Under the Moon Gate Read Free

a magazine from the coffee table and tried fanning her, shaking her lightly, sprinkling her skin with water from a pitcher on the marble stand behind the couch, even stroking her face gently. He was at his wit’s end. And that Sallie person she’d mentioned was nowhere to be found.
    Helpless, Nathaniel looked down at Patience. Somehow he felt a connection with this woman. He had dreamed of her, or someone like her, on the deck of his boat, alone in the middle of the ocean, on a dark night drenched in moonlight, under a heaven sprinkled with stars, drifting in and out of sleep, of consciousness, as his vessel rocked toward Bermuda. But nothing could have prepared him for this visceral reaction to the flesh-and-blood woman who’d gone limp in his arms.
    The truth of it had first hit him like a powerful wave when she opened the door to him earlier, nearly knocking the wind from his sails. And he’d detected a spark of recognition in her face, too. He was sure of it. She’d looked as stunned as he felt.
    Before she died, his grandmother foretold he would find his destiny in Bermuda. He didn’t believe any of that hogwash about destiny or fate. But she had made him promise to go to the island and hand deliver a letter and a small fortune in diamonds to William Whitestone. He was honoring that promise now; however, he intended to take something much more valuable back with him.
    But William Whitestone was dead, and so was his wife. Was Nathaniel obligated to reveal the contents of the letter to Whitestone’s granddaughter? And what was his grandmother’s connection to the German spy William Whitestone and his dangerous wartime associate Nighthawk?
    He had a purpose in Bermuda beyond humoring his dying grandmother. He had come for the gold his uncle had told him about, and he was determined to locate and leave with every last ounce of it. The trip was long overdue, and no woman, breathtakingly beautiful or not, was going to interfere with his business here.
    Nathaniel expected Patience wouldn’t be cooperative. He couldn’t just come right out and tell her the reason for his visit. He would have to skillfully navigate the choppy waters.
    Naturally, she’d be angry. Anger only seemed to make her more magnificent, if that were possible, and more vulnerable. He couldn’t afford to have her fall apart. He wanted her alert when he questioned her. She was going to hear him out, whether she wanted to or not. But first he needed some information from her. And he could hardly get answers from an unconscious woman.
    There was really no easy way to tell her about her grandfather. And no surer way to confirm whether she knew the truth about him than to question her face to face.
    Looking into that face, Nathaniel acted on another impulse, one he couldn’t have controlled even if he cared to. He reached to slide a lock of her golden hair between his fingers. Somehow he’d known her hair would feel like fine silk. If he were the poetic type he’d tell her, if she ever regained consciousness.
    Nathaniel looked around the room and out the window at the expansive grounds. Prime Bermuda real estate in one of Bermuda’s most exclusive residential areas—prestigious Tucker’s Town. This quaint village of splendid properties was home to movie stars, prime ministers, a veritable Who’s Who of the rich and famous in Bermuda and around the world. People with legendary last names like Astor and Rockefeller.
    The sprawling stucco house, painted a pale yellow, was built in the island’s traditional architectural style and comfortably but luxuriously furnished. Morning glory vines ran wild along the roadside. Marigold House was fronted by a pair of elegant gateposts and accessed by a sweep of tapered stone steps leading to the front door in the traditional welcoming-arms pattern. Unlike the tepid welcome Patience had given him. Why didn’t the woman wake up?
    Frustrated, he pulled her toward him and kissed her. That always seemed to work in