Chapter Nine #3
“Unfortunately, he knocked me up,” I say brightly, because I don’t care if this woman comes for me.
But I can’t bear her swinging at him, and I decide not to interrogate myself about why that is, because I had my chance to tell him and I didn’t.
“So it was marrying me or contributing to the illegitimacy issue currently clouding the family legacy. We wouldn’t want that, would we? ”
Francette stares at me in a kind of frozen astonishment that I suspect is meant to shrivel me down to size.
Instead, I stand my full six feet, complete with the two-inch heels I’m wearing today, that put me right at Taio’s shoulder.
“I thank you both,” Taio says sardonically, “for making this as seamless transition as possible.” He glares at his mother.
“You know exactly why I didn’t tell you about this.
For precisely this reason. Annagret is my wife.
That’s the end of the discussion. You will notice that I did not ask for your commentary.
” He turns to me. “And this is my mother. You do not have to like her. But I must ask that you respect her.”
I feel immediately chastened, and a little bit like a child, which is not a pleasant place for me to be. But I suck that up, because what matters here is that he loves her. I don’t need to get in the way of that.
“My apologies,” I murmur.
He and his mother exchange a few more frozen sentences—in French this time—and then she glides away, back to where she came from.
And we stand there at our pretty garden table, dressed in our wedding clothes, and stare at each other.
“I’m sorry,” I say while she’s gone. To him, directly. “I don’t know what came over me.”
“The thing about my mother,” Taio says, his gaze dark as he looks back at me, “is that she is not necessarily a warm woman. If forced, I would describe her as frozen solid. I do not know if she was always this way or if she became this way. But she is my mother.” He shrugs then, and looks something like helpless.
“And she is the only parent I have left.”
“I understand.” I go with an urge and reach over, then, to take his hand.
“Even now, I love my father. Even though I know that he cannot love me back in any way that’s meaningful to me.
He chose my stepmother and my stepsisters again and again, and I’m certain that if I gave him the opportunity he would do the same thing again.
I’ve always considered him a weak man. I think he is one.
” I squeeze Taio’s hand and lean in closer.
“But that doesn’t mean I don’t love him.
It just means I can’t subject myself to the way he loves me. ”
And after a moment, that dark stare of his changes. I see the gleam of that smile in those tea-steeped depths. I feel my shoulders sink down from my ears.
“You will notice that this is a very big estate,” Taio tells me, and when his mouth curves, I smile back at him. “It is very easy to go a great many days at a time without encountering my mother at all. This is how we prefer it.”
“Who does she want you to marry?” I asked.
“It may surprise you to learn that she feels that the gene pool would be improved if we added more Frenchwomen to it.”
“And does she therefore throw them in your path?” I try to imagine a pack of soigné French girls, all jutting cheekbones and slim hips, smoking their cigarettes at Taio. And how much he would hate it.
“She would never lower herself to do such a thing. She must always be above such petty considerations.” He flips our intertwined hands over and plays with the rings he put on my finger, wiggling them this way and that.
It makes me feel… cared for, I think. It’s difficult to name when I have never experienced its like before.
I don’t know how to categorize it. “She makes her wishes known in other ways, but believe me, I am never in any doubt.”
I think about my father, and how his body has reflected his choices over time, stooped and tired. I think about my stepmother’s harsh words and insults and the grooves they’ve left in her once-lovely face. I think about the deep chill that Francette seems to exude with so little effort.
“I think we will have to decide, you and me, what kind of parents we will be,” I say, the words spilling out of me heedlessly. “Because I promise you, I will not be cold. I will not be…like your mother. At all.”
“And I assure you that I will not be weak,” Taio tells me in the same fierce way, his eyes on mine. “I will never, ever choose anyone over you, Annagret. This I promise.”
That electric connection we’ve had since the start sizzles, then. It snaps inside me, crackling with intensity. I can see it has the same effect on him.
So I go up on my toes and tilt my face back so I can look him in the eye.
“Taio,” I say quietly. “What if I’m not hungry for food?”
And when he sweeps me up in his arms this time, he carries me back up the stairs and through this grand, sprawling palace of the house, taking me into a part of it I haven’t seen. His part, I understand immediately.
He lays me down on yet another bed, and once again, meets me there.
And as our mouths find each other again, and our hands follow, I acknowledge that I never thought that I would get to taste him again.
It’s like coming home. It’s like being made new.
It’s possible that I’ve never lived until now. That coming back to him is what makes me whole at last.
When he slides his hand up beneath my smooth white gown and finds my soft heat, I believe it.
And everything between us explodes quicker this time. We are wilder. Bolder.
We are married and it makes us desperate. We tear at each other’s clothes. Our mouths fuse together, and it’s feverish.
Even more glorious than I remember.
We are naked flame and we burn bright—again and again—and when we are done, we lie in a panting heap, together. His hand rests upon my belly. I feel him, deep in my soul.
In every breath I take.
And I understand a deep and irrevocable truth.
I am in love with this man I married, despite my best intentions.
But this marriage is precarious, and I know better than to believe in it, because I know where I came from. And I know where I am.
I don’t see how these things can ever go together.
And no matter the glory we find together in this bed or any other, I do not intend to live a lie, ever again.
Especially not with him.