interrupting her race toward safety. "There you are, Your Highness. I have someone to introduce to you."
A man of no more than twenty-five years old strode outside. With flaxen hair combed back severely and an unadorned black suit, the stranger stood in sharp relief against the duke’s gaudy uniform.
Canastra beamed, eyes glittering like a besotted maiden, his chest gleaming with medals like a fanatic. "I have the honor of introducing His Highness, Don Alfonso, Prince of Asturias. The rightful king of Spain."
Henrique halted. So this was the prince Dio gushed about. He had the square Bourbon chin and the straight Bourbon nose. His mouth was an uncompromising slit topped by a waxed mustache. Dark eyes finished what was, he had to admit, a strong face. What lay underneath, though, he could not tell and had not the slightest inclination to discover.
Alfonso took hold of Isabel’s hand and bowed at the waist. "I’ve been denied my home for long years, and when I return, it is to find the beauty of my Spain obfuscated by a Portuguese princess."
He spoke with the right amount of eloquence and surprise, as if he had just come up with that fanciful speech. He stared at Isabel with ill-concealed hunger. Henrique didn’t like it and fisted his hands at his sides. Sure, the prince was handsome, in a predictable, staid way, but Isabel would not fall for his Romeo act.
Isabel curtsied gracefully. "I must discount your words as undeserved compliments, Your Highness. Your Spain’s beauty gains on me by leagues."
She was wrong. With her flashing green eyes, alabaster skin, and regal posture, she put Spain’s hills and golden beaches to shame.
Tilting her head, she wiped off all traces of the vengeful mermaid from her expression. "But I thank you for your kindness. It is a joy to find a gentleman with courtesy these days."
She didn’t even deign to look at Henrique, but the barb hit home. He certainly deserved it. He took a step forward and cleared his throat.
The duke waved in his direction. "And this is the Viscount of Penafiel. A scientist," Canastra drawled.
Henrique ignored the petty slight to his profession, grabbed the prince’s hand, and squeezed. Alfonso’s grip wasn’t the wishy-washy one he expected, but a firm handshake, returning the pressure Henrique gave.
Henrique sustained the other man’s gaze until the prince’s eye sought Isabel again.
"My sisters said wonderful things about you." Alfonso offered his arm, and Isabel placed her hand above his elbow.
Those fingers had just curled over Henrique’s chest.
His gut tightened, and he started after the royal couple.
The duke grabbed Henrique’s elbow. "Why the long face? Let’s leave the young people to know themselves better."
Henrique gritted his teeth. "Dom Luis sent me here to protect his sister—"
"I can vouch for Dom Alfonso. He is a perfect gentleman. Isabel is more than safe with him as an escort."
The house party guests had abolished the siesta en masse to stroll around the garden. No one in their right mind would want to walk in the mid-afternoon sun under the Spanish heat. Still, the Bourbon prince had taken Isabel for a turn, and voilá, here Henrique was—following the royal couple, dragging an uncooperative Rafaela by the arm. The Spaniards watched Alfonso and Henrique’s princess with barely concealed glee. Crap, she wasn’t his anything. He shouldn’t care if the prince drooled all over her. She could defend herself.
While Isabel sauntered on the arm of the Bourbon prince, Dolly chatted with Charles, their profiles partially hidden by a trellis. The rake’s besotted looks would send any chaperone running for smelling salts, but not Isabel. How quickly she forgot her charge.
Without so much as a ’by your leave’, Alfonso steered Isabel out of the garden path and into Canastra’s maze. What a sleazy bastard. Taking a maid into the tall hedges, concealed from view, was the oldest trick in the rake’s book.
Henrique increased the speed of his steps.
Rafaela pressed his arm. "Darling, if you go any faster, these slippers will torture my toes. Why race after the princess, anyway? My husband’s protégé is a boring stick in the mud. He won’t dishonor her."
"He can stay in the mud until it is dry. I’m curious about the maze, that’s all."
She sank her feet on the grass and pointed to the Minotaur sculpture guarding the entrance. "My husband adores the myth of how Ariadne gifted Theseus with a spool of thread so he could defeat the monster and leave the labyrinth. Some say the Minotaur represents our deepest fears. I have nightmares about its hideous horns."
"Nonsense. The Minotaur is an allegory for humanity’s basest desires." The creature was the son of a goddess and a bull. It didn’t get baser than that.
"I won’t enter."
"I’ve seen it from above. It is a spiral with branching exits every seven feet. I can navigate it with ease."
Canastra strolled along with his companions.
Rafaela threw herself in Henrique’s arms. Canastra eyed his wife’s spectacle and frowned. Then he averted his face and continued on the graveled path.
What in blazes was she doing, taunting her husband like that? The fiery duchess would get him expelled from the castle with her overtures. Frowning, Henrique planted her to her feet and stepped back.
Rafaela whirled to leave. "I bid you adieu. The laundry maid needs me—"
Henrique caught her arm. "Not until you tell me what is going on."
Her carefree smile faded, and she touched the paw-shaped leaves covering the maze’s wall. "Have you ever been in love?"
Henrique had lost the royal couple and was fast losing his patience. "What does love have to do with this? The way you throw yourself in my arms every time your husband appears? If you are trying to incite a duel, you must know honor wouldn’t allow me to kill him. Is this your plan? Do you wish to become a widow, Rafaela?"
"Of course not. I love him." Her black eyes turned liquid.
"Then why?"
She looked at him, and such hurt glimmered from her gaze that Henrique wondered how she managed her fun-loving façade.
Her chin trembled. "I love him, and well… my husband loves Spain."
Henrique brushed her arms and pulled her into a brotherly hug. Was all humanity blind? Rafaela was utterly different from Canastra. To think they could share anything more than a few grunts in an unlit bedroom was society’s greatest lie.
"I’m sure he cares for you. Most husbands can be cold during the day, but at night, they—"
"He doesn’t visit my room. I’m hopeless, aren’t I?" She smiled, cleaning tears from her eyes and smearing her face powder. "Desperate for my husband’s affection, trying to make him jealous when he clearly doesn’t care."
"I would gladly help, but—"
"Thank you, oh, thank you! No one in Spain dares to come close to me. He is too powerful. But he has no power over you. I’m sure he will notice me if he thinks you are interested."
She kissed his cheek and skipped away.
Henrique’s shoulder deflated. This stay couldn’t possibly get more complicated. Shaking his head, he entered the maze. The evergreen walls raked his clothes. Their height was five inches taller than he, swallowing the sunlight. Closing his eyes, he visualized what he saw through his window. Right, left, right, center, three rights. Yes. He grinned. How easy it would be to surprise them in the center. Isabel’s face would be priceless, with the bonus of curtailing their time alone.
Henrique’s pulse quickened as he approached the last bend. Water dripping and murmured voices sounded closer. He was almost at them. Clenching his hands, he emerged at the central square.
A fountain gushed there, indeed, but its only dweller was a statue of Theseus killing the Minotaur. The royal couple had vanished. Henrique ran his fingers through his hair and clenched his jaw. Where did they go?
A shape detached itself from the shadows.
Henrique narrowed his eyes. "Almoster? Why are you haunting the maze like a golden-haired Minotaur?"
Pedro Daun strode near. He had ditched the military uniform and wore a black frock coat, his blond hair hidden underneath a tricorn. Anne wasn’t with him. Still, Pedro didn’t look like he was on holiday.
"Keep your voice down. I’m not officially in Spain."
"That, my friend, is a paradox. But making sense or not, you are a welcome vision. This place is a madhouse."
"Where is the princess?"
Henrique gritted his teeth. "She is with Alfonso de Bourbon."
"Shouldn’t you be shadowing her?"
"Believe me, I’ve tried."
"I have critical information for you."
Henrique laughed. "You sound like a spy."
Pedro lifted an eyebrow. "Luis has been coerced into sending his sister here."
Coerced? The king had told him Isabel wanted a vacation. Of course, Luis had lied. Isabel was as interested in this loose seaside resort as he was in becoming a eunuch. Luis must have manipulated her into coming, just as he did with Henrique. Cunning royal bastard. "How can a Spanish duke force the Portuguese king to do anything?"
Pedro’s look said Canastra could do that and much more. "At first, I suspected Canastra to be threatening Luis’ finances. For a decade, the king overspent the annuity allowed by the Congress, contracting credit from the Rothschilds and the Burnay Bank in Lisbon—"
"And Isabel? Had he spent her—"
"The princess has a separate settlement. She keeps a tight financial rein over her household and wisely invests her mother’s inheritance."
"That’s my girl," Henrique said, his lips tugging up.
Pedro narrowed his eyes, no doubt processing Henrique’s use of the possessive.
Why had he blurted the words? Isabel wasn’t his anything. He shouldn’t have kissed her. It was basic physics. Energy couldn’t be destroyed. And they had created a lot of power with that kiss. Now it would walk with him, pestering him all day, with no chance of dissipating.
Pedro tilted his head to the side, his compelling gaze studying him closely. "If the problem was financial, the king would’ve come to me. Last month, I learned Luis kept a Spanish mistress, and she was selling his love letters. Before my aide-de-camp could retrieve them, Canastra bought the lot."
"What a sordid mess."
"Indeed. Before I go—"
"Go? How did you even get here?"
"The Angel is anchored in a hidden cove south of here."
"If Gabriel and Cris have returned from their grand tour, they can take my place."
"They haven’t. I bought another yacht. Anne believes we are summering here."
"I have an idea. You stay here to clean up after the king’s affairs. I will escort Anne to Biscay Bay."
Pedro laughed. The sound was still foreign to Henrique’s ears, and in all their time serving in Mozambique and haunting Lisbon’s hells, he never knew his friend had so many teeth. Marriage to Maxwell’s sister agreed to him. The girl combined softness and courage, her strength so acute she could put a grown man to shame. At first, Henrique believed their marriage was doomed. Pedro and Anne were as different as combustion and photosynthesis. While the first released energy by breaking organic matter—or people’s skulls—the latter consumed power to build matter. Who knew destruction and creation’s final product were smiles?
"Even if I had the slightest inclination to relinquish my wife’s company, she would balk at having me here with the princess. Despite her friendship with Isabel, I don’t think she forgot Luis offered me the princess’ hand last summer."
"Curse Dom Luis and his impulsivity." Pedro was a handsome devil, and the shrewdest bastard he ever knew, but a marriage between him and Isabel would’ve ended disastrously. They would clash day and night, both as bendable as a granite slab. "If you explain the situation to the princess, we could convince her to return to Lisbon." And then he could resume his life.
"I cannot be seen here, and before we discover Canastra’s schemes, incurring his wrath would be a mistake."
But what of Dolly and Charles? The plan was already in place. In fact, Isabel would witness the couple strolling in the garden after dinner. If Isabel left because of a personal matter, Canastra could not blame Dom Luis. Henrique crossed his arms over his chest. "Why me? You are the politician. Every day I dally here risks my position in Oxford, not to mention the sale of my estate."
Pedro placed a hand atop Henrique’s shoulders. "Your photographic memory and deduction skills will prove invaluable in bringing Canastra to the ground. I’m sure you will make your country proud. Your sacrifice won’t be in vain."
Sacrifices of any kind left a bitter taste in his mouth. The Penafiel family perpetrated them as a sort of unofficial motto. His father, with his fervent patriotism, was always ready to sacrifice for the sake of his country. Henrique should be excused if he had a distaste for the sacrifice chain. "Damn, you are good. You almost made me believe your crap. Save the haranguing for your soldiers, General."
"The country is counting on you."
"God have pity on their poor souls." Henrique turned to leave.
Pedro clasped his shoulder. "I need those letters. The king’s popularity won’t resist the scandal. You will help me recover them."
They had shared more than a bivouac in Mozambique. Pedro knew Henrique didn’t care for politics, and few things would compel him to do what he had no interest in accomplishing. They were well-matched in stubbornness. "Impossible. Canastra has guards and is surrounded by devoted aristocrats."
Pedro’s expression hardened. "If Luis falls, think what will happen to your girl. The best she could hope for is an exile to Prussia."
Henrique clamped down his retort so he wouldn’t give Pedro more ammunition. He should not concern himself with her, and yet… Isabel, with all her sacrifices for morality’s sake, should not pay for her brother’s indiscretions. Henrique glared at Pedro. Almoster was not the most powerful man in the kingdom for playing fair, was he?
"What do you want me to do?"