Page 21 of The Education of Ivy Leavold
“Are you afraid now, wildcat?” he asked, his fingers tightening. “Afraid of me?”
“Julian,” I murmured. “Please.”
“Please what?”
His fingers were still loose enough that I could turn my head, and I did so now, looking back at him and wincing at his tortured expression. I only knew one thing that would help, the one thing that always helped us, the language our souls both spoke and demanded. “Fuck me,” I pleaded. “Fuck me until this isn’t here anymore.”
This. This fight, this betrayal, this doubt. This ugly thing I’d nursed for the past two months and now let free in a sunny meadow on a perfect afternoon. But he could get rid of it, my Julian could. He always did that, with his mouth and his fingers and his cock. He could drive us away from pain and into bliss, erase my doubts, if only temporarily. If only he would give it.
If only.
“Not this time, wildcat,” he said. And he let go of me, stepping back.
No.No, that couldn’t be it. We’d always shared our bodies with each other, sharing pleasure, giving and taking, our skin whispering what our words could not. And he was saying no? Even as the hard length of his cock was so erect, I could almost trace the veins through his trousers?
“No,” he said again, reading the horror on my face. And then he said nothing else, scooping up his jacket and leaving me kneeling, weeping, among the bluebells and the rustling grass.
I don’t know how long I knelt there, slumped and sobbing, my heart rending itself into pieces. But the blue sky had silvered itself gray and the breeze had turned chilly and sharp by the time my tears finally subsided. I tried to stand¸ but my muscles screamed in protest—cramped from kneeling for so long—and I half fell over instead, curling onto my side and staring at the sky listlessly until I felt the muscles loosen and relax.
But even then, it was hard to find the motivation to stand. I would stand up and walk back to…to what? To Mr. Markham, angry and cold? Or to an empty house, bereft of his presence? Certainly, it would be to an empty bed, and I couldn’t stand that. Not when I needed him more than ever.
I stood shakily, wondering when the independent and free-willed Ivy Leavold had become this wreck of a girl who could barely walk. When had I traded my reason for madness? Because it could only be madness, this feeling that drove me toward Julian Markham. Despite what Silas had said, the police and the county were convinced that Mr. Markham had killed my cousin. What’s more, he had expressly forbidden me from asking about her death. All the evidence—the testimony of others and his own behavior—pointed to his guilt.
So why did I continue to pine for him? My body craved him, yes, but it was my mind and my soul that ached and thrashed the most without him. I hated myself for hurting him, for making him leave, yet I hated him too for leaving, for giving me no other choice, no other way.If only he’d confided in me from the beginning, I wished vehemently, then stopped. It didn’t do any good now. He’d done everything he could to keep Violet’s death shrouded in mystery and that was why we were here now.
Alone.
Apart.
Furious with each other.
As I walked, my anger gained greater and greater strength.How dare he act as if he is the victim? As if I am the one acting egregiously?He was the one suspected of murder, the one keeping secrets. How could he expect me to stand by and absorb his darkness without reacting to it?
He wanted me to be like Arabella. But I couldn’t. I could only be Ivy.
I wandered through the woods until the rain started, a drizzle that brought with it an early dusk, and by the time I made it to the house, my dress was wet and muddy and my hair was plastered to my head in tangled strands. It didn’t signify; there was no one waiting up indoors, not even a servant. They’d all retired early, I supposed, not one of them thinking to save a supper for me…or to even come looking for me.
I barely existed here. I was a ghost before I was even dead.
I peeled off my dress in my room, not bothering to change into anything else, and went to Mr. Markham’s chambers. I knew he wasn’t there—from the moment I’d stepped in the house, I’d recognized that empty stillness that was characteristic of his absence—but my chest still ached when I saw the empty room, bedspread pulled taut as if the rumples and wrinkles from our morning lovemaking had never happened.
There was no fire, and a chill was seeping in through the windows and walls, so I slid under the covers of his bed, tears burning anew at the scent of the soap he had sent up from London. That smell, more than anything else, reawakened the heavy pulsing in my sex, a pulsing made all the worse for the tangled emotions surrounding it.
I knew it was no substitute, but it was mindless need more than anything that drove my hand in between my legs. I ran my fingertips over the soft folds, imagining it was Julian doing it with hungry eyes and an even hungrier mouth. I breathed in the fresh male scent that clung to the sheets and began circling my clit, hard and fast, thinking of him thrusting into me in this very bed. Thinking of the way his cufflinks had gleamed in the restaurant as he fucked my cunt with his fingers. Of the way he’d owned me today in the field, of the arresting way he took control of my body and used it against me.
I buried my face in the pillow as I came, crying out from the all-too-brief flash of pleasure and also from the concurrent ache of emptiness that came with it. It didn’t matter how roughly I touched myself or how many orgasms I created—it wasn’t the same. It wasn’t him.
And what if it never was again?
I slept late. Deep and late, with no dreams, but the keen awareness of loss welcomed me the moment that the opiate of sleep wore off. I was alone in my future husband’s bed, with no way of knowing if he would still consent to be my husband. I had been afraid that he was going to kill me, but the morning brought an even clearer realization—I was afraid of losing him more than I was afraid of him hurting me.Perfect love casts out all fear, I recalled my childhood curate saying—and my love was far from perfect. But it was still trying valiantly, a bird beating the air with broken wings.
I wasn’t hungry and I didn’t want to dress. Instead, I left the bed to curl up on an armchair near the window so I could watch the wet world outside and think.
I wanted Julian. I wanted to fuck him and fight him, and I wanted to nestle by his side at night. I wanted more nights like two nights ago—where he’d woken me by whispering poetry in my ear, chanting Keats and Shelley and Blake as he wrenched climax after climax out of my body. I wanted more days like our last day in York, where we had held hands in the street and argued over which restaurant to eat at for supper.
But I couldn’t have Julian the way I wanted with Violet’s grave between us. One way or another, I would have to find out the truth. No more shoving the worrisome suspicions to the back of my mind, no more avoiding the topic as if her name alone would burn our lips. I would have to either torture him or coax him into telling me about whatever happened that night that tormented him so, and if it was that he had killed his wife in a moment of heat and violent rage…then I would face that problem once I got to it. For now, I needed to focus on how to extract the truth to begin with.
But how? Mr. Markham was impenetrable, a fastness of determination and silence. There was no way I could tug the truth loose from him, not if all the policemen and dark whispers in the county couldn’t.
