Page 32 of Mine before Dawn
Her voice cracked like a brittle, dry branch snapping underfoot.
“Look at it.”
Her golden-brown arm almost glowed against his pale roughened skin dusted with black hair.
She squeezed his forearm tighter and held them side by side like evidence before a judge.
“Asha—”
“Admit it.”
He yanked his hand free.
“Admit what?”
“We are different!”
The words burst out louder than she intended but it was drowned out by the noise from the pub.
Asha pressed trembling fingers against her mouth briefly before continuing in a lower voice.
“You can pretend all you like, but people see this first.” She gestured bitterly between them. “Before anything else.”
James’s jaw was clenched.
“I don’t care.”
“But I do. And my son will when his classmates call him the son of the Indian whore.”
She looked up at him then, beautiful brown eyes glistening. The long lashes were clumped together.
“Are you planning to marry me, James?”
The question hit him so unexpectedly, he took a step back. He said nothing because the thought had never crossed his mind. He foolishly thought they would go on like this until they had enough of each other.
In his silence, she got her answer she always expected.
Asha nodded once.
There it was.
James opened his mouth, then closed it again. Because what was he supposed to say?
He had never imagined marriage in concrete terms. Never let himself think further than the next night. The next touch. The next stolen hour upstairs.
And she knew him well enough to see every hesitation flicker across his face.
“You will get bored eventually,” she said quietly.
“That’s far in the future, love,” he said, trying to gain some of the ground he had lost.
“Maybe not now.” Her voice shook as she soldiered on. “Maybe not next month. But one day you would wake up and realise what everyone else already knows.”
He stepped toward her again, angry now.
“And what’s that?”
“That you want a nice white girl to marry.” Tears finally brimmed over her lashes. “Someone you can take into town proudly. Someone your children will look like.”
