Page 48 of Seductive Reprise
“Traveling. Living over there. With the Turks.”
“Ah,” he said.
The curiosity in her voice set off a conflict within him. He yearned to tell her everything about himself. About his home, his childhood. Watching thefeluccason the Nile with his Uncle Ram. The fountain in the courtyard, the woodenmashrabiyyawith its intricate wooden latticework he would trace with his fingers. The songs his nanny would sing to him. Hell, his mother. The terror of a new school in a new country. How he’d shed Yusef for Joseph, only to find his way back to himself years later. He ached to hear that name fall from her lips.
But he also felt a familiar trepidation, the need to head off whatever ignorant falsehoods the English held about the world beyond their soggy little island. He had always hoped she was better than the rest of them, that she’d loved him for him. He swallowed.
They passed a handbarrow organist, slouched up against a wall, his instrument and livelihood waiting silently alongside him in a barrow, thank God. For there was no crowd to be had, and no reason to crank the dreadful instrument.
“I’m not Turkish, if that’s what you’re asking.”
Her grip loosened, her fingers dancing upon his arm as she thought.
“I wasn’t, but…” She placed her other hand upon his arm as well, and looked at him ardently. “I should very much like to know about it. About any of it. About you.”
He waited a moment. Even Rickard only knew half the truth. Come to think of it, the only person upon these shores who knew both him and his mother was… his father. The Duke of Marbury.
The notion was wretched. And sobering.
With a sigh, Yusef began. “I was born in Egypt. At my grandfather’s house. He was furious at my mother for her indiscretion with my father, but I never knew about it. Not until my grandfather’s death. He was always kind, generous. Loud. A wealthy man, prominent in his own circles.”
As if on cue, they arrived at a funerary monument shop, its window display stern and ominous, filled with blank bases upon which sat urns and stone wreaths, large friezes of sorrowful women. There was an incongruence to it—all the headstones, absent of epitaphs.
“Your mother,” Rose ventured, “loved your father?”
“Strangely enough, I think she did. Still does, actually, if one were inclined to believe her nostalgic ramblings.” He scoffed good-naturedly at the thought of his mother regaling him once more with the tale of how she first clapped eyes on the duke, recounting every small detail from the date and location of the ball to the origin of the lace that trimmed her gown. The thoughts of his mother warmed him, and he smiled at Rose. “You recall my father, do you not?”
Rose laughed at that. “How could I forget? He scared me half to death when I first came to Icknield Court. I mean, a duke. Can you imagine?” She shook her head, a nostalgic smile on her lips.
Yusef wanted very much to kiss her.
Instead he spoke of his father again, this time with a slight irritation at the man occupying so much of his precious conversation with her.
“It’s funny, that. My mother could’ve had any man, and yet she chose the silent, bespectacled foreigner, even as she had no intention of ever leaving home.”
Thatinterested her. She turned and pinned him with her stare. “No? You mean she’s never…”
He smiled sadly. “Not a once. She’s quite happy where she is. I visit when I’m able.”
She snorted. “She must’ve never married.”
“Why do you say that?”
Rose broke away from his arm, eyes twinkling. “If she’s quite happy, it stands to reason.”
Despite himself, Yusef laughed.
Rose moved along, and he let her go. For the moment he contented himself with watching her and the way she moved—different now than years ago, still a bit absentminded but with purpose. She strode past a milliner and stopped in front of a photographer’s studio, taking an interest in the various prints and cabinet cards on display.
He stood behind her, as close as he dared.
“Marriage and happiness, then, are incompatible?” Even though many long moments had passed, Yusef was desperate to hear her answer. He recalled her in Hartley’s sad little drawing room, indignant as she evaded Mrs. Hartley’s clumsy attempts to broker an arrangement between Rose and her son. How he’d wanted to murder Hartley then.
He watched her reflection in the glass, her eyes lowered in thought. He wanted to reach out and trace the line of her neck with one finger. He wanted her to lean back into him, to feel safe with him. To accept his protection. To accept his suit. To accept him.
“I can’t say,” she finally said, releasing the words as she would a sigh. “I’ve never been married.”
He stood there, breathing in her scent, not wishing to play this agonizing game. In all other facets of his life, Yusef never wanted for anything. He already had all he could ever hope for. And much like his mother, he could even have a fair play at whatever partner he desired. Noble beauties, young and fresh-faced, in the finest adornments, as genteel as you like. But he was sick of not having the one thing he truly wanted above all else. He wanted her.
