Page 41 of Angel's Kiss
“Which little minx made you feel what way?” Philippe bellowed, stumbling towards Raoul. “Has some little whore finally plucked you? Let us celebrate! It’s been long enough!”
“Philippe!” Sabine gasped as her older brother grabbed Raoul’s face. His breath stank of spirits almost as badly as his clothes smelled of smoke. He pressed Raoul’s cheeks hard as he examined him with bleary but discerning eyes, then sighed.
“No, I don’t think you have been, you still blush like a girl,” Philippe slurred, dissolving into laughter. “Too bad. We could have shown you some real fun last night.”
“Of for heaven’s sake!” Sabine yelled. Finally her older brother noticed her, and her glare sent him stumbling into a chair while Antoine laughed at the threshold.
“You have no sense of fun,” Philippe pouted. “Either of you.”
“Food! We need food!” Antoine cried, startling the valet with a playful blow. “And coffee!” he called after the man as he fled.
“Did you tell some second-rate journalist about Christine’s family?” Raoul demanded of his obviously still-drunk brother.
“Why would I care about her family?” Philippe asked back with a hiccup.
“Because her father was a gypsy mongrel.” Raoul spun to stare at Sabine. His sister’s face was hard and implacable. “She’d be unsuitable even if she wasn’t an actress, which I should not need to remind you is only one rung above a whore.”
“She is not like that!” Raoul fumed. “She is a good Christian woman!” This drew a snicker from Antoine and an eyeroll from Sabine. “Did you tell someone about her?”
“I did.”
Raoul rounded on Antoine at his words. “Why? How did you know?” Antoine pointed blearily towards Philippe and snickered again. “Why?”
“Because such a woman does not befit our station,” Antoine said with a shrug. “And I hoped revealing the taint on her blood to all of Paris would protect this family. You know what those people took from us. I wouldn’t want to have that woman’s reputation ruin your sister’s.” Raoul looked between Antoine and Sabine, who, to Raoul’s horror, actually seemed impressed.
“As if whatever you two were up to last night or get up to with yourfriendsat the Opera doesn’t ruin your names,” Raoul snapped.
“It doesn’t, because our women know their place and we know the rules,” Philippe snarled and Raoul shrank down. “Sabine, dear, would you mind leaving this discussion to the gentlemen?”
Sabine sighed powerfully but rose to leave, giving Antoine one more infuriating smile as she did. “I’ll see you when it’s time to leave for the theater,” she commented, reminding Raoul that he had to share a box tonight with all of the people he very much wanted to strangle.
“When will you get it through your head that no one cares if you take a tumble with a ballet rat or a soprano – it’s what they’re there for. But you can’t go about thinking they can ever be anything more,” Philippe declared as soon as the door was shut. “I don’t care if you make Daaé your mistress, but you cannot make her your wife.”
“You know that telling me I can’t do something is the surest way to encourage me?” Raoul shot back. “You said I didn’t have the stomach for the sea or the wits to survive without you clucking after my every move and see what I’ve done.”
“Ah yes, taking our noble family name across the seven seas!” Philippe crowed.
“I don’t care about our name, or Father’s legacy, or Christine’s lineage, you boar, I only care about her.” Raoul did not like the way Philippe and Antoine looked at him, with a combination of pity and disgust. “And I don’t appreciate your continued insistence that her morals are so loose. She would never!”
“Admit it, boy,” Antoine sneered. “She’s a whore like all the rest of them. The sooner you learn that, the sooner you’ll be free to enjoy her for what she is.”
“Just because you have no soul doesn’t mean the rest of us have sold ours,” Raoul seethed and charged out of the room.
He wanted to get out. He wanted to go to church and wash off the stain of Antoine’s presence and his brother’s moral rot. He wanted to go to Christine and hold her again and let her reassure him that she was good, as he knew in his heart she had to be. She was not what they said. She was not corrupted. She was an angel.
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The pain did not botherErik as they walked. The sting of his wound had barely been a worry all day because he had been with her. Admittedly, the journey up from his home to Christine’s dressing room had been more tiring than usual, but that simply meant they had to go slower, which gave him a few more precious minutes with the woman who continued to astonish him at every turn. They had planned and practiced all day, spending the hours in quiet intimacy he could barely fathom, and he was not ready to part.
“You’re sure they won’t have given the room away already?” Christine asked as they ascended the final flight of stairs on his secret road. “I wouldn’t put it past them.”
“The managers and Carlotta may be fools, but everyone in the company knows this room is haunted,” Erik replied as they arrived behind the mirror. “We can go another way if you like.”
“No, it’s fine,” Christine whispered, turning to him. It was a small space behind the mirror and naturally forced them to be close. Yesterday Erik would have recoiled at the way her movement brought her near, and the instinct was still there, but her assurances and the magic of the kiss she had bestowed on him gave him the strength to remain still. In the cool dark of the passage, even through their cloaks, he could feel her warmth. She looked up at him, face illuminated by the golden light of the lantern as he held it aloft. He’d never seen someone more beautiful.
“You remember where to go?”
“Yes, you were extremely clear in your instructions,” Christine replied with an annoyed smile. “Will you be alright? No tearing those stitches I worked so hard on.”
