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“Indeed,” Calliope said, more ill than amused. “I shall try not to be long.”
“It doesn’t matter. I will worry for your safety and wellbeing no matter the time you spend in that dismal maze.” She gave a mock shudder and Calliope felt the need to reassure her.
“I have faith that Sebastian will be there. He will ensure no harm comes to me.”
Isadora reluctantly nodded but took up a firm stance by one of the openings. “I’ll wait right here.”
Calliope reached out and gave her an impulsive hug, and then she started to trudge forward. She kept chanting Sebastian’s name in her mind, but with every rustle she heard around her, her heart managed to lodge in her throat. She wouldn’t be easy until she was standing before Lord Blakely.
Although her note from him hadn’t given any further instruction than the place and time, the area appeared deserted for the most part, so she assumed it would be easy to locate him, or at least somewhere that looked like a place for an assignation.
With each step that she took, equal parts fear and excitement coursed through her. She wasn’t sure why he didn’t just call at the townhouse, as opposed to setting up this clandestine meeting, but she really didn’t care. She was just glad that he was giving her the opportunity to speak to him, to apologize for being so blind and not realize how much her heart yearned for him, until he was already gone.
Calliope lifted her skirts and picked up her pace, rushing in her haste to see Sebastian and tell him that she loved him.
As the fireworks sparked overheard and lit up the sky with promise, she turned a corner in the path.
And froze.
Sebastian frowned. He didn’t know what kind of game she was playing, but he didn’t appreciate it, especially when he was due to meet Calliope at any moment. “What are you doing here, Sabine?” he demanded.
Instead of replying immediately, she slowly untied the ribbons of her bonnet and slipped it off her golden curls. She set it on the bench she’d just vacated, and then walked closer to him in a dress that would have made any man weep with desire. It clung to her shapely figure in all the right places, and the sapphire blue gown matched perfectly with those deep blue eyes that had captivated him at one time. Until recently, she had even shared his bed a time or two after she’d become a widow.
She lifted a gloved hand and cupped the side of his jaw. “I’ve missed you, my darling.”
“Have you?” he asked flatly. “Regrettably, I cannot say the same.”
She tilted her head to the side and said in a placating manner, “Don’t be cruel. I know you’re probably still upset with me for marrying the baron, but you know he meant nothing to me. He was merely a means to an end to satisfy my father with a long-standing arrangement. But with his death, I’m a free woman to choose whomever I please, and that man is you.”
“How convenient,” he muttered.
“Isn’t it?” she purred in return, either ignoring the sarcasm in his tone, or brushing it aside. She moved even closer, until her full breasts were pressed intimately against his chest. Her mouth was a hair’s breadth away from his. “Don’t you remember how good we were together?” She slid her hand down the front of his trousers. “Your cock was the best I’ve ever had.”
He clenched his jaw, but his cock didn’t even twitch with interest, even when she started to rub him lightly. “I’ve moved on, Sabine. I’ve found someone I truly care for. With you, it was nothing but empty sex.”
She lifted a delicate brow. “Do you mean Lady Calliope?” She shook her head slightly. “I would be cautious there, my love. She was only using you for sport. Rumor has it she is already spoken for and that she ran off to the coast to escape an unwanted union.”
Sebastian narrowed his eyes. “You’re lying.” He moved away from her, glad that she didn’t pursue him.
“As your old friend,” she said softly, “I didn’t want to see you hurt again when I could prevent it.”
He snorted. “All you’ve ever cared about was yourself.”
“That’s not true.” She floated closer to him. “I love you, Seb. With every fiber of my being. I came here tonight because I want to marry you. I know I can make you happy if you would only give me another chance…”
Sebastian knew he should just walk away and leave her standing there, but he wanted to prove a point. He wanted to show her that he felt nothing for her, and he was no longer prepared to play her little games. He would humor her one last time and then tell her in no uncertain terms to go to hell.
Their time together had come to an end.
He smiled roguishly and pulled her to him. She gasped, her eyes burning with a fevered passion. He lowered his head and ensured that it was an embrace she would remember for the rest of her life, the one that would make her lament ever leaving him all those years ago. He would make her burn and then snuff out any hope she might continue to harbor about the two of them, because Calliope was all that mattered to him.
She was all that would ever matter to him again.
He could feel Sabine grab on to his jacket and start to slide it off his shoulders. He started to pull back, but a shocked gasp caused a frisson of warning to shoot up his spine.
His head whipped around in enough time to see the betrayal on Calliope’s face, before she spun around and rushed away.
Calliope was running blindly. The moment she’d spied Sebastian and that woman in such a heated embrace, tears had pricked her eyes and begun to flow unchecked down her face. She was holding her dress up with one hand, but still, she stumbled down the path, desperate to find the way out of this horrible maze.
