Soon, the seduction begins. Through the fog of day-after crapulence, the words came to her, echoing through her head like a gong. Why had she spoken them? Tohim.
She knew why. She’d hoped those words would imbed themselves under his skin like little, sticky burrs.
Hortense began fluttering around the bed, straightening blankets and pillows. “Zee green fairy,non?”
Mariana peeked out from beneath a cucumber. “Pardon?”
“Zee absinthe,non?”
“Non.”
“You don’t know of zee absinthe?”
Mariana shook her head and immediately regretted it. “It was zee whiskey.” She sensed now might be her opportunity to discuss Hortense’sotherduties. “Have you been in your other line ofservicevery long?”
Hortense’s gaze met hers, and Mariana saw that the girl understood this turn in the conversation. “Since I was fourteen years of age.”
“How many years have you now?”
“Twenty.”
Shock traced through Mariana. At twenty, she’d been a married woman with a pair of twins to care for, a household to run, and a philandering husband to ignore. “Is Hortense your real name?”
“Zee answer to that question is . . . complex.”
“How did you become—?” Mariana hesitated.
“Your husband saved me from a bad family situation.”
“Nick casts a wide net, doesn’t he?” Mariana said, unable to hide her sarcasm.
“Your husband is a great man,” Hortense said, her dark eyes flashing. “You are lucky to call such a man yours.”
With a start of surprise, Mariana understood this girl knew nothing of her relationship with Nick. He’d certainly succeeded in keeping his two lives distinct.
As if realizing she’d overstepped the mark, Hortense blushed bright scarlet and busied herself fluffing pillows that had been fluffed minutes ago. She must say something to put the girl at ease. “Your loyalty to Nick does you credit.” Strangely, she meant it.
Hortense nodded once in acknowledgement, and the mood in the room lifted. Mariana snuggled deeper into her robe and again covered her eyes with the cucumbers.
What had gotten into her last night? What had gotten into Nick?
Whiskey.
But that wasn’t all there was to it. To blame the spirits was too easy of an absolution. The whiskey had simply made it easier to remember what she liked about her husband. Too easy. In the future, she would stay away from whiskey around Nick.
A soft, but insistent, tap-tap-tapping sounded on the exterior door to her rooms. Mariana’s ears strained toward the sound of Hortense turning the key in the deadbolt and opening the door on smooth hinges. Hortense had no time to ask for a calling card before a cacophony of voices filled the rooms. Mariana knew those tones, rhythms, and cadences nearly as well as any on earth. Family had arrived.
More irritated than alarmed, she flicked the cucumbers into a rubbish bin, cinched the belt at her waist, and strode through the doorway to her sitting room. She could ignore the mild, persistent throbbing at the base of her skull. “Uncle Bertie? Aunt Dot?” Their names emerged in the halting staccato of bemused disbelief. “How extraordinary to see you.” It was the politest way she could think to ask what they were doing here.
With her characteristic cloud of unruly white frizz puffed about her head, Aunt Dot rushed across the room and took both of Mariana’s hands in her own slightly damp ones. Aunt Dot ever had moist palms. “Oh, my dear. Oh, my dearest.” She rotated back and forth between Uncle Bertie and Mariana a few times. Mariana likened Aunt Dot to a spinning top once she got worked up. Today, she was in top form. “Oh, my dearest dear.”
“Has something happened?” Mariana asked, genuine alarm beginning to creep in.
“Has something happened? Has something happened? Oh, my dear.”
Mariana glanced up at Uncle Bertie, a ponderous man whose great jowls sagged lower than ever, and lifted her brows in query. “Uncle?” she asked in a weak voice, bracing herself for the worst.
“Oh, my dearest, your face—”
