A Girl Divided

by Ellen Lindseth

  Joe cleared his throat. “The band is good tonight. Just right for dancing.”

  “Do you think so?” she asked, eager to keep the conversation going. “I was telling Ted earlier that I’ve never danced.”

  “That’s right.” Ted abruptly scooted his chair back, startling her. “And I promised you a dance lesson, Miss Baker.”

  “Shouldn’t we wait for our drinks first?” she asked, still perplexed by his sudden shift in mood.

  “It’s not like they’re gonna go anywhere without us.” He cocked an eyebrow. “Or are you afraid to dance with me?”

  He held out his hand to her.

  “What about Joe?” She stared at his hand, her heart racing with excitement and nerves.

  She wasn’t completely ignorant of dance positions. To be done properly, a woman would have to allow a man to stand very close to her. To touch her. Not inappropriately, of course, but still . . .

  “I’ll be fine,” Joe said with a slight smile. “You kids run along, and I’ll watch your drinks.”

  “If you’re sure . . . ,” she said, but Ted was already tugging her out of her chair. Giving in to the inevitable, she followed him to the small dance floor, where several other couples already danced.

  The infectious rhythm was so different from the music she had grown up with, the tunes a little discordant even. But none of that mattered once Ted turned her in his arms. His tan shirt with its gold wings over the pocket and the perfectly tied knot of his brown tie was all she could see. She frowned slightly as a pleasant, almost spicy fragrance teased her nose, reminding her of forests and crushed mint.

  She glanced up, and her suspicions were confirmed by his smoothly shaved jaw. “You changed clothes.”

  His lips twitched. “So did you.”

  Yes, but he had likely bathed, something she hadn’t had time for with the fuss over the still-unconscious Lavinia and Nathan’s lecture.

  “First off, you gotta relax,” he teased as he set her left hand on his shoulder and took her right. “Dancing is supposed to be fun.”

  “I know.” She inwardly winced at how shrewish she sounded. With an effort, she forced herself not to think about baths and the weight of unwanted responsibilities. Better to focus on Ted’s shoulders, which were so wonderfully solid and strong under her palm, and on the flexing of his muscles under her fingertips. It was like holding on to sun-warmed granite. Her skin was nearly scorched by the heat radiating through the smooth tan fabric.

  “So dancing is easy,” he continued, oblivious to the turn her thoughts had taken. “All you have to do is follow my lead. Meaning, if I move this way”—he stepped to the right, taking her with him—“you follow. And if I move this way . . .”

  He stepped to the left.

  “I follow?” she guessed as he tugged on her hand, urging her to move with him.

  “Just so.” His smile deepened, revealing a faint dimple on one side.

  Her breath caught, and she managed to completely miss her next cue to move. She hurried to mimic his movement, only to be left behind again when he switched directions.

  Mentally kicking herself, she made herself focus on the dance. Finally, her feet caught on to what they were supposed to do, and she made it through the rest of the song without a mistake.

  Pleased with herself, she grinned up at him. “This is easier than I thought.”

  “Told you.” His dark eyes sparkled with humor and approval.

  Suddenly self-conscious, she glanced at the couple next to them. The serviceman twirled his dance partner in and out of his arms. The girl laughed, her face flushed and happy.

  “Are we going to dance like that?” she asked.

  He chuckled. “Not tonight. You gotta walk before you can run.”

  To her delight, he didn’t release her when the song ended. The next song was faster, requiring more concentration on her part. A silence fell between them that should have been awkward, but it wasn’t. His movements remained smooth and controlled, his muscles relaxed under her fingers. She had the sense that he was enjoying himself, so she stopped worrying and sank into the moment.

  Ted hummed softly to himself as he added a turn to her repertoire of dance steps, not even wincing when she stepped on his foot.

  “Sorry!”

  “I’m fine. Don’t worry about it. You’re learning.” He went back to humming.

  “You know this tune?”

  “‘Begin the Beguine.’ Fred Astaire danced to it in Broadway Melody of 1940. Wonderful flick. You even look a little like Eleanor Powell, except for the color of your hair.”

  “Who?”

  “That’s right, you wouldn’t know. I bet you didn’t get too many movies in your town.”

  “No.” She paused for a second to get back on beat and then continued. “Though when we lived in Hankow, my father took me to see several. Mostly Chinese ones directed by a friend of his, but once we went to see one starring Shirley Temple.”

  “No offense, but I’m having trouble picturing your father at the movies.”

  “Why? He quite enjoyed them, actually. Particularly if they demonstrated good morals. One of his favorites was—oh, how should I translate it—Spring Dream in Peking. I think that’s close. Anyway, it was about a man who falls in love with an evil woman, who encourages him to seek success through trickery and corruption. Of course it all falls apart, leaving him with nothing but a memory, a ‘spring dream.’”

  “Not exactly light fare for a young child. How old were you at the time?”

  “Ten, I think. It was the last movie I saw before we moved to the mountains.”

  “That had to be quite the adjustment. Did you miss the city?”

  “No.” Her answer was easy and immediate. “I had everything I loved with me, so there was nothing to miss.”

  He was quiet a moment, and she sensed he was turning something over in his mind. “You’re an interesting girl, Miss Baker. Not what I expected.”

  “My father used to tell me I was one of a kind,” she said with an embarrassed laugh. Then unexpected despair swamped her, and she couldn’t breathe. “What if I never see him again?”

  Her damp cheek was suddenly pressed against smooth fabric, Ted’s arms tight around her.

  “It’s all right. You’ll see him again. If not in this world, then in the next.”

  “I thought you didn’t believe in heaven,” she said around a sniff. His heartbeat was steady under her ear.

  “Some things stick, even after you grow up.”

  She pushed back in his arms and searched his dark eyes, her heart full. “Because you want to see your mother again. Like I want to see mine.”

  “Yeah.” He held her gaze for a long moment, and she felt as though she could fall into the mahogany depths, never to resurface. “We should probably go back to the table. Our drinks have arrived.”

  She leaped back, mortified by how she had been staring at him. It’s embarrassing how you throw yourself at him. Nathan’s words sank like a dagger into her chest.

  “It looks like Joe ordered us some food, too.” Ted gestured for her to lead the way. “Good man!”

  She started for the table when she caught sight of George by the bar. He was chatting with a dark-haired woman in a green dress that left little to the imagination. Unexpectedly, his hand slid down the woman’s back to rest familiarly on her buttocks.

  Actually, he was doing more than resting his hand on the silk-clad cheek; he was actively massaging it, the emerald fabric bunching under his fingers.

  Genie tripped.

  “Hang on. You all right?” Ted asked, steadying her.

  “Yes . . . I . . . does George know that woman?”

  Ted turned to follow her gaze. After what sounded like a muffled expletive, he immediately redirected her movements, cutting off her view. “Forget you saw that.”

  “But he was . . .” A curious tension curled deep in her body as she sought the words to describe the scene, her mind’s eye caught by the sensua
l ripple of silk as it caught between his fingers, the displacement of the woman’s soft flesh beneath the fabric. Heat climbed up her neck, leaving her flushed, shaky.

  “Doing nothing you needed to see. I guess they’ve lowered their standards since the last time I was through.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Never mind. They’ll be leaving soon enough.”

  Joe stood politely as she reached the table. “You kids have fun?”

  “When did they start letting birds in?” Ted asked angrily before she could say a word.

  Joe looked around the club. His eyebrows rose when his gaze reached the bar area. “Well, well . . . so that’s why George sent a waiter back with the drinks.”

  “Warn me if he starts to bring her in this direction,” Ted growled as he pulled out her chair. She sat, still at a loss as to what was going on.

  “No worries about that,” Joe said, resuming his own seat. “They’re heading toward the door.”

  “What . . . ,” she began, and then the pieces began to fit: Ted’s discomfort, George’s hand so low, the tight dress, “birds” . . . birds of paradise, her father had once called them. “That woman was selling herself? She was a prostitute?”

  She knew about prostitution, of course. The world’s oldest profession was mentioned several times in the Bible, and missionaries everywhere worked to stop the trade. She just hadn’t seen a fallen woman in the flesh before. Nor ever thought she’d know, no matter how tenuously, a customer of one.

  Ted sat beside her, his dark eyes apologetic. “I’m sorry, Miss Baker. They tend to show up anywhere there are soldiers, tonight being no different. It used to be they had to work their trade outside the club, but I guess times have changed.”

  Joe only shrugged and stubbed out his cigarette in the metal ashtray.

  Her gaze flicked to the bar again. Joe was right. George was gone. Both he and the girl, actually. Her stomach clenched, but not with disgust as she had expected. Her emotions weren’t nearly that uncomplicated. To her shame, beneath her discomfort also lurked a certain fascination.

  Picking up her fork, she couldn’t stop herself from wondering what would happen next. Where would the two conduct their business? In a room with a bed? An alley? Would they both disrobe? Or only the girl?

  Would she, the girl, like it?

  At that thought, she forgot to swallow and breathe separately, and choked. She hurriedly reached for her club soda as Ted smacked her on the back.

  “Are you all right?” he asked.

  She managed a smile over her glass. “Fine.”

  The rest of the meal passed in relative quiet. Ted concentrated on eating like a man who hadn’t seen food in days. Joe smoked more than he ate, seemingly lost in his own thoughts. Her own appetite subdued by worry and nerves, she picked at the unfamiliar and spicy food on her plate. Her attention kept drifting toward the dance floor and the laughing couples.

  If only Ted would ask her to dance again . . . or, of course, she could suggest it herself . . .

  But she didn’t.

  At last, Ted settled up the bill, and the evening was over.

  Chin stood and bowed politely as they started to take their leave. “It was a pleasure dining with you, Miss Baker. Perhaps we’ll meet again.”

  “Perhaps when I return to China,” she said, smiling at him.

  He returned her smile, but it was touched with a sadness she didn’t want to see.

  She would return to China, and soon. The war couldn’t go on forever.

  Ted hailed another cab, and soon they were on their way back to the hotel. Part of her rebelled, not wanting to let go of the evening quite yet. She had loved dancing with him, enjoyed listening to him discuss politics, and she held his admission that he wanted to see his mother again close to her heart. There was so much she wanted to thank him for, so much she wanted to say into the warm velvety darkness of the cab.

  “Was that woman really selling herself?” The words were out before she realized what she was asking, and then she wanted to sink through the seat. That was not what she had intended to say.

  Ted sighed. “Genie, you need to forget you saw any of that. Sterling will skin me alive if he finds out.”

  “Was she?” She might as well find out, now that she had asked.

  “Yes. And before you ask, no, I have never been with one, so any other questions you have on the subject will have to wait for someone else.”

  “Oh.” His admission eased the knot in her stomach. “Why not?”

  “Because I can’t get past that they’re somebody’s sister or daughter. Maybe even mother.”

  Ted opened his door and swung his legs out of the car. With a start she realized they were already at the hotel, and the evening was well and truly over. She slid out his side while Ted paid the driver. Then the cab was gone, leaving her and Ted alone on the sidewalk in front of the hotel.

  “Well, here you are, Miss Baker,” he said, his easy smile back in place. “Back at your hotel, safe and sound.”

  A curious panic gripped her as she realized this might be the last time she saw him.

  “I enjoyed the evening tremendously. I’d like to go on being friends. Can I write to you?”

  He was already shaking his head before she had even finished her question. “I’m not sure that would be a good idea, Genie.”

  “Why not?” She searched his face in the dim streetlight. “Friends write to friends all the time. And we’re friends, aren’t we?”

  “And what would your fiancé say about you writing other men?”

  “He’s not my fiancé,” she protested, but she could tell from his expression he didn’t believe her.

  He took a step back. “Genie, look—you’re a swell kid, and I enjoyed getting to know you.”

  “But you’re not interested . . .” Her voice trailed off, her emotions too raw to voice. Abruptly, she turned her gaze to the darkened buildings down the block, afraid she might cry if she looked at him.

  “I didn’t say that,” he said a touch sharply.

  “Then why can’t I write you? Am I so repellent?” she cried, and then pressed a fist to her lips to seal in her despair. She would not embarrass herself any further.

  “Oh hell.” He pulled her into his arms and held her tightly. She reveled in the feel of his body against her cheek, the strength of his arms, and the beat of his heart, steady and strong beneath her ear. “Genie, sweetheart, it’s been a hard couple of weeks for you. But once you get to the States and you’re safe with your aunt, you’ll forget how you feel right now. I’ll be just some pilot you knew, some guy who taught you to dance.”

  “That’s not true.”

  He tipped her chin up. “It is true. You have your whole life ahead of you, with much better men waiting to make your acquaintance. If not Sterling, then someone else. Someone you’ll have more in common with—”

  “How can you say that?” Angry tears blurred her vision as she pushed back out of his arms. “We’ve both lost our mothers; we’ve both been forced to leave the lands of our birth. We have lots in common. Or am I just too ug—”

  “Genie, stop.” He caught her, his fingers flexing into her shoulders as she tried to turn away. She resisted as he pulled her toward him, her mortification beyond what anybody should handle as he forced her to look at him. And then his lips were on hers. Her breath caught. She hadn’t expected that. A queer numbness, almost like a hum, not at all unpleasant, spread through her blood. The warmth of it sang all the way down to her toes, and she clutched his shirt to keep herself from tilting along with her world.

  Her first kiss . . .

  Too soon his mouth left hers, taking a part of her heart with it. She struggled to breathe normally as he brushed a strand of her hair out of her face. She shivered under his touch.

  “Take care of yourself, Eugenia Baker.” His voice was soft, tender. “And stay out of trouble. I don’t want to read about you in the papers.”

  “You too.” Stay a
live, she wanted to add. Please.

  Stepping back, he gave her a brief salute with his first two fingers and smiled. “Roger that.”

  Then he turned and walked off down the darkened street. After a heartbeat or two, he began to whistle, and her heart followed the sound. When he was gone, she turned and entered the hotel.

  “It’s about time you came back.”

  She jumped and whirled to face Nathan. “What are you doing here?”

  “Not making a spectacle of myself, for one.” There was no mistaking the frost in his eyes. “I can only be thankful Brother Marcus didn’t see you.”

  She turned toward the lobby, hoping to hide the flush stealing up her neck. “I would hardly call a kiss goodbye a spectacle.”

  “I disagree. And it shows a weakness of character that, frankly, I find concerning.”

  She drew a deep breath to rein in her temper. “It was a kiss, Nathan.”

  “With someone who is neither family nor fiancé.”

  She threw up her hands in exasperation. “And have you never kissed someone who wasn’t family?”

  “No. I haven’t.” An answer that didn’t surprise her in the least. He gestured across the lobby. “I’ll accompany you to your room.”

  “That’s hardly necessary.”

  “Perhaps not, but I insist. And I’ve decided you’re right,” he said as they began to walk. “We are not well suited to each other. I’ll not trouble you with talk of marriage again.”

  Chapter 14

  “Eugenia.” Someone shook her shoulder, interrupting her dance with Ted. She pushed the disruption away. Whatever they wanted could wait until later. Right now she was exactly where she wanted to be . . . in the gardens outside the club . . . with hidden birds chirping in the foliage. She slipped back into Ted’s arms, and he smiled lazily at her.

  Her skin tingled with anticipation as his dark eyes glinted with wicked intention. He was going to kiss her.

  “Genie!”

  The voice was louder, more insistent. She frowned with annoyance as she recognized the intruder. What did Nathan want with her now? Couldn’t he see she was having one of the best dreams of—