Black Knight, White Queen

by Jackie Ashenden

  Those aren’t physical things.

  Aleks opened his eyes, disturbed. He tried to force Izzy out of his head but she wouldn’t go. He looked down at his board, found his gaze caught by his white queen. Viktor had done something special with her, carving her in the shape of a woman with a delicate, fierce face.

  Izzy’s face.

  He reached out, took the queen in his hand. She was the most powerful piece on the board and some players resigned when they lost theirs, figuring the game was over. But he never had. He’d played without a queen and won before. Had even relished the challenge.

  Yet now it didn’t feel like a challenge. His white queen was gone and he felt lost.

  He cursed, rose to his feet, thrusting the chess piece in his pocket. Tried to think logically. His feelings about her had never made sense to him, so perhaps he needed to try and work them out. But he couldn’t do that by himself. He needed her to help him, to talk to him. She knew about these things, didn’t she?

  Aleks curled his fingers around the chess piece in his pocket. Yes, and once he’d made sense of these feelings, then he’d be able to concentrate on his game preparation. Then he’d be able to play.

  Yes, that made sense.

  The main problem was that finding Izzy was going to be difficult, since he hadn’t bothered to find out where she was staying. He had no way of contacting her. No way of finding her. Shit, why hadn’t he thought to ask her before? He just hadn’t expected to need to know.

  A strange, desperate feeling filled him.

  He looked quickly around the suite, searching to see if she’d perhaps left something behind. Something that she would have to come back for again, like her sketchbook. But there was nothing. She’d left no sign that she’d even been here. The scratches on his back from her nails, the ones she’d given him after he’d dried her from her bath and they’d ended up making love on the floor of the bathroom, were all that was left of her presence.

  The desperate feeling gathered tighter.

  He could think of only one thing to do—find out where she was staying. And the only way to do that was to ring around the hostels in the city. All the hostels in the city. Until he found her.

  Stalking over to the suite’s desk, he picked up everything he’d knocked off it, including his laptop. Luckily it still worked. Firing it up, Aleks began searching.

  Mercifully there was no one else in the dorm room when Izzy arrived back at the hostel but even so, throwing herself down on the bed and weeping seemed a touch dramatic even for her.

  Instead she’d do what she’d done all the way back from the hotel—not think about it. Not think about him.

  She put her bag down, had a shower, got changed into a blue tank top and some loose, flowing trousers in purple silk. Then she began to pack her gear.

  Time to get out of Bangkok. She’d stayed too long as it was. If she’d just headed to Pattaya a couple of days ago instead of staying on, all this would never have happened. She would never have met Aleks. Never have fallen for a man who insisted on thinking he was broken. Who’d gotten rid of her like yesterday’s news.

  She picked up some shoes, shoved them into her large backpack.

  Hell, she’d been planning to go anyway. Had gotten up early hoping to sneak out without him noticing. Without having to deal with all the goodbye crap because she hated goodbyes. Leaving was always better than being left, than being told to go.

  Except she’d ended up being told to leave anyway.

  Izzy picked up some more gear, stuffed it into the backpack then zipped it up with so much force she nearly broke the zipper.

  Shit. Why did she feel this way? Why the hell did she feel like he’d carved her chest open with a spoon? She’d only known him a couple of days, and yet the hurt she’d felt when he’d told her to go had been agonizing.

  A tear ran down her cheek. She wiped it angrily away.

  Stop crying, you stupid woman.

  Yeah, she needed to get it together. If he wanted to live his life as an emotional coward that was no skin off her nose. She would move on, forget him. A few days on the beach and she’d be fine, back to her old self again.

  Whatever that was.

  Bending, she picked up her heavy backpack and slung it on, then marched out into the reception area. The guy at the desk gave her an odd look but soon glanced away at Izzy’s belligerent expression. He began totting up her bill while she fished around for her money belt.

  Afterwards she stepped out into the teeming street, looking for a taxi to take her to the bus station. The whole place was a confused mass of cars, tuk-tuks, buses and bicycles.

  When she’d first gotten here, the noise had thrilled her. So different from home. So vibrant and alive after the months of living under a pall of grief.

  But now she didn’t want to be here anymore. All the fun had gone out of it.

  Damn Aleks. Damn Aleks for making her feel this way. For ruining what had been up till now a perfectly lovely holiday.

  At the bus station she was lucky to get a ticket on a bus that was leaving that morning, but it still meant at least an hour to wait. She found herself a seat in the busy terminal, watching people get on and off buses.

  Normally it would have interested her, made her get out her sketchbook at least, but now she just felt as if there was a big empty space inside of her. A lonely space that ached to be filled.

  People left and people returned, saying goodbye and saying hello. A large woman descended from a bus to be enveloped by a couple of excited children.

  Izzy’s eyes began to prickle with tears.

  People never came back to her. No, they all left her instead. Angie to suicide. Her parents to grief. She’d even felt a chasm open up between her and her friends. They didn’t understand loss and until it happened to them, never would, not really. Everyone had left her. And the one man who’d made her feel just a little less alone in the world had sent her away.

  Why? What the hell was so wrong with her that everyone she cared about had shut her out?

  Shit, she was such a mess.

  She folded her arms to keep in the sudden, tearing pain in her heart and looked down, the sun glinting off the silver bracelets on her wrist. Off the one Aleks had bought for her on Patpong Road.

  Aren’t you doing exactly what Angie did? Removing yourself?

  She stared at the light glinting off the band, hearing Aleks’s voice in her head. And something went very still and quiet inside her heart.

  Fuck. He was right. Last night he’d accused her of running away, he was bloody right. She was running away. Away from the fallout of Angie’s death. Away from her parents mired in their grief. Removing herself because it was so much easier to leave than to be left.

  And now she was doing the same thing again—leaving Aleks. God, he wasn’t the only emotional coward around here.

  Izzy took a soft, halting breath.

  She couldn’t do this anymore. She couldn’t keep running away. Couldn’t keep removing herself from life like her sister had done.

  You can’t keep blaming yourself for someone else’s choice, Izzy…

  Slowly Izzy touched the bracelet on her wrist, the silver cool under her fingertips.

  In the bar, Aleks’s calm logic about Angie’s death had given her a glimpse of a way out of the endless guilt cycle. A way out of the grief. An outside perspective.

  She could do no less for him. Because a man who saw so clearly wasn’t broken. Wasn’t disturbed. Just lonely and scared and hurting. He needed someone to show him that. He needed her.

  Because underneath all their differences they were the same.

  Aleks put down the phone. Another blank. Another dead end. He’d been calling hostels all morning and none of them had a woman called Izzy Cornwall staying with them.

  Frustration burned like a coal in his gut. What if he never found her? What if she’d left the city? Hadn’t she said she was going to Pattaya at some point?

  Angrily he pushed away
from the desk, getting up and pacing around again. The walls of the suite felt like they were pressing in, suffocating him. He couldn’t bear to be in here a second longer.

  Grabbing his card key and his phone, he strode to the door and went out. He’d start looking physically, that was a better idea. Calling at each hostel personally.

  It took him hours, visiting every hostel he came across. He did it systematically, taking in one district first before moving on to another. The area around Patpong Road was difficult because he kept remembering walking down it the night before with her, her fingers twined with his. He could still feel the warmth of her hand like a phantom limb, and he found he’d curled his fingers around it as if trying to keep the warmth in.

  Moving through the streets felt like swimming through thick water, and he had to stop every time he saw a pale head in amongst all the black-haired Thais. Kept having to check to see if it was her. It never was. And every time it wasn’t her, it hurt. And he didn’t know why.

  Because people who didn’t form attachments surely couldn’t miss someone? Or feel pain that they’d lost someone? Or regret that they hadn’t stopped someone from leaving?

  No, they couldn’t.

  Eventually, as night crept up onto the city and exhaustion settled into his bones, Aleks gave up and began to make his way back to the hotel. Tomorrow he would get up early and keep going. Fuck the tournament. He’d visit every damn hostel in the whole city. Eventually he’d find her. Eventually he’d get his queen back.

  Back at the hotel he couldn’t face the idea of going back to the suite, so he bypassed his floor and went up to the rooftop bar. Vodka would help. It always did.

  The atmosphere was different from two nights ago when he’d met Izzy in a thunderstorm. No rain for a start, the evening sinking over the city, lighting up the clouds with red and orange streaks.

  At the crowded bar, packed with people taking advantage of the fine weather to see the famous view, he at first didn’t see the woman leaning against the glass balustrade along with everyone else. But then he registered the cloud of blonde hair and like it had that first evening, the whole world stopped and slowed down.

  “Izzy.” Her name escaped him in a whisper. Like a prayer.

  She had her back to him and didn’t turn. But then he’d said it so quietly she wouldn’t have heard.

  Slowly, threading through the people around the bar, Aleks came up behind her. And he knew by the way her whole body went still that she’d sensed him.

  Then she turned around.

  It had only been a matter of hours since he’d seen her and yet that blue gaze of hers hit him like a punch to the stomach. Familiar and bright and full of expression.

  He couldn’t see anything else. Just her eyes. Just her pale face.

  His white queen.

  “I looked everywhere for you,” he heard himself say. “All the hostels in the city.”

  Her eyes widened. “Why?”

  “Because I didn’t want you to go.”

  Colour flushed her cheeks in the way he was becoming familiar with. The way he was starting to look for. The way he was starting to love. So much colour. Pink skin and blue eyes, pale hair and purple top. He’d never wanted colour in his life. He’d always been happy with black and white. And yet now…now he’d experienced all the vibrancy she brought with her, he was beginning to realize that perhaps living in monotones wasn’t that great after all.

  “Well, I didn’t want to go either,” she said quietly. “I wanted to stay. And that’s why I came back.”

  The crowd still brayed and chatted and laughed around them, but they may as well have been in a still, silent bubble all their own.

  “You were right when you told me I was running away,” Izzy went on. “I’ve been running away a lot. In fact, that’s all I’ve been doing for the past six months of my life.” Her lip trembled a little then firmed. “Everyone left me, you see. Left me or shut me out. Angie. My parents. My friends. So I thought…I thought it was my turn to leave for a change.” She took a breath. “But I can’t keep doing it. I can’t keep leaving. That’s what Angie did and I don’t want that to be my choice.” Her gaze held his. “You need me, Aleks. Whether you like it or not, you need me. And I can’t walk away from you like I walked away from my sister.”

  There was something in his throat that made speaking difficult. “I can’t give you what you want, Izzy. I don’t do relationships. I don’t do love. I can’t.”

  “Actually, funny you should say that because that’s the whole reason I came back.” Izzy pushed herself away from the balustrade. “To show you that you’re wrong.”

  A surge of adrenaline went through him as a feeling coiled in his gut. Raw and desperate and violent. An intensely physical feeling. “I’m not wrong.”

  “Yes, you are. You’ve just never had anyone who can prove it to you.” Her eyes glittered. “But I can.”

  Chapter Eleven

  She could see the desire in his eyes, a hot, burning thing. Desire for her. Desire for understanding. And perhaps he didn’t recognise it but she knew it was also a desire for what she could give him. A desire for love.

  “Prove it to me?” he asked blankly. “How?”

  Izzy reached for his hand. “Not here. Down in your suite.”

  He stared at her for a long moment then down at where their hands were joined. “Sex?”

  She could hear the surprise in his voice. The doubt. But that’s because sex for him, she suspected, had never been an emotional experience. Only physical.

  “No, not sex.” She leaned forward to murmur it quietly. “Making love.” Because that’s how she would show him. How she would prove to him just how much he was capable of. Sex had always been where their guards had been lowered with each other.

  “It’s the same thing—”

  “It’s not, Aleks. And I think you know that too.”

  His fingers tightened around hers but all he said was, “Okay, fine. Prove it to me then.”

  He didn’t understand, she knew that. Not yet at least. But he would. She would make him.

  Downstairs in the suite, she dumped her massive backpack on the floor and when she turned, she found him right behind her, reaching for her, pulling her into his arms. Already he had one hand fisted in her hair, gripping her tightly as he tugged her head back. She could feel his desperation, knew it stemmed not just from physical desire but from an emotional one too. Knew that whether he was aware of it or not, he wanted this connection between them. That he needed it. The look on his face as she’d turned around up on the rooftop had been enough to show her that.

  I looked everywhere for you. All the hostels in the city…

  “Aleks,” she said softly, placing her palms on his chest and exerting a little pressure, keeping him at bay. He was so very hot, the muscles beneath her hands flexing in response. She wanted so much to just give him whatever he wanted, but this was too important. Desperation was fine but afterwards he retreated. Closed himself up. And she couldn’t let that happen, not today.

  He ignored her, bending his head and covering her mouth with his in a hot, hungry kiss.

  She let him take what he wanted and then, when he began to kiss her jaw, her neck, she exerted more pressure, pushing at him until he lifted his head, his gaze on hers.

  “What?” he asked. “I thought you wanted this.”

  “I do. But we’re going to do this my way.” She lifted her hands and took his face between them. “Do you trust me?”

  The fierce look in his eyes took her breath away. “I…want to trust you.”

  Izzy swallowed past a dry mouth. God, she hoped that would be enough. It would have to be. “I have to be in charge this time, Aleks, okay?”

  “You were in charge last night.”

  “Yes, but today is different.” She stroked her thumbs along his jaw. “This time it’s not just about scratching an itch or feeding a hunger. This is about me loving you.”

  The expression in his eye
s flickered, and she could see the retreat again. An almost physical thing. Her hands tightened on him, holding his head so he couldn’t turn away. “I know. You think you’re broken. That you can’t love. That you can’t be loved.”

  “No, that’s not—”

  “Yes, it is. You think I can’t see your fear? You don’t want it to be true, but you’re afraid to hope.”

  “You’re not thinking clearly, Izzy. You’re letting good sex blind you.”

  “I’m not.” She let her thumbs move up from his jaw, along the exquisite line of his cheekbones. “In fact, I think I’m seeing clearly for the first time in months. Because of you. You’re not broken, Aleks. You’ve just never been taught what love is.”

  His eyes darkened, his body going taut. That hand in her hair tightened still further. “I don’t need to know.” Then he kissed her again, his mouth hard and demanding.

  Izzy let him kiss her, kept stroking his face, soothing him, trying to drain all the pent up emotion he refused to acknowledge with her touch.

  Eventually he lifted his head, his breathing fast and ragged. “Don’t…don’t do that. Don’t touch me like that.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I…” He stopped, his whole body tensing. “I don’t like it.”

  She could see fear in the depths of his eyes now, knew that her tenderness was pushing him. But she wanted him to shatter and let her in, not harden further.

  Gently she lowered her hands. “How about we go to bed now?” Sex had always deepened their connection, and she suspected that would be the key for him. Because sex was the only connection he’d allow himself.

  Aleks didn’t answer, merely took her hand and drew her into the bedroom.

  There she let him take her clothes off, her heart aching in her chest as his fingers shook on the little buttons that did up the silk trousers she wore.