“Better?” she wailed. “How dare you do that? What am I going to do now?”
He was approaching her, a determined expression on his face. Something about the gleam in those blue-black eyes made Anna take several hasty steps backward.
“Make love with me,” he said, and reached for her.
“What? No!” She yelped as his hands closed over her upper arms. “Let go of me, you …”
“You know you want to. And I want to. I mean to love you till you can’t think of anything else. Or anybody else. Just you—and me.…”
He dragged her close and bent his head to find her mouth despite her struggles. Anna tried to resist the hot allure, but in the end she could not. All her instincts shouted a warning, reminding her to consider how he had used and left her before, but her body wasn’t listening. It responded to the hard demand of his with a single-minded surge of longing that washed away every obstacle in its path. Like an addict in desperate need of opium, she was helpless in the face of her craving. Her arms went around his neck, her fingers curled in the coarse strands of hair at the back of his head. She let him draw her up on tiptoe, pressed her body against his, and clung.
His hand was on her breast even before his tongue entered her mouth. Swirling away on a whirlwind of desire, Anna felt her breast swell against the abrasive heat of his palm. Her nipple hardened, thrusting upward, begging for his touch. He obliged, running his thumb over the aching nub, his other hand supporting her back as he lowered her to the ground.
His mouth never left hers. His tongue explored the eager wetness of her mouth, greedy in its demands. Anna, trembling and nearly mindless with passion, answered as best she could, shyly venturing to enter the hot cave of his mouth with her tongue, exploring there, licking his lips as he licked hers. So enraptured was she with this game that she scarcely felt the coolness of the vines beneath her back, or the hardness of the ground beneath that. The roar of the waterfall, the chattering of the birds, the rustling of small creatures in the undergrowth nearby might have been a heavenly chorus for all she heard of them.
She was deaf, dumb, and blind to everything but Julian and the way he was making her feel.
His hands were trembling as he yanked the straps of her chemise down to bare her breasts. For just a moment he lifted himself away from her, staring at the bounty he had uncovered. The fire in those eyes as they feasted on her breasts made Anna whimper with wanting. Instinctively she arched her back in a gesture of offering as old as woman. Then she cried out as he bent his head to take an aching nipple into his mouth.
The straps of her chemise were tight just above her elbows, binding her arms to her sides. He suckled first one breast than the other as she struggled to free herself from the constrictions of the undergarment so that she could touch him as she was longing to do. But her arms would not come free; she could only lie there, squirming, as he tormented her breasts with teeth and lips and tongue, setting her body afire.
Then his hands were at her waist, untying the tapes of her petticoat with fingers that fumbled. When at last the knot came free, he lifted himself off her just long enough to yank the skirt away from her, tossing it aside to land crumpled at the base of a bush. He was kneeling beside her, and for a long moment he stayed that way, looking down at her. His eyes touched on the drying strands of her silvery hair, spread in a tangled fan shape that framed her body against the background of deep green vines. His eyes moved over her face with its passion-drugged eyes and parted lips that were rosy and swollen from his kisses. His eyes slid down to her small naked breasts with the tiny nipples that were distended now and the color of strawberries. His eyes drank in the soft creaminess of her skin, then registered the chemise, which still imprisoned her arms and was twisted around her waist, leaving her lower body as bare as her breasts. He made no move to free her from this remaining garment, or even to release her arms. Instead his eyes flared, darkened, then wandered farther, lingering over the gentle curve of her hips, the hollow of her belly button, the ash-brown tangle of curls between her thighs. Finally his gaze moved down her slender thighs, pale above the black cotton stockings that ended in ribbon garters inches above her knees.
And then, at last, he touched her. His hand gently traced the line where her legs pressed together, running between her thighs from her knees to the nest of curls. Anna caught her breath at being so caressed. Her eyes, languorous and heavy-lidded, watched the progression of that long-fingered, swarthy-skinned hand against her white skin. When it reached its goal, her lids fluttered down, then up again, and she quivered visibly.
“Let me in,” he whispered, his fingers delving between her legs. His eyes never left her face, watching her helpless reaction to his touch with a hard satisfaction that mixed oddly with the dark fire of his hunger for her, “Open your legs for me, Anna.”
The words were shocking, her response more shocking yet. She drew in a harsh little breath, held it—and timidly parted her legs.
As if to reward her, he gently stroked the sensitive insides of her thighs.
Anna moaned.
It occurred to Julian then that maybe, just maybe, he might get her to fall in love with him yet. Her helpless reaction to his touch could be turned to his advantage. He would win her heart through his mastery of her body, by bedding her until she couldn’t think of anything—or anybody—else.
For a moment longer he allowed himself the luxury of looking at her. Almost naked, she was spread before him like a feast. Her lips were parted, hungry for his kisses, her back arched, offering him her swollen breasts, her legs spread in shameless invitation. She wanted him—him—and the evidence before his eyes was intoxicating.
He slid inside her carefully, held himself there, waited. Sure enough she began to writhe, then buck up against him as if she couldn’t stand the delicious torture any longer. Julian held off as long as he could, until sweat beaded his upper lip and his arms trembled. Then he plunged into her fiercely, once, twice, three times to the accompaniment of her frantic cries before he exploded with an intensity that left him shaking.
Afterwards he lay atop her, cradling her in his arms. He did not quite dare look into her face. He’d been angry over seeing her with Dumesne, and he’d behaved badly. But he’d made amends at the end— he hoped. Still, it was possible that, once she got over the shattering effects of their lovemaking, she’d be furious with him all over again.
When what he badly wanted to see in her face was love.
The maddening little witch spoke not a word.
Finally Julian rolled off her and sat up.
At last she opened her eyes to smile dreamily at him. Julian watched her, almost holding his breath. Then, as her eyes focused, the dreamy look vanished. She scowled at him and sprang to her feet.
“Oh, no!” she said. “You’ll not do that to me twice! You fickle swine, how dare you make love to me, vanish for a week without a word, then come back as unpleasant as can be and make love to me again! I’ll not stand for it!”
Julian got to his feet, sighing. “Just where do you imagine I was?”
“I don’t care!” She found her petticoat and pulled it on. She snatched up her stockings and her shoes.
“Just look what you did!”
She shook the garment at him.
“I’ll make it up to you,” he promised.
“I don’t want you to make it up to me! I don’t want you to come near me ever again,” she hissed. Grabbing her remaining pieces of clothing, she darted away down the path.
Julian was left to stare thoughtfully after her. It might, he decided after a few minutes, be best to let her have a few days to cool off before he began his campaign to win her heart in earnest.
XXXIV
Five days later, Anna was perched sidesaddle on the back of Baliclava, a tan donkey with a moth-eaten hide, which had the lone virtue of being the only ridable animal left in the stable. She was headed resolutely down the mountain toward the section of land that Hillmore, during their meeting
the night before, had told her was targeted for clearing that afternoon. On her head was tied a huge, faded blue sunbonnet with a flapping brim. Her feet and ankles were protected by stout boots, her hands by leather gloves. These additions to her mourning costume looked ridiculous, she knew, but she was too angry to care. She meant to see what was going on in the fields for herself, however much Julian might dislike her interference. Indeed, she hoped he did dislike it! Because she disliked everything about him, from his dark, arrogant handsomeness to the way he turned up his nose at curry for dinner!
Since their shattering encounter by the stream, she had been deliberately cool to him. She was not a wanton, to be used and discarded at will! Julian spent most of his time riding about the estate with Hillmore, directing the clearing of the most promising fields for the planting of orange pekoe. When Anna informed him that she preferred to try Hillmore’s experiment on a far smaller scale than the two men envisioned, Julian replied that he had given Hillmore the go-ahead and meant to see the scheme carried out whether Anna liked it or not.
She didn’t like it, but there didn’t seem to be much she could do about it. Hillmore, while humoring her as the titular mistress of the plantation, more and more openly took his orders from Julian. Her efforts to order Julian off the place had proved futile. Arguing with him had proved worse than futile, with Anna ending up screeching furious insults at him as he mocked her or, equally maddening, just walked away. The fields would be cleared, and orange pekoe would be planted, and if she didn’t like it then that was too bad—this was Julian’s attitude to her objections. Anna, furious, became all too aware that she was helpless to stop him from doing anything he wished and had decided reluctantly that she must use reason rather than harsh words to get across her very real objections to the plan. But first she had to know whereof she spoke. If she found, as Julian insisted, that the tea plants being destroyed were practically worthless anyway, then she might, just might, be left with nothing to say. But she did not think that fully half of her fields could be to all practical purposes nonproducing.
“Be careful, Baliclava,” Anna said, as the donkey picked his way over some exposed roots.
The path through the rain forest was relatively clear. As part of the modernization of the plantation, a new series of tanks, or water reservoirs, was being built. Elephants had dragged fallen trees along this route just a few days before to be used to dam natural depressions in the ground near the fields to be cleared. The depressions would fill up with rain during the half of the year that was wet, and then, when the dry season came, would be drained of water as needed to soak the parched fields. This system of irrigation was common all over Ceylon, but on Srinagar there had never been enough money to do the thing properly. Now, of course, there was.
Leaf monkeys chattered in the trees overhead, causing Anna to look up. With their red faces and rough brown coats, they were comical-looking, and their antics were usually enough to draw a laugh from even the glummest observer. But today, even as Anna smiled at their games, she saw something that made her shiver: a venomous golden tree snake slithered along a branch, its slender body gleaming through the half-gloom of the forest. Cringing slightly, Anna leaned forward in the saddle and urged her plodding mount into a trot. She had always had a horror of having a snake drop from a tree onto her. It occurred to her, annoyingly, that perhaps Julian’s objections to her gallivanting (as he put it) about the jungle alone were at least partially justified. In England, a lady was always accompanied on her jaunts out of a respect for propriety. In Ceylon, such companionship was more of a safety precaution. The natives were gentle, harmless people as a rule, and Anna felt far safer with her fellow humans on Ceylon than she did in England. But accidents happened so often in Ceylon that they were regarded almost as routine. A tree branch fell, impaling a man to the ground and leaving his wife a widow; a wolf snake struck and parents lost a child; a sinkhole opened up unexpectedly and whole families disappeared.
Anna shivered, glancing up again. The tree snake was left behind, but the creeping sense of dread remained. She’d actually thought about asking Ruby to accompany her (despite the fact that she hated to give Julian the satisfaction of seeming to bow to his wishes), but Ruby was not exactly enamored of the local fauna. Spiders made her scream, and she lived in fear that Moti the mongoose would find its way into her bed some night.
That left Raja Singha, the three housemaids, Oya the cook, Chelsea, and Kirti as prospective companions for this ride through the jungle, none of whom were available at the time. So Anna had come alone. Which, if Julian and his disgusting henchman had not filled her ears with warnings about possible dangers, would have bothered her not at all.
Blast the man!
“Slow down, drat it!” she said, but the donkey paid her no heed.
Still bouncing inelegantly as Baliclava, having quickened his pace, refused to slow it again, Anna burst out of the forest into the first field. She sawed at the reins, trying to slow the beast to a walk, but without much hope of success. The donkey’s mouth was as tough as leather. Fortunately, a trumpeting elephant nearby distracted him, making him look around and bray an answer. Taking advantage of his lack of concentration, Anna was able to pull him down to a walk and take her first good look in months at the plants that had fueled so much controversy.
Laboriously cleared years ago by the process of chena-farming, or burning down existing vegetation to plant crops, the jungle that had once flourished undisturbed all over the island had been turned into acre upon acre of verdant land for the cultivation of tea, cinnamon, and rice. As she passed what remained of that particular field’s once orderly rows, Anna was chagrined to find that the tea plants she had been championing so passionately had grown to, in some instances, as much as thirty feet tall. The stalks were thick as tree branches, and looked to be as tough. She could see the all-important flushes, or new shoots, only at the very top of each plant. As much as she hated to admit it, it looked very much as though Julian and Hillmore were right-about this field, at least. Still, she couldn’t believe that half the plantation was in such bad shape. Why, such neglect must date back to Paul’s stewardship!
Elephants and oxen labored side by side with turbaned islanders some two hundred yards away, clearing a firebreak between the tea plants and the forest. As she emerged at the end of one row, Anna saw a telltale plume of smoke at the far side of the field; apparently the burn-off had just begun.
Clucking to Baliclava, she turned him away from where the islanders labored. Her first view of the tea plants had not been promising; she wanted to examine them more closely before they were burned.
The possibility of the fire spreading out of control never even occurred to Anna; fields were cleared all the time by burning, and no one was ever hurt. Besides, the small plume of smoke had been at the opposite end of the field, some ten acres away. She would have plenty of time to judge the condition of the plants and get out of the way before the fire was remotely in her vicinity.
Thus, as she rode slowly along the rows of plants, it came as a surprise to her that the smell of burning was so strong. The acrid odor was enough to make her eyes sting, and she wondered at it briefly. But there was a wind, after all; it was monsoon season. That must explain it, of course. The smell had been carried farther than usual by the wind.
It was only when wisps of smoke began to curl through the rows that Anna began to suspect that something was horribly wrong.
The fire was much closer than it should have been.
The knowledge hit her suddenly, making her go cold. Baliclava, apparently coming to the same conclusion, tossed his head and brayed. Rubbing her stinging eyes, trying not to panic as more smoke with its attendant stench of burning poured in her direction, Anna tried to see exactly where the fire was.
The plants were too tall to permit her to discern much except her immediate surroundings. All she could see on all four sides were stout stalks of tea and smoke—and a strangely costumed man. Anna’s eyes widen
ed. She blinked, and he was gone. Had she imagined him, or …
Baliclava brayed again, then began to dance on his four tiny hooves as lizards by the dozen appeared, swarming toward him from the depths of the field. They seemed to come from every direction, and mixed with their number were fast-slithering snakes and leaping Indian hares. In a matter of seconds the earth was covered with an undulating carpet of living creatures, all trying to escape the fire. Baliclava panicked and pawed the earth, shrilly braying for help.
Anna screamed and kicked the donkey into motion, heading him back in the direction from whence they had come. She bent low over his neck, trying not to breathe the hot, thick air that was increasingly laden with smoke and sparks. Then she heard it, and it seemed to come from all around her: the ominous crackling of the approaching fire.
Above and dangerously near, the thick foliage of a tea plant ignited with a roar. It flamed like a torch, dropping sparks in a rainlike shower. One hit Baliclava’s rump. The donkey screamed, whirled, and galloped in the opposite direction, nearly unseating Anna and causing her to lose her reins. She clung to the saddle with both hands, tenor alone giving her the strength to hold on. If she fell, the fire would surely consume her. Baliclava was the only chance she had.
The donkey plunged headlong through tea plants that were as closely entwined as jungle. Branches struck Anna’s face, stinging her. Only the protection of her clothing kept her skin from being burned. Then a spark hit her bonnet, causing it to smolder. Frantically she beat at her head with one hand, putting out the small flame. Only then did it occur to her that the falling sparks might set her clothing afire, and a fresh spurt of terror hit her. It seemed likely that she would be incinerated in her own field!
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