by Linda Jones
Her eyes met his. Challenge and defiance sparked there. “Grandmother will expect me to wear something hideously adorned for dinner. Lace that scratches my throat, bows so large that when I try to sit they get in my way; little, tiny roses made of satin.” She scoffed. “In the past I have thrown the awful dresses she leaves on my bed out the window, or cut them up with my knife in protest. But if I must wear clothes…” She seemed to pout, in a way so naturally female, it must come easily to every girl-child and woman on the planet, no matter what their age, no matter what their education.
“You must.”
“Then I will be comfortable in my own room.” She continued unbuttoning. “And I am not going to take a nap,” she said, sounding thoroughly disgusted at the idea. “I do not know why Grandmother always insists that I sleep in the afternoon, when I sleep very well at night.”
“Many young ladies find that an afternoon nap refreshes them.”
Anya again snorted in disgust.
“You must stop making that noise,” Julian said.
“Why?” Anya peeled off her dress and stepped out of it, kicking it aside with a vengeance before beginning with her chemise and petticoat.
“It’s not…” Something rose up in Julian’s throat to choke him. “Not…”
“Ladylike,” Anya supplied with a smile.
“Exactly.”
He had to admit, grudgingly, that her smile was enchanting. It was so real. So honest and unfettered. Anya had surely never stood in front of a mirror and practiced that grin, or worried that such a smile would give her wrinkles in her later years. She simply… smiled.
In a matter of moments she had shed her clothing. Entirely. Here in the privacy of their sitting room, she apparently felt safe enough to remove the knife and sheath from her thigh and set it aside.
After looking her over once, Julian turned his gaze to the floor. And he had thought restraining all that unruly hair was such a fine idea. But with those red tresses atop her head, there was nothing to cover her breasts, no soft curtain of hair to conceal at least a portion of her body.
“I imagine you will want to put on your scarf and let down your hair,” he said, walking to the window and lifting his head to look to the East. One could almost see the ocean.
“No. I am perfectly comfortable as I am.”
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Anya stretch this way and that. She lifted her arms and twisted slowly, moving like a cat. He had never seen so much flesh. He had never studied a woman’s curves and softness and… freckles. In desperation, he tried to appeal to her feminine side. “That very colorful scarf, the one you wore on the day we met, it was quite lovely. Very beautiful, in fact. I was rather hoping you would wear it again.”
She stilled. “You liked it?”
“Very much.”
Anya slipped through the door and into her room, and appeared moments later with the large scarf positioned so that it covered one thigh and the apex of her legs. Her hair was still up, though, her breasts still bare.
“You wouldn’t have… another scarf, would you? Perhaps something in blue or red to match the one you’re wearing.”
“Grandmother gave me many scarves when she discovered that I was willing to wear them,” Anya said, her voice low and suspicious.
“I have an idea,” Julian said, shooing her into her bedchamber and following.
Without being asked, Anya opened a long drawer filled with scarves. Fancy and plain, they were stacked high. Julian plucked a bright blue one off the top and closed the drawer. “Here,” he said, handing it to Anya without looking directly at her. “Wouldn’t it be lovely if you wore this over your… if you used it to cover…”
“You want me to cover my bosom?”
“Yes.” The scarf slipped from his fingers as she took it from him. Slowly.
“Why?”
Ah, there was no easy answer to that one. He had a feeling Anya would be delighted to discover that her nakedness disturbed him. Hell, she probably already knew. She had a way of seeing things. Of knowing what would rattle him. And she seemed determined to rattle him.
“A man is always more interested in what he cannot see than in what he can,” he said, trying to sound reasonable.
“You want to be interested in my bosom?” she asked, holding the scarf before her.
“Of course not.” He hoped the blush he felt did not show. He feared he hoped in vain. Glancing at Anya out of the corner of his eye, he caught her smile.
“I will wear it,” she agreed, “if you will help me put it on.”
“I really have no idea how to affix such a thing.” To such a place.
“Neither do I.”
Julian took a deep breath and snatched the blue scarf from Anya. Placing his hands on her shoulders, he turned her about and discovered that her well-shaped back was almost as fascinating as her front. Perfectly formed, feminine, soft… and somehow strong as well.
He folded the scarf, his hands shaking just slightly as he accomplished the task. To soothe himself, he thought of the places he would travel when his task was done. Islands of the Indian Ocean, Africa, the wilds of Australia. So many places he had not yet begun to think of them all.
He instructed Anya to lift her arms, and she complied. Taking a deep breath, he wrapped his arms and the scarf around her. When he had difficulty getting the scarf correctly positioned, Anya was no help at all. She simply stood there, stock still, while he was forced to straighten the silky material over her right breast. His fingers brushed her warm skin. The fullness beneath his hand gave in a most wondrous way.
He removed his hand, closed his eyes, and counted to ten.
“What is taking so long?” Anya asked patiently. Her arms stayed raised, she swayed slightly, and her backside almost brushed against him.
“I’ve never done this before.”
“So I see,” she whispered.
He quickly completed the chore, tying the scarf snugly at her spine, and stepped back. Anya turned so Julian could admire his handiwork. Her breasts were covered, in a way, but there was still so much skin exposed, so much… temptation.
“Very good. I will make you my own personal maid,” she said. “No one else seems to want me.”
“Perhaps you have trouble keeping a personal maid because you break things and threaten those around you with physical violence.”
“No,” she said matter-of-factly. “They do not like me because I am different.”
“You know,” Julian said, seizing the opportunity that presented itself. “If you would dress properly and take to heart all the manners and ways I teach you, you will soon not be so different.”
Anya’s easy smile faded. “I could make myself look like my cousin and my grandmother and all the other women who live in this part of the world, but inside…” She raised a fist to her chest. “Inside I will always be different.”
He was almost certain he saw the gleam of a tear in her eye before she spun around and stalked into the sitting room.
*
Her husband did like her. He might not admit to such a fault, but he did like her. She had known it from the moment she had first laid eyes on him. From the moment he had first laid eyes on her.
She needed to be with someone who liked her. Even if it was in this way, where she sat in a chair by the window trying to read a boring novel she had already read twice, and he sat at the desk across the room and furiously scribbled notes on a sheet of paper.
Julian must not leave when the time came. He must not leave her in this house where she was called beast and whore and barbarian. Sometimes she was called these names to her face, but usually they were whispered behind her back by the servants. She heard, though. She always heard.
She had to convince Julian to stay, and she knew of only one way to tie him to her. Only one way to persuade him that he could not live without her.
She dropped her reading and began to take the pins from her hair.
At the sound of the book hi
tting the floor, Julian lifted his head and laid his eyes on her.
One strand at a time, her hair came spilling down. “These pins are giving me a headache. No wonder Valerie is always in such a foul mood.”
“I can imagine,” Julian said softly. He still had not returned his attention to his work.
“Are all women in this country so… so…” She ruffled the loosened strands and let them fall around her body. “Disagreeable?”
“Of course not,” Julian answered. “Most women are perfectly agreeable. I’m sure Valerie is a lovely person, in the right circumstances.”
“You have known many women,” she said, knowing in her heart of hearts that it was not so. “You have taken many beautiful women to your bed.”
Julian returned his eyes to the paper before him and scribbled something new. “Not really,” he said, his voice low.
“But you are handsome and strong,” she protested. “Surely many women have offered themselves to you.”
Julian took a deep breath, as he often did when he was disturbed. “It is important for you to realize that proper women do not offer themselves to anyone. To do so would be undignified and morally wrong.”
“Even if the man a woman offers herself to is her husband?”
He swallowed hard. “We have had this discussion before, Anya.”
“But I still do not understand.”
“When my books arrive later this week, I will give you some pamphlets to read. They explain everything.”
“I want you to explain—” Anya stood and walked toward her husband. He tensed with every step she took—“why here it is not proper for a man and woman to come together as they have from the beginning of time, as they do around the world? With power and pleasure and a divine unity.”
He blushed. “We are better men.”
“Or simply foolish men,” she countered. “What do you gain by your chastity?”
“The energy expended in marital relations can be better used in thought,” he said calmly. “In truth, the only reason for a husband and wife to submit to their sexual powers is for reproduction. In denying their sexual selves they can discover the joys of a true, pure friendship.” A small muscle in his jaw twitched. He was not able to meet her eye. “This is best for everyone, as misuse of and overindulgence in man’s sexual energies can lead to sickness, even death.”
“Who told you such nonsense?” Anya stopped before her husband, placing her hands on her hips and staring down at him.
“It’s a widely held fact that—”
“Nonsense,” she interrupted.
“Anya, you have no idea what you’re talking about.”
She knelt before him and placed her hands on his knees. “But I do, marido. Since I have come here, everything has changed. I am no longer a goddess. I always say and do the wrong thing. I feel like I am living in a nightmare.”
He laid a comforting hand in her hair.
“I am wrong, more often than not, but I am not wrong about this. No man ever lost his ability to think or died because he took pleasure in his wife’s body.”
“As I said, marital relations are best reserved for procreation. For… for creating life.”
Her heart fell. “And I cannot have children.” It was her greatest heartache. “That means I am imperfect in your eyes.”
For the first time since Julian had initially spurned her, she believed him. He did not want her. It had nothing to do with his ridiculous excuses, though. She could not give him a son, and so he did not want her. It was that simple.
“No…” he began.
Anya did not sit at his feet to listen to his vile excuses. She jumped up and returned to her chair.
“I will not make a fool of myself by asking you again to bed me,” she said, her eyes on the window and the bright sun beyond. “I would not ask you to sink so low as to sleep with a flawed woman.”
“Anya, you are not flawed. But this is… this is…”
She sat in her chair and scooped her boring book from the floor. “You are the teacher and I am the student.”
“Exactly.” He seemed relieved.
“You will teach me to behave in the way my family expects, and then you will leave and never come back.”
“Yes. This is a business arrangement, Anya. Nothing more. A man and a woman can expect more from marriage than a physical relationship that might very well do them both harm. There is companionship to be had in marriage, as well as a dedication to higher and better morality. We are not savages, Anya. We are civilized men and women who have risen above the physical.”
She had been so certain, when she had looked at him, touched him, smelled him, that he wanted her. How could she have been so wrong?
She had not been wrong. Julian did desire her, but he did not want a wife who could not give him a son.
Like Sebastian. Poor Sebastian. He had terrible bad luck, for a king. His first concubine, Emelda, was also barren. As was Anya. As was the woman he had taken to his bed when Anya had proved unable to give him a child. Three women, all of them unfruitful. A king needed a son, yet each of the three women Sebastian had taken as a lover proved to be unable to give him a child. Poor Sebastian, he had surely been cursed.
Julian smiled at her. “One day you will know I am right about this.”
She threw the book at his head.
*
“My darling, you look marvelous!” Mrs. Sedley crossed the parlor with quick, delicate steps, her radiant smile for her granddaughter and no one else. Valerie and Seymour exchanged a look and then left the room together.
Mrs. Sedley took Anya’s hands, clasped them between her own, and looked the girl up and down. The gown Anya wore was a colorful rose, with a neckline lower than Julian approved of. It was rather decadent, and Anya filled it out rather nicely.
“Just marvelous,” the older woman continued. “Why, you’ll be a proper lady in no time.”
Julian rubbed the small bump on his aching head, a reflexive action Anya surely saw.
“It is too tight,” she said tersely. “And the lace makes my bosom itch.” To make her point, Anya delicately scratched at the rising flesh above the low neckline.
Mrs. Sedley’s smile faded, just a little.
“And must I wear this large bow on my arse?” Anya turned to display the satin bow in question.
“Anya,” Julian scolded in a low voice. “That’s not a proper word.”
She looked at him as if he were daft. “Bow?”
“You know perfectly well what I mean.”
“Arse? That is the forbidden word. There is a better word?”
“Of course there is, but it’s always best not to speak of such things at all.”
“What things?”
Mrs. Sedley muttered, “Oh, dear,” and excused herself to check on supper.
“Parts of the body,” Julian continued as Mrs. Sedley left the room.
“We should not speak of them at all?” Anya stepped toward him and lifted her hand. He almost flinched when she placed the tip of her finger there. “Nose,” she said, running her finger downward. “Mouth. Chin. Neck.” Her hand drifted steadily down. “Chest. Belly.”
Julian grabbed her wrist and stopped her inspection. “It’s best you stop right there.”
“I see,” she said, not at all surprised that he had stopped her when he did. “You are telling me that it is perfectly acceptable to discuss some body parts, but if those parts are below the waist…”
“Anya…”
She leaned closer. “Perhaps I should whisper.”
“Perhaps you should behave.”
“Julian DeButy,” she said, her eyes glued fearlessly to his. “You are a prig.”
He didn’t deny it, though he didn’t care for the word at all. No more than he cared for prude or puritan. He’d been called all that and worse, in the past two years. “I am a moral man.”
Her eyes softened, became dreamy and inviting. “You are afraid of the animal that lurks inside yo
u.”
“There is no…”
“You are afraid.”
He didn’t deny it.
“In the moments we have before dinner, perhaps we can discuss the way you walk.”
Anya smiled. “You like the way I walk?”
Julian took a deep breath. “Well…”
Before he could form the words, Anya turned and walked toward the doorway, her hips swaying in their own rhythm, her every step a seduction. At the doorway, she turned and began to walk toward him, her satisfied smile adding to the seduction.
“Your manner of walking is… lovely, in its own way,” he said staidly. “And while such a manner of walking might be perfectly acceptable on Puerta Sirena, it’s not quite demure enough to be acceptable here.”
Her smile faded. “You want me to change the way I walk?”
“You should watch Valerie and your grandmother. They both—”
“They walk like they are in pain,” Anya protested. “They move like something inside them is broken.”
“You needn’t alter your way entirely,” Julian said, as he noted the displeasure on his wife’s face. “But if you could subdue the, uh, sway of your hips.”
Her displeasure faded. “I do not know if I am capable of changing the way I walk. My hips simply sway.” She turned her back on him and took a luxurious step. “See?” she said as she took another languid stride.
Julian crept up behind her and laid his hands on her hips. He had to make her stop. She did, and he stood there with his hands on her hips and her back to his chest. “All right,” he said softly. “Take a step.”
She did, and he stilled the natural sway of her hips as she moved forward. Her flesh moved beneath his hands, undulating gently beneath pink satin. But it wasn’t satin he felt. It was his wife. The swell of her hips. Her warmth. Her softness.
“Is that better?” she asked softly.
“Much,” he choked.
She took another step, and his hands remained where they were as he tried to contain the swing of her hips. His step was in time with hers, they moved in symmetry, as if they danced.
Julian lowered his nose to her hair and closed his eyes. Heaven above, this woman smelled so good. What made her hair smell so enticing? Perfume. Maybe the lingering aroma of a scented shampoo. They took another step, and his body pressed more insistently against her back.
