This Wicked Gift

by Courtney Milan

  “Because I’ll go to the devil before Lavinia kisses a scoundrel worse than me.”

  James stopped and cocked his head. In that instant William saw in the boy’s posture something of Lavinia—a chance similarity, perhaps, in the way his eyes seemed to penetrate through William’s skin. William felt suddenly translucent, as if all of his foolish wants, his wistful longing for Lavinia, were laid out in neat rows for this boy’s examination. He didn’t want to see those feelings himself. He surely didn’t want this child sitting in judgment over affections that could never be.

  William shook his head. “No.”

  Her brother had not said a word, but still William felt he must deny what had gone unspoken. “Don’t look at me like that. I can’t care for her, you idiot, so you’d better start.”

  James could not have accrued any substance to his frame in these few minutes. Still, when he lifted his chin, he looked taller. “Don’t worry,” he said quietly. “I will.”

  LAVINIA HEARD HER BROTHER’S FOOTSTEPS fall heavily on the stairs that led to their living quarters. James had seen her embracing a strange man. Half an hour ago he’d followed William outside. Now he was coming back, and she didn’t have answers for any of the questions he might put to her. She didn’t want to defend her virtue tonight. Instead she stared at the account books in front of her. Industriousness would ward off any hard questions.

  She forced herself to concentrate on the numbers in front of her. Five plus six plus thirteen made four-and-twenty….

  The door squeaked behind James, and then closed.

  Four-and-twenty plus twelve plus seventeen was fifty-three.

  He crossed the room and stood behind her. She could hear the quiet rush of a resigned exhalation. Still, Lavinia pretended she couldn’t hear him. Yes, that was it. She was so engrossed in the books that she didn’t even notice he was breathing down her neck.

  Fifty-three and fifteen made sixty-eight.

  “Vinny,” James said quietly. “I don’t think you should always be the one to slave away over these books. Isn’t it about time I began to take over?”

  No accusations. It would have been easier if she’d been able to lie to him. Lavinia carefully laid her pen down and turned to her brother. His eyes were large, not with accusation, but with the weight of responsibility. She’d wanted to save him from that.

  “Oh, James.” Lavinia arranged the lapels of his damp coat into some semblance of order. “That’s very sweet of you.”

  “I’m not being sweet. It’s necessary. I need to be able to manage without you.”

  Why? I can do it better.

  She caught the words before they came out of her mouth. How many times had James offered to help, in his awkward way? How many times had she refused him? She couldn’t even count.

  “After all,” he continued, his voice slow, “you might marry.”

  “I’m not getting married.” Her denial came too fast; her light tone sounded too forced. He’d seen her with William. And even though he hadn’t actually caught them kissing, they’d been clasping hands in easy intimacy. How was she supposed to explain to her younger brother she had engaged in such conduct with a man she was not marrying? Best to talk of something else.

  But before she could offer up even the most ham-handed change of subject, James let out a slow breath. “Still. Should I not help?”

  What had William said about them? Oh God. Had he told James the embarrassing details? Lavinia’s hand shook, ever so slightly, where it rested on her brother’s coat. “You’re right. Maybe I can assign you some task—something small.”

  He frowned and folded his arms. “I should have thought you would be happy to step down.”

  Step down? Step down! That would ruin everything. Her brother had no notion how to argue with creditors for a favorable repayment schedule; he’d not learned how to account precisely for the location of every volume in the library. If she left the shop to him, he’d lose a ha’penny here, a ha’penny there, until the flow of cash dried up. The library would falter and then fail. Everything she’d worked for would fall to pieces.

  James didn’t seem aware he’d just proposed complete disaster. He continued on, as if he were a reasonable person. “I think I should be able to handle the work very well. I am almost sixteen years of age.”

  “James.” In her ears, her voice sounded flat and emotionless. “I can’t step down. There are too many things to remember.”

  “So you can tell me what to do at first.”

  “I can’t tell you everything! Would you think to save pennies each day, so we might have a Christmas celebration? Would you think to bargain with the apothecary, giving him priority on the new volumes in exchange for a discount on medicines?”

  She could see his fine plans crumbling, his desire to do more faltering. He drew his brows down. “Would it be so awful, then, if I made a mistake or two? I just want to do my part.”

  Lavinia shut the account book in front of her. “If it weren’t for your mistakes,” she said, her voice shaking, “we’d be having a real celebration on Christmas, just like Mother gave us. It would be as if she were not gone. Now we’re having nothing. Why do you suppose I’m staring at the accounts, if not to conjure up the coins you lost?”

  His face flushed with embarrassment and anger. “I said I was sorry already. What more do you want from me? You’re not my mother. Stop acting as if you are.”

  “That’s not fair. I’m just trying to make you happy.” She wasn’t sure when her voice had started to rise, when she had begun to clench her hands.

  Her brother shook his head. “You’re doing a bang-up job of that, then. So far, all you’ve managed to do is make me miserable.” He stomped away. He couldn’t get far; the flat was simply too small. He paused on the edge of his chamber, and then turned. “I despise you,” he said. A second later the door to his chamber slammed. The walls rattled.

  Lavinia curled her arms around herself. He didn’t hate her. He wasn’t miserable. He was just…momentarily upset?

  “One day,” she said softly, “you will understand how idyllic your childhood has been. You have nothing to worry about. That’s what I’ve saved you from.”

  She clenched her hands around the account book, the leather binding biting into her palms. Then she opened the book carefully and found the spot where she’d left off adding columns.

  Fifty-three and fifteen made sixty-six….

  EVERY TIME LAVINIA AWOKE THAT NIGHT, tossing and turning in her narrow bed, she remembered her words to William. You thought you had forced me, and thus you dishonored yourself. She could call to mind the precise curl of his mouth as he’d realized what he’d done, the exact shape of his hands as he grasped the dimensions of his dishonor.

  She had wanted to lessen his hurt, but she’d made it worse.

  All you have managed to do is make me miserable. Not William’s words, but they seemed to apply all the same.

  No, no, no. Lavinia stood and walked to her window. Thick, choking fog filled her vision. It was past midnight, and thus it was now Christmas Eve. But it was not yet near morning. The night fog was so thick it would swallow an entire troupe of players juggling torches. It could easily hide one nineteen-year-old woman who didn’t want to be seen. She would make William feel better. She had to.

  Silently she opened her bedroom door. She crept out into the main room and removed her cloak from its peg. She found her boots with her toe, and then bent to pick them up. Slowly she crept down the not-quite-creaking stairs, and across the lending library. And then she was outside, the fog enshrouding her in its cold embrace.

  Lavinia lifted her chin, put on her boots and walked. In the few nights before Christmas, a musicians’ company sent men on the streets to play through the darkness of night. There were no players anywhere near her house, of course, but in these quiet hours before dawn, the haunting sound of twin recorders came to her in tiny snatches. The sound wafted through the fog like fairy music. She’d catch a bar, but be
fore the melody resolved itself into a recognizable tune, it slipped away, melting into the fog like the shadow of a Christmas that had not yet come.

  As she walked through the engulfing mist, those enchanted notes grew fainter and fainter. By the time she reached Norwich Court, they had disappeared altogether.

  When she arrived at his home, she realized she had no key to unlock his door. Surely, his chamber was too distant for him to hear her knock.

  A little thing like impossibility had never stopped Lavinia.

  She was systematically testing the windows when the creak of a door opening sounded behind her.

  “Lavinia?” His voice.

  She turned, her stomach churning in anticipation at the sound of her name on his lips. He stood, four feet away from her, his form barely visible through the fog. She jumped down from her uncomfortable perch on the windowsill, and would have run into his arms—but he’d crossed them in a most forbidding manner. Instead, she walked slowly toward him, her heart pounding.

  “You must be freezing.” His words reeked of disapproval. “Thank God I couldn’t sleep again. Thank God you didn’t meet anyone on your way over. If you were my—”

  She had come close enough that she saw the scowl flit over his face at that. He shut his mouth and turned away, walking into the house.

  She followed. “If I were your wife,” she threw at his retreating back, “I wouldn’t need to risk all this fog just to see you on a morning.”

  He didn’t respond. But he left the door open, and she went after him. This time, he had not climbed the stairs to his bedchamber. He was headed down a narrow cramped hall into the back of the house. Lavinia sighed and closed the door behind her.

  She was not his wife. She was not even anything to him so clean and uncomplicated as his sweetheart. She was the woman who’d made his life miserable. Still, she followed him down the hall. The narrow passage gave way to a tiny kitchen in the back of the house. Without looking at her, he pulled a chair out from under a narrow, wooden table and placed it directly by the hearth. She sat; he stoked the fire and then placed a kettle on the grate.

  For a long while he only stared into the orange ribbons that arched away from the flames. The dancing light painted his profile in glimmering yellow. His lips pressed together. His eyes were hooded. Then he shook his head and stabbed the coals with a poker. Bright sparks flew.

  “If you were my wife,” he finally said, “this moment would be a luxury—enough coal of a morning to heat the room.”

  He shook his head, set the poker down and turned away. William moved about the tiny room with the efficiency of a man used to dealing for himself. He set out a pot and cups, and then turned back to her. “If you were my wife, you’d take your bread without butter. You would mend your gloves three, four, five times over, until the material became more darn than fabric. And when the babes came, we’d have to remove from even these tiny and insupportable quarters into a part of London that is even less safe than this address. We’d have no other way to support a family.”

  “When the babes came?” Those words sent a happy thrill through her.

  He turned to contemplate the fire again. “I am not such a fool as to imagine they wouldn’t. Lavinia, if you were my wife, the babes would come. And come. And come. I couldn’t keep my hands off you. I pray one is not already on the way.”

  It was not her fog-dampened cloak that left her chilled. He spoke of putting his hands on her as if she were one more bitter sip from a cup that was already starkly devoid of happiness.

  “It would be worth it,” she said quietly. “The gloves. The bread. It would be worth it to me for the touch of your hands alone.”

  “Is that why you came here this morning?” He spoke in tones equally low to hers. “Did you come here so that I would touch you?”

  Yes. Or she’d come to touch him—to see if she could salvage the moment when he’d thought himself dishonored. He’d said once he had no notion of love. She’d wanted to show him.

  “Did you come thinking I would kiss your lips? That I would undo the ties of your cloak and let my hands slide down your skin?”

  Her body heard, and it answered. The heat of the fire flickered against her neck; she imagined its warm touch was his hands. She imagined his hands tracing down her cheek; his hands cupping the curve of her bodice and warming her breasts; his hands coaxing her nipples into hard points. She ached in tune with his every word. Her breath grew fast.

  He knelt on the floor in front of her, one knee on the ground. With that frozen, almost supercilious expression on his face, his posture seemed a gross parody of a proposal of marriage.

  “In the year since I first saw you,” he said, “I have imagined your giving yourself to me a thousand times. If these were my wildest dreams, I’d have you now. On that chair. I would spread your legs and nibble my way from your thigh to your sex. I’d slip inside you. And when I’d had my way with you, I would thank the Lord for the bruises on my knees.”

  As he spoke, her legs parted. Her sex tingled. His breath quickened to match hers. Do it. Yes, do it.

  He reached out one hand and laid it on her knee. It was the first time he’d touched her all morning, and her whole body thrilled in wicked recognition of his. She leaned forward. For one eternal second, she could taste his breath, hot and masculine, on the tip of her tongue. She stretched to meet him. But before her lips found his, he stood.

  “Lavinia.” His words sounded like a reproach. “I can’t have you in dishonor. I can’t have you in poverty. And so I will not be marrying you.”

  She stared up into his eyes. Those dark mahogany orbs seemed so far away, so implacable. She had to fix this. But before she could speak, a hissing, sputtering noise intruded from her left, and he turned away from her.

  It was the kettle, boiling with inappropriate merriment over the fire. He found a cloth. For a few minutes, he busied himself with the kettle and teapot, his back to her.

  When he finally turned back, he held a cup in his hands.

  “Here,” he said. “The very nectar of poverty. Five washings of the leaves. I believe the liquid still has some flavor.” He handed it to her. “There’s no sugar. There’s never any sugar.”

  She took the cup. He pulled his hand away quickly, before she could clasp it against the clay. In her hands, the warm mug radiated heat. Tiny black dots, the dust of broken tea leaves, swirled in the beverage.

  “You don’t speak like a poor man.” She darted a gaze up at him. “You don’t read like a poor man, either. Malthus. Smith. Craig. The Annals of Agriculture.”

  He turned away from her to pour his own cup of tea. He did not drink it. “When I was fourteen, my father, a tradesman who aspired to be more, engaged in some rather risky speculation. A friend of his had lured him in. He promised to see me through my schooling, and to settle some significant amount on me should the investment fail.”

  William lifted the mug to his mouth. But he barely wet his lips with the liquid. “The investment did fail—quite spectacularly. My father shot himself. And his friend—” he drew that last word out, a curl to his lip “—thought that a promise made to a man who killed himself was no promise at all. What little property remained was forfeit when my father was adjudged a suicide. And so down I went to London, to try and make shift for myself.”

  “Where did all this take place?”

  “Leicester. I still have the edge of their speech on my tongue. I’ve tried to eradicate it, but…”

  He looked down, moving his cup in gentle circles. Perhaps he was trying to read his own tea leaves. More likely, Lavinia thought, he was avoiding her gaze.

  “So you see, I am in fact the lowest of the low. I am the son of a suicide. I make a bare eighteen pounds a year. I was once a member of that unfortunate class that your lovely books label the deserving poor. After I had you—after I took to my bed a woman I could not afford to marry—I don’t qualify as deserving any longer. Even if I had the coin to take you as my wife, I don’t t
hink I’d have the temerity.”

  Lavinia stood, the better to knock sense into his head.

  But already he was setting down his tea, stepping away from her.

  “It’s getting on toward morning,” he said. “I’d best get you home.” And then he turned toward the hall and left her.

  Chapter Five

  WILLIAM WALKED DOWN THE HALL. He had made the matter as plain as he dared to her. She’d wanted to argue—he’d seen it in her eyes. Her words could have tied him in knots. And having to watch her deliver those arguments—having to hold his distance from her when every fiber in his being yearned toward her—had been almost impossible. But she had no way to debate straightforward gestures. He hid behind those unarguable motions now. He got his coat. He walked to the door. He opened it, and stood there in silence until she came from the kitchen.

  Even then she stopped by his arm and looked up at him. Her blue eyes seemed to see right through to the contents of his soul. So what if she took the measure of that sorry item? After all, he’d set it out for her to see, a standard tattered past the point of all repair.

  He walked outside, into the chill of early morning. She followed, her eyes liquid, her skin seeming to light with an incandescent glow against that mass of white fog. He wasn’t sure he could bear another fifteen minutes in her presence—but whatever depths he’d plumbed, he had not sunk so far as to send a woman alone into the maw of that dampening mist. Least of all Lavinia.

  Outside, Norwich Court was a silent sea of mist. Tendrils of white curled around the gaslight on the corner and combed long, thin fingers through the tangled branches of the trees. Lavinia came up behind him. He could feel the warmth of her body radiating through the fog. She was mere inches away from his embrace. She’d never felt so distant.

  “I rather think,” she said, “that I should be the one to decide if you’re deserving.”

  He hunched his shoulders deeper and drew his coat about him. “I don’t wish to speak about this at present.”