Any Other Name (The Split Worlds) - By Emma Newman Page 0,36
can’t think of a better word to describe you,” he murmured and they kissed again.
Cornelius battled the urge to burst out of his hiding place and throw William across the room. He buried his face in the silks of Amelia’s dresses as the kiss went on and on. Why wasn’t William with his wife, on tonight of all nights?
“You promise to keep Cornelius safe as well as you care for me?”
“Yes, I promise.”
“And you promise to let us live here, as we always have?”
“Yes. I didn’t want to take the deeds, Father insisted. Don’t see the house as mine; it’s your home, and Cornelius’s too.” He punctuated every two words with a kiss. Cornelius’s fingers twitched at the thought of throttling him.
“Then yes, William, I’m yours.”
Cornelius couldn’t listen any more. He pushed the secret door open and left his sister to her fate, with only silent promises of revenge to keep the rage in check.
Sam watched Cathy pale to the point when he wondered if she was going to faint – if that was even possible sitting down. “Oh, fuck.”
He took a long gulp of beer. She’d told him she’d been married off that day and narrowly avoided having to consummate a marriage to a man she hardly knew. For him to dump Lord Poppy’s message on top made him feel worse than shit. At least he’d been in London, on the way to see Leanne, when she’d called with her new number.
“Are you sure he said by the next new moon?”
“Yeah. It’s twenty-eight days. I checked.”
“Shit. I can’t paint.”
“I’m so sorry. I really thought I could save them.”
“It’s not your fault,” she said after what seemed like an eternity. “You didn’t exactly come away unscathed. How the hell did you get there without me or the Sorcerer?”
He told her about the strange tree and the faerie who’d found him there. She shook her head. “They were watching for you, maybe cast some magic to draw you in, maybe even put the idea in your head in the first place. It’s too much of a coincidence.”
“At least I can get to the edge of Exilium by myself.”
“You can?” She listened intently as he described the iron and copper pillar. “I have no idea what that’s about. Doesn’t change the fact Poppy has us both over a barrel. We are royally fucked here. There’s no other way to put it.”
Sam just nodded.
“Well… I suppose it puts this marriage into perspective,” Cathy said, picking up her beer. “It’s the last thing I’m worried about now.”
“Will you be OK? Can anyone help you? Can I do anything?”
She took several gulps and put the glass down. “Bloody hell, that’s gone straight to my head. No… I’ll think of something. There must be a Charm… I need to go.”
“Take care, Cathy, and I’m sorry.”
“Just keep in touch,” she said. “I’ll check for messages whenever I can. And Sam? Don’t try and be heroic again, OK?”
Sam finished his beer and then hers. It was time to go to the apartment and focus on the other thing he’d fucked up beyond recognition: his marriage.
He twisted his wedding ring as the lift to the fifteenth floor climbed. Free from the burden of passing on Poppy’s message, he was now worrying about the call from his boss saying that he had to be in work at 8.30am on Monday with a damn good explanation for his repeated absences.
He was impressed by the building but a little intimidated. It was all shiny floors, glass and steel, the antithesis of their cosy Victorian terraced house in Bath. There was a concierge, which comforted him as he didn’t like the thought of Leanne being alone in London. At least there was someone there to make sure dodgy people didn’t come in.
The interior designers were too fond of metallic finishes for his taste. When he got to the door of the new apartment there were strips of burnished copper riveted to it in something they probably thought was an artful design. To him, it looked like a flattened basket with a warped horseshoe floating above it.
He hadn’t really seen Leanne since they’d argued about her taking the job. He’d been pulled away from home by Ekstrand’s interference and she’d been working all hours as usual. When she moved up to the flat it had been strangely insignificant as she’d only taken a couple of cases of clothes and left the house as it had always been. Sam wasn’t happy about the move and