Her abilities as a fortune-teller weren’t a total ruse. She could learn something of a person through touch. At least, enough to satisfy the average customer.
But the remarkable abilities that had come to her with the onset of puberty had recently begun shifting. They were slowly draining away in some areas while increasing in others. Her ability to read Humans became less reliable with each passing of the moon. She prayed it wouldn’t fail her now.
A sigh of relief left her lips when the mind mist enveloped her, calming her with its familiarity. Her eyes drifted shut, and she drew her fingers over him, occasionally following a crease or dusting over a mount. Just the barest, minute mixing of skin oils was all it took for a simple telling of fortunes. It was important to avoid melding. If she bonded further, parting sometimes caused her pain.
“I see a forest,” she began. “An ancient forest. It surrounds a flourishing garden covering many hillsides. I see three brothers, three splendid homes.”
She opened her eyes and pondered him curiously. Only Nick noticed how refined her accent had become.
“Lord Satyr owns a large estate in Tuscany, along with his two younger brothers,” supplied Signorina Rossini. Her voice trembled with excitement that Jane had guessed correctly.
Jane smiled at her. Now she had his name and residence. People were so free with information. Really, it made her efforts quite simple at times.
Nick eyed her sardonically. “My estates and family ties are no secret. You will have to do better to earn your coin.”
If she’d been wise, she would have fabricated a silly fortune and released his hand as soon as possible. It was no doubt what he expected. But she was overcome with an irrational desire to prove herself.
She ducked her head and continued.
“I see material wealth. Power. Passion.” She slanted him a glance through her lashes. “Concealment.”
A subtle tension invaded his skin.
Signorina Rossini giggled. “Passion! Goodness! And what could you be concealing, Lord Satyr?”
His hand shifted so his thumb interlaced Jane’s two smallest fingers, stroking the tender skin between them. Deliberately?
She was amusing, he thought. Her fingers were soft, her skin unlined and youthful beneath her ragged crone disguise. His curiosity was aroused. He shifted on his seat. He was aroused.
Annoyed that she had caused his need to flare when it couldn’t be quenched, he smiled, flirting. Just to rattle her.
As Jane stared at the full curve of his mouth, sudden shocking visions dashed at her like storm-tossed waves. She saw him in another time and place. He was standing. The muscles of his naked chest flexed and rippled in soft candlelight. Or was it moonlight? His features were raw and savage, and eyes glittered as he stared intently at—something. A woman. She was before him, bent over some sort of table. W—what was he doing to her?
She gasped, realizing they must be copulating. Blushing, she snatched her hand away. The vision snapped off as though a door had slammed shut.
Flames of interest lit his eyes.
Surreptitiously, she wiped her fingers on her skirt. This was insane. What was she doing melding so closely? What if he were to rip off her disguise and report her doings to her aunt and father?
In a panic, she began to pack her belongings. His gold be damned.
“You’ve only told me a mix of obscure speculation and what I already know to be certain. What of my fortune?” Nick demanded.
It was impossible to look at him now. What if he read the truth of what she’d seen? Of him doing that. It was wrong that she’d observed him in such a private moment. Evil that she had the despicable ability.
“’Tis a pleasure to report all yer prospects be excellent! I see only good fortune in yer future,” she predicted hastily. “And there’ll be a bride for ye soon! One with pretty blue eyes.”
There—that should please his companion.
Smiling, she turned to Signorina Rossini and pretended to realize her identity just then. “As for yer young lady—I’ve previously given her a fortune, tellin’ her she would meet someone dark and handsome.”
Here she turned back to Nick. Not daring to meet his gaze, she stared at his chin. Already a blue-black cast shadowed his jawline, though it was only early evening. For some reason, this small confirmation of his virility alarmed her all out of proportion to its import.
“Yer appears to fill the bill, good sir. I’ll leave you to it then.”
She gathered the trappings of her fortune-telling trade in the table scarf, loosely tying its fringed ends. Holding the makeshift bundle to her chest, she rose to leave.
But the muscular god stood as well. Was he being polite, or did he intend to block her exit? By now, she’d dodged a sufficient number of men along Tivoli’s streets that she’d become wary of their bold hands.
Determinedly, she moved forward, shying an arm’s length from the formidable wall of his chest. Lord, he was tall. A vision of him naked and straining flashed in her mind, and she nearly moaned in despair.
“I mustn’t tarry. The, uh, spirits call me away,” she informed the toes of his boots. They were midnight blue, nearly black. And there was a pattern etched on them of writhing vines that entwined some sort of mythological creatures. How odd.
She felt him smile at the top of her head. He sought to toy with her, did he?
Though the eyes she lifted to him shot green sparks, her voice was mild. “Please stand aside, signore.”
“Lord Satyr?” his companion asked uncertainly.
At her voice, he seemed to come back to himself. He shifted, parting the drapery at the tent’s opening.
Something nagged at Nick as the gypsy’s bent figure scurried beneath his arm and outside, but he couldn’t determine the source of it.
He stared after her, loathe to let go of an unsolved puzzle. “Strange one, that.”
“Well, she is a fortune-teller, after all,” Signorina Rossini reminded him.
She was right, of course. He shook off the feeling that something wasn’t quite as it should be and turned back to his companion. He had more important matters to attend to.
He pondered whether to tarry alone with her in the tent’s confines. Her brother would report the indiscretion to her parents, which would likely facilitate their consent to a quick wedding.
Instead, he watched his hand part the drape, and he escorted her outside. Uncertain as to why he had done so when lingering within would have been to his advantage, he attempted to engage her in conversation apart from her acquaintances.
Putting a question to her regarding an upcoming ball was enough to incite her interest. As she was one of those young ladies who required little attention in order to prattle on about inconsequential matters, it took only a small portion of his mind to keep up his side of the social discourse from there. Another part of his brain returned to puzzle on the episode that had passed inside the tent.
A moment later, he realized he’d missed much of what Signorina Rossini had said. He stared down at her and recognized his uppermost emotion for what it was. Boredom.
Worse still, the Faerie scent that had once cloaked her had dramatically faded. In fact, it had all but disappeared.
He stepped back from her. Seven hells! It wasn’t she after all!
If he stayed by her side any longer, society would have him engaged to her no