by Alys Murray
“Fine.” Sam’s jaw tightened.
“He was plenty embarrassing at the party last night. Good choice. He really looks smitten with you. It’ll make for a good laugh when all of this is over.”
“He isn’t a laugh,” Sam countered. “He’s a person.”
The defense was soft and brittle, too quiet to be heard. She was too cowardly. At the end of the day, no matter how she hated it and him, Captain held her future in his clammy, wandering paws. Appearances and deference were important. She could no longer be the woman she was last night… Or the person she was this morning when she got caught singing to herself in the shower.
“I came here to ask you something. Not as your regent, but as…” Captain ran a hand through his unruly hair. “Whatever I am to you.”
Nothing. You’re less than the dirt I walk on, the liquor I pour down the drain at the end of the night, and the mud between my toes after running barefoot through the rain.
“Yeah.” Sam sank into the nearest chair. Captain would say whatever he wanted to say no matter her feelings on the matter. Might as well be comfortable. “Shoot.”
From her place at the edge of an overstuffed cushion, she watched her unexpected guest. He stood in one of the windows overlooking the whole property, and a freezing chill gripped its spindly hands around her throat. Cold eyes surveyed her family’s grounds with the same hungry glare he served her every time they were in close company.
“There’s a ball tomorrow evening and I would like for you to attend. As my date.”
Would you give me the great pleasure of being my date to a ball at Ashbrooke Manor this Friday? That’s how Daniel asked her out. His was a question, a choice, a decision he hopefully laid at Sam’s feet.
All leftover glow from Sam’s one spectacular night vanished. Captain didn’t even have the decency to pretend she could choose. Where Captain was concerned, she knew the word no was no longer a part of her vocabulary. For so long, she assumed he only liked to threaten this sort of forced intimacy. The random groping, the heavy breath he laid on her skin every time he got too close, the lewd comments… She always assumed he relished the power trip. Now, she wasn’t so certain. Maybe this was bigger than her, bigger than the psychosexual games he’d been playing since she first declared herself a candidate for Animos.
Maybe this was about Ashbrooke. Marrying a duke’s daughter would certainly move him up in the world. And there was nothing to set Captain apart in this world like his unbridled ambition.
The air in the room hardened to unbreathable lead, filling up Sam’s lungs with heavy metal. You swore you wouldn’t do this, she admonished the shivering muscle in her rib cage. You swore you would have your one night of freedom and be content forever… At least until you’re a member of Animos. You have to accept him.
“I’m flattered,” Sam replied, as if she’d been delivered a body bag.
“I thought you’d be.”
He was so knowing and magnanimous; she had to know. “Why?”
Laughter broke the air. It wasn’t the belly laugh Daniel let loose when she made a sly joke. This was malicious. Taunting. She heard his laughter in the same way she heard everything Captain ever said to her—as a threat.
“Don’t play coy.” He glided from his post at the window to the place where Sam perched herself. If he saw that her hands were shaking, he didn’t care. “I’ve noticed the way you look at me, the little rebellions you try during your Animos tasks, the way you danced with your mechanic last night. You’ve been trying to get my attention. I have to give credit where it’s due. It’s worked.”
“I don’t want anyone to think I got into the Society because I’m your girlfriend,” she countered, refusing to open her mouth too wide in case the bile filling up her throat took its chance and escaped.
“Then we won’t put labels on it,” Captain said, in what Sam assumed was supposed to be a seduction. He towered over her, casting his long shadow over her pale face.
“I’m flattered. Really.”
There should have been a but in there somewhere. In this, as in everything, she held fast to her mantra. A little pain now is worth a victory later. Suffering Captain would be worth it when her father cared about her.
A silent scream clawed at Sam’s throat, desperate to get out. She bit her lip to keep it contained.
“Good.” Captain clapped his hands together. “I’ll send a car for you at seven.”
More instructions froze on his lips as Mrs. Long entered the living room, her face obscured by a wine bottle stuffed with wildflowers. The bouquet wasn’t anywhere close to a professional arrangement, something crafted by florists or even someone with an eye for color, but it was so thoughtfully constructed Sam wanted to buy a house of her own to fill them with bouquets like it.
Her rushing blood shuddered. Flowers… For her?
“Miss Dubarry. I’m sorry to bother you again, but this has come for you.”
Sam reached for the wine bottle. Tied to the glass with a thick ribbon of twine was a note, scribbled in hasty script. She scanned the scrawl, her nose buried in the fresh hillside scents of the flowers.
“What is that?” Captain sneered.
He reached for the card, but Sam ducked out of his reach.
Dear Sam,
Tolstoy (See? I’m well read for a kid who went to state school!) once said, “We are asleep until we fall in love.” If he’s right, it would explain why I’ve felt like I’m on caffeine pills since meeting you. Even better, if I’m finally awake, it means last night wasn’t a dream.
Yours,
Daniel.
P.S.- My band is playing at my bookshop’s open mic night on Sunday… There’s this agent coming and I’m nervous and…anyway, I’d love to look out into the crowd and see you there.
P.P.S.- I haven’t ever read Tolstoy. My mother has the quote cross-stitched onto a pillow. I didn’t want to lie to you.
Before she knew it, Sam pocketed the letter and took another deep breath of wildflowers. Captain couldn’t keep her out of the Animos for refusing to date him. Well, he could, but then he’d make an enemy of her father.
“I’m sorry, Captain. I have other plans tomorrow.”
Chapter Thirteen
Sam had only been invited into her father’s office once. When she first arrived at Ashbrooke over two years ago, he’d called her into his chamber to “discuss the practicalities” of her new life. It was clear, from the tense set of his shoulders to the terse, clipped sentences he directed at her, that he’d not been as eager as his son to welcome her into their home. He spoke of family, honor, and her new duty to her station before dismissing her without an invitation to ever return.
But when she woke up on the morning of Daniel’s open mic night, she also woke up to a small card under her door that read:
From the Desk of Lord Thomas Dubarry.
My office. Ten thirty.
Direct. Blunt. Not necessarily the flowery cards she expected other children got from their parents, but it was something. A chance to talk to him one-on-one, something he hadn’t voluntarily done since her first week home. So, at ten thirty a.m., with her hair set in a perfect bun and her reliable blazer-trousers combination pressed, she knocked on her father’s door, hoping he couldn’t hear the nervous gurgle of her stomach through the thick wall separating them.
“Come in.” She did so, revealing the room behind. Lord Dubarry’s office reflected the man it belonged to, though he surely had inherited the interior design rather than selected it. Dark stains on the oak paneling glinted from the fireplace’s light. The rich brown and maroon decor soaked up all of the heat. His hand-carved desk was stacked high with papers and a brand-new computer. A china teacup steamed the air. A painting of the man in his younger years and a hunting dog Sam had never seen before hung over the mantel, reigning above his domain. Despite having invited her and despite the fact that he’d set the appointment, he didn’t glance up from his computer, nor did he greet her or offer her a ch
air.
“You wanted to see me?”
“Yes. I received a telephone call from Reginald Wavell’s father.”
A good moment passed before Sam remembered that Captain wasn’t his real name. Reginald was. She stepped closer to the fire to warm the sudden chill from her bones.
“Oh? And what did he have to say?”
“He was rather concerned, actually. Said something about your dating our mechanic even though Reginald’s made his interest in you clear.” With his thin, gold-rimmed reading glasses firmly at the end of his nose, he delivered a brutally invested stare. Brutal because he’d never been this invested in her before. His voice dropped from lightly distracted to pointed and low. “I don’t mind anything you do with the help, but stories like this can’t be getting out, do you understand?”
“I’m just—”
“If you’re going to be a member of this family, you’ll do everything that requires. Getting into Oxford was a good start. Animos is even better. But we have a reputation. We have a duty to this house and our name, do you understand?”
“He’s my Mud Duck. I have to cultivate him.”
“Samantha. I don’t care what you do in private. But Animos is meant to be secretive. So, keep your secrets. And maintain our family’s dignity as much as you can.”
As much as you can. With those words, he’d said everything she knew he wanted to say. Your presence here is a stain on this house as it is. Your connection to this family has shamed us enough as it is. You’re living proof of my failure. Don’t make matters worse.
“Yes, sir,” she said, a small miracle, considering her throat was so tight she could barely breathe.
“And Reginald’s a good boy. He’s from good stock. Maybe we could invite his family for a dinner or something.”
“Yes, sir.”
An image formed in her head, an image of everything she thought she wanted. Sitting beside her father at a long, overflowing dinner table, surrounded by his peers, hearing him claim her as his own. But when she focused on that dream for too long, she realized it wasn’t Captain sitting on the other side of her. It was Daniel.
Taking a long sip from his teacup, he nodded at her. “How has your initiation been going? All well, I trust?”
“Yes, sir. It’s tough, but I’ll make it through.”
“Yes, I believe you will. I look forward to seeing you in Animos blues, Samantha. Joining the family tradition. Good on you.”
Sam’s heart lifted. It was, in all of her life, the nicest thing he’d ever said to her. And it was all because of Animos.
It was working.
“Thank you.”
“Keep up the good work.”
…
Sunday night came with no word from Sam, not even to reply to the oh-so-funny cat gifs Daniel sent her as a means of distracting himself from the terror that tonight held. Now, with his performance so close at hand, he stood in the densely packed Crowdwell’s Bookshop, scanning the room for any sign of her. These open mic nights were usually his favorite way to unwind after a long week. His day job might have been fixing up nice cars for an old geezer and restocking bookshelves; the menial, manual labor of his days only made his Sunday evenings sweeter. He usually would have been hunched over a table and a pint by now, sandwiched by Angie and some of their musician pals, talking shop about guitars and demos and Prince. Instead, Daniel stationed himself by the door, waiting for her.
“Big night tonight, Danny Boy.” Angie hopped next to him, offering him a longneck of cider. When he refused it, swatting the sweating bottle away like trash, she shrugged and brought the drink to her lips as if to say more for me.
“You know, I think I’m not feeling really well.”
“Oh, no. You’re not pulling the sick card on me. Alanis came all the way from London to see you and you’re going to perform. I’ve told her all about the new song and she’s keen.”
That was a small relief, at least. After leaving Sam at her house after the Blitz Ball, he’d had to pull off on a side road and scribble down chords and lyrics. The music flowed through him, a rich, unstoppable river of sound and poetry. It was a song about her. About them. About all the things she said she didn’t believe in. The kind of song that could maybe, just maybe, melt her heart.
“I was hoping Sam would be here,” he said.
Angie folded her arms.
“You don’t need her to sing. You’ve never needed her before.”
“But I never had her before,” he countered. “How could I know I needed her if I didn’t know her?”
Angie clearly wasn’t interested in arguing with him.
“Just close your eyes and pretend you’re singing to her, then. Anything to impress our friend at table number three.”
Daniel scouted the crowd again. He counted the regulars, all strung up with their cases and kits. Natasha. Sophie. Steve. Matt. Joe. Even his parents came. They always showed up for these things. At table three, a short, suited woman with a purple-and-black bob took notes on a small pad resting upon the table. Alanis.
He had to do this. He had to sing, no matter how sick he got thinking of the empty chair he’d saved for Sam at the front and center table.
This was his dream. He had to chase it, no matter what.
“All right. Let’s do this.”
…
She meant to text Daniel and tell him she wasn’t coming. Honest, she did. Something always popped up every time she opened their thread to text. The first few times, when Thomas caught Samantha’s eyes flickering between her cell phone and the pauper’s bouquet she placed by the window near her favorite reading chair, he made a point to embarrass her about it, asking if she was texting Her Mechanic. Then, her phone died, and she’d been getting so many texts from Captain about their “date” she didn’t bother plugging it back in.
And she was a coward. A huge coward who dressed herself for a ball while trying to talk sense into her revolting heart. Her brother and her father both agreed, and Sam’s sensible side did, too. Captain was the expected, respectable choice. An inevitability she needed to get used to. Her father had set her on a collision course with him, and she couldn’t find the brakes. Daniel was a distraction.
A useful Mud Duck of a distraction, but a distraction all the same.
Yet, when she got into her car, ball gown and all, she thought about spending the night with Captain, dancing in his arms, feeling his hot breath against her ear. And somehow, through those waking nightmares, her car just…sort of drove itself away from the address Captain had sent her. And before she knew it, she was standing on a blustery street in a gown of chiffon and lace, staring through frosted windows at the golden haze coming from inside of the shop.
An aging woman in an oversize sweater leaned against a nearby wall and smoked, tugging nicotine clouds into her mouth before releasing them into the chilly air around her.
“Well. Look what the cat dragged in.”
“Pardon me?”
“You’re her, aren’t you?” The woman gazed at her once from head to toe, drinking in the obnoxious gown, a surefire giveaway of exactly who she was. “The lord’s daughter.”
“Sam. I’m Sam. I’m a friend of—”
“Yeah. I know all about you.” She dropped her cigarette, stomping the embers of the ash into the cobblestones. “He told me what you said to him.”
Sam didn’t need specification. The old woman’s voice was hard enough to explain everything. Whoever she was, Daniel told her about the penniless guitar player insults.
“And I’m so sorry about what I said. I lost my cool, and—”
“Daniel’s a good boy. He deserves better than lost my cool.”
There was maybe no one on earth who understood as well as Sam what Daniel Best did and did not deserve. She was doling out both in heaping measures.
“I know. Believe me, I know—”
A sudden arrival halted the heated chat. A woman with a bob of blindingly red hair, hair like a tropical sunrise
, appeared from the nearby alleyway. She wore a Crowdwell’s Bookshop T-shirt under an army-green jacket, Sam’s only hint this might be a friendly intrusion.
“You must be Sam!” The woman slapped her hand into a vigorous shake. The gesture was friendly and peaceful, but the rest of her was guarded. She, too, must have been skeptical of Sam’s presence here, though not nearly as much as the chain-smoking woman. “I’m Angie. Danny’s mate. God,” she said, then popped a mouthful of air between her lips. “You couldn’t look richer if you tried, could you?”
Sam could have taken offense, but instead she chuckled and returned the good-natured jest. She recognized this kind of teasing from Daniel. “I did leave my tiara at home.”
“Is she bothering you?” Angie asked, pointing at the woman, who had, by now, lit up yet another cigarette.
“I’m looking out for my grandson,” she defended.
“Nan.” Ah, this must be the famous Nan about whom Daniel talked often. “Sam here’s fine. She and Danny were out until six yesterday morning.” Angie wiggled her eyebrows suggestively. “She’s back in the good books.”
“His good books, maybe. He writes his good books in Sharpie and his bad books in pencil. Mine’s the other way around.”
Angie rolled her eyes and looped her arm through Sam’s.
“Let’s get out of here before she starts breathing fire.”
When she was sure they were at least mostly out of earshot, Sam whispered, “She’s intense.”
“She’s not usually so aggressive. Danny’s her baby, though. She’s very protective.”
“I really didn’t mean what I said to Daniel about—”
“You don’t have to tell me.” Angie pressed her ear to Crowdwell’s wooden door. She listened for a moment, backed away, and nudged Sam along. “Here. He’s about to go on. There’s a seat saved for you in front.”
Sam always tried to listen to her intuition. Her mother, as bad a mother as she was, did give her one useful piece of advice: Always listen to your intuition. It knows more than you do.