13. Chapter 13 #2
He looked down at her from his great height as she glared back at him. Suddenly, she wanted to slap his stupidly handsome face. She wanted to bite him until he bled the way she had been bleeding all week.
Not for the first time, Asha had the distant thought that he could crush her like an insect if he truly wanted to. Except he handled her like the finest porcelain. He always backed off when he sensed she was upset.
Except tonight, that is.
James walked forward, forcing her backward step by step into the room until the side of her hip struck the table edge.
Then he reached behind himself and shut the door firmly with a loud click.
“Hiya, mate,” he said casually to Tanay, but his eyes never left Asha’s angry face.
Tanay brightened instantly.
“Hi, James.” Then with complete childish honesty he added, “I thought you weren’t coming back.”
James’s jaw flexed.
“Yeah,” he muttered. “Yer mam tried that. Didn't work.”
Asha opened her mouth furiously to tell him he could turn around and walk out.
And another knock blasted the door. James closed his eyes briefly.
“Christ, give me strength,” he muttered under his breath.
Asha managed to twist around him and yank the door open again.
Mrs. Burton stood there in a bright pink housecoat and slippers, grey curlers still in her hair, looking ready to commit murder.
“What in God’s name’s goin’ on up here?” she hissed. “I should tan yer backside, James Fletcher. The whole bloody building can hear you.”
James rubbed a tired hand over his face.
“We need to talk.”
“Oh aye?” the landlady snapped. “At volume fit for the mines?”
Then she noticed the boy sitting at the table chewing on his pencil, staring between them all with huge eyes.
Her expression softened slightly.
James looked at the boy, as if remembering himself.
“Tanay, mate, d’you mind goin’ with Mrs.Burton fer a bit?”
The landlady sputtered with indignation.
“The nice lady’s made carrot cake. I could smell it on my way up,” James added smoothly before she could protest. “An’ if there is no one to eat it, she’ll only throw it away.”
Mrs. Burton glared at him.
“Cheeky sod.”
Then she sighed heavily.
Her sharp eyes moved between James and Asha.
“Do ya know what you're doin’, lad?”
James answered immediately.
“Yeah. I know what I want.”
Something in his voice made the older woman study him for another long moment. Then, surprisingly, she nodded as if something monumental was decided.
“Alright then.”
She turned to Tanay and softened visibly.
“Come on then, ducky. I’ve got a proper cake downstairs.”
Tanay slid off the chair quickly. But before he followed her, he looked up at James with solemn brown eyes far too serious for his age.
“Don’t hurt my mum, James.”
James considered that and slowly he crouched down in front of the boy. And very quietly he said—
“I promise I won’t. Cross my heart.”
Tanay examined him carefully as though weighing the truth of that promise.
Finally, he gave a tiny satisfied nod. He took Mrs. Burton’s hand and let her lead him toward the stairs.
Halfway down she called back loudly—
“I’ll send ‘im back in an hour!”
“Make it two!” James shouted after her.
“Don’t push yer luck, lad!” she barked back immediately followed by the slam of her front door. Then, the stairwell fell quiet.
And suddenly it was only the two of them again.
Asha stood rigid beside the table and James by the door.
The room felt thick with all the things neither of them knew how to say. They faced each other like gladiators entering an arena.
Neither spoke.
Asha stood rigid beside the table wondering if her breathing sounded as loud to him as it did to her. Fury and humiliation twisted together with impossible longing inside her until she could barely breathe.
James watched her with that same burning look in his eyes.
Then as if she couldn't take the standoff any longer, her eyes slid away and she hissed.
“You need to leave.”
“Aye, an' pigs might fly, love.”
The calm certainty of it enraged her.
“This is my house...mine...You do not get to come here and—”
He crossed the room in two strides.
Asha barely had time to gasp before his hands closed around her arms and he hauled her against him as though she weighed nothing. Her feet dangled off the floor.
“James! Stop grabbing me when I say something you don't like.”
She struggled like a wild thing. She bared her teeth at him like an angry cat and tried to wrench free.
Instead, he smiled and backed her against the wall.
Then, his lips were on hers, his tongue demanding entry. The force of it stole every coherent thought from her head. His mouth was rough and desperate and angry all at once, like he had spent the entire week starving for a taste of her.
Asha made a furious growl against his lips and tried to knee him.
James just pinned her tighter against him. Immediately, one massive arm banded around her waist so thoroughly she could barely move.
“Behave,” he muttered against her mouth.
She rewarded his highhandedness by biting his lip hard.
“OW— bloody hell!”
He jerked back, staring at her in disbelief while still dangling her off the floor.
“What’d you do that fer?”
Suddenly all the strength seemed to leave her. Tears spilt helplessly down her face.
“Why didn’t you stay away?” she choked out. “Why? Why did you come back? Why are you doing this to me? What did I ever do to you?”
Varying emotions flashed across his face then. Anger. Hurt. And that possessiveness which would never let up.
“You think it’s that easy?” he said roughly. “You think you can just shove me out after lettin’ me in?”
His eyes blazed bright, cutting into her like shattered glass.
“No, darlin’,” he said hoarsely. “Not happenin’.”
She shoved against his chest uselessly.
“Then what?” she cried. “I stay your mistress while she sits in your home and has your children?”
James blinked.
“What?”
“It’s never going to happen. NEVER...”
She was shrieking like a banshee now.
“The girl from London! Your childhood sweetheart.”
Realisation began dawning slowly across his face.
“How could you send her to Mrs. Wilmslow’s shop? How could you be so cruel,” she sobbed. “With your mother, no less. You did it on purpose, didn’t you? You wanted me to see—”
And suddenly, the light in his eyes changed, like something clicked in place. The bastard’s smile widened.
Asha made a sound of pure outrage and struggled anew.
“You bastard!”
He had to let her go, but caught both wrists immediately before she could claw his face, though not before she managed to scratch him twice.
“Asha—”
“LET ME GO!”
“Christ, yer feral.”
“LET ME GO NOW!”
He finally wrestled her against him again, her hands tight behind her back, breathing hard himself now.
“Awrite! Stop wrigglin’, woman.”
“Go to hell!”
“You’d miss me. Then I'll have to come back and get ya.”
“I WOULD NOT!”
“Liar.” he muttered and the fool tried to kiss her again only to be met with the clank of her teeth.
She struggled harder and harder until she went limp again. All her strength was seeping out of her. Then ugly, broken sobs filled the room.
No graceful tears or pretty crying for Asha. The sobs only blocked her nose and shook her entire body.
James’s expression changed instantly.
“Asha…”
“I hate you,” she wept. “I hate you so much.”
He tightened his hold reflexively.
“Darlin’—”
“I’ll rub my snot all over you if you don’t let me go NOW.”
To her horror, he barked out a startled laugh.
“Go on then.”
She stared at him furiously through tears.
“I mean it.”
“Aye?” His voice dropped lower suddenly, rougher. “Woman, I’ve had a tongue between yer thighs. What’s a bit o’ snot?”
Heat exploded across her face.
“You— you dirty—”she ground out between angry sobs.
But she was still shaking.
James looked at her helplessly now.
“Stop it.”
She only bawled harder.
“Asha. People will think I am beating ya.” His forehead dropped briefly against hers. “Stop cryin’. Yer breakin’ my bloody heart.”
“You don’t have a heart,” she hiccupped miserably. “You idiot. You stupid stupid man. You only think with your manparts.”
He grinned despite himself.
“Asha.”
“No!”
“Asha, look at me.”
His eyes crinkled at the corners, the exhaustion etched deeply beneath them clear for all to see.
Grey. Like the wing of a dove. And unbearably gentle.
“She’s not marrying me.”
Asha blinked.
“What?”
“She’s marryin’ my brother.”
Silence.
“She what?”
“My brother,” he repeated patiently. “Who also lives in London.”
Asha stopped crying. All the fight drained out of her body so abruptly he almost stumbled adjusting his hold.
“You…” She stared at him blankly. “You are not getting married?”
“No.”
“Oh.”
He studied her cautiously.
“If I let go, are you gonna reach fer knives?”
She sniffed hard, then reluctantly nodded no. James loosened his hold by a few careful inches, testing her. Once he let go, his rough callused palms came up to cup her face.
He wiped away her tears gently with his thumbs.
“Asha,” he murmured quietly, studying the changes in her now. “Yer losin’ weight, girl.”
“So what? Who are you to tell me to eat or not to eat?”
“You not been eatin’?” he asked, ignoring her outburst.
She shrugged stubbornly. James exhaled heavily through his nose as if talking to a recalcitrant child.
Then he sat down heavily in the chair near the table and simply pulled her straight onto his lap. It was like coming home, though Asha would never admit it. She was too emotionally exhausted to fight anymore.
His arms wrapped around.
“I just want t’drag ye into bed and never leave it again,” he muttered against her hair before resting his chin on her bent head. “Christ, I’m tired.”
They stayed there like that before she finally looked at him.
Dark circles shadowed his eyes. His striking face had become leaner over the week apart, hollows sharper beneath blunt cheekbones. New lines bracketed the corners of his eyes and mouth like strain had left its mark on him.
He looked exhausted.
Worn to the bone, like he had not slept properly in days.
And suddenly Asha realised with a strange ache in her heart that perhaps she had not been the only one suffering after all.