A Curious Beginning

“Really, somehow I think otherwise.”


She gave me an appraising look followed by a shrug. “I was the first woman to know him. You will understand why I am curious about you. We are very different.” She stepped nearer. “How did you meet him? What do you speak of together?”

I tipped my head. “Such interesting questions. But really, you ought to ask Stoker if you want them answered. Oh, but I am forgetting. You already did.”

With that she flicked her hair and walked away, swinging her hips as she moved. Out of the shadows I saw a figure sidle up to her, and I was interested to recognize the form of the flirtatious groom, Mornaday. Having halfheartedly tried his luck with me and found it wanting, he had no doubt decided to cast his line in likelier waters, I reflected. I wished him joy of her, but it did seem a trifle much that we should now share two men.

I proceeded on to the tent and found Mr. Stoker pacing by the back flap.

“Finally! Where in the name of hell have you been?”

“Eavesdropping,” I said with deliberate sweetness.

He stopped and stared at me. “What—”

I reached up and applied my handkerchief to his face, scrubbing vigorously. “You have lip rouge on your mouth.”

He had the grace to blush. “Yes, well, that was—”

“That was none of my business, but you look quite ludicrous. Quite ludicrous indeed. If you mean to exchange favors with Salome, I would only ask that you attempt a little discretion. We must give the appearance of content married life if the masquerade is to be credible, must we not?”

He snatched the handkerchief out of my hand. “Give me that! You’ve rubbed my skin raw.”

I gave him a look of mock contrition. “Oh, I do apologize. It is such a garish shade, it is quite difficult to remove.”

He scrubbed at his own face. “Better?”

“Yes, although there is some on your collar. And you might want to attend to the top button on your trousers.”

He muttered a curse, but I gave him a brilliant smile. “It sounds like a very full house tonight.”

“Veronica, about Salome—”

I placed a hand on his sleeve. “Really, Mr. Stoker, you needn’t bother. I assure you she does not trouble me in the least. If you decide to pay a call upon her, I shan’t wait up. I will just leave the bolt on the caravan door undone. You can let yourself in—only do be quiet getting into bed, won’t you? I am quite tired this evening and would so hate to be awakened.”

He stared at me openmouthed, then snapped his jaw shut and took me hard by the wrist, half dragging me to the flap.

I smiled to myself that I had provoked him to such a fine display of temper, but I was by no means finished. I had not even begun.

We stood outside the tent, listening to the incoming crowd, a thin layer of canvas providing us with a modest bit of privacy. “They sound keen,” I remarked. “Almost as keen as you in the arms of the delicious Salome.”

He whirled on me. “That is enough,” he growled. “I swear to the devil, Veronica, if you vex me further, I will not be responsible for my actions.”

“Oh, come now, Mr. Stoker. You will have to do better than that if you mean to make me afraid of you. I have been menaced more effectively by poodles.”

“God, you have a vicious tongue,” he retorted. “But I am no more afraid of you than you are of me. I have little doubt your bark is worse than your bite.”

“How do you know, Mr. Stoker? I haven’t bitten you yet.”

I leaned close and snapped my teeth, a whisper away from his nose. He bent to me and my lips parted of their own volition. My fingers crept to his shirtfront and I could feel the pounding of his heart under my palms. His hands were curled into fists, and he held them at his sides, as if fighting the urge to touch me with every particle of his being. His mouth was a breath away from mine, and yet he did not move closer. He did not finish it. He simply stood, as perfectly still as one of the mounts in his own workshop, captured in a moment that stretched tautly into an eternity.

I was conscious of a curious buzzing in my ears and realized it was my own excitement fizzing in my blood. I understood then what a significant miscalculation I had made. I had thought to toy with him and instead had managed to rouse myself to a fever pitch. Whatever pleasant dalliances I had enjoyed in the past, those interludes would be drops in the ocean compared to the tidal wave of this man. And the knowledge of that shook my composure to the core—a composure I would not, could not, afford to lose. Worse still, I had used my trick of prodding his temper to provoke something entirely different, and it felt suddenly shabby and mean to have done so.

I stepped sharply backward, letting my hands fall, empty, to my sides.

“How uncivil of me,” I told him, forcing my tone to lightness. “I do apologize.”