Page 130 of Kiss an Angel

The rhythm of their act gradually fell apart. Alex destroyed one of the tubes in two cuts, another in four. He forgot a new bit he’d added with a ribbon streamer, and when he wrapped her wrists with the whip, the audience stirred uneasily. It was as if the tension between the two of them had somehow communicated itself, and what had formerly been an act of seduction now seemed tinged with violence. Instead of a bridegroom trying to win the affections of his wife, the audience felt as if they were watching a dangerously predatory male attack a small and fragile female.

Alex sensed what was happening, and his pride kicked in. He seemed to realize he couldn’t afford to wrap the whip around her again without completely alienating the audience, but he also needed one final gesture to bring this part of the act to a close before he signaled Digger to release Misha.

She saw his eyes settle on the crimson tissue paper flower nestled between her breasts and realized he had forgotten it earlier. He signaled what he was going to do with a subtle nod of his head. She faced him numbly, wanting only to have this done with so she could go off by herself and hide from the world.

The music of the balalaika swelled and she found herself looking across the ring into his eyes. If she had not been frozen herself, she might have seen the suffering there, along with a deep, wrenching grief that matched her own.

He drew back his arms and flicked his wrist. The tip of the lash flew at her as it had dozens of times before, except this time she felt as if she were seeing it in slow motion. With a peculiar sense of detachment, she waited for the paper petals to fly, but instead, she felt a searing pain.

All the air was ripped from her lungs. Her body buckled as liquid fire cut across her from shoulder to thigh. The arena began to spin and she started to fall. Seconds ticked by, and then music erupted, a loud and happy tune that rang out in bizarre counterpoint to a pain so intense she couldn’t breathe. Strong arms swept her up as the clowns came racing in.

She was conscious, although she didn’t want to be, and she heard a prayer that she hadn’t spoken herself. The lively music, the muttering of the crowd, Jack’s calming voice, all those things echoed dimly behind the wall of pain that enveloped her.

“Get away! Get back!”

Alex’s voice. Alex carrying her out through the back door. Alex the enemy. The betrayer.

She felt the ground, hard and chill against her back, as he laid her down against the side of the big top. Bending over her, he used his body to block her from the view of the others. “Sweetheart, I’m sorry. Oh, God, Daisy, I’m so sorry.”

Using what remained of her strength, she turned her head away from him so that she was facing the dusty nylon, only to gasp with pain as his hand brushed the torn fragments of her gown.

Her lips felt dry and so stiff she could barely part them.

“Don’t . . .touch me.”

“I have to help you.” His breathing was quick and shallow, his voice reedy. “I’m going to carry you to the trailer.”

She moaned as he picked her up, hating him for moving her and making it all worse. She found just enough breath to whisper, “I’ll never forgive you.”

“Yes . . .yes, I know.”

The scorching trail of fire cut from her shoulder across the inside of her breast, then over her belly to her hip. It burned so fiercely she wasn’t conscious of his gentleness as he carried her across the lot and into the trailer where he laid her on their bed.

Once again she turned her head away, biting her lip to hold back her screams as he slowly eased the ruined gown from her body.

“You

r breast . . .” He drew a ragged breath. “There’s a welt. It’s—the skin isn’t broken, but there’ll be bruising.”

The mattress moved as he left her, only to come back much too soon. “This’ll feel cold. It’s a compress.”

She winced as he laid a wet towel over the seared skin. She squeezed her eyes shut, willing time to pass.

As the towel warmed from her skin, he removed it and replaced it with a fresh one. Once again, the mattress sagged as he sat next to her. He began to speak, his voice soft and rusty.

“I’m not—I’m not poor like I let you think. I teach, but—I also buy and sell Russian art. And I do consulting work for some of the biggest museums in the country.”

Tears leaked through her lids and onto the pillow. As the compresses began to do their work, the pain subsided into a dull, aching throb.

His words were awkward and halting. “I’m considered the leading authority on Russian iconography in the—in the United States. I have money. Prestige. But I didn’t want you to know. I wanted you to think of me as an uneducated roughneck living a hand to mouth existence. I wanted to . . . scare you away.”

She willed her lips to move. “I don’t care.”

He spoke rapidly now, as if he had only a short period of time to get everything out. “I have a—a big brick house in the country. In Connecticut, not far from the campus.” With a feather-light touch, he replaced the compress with a new one. “It’s filled with beautiful art, and there’s—I have a barn in the back with a stable for Misha.”

“Please leave me alone.”

“I don’t know why I keep traveling with the circus. Every time I do it, I swear it’s the last time, but then a few years go by and I start getting restless. I might be in Russia or Ukraine, maybe in New York—it doesn’t seem to matter—I just know I have to go back on the road. I guess I’ll always be more Markov than Romanov.”

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