by Linda Jones
In an instinctive move, Anya’s hand fell over her concealed knife. And then it dropped. Her heart was suddenly heavy, the joy she had felt when Julian held her was gone. She did not care what a woman like Margaret March thought of her or said about her. What hurt, what broke her heavy heart, was that Valerie stood there and listened, and said nothing in Anya’s defense. She did not laugh like the others, and her face had gone pale… but she said nothing.
Someone noticed that Anya stood within earshot, just as the orchestra began to play again. Then another person saw her, and then another. The throng parted, until Anya and Margaret could see each other and a short corridor formed by well-dressed revelers stretched between them.
Heart in her throat, Anya stepped through the pathway, past the shocked people who watched with great interest, as if this were a play, a show for their entertainment.
Margaret glared at Anya, a feral gleam in her eyes. “Did I say something that wasn’t true?” she asked calmly. “Are you going to call me a liar?”
“No,” Anya said softly.
“Poor Julian. I did think better of him. Didn’t he know that it wasn’t necessary to marry you in order to get you into his bed?” Margaret’s eyes hardened. “Tell us, Anya, did you really run about the house naked when you first arrived? When Seymour told me I scarcely believed it, but…”
“Yes,” Anya said, cocking her head to watch Margaret’s face. Where was the evil that should be so evident? She moved closer, snaking through the crowd that closed behind her until she was trapped in the midst of these curious, shocked, titillated people.
“What is the difference between a king’s whore and a prostitute who will sell herself to any man who walks by?” Margaret asked.
Anya stopped when she stood no more than a foot away from Margaret. “I do not know. Perhaps you can tell me.”
Those who did not know of Margaret’s less-than-virtuous behavior might not catch Anya’s meaning, but the widow herself certainly did. Her face went red and her hands formed small fists. “You are a despicable person, and you must’ve tricked Julian into marrying you.” She no longer tried to hide her anger. “You are no better than an animal. Surely you don’t think your husband truly cares for you. I understand your grandmother is going to pay Julian a tidy sum for taking you. I wonder if it’s enough to make up for the sacrifices he’s made. Good heavens, for a respected physician to marry the Beast of Rose Hill, the sum must have been great.”
The corset choked Anya, and she was close to tears. Tears! Her eyes burned, and she felt the growing moisture gather there. Weeping for Romeo and Juliet was not a sin, but to allow this woman to make her cry would be.
Anya cast a quick, condemning glance to a pale Valerie. If anyone were to say bad things about her, Anya would come to Valerie’s defense without a second thought. She would fight for those she loved. It did not matter what Margaret March or these other people thought of her, it did not matter that they thought her an animal, that they knew her husband had been purchased at a high price. But Valerie stood there and said nothing, and that was what hurt Anya’s heart.
“I am going home,” she said softly. She turned and pushed her way past a squealing young lady in a yellow gown and a tall skinny man who was so anxious to get out of her way that he almost knocked down the lady standing behind him.
“Anya,” Valerie called softly. But it was too late.
Chapter 10
The kitchen maid’s burn had been blessedly minor. Julian had applied a bit of salve, offered a few calming words and a neat bandage, and once that was done the young servant finally quit crying. It had been the hysterical tears that made James Mansfield panic, not the severity of the injury.
Julian searched the crowded ballroom for Anya, certain his eyes would fall upon her right away. That red hair, that gold gown. The almost tangible energy that radiated from her. A disquiet settled in his stomach when he did not see her immediately. He loved her. He wanted her. He was still not sure what she might do next.
When he finally decided Anya was not in the room, a scene on the other side of the room caught his eye. Valerie. Surely she knew where Anya had gone. He was halfway across the room, weaving past and around the dancers, when he realized that Valerie stood toe to toe with Margaret. Neither of them appeared to be happy.
“You should be ashamed of yourself,” Valerie said, her cheeks blushing bright pink and her hands working nervously. A quiet and seemingly supportive William Mathias stood at her back. “Anya is a sweet, wonderful woman who suffered a horrid tragedy in her childhood.”
Margaret looked down her nose at the plump, fair-haired Valerie. “No matter what the cause, she is exactly as I described her, a…”
“Julian!” Valerie caught sight of him and rushed away from Margaret while the widow was in mid-sentence. “You must stop her.”
“Margaret?”
“Anya! She left. She said she was going home.”
Julian’s heart lurched. He knew that, more often than not, home to Anya was a place far away from North Carolina. Everything had been going so well. What had happened to make her run this way? All that mattered now was stopping her before she went too far. He headed for the door, not even glancing at Margaret as he passed her. Valerie kept up with quick steps, and Mathias was right behind her.
“Tell her I’m sorry.”
“For what?” Julian’s eyes were on the front door.
“Tell her I’m not brave like she is, but… but that I did defend her after she left.” Valerie sniffled. “I should have said something sooner, I know. I’m such a coward.”
“You are not,” Mathias said, reaching out to place a hand on Valerie’s shoulder. “You were quite brave.”
Julian stopped with his hand on the front doorknob. His instinct was to run after Anya, but he needed to know exactly why she had run. “What happened?”
Valerie’s trembling lips hardened. “It was that awful Mrs. March. She said terrible things about Anya.”
“Such as?”
“That… that she was an animal, and that she was a king’s… a…” Valerie looked pleadingly up at her suitor, and Mathias leaned forward to whisper the vile word into Julian’s ear.
Julian’s fingers twitched, and a ball of fury joined the worry in the pit of his stomach.
“And she told everyone that Anya used to wander around the house without clothes, and that Grandmother… bought you for her.”
Julian groaned. Not this. Not now. “She can’t have been gone long.”
“Just a few minutes.”
He burst through the front door and onto the lawn. Carriages and drivers crowded the well-lit driveway. Torches burned bright in the night. Julian headed for the nearest driver.
“Red hair, gold dress,” he snapped.
The man pointed to the road, and Julian cut through the grass. Once on the road, he ran. The lane was narrow and lined on either side by a well-kept white fence and lush fields. His heart pumped hard, and not from the exertion of running. What if he didn’t find her? If any woman would be brave enough to strike out on her own, to walk away without looking back, it would be Anya. She would have no second thoughts about sneaking aboard a ship bound for parts unknown, and then demanding that they take her home. Home to Puerta Sirena. The thought of actually losing her made him run faster.
He hadn’t gone far before he finally spotted her. There was enough moonlight to illuminate the narrow road, to shine upon Anya’s gold dress and her copper hair, as she stalked down the road ripping pins from her elaborate coif and shaking her red tresses down one strand at a time.
“Anya,” he called as he ran after her.
She must be able to hear. He was certainly close enough, but still she did not answer or turn around to acknowledge him.
“Anya!” He ran faster. She didn’t slow her step, but she didn’t run from him, either. He finally caught up with her, wrapped his arms around her waist, and spun her around.
He expected to see tears, a
nd he did. A few drops hung in her eyes and glistened in the moonlight. He expected to see anger, and he did. Fury shone in those tearful eyes as surely as the moon did. He had not expected his own heart to break when he saw her face, but it did.
“You don’t have to run,” he whispered.
“I do. I am going home.” She tried, not very vigorously or successfully, to shake him loose.
“Margaret is a vindictive, vicious person, and you should not allow her to upset you.”
“Vindictive and vicious mean the same thing,” she said, pouting slightly. “And your puta did not upset me. It was… it was…” Her lower lip trembled.
He had heard enough of the story to know what troubled her. “Valerie?”
The tears in her eyes dripped down her face. “She just stood there and let that awful woman talk about me as if I had no feelings, as if she cared nothing for me.”
“Valerie did defend you, after you left,” Julian interrupted. “She was giving Margaret a piece of her mind when I discovered you were gone.”
“Truly?”
“Valerie asked me to tell you that she’s sorry she took so long to speak up in your defense, but that she does not have your bravery. She does love you, Anya.”
Anya slipped out of his arms and stepped back. “I am glad to hear that, but it changes nothing.”
“I’d say it does.”
“All the things Margaret said about me? They were true.” Anya spun in the moonlight, as if she were dancing all alone. Pagan and wild and beautiful, she seemed to pray to the moon. “I do not belong here.”
“That’s not true.”
“It is true. It does not matter that I love you, that I sense something wonderful just out of reach, that for a while I thought this place was home.” Anya stopped spinning, lifted her skirt, and very deftly slipped the knife she wore at her thigh into the palm of her hand. “For all my threats, I have never harmed anyone,” she said softly. “I have never committed murder, until tonight.”
“Anya…“Julian stepped forward quickly, but he was not quick enough.
With a quick, precise motion, Anya slipped the tip of the knife into the bodice of her gown and drew it downward. The sound of fabric ripping, tearing in two, was loud there, so far from the house and the noise of the party. “I am tired of pretending to be someone I am not. For you, Julian, only for you would I go so far.”
“You are not pretending. You are… my wife.”
The gold fabric hung over her untouched chemise and corset, flapping lightly in the summer breeze. “Am I? I do not know who I am anymore. On Puerta Sirena, I knew. There was no question. I knew my place, and no one ever questioned it.”
“The king’s mistress,” he said softly. “A goddess of love.” He had tortured himself wondering about this damned King Sebastian. About the training of a love goddess. How many men had touched Anya? What kind of training did a love goddess undertake? Some nights it was like torture, as he wondered. As he imagined.
He no longer cared. “It doesn’t matter who you were, or who your family expects you to be, or even who I expect you to be.”
She slipped the knife beneath her chemise and ripped down once again. The fine linen, decorated with silk ribbons, was cut in half, and the ragged ends fluttered in the breeze. “I am tired of pretending.” She began to cut at the corset, a tougher chore than slicing through the gown and chemise. She worked, and as she did the tears began to fall again.
“Stop it,” Julian said as he neared her.
“No. It is choking me. It is not who I am.”
In a move she did not expect, he deftly took the knife from her. “You’re going to hurt yourself.”
She shot him an accusing glance. He studied the knife for a moment, before turning her about and gently pushing what remained of her gown off her shoulders. With a surgeon’s precision, he slipped the tip of the blade beneath the bottom corset cord that laced up her back. He worked the blade upward, slicing through one lace after another. The corset came looser with the popping of each string, and finally fell free when the last one was severed.
“Better?”
Anya turned, lifting her face to him. “Yes.”
Julian shook off his jacket and put it around her shoulders, covering the tattered gown and her exposed breasts. Anya stood there, unmoving, as he placed her arms through the long sleeves, rolled them up to free her hands, and then buttoned it closed.
“Do you still want to go home?” he asked softly.
“Yes.”
“I will take you.”
“But—”
“Don’t argue with me, Anya,” he said, guiding her to the side of the road and almost forcing her to lean against the white rail fencing there. “I’m going to borrow Seymour’s horse, tell Valerie to collect our things tomorrow before they head back and your grandmother not to worry, and then I will be back to collect you and we will go home.”
A strange look passed over Anya’s face, something childlike and strikingly poignant. “Do you promise?” she asked softly. “Do you promise that you will come back?”
“Yes.”
“Hurry.”
*
For much of the journey on horseback, Anya rested her head against Julian’s chest and pretended to sleep. The ruse was not necessary, as he did not seem to want to talk any more than she did.
Of course he did not want to talk. What was there to say? Everything Margaret had accused her of was true, in a distorted way. It all came down to one truth. She did not belong here.
Julian might feel an attraction for her, but surely he did not love her. She had successfully used her body to win him, but what did she really have? His love? No, it was only desire. He simply did not know the difference. She had been foolish to think otherwise.
“We’re home,” he said softly.
Anya lifted her head to look at the depressing, sprawling brick mansion lit by eerie moonlight. “This is not my home.”
“Of course it is.”
“It is very dark.”
Julian steered the horse toward the stables at the back of the property. “It’s empty, with all the servants gone for the weekend. They’ll return tomorrow afternoon.”
“I do not like this place,” she whispered.
“It’s a fine house.”
“Yes, but I do not belong in it.” She hugged close the coat Julian had put on her. “It is a cold, lifeless place, filled with lies and false promises.”
“I have never lied to you,” he said defensively.
“And when you leave?”
He did not deny that he would, one day too soon, leave. It had been his intent from the beginning. “Your grandmother and Valerie both love you very much. Peter seems to be very fond of you. And Seymour…” Julian shrugged and Anya felt it, the subtle shifting of his warm, solid body against hers. “I don’t imagine Seymour likes anyone, much.”
It was not what she wanted to hear. “When you leave here, would you take me home?”
“Anya, you are home.”
“This is not home,” she whispered.
They reached the stables and an eager boy, surprised to see them, ran out to take the horse. He held the reins while Julian dismounted and then lifted his arms to assist Anya as she left the saddle.
“Everything’s in good order, sir,” the boy said. “I checked around the house just before sunset.”
“Very good,” Julian said, taking the lantern the boy offered.
They walked to the house, the dimly lit lantern hanging from Julian’s hand, his free arm around her waist. Was he afraid she would run even now? She was tempted. Very tempted.
But Anya did not run. She leaned into Julian and took the comfort he offered. “I will go without you,” she promised.
He sighed, but did not seem surprised. “I wish you would give your family another chance.”
“They are not my family.” You are my only family. She felt that, wanted to say it, but did not. “I have been too long away from t
his place for them to be my family.”
Julian opened the door that led them into the north parlor, a rarely used room she had never cared much for. There was no color, here, no life. In the moonlight the room seemed full of ghosts. She and Julian had married here. She had not loved him then. In fact, she had not known him. Not really.
“You must be hungry,” she said as they left the dark parlor behind. “We had a long ride.”
“I am a little hungry,” he confessed. “Should we raid the kitchen and see what we can find?”
The thought of the staid Julian DeButy raiding anything brought a smile to Anya’s face. “A wonderful idea.”
He placed the lantern on the oaken table in the center of the large kitchen, and they foraged until they had bread, jam, and apple cider. Instead of going into the dining room to share their simple meal, they sat at the oak table where the servants took their meals.
Anya liked the kitchen. Even now, it was warm and welcoming, in a way the rest of the house was not. The bread and jam sat well on her stomach; the cider was sweet and cool. “I have an idea,” she said, pushing her mug and napkin away. “I could go with you.” She could stay with him until the passion between them expired, and he realized that he did not love her. It would be enough, she decided. His passion would satisfy her love for him, for a while.
“Go with me where?” Julian asked as he finished the last of his late-night meal.
“Wherever you go,” she whispered, terrified that he would immediately dismiss her suggestion as foolish. “I can be an anthropologist, too. I know many languages, and might be of great help to you.”
“I get the feeling,” Julian said in a teasing voice, “that most of your impressive linguist abilities are phrases only salty sailors will respond to.”
“Perhaps, but I have a good ear and am a very fast learner.”
Julian pushed his own mug away, stood, took the lantern in one hand, and offered her the other. “If you had made that suggestion a month ago, perhaps even a week ago, I would have thought you’d lost your mind.”
