The Devil She Knows - By Diane Whiteside Page 0,55
wine’s residue on her fingertip and glanced at him. His pupils were very dark and completely fixed on her mouth.
Instinctively, her tongue flicked over her lower lip.
His adam’s apple bobbed in his throat before he could speak. “Yes, of course.”
He set his plate down awkwardly, as if it no longer belonged to him, and his fingers clumsily worked at his necktie.
“Where did you learn French?” Portia inquired, trying to adopt enough savoir faire to carry off a casual conversation while a man undressed before her.
“I never heard anything about what you did, except that you were well,” she added.
“No, I asked William and Viola not to speak of me to you unless you asked. After that disastrous confrontation at the wedding, I didn’t think you’d want any reminders of me.”
His voice held the bitter calm of long acceptance. How could she tell him she’d both hoped and feared for news?
She shrugged away either agreement or denial and waved at him to continue.
“I’ve always found it easy to pick up languages—”
“And any skill you needed,” Portia inserted, still far too fiercely proud of him for her own good. Leaving him would be painful.
He glanced up at her, from where he’d just laid his folded vest and necktie, his expression startled. An instant later, his countenance smoothed into a more pleasant mask. She could have cried over the lost intimacy.
“Most skills,” he temporized. “In any event, you know how I always grow tired of seeing the same places.”
She frowned and drew herself back into a corner of the divan, closer to where the seabirds sang through the slatted windows. “Go on.”
“I asked William to send me abroad so I could enjoy some new sights,” he said lightly.
“Europe?” she guessed, hoping against hope, judging by the hard grooves settling into his cheeks.
“China first, in 1880.”
“You must have left immediately after my wedding,” she guessed, “to have arrived there before year’s end.”
He shot her a glare which would have flattened a symphony’s brass section. “You know Donovan & Sons’ motto.”
“High risk freight to high risk places,” she said impatiently. “But you didn’t learn to speak French in China.”
“No. I visited Shanghai, Hong Kong, and finally landed in Indochina, to bring in spare railroad parts. A monsoon season there left me with a working knowledge of French.”
“And malaria, too?” Good Lord, was he condemned to burn at unpredictable dates for the rest of his life, thanks to a hellish fever?
“No malaria, honey.” For the first time, his familiar crooked smile flashed at her. “I’ll admit I was damn lucky but I visited Viola’s quinine powder more religiously than any preacher’s altar call.”
“Thank God.” She’d attended church as seldom as possible after her wedding to St. Arles. But Gareth’s safety might deserve some special prayers. “Is that all?”
“No, I headed for drier climates after that.” He lounged back on his elbows, like a big, lazy cat ready to either purr or show its claws. “I’ve crossed Arabia’s Empty Quarter to the pearling fisheries in the Persian Sea. I worked with the French archaeologists in Egypt, who wanted to sell their finds to American millionaires.”
“You have more scars than that.” The whisper came from Portia’s heart, not her throat. Even so, Gareth heard.
“Egypt doesn’t offer everyone perfumed luxury, honey. There are flies and dust, gunshots and knives in the dark.”
“There are knives at diplomatic banquets, too. But only the verbal ones cut your throat or are left in your back,” she retorted.
“Sorry, honey.” He caught her hand and kissed it, his silver eyes glinting like winter rain. “I forgot not every scar can be seen.”
She twisted her fingers to clasp his, silently sharing her own nightmares of times when she too had been the target.
“Algeria, mostly, and here in Constantinople,” he added after both their grips relaxed. “French notions of how to colonize are brutal. But I can stomach the work to be done in hauling goods between these parts, France, and back to the States.”
Portia frowned, teasing out the violence and savagery which underlay French stories of conquering their new territories in North Africa from the original Muslim holders. How much had Gareth seen of that? He’d always treated Indians more than fairly and had even had very close Indian friends. He could not have enjoyed watching the local tribesmen being torn apart to make room for Frenchmen, no matter what rights and wrongs dwelt on either side.
Why had he stayed away from home, from Arizona, from Uncle William and Aunt Viola for so long?