by Jeannie Lin
“I will follow your lead, Constable.” Mingyu had a way of commanding obedience, while remaining soft-spoken and unchallenging. One couldn’t help but comply.
Her sleeves billowed around her as she stood, the sweep of them nearly brushing the ground. In profile, he could see the gentle slope of her neck and the shape of her cheek. Beautiful from any angle, in any light. Kaifeng guided her away from the corner while curious eyes followed their departure.
Mingyu had ventured far from the Pingkang li to come to him. Rarely had he seen her outside of a function without an escort or her courtesan-sisters in attendance.
He looked to the mysterious case she held between them, tucked close to her side. “Are you in danger?”
“We can speak once we’re alone,” she murmured.
His room was rented out from a shop owner with a workroom to spare. Mingyu followed him into the dark mouth of the alley. Her hand lifted to rest against the crook of his arm, warming him through his sleeve.
He reached the back door of the shop and held it open for her to enter first.
“It’s dark,” she said as he closed the door behind them.
“I’ll light a lamp.”
He found the tinder pouch in the darkness and struck the flint against it. A bit of tinder ignited which he held to the dish of oil on the table. Soon a small orb of light illuminated the room.
When he turned, Mingyu was glancing over the surroundings, though there was little to see. It was four walls and a roof to keep him dry during the rainy season, which had thankfully gone its way. The sleeping pallet was fashioned of wood and set on the floor against the far wall. By the table was a single stool. He never had guests.
There was a small window cut into the back wall and the light ebbing through it was faint. A saving grace was that there was little in the room to trip over. His belongings were few. Most nights, he didn’t even bother to light the lamp to save the oil. He simply removed his sword and eased onto his pallet, alone with his thoughts until morning.
“This lodging is only temporary,” he began. Though the place he had just purchased was in no better a state.
Mingyu gave the room a cursory glance and nodded absently.
“What is it you wished to speak to me about?”
“You don’t know, Constable?”
Her slippers glided over the bare floor as she came to place the wooden case onto the table beside the lamp. She was close now, close enough for him to smell the jasmine scent of her skin and hear the whisper of silk that surrounded her.
He did know. His pulse beat relentlessly beneath his skin, like a fierce creature demanding escape. There could only be one reason Mingyu was here with him, alone and smiling at him with those lips that men dreamed of. There was only one reason, but it simply could not be the reason.
The firelight danced in her eyes as she looked up at him while he stood like a lion carved in stone before her. If he dared to move, the moment might break.
She touched her palm to his chest, pressing lightly as if to test for a heartbeat. Her presence here brought everything with it, all the emotions he’d held at bay for so long. The loneliness came crashing in on him like a rush of cold, black water, the emptiness of his days, waiting for a glimpse of her like a love-starved youth even when she didn’t know he was watching. Even when she hated him.
Whatever answer Mingyu was looking for, she must have found it. Her fingers curled into the front of his robe and her lips parted in invitation.
His hand closed around her wrist to stop her. “I know what this is,” he said grimly. “Tell me why you’re here. Why you are really here.”
“To be with you.”
He shook his head.
“Is it so hard to believe that I would come to you simply because I wanted to?”
A sharp pang struck him in the chest. Her voice was soft, her expression pained, but Mingyu moved away before he could answer. She reached for the wooden case she’d brought with her.
“There is something I needed you to see,” she said, her tone confident now. And cold.
She opened the lid and then stepped back. “This was given to me as a gift.”
A scroll lay inside, the paper the color of pale ivory. Even with his rough hands, he knew to handle it with care as he unrolled the top portion.
“An orchid,” he declared flatly. Certainly not what he expected.
“But does it look familiar to you?” Mingyu held her breath as she waited for his answer.
Kaifeng inspected the painting closely, from the delicate flower to the array of leaves surrounding it. The flower was rendered in a few simple lines. The petals were painted a deep rose color with the center accented in bright yellow, the green of the leaves a soothing counterpoint to the fire of it. He frowned as he read over the characters that graced the edge.
“‘A faraway orchid in a lonely valley,’” she read breathlessly.
“Similar to the inscription on the scroll found in General Deng’s study,” he observed.
“On a portrait of me.”
He pushed the oil lamp and other items on the table aside so he could open the entire scroll over the surface. By itself, the painting seemed harmless; a solitary flower leaning slightly in the breeze.
“Who gave this to you?”
“Inspector Xi Lun. He had it sent to the Lotus this evening.”
He started. “Xi Lun?”
“He’s the imperial censor who is overseeing your investigation, is he not?” Mingyu watched for his reaction as she spoke. “The inspector admitted that he had admired me from afar many years ago, when he was a candidate for the imperial exams. Before General Deng became my benefactor. Xi Lun also spoke of earning money selling paintings. He sold that picture of me to Deng, I just know this.”
“We don’t know anything,” Kaifeng replied curtly. That demon Xi Lun seemed to be everywhere, but Kaifeng couldn’t start rushing headlong to conclusions. “I will have to compare the two paintings. Lay them side by side so I can study the inscriptions and the style. And even if Xi Lun painted your portrait, what does it truly tell us?”
“That Deng Zhi and the inspector are connected. Don’t you find it suspicious?”
“Mingyu, you are notorious in the capital. There are any number of powerful men connected through you.”
Returning to the scroll, Kaifeng braced his hands on either side of the table as he studied it. The painting in Deng’s study had been stained with blood. Kaifeng had assumed it was merely circumstance that Deng had her portrait before him when he was killed, but what if it wasn’t coincidence?
“Inspector Xi is fixated on me,” Mingyu insisted. “When he came back to the capital, he started watching me and everyone around me. He knows about my arrest last year. He knows about our association.”
“What association would that be?” Kaifeng looked up from the scroll, his shoulders tense.
She avoided his eyes. “Any association is a threat to him. He’s obsessed, Kaifeng.”
“And what man isn’t obsessed with the beautiful Mingyu? Wasn’t there some student several years ago who took his own life out of despair when you didn’t return his affections?”
“Those are just stories.” She moved away from him, exasperated. “Every couple of years there’s a new lovesick scholar and another courtesan. It’s the same tragic fable over and over. This is different. Xi Lun wants to own me, Kaifeng.”
Mingyu paced to the opposite end of the room. Her movements were agitated and desperation crept into her voice. “Xi Lun thinks he already owns me. He doesn’t want me hosting any banquets or performing in the quarter. It will only be a matter of time before he offers to redeem me and Madame Sun will be forced to accept his offer.”
This was an aspect of life in the Pingkang li that Kaifeng was wholly unfami
liar with. He could only watch and listen as a hollow pit widened in his stomach. Lately that was all he could be, a silent observer.
“Isn’t that inevitable? Won’t some patron eventually claim you as his own?”
“Then let it be anyone but him,” she said bitterly. “He’s worse than General Deng. Xi Lun thinks of me as a solitary flower that he wants to save. He’ll lock me up so that I only exist for him. A lonely orchid.”
Mingyu bowed her head. The sight of her looking so defeated tore into him.
Methodically, he rolled up the scroll and returned it to the case. “I am trying to think of some way I can help, but—”
“There’s nothing anyone can do. Madame Sun owns me. In turn, Madame Sun is ruled by the powerful and wealthy. If she causes the inspector to lose face by refusing, her livelihood, the entire Lotus Palace is at risk. You know how relentless Xi can be.”
She looked over at the wooden case, her shoulders sunken. “This is a gift indicating the inspector’s intentions. I had always hoped that after so many years, I would finally earn my freedom, but it was just an illusion.”
He wished with every breath in his body there was something he could do. Kaifeng closed the case, shutting away the ill-omen inside. “So you belong to the inspector now.”
“Not yet.”
Her gaze filled with longing, but it wasn’t for him. Kaifeng knew this in every bone in his body as he crossed the room to go to her.
“Say something,” she implored when he stood silently before her.
He lifted his hand to trace the curve of her cheek, very much aware of the roughness of his touch. “If I know anything about you, Lady Mingyu, it’s that no man can truly claim you.”
Mingyu tilted her head back and her eyes, those dark, captivating eyes, took hold of him. “You can,” she said breathlessly.
But her look was far from seductive. Her hand tenuously covered his. “Don’t you ever think of this? Of the two of us together?”
She hadn’t touched anything but his hand and his body was already taut with desire, his breathing labored.
“I think of it,” he confessed.
Mingyu raised herself onto her toes and his hands found their way around her waist without any conscious thought on his part. She weighed no more than a butterfly as he lifted her. The sleeping pallet was set against the wall, no more than five steps away. Kaifeng lowered her onto it while he wrapped his arms around her to cradle the fall. And it was a fall in every way, a drop off a cliff with no bottom.
Kaifeng loosened her sash enough to ease the layers of cloth aside. It wasn’t long before his hand brushed against the warm, smooth skin of her thighs. Softer than the finest silk.
“This is only for tonight, isn’t it?” he inquired solemnly.
Mingyu closed her eyes and shook her head. Not because she was denying it, he knew, but because she didn’t want to answer.
“I understand, Mingyu.” All he wanted was the truth.
He bent to kiss her the way a kiss should happen between a man and a woman. Not out in the open. Not with drums beating and the threat of intrusion from the outside world.
Mingyu’s kiss was just as she was—bold, passionate, vulnerable. He took the time to discover her in the give and take between them.
His tongue slipped into her mouth, tasting wine and the sharp, sweet bite of cloves. With a moan, Mingyu dug her hands into his shoulders. She writhed beneath him, melding her soft curves to his hard muscles, causing blood to rush to his organ.
Kaifeng reached into the opening of her robe to explore her with his hands in a winding and sensual path that circled her breasts and coursed down over her stomach. The soft sigh of her breath urged him on and her muscles warmed and her skin heated with each caress. When he slid a rough fingertip over her sex, she became pure fire in his arms.
“Kaifeng.”
Mingyu called out his name with her head thrown back and her eyes squeezed shut. She called him other things, sweet, endearing things, as he continued to stroke her until she was slick and soft and willing.
“I want you to remember this,” he said as he slid a finger deep within her. Her damp flesh closed around him and a shudder racked her body.
“I will,” she gasped.
Her eyes were black with desire, caught between pleasure and agony, as she struggled to catch her breath. He was going to make love to her as many times that night as he could manage, if only to see that look.
There was no elegance to her now as her hips rose to demand more of his touch. She was talented and treasured and sought after and she was writhing beneath him on the wooden slats of his bed.
“Stop.”
Her command was no more than an exhalation of breath. She gasped as his fingers sank deeper into her.
“No, please stop. I want you with me.” Yet her body still arched into him, pleading for more.
His voice rumbled in his throat. “You’re close. So close.”
Kaifeng could see it in every part of her. Her skin was flushed pink, her nipples raised into hard points. He was caught up in the sight of her pleasure and in knowing he was the one who had brought her to the edge.
But Mingyu would not be denied. She dragged his head down and caught his lower lip between her teeth, demanding blood from him along with everything else. But pain wasn’t her goal. Breaking the kiss, she removed his belt and tugged his robe away from his shoulders. Then she undid the tie of his trousers and pulled them down until he was completely bared before her. When her hands closed around his sex, he lost all ability to think.
She stroked the length of him slowly, her hands soft, her grip firm. Everything that he was narrowed impossibly down to where she held him. He closed his eyes and let her touch consume him, but Mingyu wasn’t done with him. From the blind place where he’d willed himself, he sensed her hands leaving him only to be replaced with the slick caress of her tongue. Then her mouth surrounded him, hot and wet, and every muscle in his body seized with the sheer pleasure of it.
He had to force her away from him. Impatiently, he removed the rest of her clothing, stripping off layer upon layer from Mingyu like so much armor until not a thread separated them.
When they came together again, she kissed his mouth, then the side of his neck, then his shoulder. Each touch like a fall of peach blossoms. Without warning, he felt the sharpness of teeth against his throat. His organ thickened to the point of pain.
Pushing Mingyu back onto the pallet, Kaifeng hooked a hand beneath her knee to lift and open her. He rested the head of his sex against her opening for only a moment before sinking in fully.
Mingyu let out a sigh of surrender as her back arched entirely off the bed. He caught her like that, his arms circling her lower back to steady her as he thrust again, slow, but deep. Driving the breath from her in one long gasp.
It had to be like this. His body was no longer his own. It belonged to some wild creature as he plunged into warm, wet flesh again and again. And his mind—his mind had gone to that dark place where stars retreated in the daylight.
Vaguely, he sensed Mingyu’s hips lifting to meet him. She clung to him, her arms around his shoulders, her legs locked at his hips while down below, her flesh shaped itself to him where their bodies were joined.
He couldn’t last. Not for long, with Mingyu holding on to him in every way possible. Her eyes were squeezed shut. A thin crease appeared between them as she concentrated on her own pleasure. Her brow glistened with sweat as their bodies struggled, seeking that perfect moment at any cost. Kaifeng willed himself to continue, to delay the inevitable moment of release, but his will meant nothing.
Reaching between the crush of their bodies, he strained to find the center of her sex once more. His fingers rasped over the tiny bud as he moved inside her. All at once, Mingyu tightened around him. With a stra
ngled cry, she pressed her face against the crook of his neck as her body shuddered, lost. He followed her, thrusting without grace or skill until sensation overwhelmed him. His very essence poured out of him and into her.
With that rush of sensation, the fog of emotion drained away and his mind cleared. He wasn’t blind. Mingyu was using him, and using him well indeed. Yet every instinct in him wanted to sink his head onto Mingyu’s shoulder, to taste the salt on her skin and to stay for as long as she let him.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
“YOU’RE STILL HERE.” Kaifeng sounded surprised.
“I’m still here.”
Mingyu curled up against him, seeking warmth against the chill of the early morning. She liked the way he sounded, his deep voice muddled with sleep and every breath rumbling in his chest.
Languidly, he rolled away from her and propped himself up on his elbow. The action was immediately followed by a yawn. She was reminded of a lion drenched in sunlight.
“So this is what you really look like,” she mused.
“Frightening?” he asked, his voice tight.
“Not at all.”
She reached out to trace the line of his arm. Kaifeng was lean and spare of build, not one bit wasted. When poems spoke of masculine beauty, they prescribed a cultured appearance—light skin, arched eyebrows, an inoffensive chin and forehead which didn’t draw too much attention to one or the other.
Kaifeng was far from an example of male beauty. His features were striking, his skin bronze. The cords of sinew and muscle that defined his body spoke of toil and labor rather than refinement, but the effect was undeniably powerful to the eye. At least to her eye.
“I’ve been studying your face,” she said, resting her head over one bent arm.
He didn’t say anything, though he did shift to face her while he waited for her to continue. They mirrored one another as they reclined upon the pallet, engaged in a lover’s conversation.
“It’s not an unpleasant face,” she observed.
