Page 18 of Dangerous Exile

She looked at the stack, her fingers running along several of the titles embossed along the sides of the leather jackets. “And they might just entertain me as well?”

“Will they?” His brows lifted. “If that is the case, then it is merely a fortunate happenstance.”

He piled the rest of the books atop her stack and picked up the tower of them, then moved toward the door. She scooted in front of him and opened the door for him.

They walked through the corridors alongside each other, her a half step behind for she didn’t know her way. Which was good. He didn’t intend for her to ever be outside of her room or his office.

He stopped in front of her door and nudged it open with the toe of his boot.

She went into the chamber, quickly going to the small rosewood desk by the window and brushing aside the hairbrush and hair pins that sat scattered atop it.

He set the stack of books down and turned to her. “We’re not done. We’ll do this again, tomorrow if I’ve recovered by then. We’ll see if you can best me once more.”

She chuckled, the gentlest chime of laughter that struck a pang deep within him he couldn’t identify.

“Thank you for letting me best you. You didn’t have to do so.” Her face grew serious. “And thank you for not dismissing me. For listening to me and not thinking me silly. I don’t know that anyone has ever done that for me, save for Juliet.”

The inexplicable but visceral need to protect this woman reared deep in his gut again and he forced his mouth closed for fear of what would come out of it. With a quick nod, he turned away from her and stepped out of the room into the hallway.

It wasn’t until he’d closed her door and locked it that he exhaled the breath held in his lungs.

The best way to protect Ness was to teach her to protect herself. That was truth.

For he knew full well he couldn’t be trusted to protect anyone.

{ Chapter 7 }

Ness looked up from the book she was reading and watched Verity come into the room and set a tray of roasted beef, bread, asparagus and parsnips on the small table. The food here at the Alabaster was always cooked to perfection, seasoned to make her tongue curl around the morsels, and heavy.

Men’s food, thick in her stomach.

She’d already added a reasonable layer to her frame—the bones that had started to poke through her skin weeks ago after eating so little were now receding. Useful, for she didn’t know what her future held and lean times could very well be her lot once she was safe to leave the Alabaster.

Ness smiled as Verity stood straight, smoothing her apron as she turned to the door. She liked the young woman—close to her age, if she were to guess. Verity had been nothing but kind to her, bringing her the finest soaps, ribbons and pins for her hair, a hairbrush, and books to read. She was always unassuming, but saw details that needed to be tended to.

Verity was pretty with delicate features—something one could only see when her head lifted from the bow she always held it in. Her green eyes were almost always downcast, and the first time that Ness had seen them straight on she’d been startled. A green so pure and bright it looked like a springtime field under the full sun. The dark cap she always wore on her head covered her hair completely, but Ness had occasionally noticed a few strands of dark red hair poking out from under the brim of the cap. Verity would probably be not only pretty, but quite beautiful if her hair wasn’t severely pulled out of view and the innate sadness lifted from her cheeks.

Ness stood from her chair by the fireplace, holding her book against her belly. “Verity, if I may?”

Verity stopped and turned around, her head tilted down but her look lifted to Ness with her eyebrows raised.

“I have a question about the Alabaster. Are there other women here?”

Verity’s head tilted to the side, her eyebrows drawn together to indicate she didn’t understand the question.

“Other women with big bosoms.” Heavy with the splint and bandages that wrapped her elbow to palm, Ness’s left arm lifted, the tips of her fingers motioning to the air in front of her own breasts.

Verity lifted her shoulders.

“Whores?” The word came sour off Ness’s tongue, but she had no other name for it. She didn’t want to use the word, as she’d been pondering it ever since she’d learned that Juliet had been the madame of a brothel. Knowing Juliet and where she’d come from, yet what a decent and kind woman she was, had made Ness start to rethink a lot of things she thought she knew about the workings of life. The word whore now seemed crass to Ness, a label uttered in haste as a slur against women who were, in reality, just trying to find a way to live into the next day with what little assets they had.

Verity’s green eyes widened and she shook her head. Shook it vehemently.

Ness’s forehead wrinkled. “No women work here for…sexual favors?”

Verity continued to shake her head.

Ness exhaled, nodding, confused. “I see.”

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