Time Without End (The Black Rose Chronicles) Read Online Free PDF Page A

and objects we desire most.
    “I am pleased to meet you,” I managed to reply, though I have to admit I was as nervous as Daisy. I was just better at hiding what I felt than she was, that was all. I’d had a long time to practice.
    She frowned, her pretty brow knitting for a moment in consternation. “Do I know you?”
    The answer to that question was better saved for another time. “No,” I replied, missing a beat or two. I knew that, deep in her subconscious, she remembered me, and everything we’d been through together, in minute detail. The human mind is a superlative scribe, missing nothing, trundling its uncountable impressions from one lifetime to the next.
    Daisy rose, somewhat shakily, and only thought to remove her fingers from mine after she’d gained her feet. She was wearing tight jeans that had seen better days, and her white summer top was airy and ruffled, inviting the eyes to her finely shaped breasts.
    I felt a rush of jealous irritation, a downright silly desire to fetch one of my capes and cover her with it. I had had to share her with others when she was Elisabeth Saxon; I could not do so again.
    “Your show was fantastic,” she said with a tentative smile.
    I merely inclined my head once, in acknowledgment of the compliment. There was—and is—no false modesty in my makeup. The performance was indeed “fantastic,” and more; my audiences paid for magic, and they got their money’s worth.
    She looked about, noticed as I did that the waiters and bartenders were gone, replaced by the cleaning staff. “I guess I should be going,” she said with a sort of cheerful desperation, and I felt a pang of regret because I knew Daisy wasn’t normally a timid person. I was frightening her, and I hated that.
    “Yes,” I said quickly, at last releasing the mental hold I had taken on her earlier. “Good night, Miss Chandler.”
    She studied my face, and for a breathless moment I thought she consciously remembered me. In the next instant, however, the pensive expression in her beautiful eyes vanished. Daisy waggled her unmanicured fingers in farewell and dashed out of the showroom without looking back.
    I went to my dressing room, where the mirrors were draped and the lights were dim, and stood in the middle of the floor, struggling against the rage and frustration that had arisen in me. I didn’t want to go through it all again, loving her, wanting her, losing her, and suffering the soul-crushing consequences once more, but I knew the curse some passing devil had cast over both of us would run its course. The ring would arrive, and Daisy would die.
    I was standing there, outwardly still, but with all hell breaking loose inside, when a soft tapping sounded at the door.
    My first reaction was fury; I was grieving and did not wish to be disturbed. But then the door opened, and I saw my caller.
    Daisy had returned, looking uncertain, as if she’d reached the end of some invisible tether and been drawn back by it. She gripped one of my colorful, printed programs in her right hand and wore a determined if still-fragile smile. There were no photographs of me in the publication, of course, only reproductions of paintings, and she had the booklet open to one of these.
    “I was wondering . . .” she began, her eyes straying around the dressing room, taking in the shrouded mirrors and muted lights.
    I was so glad to see her that it required the utmost restraint on my part not to wrench her into my arms. “Yes?” I prompted, perhaps sounding the least bit patronizing. My friends, as well as my enemies, tell me that a certain arrogance is native to my manner.
    She shoved the program at me, along with a cheap plastic pen. “Would you autograph this, please?”
    I did so with a flourish and handed both the booklet and the pen back to her.
    Daisy bit her lower lip, and I felt a rush of arousal so keen that I writhed in the core of it, like a man in flames. “Thanks,” she said. She hesitated, then went on in