“Some women cannot be saved.” She squeezed his hand, transferring her warmth into his, before releasing it. “Just as you have given me hope during a time I needed it most, please know you have a friend in me. A true friend. One you can always rely on.”
The wilderness of the country she had come from whispered she held no fear.
Not a fear of him, not a fear of his life, not even a fear for her own life.
Even worse?
She wanted to do it with a smile.
It wasn’t right. He had to shake this idea of them even being ‘friends’ out of her head before it took her down a very dark alley he wouldn’t be able to yank her from. “Friendship is far too strong of a word for us to even share. Let us be passing clouds in the night sky so no one can see it.”
She shook her head. “I will not settle for that. Especially given you fear being bruised by attachments. ‘Tis a very lonely existence you attempt to cure with a raven.”
There went his reputation. “I’m not lonely.” God keep her from pitying a man who routinely masturbated to ensure he never crossed any lines. “Far too many people shuffle in and out of my life on a regular basis. Hell, I couldn’t be lonely if I tried.” Even married women attempted to wedge past his door holding up spice cakes in the guise of wanting more. As if he had carved OSCULATE ME on his forehead and cock. “I’m not lonely.”
“One can be in a crowd and still feel very alone, Mr. Ridley. I have often felt that when in India and the population there is well over England’s.”
It was like trying to argue with a five-foot female professor. “Unfortunately, some people are meant to only watch the crowds as opposed to be in them. Ten years from now, I’ll still be doing what I do best. This. And Chaucer and I are more than fine with it. It’s who we are and it suits us and our feathers.”
“I fear for you, Mr. Ridley.” Her expression wavered. “You appear to have embraced your own murder and celebrate nothing but death. Why? Do you not want more for yourself?”
The silence loomed between them like a heavy mist.
That stung. Especially given it was coming from someone so young. Especially given how often he thought of ending it all when her life was barely beginning.
She hesitated. “I did not mean to offend you.”
How could one forgive what was true and what remain unchanged?
Holding her gaze, he brought up the rope between them and tied another knot into it for her to see. Regret. “When I was your age, I would have loved to have had no responsibilities outside of a tying a cravat. I would have loved to have gone to parties, attend horse races, gotten drunk, played cards, been an idiot with no education and gone sailing, merely because I could. Instead, I was hovering over books and dead bodies in every morgue throughout Paris, determined to understand what made the flesh fall apart so I could put shackles on what was happening all over the world regardless of the culture: murder.”
He pointed down at her face, gently dabbing her brown little nose. “You have a chance to do all of those things, Kumar. Do them. Right down to the sailing. That is why I’m saving your life and giving you money to run with. So you can have a life. Above all, understand that the grooves of my muddy road have gotten too deep and well below the knee, which means the turning of any wheel outside of that rut, snaps the elliptic springs holding the forebeds, futchells, bolts, and splinter bar of the coach I’m riding in. So whatever you do, don’t think you can be like everyone else and try to take these reins by offering me your so-called ‘friendship’. Because I’m the only one who knows how to drive this form of transportation at high speeds without killing the horse.”
That was a bit long winded.
Even for him. “It’s late and that was your bed-time story. It’s called Pandora has a box and Ridley owns both so don’t rattle it. One never knows what crawls out.”
She held his gaze. “After a bed-time story ends, Mr. Ridley, it is usually followed by a form of affection toward the one who has quietly listened. I will retire, but only if a kiss is bestowed onto me.”
There was no wavering in her voice or in those pale blue eyes.
Nor was she teasing.
Despite the warning.
Despite the rope still hanging in his hand that symbolized his life: twisted.
In between methodical breaths he took in an effort to remain calm, he stared at her knowing she and her wit and her buoyancy and botanical intelligence and youth and faith of better things to come in a world that rarely if ever offered it, wanted to kiss the lips of morbid Evan Oswald Ridley.
Though not in the way other women tried to.
She wasn’t looking to seduce, corner, dupe, control, ply, grab or possess him.
She didn’t even want his money.
She was merely attempting to hold out her hand as if it were enough.
His mind, which was impenetrable in its strength and pride and what it believed in and wanted, betrayed him. It spiraled him into an inner world better known to him as…dissections.
Coca leaves and limestone emptied out of the tin and the box, no longer in use.
An endless night of work alongside a keen, understanding face.
Gloved hands gripping tight in smoke-ridden crowds.
Passing off the cigar and waiting for it to come back after a drag from her own lips.
Stacks of paper filed, organized, ready.
Him dictating and her taking notes.
Her slicing foliage to determine a source.
It only barreled forward faster and faster and faster after that.
Her laughter.
Hours of conversation.
Her bronzed skin dewing from the mist that came in at night as they walked to an assignment.
Ropes that became her clothing whenever they were in the house as she paged through books.
Them fucking and fucking and fucking until pleasure was a nuisance and pain a necessity.
A pistol shot to the skull of any son of a bitch who tried to look at her or hurt her.
Bam, bam, BAM!
Ridley’s nostrils burned.
They. Burned. Like. Fuck.
For he knew he was standing at the gates of hell with sulfur sweeping at him holding up the key that was going to latch every criminal into place.
It was the future known to his analytical mind as heaven.
He had peered into the future that he knew he would one day share with her.
A future his methodical mind had already measured, laid out and set.
It’s how he saw the world. Through an array of puzzles known as dissections.
The more intricate the dissection, which included language and maps and paintings and books and people and murder scenes, the more everything warped into what could have very well been mounted on massive sheets of hardwood spliced into pieces he always put together.
And she was a piece.
One that would fit into the palm of his hand and click into everything he was and wasn’t.
Only not now. Not for many, many years to come.
She was too innocent.
She needed to become what she still wasn’t: a woman.
God blind him, how he wanted to hold onto that moment of knowing everything he saw in his head would be real, but his mind sped up and roared knowing if it did ever happen, it wouldn’t be for a very long time.
Feeling his chest was no longer his own out of frustration that the future couldn’t happen now, he gritted his teeth and snapped the rope across her shoulder, startling her. “Damn you into hell for making me wait.”
She held his gaze, her expression wavering and gaping. “You…you hurt me. Intentionally!”
It took him a moment for him to register what he’d actually done.
The overlord had spoken.
He, who had remained calm throughout an entire marriage that had dragged his teeth across the pavement without ever once swatting at Elizabeth, had snapped a rope against the shoulder of a young, Indian girl looking f
or a hero.
One who would shape the future of not only his life but others.
Son of a bitch. “There was a point to that, but I still shouldn’t have done it.” He numbly dangled the rope before her. “Feel free to return the favor.”
Welcome to the life you never wanted.
She took the rope, as if arguing with herself about what to do. Half-squinting up at him, she tugged it tight and— “This is for not kissing me like a normal man would.” She snapped the rope against his chest, whipping it right on the nipple so hard that his linen shirt felt as if it had been slashed open.
He sucked in an astounded breath. “An incredibly well-delivered strike. Bravo and I felt it. Now—”
“This is for coca and limestone.” She lowered his chin and snapped the rope against him harder.
The sting made him realize she was just getting started. “Uh…can you not—”
“This is for the room you do not keep which reflects your soul!” She whipped the rope, snapping it again and again.
He blocked the lashes and glared. “Ey. Enough,” he bit out, hardening his tone to lethal so she understood she was overstepping bounds no overlord would permit.
A breath escaped her as she grudgingly held up the rope, dangling it between them. “I do believe my list of complaints are done.”
Ridley slowly took the rope. It was fairly obvious he’d found a rope-swinging sort of girl ready to not only reorganize the study but his life. “I shouldn’t have done that and you have my apology. I was annoyed. I was annoyed knowing...” You’re not broken.
She squinted. “Knowing what? Do explain, Mr. Ridley. Do. For taking a rope to me was uncalled for.”
Unraveling each knot in the hemp rope, he tied a new one. Patience. He shoved the rope into his pocket. “Why do you think I permitted you to return the favor? Pain for pain. Though somehow I ended up shouldering more.”
“Speaking of shoulders…” She lowered her chin and tapped at her own shoulder, circling it. “I believe you owe it a kiss.”
This one didn’t know when to stop.
Ridley angled in, trying to remain calm lest his mind revert to the earlier blur he saw in his head. “Kumar. You are far too young and far too mirthful in nature to tie an anchor the size of mine around that little throat anytime soon. Ropes, ravens, murder, and poison is only the beginning. There is no happily ever after given the sort of man I am and you aren’t ready for the life I lead. I require someone…broken. In pieces. So I can pick them up and put them into my pocket for later use.”
She lifted her gaze to his and lingered.
Dropping his hand to his side, he rounded the desk and seated himself again, whipping the rope onto the desk.
She adjusted the robe at its collar, exposing the raw, skinned marks on her wrists from the shackles she had been in for days.
As if she hadn’t endured enough.
Those poor wrists. Fuck.
Pickering had earned more than a visit. All forty-seven links that had been heartlessly weighing against those small wrists too tightly with a bolt turned inward were going to be punched into that motherfucking body.
After she retired.
For she didn’t need to know about him being a loon. Which he was. It was the only part of himself that he tried to hide. For he enjoyed it too much and knew that his restrained and chained façade held back a mind that veered him burningly close to the very thing he arrested others for.
Quickly yanking open a drawer, he pulled out a tin jar of salve he used for cuts, scrapes and burns which he encountered during assignments. Opening the lid with a ting, he swiveled his chair sideways and gestured toward the open space of the floor beside him. “Come to me, Kumar. Your wrists need tending. Do they hurt?”
“Haan.” She glanced down at them, then bustled over and regally knelt before him with the billowing of the robe and calico skirts, lifting her eyes and her raw-reddened wrists to him. “Kali praise you.”
He pointed. “None of that. Kali and I don’t know each other. You should also learn not to forgive people so easily. Stay angry. It’s good for you.”
She puckered her lips. “I prefer not to give you another case to work on.”
“Your so-called humor has finally found its bounds.”
She peered into the tin he was holding.
Sitting closer at his feet, she dabbed her brown finger into the cool, scarlet substance and held it to her nose which she crinkled. “’Tis bloodroot. How fitting you have a tin of a plant that relies on ants to spread its seeds and has no nectar. It might as well be your soul.” She eyed him for a long moment. “It is only ever used by the Algonquins. Why do you have it?”
He lowered his chin.
If he weren’t already sitting, he’d be kneeling. For if this was her mind at eighteen…the glory of what it would be at thirty almost knocked the motherfucking breath out of him. “My, aren’t we a bit of a genius and hello, hello. A native from the Algonquin tribe came into London last year. He was gracious enough to share a gift devoted to healing. I use it all the time.”
Damn you for not being broken enough to play with.
Digging a finger into the tin, he removed a sizable amount of the cool, thick salve and set the tin onto the desk. Taking her one hand, which was so damnably small and soft, he carefully applied the red-tinted salve around her entire wrist, tilting her hand in doing so.
She winced.
As if he didn’t feel bad enough. “I promise it will heal fast.” Releasing her hand, he leaned over to the desk and dug a finger into the tin again. Edging back to her, he took her other hand and carefully applied the salve to that entire wrist.
She winced again and hissed, her features untwisting and then flickering.
His voice softened. “Are you all right?”
She puffed out breaths, her small cheeks inflating and deflating.
Seeing her in so much pain was…horrible. Unacceptable. Why did he hear creaking coming out of the cavern known as his heart? What the hell? “Guéris rapidement. Heal fast.”
Her expressive face changed as she watched him. She grew somber.
Too somber for his liking. “Does it hurt that much?”
She slowly shook her head. “Nahin. I was thinking about…” Her voice cracked.
He clicked on the tin, trying not to focus on her pain. Pickering. Cane. Tonight. “Yes? What?”
“Given what you do, if someone had disappeared over ten years ago and there were pieces of that puzzle that were still remembered by a few, is it possible to investigate that person’s disappearance? Perhaps even find the one responsible for it?”
He knew she was referring to her mother. The one Dr. Watkins had told him of when they were sitting across from each other in prison trying to dig through ways to keep her from getting hanged.
It twisted his breath. “The more time passes, the less likely anything will ever be found. With no evidence, there is no path, and without witnesses, it tosses the map that might lead me to finding those responsible. Do you understand?”
Tears streaked her eyes. A tear rolled down her cheek. And another one. “I had hope.”
It was exactly that hope that he wanted her to keep.
One that would disappear once surrounded by his life.
Swallowing hard, he brushed away the tear that had escaped with his thumb. He held up his now tear-dabbed finger for her to see the moisture he had removed from her face. “I acknowledge your pain.” Holding her gaze, he brought his finger to his own lips and kissed it. “Now it is mine.”
She stared up at him, her lips trembling. Her hands jumped upward and grabbed at his arms and shoulders as she quickly leaned upward and toward him.
He stiffened. The moment he let her infiltrate those thirty-seven locks better known as his heart, there was no going back. Not given who and what he was.
She wasn’t ready and neither was he.
Ridley jerked far back and removed her hands one by one from his tensing mus
cles that roared against his own will to cooperate. “No. Cease.” He couldn’t breathe knowing what she wanted of him. Already. The future was already knocking on that door, demanding he not only open it, but rip off the hinges. “You’re leaving in less than three days. Whether we overturn that conviction or not, you’re set to depart. It’s for your safety and there is no way around it. So don’t complicate this.”
He swiveled away in his chair, purposefully leaving her on the floor at his feet to contemplate his words as he snapped the tin’s lid hard back into place and set it back into his drawer.
He slammed it shut. Much like he was slamming shut any idea that she was ready for the sort of life she was asking for. Not for another five years. She needed to crack and break beneath the weight of experience to better understand him and his ways.
Moving his chair closer to the desk, he opened a ledger and refocused.
Kumar quietly rose. She rounded the desk with a soft swish of cashmere and calico, and stood before him, running her fingers across one of the open ledgers as she angled it toward herself. “I will permit you to work.”
He nodded.
She hesitated upon seeing his notes and jerked down toward it. She waggled a finger across it as if trying to erase what she saw. “How much coca have you been chewing?”
“Pardon?”
Her brows flickered. She pointed. “This. Whatever is this?”
Unable to think, he leaned forward in his chair, tapping one of many cases he was working on and somehow managed, “Eraow acaer tupress jeren.”
She gaped and then squinted. “That is not any language I know. Is it…Swedish?”
“No.” She was attempting to dig out all of his mind’s secrets and…he was letting her. He was letting her because he wanted that future to be his. His. “It’s called a shadow language.”
“I do not understand.”
“Meaning, it doesn’t exist. I write all of my notes in it so that if anyone breaks into this house and seizes my notes, and it has happened, they can’t figure out what it says. If it’s unusually important, I also keep additional copies of it locked in a tamper-resistant box.” He pointed to a bookshelf where the safe was hidden behind. “In my line of work, you have to dig deeper than the nearest shovel can.”
Mr. Ridley: A Whipping Society Novel Page 13