Edith Layton (21 page)

“We rode through green meadows, had a glorious time. Then we went home, happy and well pleased with ourselves. My father was kind as well as clever, always thinking about how to please his motherless lad. He hadn’t married again because he’d buried his heart with my mother, and I know he felt guilty about it for my sake. That was one of the reasons he was so happy about my friendship with Jon. Your mother was kind to me. Remember?”

She nodded, but he was lost in his reveries and went on without waiting for her reply.

“We were weary, in that thoughtless way you are after a day in the sun. We were about to have dinner when a knock came on our door. Our maid opened it. Two men were there. They changed our lives, forever. They called my father a thief. When he protested, they put him in irons.” There was no emotion in his voice, he might have been reciting a lesson. “I was terrified, I flew at them. They restrained me and put me in irons, too. Then as all the neighbors came out to gape, they loaded us in a coach like so much mutton for market, and brought us here, to Newgate.”

He gazed around the cell, and his smile was bitter as his voice. “We weren’t given such luxurious accommodations then. They threw us into a pen with
twenty other men. It was lucky that I was literally thrown in,” he added. “Because I skidded into another boy. I was too confused and angry to say anything but ‘sorry’ to him. And I certainly didn’t want to say more after I got a good look at him. He was my age, ragged as a scarecrow and dirty as a sweep. But when he spoke his voice was reasonable, and whatever else I saw, I saw the pity in his eyes when he looked at me. That was Amyas. He told me not to worry. Then he went back to sit by another boy, his brother. But he kept watching me.

“A short time later, when my father had his back turned, a man put a hand on me. He was a monster of a man, dirty, unshaven, greasy, thoroughly terrifying to me. I think he was only trying to steal my coat; good clothes have to be fiercely defended here, most prisoners lose them the first day. I shouted. My father swung around, knocked the fellow to the floor, and warned him not to touch me again. My father wasn’t a big man, but he was athletic and fit. The man he’d struck recognized a fellow who could handle his fives and crawled away without another word. That made Amyas sit up and take notice. A short time later he made us his offer.

“‘Look after us, my brother and me, like you do your son,’” he told my father, “‘and we’ll do the same for you.’ My father promised to watch out for him, and added that he needn’t worry, because he didn’t have to do anything for us in return.

“‘Do I not?’ Amyas replied,” Christian said, mimicking Amyas to perfection. “He asked if my father knew where to stand when they brought in the food?
He wondered if we knew where to put our shoes when we slept, so they couldn’t be stolen. He put his hands on his skinny hips and asked if we knew which guards would do a favor for a penny piece, and which would take the penny and give back only a thump for it. Then his brother chimed in, asking if we know which men there would kill us soon as look at us and which only looked like villains?”

Christian’s expression was as rueful as amused as he went on. “And while we thought about that, Amyas told us that he and his adopted brother Daffyd had formed just such an alliance, because they’d been practically raised in prisons, and had been in and out more times than they can count. They bragged that they know everything about Newgate. Amyas offered a bargain: If my father would protect them, he and Daffyd would look after us. They knew a lot, but they weren’t grown men. They added they wanted to be, though. And since my father had a punishing right, and a son of his own to protect, they thought it would be a good trade.

“It was,” Christian said. He smiled, remembering. “We became a fighting troop that night, my father and I and Amyas, and Daffyd. And so we stayed, to all our profit.” His smile fled. “What profit, after all? The years have passed, I cheated Death so many times…and here I am again, on the brink of extinction again.” He got to his feet and began pacing again.

“The pens where I was held are there,” he told Julianne, waving in that direction. “Those for the condemned are farther down the passage. We were
eventually held there, too. But we had enough money to ensure we stayed together, at least.”

“But Amyas and his brother,” Julianne asked, “surely they didn’t put them in the condemned cells, too?”

He stopped, his smile was not pleasant. “Of course they did. Because they also had a date with Jack Ketch. The hangman,” he explained to Julianne’s puzzled look. “They were set to dance on the air for the crowds in Newgate square. Amyas had picked a pocket, and he was unlucky enough to have it contain a pound note, and his brother had held it for him before they caught him. Crimes punishable by death.” One shoulder seemed to spasm as he shrugged it.

“Our cousin, the late earl of Egremont, heard of our misfortune and had our sentences commuted to transportation. We heard he didn’t want a slur on the family name,” he said with a twisted smile. “It certainly wasn’t because of concern for us, because he never came to see us or hear our side of the story. I suppose he felt death in prison or a distant land was preferable to any taint of scandal because such deaths are quiet and quickly forgotten. Hanging’s a matter of record. Father raised funds from his friends and used it to bribe the officials to get the same sentence for Amyas and his brother. We stayed together. We were sent to the Hulks to await transport to New South Wales…” His voice trailed off.

“That’s the past,” he said briskly. “The thing is, I know this will be, too. But I’m back in Newgate,” he told her, pain and uncertainty back in his voice. “And try as I might, I can’t forget it here and now.”

His voice was by turns jaunty and dull with horror. He kept his expression serene by some incredible act of will, but his eyes were alive with terror and pain in that impassive face. Wide, bright, blazing blue, no wonder, she thought, that the young Amyas had taken him as a friend. She wanted to take him in her arms. She could almost feel all the blind terror that he was holding back with the main force of his will.

He turned and struck the wall with his fist. “By God, I’d give anything to forget this place; you can’t know how hard I’ve tried. Most of the time, I can. But I can’t get the hang of directing my dreams.” He splayed his hands out on the wall and rested his forehead against it as he spoke. “Now, I’m awake, and I’m here again. It unmans me. I keep remembering what I’ve trained myself to forget. Such sickness and filth and degradation that there is within these walls, and no one cares,” he muttered. “Men and boys, women and children went wailing to their appointments with the hangman, and the last sounds in their ears were the merry cheers of the good people of London celebrating as they died.

“That was merciful compared to what happened to others,” he said, his voice low and haunted. “Men died in dark corners, and you didn’t know it until the light came. There was no privacy for anything but death. Men coupled with each other in the night, and you knew it, even if both were willing, because of the noises they made. And sometimes there were those who were unwilling to die or to lie with anyone, and much good it did them. We couldn’t protect the whole world.”

He swung around, his eyes wild. “Damme for a villain! I shouldn’t be telling you this. I’ve lost whatever control I had over myself, and I’ve kept such strict vigilance. Leave me. Go home! You’re corrupted simply by being here with me. I’m not myself. I can’t be here, this place lives in all the dark places of my soul, and there are too many of them. Go home, Julianne. I’ll come to you when I can.”

“How will you sleep tonight?” she asked.

“There’s nothing wrong with staying awake. It’s how you survive the place.”

She sat quietly. He turned from her. The silence pounded against her ears, a deep silence born of the dark, buttressed by thick stone, meters deep in the earth.
So it must sound in your coffin,
she thought. There were no echoes here. The stone blunted sound and ate it up. The only echoes were in the mind, and so how much worse for him, who still heard all the old echoes of fear and pain?

“I’ll be released in no time,” he said after a moment. “Don’t worry, and don’t listen to me carry on. This is a good test of my character. I’ve endured worse.”

He came and sat beside her again. He leaned toward her and breathed in deeply. “Perfume,” he said softly, “Lord, but you smell sweet.”

“Just soap, and lemon rinse for my hair,” she said in embarrassment.

“Here, that’s fine French perfume. Fah!” he said, pulling back. “And I must stink. Forgive me. But all they give me is a bucket of water. My years here gave
me a deep appreciation of bathing, and I feel like a goat since they deprived me of that.”

“You don’t smell bad at all,” she said thickly, turning her head aside.

“Weeping?” he asked, touching a hand to her cheek. “Ah no, Julianne. I never meant that. Be easy. I’ll be dancing in the sunlight soon.”

It was a bad choice of words. She got the sudden image of his lean body twisting in the wind at the end of a rope. “Oh, no, Christian,” she cried, and embraced him. She buried her face in his neck. He didn’t reek, he lacked his usual spicy scent but smelled faintly of soap, and his skin was warm and sleek. She raised her head. He looked at her, and then raised a hand, slowly, tentatively. He cupped the back of her head in one hand. And then he kissed her.

His lips were soft, his mouth was warm, his kiss tentative. And yet she felt all that he was holding back.

She kissed him back with all the art and passion, pity and love that she felt.

“Oh, this will never do,” he said, when he raised his head.

“You don’t like it?” she asked, so moved by his matching response that she trembled. She forced a smile. “You only like my kisses at dawn?”

“I like them too much at any time. Go home.” He raised his head. “I hear my gentle jailer coming. Newgate never gives you value for your money, surely our hour isn’t up?” He rose to his feet as the door swung open.

Amyas stood there, blinking, trying to adjust his eyes to the dimmer light.

“Ready?” he asked Julianne.

“No,” she said, because she’d made up her mind. “Come back for me at dawn, please.” And then, with a smile that was all sunlight, she added, “I’m used to leaving your brother at dawn, you know. It just wouldn’t feel right to go now.”

“Don’t be ridiculous!” Christian snapped.

“If I’m caught, now or at dawn, will it make a bit of difference? Shall I have a shred of reputation left?” she asked. “I think not. In fact, I’d be more easily found out if I trotted home now, or even at midnight, because that’s when my cousins are at their most active. I’ll leave just before the dawn, when they’re all sleeping,” she told Amyas.

“Don’t listen to her,” Christian said roughly. “It’s pity speaking.”

“Pity feels, it doesn’t speak,” she corrected him. “I’m talking good sense. I’ve decided to stay to keep you from dreaming; I have a feeling you won’t go to sleep with me here. Your manners are much too good. Come, Christian,” she said seriously. “You know me, and I, at last, am sure I know you. I’m staying with you.”

“A very good decision,” Amyas said with a wide white smile. “Be ready to leave an hour before dawn.”

He pushed the jailer into the corridor, backed off, and swung the door shut in their faces.

T
hey were left alone, for the night, locked in a small cell together, with no one but each other for comfort and warmth. Julianne looked at Christian and held her breath, her courage born of the moment rapidly fading.

He sank to the cot and put his head in his hands. “Now see what you’ve done!” he said.

The tremulous smile slipped off her lips. “You really didn’t want me here?” she asked.

“I really did not,” he said.

“Oh!” she said.

He looked up at her. “I don’t think you understand,” he said in a slow, unhappy voice.

“Indeed, I think I begin to,” she said, and now she was the one who began to pace around the cell. “I think I’ve been beyond blind.”

He nodded. “So now you think that because I don’t drag you into my arms and have my way with you that I have somehow betrayed you, misled you—worse, led you astray?”

“Well, yes,” she said, “but that’s not entirely your
fault. I had to believe you, didn’t I?” She took another agitated turn around the tiny space. “I should’ve known that a man of your appearance, with your charm, having traveled so much as you have would naturally…”

He cut her off, as he said, wearily, “…Deceived and cheated you for my own vile purposes?”

“At least so much as to win me to your side,” she agreed. “And I wouldn’t go so far as to say ‘vile’ purposes.” She swallowed down tears, and when she spoke again her voice was steadier, if a little muffled by emotion. “What a fool I was, am still. I ought to have known it was all for effect. At any rate,” she said, stopping her pacing and faced him directly, “if you just call for the jailer, I’ll be on my way. And don’t worry—I won’t say a word against you to anyone. This was between the two of us, and there it will stay.”

“Sorry, it won’t be so simple,” he said. “The jailer was paid to make himself scarce until dawn, and he will. It’s done, and I’m afraid you’ll have to make the best of it. You can have the bed,” he added. “I won’t be using it anyway.”

She just stared at him.

“I do have
some
honor,” he said. “Don’t worry, I won’t touch you.”

He rose from the bed, bowed, and swept his hand to indicate the empty cot. Then he stepped away and went to lean against the wall.

Head up, she marched to the bed, sat down, keeping her spine as stiff as a queen at a review of the troops. But she felt stupid, embarrassed, and shamed, too proud to cry and too hurt to speak.

The silence was deafening. Julianne heard the blood beating in her ears.

“You should consider yourself fortunate,” he finally said, softly. “At least you’re not ruined. If Amyas gets you back by dawn, no one will be the wiser, and there’ll be no harm done.”

She nodded.

“Come,” he said softly, “don’t hate me. This is for the best, you know.”

She didn’t answer.

“And I do appreciate your faith in me,” he said, as though he too couldn’t bear the silence any longer. “I’ll never forget it. Honestly. That is,” he added bitterly, “if you can ever think of that word in the same context as me.”

“No, obviously you’re honorable, in your fashion,” she said dully. “I appreciate that. Not that it’s any great effort on your part in my case, I suppose. I’d wish you’d not pretended otherwise before, but I understand the necessity. Thank you for speaking up at once and sparing me further humiliation. I just wish you’d let me know
before
Amyas had a chance to slam the door.”

The silence beat on for a minute more.

“What the devil are you talking about?” he asked.

“I know you had to win me over,” she said.

“It was helpful, but not entirely necessary.”

“But…” Whatever she was about to say was stopped by a little choked sob that escaped her lips. Horrified, she threw up a hand. “Disregard that! I didn’t mean it. Never mind.”

He came to her, and knelt at her feet. “Julianne, Little Jewel,” he said softly, “this is truly for the best. What can I say to help?”

“Nothing,” she said on a shaky sniffle. “Just give me a moment to compose myself. I didn’t expect rejection, you see, though I suppose I should have, considering.”

“Considering what?”

She looked straight at him. Beautiful, she thought, that still solemn face is truly beautiful in my eyes. “Considering that you are what you are.”

“And I am…?” he asked, seemingly fascinated by what he saw in her eyes.

“You’re so handsome, and charming,” she said helplessly. “I suppose I’ve adored you since you were a boy.”

He seized her hand. “You
still
believe I am Christian Sauvage?” he asked with wonder.

“Of course,” she said. “Nothing you’ve done makes me doubt it. In fact, the reverse is true, because you always were honorable. I should have known you’d have found your true love by now. It only makes sense; you haven’t lived in limbo all these years, as I have. I suppose I didn’t want to contemplate the possibility. I know you had to show some ardor in order to win me over, but now that we’re alone, I admire you for keeping faith with her—and me—whatever it might mean for your future. Although,” she added on a wistful smile, “as I said, staying faithful to her wouldn’t be so very difficult for you as it concerns me. Nor do you have to worry about what
I’ll say. But you can imagine how sorry I am that I threw myself at you. Please forget it.”

He frowned. “Let me be sure I understand you. You believe I rejected you because I’m being true to another?”

She nodded.

“Well, you are the greatest fool in nature,” he said angrily.

In one swift move he rose, sat beside her, and gathered her into his arms. “How did such a wise child turn out to be such a fool?” he demanded, his lips against her hair. He didn’t give her a chance to answer.

He drank at her lips as though he needed to in order to live. She clung to his shoulders, feeling his body tense and hot beneath the thin material of his shirt, and kissed him back, dazzled by pleasure, reveling in their closeness, refusing to think.

He raised his head to breathe, and murmured, “I tried, God knows, I tried to resist this; but Julianne, I can’t, not anymore.” Then he kissed her again. And again.

His hair was sleek and soft under her hands, his body lean and tensed muscle as he clasped her close to himself. His beard was growing in, and the contrast between it and his skin made her marvel once again at how smooth and fine that skin was. His mouth was soft, yet firm and insistent; it tasted of dark sweet liquors that made her drunk with desire for more of him.

He left off kissing her mouth and feathered little kisses on her neck. She arched her neck and shivered.
When he trailed his lips along her collarbone, she held his shoulders tight and trembled. When he moved her gown aside and cupped her naked breast, she gasped and held her breath, reveling in the wild thrill of it. When he put his hand beneath her breast and brought his lips to it, she closed her eyes to better feel the pure pleasure as it coursed through her.

Christian started to lower her to his bed. She lay back and reached for him. He drew back, and started to pull at his shirt, to be free of anything that would keep him from getting close to the smooth skin he’d felt. That was long enough to warn him. He didn’t know how long it had been since he’d gotten drunk on her sweet compliance. But too soon, and almost too late, he realized how far they’d gone.

With a pang of frustrated desire so keen it was pain, he drew back farther. He opened his eyes, trying to free himself from the familiar, dark, relentless, mounting drive toward completion. He fought to return to sanity again.

Seeing didn’t make it easier. He saw that his hands had loosed her hair from its ribbon, and so her face was framed by her soft dark hair. Her eyes were closed, her color was high, her lips were parted, and her gown was half off her shoulders. He was glad he was sitting, so she couldn’t see the effect she’d had on him.

Her eyes slowly opened. She looked at him and saw the color on his high cheekbones, his eyes blazing blue as he looked at her, and she raised a hand to touch the livid bruise on his cheek.

He took her hand and kissed it, then held it, and forced himself to smile. “No,” he said, “our first time,
my lady, will be in a high soft bed, with sweet-smelling sheets and sunlight everywhere. You’ll wear my ring on your finger, and nothing else. Nor will you feel shame because you’ll be mine in heart as well as name, in every court of law in the land. I’ve wanted you for a long time. But if I could resist you before, it’s even more imperative now. No hedgerow tumbles for you,” he said, pulling farther away from her. “There won’t be a union in a stinking little cell, either. Much as I long for you, I won’t do it. And
that
, my clever girl, is why I tried to reject you, and will try and succeed through this night.

“I have no other woman,” he said. “Though I can’t in all truth tell you that I never did,” he added with a crooked smile. “And all truth is what you’ll have from me.” He paused, as they both remembered what he’d said about the truths he could tell her.

“I adored you when you were a girl,” he went on, “but I never thought of you as a lover then. You were, my dear, a charming pest. But now…” He touched her cheek with his fingertips. “Now you’re my life. I pledge it, and whatever happens, so it will always be with me.”

“But there’s the point,” he said seriously, his eyes steely as his voice. “I don’t know what the future will bring. I can’t take you as mine until I do. Fine thing to take you if I can’t take care of you,” he said, shaking his head. “I believe I’ll soon be free. But no one knows the future, and Fate hasn’t always been fair to me. So I have to tell you that in spite of all I want and hope, you may well have to marry someone else someday.”

She opened her mouth to protest; he placed a long finger over her lips. “Ssh,” he said. “Listen. If I touch you again, who knows what may happen? With all the care I could muster, still Nature is what she is. What I most wish to do with you now might burden you with more than my memory forever after. So rest easy and sleep sound. I won’t touch you again tonight. Not because I love another but because I care for you too much to dare.”

She smiled. She placed a finger on his lips, too, not to silence him but to trace and marvel at the purity of their strict classical lines. She shook her head. “Such a beautiful mouth to say such nonsense.”

His lips quirked as he echoed, “Beautiful?”

“Yes, and such a pother, such a fuss you make over nothing,” she said. “I love you entirely, and always have, and always will. At first I thought I was thrilled to see you again because you brought back my memories of my brother and happier times. Now I know it was because you brought back memories of yourself. You were the ideal male I always sought, and I never settled for less. What do I care about tomorrow? I’ve lived in the past too long. I don’t trust the future at all. I believe in now, and now is what we have.”

She didn’t tell him she feared she might never see him again. Nor that she’d never have had the courage to offer herself if they weren’t here, and he so overset, and she, so desperately sorry for him. But sorrrow had turned to desire, and desire to need, and that need, imperative. She’d tried to make him forget where they were. She’d forgotten that in his arms, and now that she was alone again, she could hardly bear it.

Julianne sat up, leaned forward, and brushed his mouth with hers. He sat still. She dared to touch his sealed lips with the tip of her tongue, and felt them begin to part, before he closed them tight again. She sat back and smiled at him.

“And now, my dear, honorable, upright…” She paused and glanced down at his lap. He was astonished to hear her giggle as she went on, “my dear so very upright love, I tell you that I want you, too. And I will not suffer to wait until we get into that high, soft bed. You said you don’t like to sleep because of your dreams of this place,” she said seriously. “I don’t blame you. Let me give you new things to remember about this place instead.”

He didn’t answer.

She squared her shoulders. “You mustn’t think only of yourself. I need you at least as much as you need me, you know. I’ve lived only on memories for so long, I need you to give me a chance to experience life. Because if anything
should
happen to your plans for freedom—heaven forbid—what would I have of you but the memory of kisses in a field at dawn and an embrace here? I need more of you. I believe you need me. I could be wrong,” she said when he remained quiet. “I have been before.”

He still didn’t answer.

“Well!” she said, and blinked. “I won’t beg.”

She looked down at her gown, and flushed rosily. She drew up the neck of her gown and adjusted it. Then, head still down, she took a deep breath. She looked at the bed, then back at him. In the glow of the single lamp, he could see her eyes glittering with
unshed tears. “It will be a long night, after all,” she murmured. “So!” she said briskly, lifting her head high. “Do you perhaps happen to have a deck of cards?”

He gave a shout of laughter and pulled her back into his arms. “How can I resist you?” he asked again, as he rocked her back and forth. “Devil and imp, innocent and fiend, Julianne, you’re my only love. And if you stoop to love me, I won’t say no again.”

“Good,” she said, against his chest, “oh, good.” She didn’t say more. Because she wasn’t half as sure as she pretended.

He knew that. But he needed her every bit as much as she thought, and more. He tried to show her that. “First,” he breathed against her neck, “we must dispense with all these clothes.”

She smiled as he pulled off his shirt. But as soon as he had done that, he frowned and looked around. He rose, went to the table, and, shielding the lamp with one hand, blew out the light.

It was suddenly so dark in the cell that she couldn’t see him. But he was back at her side in a moment.

“I thought you wanted sunlight,” she said breathlessly.

“Sunlight, yes, not lamplight, not here.” His voice sounded pained, a little anxious. “If anyone—should glance in through any chink in the wall,…not that I know of any,” he said quickly, “and I’ve looked, I promise you. But I take no chances. So,” he said softly as his hands found and traced the shape of her, “you and I must meet in the dark, and our hands and lips will show us the light.”