by P. J. Fox
“Please, Belle,” he said, “tell me what you’re thinking.”
That I love you.
“I’m sorry I didn’t.”
“I know.”
She’d half expected him to berate her. She would have, in his position. And to think that he’d been so upset, he’d ever considered…. The thought didn’t bear completion. But he let the matter drop. Whatever wound had opened between them, she knew that it was now healed. For which she was profoundly grateful.
He stroked her hair. “Charlotte?” he said.
“Yes.” She stared at the books lining the built-in bookcases on either side of the fireplace. Marching lines of leather-spined tomes. “It was the strangest thing. She just, I don’t know—appeared. I half wondered if she was trying to kidnap me. Lead me to the gate and then…I mean, it sounds ridiculous now, when I say it….”
“Not so ridiculous.” Ash thought for a moment. “In truth, I’m wondering the same thing.”
“Really?”
“Really. Something about Charlotte seems…off. I had Alec check up on her and she is, in fact, some sort of intern. And she did take the LSAT. But she’s nowhere near where she’s supposed to be and Alec’s contact gave him reason to believe that the status of her internship might be in doubt if she can’t pull herself together.”
“I wonder…I wonder if she didn’t choose that because of me. Because of what she thought happened to me.”
“And now you feel guilty.”
“Yes.”
Ash was still stroking her hair. Around them, gloom was settling into night. But Belle didn’t want to move and, obviously, neither did he. They needed this time together. Just to be together. “You’re not responsible for her choices. Or mine. Or anyone’s.” Or your mother’s, came the unspoken comment. Or your father’s. “Charlotte might use you as an excuse, as I’m given to understand that she’s used the men in her life as an excuse for why she can’t maintain a relationship.
“But speaking as an—until recently—inveterate bachelor, she’s chosen men who are, in whatever respect, unavailable. Either because they’re involved with other women or because they’re simply not emotionally equipped for relationships in the first place. She can then conveniently blame them when things don’t work out. And Belle it is convenient; she can maintain her status, at least in her own mind, as the victim.
“Charlotte is a selfish individual. You’ve told me that, yourself.”
When Belle protested, he held up a hand. “Perhaps not in so many words. Indeed, you’ve always been perfectly kind. Too kind. Nevertheless, however careful you are to excuse her behavior, the underlying facts are still there and I’m free to form my own conclusions. Which I have. And among them are the fact that if Charlotte were the last woman on the face of this earth the human race would die out.”
Belle laughed out loud.
“Charlotte looks for excuses to do what she wants to do, anyway.” And this time he did say it. “Just like your father. He’s not a drunk, because his parents were cruel to him or there weren’t enough opportunities for work in Julia Cove or because your mother failed to understand him sufficiently.”
“Or because I wasn’t a good enough daughter.”
Ash tensed. “He said that?”
Belle shrugged. She’d heard worse, growing up. A lot worse.
“What a hateful man.”
“He’s sick.” But her protest was half-hearted.
“I’m sick. He’s deranged.” And then, more gently, “alcoholism might be a disease, but the choice to drink is still a conscious one.”
“I suppose.”
“Belle, you didn’t cause the problems in your family. And you didn’t cause Charlotte to make you her latest cause célèbre. If she’d cared about you this much before, you might not have ended up in this mess.”
Belle sat back, so she could look at him properly. They’d talked about almost everything in their months together, but they’d never before talked about that night. The night.
“I’m glad she didn’t,” she said.
His expression softened slightly. “I am, too. But at the same time I’m torn. That night, when I first saw you…somewhere, the bottom dropped out. I thought to myself that, sitting there, alone at that table, was the single most captivating woman in the world. But, at the same time, I couldn’t help but notice that you were alone. And that something was upsetting you.”
“You could tell that?”
“It was in your eyes. In your posture. You were carrying the weight of the world on your shoulders and you looked exhausted. And like you’d rather be almost anywhere else but were trying very hard to hide that fact. To put on a good show.
“Meanwhile, your friends had abandoned you. Abandoned you when they should have been hanging on your every word.”
“No one ever hangs on my every word.” But she blushed.
“When I finally got to speak with you, I made a complete ass of myself.”
“I was a bit hard on you.”
“No. You were fair. I wasn’t…I mean, look at me.”
She laughed again.
“I had absolutely no experience with decent women, a fact of which I only became so acutely aware after I met one. Realized I wanted to court her and had absolutely no idea how. I mean, really. Not the first clue. And I wanted…I wanted, I realized then, to be the kind of man you wanted. Which made things difficult for me.”
“What do you mean?”
“When I realized that, not only had I frightened you, but I also obviously repelled you.”
“Everything frightened me, back then.”
“But it doesn’t, now?”
She leaned in, planting a soft kiss on his lips. “No,” she said. “Because I have you.”
NINETY
“You do, you know.” His eyes searched hers. “Have me.”
“I hope so.”
Had he just told her that he loved her? She hoped that, too. She’d told herself, so many times, that he had. That he did. She kissed him again, her lips soft against his. He held her against him for a long time, not responding but just accepting her. Breathing her in.
There was a greater vulnerability in what they had, than in the supposedly “ideal” relationships that Charlotte envied. She knew that now. She’d given herself to Ash, mind and body. And in so doing, she’d taken what might be described as a most unique leap of faith: that he wouldn’t abuse his power. She was in his power, and had been since that first night. Not because he could hurt her physically but because she’d been totally helpless emotionally. She hadn’t known who she was or what she wanted, but she’d been so lost that she hadn’t realized even that much.
She was still figuring things out, but at least these days she was conscious of that fact.
The worst thing Charlotte had ever risked was an STD or an unplanned pregnancy. Belle had risked…everything. For this man, whose hands were slowly sliding up her back and into her hair. Pulling it out of its bun so it cascaded down over her shoulders. Returning her kiss, slowly and with deliberation.
“Make love to me,” she said.
The room was completely quiet.
His eyes searched hers. He brushed a loose tendril of hair back from her cheek and tucked it behind her ear. His touch was tender. Hesitant, almost.
Leaning forward, he pressed his lips to hers.
He was her prince. Her dark prince of ice and snow. She opened her mouth to his, desperate for him in a way she’d never been. He slid her coat down over her shoulders, letting it fall to the floor. And then carefully, so carefully, he began to unbutton her blouse. She shivered. Like most of the castle, this room relied on the old fashioned warmth of fireplaces to supplement modern heat. The arctic-damp air was sucking the life out of her but she didn’t care. At all.
Drinking in his warmth, his touch, she pressed herself against him.
“Darling,” he whispered hoarsely. “Darling.”
She thought of his sardonic wit and c
utting insults and his rare, wonderful smiles and realized that he was the most precious thing in the world to her. She didn’t care what he’d done, or what he had or hadn’t told her. All that mattered was this. Now.
His lips still on hers, he lifted her up and helped her straddle him as he freed himself from his pants. There was nowhere to go in this room that wasn’t hard, and freezing. And then, so carefully, he lowered her down onto himself. She gasped, in shock at the—not intrusion but joining. Together with him, like this, she felt whole.
She placed her hands on his shoulders, to steady herself. His shirt was open and his bare chest pressed against her. He wrapped his arms around her, holding her to him, sheltering her in his warmth. His kiss was overwhelming. Drugging. The most wonderful thing she’d ever experienced. The feel of his hands on her, of him inside of her, was indescribable.
She rocked her hips forward and back, the friction building into a slow burn that spread out to her fingertips. He kissed the base of her neck, her shoulder, her breast, his hands holding her steady all the while. He took her nipple in his mouth and flicked his tongue back and forth across it, sending a lightning bolt straight down to her center. She moaned, arching her back, thrusting herself toward him as she dug her fingernails into his flesh.
She didn’t need to move much: just her hips. She could tell that she was driving him wild, refusing to speed up or give into her need. Her need, or his. His breath came in short, ragged gasps as he leaned back in the chair, still holding her to him. The place where his mouth had been felt like an ice-cool kiss in the unheated air, a sharp counterpoint to the heat building inside her.
She rubbed herself back and forth, using him to pleasure herself. All the time, her eyes were on his. Communicating what words could not.
He tensed, pulling her to him, crushing her against him as he thrust up, pounding into her, unwilling or unable to control himself any longer. She went limp, letting him have this control, closing her eyes as he brought her past the point of no return. She spasmed around him, helpless in her pleasure, as she felt his release deep inside.
They remained like that, together, neither one moving a muscle, for a long time.
When she finally did move, the room was cloaked in full dark. He produced one of his handkerchiefs, from somewhere, and helped her clean herself up. Still, at this point what she wanted was a hot shower. Or maybe even a bath, to soak out some of this chill. A chill that, especially after her time outdoors, felt bone-deep.
“I’ll have dinner sent to our room,” he said, as if reading her thoughts.
She nodded, even though the outline of her head was only barely visible.
When Beauty and the Beast was first published in 1756, it was done so partly as a bit of propaganda for arranged marriages. Of course, other versions of the story had been around for hundreds of years; girl meets monster was, indeed, a tale as old as time. The point of the tale being, for earlier audiences as well as those in 1756, that sometimes what at first appeared to be the husband from hell was actually a perfect match. Or could be, with a little squinting. What people less nerdy than Belle failed to realize is that this was a tale of hope: for the thousands, the hundreds of thousands of women who had no control over their destinies. Who were forced to marry whomever was expedient.
The hope lay in the notion that happily ever after—their own happily ever after, not someone else’s—might still be salvaged from this situation.
Belle—neither she nor her namesake heroine—didn’t make irrational justifications for her captor’s behavior. She didn’t dream reams of meaning into ultimately empty gestures. She’d heard an argument in a class in college that the Beast giving Belle the library in Disney’s version was an empty gesture, because the library was already there. Which Belle, although she’d kept her mouth shut, had thought ridiculous. The Beast had taken the time to learn what Belle liked—had wanted to learn what Belle liked—and acted, not to please himself but solely to please her. Which, after a lifetime of selfishness, constituted an enormously significant act.
And…hadn’t that been the real moment of his transformation? Not from beast into man but from cold-hearted and cruel wastrel into someone actually capable of caring? For Beauty and the Beast to be about Stockholm Syndrome, the growing love between them—and the changes working inside the Beast, which made such a love even possible—would have had to exist solely in Belle’s mind.
But it wasn’t.
Was it?
NINETY-ONE
Belle was eating a grapefruit when it happened.
She and Ash were still planning on their afternoon picnic as the day was, so far, a glorious one. But Ash had been acting strange all morning, cross one minute and distant the next. Belle didn’t know what had gotten into him, and didn’t dare ask. A small, scared part of her worried that it was because she’d somehow pushed him too far, the evening before. Asking him to make love to her.
Or maybe he regretted opening up as much as he had, telling her that he feared she’d left. She could only take solace in the fact that they did have plans later. He couldn’t loathe her too much if he was having lunch with her. And although he rarely if ever discussed work, she knew he was in the middle of closing some deal. She tried to tell herself that that was the source of his malaise, but the explanation felt hollow.
Diana always brought her the same breakfast: half a grapefruit, two pieces of toast carefully placed in a toast separator so they’d get good and cold, and a scrambled egg cooked with a little butter, salt, white pepper, tarragon and paprika.
Belle had only toyed with her egg and now it was cold. She forced herself to take a bite of grapefruit. The grapefruit tasted sour, without even a hint of sweetness.
She forced herself to take another bite.
Ash, across from her, was reading the newspaper.
Light spilled into the breakfast room, warming the already cheerful colors of yellow and cream.
The past few days had been a whirlwind—from Piers to Charlotte and now this: an unexpected chill from the one person she depended on to be reliable. Since she’d met him, he hadn’t acted like this. Was he…had he truly grown tired of her?
That didn’t seem possible, not after last night. But last night had been different. She chewed the same thoughts over and over in her head, tormenting herself. He told her that she was supposed to share her feelings but how could she possibly, in a situation like this?
She about jumped out of her skin when Diana reappeared. “That Ford woman is back,” she said, with uncharacteristic discourtesy. Diana was good at making her feelings known, but she usually opted for passive-aggressive over outright aggressive, maintaining at least a thin veneer of manners.
She waited on Ash for instruction.
Ash turned to Belle.
The world ground to a halt.
Belle blinked. Her throat felt as parched as a desert, and the grapefruit she’d just eaten tasted like ashes. She was also increasingly worried that she might throw up. She knew, somehow she knew, that something terrible was happening. She was only uncertain as to what form it might take. Part of her expected to see men swinging in through the windows, menacing her with assault rifles in a shower of broken glass.
But outside, a bird chirped.
Diana waited.
Belle begged Ash silently not to go.
“I’m not going anywhere,” he said.
She sagged little in her chair.
Ash turned to Diana, whose disapproval had hardened into a glowering mask. “Show her in,” he said. “To the small parlor. And have something sent in. Tea for the rest of us, coffee for Belle.”
Diana nodded curtly, and vanished.
Ash stood up and, coming around the table, helped Belle to her feet. She leaned against him and he held her. “I just said goodbye to her.” She murmured the words into his chest. And she had: forever, or so she’d thought. She’d been relieved, too. Beyond relieved, thinking that this chapter in her life was finally over.
“She must have something to tell us.” Ash stared off into the distance. “I can’t imagine what.”
Belle couldn’t either. Had Charlotte changed her mind about letting Belle live in peace, after all? Were they about to embark on some protracted legal battle that would leave them both wretched? She didn’t—this wasn’t how her story was supposed to end.
“Charlotte might have liked coffee as well,” she said stupidly. “Americans prefer coffee.”
“She can starve, for all I care.” Ash led her toward the door. “That she’s receiving tea instead of Alec’s piss in a cup is only because I am my father’s son, and there are certain depths to which I will not sink.”
“You really can’t stand her.”
“She hurt you,” Ash said simply.
They found Charlotte standing in front of the fireplace, where she’d been that first time.
Ash was as calm as ever. “Welcome again, Ms. Ford, to our home.”
“You’re so polite.” Charlotte seemed startled. Off kilter, somehow.
“Thank you.”
“I don’t…I haven’t been kind to you.”
She didn’t understand, of course, why he was being so polite when she’d been so hateful.
“No.” Ash spoke quietly but firmly, and without rancor. “But you are both a human being and a guest in my home, and as such deserve the basic respect that civility entails.”
“You’re not a slave trader, are you.”
“No.”
Charlotte glanced back and forth between Ash and Belle.
“I rescued Ms. Wainwright from an unpleasant situation. But in truth, she rescued me just as much. After a short period of acquaintance, she agreed to live here with me and thus made me the happiest man in the world.” He spoke as dryly as if he were reading the weather report. “And thus you find us.”
They waited.
This was, as Ash would say, Charlotte’s party. And Ash was the consummate negotiator. One thing that Belle had learned from him was the power of waiting. Of giving the other person carte blanche to say and do what they pleased…or not. People like Charlotte knew how to react, but not always how to act. She’d clearly been waiting for Belle to tell her off, or for Ash to transmogrify into some sort of demon. When neither of those things had happened she was, in effect…stuck.
