One would think she wasn’t a servant but a queen.
With a miserable breath, Jemdanee hitched up her own sari to her knees and splashed the cool water, spraying her.
Kalpita gasped, opening her eyes, and seeing her, tsked.
Grabbing a piece of papaya and pushing it into her mouth, Jemdanee seated herself on the sandstone ledge of the fountain. In between chews that were soft and melty sweet, she leaned in toward Kalpita and held up the peacock amulet, rattling it. “You told me to use this to command him, but you never actually told me what it is for. Might you tell me?”
Kalpita paused, seeing the amulet on Jemdanee’s wrist. She eyed her and then primly took Jemdanee’s hand, positioning it toward herself. With a quick fluttering of fingers, Kalpita unraveled the leather string and tied it on her own wrist, patting it into place. “I had too much hariya last night. I was supposed to give you the one with the three leather strings, not two.”
Jemdanee lowered her chin. “Kalpita. That did not answer my question. Ridley laughed when I told him it was yours. He never laughs. Ever. Why did he laugh?”
The woman pertly adjusted the gold amulet, then glanced around, as if to ensure there wasn’t a soldier or another servant in site, then leaned in and said in a flurry of Hindi, “I will give you the other one. That one has not been marked.”
She blinked. “Marked?”
“Haan. Our modern people snub their noses to the ancient ways of India, but it holds great power. All things tantric leads to the root of life that rests within the pleasure of one’s soul.”
Oyo. “I am asking you to define its power.”
“It is said the moment a man rubs his seed onto it, his soul is bound to its wearer for eternity. And…the Field Marshal and I are bound.”
Jemdanee choked and repeatedly plunged her bare wrist into the water, frantically scrubbing it until it stung at the thought that the Field Marshal’s seed had—
Kalpita puckered her lips. “I will give you the one that was not rubbed by him.”
Jemdanee flicked her wrists and swiped it against her sari, shuddering.
That head wobbled. “You were desperate and the rest was hariya.” Kalpita leaned in and with a tapping finger to her hand, said in a sultry tone, “It works. I have been unable to get rid of the Field Marshal since. All he wants is me and mmmmm. Beware the golden bone of a peacock.” She nudged her.
One good thing came out of it.
It amused Ridley enough to make him laugh. That was magic at its finest. “Kalpita?”
“Jee?”
“Ridley asked me to marry him. Am I wrong to deny him given he flings himself at danger?”
Those dark eyes met hers, growing serious. “Life bound to a white man who dedicates his life to danger is too much of a hardship. ‘Tis why I will never wed my Charles despite my love. For we will suffer, as will our children.”
Jemdanee sniffed hard and nodded.
Kalpita sighed and rubbed her arm. “Assist me in the kitchens today. Might you?”
Anything to prevent her from thinking about the pain she was about to deliver to Ridley. That pain, however, was going to remind him that what they shared would never be reduced to a piece of parchment he wanted her to sign for all the wrong reasons.
As his wife, he could legally demand and prevent her from abiding by his command.
But as his Hindu bibi…he had no say. None. At. All.
* * *
11:23 a.m. - 15 Larkin’s Lane, Registration Office
Her absence bespoke of a childish insubordination that made him want to smash every window out of every building on the block.
She thought she was loving him.
She wasn’t.
What she was doing was murdering what little peace he had left in his head and in his heart.
“I think it is fairly obvious she isn’t coming,” the Field Marshal confided.
In the silence of the stuffy registrar room, Ridley half-nodded, numb.
Rounding the desk, Ridley set aside the folder he had brought with him, containing his will, and commenced systematically organizing the entire registrar desk.
The Field Marshal eyed him, his heavily tanned face wary. “What are you doing?”
“Giving her seven minutes.” Ridley aligned the ledgers, corked the inkwells, set the quills back into their holders, using his fingers to smooth each end of the feather, and even closed the registrar book, setting it back onto its designated silver tray. “Were you able to look into any ships?”
“Yes. Four officers can escort you however far you need them to.” The Field Marshal trooped. “There are no ships departing out of Calcutta for another month, given the last fleet of merchants left this week, but from my understanding there is a naval ship departing in five days out of Bombay. If you leave by tomorrow night, you’ll be there on time. I can issue you a government signature missive to get you on board.”
A ragged breath escaped Ridley, knowing he had four months of travel ahead of him, not including the coach taking him into Bombay. “I will take it.” Removing the handkerchief bearing Jemdanee’s smeared red lip rouge from the pocket of his morning attire, Ridley grazed his finger against it and stared at the linen.
He might as well be looking at her blood.
He’d always known that involving any woman in his life would put her in peril.
That was the price of letting the world know that he refused to kneel to injustice. Only now that injustice was bleeding across the hands of everyone.
It was like being married to Elizabeth all over again.
For he was back to loving a woman beyond his control. Beyond his reach.
Jemdanee was trying to dominate a very dangerous game she didn’t understand. A game she had never played. In his name, she was reaching her hand for a pair of dice without realizing an ax would fall the moment her fingers grazed the ivory.
It was up to him to end her reach.
With the tightening of his shaven jaw, he walked around the entire desk and whipped and snapped the rouge-smeared linen so hard across its wood surface, thick dust plumed into the air around them.
The Field Marshal coughed and winced against the dust, waving a gloved hand while sending the shoulder tassels on his uniform swaying. “Whatever are you…doing?” He coughed.
“It needed dusting.” Ridley shook his head in grudging annoyance. “If they cannot take pride in their registrars, what can they take pride in? Their funerals?” Trying to further distract himself from thinking about the fact that Jemdanee wasn’t coming, he folded the handkerchief down to a perfect small square, then tucked it back into his waistcoat.
Why did he let Jemdanee into his heart knowing he wouldn’t be able to keep her?
He quickly dug into the other pocket and removed a wad of rupee bank notes. He unfolded it and thumbed through its hundreds.
The Field Marshal lifted a brow. “You count them as if they were fives.”
“I sold an entire room of books before I left London.” He tossed over a thousand into the payment basket. “Based off the dust, they fucking need it.”
Ridley grudgingly folded the remaining wad of rupees and tucked it away. He adjusted the gold ring on his finger, mentally preparing himself for the game he knew he had to play. “We have waited long enough.” It hurt. How could she do this? How could she do this to his need to protect her in the only way he knew how? If he died, she would have nothing.
The Field Marshal lingered. “What do you want me to do?”
“I don’t leave until tomorrow night. I will ensure my will reflects the decision she has made. I cannot very well do more than that.” Rounding the desk again, he dragged his hair out of his eyes, then methodically opened drawers, scanning the contents of each one. He closed one. He closed two.
“What are you doing now?”
Ridley thudded a sander out onto the desk from one of the drawers, rattling the inkwells.
Holding the Field Marshal’s gaze, Ridley pat
ted the desk. “Everything is in place and ready for the next happy couple. It simply won’t be me or you. Our careers ensured that.”
The man’s mouth twitched.
Leaning toward the desk, Ridley grabbed the folder he had brought with him and removed his watch. Flicking open the gold casing, he glanced at it. “Whoever thought I would ever see the day when women rule over men with the same disregard we rule over them.” Riled, he tucked his pocket watch back into his waistcoat. “She decided. It’s over.”
The Field Marshal sighed. “Shall we proceed as planned?”
Rounding the desk with his folder, Ridley pointed at him. “Yes. Arrest her the moment she tries to leave Calcutta. No shackles, please.”
“I wasn’t planning on it.”
They stalked out and down the aisle beyond, falling into stride with each other’s regimented, stalking steps.
They left the building as if they had gotten married.
Chapter 11
11:14 p.m. - Spence’s Hotel
Long after everything had grown still, save the call of koels in the distance beyond the windows, a click made her pause.
A knock on their adjoining door made her glance up in astonishment from the book she was reading. She set her knuckles against her teeth as if the dead had creaked open their caskets, knowing Ridley was finally done being miffed.
Heart pounding, she crawled out of her bed, shoving aside her phytology book. Clasping a hand over her mouth to keep herself from breathing too loud, she quickly crossed the room and unlatched the door leading to his bedchamber.
She swung it open, ensuring the unmarked gold-dipped peacock bone wrapped on her wrist was ready to control this entire situation.
Peering into his diya lit room, her lips parted.
His broad back still to her, Ridley was shirtless and smoking a cheroot. With the shifting of taut, bunched muscles, he shook out the linen of his bed that had almost blown off the mattress due to the open window and mounting wind.
He smoothed the linen with the rigid sweep of his scarred hand, the hemp rope bundled around his shifting bicep.
She lingered, unable to even wheeze.
Leaning over the bed, he closed the window enough to keep the wind from disturbing the net and sheets. “Were you reading?” he asked matter-of-factly over his shoulder as if he were fully dressed.
She fingered the doorframe she leaned against for support. “Haan,” she breathed out.
Taking a drag of the cheroot, he blew out the smoke. “Are you coming in or not?”
She entered his room and closed their adjoining door behind herself.
Turning back toward him, she eased out a steadying breath, feeling as if she were finally meeting the real Ridley.
He removed his boots, letting them thud onto the marble floor. “Latch the door,” he offered past the cheroot dangling from his masculine lips.
She hesitated but…latched it. “Why are you asking me to latch it?”
Easing out smoke, he removed the cheroot from his lips. “Because I wanted to see if you would do it. And guess what? You did. You obey some orders.”
She crinkled her nose. “Based off that mocking tone, do you want me to leave?”
“No.” He tapped the ash off the cheroot and searched her face. “How was your day?”
She pressed a hand to her cheek in an effort to remain calm and drifted toward him. “Long.”
The hiss of the tobacco glowed as he glanced down at her with brooding features. “Mine, too. Aside from being jilted, I had to cancel on Dunning, which made me feel like an even bigger prick. Not to prioritize, but I’m giving the boy my afternoon tomorrow. It’s not like you need me.”
She lowered her chin. “I did not realize you had it in you to be a father.”
He stared her down. “I did not realize you had it in you to jilt me.” He reached down and tapped at the peacock bone, holding her gaze. “Don’t insult yourself or me. You aren’t going to need that.”
“Then why invite me into your room?” she countered. “What did you want?”
Looking toward the net-draped open window before them, he eased out smoke through his teeth into the night air around them. “Back in the land of England, we call this talking. In France, we call it something else given my shirt is off. Choose whichever suits you.”
She lingered, awed by the candlelight illuminating the squared tanned muscles of his chest and every band of sinew that defined a stomach that did not even look real. The overly defined bulk of his arms showed scars.
He was…beautiful.
A god.
Seven of them. Maybe even another hundred.
He tapped more ash off his cheroot. “How about we get to the point of this evening?” Sticking the cheroot into his mouth, he stepped toward her and yanked her up and into his muscled arms hard, just before her knees collapsed.
He swung her back to the bed.
Jemdanee clung to him, her pulse roaring. Her chest quaked.
“Are you all right?” It was mocking. He tightened his hold around her body and the lower half of her sari that was beginning to unravel. “The look on your face might as well be a scream heard in the middle of the night.”
She held his gaze and remolded her lips, nose and eyes. “How is that?”
The cheroot twitched against his lips. “Worse.” He set her onto the softness of the bed past the mosquito net. “You’ve survived this long. Relax.”
Her arms thudded into the mattress hard enough to make the linen billow. “You make relaxing impossible.” She sank deeper into the mattress like fruit wobbling in gelatin.
Ridley continued to smoke what little remained of the cheroot and eyed her from where he stood at the side of the bed. “We’re going to talk about what happens tomorrow night.” Shifting forward and toward her, he stretched himself alongside her and propped his dark head against his hand. “I leave at exactly ten at night.”
Jemdanee turned toward him against the pillow. “Why not wait until morning?”
He searched her face. “Traveling at night has its perils, but it’s less straining without the heat. I rise early tomorrow morning. My trunks depart with me into the barracks and then into a military coach from there in the evening. The hotel is already paid for throughout these next ten months. The owner has instructions to ensure this entire floor remains yours. You’re across the street from the compound which will further ensure your safety should you need anything from the Field Marshal. Tomorrow night, meet me at the old banyan tree of the Government House at nine o’clock. That gives us an hour to say adieu. Be there at exactly nine. If you’re late by even a minute, I’ll leave without saying good-bye at all. Do you understand?”
It would not keep her from following. “I understand.”
“Good.” Taking up a section of her unbound hair, he brought it to his lips. “No peach oil?”
She lowered her chin. “Are you attempting to seduce me, Mr. Ridley?”
He held out the still glowing cheroot between two large fingers, observing it. “No.” His low voice matched the disquiet in his amber eyes. “I’m attempting to enjoy this. You. Me. Joie de vivre. Equanimity. Quintessence.”
If Casanova had a very well-educated nemesis, Ridley would be it.
She stared him down. “I would reach for the dictionary but at the moment, you are in the way.”
He rolled the cheroot. “I am the way, Jemdanee. Never forget it.”
She gave him a withering look.
He tapped her cheek. “What did you do today aside from break my heart?”
She set her chin. “I assisted Kalpita in the kitchens.”
“Were your hands weighed by too much dough at eleven this morning?”
A soft breath escaped her. “If I legally bind myself to you, Ridley, you will have more say over me than I do myself. That is the way of the law and marriage. And given your decision to go into London without me, I prefer you not own me.”
He said nothing.
“The decision I made this morning was not based off of how I feel for you.”
He said nothing.
“Are you angry?” she pressed.
He stared her down, nodding. “Very. But I am choosing to set that aside in this moment knowing we won’t see each other for some time. Maybe even never again if things go badly.”
Her throat tightened. She held up her black diamond ring. “So much for eternal commitment.”
Edging closer, he held out the cheroot. “Take this.”
Jemdanee took what remained of the cheroot he offered, her fingers grazing his. She brought the last of the cheroot to her lips as he watched.
They held each other’s gaze in silence.
He leaned over her, searching her face, and then lowered his head, hovering the heat of his mouth close to hers. “Keep it between your lips. Don’t move.”
She stilled, the cheroot tilting out of her mouth and almost touching his shaven chin.
Holding her gaze, he lowered his mouth until the burning end of the cheroot singed his lip.
She winced for him, startling back as hot ash fell from its end and onto her chest. She coughed and blinked, swatting away the ash. She glared at him and his mouth that now had a mark flaring red on his upper lip. “Why did you—”
“My. Look at that unending concern.” He squinted, his mouth took on an unpleasant twist. “She did the same to my heart this morning, but for some reason is more startled by the blister on my lip.” Snatching the cheroot from her, he leaned back in agitation, reaching out a muscled arm and set the stub of the cheroot into the pan on the nightstand.
Rolling back toward her, he remained propped on his hand. “Learn to better appropriate your concern, because right now…I’m not fucking impressed.”
She eyed the burn mark on his lip. “There is something wrong with you.”
“Or maybe I have reached a level of intelligence others have yet to understand. An ordinary life is for ordinary men, Jemdanee, which I will never be. You seem to forget that. So stop treating me like other men.” He sat up and swung off the bed with a thud.
The Devil is French: A Whipping Society Novel Page 21
