The Seduction Of Ellen

Three

Aboard the SS White Star

April 1899

In top cabin staterooms, very near to their own, was the strange carnival contingent that was to guide Ellen and her aunt to the Lost City of the Anasazi.

After having met all four, Ellen wondered how such a diverse group of people had ever come together.

Mister Corey was obviously a loner who needed no one. If he had any feelings, he never revealed them. He said little, rarely smiled, kept his own counsel, went his own way. His rugged sensuality, heavy-lidded gaze and devil-may-care attitude was repellent and appealing at the same time.

A man best left alone.

Enrique O’Mara was the exact opposite of the somber Mister Corey. He was a sunny-dispositioned, carefree half-Latin, half-Irishman, who everyone called Ricky. Of average height, Ricky was a sturdy, muscular man in his early thirties. He had dark wavy hair, snapping green eyes and an ever-present smile that could melt the coldest of hearts.

There was Padjan, of course. A man who loved to talk to anyone who would listen, he could speak for hours on any subject under the sun. Seemingly better educated than most university graduates, he impressed both Ellen and Alexandra with his vast wealth of knowledge. Alexandra was clearly fascinated by Padjan and the two spent long hours together talking.

Rounding out the quartet was the birdlike Summer Dawn, a tiny Indian woman who was so old and so weak she could not walk unaided and no longer spoke. Shriveled and extremely frail, she had tried to smile when Padjan had introduced her, saying simply, “This is our sweetheart, the precious Summer Dawn.” Nodding, smiling, both Ellen and Alexandra had assumed that Summer Dawn was a close relative of Padjan’s. His grandmother, or perhaps even great-grandmother.

Having met the entire foursome, Ellen’s concerns had only increased. Did Alexandra actually expect these down-on-their-luck characters to lead her to the fountain of youth? There was no doubt in Ellen’s mind that they were a bunch of charlatans whose sole aim was to fleece Alexandra of her fortune. And she dreaded the prospect of spending the next several weeks—perhaps even months—in the company of such disreputable people.

Especially in the company of the disturbing Mister Corey. Ellen wouldn’t allow herself to even think about the treacherous trek across the rugged country of western America when there would be nowhere she could escape his presence.

It would be all she could do to avoid him on the long voyage home.

As feared, Ellen encountered Mister Corey on shipboard.

Often.

She simply couldn’t bear to stay in the stateroom forever listening to the constantly complaining Alexandra. She had to get away from her aunt for a few minutes now and then if she were to maintain her sanity. But every time she ventured out to stand at the railing to feel the mist on her face or take a leisurely stroll around the deck, the unprincipled man she held personally responsible for this entire costly charade mysteriously appeared.

And immediately gravitated toward her.

“Enjoying the voyage?” he asked that sunny afternoon as he stepped up beside her.

“I was,” she said pointedly, “until now.”

“Does that mean you’d rather I hadn’t joined you?”

“How quick you are,” she replied.

He cocked his head to one side. “You don’t like me, do you, Ellen?”

“If I ever gave you a thought,” she responded, “I’m sure I wouldn’t.”

“Oh, you’ve given me a thought or two.”

Her head snapped around. “I most certainly have not! I have much better things to do than—”

“Like what?”

“Like…oh, for heaven’s sake, Mister Corey, what is it you want from me?”

“I don’t know, Ellen,” he drawled. “What are you offering?”

Ellen felt her face flush hotly. Anger rising with her growing discomfort, she said, “Nothing for you. Get this straight, Mister Corey. You may be able to hoodwink my aunt, but I am not quite so gullible.”

An infuriating half smile touched his full lips and he said, “You don’t want me to put the bloom of the rose back into your pale cheeks?” He lifted a hand and lightly brushed her face.

She stiffened and pulled away from his touch. “I want nothing from you,” she said firmly, “except to have you out of my sight!” Lifting her chin, she added, “If you think for one minute that I intend to stand idly by and let you and your band of thieves steal all my aunt’s money, you are sadly mistaken.”

“How do you know we are thieves?” He was unfazed by the accusation. “What if we’re telling the truth and there really are waters of magic?”

“You stopped recognizing the truth years ago, Mister Corey. Your entire life is a lie.”

“And yours isn’t?”

The offhand remark cut too close to the bone. Flustered, Ellen said anxiously, “If you’ll kindly excuse me.” She turned and hurried away.

Ellen blamed Mister Corey for this whole outlandish fiasco. The others were merely pawns in his elaborate con game. It was, she felt certain, Mister Corey who had hatched the far-fetched scheme. He who had rounded up the players and he who would claim the lion’s share of the money they managed to swindle out of Alexandra.

Ellen strongly suspected that the cold Mister Corey would not be content with the sum—however great it was—that her aunt had agreed to pay. He had undoubtedly read about Alexandra Landseer’s visit to London in the London Daily Express. He knew that her aunt was an extremely wealthy woman and extremely vain. It was as if he had purposely placed the advertisement in the paper knowing that Alexandra would see it and respond.

Would a man like that be satisfied with what he’d been promised or would he try to relieve Alexandra of the bulk of the Landseer fortune?

These doubts were nagging at Ellen on the fourth evening at sea when she accompanied Alexandra to a shipboard dance. She found herself hoping that the cool, confident thief wouldn’t be there.

But despite the fact that she knew exactly what he was, she couldn’t deny the attraction he held. A fact that shamed and frightened her.

She shuddered to think that such a flawed man could nonetheless so perfectly symbolize the fortuneteller’s prediction and the mysterious, dreamlike vagueness of her own romantic fantasies. Fantasies that had long been forgotten until she’d had the misfortune of meeting Mister Corey.

Thank God he couldn’t read her thoughts.

Midway through the evening’s dance, Ellen finally began to relax. How foolish she had been to worry about Mister Corey appearing at this gala affair. Surely his kind had not been invited. And even if he had, he couldn’t possibly own the proper attire for such an occasion.

Bored and growing warm in the stuffy, crowded ballroom, Ellen told Alexandra that she was going up on deck for a breath of fresh air.

“Don’t stay out too long and catch a cold,” her aunt berated.

“I won’t,” Ellen dutifully replied.

Four

Lifting the skirts of her well-worn ball gown, Ellen made her way toward the wide center staircase, paused at the base and looked up.

And lost her breath.

His lean, tanned hand resting carelessly on the smooth marble balustrade, Mister Corey stood at the top of the stairs. He was elegantly dressed in dark evening clothes and a pristine white ruffled shirt. His hair had been carefully brushed and was shimmering in the light from the crystal chandeliers. The curving scar on his right cheek shone pale white against the darkness of his olive skin. The left corner of his mouth was lifted in the hint of a teasing smile, but his black, brooding eyes were as lifeless as ever.

Mister Corey was looking directly at Ellen and she at him. She wished she could return to her chair. But it was too late. Holding her gaze, Mister Corey leisurely descended the carpeted stairs, took her elbow and guided her onto the polished dance floor.

In his arms, Ellen was more than a little uncomfortable. His nearness—the closest she had been to a man, other than her son, in ages—was so intimidating she was momentarily tongue-tied and unduly flustered. Heart pounding, face flushed, she made a misstep. Mister Corey caught her, held her tightly and suggested she relax.

Which made her all the more nervous.

Fully aware that she was behaving like a foolish, frightened old maid, Ellen realized—miserably—that the perceptive Mister Corey had already picked up on her involuntary response to him.

But Ellen was also an astute woman.

While Mister Corey had that insolent, nothing-bothers-me manner of a totally secure man, she sensed that his caustic wit and sardonic grin likely masked some deep, underlying pain.

She knew enough about concealing pain behind a brittle facade to easily recognize the practice in others. Somewhere in Mister Corey’s past, he had been hurt. Badly. She would bet her life on it.

But that was his problem, not hers. Her once-fragile heart had long since hardened. This dark, mysterious man warranted no compassion from her. He was, after all, a thief and a fraud and she had no use for him.

Mister Corey didn’t know what was going through Ellen’s mind at that moment, but he was well aware of his unsettling effect on the lonely woman. Her dislike of him was elemental and impersonal. She firmly believed that he was after her aunt’s money. Ellen Cornelius clearly didn’t approve of him, didn’t like him.

But she was attracted to him on a purely physical level. It was not a mutual attraction. While he had no doubt that she had once been quite beautiful, there was now little about her that was appealing. She was too thin to suit his taste. With his arm around her, he could feel her ribs and there was no generous swell of bosom rising above the square-cut neckline of her sadly out-of-fashion pink ball gown.

Her brown hair didn’t gleam with golden highlights and she wore it pulled severely back from her face and twisted into an ugly pinned-up knot at the back of her head. Her green eyes were large and almond-shaped, but they held no spark, no glow. And her lips seemed to be permanently drawn into a stern line of disapproval that strongly discouraged any temptation to kiss them.

The years had been unkind to Ellen Cornelius and she obviously was not a happy woman. But he had no real interest in learning the cause of her disillusion. Her problems were the last thing he needed.

Feeling awkward and anxious and wishing the dance would end, Ellen was conscious of the fact that dozens of ladies in the ballroom were far prettier than she. She wondered why Mister Corey had chosen to dance with her. Was it simply that he was mean-spirited and cruel and enjoyed upsetting her, liked having her make a fool of herself in his arms?

Her forehead pressed against his cheek, Ellen nervously glanced around, convinced that everyone was watching them. She wasn’t that far off the mark. Within minutes of his late arrival, a number of interested females were twittering and smiling, intrigued by the dark, enigmatic Mister Corey.

As soon as the dance ended, Ellen found herself back in her gilt chair beside the elegantly gowned Alexandra, who wasted no time critiquing her niece’s performance. “You never did learn to dance properly. You haven’t any natural grace, Ellen. You are clumsy and uncoordinated and you’d do well to just stay off the floor and stop embarrassing yourself and me.”

Ellen was so accustomed to her aunt’s belittling, she paid her no mind. Her undivided attention was on Mister Corey and his new dance partner, a tall, stunning, expensively gowned beauty with dark hair, fair skin and a voluptuous body that she was eagerly pressing against his.

Even Alexandra noticed the striking couple. “Ellen, look who Mister Corey is dancing with now!”

Endeavoring to sound nonchalant, Ellen said, “Mmm. Who is she? Do you know her, Aunt Alexandra?”

“I know of her,” sniffed Alexandra. “She is Mademoiselle de Puisaye, a rich, spoiled French beauty who does exactly as she pleases. They say all the eligible bachelors on the Continent are after her.” Alexandra clucked her tongue against the roof of her mouth. “Looks like she is enjoying the dance with Mister Corey a bit too much.” She shook her head and exhaled loudly, “What could any sensible woman see in that rude, scowling man?”

“I can’t imagine,” said Ellen.

And then she felt her heart squeeze painfully in her chest as the music ended and the French beauty whispered something to Mister Corey.

He nodded.

She laughed.

And the couple hurriedly left together.

Waiting just long enough to make certain she wouldn’t bump into the pair, Ellen claimed a raging headache and escaped to the stateroom she shared with her aunt. Inside, she paced about, restless and edgy.

And wondering, miserably, if Mister Corey had only seen Mademoiselle de Puisaye to her stateroom where he had said a gentlemanly good-night. Or had he gone inside?

Instinctively, Ellen knew the answer. She sighed and sank down onto the edge of the bed.

Just a few doors down, in the well-appointed stateroom of Mademoiselle de Puisaye, Mister Corey and the French beauty sank down onto the edge of the bed.

“I saw you the minute you walked into the dance,” said the confident Gabrielle de Puisaye, “and I said to myself, ‘That man is going to make love to me tonight.’ You are, aren’t you?”

Mister Corey leaned down and placed a kiss on the bare swell of her breasts above her low-cut bodice.

“Tonight. In the morning. Tomorrow afternoon. Whenever. Whatever you want.”

“I want you to undress me and I want you to tell me your name.”

“Mister Corey,” he said, urging her to her feet before him.

“I know that,” she said. “I mean your given name.”

“Doesn’t matter,” he said as he turned her about and began to deftly undo the tiny hooks going down the back of her lush satin evening gown. He urged her opened dress down to her waist and was amused to see that she wore absolutely nothing beneath the gown’s bodice. Curious, he pushed the dress to her hips and revealed her naked backside. “My, but you’re a brazen lady, Gaby. No underclothes of any kind?”

Giggling, Gabrielle shoved her shimmering eggshell gown to the carpet, stepped out of it, kicked it aside and turned to face Mister Corey. Naked, save for her shoes and stockings, Gabrielle quickly discarded her dancing slippers, peeled the stockings down her legs, and tossed them aside. She sank to her knees before him and quickly removed his shoes, but not his black stockings. She then rose to her feet, bent to him, kissed his lips, then eagerly climbed astride his lap.

“I’m not brazen, I just plan ahead,” she told him, running her hands through his hair and tracing the long white scar down his cheek with a red-nailed finger. “This way you don’t have to fuss with all that cumbersome silk and lace to get to the real goodies.”

“I do admire a woman who is well organized,” he said, his hands spanning her bare waist. “Now, if you’ll just give me a minute, I’ll get undressed.” He started to lift her up off his lap. She resisted, clinging to his neck.

“No, not yet,” she begged. “Do it to me while you’re still fully dressed. I like it that way. It’s so…naughty and exciting.”

Her hands went to the waistband of his dark trousers. Looking into his cold black eyes, she promptly freed his throbbing erection and said, “Oh, God, I knew it. You’re so big and hard and hot. Put it in me, Mister Corey. Hurry, hurry, I can’t wait to feel you moving inside me.”

Mister Corey willingly obliged.

“Ahhhh,” Gabrielle moaned with delight as he slowly impaled her on his hard, pulsing flesh.

With his hands on her firm thighs, he guided her, lowering her soft, yielding body down onto him until he was buried in her.