His eyes fell to the bed. With the sheets twisted in knots, it was all I could do not to think about that passionate night Edward and I had spent together. From the way Montgomery’s hand balled into a fist, it seemed he was thinking the same.
“How long was he staying here?” he asked.
I fumbled with the corners of the quilt. “A few weeks. It was before the masquerade.” Before you. “He had better control of himself then.” My fingers drifted to my shoulder, where the scratches had all but faded.
“I’d rather not think about that. About him.” He sat on the bed, rubbing my shoulders through the quilt. “All I want is to be with you.” He drew my hand to his lips and kissed the silver ring, sending my heart pounding.
It struck me that he and I would be alone all night, a night when anything could happen. We were engaged, after all. I knew that proper young ladies didn’t sit in bed with brooding young men, even those they were engaged to, yet I had long ago stopped caring about society’s opinion regarding my chastity.
I stood and went to the door, needing a moment to breathe, and double-checked the lock. I lingered there, resting my forehead against the door as I tried to get my trembling nerves under control.
When I turned around, Montgomery was bent over to unlace his heavy boots. His strong hands worked fast. His blond hair had strayed from its tie and fell over his eyes. By the time he finished and looked up at me through those fair strands, I was helpless.
I had made love to Edward in a rush, and now regretted it. I didn’t want the same to happen with Montgomery.
Blast regret, I thought. I want him.
I would have stumbled across the room to him if he hadn’t stood first and dragged me back to the bed. My lips found his as I shrugged the quilt to the floor.
“Take off this dress,” he whispered. “It smells of Newcastle’s tobacco.”
My hands fluttered to the buttons. Was I supposed to act a certain way? Try to entice him? From the look of it, he didn’t need any enticement. He looked ready to tear my dress off himself if my hands moved any slower.
He pulled at the fabric, eager to get it off. Then there was the matter of my winter petticoats. Each one was a frustrating process of untangling cords and peeling them off, one by one. As the pile of my underclothes grew on the worn floor, our hands only moved faster. I kept imagining what his rough hands would feel like against my bare skin.
I paused. As much as I wanted him, it still felt wrong like this. Too sudden. This was no desperate act of loneliness, not like before.
“Montgomery, I think . . .” But my words faded, breathless.
He grabbed me around the h*ps and pulled me onto the bed. I thought of all the things we should say to one another—asking permission to touch here or there, crawling under the sheet for modesty’s sake, discuss the lengths we intended to take this. But as soon as his lips were on mine, those thoughts vanished. Words? I could barely think. All I could do was feel, and each one of my senses was so flooded that I doubted I could even manage that for much longer.
“I know what you’re thinking,” he whispered, surprising me. “We can wait until we are properly wed. I won’t rush you. But I don’t want to be away from you, Juliet, not now. Please.”
I wasn’t certain if I was relieved or not. Part of me longed to feel him; another part of me felt it was best to wait. As we kissed in my old wooden bed, I thought of how society said intimacy was supposed to be gentle, and quiet, and tender. There was nothing tender about the way Montgomery had his lips all over mine.
And yet he was good to his word; and so was I. I fell asleep in his arms, still dressed in my combination and he in his trousers, and for those few hours it didn’t matter that I was being hunted by Scotland Yard; it didn’t matter that my fate was as uncertain as Edward’s, it didn’t matter that I was parentless once more.
Montgomery and I had each other, and our love could survive anything.
WHEN I WOKE IN the morning, Montgomery was already packing my collection of scientific equipment into a crate to take back with us. “We should be able to sneak back into the professor’s now,” he said. “Balthazar’s waiting outside.”
I untangled my limbs from the old quilt and dressed slowly, taking my time to notice all the little details of my attic I’d taken for granted: how the window let in warm rays of light, and how the woodstove looked like a squat old gnome.
“I’ll never return here, I imagine,” I said.
I let my fingers run over the bedpost, worn though it was, and trail along the cabinet where I’d stored the mint tea that had warmed my bones after many a long night’s walk to get here. If I closed my eyes, I could pretend nothing had changed: Sharkey curled by the warm flames at the hearth, pot of tea ready to boil, the old chair waiting for me.
The professor had given me everything a girl could desire—a sea of pillows, forests of silver candlesticks, mountains of books. So why did my heart clench at the thought of leaving this broken-down little room?
I glanced over my shoulder at Montgomery, who knew nothing of the war raging in my heart. He had told me that these odd tendencies were a symptom of my illness. Once I was cured, no longer would I have such strange sentiments.
I went to the worktable, where Montgomery tucked my canisters of phosphorous salts into the crate. My finger ran along the spine of Father’s journal.
“That was your father’s,” Montgomery said in surprise.
The book found its way into my palm. I flipped open the cover carefully, tracing my hand down the worn paper. “I found it on the dinghy, among the other supplies. I assumed you’d put it there.”
“If I did, it was by mistake. I was in such a rush to pack that night. May I see it?”
I surrendered it to him hesitantly. He handled it rougher than I had, flipping through the pages haphazardly.
“Half of it doesn’t make any sense,” I said. “He used a personal shorthand I could never decipher.”
“Yes, I recall. Although it wasn’t shorthand; it was a code he’d developed. Blast if I could ever figure it out.”
“If we could decipher it, it might say something about a cure for Edward.” I paused. “Or for me.”
The idea seemed to energize him. He flipped through pages of nonsensical letters and numbers strung together, smiling almost fondly. “Your father used to curse like the devil when he was writing in code. Rambling on about church and religion. He would curse the books in order. ‘Goddamn Psalms! Blasted Proverbs! Cursed Ecclesiastics!’” He shook his head and closed the book, then stowed it in the crate and started to pack my burners.