finished and her clear ivory skin had been stripped of the obscene “adornment,” he rocked back on his heels and blew out a long, slow breath.
The question of her age was not entirely solved, but now that he could see her face, he knew she was at least a half-dozen years older than she had appeared in the saloon … and far more beautiful than even he had guessed. Her lips, no longer smeared with some pale tint designed to give her a more childish appearance, were softly rounded and womanly in a way no child’s could be. Her eyes were framed with long lashes, darker than her hair, and her features were mature and defined, with high cheekbones and a firm chin.
Cort closed his eyes to shut her out. She was still helpless, and the last thing he wanted was to feel anything more than a detached interest in the girl’s usefulness to him and his empty wallet. He certainly had no desire to acknowledge any attraction to her, even of the most primitive physical kind.
She was nothing to him. And while he could reluctantly accept that he had been instinctively drawn to her because she was loup-garou, she could not be as helpless as she appeared. If he’d let matters take their natural course and allowed Cochrane to win her, she would have been able to defend herself once she recovered from the influence of the opium. Her potential buyers were all human, and no match for even the smallest female werewolf.
Unless she came from a family like the New Orleans Reniers, the loups-garous who ruled all the werewolves in that city and much of human society besides. They seldom Changed, and when they did it was only for ritual occasions and to remind themselves why they were superior to mere humans, and other werewolves not as privileged as they were. Madeleine had been delicate, sheltered, never expected to take wolf shape in defense of her life or her honor.
If this girl were like Madeleine.
Cort laughed. He was constructing a life for her that might bear no resemblance to reality whatsoever. He had never made any effort to learn how the San Francisco families lived, whether or not they hewed to their animal roots or preferred to ignore them altogether. Until the girl woke up, it would all be fruitless speculation.
With a quick glance at her face, Cort crouched over her. Her breath, still tainted with laudanum, puffed against his face. He lifted her head.
The contact sent a wash of sensation almost like pain through his body. The last time he had felt anything like it had been when he was with Madeleine. He had assumed then that it had sprung from his love for her, and that such feelings could never come again.
And of course they had not. That was impossible. Whatever he felt now was merely a pale imitation.
Cort quickly tucked the pillow under her head, adjusted the blanket once more and got to his feet. He pulled the room’s single chair close to the sofa and sat, stretching his legs and leaning as far back as the rickety chair would permit.
Think of the reward, he told himself. Yuri had been correct; they could be comfortable again, perhaps more than that, if they played their cards right. If he did.
And then, at last, he might find the means to take his revenge.
He closed his eyes again, focusing all his senses on the girl. He could safely rest for a time, knowing that he would be aware of any change in her condition and would be fully wake long before she was.
And then, in a matter of days, she would be gone from his life forever.
CHAPTER TWO
ARIA WOKE SUDDENLY, her head pounding and her eyes stinging. Her mouth was dry and her tongue leaden, coated with a foul taste that made her gag.
For a moment all she could do was lie still, listening to her pulse boom behind her ears. She was afraid to open her eyes, afraid to see what might lie on the other side of her eyelids. Memories fought a furious battle in her brain, some so unbearable she tried to force them away.
But she couldn’t. They were too strong, etched into her senses in sound and scent and taste. Hunger. Confusion. Harsh, mocking voices, and a rag soaked in bitter poison slapped over her mouth.
Had those been the last memories, she might not have struggled so hard against them. But there were others far worse.
She tried to swallow the bile in the back of her throat. She didn’t know where she was, but it might be somewhere even worse than the last place she had been before they had forced her to take the potion.
You must face it, she told herself. Hiding from her fear would gain her nothing, and knowing the truth would allow her to make a plan to escape. How many others were here? She had a hazy vision of many men looking at her, and the low hum of many voices. There had been one man in particular, though she could not recall his face. Someone who had touched her gently.
Open your eyes.
She did, and the room swam into focus. Peeling paint on a low ceiling. A few scraps of mismatched furniture. A wall covered with torn and faded paper. She was lying on some sort of couch, and a blanket covered her up to her chin.
She breathed in slowly. Mildew, dust, stale cooking. Bread and cheese closer by, setting her stomach to rumbling.
And another scent she recognized, cool and clean and masculine.
The room spun as she turned her head. The man sat a few feet away, long legs stretched before him, his head resting on the back of his chair. He was tall, well formed and elegantly dressed; his hair was deep auburn, and what she could see of his face was as handsome as that of any man she had seen in her long journey west.
He was not one of the men who had captured her. But she knew his face.
Cautiously raising herself on her elbows, Aria pushed the blanket aside. Sickness spiraled up from her stomach, and she had to sit still for several minutes. She watched the man’s face for any sign of waking, but he seemed completely unaware of her. Once again she tested her strength. This time she was able to sit up, and after a moment the hammer beating inside her skull fell silent.
Wherever she was, it wasn’t what she had expected. Despite the voices she could hear outside the room, she felt no sense of threat. She still wore the gown they had put on her, but when she touched her face she realized that it was clean again.
They meant to sell me, she remembered. They had spoken of it when they were certain she couldn’t hear. She was to become the “property” of the man who won her in some sort of card game, like the ones she and Franz had sometimes played on snowy evenings. Property just like the sheep who belonged to Matthias the shepherd, or the pony she had left behind in Trieste.
She looked hard at the man. Had he been the one to win her? Was he waiting to do the kinds of things to her that she had seen men doing with women in the back alleys of New York and San Francisco?
Even if he was, he seemed to be alone. She had some chance of escape.
Biting her lower lip, Aria pushed the blanket below her knees and swung her legs over the side of the couch. Her feet touched the bare, pitted floorboards. She put a little of her weight on them, testing her steadiness and the surface beneath her soles.
The boards made no sound as she pushed herself up. Another wave of dizziness caught her, and she stopped, half crouched, her heart drumming under her ribs. There was a door across the room, not far. All she needed to do was open that door and find her way to freedom.
Aria
