Part 21 (1/2)

His hand was on mine, holding me in place. ”Why did you come, Lucy?” he said roughly against my ear. ”Why are you here?”

”It doesn't matter. Truly. I'll go back home.” I was crying again, and I dashed my hand across my eyes, muttering fiercely, ”G.o.d, how stupid I am. What a silly, stupid woman.”

I rose. It was a single step to the door. He was there suddenly too, grabbing my shoulder, forcing me to face him. I put my hands on his chest to push him from me. My vision was blurred, and I felt desperate in a way I could not explain, as if just his presence was too much; as if I could not find ground steady enough to hold me. ”I'll be fine. If you'll just let me go.”

He took hold of my wrists and moved my arms as if they were made of clay, pliable, elastic, down to my sides, trapping them there so I could not move, and then he kissed me.

I felt his lips on mine with a little shock, and then he was pressing against me, his body holding me to the door. I had both wanted and feared this, perhaps it was even what I had come to him to find, and I opened beneath him. He loosed my arms and put his hands on either side of my face, and I leaned in to him and followed when he pulled me with him to the bed and we fell onto the ragged quilt together. I did not hesitate but only reached for him when he backed away to slide up my cloak and skirt and petticoats, when he pushed between my legs. Though we were both clothed when he came inside me, it seemed I felt him with every part, that he freed me so I was thrusting against him, impatient, yearning, pleading, and then stunned as the pleasure coursed through me, leaving me mindless and crying out into his mouth, gripping him until he collapsed upon me with a final groan. We lay there for some time, it seemed, until the pleasure died, and I could not move for the intensity of my release.

When he stirred, I did not want him to go. But he slid from me and sat up, tucking and b.u.t.toning while I lay there with my clothing pressed up to my hips, my boots and stockings still on, my hat falling from my head, clinging to a loosened hat pin.

He sighed, and I became self-conscious. I pushed down my skirt and sat up. The hat pin fell out. My fingers trembled as I reached for my hat and held it in my lap, afraid to look at him, to look at anything but a burgundy rose and a jaunty dark green feather. I could not say anything, and I wanted him to stay silent as well; I did not think I could bear whatever it was he would say.

But then he turned to me, and his gaze caressed me, and I found myself saying, ”I . . . I've never felt like that. Not even the electrotherapy . . .”

”Yes,” he said quietly. ”It's not the same.” His eyes darkened and he said, ”Someday I would like to see all of you.”

I reached for the fastening of my cloak, embarra.s.singly quick, to please him. ”Yes,” I said. My breath came fast again; I looked at his mouth. ”Yes, of course. Just let me-”

His hand came over mine, stopping it. ”Not now,” he said. ”Not here.”

I was disappointed. ”Oh. I thought-”

”It's late.”

”Surely it's not-”

”Where does William think you are?”

William. I had so completely forgotten him that when Victor spoke his name, it was like that of a stranger. I was horrified at what I'd done, at what we'd done, and I scrambled off the bed, shamed by the wetness between my legs, by the sc.r.a.pes of mud my boots had left on the quilt. ”Oh, I didn't think . . .” I twisted my hat in my hand.

”Ssshhh,” he said, coming to me, taking the hat from my hands. ”It's all right, Lucy.”

”No,” I said desperately. ”No, it's not all right.”

”He keeps you caged.”

”Yes,” I said breathlessly. How much I craved the touch of him, already-so quickly-yielding to him again.

”You mustn't feel guilty for this. You needed this.”

”Oh yes.”

”Does he know where you went?”

I shook my head. ”I just left. I came by myself. I didn't tell anyone.”

”Good,” he murmured against my ear. ”That's very good.”

I lifted my mouth to his. ”I suppose that he should know. . . .”

”We'll talk about that later,” he said.

”But he'll have to know. If I don't go back-”

”You have to go back,” he said. It was a breath against my lips, but it startled me.

I jerked away from him. ”What?”

”You have to go back,” he said. ”Come, Lucy, you know this. You can't stay here.”

”Why not?”

”Look around you.” He motioned impatiently at the room. ”You don't belong here.”

”But . . .” I stared at him, uncomprehending. ”But you can't want me to go back to my husband. Not after this.”

”Where else should you go?”

The question had no meaning, no relevance. I could not bend my mind to it. ”But we've-”

”You would be ruined, Lucy,” he said softly. ”If you were to leave him now, I would be ruined.”

”I don't care,” I said. ”It doesn't matter to me.”

”Yes, it does.”

I was humiliated beyond bearing, but I could not escape him. The room was too close, he was too close. I looked at him in confusion. ”I'm falling in love with you,” I said miserably.

”Listen to me, Lucy,” he said. ”You must listen closely. We must be careful. It's not unusual for a patient to form such an attachment to her doctor. Or to mistake feelings of grat.i.tude for love.”

”Grat.i.tude? That's absurd. I know the difference.”

”Oh, Lucy,” he said. ”We still have so much work to do.” He reached over to the bed, where my hat pins lay scattered, and gathered them up. Then he set my hat on my head, gently-far too gently for any man-fastening it to my hair. He grabbed his coat from the hook by his suit, and then his hat, which he tucked beneath his arm. ”It's late. You must go home. Come. I'll take you there.”

Chapter 17.

He opened the door and took my hand, and I let him lead me out without a murmur. The old man-his father-and an old woman who must have been his mother sat at a table with another woman who was bent over a sewing machine that she operated in fits and starts.

His mother was sewing by hand, by the light of a kerosene lantern. She was so hunched her eyes were nearly on the fabric. As we came out of the room, her expressionless gaze raked over me, taking in everything, and I felt she knew exactly what had gone on behind that door, what I had done with her son, what I had come for.

He said something to them in German, and they both nodded.

”You should lie down, Mutter,” he went on in English. ”Your eyes are too tired for that.”

”Pssshhh,” she said, waving at him in disdain before she bent back to her sewing. The father did not take his gaze from me as we went to the door.