One Magic Moment (9 page)
It had been at that point that he’d made more definite plans, found a lad to put him legally in the current century, and run across a fortuitous and random mention of Cameron Antiquities, Ltd. A discreet inquiry had resulted in that cautious friendship with Oliver and even an offer of an introduction to Lord Robert Cameron. John had declined the latter because at the time he’d had enough of nobility to last him a bit.
He’d continued on with his life, continued to play, forced himself to acclimatize to his circumstances, and flown under the radar, as the saying went. He’d gone from being a grubby, overwhelmed stable boy to being a reclusive, several-times-over millionaire. He dabbled with cars because he’d always fancied unraveling how mechanical things worked. He played whatever stringed instrument he could lay his hands on—some rather badly, as it happened—because he had inherited his grandmother’s love for music. He’d moved from day to day, ignoring who he had been and contenting himself with who he was.
Until Tess Alexander had walked into his shop and forced his world to grind to a halt.
A doctor of medieval studies.
The irony of it was enough to do him in.
And now that bloody note from Oliver, whom he hadn’t seen since the first of the year when he’d first begun to investigate a move south. John pursed his lips. Of course, he’d heard of Ian MacLeod’s school of swordplay, but he’d dismissed it as a Highlander taking his heritage far too seriously for his own good.
It was as he’d thought before: Oliver had obviously spent too much time wondering why it was John had such a large supply of rare medieval gold coins and that had led him to speculating on other things he shouldn’t have.
John didn’t particularly want to think about that.
He didn’t want to think about anything else that made him uncomfortable, either, so he turned his mind back to the music in front of him. He would have a decent day, pick up a few quid for his trouble, then hopefully escape before Tess Alexander did the unthinkable and called him.
He felt fairly safe in assuming she wouldn’t. He wasn’t sure what he’d done to irritate her, but she seemed to want as little to do with him as he did her. His damnable chivalry would have been trotted out and exercised, then put away where it could trouble him no further for the day. He would return home to relative obscurity and that would be the end of it. Perhaps he would find a driving instructor and mail her the man’s business card so she didn’t carry on with leaving what he was sure were monumental dings in an innocent oak tree.
He would also never curse himself for missing the turnoff to Sedgwick because he would never have a need to go there again.
He felt better already, having put his life back in order, all the pieces back in place.
He put that beautiful, haunting woman out of his mind and got to work.
Chapter 5
T
ess
looked at the address on the card John had given her and wondered if she had lost her mind. She’d been wondering that for the better part of the day, actually, ever since she’d gotten on the train.
ess
looked at the address on the card John had given her and wondered if she had lost her mind. She’d been wondering that for the better part of the day, actually, ever since she’d gotten on the train.
She’d arrived in London too early to conduct any business, so she’d killed a couple of hours in her favorite coffee shop, pretending to look out the window and watch humanity hurry by.
She’d eventually made her way to pick up the two rare and pricey books on medieval warfare her preferred dealer had found for her, then spent a useless hour in his shop, poking around in piles of things that hadn’t been dusted in at least a year. She’d loitered in Victorian England for a bit, which had been a decent distraction, though perhaps not enough of one.
She’d wandered the streets for a good half an hour before she made herself at least go and order something for an early lunch. She tried to eat, but she’d been less successful at it than she would have liked to have been. She had managed part of a salad and some juice, then taken her knitting out and tried to work on a sock. That resulted half an hour later in the necessity of ripping out everything she’d managed to do. She had shoved everything back into her bag, ignored her instinct for self-preservation, and gone to look for a Tube station.
She realized as she now stood in front of the appropriate address that she was looking at a recording studio. She frowned, then opened the door and walked inside. It wasn’t an enormous place from what she could tell, but the receptionist was dressed nicely and the client list Tess glanced at while she was waiting for the girl to get off the phone was downright impressive.
The girl hung up and smiled at her. “You must be Miss Alexander.”
Tess smiled uncomfortably. “Yes, well—”
“John said you might be coming.” She stood. “Come on. I’ll take you back.”
Tess followed her because she couldn’t on such short notice invent a good reason why she shouldn’t. Within moments, she found herself standing in the darkest part of a mixing room listening to John playing the acoustic guitar.
She was provided with a chair, which she sank down into gratefully. A dozen questions immediately clamored for attention, but she ignored them all in favor of simply sitting there and listening. She had no idea he was accompanying a jazz vocal group until the tracks were played back together. He listened with a frown, then requested some sort of do-over. She wasn’t a picky listener; she honestly couldn’t tell the difference, but he seemed to be happier with the subsequent effort.
She continued to sit in the dark and listen as he recorded another two songs. It was so far from what she’d expected to find him doing, she could hardly take it in.
It unfortunately gave her the chance to look at him from the safety and comfort of knowing he had no idea she was sitting there gaping at him.
He was gorgeous. There was no other way to say it. She supposed she shouldn’t have expected anything else. She’d had a good look at his brother for several days and almost grown accustomed to being startled at the sight. Worse still, she just happened to know John and Montgomery’s, ah, nephew, Stephen de Piaget, who was almost as handsome as they were.
But there was something about John . . .
Maybe it was the perfection of his face with his chiseled cheekbones and strong jaw, or enviable physique that a T-shirt and jeans did nothing to hide, or his long fingers that flew over strings as if he’d done nothing else with those hands for the whole of his life but practice.
Or it could have been the fact that she knew she was looking at a medieval knight who somehow, beyond all reason, found himself masquerading as something quite different in the twenty-first century.
He finished before she’d finished the cataloging of his perfections. She’d really hoped she might get past them quickly so she could get back to listing all the reasons why she never wanted to lay eyes on him again. Too bad she just wasn’t going to have time for that. She watched as a man in slacks and a sweater came into the studio and chatted with him for a bit. The producer turned on the mic when John directed a few questions his way. Tess knew she was sitting too far back to be seen, but she found herself unaccountably nervous just the same.
“Dave’s been nagging me again,” the man in the sweater said, sounding as if he was fully prepared to engage in a bit of it himself. “He’s pretty determined.”
“No,” John said stiffly. “Still no.”
Tess was marginally satisfied to see he could be as unyielding with others as he had been with her.
“It would just be a demo now, but it could be a career direction.”
“
This
isn’t a career, Kenneth. It’s a diversion.”
This
isn’t a career, Kenneth. It’s a diversion.”
Kenneth looked at him calculatingly. “I have a lute.”
Tess found herself sitting on the edge of her seat. A
lute
? She couldn’t imagine that John would ever admit to playing such a thing, but what did she know? Maybe he was more in touch with his past than he’d let on and didn’t mind demonstrating that for others.
lute
? She couldn’t imagine that John would ever admit to playing such a thing, but what did she know? Maybe he was more in touch with his past than he’d let on and didn’t mind demonstrating that for others.
Which didn’t adequately explain why he seemed so perfectly at home in jeans and a pricey black sports car, but she would think about that later, when she could think straight again.
She couldn’t say she knew enough about John de Piaget to predict what he was going to do, but she had to admit he looked almost as ready to bolt as he had when she’d asked him if he wanted to come inside her great hall.
He sat back in his chair and looked up at Kenneth with absolutely no expression on his face. “Absolutely not.”
Kenneth looked at him, obviously amused. “I’m not asking you to cut out a major organ and hand it over, John. It’s just a lute.”
Tess found herself unaccountably nervous. It was one thing for her to know who John was and, more to the point,
what
he was; it was another thing entirely for someone else to know. Kenneth, whoever he was and whatever sort of sway he held over John, was likely completely oblivious to John’s past. She could only imagine how zealously John guarded that past.
what
he was; it was another thing entirely for someone else to know. Kenneth, whoever he was and whatever sort of sway he held over John, was likely completely oblivious to John’s past. She could only imagine how zealously John guarded that past.
Actually, she didn’t have to imagine much. She could see it on his face.
Briefly. As quickly as the shutters had come down, they disappeared and the moment was gone. John simply looked up at his tormentor.
“Don’t tell me,” he drawled, “Dave just
happened
to leave it behind the last time he was here.”
happened
to leave it behind the last time he was here.”
“He’s forgetful.”
“Why in the hell would he think
I
could play it?”
I
could play it?”
“He heard you in Edinburgh last year at the Festival.”
John looked heavenward briefly, then back at Kenneth. “I was drunk.”
Kenneth only smiled. “Were you?”
“No,” John said shortly, “but I wish I had been. I absolutely wish I were now.”
“But you aren’t, and I have a very lovely reproduction instrument in my office.” He smiled encouragingly. “One song, sung soberly.”
“I only
know
one song.”
know
one song.”
Tess doubted that, but she didn’t suppose she should offer that observation.
“Then play that one,” Kenneth said smoothly. “Five minutes of your time and I stop having to avoid his calls. Do it for me as thanks for all the lovely gigs I’ve gotten you over the years.”
John dragged his hand through his hair. “Damn you.”
Kenneth rubbed his hands together. “I’ll be right back.” He looked over his shoulder on his way out the door. “Don’t go anywhere.”
John sent him a dark look, then put away his guitar and began to pace around the studio. He stopped at one point, then turned and looked into the booth.
Tess was sure he couldn’t possibly see her. She was sitting so far back in the shadows that she could hardly see herself. But he didn’t look away. He didn’t smile, either. It was as if he stood on the edge of something he didn’t want to fall into but found himself without any choice.
She understood. She’d felt that way when he’d held out his hand for her keys that morning.
Kenneth was nothing short of relentless upon his return. Tess watched as he nudged and pestered and badgered until John was sitting down again with one mic pointed at the lute and another staring him in the face.
“No need for perfection,” Kenneth said soothingly, backing out of the room carefully, as if he feared to break the spell he’d been weaving. “He knows what you can do.”
John shot him a murderous look, but said nothing. He took a deep breath. In fact, he might have taken a couple of them. He sat there for an excruciatingly long time, as if he wrestled with things he couldn’t bring himself to face.
Tess understood completely.
He finally sighed, then tuned the lute as if he’d been doing it for the better part of his life.
Tess would have closed her eyes, but she was afraid she might miss something. She felt time begin to layer itself over her, over John, over the whole place, as if his past was colliding with her future.
She suspected that if anyone had touched her at that moment, she would have jumped out of her skin.
Kenneth popped into the production room and almost tripped over her. “Sorry, love. Didn’t see you there. Guy, turn the tape on and leave it on. We’ll edit out the profanity later.”
“He’s going to kill you,” Guy said mildly.
“He won’t,” Kenneth said confidently. “Not today.”
Tess wouldn’t have been so sure of that, but maybe Kenneth was better at ignoring the rather pointed and vile warm-up of curses John indulged in than she was. Kenneth and Guy only watched, unintimidated.
John finally stopped, took another in that series of deep breaths, then was silent for a couple of minutes.
Then he began to play.
Tess lost her breath, then felt her eyes begin to burn when he began to sing. The love song, sung in flawless medieval French—and yes, she most definitely could pin down the accent—was absolutely breathtaking. It was no wonder the mysterious Dave wanted him on tape and Kenneth was willing to brave all kinds of abuse to get him there.
And whatever else he was, John was a professional.
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