Raven heard much more than a description of her scar in his voice. From his eyes, his face, the way he caressed her, she started to believe he didn’t want to hurt her.
He withdrew his hand. “I gave you something to heal your injuries, but the change in your leg is temporary. It’s already beginning to wear off.”
A look of horror flashed across Raven’s features. “Temporary?”
“Unless the treatment is repeated,” he qualified, searching her eyes.
“Will my head injury return? Will I die?” Raven’s heart thumped in her chest.
His hand slid underneath her hair to the back of her neck.
“Look at me,” he ordered, his gruff tone at odds with the lightness of his touch.
He brought his face close to hers.
“The mortal wounds were healed. But your appearance and the old injury of your leg will return to what they were before, perhaps with some small variations.”
Her gaze dropped to his mouth. “How is that possible?”
“How is it that a relic deters a feral, and holy ground repels Maximilian and Aoibhe?”
“You’re a murderer.” She changed the subject.
He did not blink. “Yes.”
“And a thief.”
William released her neck and straightened.
“With respect to the illustrations, I merely repossessed them.”
“But you came to see if I was frightened after I saw the policeman being killed.”
He nodded once.
“And you came to me tonight, when you thought I was in danger. Now I discover you fought three men to save my life, even though you didn’t know me.” She gazed up at him in wonder.
He moved to cup her face.
“I know you.
“I know you live alone and have few friends. I know you walk with a cane because of your leg and ankle.
“I know you weep over a homeless man and risked your life to save him.
“I know that, despite the quiet and simplicity of your life, you’ve been happier in Florence than anywhere else.”
He drew a circle on her cheek with his thumb before dropping it to her jaw.
“You are my greatest virtue and my deepest vice.”
He leaned forward and pressed their lips together.
Anguish and desire flared in his chest as his mouth touched hers, his kiss becoming firm and insistent. His thumb traced a tempting trail down her beautiful neck and he groaned, the sound throaty and carnal.
Raven had been taken by surprise. At first she was motionless, trying to get her bearings. At the sound of his groan, which she took to be an indication of genuine desire, she relaxed against him.
His mouth was sensuous, his lips softer than she expected. And he kissed with the intensity of a condemned man.
Suddenly he pulled away.
“Good night, Cassita.” His words were a command and not a suggestion.
He turned his back on her, walking to the far end of the room where the Botticelli illustrations were displayed.
Raven wanted to ask him questions. She wanted to ask why he’d kissed her. Why he’d changed his mind and stopped.
She wanted to ask about the medicine he’d used to save her.
His mood had shifted. He seemed irritated, if not angry, and she was wary of him.
Her wariness was enough to propel her to obey his command and delay her escape. She had too many unanswered questions to leave now.
Without a word, she lifted her knapsack and exited the room, touching her lips in wonder.
Chapter Twenty-three
William strode to his library and shut the doors, locking them from the inside. Bookshelves ascended from the floor to the domed ceiling. A sliding metal staircase ran on a track that curved around the room, enabling one to climb to the tallest shelf.
Not that he needed the staircase.
Through the immense glass panes that formed the ceiling, he could see the moon, and the stars winking above him. Year after year, century after century, he’d gazed at that same sky. Its response was always the same—beautiful, cold indifference.
Just like God.
He growled at the thought.
He hadn’t chosen this life; it had been forced on him.
So much for the justice that governs the universe. Dante was a fool to believe such myths. Some of us are damned by the actions of others and exiled to hell through no fault of our own.
It was rare that he indulged himself with such thoughts. They stoked his anger and tested his discipline. On this evening, they could not be put aside.
He’d served God, even after God had taken what he treasured most. And in such a sick and twisted way.
Then God had taken from him again.
Twice he had seen goodness disappear from the world, watching the very life ebb away. Twice he’d been powerless to stop it. On the third occasion, when he came upon Cassita, he had the power to do something.
So do something he did.
Interestingly enough, Cassita’s goodness wasn’t cold and indifferent, as her tardy response to his kiss indicated.
The thought seared him.
He sat behind his wooden desk and opened the center drawer, withdrawing a small, black velvet box.
He opened it.
A pretty face looked up at him from behind glass.
The face was of a woman, young and fair, with large blue eyes and anabundance of long, reddish blond curls.
William remembered his anger, long since buried, as he stroked the girl’s cheek. He remembered the centuries of despair and hopelessness he’d weathered until the night he’d found the girl with the green eyes, slumped in an alley.
With her face firmly fixed in his mind, he closed the box and put it back in its place, sliding the drawer shut.
The next morning, Raven awoke late. She’d tossed and turned most of the night, her mind active and worried.
She found a card on her nightstand that indicated she should ring Lucia for breakfast. The card itself was unremarkable. What was remarkable was the fact that Raven found herself squinting in order to read Lucia’s elegant script.
Her heart sank as she realized that her eyesight, like all the other changes to her body, was reverting back to what it had been before William rescued her.
If, in fact, he had rescued her.
In the bright light of day, she wondered about his story. He claimed she’d had a head injury, but apart from a headache or two and her memory loss, there wasn’t any physical evidence.
Of course, there was the strange matter of her changed appearance. She wondered how William had been able to bring that about.
William.
The name, like the man, was deceptive. His attractive exterior and elegant name belied the criminal who was prone to violence.