as at this moment, with primitive energy humming through her.
And he was a priest. She reined in her madness and focused on that, on the coarseness of his dark robe, on the glinting of his silver crucifix in the moonlight. Diego Castillo was a priest.
But, goodness, he was an attractive priest. The maleness of him called out to her, made her flush with desire, made her wish… No, she would not consider any such thing. She was already bound by oath to another, and this…this was utter madness. Her mind coiled around her fascination and captured it. She was here for one purpose and one purpose only: to convince her betrothed’s twin to return to Spain. Only then could she procure the marriage she needed. She needed this marriage.
That thought sobered her. By the time they entered the heavy doors to the chapel her limbs had ceased their trembling. Her mind had calmed. Maybe now she could concentrate on the business at hand.
The chapel was lit by one single candle near the altar which threw golden glints of light up towards the wall where a silver Jesus hung on his silver cross. The edges of the room were cloaked in comforting shadows. Celeste glanced up at the ceiling’s thick hewn beams, and breathed in the familiar smell of wax and incense.
Their footsteps seemed too loud in the quiet, as if she and Diego somehow intruded upon the serene and sacred.
Diego seemed not to notice. Instead, he led her down the aisle to a carved pew bathed in the golden circle of light.
Good, this is good, Celeste thought, glancing around. Surely being in a holy place would help contain the giddiness of her emotions. Surely the nearby death throes of the Saviour and the close presence of the Virgin Mother would remind her of all she’d ever been taught of honour and purity.
But she swallowed hard when Diego swung with lithe grace into the pew beside her and seated himself so near that their thighs almost touched.
She knew the most intense urge to cross herself.
Mercy. God, have mercy.
Odd how she’d never thought of blue eyes as being warm before. But now she felt bathed in concern, baptized in compassion, heated from the inside out by this man’s green-blue gaze.
“I owe you an apology,” he said. “I should have made myself known to you in the confessional this afternoon. I’m sorry I did not.”
Heat flooded her face. Her gaze fled from his direct appraisal.
He took her hand in a gentle gesture of reassurance. The contact burned her skin, so that she almost gasped at the touch. “I considered it, you know, not wanting to hear your secrets, but…well…” Celeste felt rather than heard his sigh. “You had seen me as few others have.”
At the hint of amusement she thought she heard, her eyes darted back to his face. The corners of his lips twitched, and she knew he laughed inwardly at himself.
She suddenly wanted to taste those lips, those handsome lips. He would taste so good. Almost she could taste him now. His manly fragrance was all around her. She inhaled it with every breath. He would taste like that smell, that warm and erotic smell, like soap and sandalwood and male, clean and elusive.
Celeste breathed in deeply and forced her gaze away from that slight smile. The lace on her sleeve became suddenly fascinating. It was quite intricately wrought, with such painstaking handiwork…
Diego waited for her to speak. She sensed his rapt attention on her face, felt his amusement slowly change to concern. His thumb began to stroke her knuckle, an unconscious act of comfort on his part, but to Celeste an eroticism almost unbearably intimate. She pulled her hand away from beneath his, and felt his frown deepen into a scowl.
“You are angry with me?” he asked.
She shook her head, not quite trusting her voice.
“You feel betrayed, then?”
She drew in a deep breath, regretting it immediately when his gaze fell to her breasts as if she bade him there. He caught himself and looked away quickly, but not before she’d seen the blue gaze deepen to the darker azure of desire.
“Nay, not betrayed by you,” she said. “You did only that which was required to preserve your dignity and my own. If I have been betrayed, then it was by my own wicked thoughts. I did not know you were sworn to God. I would never have… I would not… Oh, sweet merciful Jesus! To know I felt such things…and for a priest!”
She buried her face in her hands.
There was silence. It stretched between them, long and rife with tension.
She lowered her hands, but could not meet Diego’s gaze.
“I have sinned against God and against you. Please forgive me, Padre.”
He did not answer immediately, but startled her by rising from the pew abruptly. “Wait here,” he said. “I’ll be back. Wait.”
He was gone only a short while. When he returned, Celeste saw that he was no longer in his robe, but dressed as any ordinary man in the simple fustian tunic of a common labourer, the garment loosely belted over hose and boots of soft leather.
The clothing was coarse, but clean. Simple, but attractive on him. It made his shoulders appear broad, his hips narrow, his legs long and powerful. His hair was casually rumpled, palest gold where the tropical sun had kissed it, more honeyed where it lay against his collar. His skin was dark, his teeth startlingly white against the bronzed glow of his face. He was cleanshaven and his chin had a cleft.
He was so handsome it hurt.
She almost wished he’d put the robe back on, so she could think of him as a priest and not be so aware of him as a man.
He took his place once again in the pew and smiled at her. “There now. Let’s forget for the moment that I’m a priest. Could you and I not talk more freely if I were merely Diego Castillo?”
She nodded.
He turned so that his body faced hers. “Then, as Diego Castillo, I must be completely honest with you. What happened between us at the river…that was an uncommon thing for me. Not your rescue, my lady. I don’t mean that. I speak of the emotion which passed between us, and of the carnal feeling that accompanied it.”
Celeste’s face grew warm, not from the embarrassment which should have met his words, but from the provocative memory of his beautiful body.
Diego saw her face redden and immediately halted. “I’m sorry. I am too bold.” He drew in a ragged breath and raked lean fingers through his hair. “Yet I know of no other way to make this right. Will you give me leave to speak forthrightly? My in tentions in doing so are honourable.”
“I doubt them not.”
Diego’s gaze found hers, intense and beautiful. “You freely confessed your sins. As Padre Diego, I was denied the opportunity to do the same. But please understand this, Lady Celeste. If you sinned in that moment on the riverbank, you were not alone in it. I reacted purely as a man. My thoughts towards you were wicked and impure. I wanted—”
He broke off and looked away, the muscle in his jaw tightening. “You wished to lie with me as I would have lain with you?”
Diego closed his eyes. “Yes. Forgive me. I repent such thoughts.” He opened his eyes and met her gaze. “I do repent them.”
Celeste nodded.
In truth, she repented nothing. Not one moment could she regret; it had been a wondrous thing. But she understood Diego’s need to do so.
She also saw that they must put that moment of pure lust behind them if she were to accomplish her other aims. Should Diego think for one minute that passion could flare between them again, he would never board a ship bound for Spain and spend weeks of sailing time in her near presence.
She smiled, meeting his anxious expression with gentleness. “I cannot claim to be a scholar