Taking a deep gulp of air, I turned and started forward, towards the reception desk. In a matter of minutes I acquired a set of keys from the night porter, and made my way up the stairs towards our suite of rooms. I was bone-tired. From the bottom of my heart I prayed that the bed up there was soft and had a nice, down-filled cushion.
Reaching the top of the stairs, I unlocked the door to my room, and was just about going to go in search of my nice, comfy bed when I noticed the figure standing in the middle of the room. A tall and leanly muscular figure in a black tailcoat, staring at me with freezing intensity.
‘Well, my love?’ Mr Ambrose’s voice was so icy it made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. ‘Do you want to explain where you’ve been?’
Suspicions
‘Well?’ Mr Ambrose’s gaze drilled into me like a diamond drill into hot butter. ‘Where were you?’
‘I… um… I…’
Seriously - that was all I was capable of saying. I… um… I… - so pathetic! What business was it of his where I had gone, anyway?
‘Do you have any idea,’ his menacing voice drifted to my quivering auricula auris[18], ‘what I thought when I left Dark Nights of Delight to find you had disappeared?’
‘Um… “Thank you, God, thank you so much!”?’ I suggested.
He didn’t seem to appreciate my fine humour.
‘You,’ he told me, taking a step towards me, gliding through the shadows, ‘don’t just leave without my authorization. Without my permission, you don’t even move a toe, do you understand?’
I opened my mouth to fire back a reply - but then I realized there was only one fitting reply to this, and it didn’t even need words. Bending, I unlaced my shoe, kicked it off and stretched out my foot. Slowly and demonstratively, I wiggled my toes. All five of them. I grinned up at Mr Ambrose. Oh, how good it felt to stretch one’s feet after such a long walk!
‘You…!’ In two long strides, Rikkard Ambrose had crossed the distance between us. Grabbing my shoulders, he pushed me backwards, away from my forlorn-looking shoe. I felt like Cinderella in reverse.
‘Hey! Let go of me!’
‘Not until I have proof that I’ve managed to instil some semblance of sense into that foolish female head of yours! Do you have any idea what could have happened to you out there in the dark alleys of Alexandria?’
‘I’m a Londoner! We have street gangs that are ten times worse than anything they’ve got here,’ I proclaimed with an unusual burst of patriotism.
‘And how much of your time in London has been spent in the darker corners of the East End?’
‘Um…’
About five minutes. And you were with me, then.
‘Exactly!’ His eyes glinted in the darkness. ‘Any city in the world has its dark places! And they’re all deadly to a defenceless girl like you!’
‘Defenceless girl?’ In an instant, my temper shot up to the boiling point.
Ha! I’ll show him how defenceless I am!
My knee surged forward and upward, right towards his crotch. But before it could hit its mark, his legs snapped closed, trapping me in between. I wriggled and writhed, but no matter how much I strained against him, I couldn’t get free. My leg struggled inefficiently against the vice of his iron-hard muscles.
‘Let go!’
‘Yes,’ he told me, tightening his hold. ‘A defenceless girl.’
‘Let go, I said!’
‘So, what would you have done,’ he enquired coolly, ‘if a few of the ruffians who infest that part of the city had decided to try their luck with you?’ Completely ignoring my attempts to get free, he leaned closer. Even in the darkness that had taken hold of the room, from this close I could see his eyes clearly now. They were dark pools, swallowing everything, demanding more. ‘Well? What would you have done?’
‘I wouldn’t have needed to do anything! The guards were with me!’
‘True. And what if Karim, in his commendable foresight, hadn’t sent half of them with you?’
‘I still wouldn’t have been alone! There was someone with me who-’
My voice trailed off as the darkness in Mr Ambrose’s eyes flared, and the muscles of his jaw tightened. I knew instantly that he had seen Captain Carter. I also knew that mentioning him had been a bad idea. A very, very bad idea.
Oops…
‘Yes,’ he said. His voice, only Icelandic so far, had moved to arctic temperatures. ‘I noticed. Tell me, just out of curiosity… Who was that man?’
‘What man?’ I tried to play innocent. The only problem was I had never been particularly innocent.
‘The man who brought you to the hotel. Tall, brown hair, a ridiculous speck of beard on his chin.’
‘It’s not ridiculous! And I don’t know a man like that anyway!’
‘Answer me! Who was he?’
I tried to shrug. This isn’t very easy to do when both your shoulders are in the unbreakable grip of a muscular financial magnate, but I did my best.
‘Just someone I know from London. We accidentally bumped into each other. Don’t worry, he doesn’t know we’re staying here under false names. I took care of it.’
Mr Ambrose cocked his head. Shadows moved across his face, casting his already dark eyes into deeper blackness.
‘Just someone you know?’
‘Yes!’
‘A mere acquaintance?’
‘Yes, exactly.’
‘Ah.’ A pause. A very heavy, very dark pause. ‘I didn’t know it was common for mere acquaintances to kiss a lady’s hand on departure, nowadays.’
Blast! He had seen that? I felt my face heat. Double and triple blast! Thank God my skin was so tanned and it was dark in the room!
What was I blushing for, anyway? If Captain Carter wanted to kiss my hand, he could do so all day long, and there was nothing Mr Ambrose could say or do about it!
‘I didn’t know it was common for people to spy on other people’s farewells, nowadays,’ I shot back.
‘It isn’t,’ he told me coldly. ‘That’s just something I do.’
‘You are insufferable!’
‘Respect, my dear, respect.’ His voice was silky, unusually soft with threat. ‘I am your husband after all.’
‘You? You are an arrogant, calculating bastard with an iceberg for a heart!’
‘That, too.’
‘Let go!’
‘No!’
‘I’m going to kill you!’
‘You’re going to try.’
Bloody hell! How can he still sound so infuriatingly cool?
‘Let - me - go!’
‘No.’ He leaned forward until I could feel his breath on my face. For some inexplicable reason, my knees suddenly felt weak. ‘Let’s talk about that man, my dear.’
‘Let’s not!’
‘Who was he, exactly, and what was he doing here?’
I glared up at him. ‘He isn’t coming back!’
‘Indeed?’ He cocked his head like a panther about to leap. ‘That is satisfactory to hear. But it is not what I asked, my love. What is he doing here in Alexandria?’
‘Go to hell!’ I snarled - or at least tried to snarl. It somehow came out softer and breathier than intended. Darn!
I could have told him about Captain Carter and his mission, of course. I could have told him everything, and he’d probably have been content. But I would be damned before I answered the questions of a man who had dared to call me a defenceless girl! Worse, a man who had grabbed me, held me, and proved to me that in comparison to him, I was a defenceless girl.
Curse him! I’ll be damned before I say a single word! No matter what malignant methods he’ll use to question me!
‘Did he follow you here? Did he follow you from London to Egypt?’
My mouth fell open in utter astonishment. The flame under my boiling pot of anger went out in a puff of smoke.
‘What?’
‘It’s a simple enough question, Wife. Did this man follow you to Egypt? Is he after yo
u?’
‘After me?’
‘Yes.’
‘You mean…?’
Lightning flashed in the dark clouds of his eyes. ‘I mean is he enamoured with you? Does he wish you to be his?’
My mouth dropped open a little farther. I didn’t know it could open this wide. You never cease to learn, I guess.
‘What business of yours would it be if he did?’
Mr Ambrose’s eyes glittered darkly. ‘None whatsoever - except for the fact that, for the next few months at least, you’re already taken.’
‘You don’t seriously expect me to…’
‘Yes, I expect you to!’ He leaned closer, and I couldn’t for an instant look away from his chiselled stone-hard face. Those eyes of his seemed to draw me in, threatening to swallow me whole, body, mind and soul. ‘Here’s how seriously I expect you to!’
His mouth was on me before I could blink. A wave of heat surged through me from my lips down to my toes the moment our lips touched. Suddenly, I didn’t mind the fact that he was holding me tightly against him so much. I didn’t mind it at all. My hands shot out, grasping his arms to pull him still closer. His lips moved against mine with enough force to shatter a mountain. Was I stronger than a mountain? I’d always thought so, but I felt ready to break into a thousand pieces of ecstasy any moment.
‘While we are here,’ his cold voice reached my ear, his murmur caressing my mouth, ‘you’re mine. Do you understand? Mine!’
‘I’m not-’
Before I could say another word, he had caught my lower lip between his teeth, holding it prisoner.
‘Let go! I ot anyody’s!’
‘What did you say, my dear, temporary love?’
‘I said I ot anyody’s!’
What I had been trying to fling into his face were the defiant words ‘I’m not anybody’s.’ But it’s difficult to fling words of defiance into someone’s face while that someone is attached to your face by biting down on your lower lip. Particularly if his gentle bite is sending tingles through your entire body, making your knees want to give way.
What the hell is the matter with you? Where is your self-respect? Stand up straight! Fight that bastard off! That’s what you want, right? Right?
Hm… maybe. But standing up straight seemed like such an exhausting thing to do right now. Besides, what could I do to fight him off, anyway?
You can give as good as you get! Bite him!
Slowly, my lips curved into a smile. All right. Let’s show him who’s in charge!
Snaking my arms up around his neck, I pulled him closer towards me. In an instant, he was on me again and was delving into my mouth, probing its depths. Trying to keep my knees from melting, I waited. I waited until he pushed his lower lip forward, gently massaging my upper lip with both of his.
Now!
My teeth came down.
‘Arrgh!’
My grin widened - for about one millisecond, before he picked me up off the floor like a doll and surged forwards. I had hardly time to think Bloody hell! What’s this? He’s supposed to let me go, not carry me to the… ! before he rushed through the door into the next room and flung me onto something soft and velvety.
‘Ouff!’
Feathers creaked under me. The chaise lounge! Why had he thrown me onto the chaise lounge?
‘I have a question for you.’ His voice came drifting out of the darkness, somehow seducing me no matter how cold and hard it was. No… because it was. ‘While you are here…’
I tried to drag a breath into my labouring lungs. I tried to see where he was, to scramble away. But the breath had been knocked out of me, it was pitch-black inside the room, and my limbs felt like putty.
‘While you are here, Mr Linton,’ came his voice out of the dark again, ‘what are you?’
This was bloody ridiculous! He had just kissed me on the mouth, and now he was calling me Mister? I opened my mouth to protest.
The creak of the feathers was all the warning I got. I never sensed him above me, so silently and smoothly did he move. Trapping both my arms at my sides, he claimed my mouth with his again, cutting off my protest - in more than one way. His kiss didn’t just keep me from rejecting him. It kept me from wanting to.
Dear God…
‘While you’re here,’ he whispered against my mouth, his smooth, ice-cold voice burrowing into me like a frozen spear until it found my heart, ‘what are you? Tell me!’
He released my mouth for just a moment. My eyes had gotten used to the dark by now, and I could see the faint outline of his face in the gloom. I could see his eyes, calling me, holding me more securely than his hands ever could.
The words escaped my mouth without thinking.
‘Yours! I’m yours!’
*~*~**~*~*
Just to make sure everyone who reads this knows: there were two beds in the suite. Two. And we used both of them that night. Separately.
I just wanted to get that out there before anyone got any ideas. My behaviour in the recent past might have been a tiny bit erratic. Some might even use the word ‘passionate’. But that was just the heat of Egypt affecting my delicate English nervous system. I was still a feminist! I thoroughly and totally despised men. Especially one particular specimen of the species!
Really? I heard a little voice every time during the next few days when our lips happened to touch, coincidentally. You don’t really act like you despise him.
Emphasis on ‘act’! I was acting a role. After all, he was paying me, at the moment, to pretend to be his loving wife. Nobody should be able to accuse me of not doing a thorough job!
Nice! The only problem with that argument is that whenever you are in company, i.e. whenever your acting skills are actually required, you behave like a vengeful harpy. It’s just when the two of you are completely and utterly alone that you-
‘Shut up!’ I growled.
The hotel doorman, who was just holding the door to Mr Ambrose’s coach open for me, stared up at me in surprise. ‘Excuse me, Madam?’
‘Nothing! I was talking to myself.’
And not winning the argument, by the way.
Quickly, I got inside and settled down beside Mr Ambrose. I didn’t ask where we were going. For the last couple of days, a routine had established itself: in the morning, we would breakfast and then drive into the city, continuing our enquiries, since apparently whatever information Bertolino had given was not sufficient. At noon, we would lunch at some place where the entire city observed us being the happily married couple. After another round of investigating, we would finally return to the hotel for a romantic dinner on the terrace.
‘Next time we sit down for dinner and I ask you what you would like to drink,’ Mr Ambrose whispered, leaning towards me, ‘do try not to answer “Your blood, with soda”. It doesn’t really fit the role of a loving wife.’
All right… maybe not all the dinners had been that romantic. But what did he expect? The stress of having to wear a wedding ring was straining my feminist limits!
‘You want me to behave reasonably?’ I demanded. ‘Then stop opening doors and pulling back chairs for me!’
Admittedly, in the beginning it had been sort of fun - but it hadn’t taken long for the chauvinistic implications to occur to me. I could open my own doors, thank you very much!
‘I can’t! I’m supposed to be a gentleman, and you my loving wife!’
‘I’m not some useless appendage to a man, my dear husband! I have two arms and hands of my own - as you will find out to your detriment as soon as I get my hands on a knife at dinner!’
‘You do understand the meaning of the term “loving”, don’t you?’
I chose not to dignify that with a response.
With a derisive snort, Mr Ambrose turned away from me and struck his cane against the roof of the coach. ‘Drive!’
More days of secret investigation followed, coupled with more attempts to display our relationship in public. Needless to say, the attempts were not very succes
sful. Once, when I was trying to smile at Mr Ambrose at a dinner in the hotel dining room, a concerned waiter who had noticed my expression came over to enquire if I suffered from lockjaw and needed medical assistance.
What I wanted to know was: why? Why was I so useless at trying to be Mr Ambrose’s pretend wife? I was usually a pro at acting! I had played a lady in distress, a secretary to one of the world’s most famous businessmen, even my own Uncle Bufford!
On that last occasion you were caught and arrested, though, weren’t you?
Well, yes, but that wasn’t the point! The point was that I was really good at playing a role - any role! Being the fake wife of Rikkard Ambrose should have been a breeze! All I had to do was dance, smile and giggle inanely. Instead, I scowled most of the time.
It had to be the feminist in me, protesting against this violation of my principles! Yes, that had to be it!
Really? Are you sure the real reason you’re having so much trouble at being a fake wife isn’t something else?
Of course not!
Indeed? Are you sure, for example, it isn’t the little twinge in your heart every time you think about the word ‘fake’?
‘Shut the bloody hell up!’
It took me a few seconds to realize the effect my words had had. Looking around, I saw a stone-faced Mr Ambrose sitting opposite me at the dining table. Around him, at other tables, couples were frozen in mid-motion, their mouths hanging open, staring at me. It was very, very quiet.
‘Um… I didn’t mean you. Sorry. Continue, everyone.’
‘Come with me.’ I heard Mr Ambrose’s low and very controlled voice. His hand fell on mine, holding my wrist like a vice. Looking up, I saw ice glitter in his dark eyes. ‘Upstairs. We need to have a little talk about acting skills.’
We went upstairs. But as it turned out, we didn’t talk much that night.
*~*~**~*~*
Yes, we used separate beds that night, too! I am a feminist, remember? Staunch and true!
At least that’s what I kept telling myself.
‘How long is this going to continue?’ I asked, trudging down the dusty alley beside Mr Ambrose, trying to cover my face against the dirt with the hand I didn’t need to hold up my dress. ‘This sneaking into the ratholes of the city, asking questions no one wants to answer?’