Gabriel’s smile slipped. “Your face is familiar. Are you sure Rachel never introduced us during one of my visits home?”
Julia’s eyes brightened with what looked like hope. “She didn’t introduce us, no, but we…”
“I could have sworn I’d met you before.” He wrinkled his forehead in confusion.
“Gabriel?” she prompted, trying to reveal the truth with her eyes.
He exhaled slowly, shaking his head. “No, I guess we haven’t. But you remind me of Beatrice, from Holiday’s painting. Isn’t it funny that you own it?”
If Gabriel had known what to look for, or if he’d been better at reading her, he would have seen that she appeared slightly ill and any hope on her face disappeared.
She bit her lip absently. “A—friend told me about that painting. That’s why I bought it.”
“Your friend has good taste.”
Something about her answer displeased him, but he dismissed his displeasure as derivative of the fact that she was so tense in his arms. He sighed and brought their foreheads together, his warm breath on her face. He smelled of Laphroaig and something distinctively Gabrielian and potentially dangerous.
“Julianne, I promise I won’t bite. You don’t have to be anxious.”
She stiffened, even though she knew he was trying to put her at ease. But he’d upset her countless times, and she was fatigued by it. She was not some marionette on a string that he could toy with for his own mercurial amusement, just because some blond-haired banker sent her a truffle. It seemed that this dance was simply an opportunity for him to declare his superiority.
“I don’t think this is very professional,” she began, her eyes suddenly afire.
His smile slid off his face, and his eyes flashed to hers. “No, it isn’t, Miss Mitchell. I’m not being professional with you, at all. I suppose it’s no excuse for me to claim that I wanted to dance with the prettiest girl in the club?”
Her lovely red mouth opened slightly, then he watched her press her lips together.
“I don’t believe you.”
“What, that you’re easily the most beautiful woman here? With all due respect to my sister? Or that I, cold-hearted bastard that I am, would want to dance with you to something sweet?”
“Don’t make fun of me,” she snapped.
“I’m not, Julianne.”
He flexed his arm across her lower spine, and she gasped because it did something to her on the inside. He knew it, of course, and had expected a reaction. What he did not know was that he’d touched her there before, that he’d been the first man to ever touch her there. And her skin had never quite recovered from his absence.
He watched her subsequent irritation with no little amusement. “When you aren’t frowning at me, and your eyes are large and soft, you look very pretty. You’re attractive at all times, but in those moments, you look like an angel. It’s almost as if you are…you look like…”
A sudden flash of recognition passed over his face, and Julia stopped dancing.
She squeezed his hand and looked up into his eyes, willing him to remember. “What, Gabriel? Do I look like someone?”
The expression on his face vanished as quickly as it appeared, and he shook his head, smiling at her indulgently. “Just a passing fancy. Don’t worry, Miss Mitchell, the dance is almost over. Then you’ll be free of me.”
“I only wish I could be,” she mumbled.
“What’s that?” He brought his forehead close to hers again.
Without thinking about how intimate the action would be, he released her hand and slowly pushed a lock of her hair aside, the backs of his fingers trailing across the skin at her neck much longer than necessary.
“You’re lovely,” he whispered.
“I feel like Cinderella. Rachel bought my dress and my shoes.” Julia changed the subject quickly.
He withdrew his hand. “Do you really feel like Cinderella?”
She nodded.
“It takes so little to make you happy,” he said, more to himself than to her. “Your dress is lovely. Rachel must have known your favorite color.”
“How did you know that purple is my favorite color?”
“Your apartment is covered in it.”
She grimaced in memory of his one and only visit to her hobbit hole.
He wanted to make her look at him—only at him. “Your shoes are exquisite.” His eyes traveled from where the top of her head lined up with his chin and down to her feet.
She shrugged. “I’m worried I’ll fall.”
“I won’t let you.”
“Rachel is very generous.”
“She is. As was Grace.”
Julia nodded.
“But not me.” His remark came out almost as a question, and his eyes sought hers.
“I never said that. In fact, I think that you can be very generous, when you want to.”
“When I want to?”
“Yes. I was hungry, and you fed me.” Twice, thought Julia.
“You were hungry?” Gabriel’s voice was rough, horrified, and he stopped dancing immediately. “You’re going hungry?” His eyes hardened into two icy blue jewels, and his voice cooled to the temperature of water gliding over a glacier.
“Not starving, Professor, just a little hungry—for steak. And apples.” She glanced up at him shyly, hoping to soothe his sudden show of temper.
Gabriel was far too upset to notice the remark about apples. His very stomach was lodged in his throat as he contemplated the reality of graduate student poverty—a reality he was all too familiar with—and the poor and hungry Miss Mitchell. No wonder she was so pale and so thin.
“Tell me the truth. Do you have enough money to live on or not? I will go to the chair of my department on Monday and have him increase your fellowship if you tell me you need it. I’ll give you my American Express card tonight, for God’s sake. I won’t have you hungry. I won’t.”
Julia was momentarily silent, for his reaction astonished her.
“I’m fine, Professor. I have enough money if I’m careful. My apartment makes cooking a problem, but I promise you, I’m not starving.”
Gabriel slowly began dancing again, leading her gently across the floor.
He looked down at her lovely shoes. “Will you be selling those to buy groceries? Or to pay your rent?”
“Of course not! They came from Grace, sort of. I would never, ever, part with them. No matter what.”
“Will you promise that if ever you are desperate for money, you’ll come to me? For Grace’s sake?”
Julia averted her eyes, choosing to remain silent.
He sighed and lowered his voice. “I know I don’t deserve your trust, but I’m asking for it only in this one respect. Will you promise?”
She took a deep breath and held it. “Is it very important to you?”
“In the extreme. Yes.”
She exhaled noisily. “Then yes, I promise.”
“Thank you.” He exhaled in relief.
“Rachel and Grace were always good to me, especially after my mother died.”
“When did your mother die?”
“My senior year of high school. I was already living with my dad in Selinsgrove by then. She was in St. Louis.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Thank you.” She moved her mouth as if she was going to say something further, but stopped.
“It’s all right,” he whispered. “You can say it.” He gazed into her eyes encouragingly, and for a moment Julia forgot what she’d wanted to say. But she recovered herself.
“Um, I was just going to say that if you ever need someone to talk to—about Grace, I mean. I know Rachel is going back to Philadelphia. But I’ll be here, um, obviously. Not that it would be very professional, but I’ll be around. Um. Yeah, that’s it.”
She avoided his eyes, and he felt her whole body tense as if she was steeling herself for something awful to happen.
What have I done to this poor girl? She’s terr
ified I’ll lash out at her or something.
Gabriel knew that he deserved her wariness, and so he resolved to lavish her with kindness…at least until the song ended and they inhabited their professional roles once again. Then he would be distant, but gentle.
“Julianne, look at me. You know, I don’t have any prohibitions against people looking me in the eye.”
She glanced up at him hesitantly.
“That’s a very kind offer. Thank you. I don’t like to talk about certain things, but I’ll keep you in mind.” He smiled at her again, and this time the smile remained. “You have both charity and kindness, two of the most important of the heavenly virtues. In fact, I’m sure you have all seven.”
Especially chastity, they each thought to themselves, independently. And he thinks chastity is something to ridicule, thought Julia.
“I haven’t really danced like this before,” she said wistfully.
“Then I’m glad I’m your first.” He squeezed her hand warmly.
Julia froze.
“Julianne? What’s wrong?”
Her eyes glazed over, and her skin grew very cold. Gabriel watched as the virulent blush that had spread across her cheeks not two minutes earlier faded completely, and her skin became a translucent white, like rice paper. She wouldn’t look at him, and when he flexed his hand against her lower back, it was as if she couldn’t even feel it.
When Julia came out of her trance or shock or whatever it was, he tried to get her to talk to him, but she was too shaken to do so. He had no idea what had happened, so he waved to Rachel and asked her to take Julia to the ladies’ room. Then he went to the bar and ordered a double, downing it quickly before they returned.
Gabriel made an executive decision and decided it was time for them to go home. Miss Mitchell was clearly unwell, and The Vestibule was no place for her, even under normal circumstances. He knew that at a certain point in the evening the men would become drunk and grabby and the women would become drunk and horny. He didn’t want his baby sister and the beautiful and virginal Miss Mitchell exposed to either type of behavior. So he settled his tab and asked Ethan to provide them with two taxis, with the full intention of paying the taxi driver for Miss Mitchell’s cab and instructing him to wait outside her residence to see that she entered safely.
Alas for poor Gabriel, Rachel had a plan of her own.
“Good night, Julia! I’ll meet you back at your place, Gabriel. Thanks for seeing her home personally!” Rachel hurled herself into one of the cabs, slamming the door behind her, and handed the cabbie a twenty so that he would peel out before Gabriel could take a single step.
He was now pissed in a very different sense, since it was obvious what his sister was trying to do. Nevertheless, she was less likely to run into some ne’er-do-well in the lobby of the Manulife Building with security on duty than Miss Mitchell was on Madison Avenue. So he couldn’t fault her judgment.
Gabriel helped Julia into the cab and climbed in after her. When they stopped in front of her building, he waved her money aside and instructed the cabbie to wait for him. He escorted Julia to the front door of her building and stood in the soft porch light while she tried to find her keys.
She dropped them, of course, because she was still shaky after what happened at the club. Gabriel picked them up, trying keys in the lock until he successfully opened the door. He returned her key ring and brushed a finger across the back of her hand. Then he stood staring down at her with a funny look on his face.
Julia inhaled sharply and began to talk to his black pointed-toe shoes (which were a tad too fashionable even for Gabriel), because she could not say what needed to be said and look into his beautiful but cold eyes.
“Professor Emerson, I want to thank you for opening doors for me and for asking me to dance. I’m sure it was demeaning to have to behave that way to a student. I know that you’re only tolerating me because Rachel is here, and that when she’s gone everything will go back to normal. And I promise I won’t say anything—to anyone. I’m really good at keeping secrets.
“I’m going to request another thesis director. I know you don’t think I’m very bright, and you only changed your mind because you felt sorry for me because of my apartment. It’s clear from what you said tonight that you think I’m beneath you, and that it pains you to have to talk to a stupid little virgin. Good-bye.”
With a heavy heart, Julia turned to walk into the building.
Gabriel moved to block her path.
“Are you quite finished?” His voice grew very harsh.
She met his gaze, wide-eyed and trembling.
“You’ve delivered your speech; I believe courtesy demands that I be given an opportunity to respond to your remarks. So if you please…” He moved out of the doorway and stood, staring down at her with an expression of nearly concealed fury.
“I open doors for you because that is how a lady is supposed to be treated, and you are, after all, a lady, Miss Mitchell. I haven’t always behaved like a gentleman, but Grace tried her best.
“As for Rachel, she’s a sweet girl, but sentimental. She’d have me reciting sonnets under your window like a teenage boy. So let’s leave my sister out of this, shall we?
“As for you, if Grace adopted you like she adopted me, that tells me she saw something very special in you. She had a way of healing people through her love. Unfortunately, in your case, as in mine, she probably arrived a little too late.”
Julia raised her eyebrows at this last statement, wondering silently what it meant, but she did not have the courage to ask him.
“I asked you to dance because I wanted your company. Your mind is good, and your personality is charming. If you want another director, that’s your prerogative. But frankly, I’m disappointed. I never thought of you as a quitter.
“If you think I do things for you out of pity, then you don’t know me very well. I am a selfish and self-absorbed bastard who barely notices the concerns of other human beings. Damn your little speech, damn your low self-esteem, and damn the program.” He huffed in frustration, trying hard not to raise his voice. “Your virginity is not something to be ashamed of, and it’s certainly none of my business. I just wanted to make you smile and…”
Gabriel’s voice trailed off as his hand found Julia’s chin. He lifted her face gently, and their eyes met.
He found himself moving toward her, his face approaching hers, their lips inches apart. So close that she could feel his warm breath on her face.
Scotch and peppermint…
They both inhaled deeply, drinking in one another’s scent. She closed her eyes, and her tongue darted out quickly to wet her lower lip. She waited.
“Facilis descensus Averni,” he whispered, his ominous and preternatural words striking her very soul. “‘The descent to Hell is easy.’”
Gabriel stood up very straight, released her chin, and strode to the taxi, slamming the car door behind him.
Julia opened her eyes to see the cab pull away. She leaned against the door for support, her legs turning to jelly.
Chapter 10
While Julia was at Lobby, there were moments when she was convinced that Gabriel remembered her. But those moments were fleeting and ethereal, and they’d disappeared like cobwebs blown away by the wind. So Julia, because she was an honest young woman, began to doubt herself.
Perhaps her first encounter with Gabriel had been a dream. Perhaps she’d fallen in love with his photograph and imagined the events that occurred after Rachel and Aaron fled. Perhaps she had fallen asleep in the orchard alone, the sad recipient of the desperate and lonely illusion of a young girl from a broken home who had never felt loved before.
It was possible.
When everyone in the whole world believes one thing and you are the only one who believes differently, it’s very tempting to assimilate. All Julia would have to do would be to forget, to deny, to suppress. Then she would be just like everyone else.
But Julia was stronger than that. No,
she had not been prepared to call Gabriel out publicly about exposing her virginity, for that would be to draw too much attention to a fact that she was partially ashamed of. And no, she was unwilling to force him to acknowledge her or the night they shared together, for Julia had a fairly pure heart, and she did not like to force anyone to do anything.
When she saw the confusion on Gabriel’s face while they were dancing and realized that his mind wouldn’t allow him to remember, she withdrew. She was worried what a sudden strong realization might do to him, and fearful that his mind might shatter like Grace’s glass coffee table, she chose to do nothing.
Julia was a good person. And sometimes goodness doesn’t tell everything it knows. Sometimes goodness waits for the appropriate time and does the best it can with what it has.
Professor Emerson was not the man that she’d fallen in love with in the orchard. In fact, Julia concluded that there was something seriously wrong with The Professor. He was not just dark or depressed, but disturbed. And she worried that he had alcoholic tendencies, familiar as she was with the alcoholism of her mother. But because she was good, she would not break him the way she had been broken, by forcing him to look at something he did not want to see.
She would have done anything for Gabriel, the man she spent the night with in the woods, if he’d given her even a single indication that he wanted her. She would have descended to Hell and searched for him, looking until she found him. She would have stormed the gates and dragged him back. She would have been Sam to his Frodo and followed him into the bowels of Mount Doom.
But he was not her Gabriel. Her Gabriel was dead. Gone. Leaving behind only vestiges of him in the body of a harsh and tortured clone. Gabriel had almost broken Julia’s heart once. She was determined she would not let him break her heart for the second time.
Before Rachel left Toronto to return to Aaron and the dystopia that was her family, she insisted on seeing Julia’s studio apartment. Julia had been putting her off for days, and Gabriel himself had discouraged his sister from simply showing up unannounced. He knew that as soon as she saw where her friend was living she’d pack Julia up personally and force her to move into a nicer place, preferably Gabriel’s guest room.
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