“Thank you for your concern, but I truly do not want it.” The rich sauces from the duke’s cook didn’t usually sit well with her.
“I hardly ever see you eat.” Placing his hands on his lean hips, Julius narrowed his eyes. “You need food.”
“Do I look as though I’m starving?” Stalking to the window, she released the sash. The velvet curtain brushed past her fingertips as it fell closed. “Credit me with some sense. I do understand the importance of food for survival.”
“But …”
She pulled the roll from her pocket and raised it to eye level. “I may not eat in front of you, but I eat.” Walking to the escritoire, she lowered the desk lid and added the roll to a bit of cheese wrapped in cloth. She shut the escritoire firmly and turned to face him, arms across her chest.
His face softened. “You stash food away. I should have guessed.”
“It isn’t anything to concern yourself over. I just like to make sure …” She swallowed.
“That you don’t have to rely on your gaoler to feed you.” Julius stepped close and placed his hands on her shoulders. “I know. I did it, too. When I was held by daimyo Muragachi.”
That was the first time he’d mentioned his imprisonment to her. She’d heard the rumors, of course. Even before her world had collapsed, before she’d killed her father in self-defense, she’d heard the stories of the Earl of Rothchild’s youngest son. The man who’d been captured while serving his country in the Royal Navy. Of the attempts to secure his release. Of his escape after three long years of imprisonment only for him to come home to find his father and brothers dead of typhus.
An accidental earl, and one that society whispered wasn’t right in his head since his capture.
Society was full of idiots. She’d always known that.
“What did he do to you?” She was frightened to hear the answer. Didn’t want those images in her head. But, like her, his imprisonment was a part of his being, and she wanted to know all of him.
Julius turned his head. “It’s not something a woman should hear.”
“Tell me anyway.”
His Adam’s apple bobbed up and down, and he shook his head.
Amanda pinched her lips together. “Then tell me who daimyo Muragachi was,” she said, her tongue tripping over the unfamiliar words. “Why did he hold you?”
Julius closed his eyes, and Amanda didn’t think he would respond. Turning away, he pressed his palms flat on the bureau, his head sagging. “Muragachi was a local warlord. The magistrate of Nagasaki sent me to him to serve my sentence after I was captured from theHMSPhaeton. We’d sailed into Nagasaki harbor in order to ambush Dutch trading ships that were soon to arrive.” His fingers whitened as he dug his nails into the wood. “We had the superior force. The Japanese cannons in the harbor were old, most of them inoperable. Under a Dutch flag, we sailed into the harbor and waited like a spider for its fly as a tender with Dutch and Japanese representatives rowed out to welcome us. We captured the Dutchmen, but in the fight the Japanese jumped into the water and swam back to shore. I was knocked overboard, as well, and nearly senseless. I was taken, the only Englishman captured.”
“But if you had superior force, why were you not rescued?” How could he have been left behind? Wasn’t the British navy supposed to look out for their own? Her heart burned.
Julius snorted. “Superiority can be fleeting. The magistrate had sent for reinforcements. Eight thousand samurai and forty more ships. Captain Pellew knew he couldn’t be in the harbor when they arrived. He couldn’t risk the lives of two hundred and eighty men just for mine.” He was quiet a moment. “The Dutch trading ships didn’t even come that year. It was all for nothing.”
Amanda tapped her fist against her lips. She leaned against the desk for support. If he could remain stoic in the telling, she could for the hearing. With an effort. “And your imprisonment? You were there for three years, were you not?”
Pushing off the bureau, Julius turned and paced to the fireplace. “My imprisonment was … instructive. The samurai have turned ropework into an art form. I learned much by feeling the rope on me, and watching them tie it. Later, as I became more respected, they taught me their techniques.” He cocked a hip against an armchair. He smiled but it was twisted and bitter. “You have my gaolers to thank for our intimate pleasures.”
Amanda swallowed, tasting bile at the back of her throat. “How can you even look at a rope, much less use one?”
He stalked towards her. “How can you sleep in a wardrobe? How can you tolerate the ropes clinging to your body? If you can tell me that, I’ll try to come up with an answer for you.”
Holding her hands to her chest, she shook her head. She couldn’t explain any of it. She let out a shuddering breath. “If you ever want to talk about—”
“I won’t.” A muscle twitched in his jaw but otherwise his face was expressionless. She felt the wall he’d erected as though she’d run headlong into it. That didn’t mean she had to accept it.
She cupped his cheek, his skin warm and scratchy beneath her palm. “I’m sorry. You must think me so weak when you had to endure much worse.”
He stepped back, and her hand fell to her side. “It isn’t a competition, who had it worse,” he said gruffly.
Amanda nodded, her chest aching. Her heart thudded dully behind her breastbone, and she watched in resignation as he took another step away. As if her presence was a burden.
She was becoming confused again. Mixing up what she felt in his bed with what she felt for the man. Julius didn’t owe her his confidences. And he didn’t owe her tenderness. He was doingher a favor, teaching her of what was possible between a man and a woman physically, and nothing more.
Rubbing the back of his neck, he turned. “What—” He threw his shoulders back. “Reggie!”
