by Gaelen Foley
“Lakshmi? Oh, well enough under the circumstances, I suppose. It’s kind of you to ask.” She smiled at him. “Lakshmi has decided to stay here with Meena. It’s been arranged.”
“You sound disappointed,” he murmured, studying her ambivalent expression.
Georgiana shrugged, shaking her head. “She’s choosing purdah. I can’t believe it. She cut off all her hair.”
“Really? Hm.” He took a thoughtful sip of wine. “I can’t say I’m surprised.”
She turned to him. “You’re not? You don’t even know her. I do, and I’m in shock.”
“Everything’s set against her. You can’t make a fish swim upstream.” He leaned closer and lowered his voice. “Most people don’t have the courage to go against the mold, Miss Knight, let alone the fortitude to stand up to public censure. You know that.”
She frowned at him and looked away. “I just find it hard to understand. I gave my friend the most splendid chance at freedom—for the first time in her life! But she refused it.”
“Freedom scares some people, believe me. You can’t force anyone to take a gift they aren’t ready to receive.”
“Well, it doesn’t scare me,” she declared.
“Yes, I can see that,” he murmured with a fond half smile, gazing at her. Then he decided to venture out on a limb. “Is that the reason you’re not married? Jealously guarding your freedom?”
She looked at him warily and then gave way to an uncertain laugh. “You have me all figured out, don’t you?”
“Not in the least,” he said, “but I’m trying.”
“In that case, allow me to explain.”
He gestured to her to proceed.
She took a swallow of wine and licked her lips daintily. “As you probably gathered from our earlier discussion, living under any man’s control does not sound to me like a very pleasant manner of existence. I shall never be any man’s chattel.”
“Well, naturally, but what exactly makes you think that is the nature of marriage, Miss Knight? I mean, I’m not so much in favor of the whole messy business myself, but must it necessarily be some sort of domestic battle for power?”
“Isn’t it?”
“Maybe, though, in theory, I don’t see why it should have to be.”
“Theory and practice are two different matters, my dear Lord Griffith. Under law, marriage gives men all the power. Women are defenseless by compare, at their husband’s mercy. Love, of course, is supposed to motivate men to treat their wives gently, but hardly anyone marries for love.”
“From what I hear, you’ve got scores of men who love you,” Ian baited her, hiding a smile. “Why not marry one of them if that is your concern?”
“Love me?” She laughed. “They don’t even know me. They cannot see beyond my face and don’t care enough to find out who I really am. Well—except for Adley, maybe. He’s the only one who has the slightest inkling of what I’m all about. But I could never marry Adley, poor poppet. He is such a dear, hapless thing. No, one wants…a husband one can look up to.”
He studied her in guarded fascination, then shook his head. “Your brothers were right. You are too picky.”
She turned to him in open-mouthed surprise. “You three were gossiping about me behind my back?” She pursed her lips and gave him an indignant poke in the arm, only half jesting. “How very rude!”
Ian laughed at her scolding. “Your brothers want to see you married off. Surely this doesn’t surprise you.”
“Well, it’s none of their affair!”
“Of course it is. They are your brothers. It is their duty to see you safely settled in life.”
“On my own terms, thank you very much,” she retorted. “I shan’t be pushed into anything I don’t want to do.”
“Yes, that much is obvious,” he answered dryly.
“It’s not that I’m opposed to marriage in principle,” she attempted to explain in a more reasonable tone. “If someone truly loved me and I him, that would be another story. Then I might consider giving up my independence. But until that chimera, that marvel, that weird, strange phenomenon should ever befall me—”
“Love?”
“Yes.” She nodded firmly. “Until that day, I shall stick to my aunt’s advice and flee the vicar’s mousetrap. Wedlock is a padlock, you see. That’s how Aunt Georgiana defined it in her book of essays.”
“Ah, the infamous book.” He looked at her shrewdly. “Your father let you read it? A risky move on his part, I daresay.”
“My father raised me to think for myself.” She scanned his face with a guarded look. “You disapprove.”
“Not of you, my dear, but the duchess…well, she hurt a lot of people in her day. Her husband and her children most of all.”
For a long moment, Georgiana fell into a contemplative silence, trailing her fingertip along the rim of her wineglass. She spoke again after a pause. “What about you, then? Why aren’t you married?”
“I was,” he said in a careful monotone. “She died.”
Georgiana gasped. She covered her lips with her fingertips, sat up straight, and stared at him. “Oh, God—I’m so sorry! I had no idea—”
“It’s all right.” With a practiced smile, he felt himself withdrawing by degrees. An automatic reaction, like his automatic words. “She is in a better place.”
Her eyes brimmed with compassion. “I’m so sorry.”
He looked away.
“Was it long ago?” she asked him softly.
“Five years.”
Her hesitant pause brimmed with tenderness. “Did…you love her very much?”
“She was my wife,” he said, not meeting her gaze.
If she noticed that this was in fact a cryptic answer, she did not pursue it, for at that moment, somebody called his name.
“Lord Griffith!”
Ian looked over. Bloody hell. He instantly donned his diplomatic mask once more. “Yes, Your Highness?”
In the intimacy of their exchange, they both had forgotten about Prince Shahu, but the royal jackanapes had been watching Georgiana all the while with increasing frustration at his failure to lure her admiration.
Several glasses of Champagne had further bolstered his self-opinion but had not improved his manners, and his father, who was talking to some men on the other side of the banqueting hall, was no longer there to keep him in check.
“Didn’t you hear my jest?” the prince demanded.
“I am sorry, Your Highness, no.”
“I said, ‘Throw her into the bargain and I shall get my father to sign that treaty for you!’”
Georgiana froze at his effrontery; the royal body-guards uneasily laughed on cue, but Ian knew better than to rise to the bait. He also knew that in the East, women could be traded like cattle, and King Johar might well be persuaded that if his darling Meena wanted Miss Knight with her, then Miss Knight should stay.
“What you ask is quite impossible, Your Highness,” he replied smoothly.
“Why is that?” Prince Shahu demanded.
Ian reached over and put his hand on Georgiana’s knee in a gesture that bespoke complete familiarity—and unquestioned possession. “Because,” he said with an icy smile, “she’s mine.”
He held the prince’s stare as a sudden burst of loud music, drums and drones, sitars and silvery bells hailed the rapid jingling arrival, in formation, of the maharajah’s dancing girls. Prince Shahu glared at Ian, then turned away in a sulk, redirecting his attention toward them.
It took Ian a moment to remove his hand slowly from Georgiana’s knee. His heart was pounding, a fierce agitation in his blood, as if his claim on her were real. He then noticed that the usually audacious Georgiana had turned three shades of scarlet, and he hid a narrow smile. Well, it seemed this time it had been his turn to shock her.
A crude move, maybe, but effective.
“I should go,” she forced out. “I think I’ve pressed my luck quite far enough. Besides—” More hookah pipes were being passed ar
ound, and she nodded toward them with a small cough. “The smoke is beginning to bother my lungs.”
“Of course.” Remembering her ailment, Ian rose and gave her a hand up from their nest of pillows. They had not yet put their gloves back on after the meal, and the shock of her bare hand in his did nothing to help dispel the tension between them.
They might still be a bit leery of each other, but the attraction was undeniable.
“Thank you.” Her delicate voice had gone a bit hoarse. The poor thing looked so shaken by his admittedly brazen touch that it seemed she could hardly bring herself to meet his glance.
How quaint, he thought in amusement, watching her look everywhere to avoid his gaze—the floor, the ceiling, the nautch girls. And here he had suspected her of being fast. He found her maiden reticence most unexpected and endearing.
“Shall I walk you back to your quarters?” he asked with tender gravity.
At last, she glanced up from beneath her lashes with a reluctant smile. “Lord Griffith, they won’t let you anywhere near the harem—but, thanks.”
He returned her smile and bent to murmur in her ear: “Someday you’ll have to tell me what goes on in there.”
“Actually, I’ve been wondering that myself,” she answered in a meaningful tone. She flicked a wary glance in Prince Shahu’s direction, then looked at Ian again. “I hope we’ll have a chance to talk again soon—privately.” Her blues eyes flashed the message, There is something I must tell you.
He bowed to her with polished caution. “I am at your disposal, Miss Knight. Send for me whenever you desire.” If she sensed any double meaning in his words, she kept her reaction to herself, merely giving him a small, nervous nod.
It seemed they understood each other.
“Until then, Lord Griffith.” Lowering her thick velvet lashes, Georgiana lifted the hem of her skirts just a bit and swept away without another word.
With heated intensity, Ian watched her cross the banqueting hall until she had disappeared through the gilded doorway.
CHAPTER
SEVEN
W hisking past the bald eunuch guards once more, Georgie escaped into the moonlit zenana. She paused a few steps inside and leaned against a fluted column, struggling to collect her wits after Lord Griffith’s intoxicating touch. Good God! she thought closing her eyes. A feverish tremor ran through her. She could still practically feel that warm, strong hand upon her knee. Her heart pounded.
Of course, it had meant nothing. His shocking move on her had been a mere fiction, a ruse designed to scare the obnoxious prince away—and it had worked. But, oh, how real it had felt for that fleeting instant, she thought hungrily. And how naturally he had reached for her…
With a soft, steadying exhalation, she looked up at the domed ceiling, at a loss to explain how the Marquess of Griffith had come to dominate her thoughts since the first day of their acquaintance. His physical magnetism had snared her attention from the start, and she had only grown more attracted to him once she had realized he was a deeply ethical man. Now his latest revelation, that he had lost his wife, tugged at her heartstrings, made her want to comfort him.
Dangerous longings. Especially when she knew firsthand what a very domineering male he could be.
Yet the memory of his touch tempted and tantalized her with a whisper that all the erotic secrets that had been forbidden to her for so long might finally be unlocked for her by this mysterious man, who clearly knew the answers.
Doing her best to shake off his potent effect on her, Georgie ordered her heated blood to cool down, put the enticing Londoner out of her mind with a will, squared her shoulders, and marched off to seek her friends.
She found Meena and Lakshmi sitting on the edge of the lotus pool in idle conversation, dangling their feet in the water and munching on sweets, a few candles burning around them, the little flames casting dancing reflections on the water.
Georgie kicked off her satin slippers, stripped away her silk stockings, hitched up her skirts, and joined them. The cool water helped to bring her temperature down, and soon she had nearly succeeded in getting Lord Griffith out of her mind.
She spent about two hours with her friends, catching up on their lives, though she had trouble getting used to seeing Lakshmi with hair chopped shorter than Gabriel’s.
When Lakshmi decided to retire, worn out by the emotional strain of all she had been through, Meena and Georgie were left alone. The lively and talkative princess spent most of the time extolling her husband’s virtues, but Georgie didn’t mind.
Earlier, she had thought of asking Meena some questions about the experience of carnal relations with one’s husband, but now she couldn’t bring herself to do it. She didn’t really want to know what the Maharajah of Janpur was like as a lover. It was only that blasted Englishman who had captivated the naughtier side of her imagination, and on that subject, Meena couldn’t help her.
At length, having talked herself out on the topic of her husband’s innumerable charms, Meena finally decided to go to bed, too, but Georgie was still restless. She kissed Meena’s cheek in farewell, said good night, and sat alone under the stars for a long while, trying not to contemplate Lord Griffith.
It really was sad that he had lost his wife. She wondered what sort of woman he had chosen for himself. A prim and proper London miss, no doubt. Some blue-blooded daughter of the aristocracy.
She sighed, growing restless again. She got up and slipped her shoes back on, leaving her stockings behind, then went wandering alone through the labyrinthine passages of the harem.
A person could get lost in here, she thought, unwilling to admit to herself that in reality, she was looking out all the various peepholes and listening grates in a covert effort to find Lord Griffith somewhere in the palace.
In one of the long, dark strolling galleries on an upper floor, she peered out through a narrow keyhole window and saw it overlooked the sprawling plaza through which she had first passed on her way into the palace, at the end of the processional road.
Flambeaux studded the darkness here and there, revealing pairs of guards on sentry duty. Some servants hurried about, as well, using the cooler air of night to see to their chores, sweeping up the cobbled ground and tending to the torches.
From her elevated position, she also had a good view of the king’s torch-lit temple dominating the east side of the plaza. It was not very large but was heavily carved, tall and narrow, with a pyramidal roof. Not far from it was the ornate, wrought-iron tiger cage, as big as a cottage. It was full of leafy trees and impenetrable darkness. Most maharajahs kept menageries, but if Georgie recalled correctly, Johar had rampant tigers on his royal crest.
Movement in the middle of the plaza caught her eye.
An Englishman, hands in pockets, came strolling through the moonlight.
Georgie’s eyes widened. A thrill rushed through her at the sight of him, so tall and elegant in the darkness, and at once, her heart began to race. For a moment, she bit her lip, debating with herself on whether she dared to go and see him alone, but then she remembered she had a perfectly sound excuse for seeking him out. She had to tell him her suspicions regarding Queen Sujana.
With that, she was on her way, hurrying down to meet him.
She swore to herself that she meant no mischief. Had she not promised to help him if she could?
Realizing she would have to make haste before he either went back inside or was joined by others, she sped through the harem’s maze until she found her way out and down to the plaza.
Within a few minutes, she was striding toward the towering cage, where she found the marquess in a staring contest with the maharajah’s Bengal tiger. At her approach, the huge tiger vanished into the greenery, only to betray its position a moment later with gold-green eyes glowing high above them from its new perch on a sturdy branch.
“Poor beauty,” she murmured as she joined him at the railing that girded the cage. “He should be running free in the forest.”
&nbs
p; “Where he can eat people?” Lord Griffith drawled, flicking an intimate half smile of guarded amusement her way.
He looked not at all surprised to see her, yet his pleasure at her arrival was palpable in the balmy darkness. She suddenly wondered if he had rambled out here with the calculated purpose of giving her an opportunity to meet him in this clandestine rendezvous.
Leaving her to ponder the question, he looked at the tiger again. “Make no mistake, Miss Knight. He may look tame, confined in there, but this animal is wild. He’d tear you apart if he got the chance.” He eyed her in teasing, subtle menace. “He’s probably thinking right now how soft and juicy you would taste if only he could be allowed to sink his teeth into you.”
A tremor of response ran through her. “Do tigers wait for permission, my lord?” she asked faintly.
“I suppose not. But…his cage is pretty strong. I think you’re safe.”
She stared at him, wondering if they were really talking about tigers at all. As he turned to her, his smile faded to a more serious gaze.
“I apologize if I offended you earlier with my answer to Prince Shahu. It was the first thing that came to mind. I couldn’t allow that notion of his to take root.”
“Of course—I wasn’t offended.” She did not deign to tell him that the scandalous truth was quite the opposite. She suppressed a sensuous shudder at the memory of that strong, clever hand upon her knee. “I—I understood what you were about.”
“I am glad.”
“Actually, the prince is part of the reason I needed to see you,” she said.
His face darkened. “Has he insulted you again?”
“No, nothing like that.” She glanced around a tad nervously. There were guards and servants posted everywhere. “Come. We must not be overheard.”
“All right.”
“This way.”
She led him through the darkness toward the temple, thinking that they risked a lower chance of being seen and intruded upon there.
“Where are my brothers?” she inquired, trying to ward off the tension that had crept in as soon as she came within arm’s length of him, close enough to touch.
