I remembered another time not long ago when we had stood like this, pressed close together, my anger boiling like a volcano in me, his freezing cold in him. I remembered what it had felt like to feel every line of his sinuous, statuesque body pressed against me. Statuesque - that was normally a word you used only for women, if you wanted to say they were tall and graceful. But as I felt him now, I knew it described him perfectly. It described the hardness of his muscles. It described the lack of motion on his face. It even described his taciturn and stony manner. Like a statue. Statuesque.
The only thing it did not describe was the anger I swear I could feel underneath the stony exterior, in his deep, dark eyes.
What was there for him to be angry about? What was it to him if I died? He’d finally be rid of me, something he had been trying to achieve by a multitude of methods for weeks now. He should be glad if a stray bullet did the work for him.
‘You could have died,’ he repeated. Behind him, Napoleon, who had left the bathroom by now, the chessboard under his arm, nodded solemnly. Blast! Even the Emperor agreed with him. I had to swallow.
‘I know,’ I said softly. ‘I know I could have died, but so could you. So could any of the men who were there, fighting.’
‘But you are not like them, Mr Linton.’
The unspoken spoken words hung like the sword of Damocles in the air over our heads: You are a girl. You are weak.
My chin rose up in proud defiance.
‘I can be like them, in all the things that matter.’
His icy, sea-coloured eyes wandered from my face then, went down my body, slowly, lingeringly, and up again. I could feel the breathing in his chest, still pressed against mine, quicken as he did so.
‘No.’ The word was absolute, brooking no contradiction. ‘You could never be.’
He leaned forward until I could feel his breath tickle my skin. What was he doing? His hands, his body, his breath, all melted together into a frightening, exciting melee of sights, feelings, smells and sounds. Suddenly, I could feel butterflies dancing in my stomach.
Butterflies? What the heck were butterflies doing down there? I hadn’t eaten any this morning, had I?
His silent, stony face was only inches away now. He was so near, so terribly near - and then he moved to close the last bit of distance.
Seeing Stars
I pushed.
It wasn’t a very hard push. Somehow, when pushing away Mr Ambrose’s hard body, my arms didn’t want to move as determinedly as I had ordered them to. But the push caught him by surprise, and he staggered back, letting go of my wrists.
‘Who do you think you are, telling me what I can and cannot be?’ I shouted. I was angry. Boiling hot volcano angry! ‘I can be anything I want! I could decide to be a member of a yellow piggy dance troop, and I could make it work if I wanted to!’
The yellow piggy removed its snout from Mr Ambrose’s coat pocket and shook its head vigorously. I ignored it.
‘You can never be a man,’ he repeated, not retreating an inch from his position. His eyes raked up and down my body once more. I was very conscious of how, without my tailcoat, the fabric of the shirt barely concealed my form, which, while lacking upstairs, was definitely feminine in the butt department.
But… that couldn’t be what he referred to, was it? He couldn’t possibly think of me in that way, could he? He was talking about women’s rights and liberties, not about me and him doing…
No!
Definitely not.
Oh God.
‘I don't want to be a man,’ I somehow managed to say. Especially when you’re looking at me like this, with eyes as deep and dark as the Atlantic Ocean. ‘All I want is to be treated the same!’
‘Where’s the difference?’ he demanded.
The difference is the way I feel right now. The way the blood is pumping through my veins twice as hard.
‘The difference,’ I said, with clenched teeth, ‘The difference is… it is…’
He regarded me like a scientist would regard a strange, undiscovered creature, while I searched for words that I could speak aloud. There were none to be found. All I could think about was how fast my heart was hammering and how hot my face felt.
Well, what if it did? I was angry at him! So of course my heart was hammering and my face was flushed. And of course his being such a chauvinistic bastard was the reason. It had nothing whatsoever to do with how his deep, sea-coloured eyes were boring into me right there and then.
‘You see?’ he said coldly. ‘You can never be like a man.’
I glared at him with all the force I could muster.
‘Will you ever give me anything but scorn?’ I demanded.
‘Yes.’ My hopes flared - until he continued: ‘I will give you your salary at the end of the month. If you do your work properly, that is.’
The flare of hope I had felt extinguished.
Why? Why did disappointment flood through me? After all, money was all I wanted from him. The money to give me my freedom. What else would I want from him?
He was still looking at me like that. In that way that made my knees feel weak.
‘Good.’ I raised my chin and, ignoring my knees, turned away from him. Marching over to the visitor’s chair I sank down on it. ‘That’s all I want. Money enough to be free.’
‘Oh, you’ll have money.’ His eyes glittered. ‘You still won’t be free, though.’
My head whipped towards him. ‘How so?’
He marched back to his own chair and sank into it with a grace I couldn’t hope to match. From behind his desk, projecting paramount, cold power and authority, he looked at me over his steepled fingers. ‘Just like in marriage, you’ll still be tied to a man - to me.’
My eyes narrowed. ‘Yes. But unlike in a marriage, at the end of the day I can go home and recuperate. And unlike in a marriage, if I ever get sick of seeing your stony visage every day, I can resign.’
Abruptly, his hands tightened into fists again. ‘But nobody else would give you a position.’
‘True,’ I mumbled. ‘Seems you’re stuck with me for now.’
Was it my imagination or did his hands relax again marginally when he heard that? We glared at each other for a moment or two, at a silent stalemate. I didn’t know what the heck he wanted, what would make him stop hating me so much! God, when he was looking at me like that, I didn’t even know what I wanted anymore! But whatever it was, it had nothing to do with him!