Well, she did not need help. She kept her eyes trained on the soprano. "You were not invited to this event."
"Asked after me, did you?"
"Only to make sure to avoid you."
"But there is champagne, and a garden. You could practice your aim."
She bit her lip. He would go away in a moment.
"Very well. At the least, you must tell me where you learned Urdu. And such interesting Urdu, at that."
At that, she turned.
"What?"
"It is already disrupted.
You
are here." She could not believe it. Lord Lockwood had told him her identity. Ashdown's real name. Knowing it was she, Julian would have seen too much in those paintings.
He jerked his head toward the door. She cast one last glance in her cousin's direction, then followed him out into the antechamber. The air was better out here. She drew a deep, bracing breath. "He promised he would not tell anyone."
His smile was sharp-edged, a little mocking. "Do you imagine he needed to tell me?" He leaned back against the wall, considering her. The white wallpaper set off his dramatic coloring, black and gold and green. She had thought him like a fever dream the first time she saw him. It came back to her suddenly. She had thought him so beautiful. She could not do this. "Sapnagar and the soldier," he said. "I recognized both."
"You—" Oh, she was a
fool.
But Sapnagar had been so small, so inconsequential in that painting. And the soldier; how could she have known he would remember?
Inside, the crowd burst into applause. The doors opened to disgorge a handful of guests. As they passed, their heads turned toward Julian, and she heard a gentleman among them mutter something about "Auburn" and "the cheek." Julian took no notice. "I must congratulate you, Emma. Your artistry is exquisite. And the RoyalAcademy—a great achievement."
Her stomach knotted. "Continue thus, and you will unmask me."
"Only if we are overheard."
The implication startled a scoff from her. "You cannot seriously think I will accompany you anywhere."
He shrugged. "You seem to value your anonymity very highly. I can't say I blame you. Your paintings are powerful. They are also … provocative. I wonder if you know the extent of it yourself."
He was confusing her. This conversation, trying to fend him off, felt like dueling with a moth. She did not like it. It was crucial that he not discompose her. "We have nothing to talk about."
"Then perhaps we can share a moment or two of truth."
She did not want to know his truths. The ones he'd already given her were enough to ruin her sleep. "Why in the world should I care to do that?"
He smiled now, though not pleasantly. "I am beginning to find this routine absurd. Unless, by chance, you are suffering from a peculiar amnesia concerning what has passed between us."
"Four years ago," she said. "Water under the bridge!"
"Then a very stagnant river."
More guests were exiting the drawing room now. Again, they seemed to evidence a most unusual interest in Julian. "Auburn," called one young man, "you should go over to the Turf Club, I think. New, yes, but it's already got a promising reputation for poor
ton."
"What are they talking about?"
Turning back, Julian shrugged. "It seems I am about to be blackballed from my club."
"For what?"
"Ill temper. Shall we walk?"
She had no idea what to do. She clenched her fists, started to turn away, then wheeled back. "Why won't you just
leave me alone?
After all, you were so very good at it before!"
He exhaled. "And there you have it," he said, and took her wrist. "Come with me."
His fingers were hot on her skin. He still smelled the same. The scent wrapped around her as he led her down the hallway: sandalwood and bay soap, and the subtle musk of his skin, the scent of the body that had pressed into hers, once. The lights seemed to brighten and dim. Her head felt very light, as though it were swimming off her neck, toward the ceiling. She could not believe she was following him. Did she have a choice?
He stepped ahead to open a door. "No," he said, and with his hand at the small of her back, urged her forward again. The next room suited him. "Splendid." He guided her inside.
She moved away from him, across the teal and taupe carpet, Axminster it looked like, very fine, and her arms were wrapping around herself for comfort because she did not know what to do. "You must leave me alone," she said, staring at nothing. There was a giant globe, as big as a carriage wheel, standing near the desk. It was startling and unusual, and she recalled suddenly having heard of it: the Ardsmores' famous globe. She stepped forward and put one finger on England. How small it looked, how defenseless, against the vast waters of the world.
His hand closed on hers. "No," he said, very close, his lips brushing her ear. The passage of his breath called up goose bumps from her skin. She could feel the heat of him all along her back, only an inch or two separating them. She inhaled, heard the way it shook. Her throat was seizing. He murmured, "Let's go back, shall we?" And his hand moved hers across the surface of the orb, applying pressure to give the globe a spin, so her finger came to rest on the shape of the Indian subcontinent.
"Where were you?" he asked quietly. He moved her finger to Delhi. "Here you were. Almost four years ago, exactly. And I found you in the garden, with your face turned to the breeze."
Don't do this.
She shut her eyes. His hand tightened on hers.
"Open them," he said savagely. "If I can bear it, so can you."
Her next breath sounded like a sob. She felt his reaction to it; it was communicated through his flesh, his arm pressing along the side of hers, the way his knuckles whitened.
"You were in the garden," he said. "You did not like the wine. It was awful, you were right. We spoke here, for the first time, in Delhi. And we touched here for the first time, as well. It was sweet, Emma. So sweet." His lips turned in to her neck. It was not a kiss. Merely a—touch. It had nothing to do with the other, in that hallway in Delhi. So long ago. "Do you remember?" he said, shaping the words against her skin, so the memory that broke over her was not visual, but physical. He had brought stars out in her stomach that time. She had liked it then but now it made her want to scream; it was soft torture, the drip of a water clock when one had a migraine; it exacerbated the pain she already felt. Pain she had been done with, which she
should not have to feel any longer.
She shook her head.
His head lifted slightly. "And then," he said after a long moment, and there was nothing she could read in his voice, only a hard, quiet resolve. "Then the war came. And you were here." He moved her hand up a small fraction, to a shaded region labeled
Rajpootana.
"Did you know that? Did you ever look to see where you had been? Once you'd come back to this country, did you look to see where Sapnagar could be found?"
She fought to swallow. It was important to swallow, to clear her throat. She wanted to make her voice as hard and fierce and clear as his. "No."
"Kavita still remembers you in her prayers, you know. She mentions your name in every letter. She still calls you her
behin."
He paused. "I will not tell her you did not look for Sapnagar. I do not think she would understand it."
Damn him.
A tear slipped, hot and burning, down her cheek. "Good," she said. "I do not care. Tell her. Or don't tell her. Your decision."
"I'm not blind," he said, very low. "Words are not the only way we communicate, you and I. They never were."
She pushed back against him, trying to break away, to run. But he was ready for it and he stepped forward, the length of his body pinning her against the globe. "You are the second person I have held down today," he said at her ear. "I will be more gentle with you, but I will not let you go. Do you understand?"
She slammed her heel onto his foot. He laughed softly against her hair. "Yes. He tried that too. It works better when you're not wearing slippers."
"I
will
hurt you," she said.
"I've no doubt of it, Emma. But first things first." His voice hardened again. "We have you in Sapnagar. Then where were you? You mentioned Kurnaul." He forced her hand down and to the right; she was fighting against it. "Perhaps we need a calendar to complement this endeavor, for I went to Kurnaul as well. I went here." He pressed her finger hard into the surface. "Is that where you were? Kurnaul, Emma?
Is it?"
The pressure of his grip eased. "Show me, then."
"Take your hand off."
His hand lifted. But he did not step away from her.
"Here," she said, and slammed her finger against the spot marked
Kurnaul.
"Yes, I was here. It rained incessantly. Half the civilians were sick from the cholera. I waited for you there. Weeks. And then they moved us southeast." She moved her finger an inch. "Here. Bar—Bart—"
"Bharatpur," he whispered. "Yes. I looked—"
"Outside of Bartpur. The Maharajah was friendly to us, they said. I waited for you there. But our camp was not safe. A man rode in. His arm nearly severed. The—the tendons. He'd run into a band of mutineers—and we were only civilians. They could not spare many soldiers. He warned us. So we rode again. All night, well into the day. By that time I was sick. I'd caught something in the camp. And then we were quartered here." Her finger landed on Aiwar. She could not speak the name aloud. She had seen terrible things in Alwar. Terrible.
His sigh made no sound. But she felt it all along her cheek. "God, Emma. Alwar, yes. I was there too; I was there twice.
How
did I—?"
"There was a woman I was quartered with there. Her child had been killed. Before her eyes, I expect. She did not stop screaming. Day and night, she screamed. One day she found a pistol. The officer was having his tiffin. He had laid it down beside him. She took it. She took it and she used it on herself in our tent."
His grip had fallen away. She turned around, raising her face to his. If you understood madness, did that mean you shared it? For she had known why the woman could not keep from screaming. And never better than at this moment, for if she began to scream at him now, she knew she would also never stop. If she kept going, if she told him all of it, she would only be able to do it in a scream. So what if his face was clouded, if his expression was haunted? She was sure she looked worse, but she did not care. She put her hands against his chest and shoved him two paces back. "You want my whole itinerary?
I will not give it!
I have given you
enough!"
The breath went out of her.
These
were the things she had not wanted to know. Because—"I wish that you had found me. God above, Julian, I wish you had found me! But—" She found air again. "You didn't find me." He thought he had found her now. It was so clear in his face. But he would never find her. That girl he'd looked for was well and truly gone. And what remained—no one would want it.
She
did not want it. She pushed out the breath she was holding. "And the journey I took then, it's simply … too late for you to follow."
"Emma, you are not the only one who took that damned journey."
"No," she said after a moment. "I am sure you suffered too. It's a very lonely path, isn't it?"
"Yes, but—"
"And sometimes one acquires a taste for the loneliness. So it seems."
"You are afraid," he said. "And angry. I understand that—"
"No," she said, sharper now, because he was looking at her as if he knew what was coming, as if he could not be surprised by anything she might say. Did he actually believe that? Did he really think that this could be as simple as listening to what she said, and giving a nod of acceptance? His intense, unwavering regard promised things that he
could not promise.
He was so sure his opinion would be unaffected by anything she told him. But he could not know what was in her head. What was in
her.
And he would not like it. He would recoil and she would not be able to bear it. Seeing him leave again.
"I'm not angry," she said. But suddenly she was no longer sure of it. An awful pressure was building in her chest. It could as easily be anger as grief. "I will admit to being afraid, though. Yes, I am a coward. And I beg you will leave this coward
alone.
I really—I can't tell you strongly enough that I don't blame you. It is an impulse, to be sure, but not a fair one, or logical. And everything else—" She shook her head. "It is too late."
A long silence passed between them. She leaned back against the globe, watching him. The racing of her heart, the nauseous anticipation in her gut, suggested that she feared something else—she did not know what it might be, but she was ready for it, ready to defend herself.
But when he spoke, his question surprised her. "And your paintings?"
"What of them?"
"What is the Urdu, Emma? Where is it from?"
He had a gift, didn't he? Unerring aim. "It is no concern of yours."
"And so we are back to our fundamental disagreement, for I think it is. The Urdu is rather peculiar. I would like to know where you learned it."
"From a dead man." It was more than she had ever admitted. "And now, if you will once again permit me the pleasure, I will leave you."
"Again and again," he said. "If that is your desire."
"No, thank you," she said as she passed. "I am fond of finality."
Crossing the threshold of the room, she could not prevent herself from glancing over her shoulder. His back was to her. He was staring at the globe. As she reached out to pull the door closed, she saw his hand come up and across his body, a sudden violent backhand. The door shut soundlessly. The click of its latch was lost amidst the sudden crash in the room beyond.