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~ The Engagement ~
Chapter Two
The silence that followed Abe's confession held us all in a state of suspended disbelief.
For a man that was so notoriously private about the dealings of his well-guarded past, it seemed almost inconceivable that he would have admitted anything regarding his relationship with Janine Hathaway, much less something this personal.
Judging by the look on his face…one that very clearly showed a mingled combination of regret and aggravation, I knew that his confession had been more in response to his daughter's relentless goading than to anything else.
He would never have willingly divulged it and looked no happier at the admission than Rose did.
Far paler than normal, she was uncharacteristically quiet as the shock of Abe's revelation stole the response of her typically caustic tongue.
Wincing faintly as the strong grip of her fingers dug deeply into the tensed muscles of my thigh, I gently pried them loose from my leg but did not release my hold on her. Turning my palm upward, I linked our fingers and watched over Rose carefully as the silence continued to build between father and daughter.
Abe paid no attention to anyone else at the table as he met Rose's unblinking gaze with an unflinching honesty reflected in the dark depths of his cunning eyes…honesty that couldn't be denied, but she seemed to find the answer to the question she had never expected all the more confusing as she shook her head slightly in a confession of muddle as she tried to process.
Those at the table with us were no different.
Lissa's troubled gazed travelled between Rose's stiff posture and Abe's as she tried to mask her surprise and failed miserably despite her normally composed façade whilst Christian stared at him as though seeing an entirely different side of him…one that he didn't know entirely how to react to.
My own astonishment aside, I tried to reason through what Abe had just said as the stigmas of the past continued to raise their ugly heads.
The perception of Moroi/dhampir relationships had only begun to change in recent years thanks in large to the marriage of dhampir, Mikhail Tanner and Moroi, Sonya Karp, but there was still naturally wide-spread scepticism amongst the purist's. Change for most was hard to accept and for the traditionalist it was almost impossible, but change had nevertheless begun to happen.
To think that Abe would have considered marriage to a dhampir twenty years ago when the stigma of it would have been almost too difficult to bear was almost unthinkable and spoke of emotions that had run far deeper than either he or Janine had ever revealed before.
"What do you mean you proposed to mom?" Rose blurted out disbelievingly, finally regaining her ability to speak as the astonishment raised the pitch of her voice. "When? Why? What did she say? Why has she never told me about this…why have you never told me about this?"
Ending her barrage aggressively, the almost accusatory tone of Rose's voice wasn't lost to anyone, especially not Abe, whose eyes had narrowed at the complaint.
Swapping hands as I saw Rose's agitation stiffen the muscles of her back and shoulders, I ran the right over her rigid spine again in an effort to calm her down. Flinching lightly from beneath my touch before she resettled, I knew the reaction wasn't because of my touch but merely because she was so tightly wound that the slightest brush of my fingers against her skin would have felt like a blow.
Balefully eyeing her, Abe's look of remorse was quickly overshadowed by irritation reflected in his shifty eyes, but he answered Rose nevertheless.
"Well, clearly she turned me down or else we wouldn't be having this conversation, now would we? Besides, it was a long time ago and there was never any real need to tell you any of this before I realised just how stupid the pair of you are being…and I should think the answer to the why would be fairly obvious, Rosemarie."
Scowling darkly at his deliberate flippancy despite having inherited it from him and having it in common with Christian, the shock that had gripped Rose suddenly began to wear off as her own baleful presence made itself known through her growling reply. "Because she was pregnant with me? That's why you proposed?"
Scoffing tightly, Rose shook her head at him as she fidgeted with her dessert spoon before tossing it onto her plate with a ringing clatter it a fit of temper. "You're such a romantic, Abe. Tying yourself to a forbidden relationship and having a child that was never going to be a pureblood Moroi...how noble of you."
Reaching up to fiddle with the golden loop in his left ear, Abe's exasperation began to manifest itself into a physical brand of frustration as palpable as Rose's as he pulled and tugged on it agitatedly. He wasn't used to defending himself to anyone; not many who knew him or his lethal reputation would ever challenge his word, much less question him, but his twenty-year old daughter wasn't most and wasn't about to back down.
"I didn't propose to your mother when we found out she was pregnant with you, Rose. By that stage we already knew that it was dangerous for either of you to be associated with me in any way, so it would have been pointless to fool ourselves otherwise…we also would never have risked you like that.
Having vulnerabilities to leverage in my line of work, even then, would have been potentially disastrous…and you, my child, would have been the greatest liability of my life to those I called enemy."
Sighing, Abe abandoned his agitated motion against his earlobe and looked past us for the first time since sitting down; finding some indefinable point above our heads as his own memories swept him away to a past that very few knew anything about.
"I knew that in the beginning too, but I also knew that I loved Janine almost from the start of our relationship and so because I was young and arrogant and thought that her feelings for me would overcome any reluctance she might have, I proposed about two weeks after we met and was summarily rejected. That didn't stop me from pursuing of course and I continued to propose until the day she told me she was pregnant with you."
"It was only then that I knew that any relationship we would have in the future would be at a distance or during fleeting encounters. If others found out that her child was also mine, despite having a different name, a country of origin or an already formidable guardian for a mother, it could have led to complications that neither of us wanted…or could afford – not when it would involve our child."
"You see, Rose, your mother and I didn't end our relationship because we cared about the opinion of others or because we were scared that it would create a scandal that neither of us could live with…we ended it to keep you safe. Yes, it would have been difficult to have anything permanent, but we were willing to risk that because it was what we both wanted, but ironically, it was what neither of us got."
"You wanted to marry her before she fell pregnant?" Rose questioned softly as her face once again began to drain of colour and she became very still.
Nodding, Abe sighed heavily. "Your perception of who we are as people and parents is severely warped by our past actions, Rose and admittedly we both have to accept responsibility for that – at the time, we both thought it for the best, but that can change now. We can try and help you with your future, but not if you insist on being pig-headed about it."
Sitting forward in his chair suddenly, his obsidian eyes bore into ours and he all but pinned us to our seats. "It doesn't have to be that way with the two of you – not like it was with us. You have the means, the ways and the opportunities to make a real relationship…a real marriage and you're wasting it."
"We're not wasting it, Mr. Mazur." I replied with quiet respect; my mind still in a fog of disbelief as I tried to think around the baring of his emotions.
"You are!" Abe countered with aggressive fervour against my point of argument. His guardians – stationed as discreetly against the walls as the waiters – took a step forward as his irritation exploded through the quiet, warm room in physical aggression, but with a slashing movement of his hand, they stopped in their tracks and retreated just as silently.
"The life-span of the average guardian isn't definite," he continued with more passion than I had ever seen displayed before as he made his stand against what he saw as our unequalled stubbornness. "Now I know that neither of you are run-of-the-mill guardian's, but in the position that you are both in, you're in the line of fire more than normal. You don't have the rest of your lives to waste on waiting for the right time."
Thumping his fist on the table with enough force to shake the crystal vases overflowing with orchids and orange blossom, Abe continued on with his rant. "The right time is now; you've only just begun to change the views of dhampir relationships in our world – you can't afford to back down from it for any reason."
Surging gracefully to his feet, Abe dabbed at his mouth with the napkin before he tossed it carelessly onto the plate and delivered his parting shot. "Don't waste it like I did; don't regret it like I do and never take it for granted."
Inclining his head towards Lissa, he smiled graciously at her, but it was tight and seemed far more forced than he could hide. "Thank you for the wonderful meal, Your Majesty, and for the invitation. Your hospitality has been impeccable, as always, but I'm afraid my flight leaves at midday and I have other business arrangements to see to before I leave."
Standing almost uncertainly, Lissa smiled at him kindly, but seemed unable to find the right words. Bending over her hand, he kissed it lightly before moving around the table towards Christian. Standing, he shook Abe's hand, but eyed us both warily as Abe turned away from him and moved around the table.
Rising, I met his outstretched hand and the hard, business-like shake of it as he looked me directly in the eye. The communication between us was silent, but not for a moment did I misunderstand it. It might have seemed like the clearing of his conscious to Lissa and Christian or the defence of his actions to his daughter, but to me, it sounded like a warning…one that I had no intention of ignoring.
Bending towards his still-seated child, Abe kissed Rose fleetingly on the forehead before he stroked his fingers lightly down her left cheekbone; a cheekbone that stood out starkly beneath the unnatural pallor of her skin…I had never seen her so subdued.
"I know you think I'm meddling and to a degree I am, but I'm also a concerned parent who loves his daughter, even if she thinks he doesn't and sometimes, just sometimes…I also know what's best for you even when you don't. Don't waste the time you have, Rose."
Lingering for the space of a single heart-beat, he turned away smoothly on his heel and headed for the door; his guardian's immediately falling into place as his flanks as the ornamental double-doors were opened and he was ushered out with all the ceremony he could muster.
"Well," Christian sounded as the silence after Abe's departure grew uneasily. "That was an interesting end to an uncomfortable dinner."
Ignoring Christian's remark, Lissa brushed aside a stray strand of hair curling around the side of Rose's face as her fingers glided gently over her cheek. "Are you okay?" It shouldn't have been necessary to ask…not after enduring a dinner filled with loud complaints and less than subtle barbs, but Rose's unnatural stillness was concerning – and not only to Lissa.
"Roza?" I prompted softly as I watched the gently unfocused pupils dilate in the flickering candle light. Turning to me, her expression was pensive, but the furiously burning depths of her eyes contradicted her blank expression.
Blinking rapidly, Rose seemed to shake herself free of her thoughts as her shoulders squared and she smiled firstly towards me before turning towards Lissa, but the gesture seemed just as forced as Abe's had earlier.
"Yeah…I'm fine, Liss. Don't sweat it." Patting the hand that was now cupping her cheek, Rose nodded once in what was her customary show of bravado as she tried to convince those around her that she was fine, but it failed miserably – none of us did.
Preoccupied by my own thoughts as I found myself thinking about Abe's warning and the darkly pained expression in his normally shuttered eyes. Feathering my fingers gently along Rose's nape as she and Lissa talked quietly amongst themselves, I was vaguely aware that Christian had joined the conversation, but their words were merely a mumble of conversation to a mind that was already racing.
Although Rose and I had never seriously discussed marriage, it had been an idea that was never far from my thoughts. Knowing that she considered herself too young had kept me from forcing the issue with anything more than the odd teasing remark or suggestion, but as Abe's words amplified through me, I realised he was right…there was no need to wait.
The fragility of our mortality aside, our lives were no longer exclusively lived by the rules set forth by others. We were no longer governed by what they said was right or wrong, so really, there was no reason to put it off any longer.
Regret was a powerful talisman…one that I had suffered from already and I had no intention of repeating that mistake ever again. Not where Rose was concerned. I knew that it wouldn't be easy to convince her; my stomach knotted as I imagined the argument I was in for, but convince her I would.
Raising our linked hands, I kissed the back of it as I gently tugged Rose to her feet. Surprise flitted across her exquisitely exotic features, but she didn't question me. Rising with us, Lissa and Christian looked on expectantly, but I shook my head at them over Rose's as I rested my chin atop it and wrapped my arms around her waist.
There would be time later for more questions.
Half listening to Rose and Lissa as they continued their conversation, Christian walked to my side with a look of almost sheepish apology on his raw-boned face. It was an unusual look for him. He, like Rose, was very rarely apologetic for his actions.
"Sorry," he began as he shook his head slightly whilst still smiling at me. Sliding his hands into the pockets of his tailored slacks, he looked over Lissa and Rose. "Couldn't resist."
"Mmm," was my non-committal reply, nodding once at him as I tightened my hold around Rose's toned midriff.
"Listen, I know I probably just caused you some trouble, but would you mind coming with me into Philadelphia tomorrow? I know it's your weekend off, but I could use your help."
Nodding, I frowned curiously at him. "Of course, Christian. It's no problem at all. Is something wrong with Smitrovich?" Cooper Smitrovich was my relief guard and normally far guard when away from the safety of Court. Ukrainian by birth, he was little over a year younger and just as dedicated, but maybe something had happened between the pair that I didn't know about.
"No, no, no. Cooper's great, it's just that…well, I would prefer someone that I know better. As a…friend, rather than a guardian."
Arching a brow in mildly pleased surprise, I nodded without further argument.
Named as his guardian during a time that was filled with painful memories of betrayal and death, Christian had ultimately lost the only family he had left with the subsequent execution of his aunt for murder. Knowing that I should have maintained a strictly professional relationship from the beginning despite our familiarity, I had been unable to.
Partly because our grief, although on different levels, was shared.
Natasha Ozera had been someone I respected for her beliefs and admired for her courage as she defied convention. For a brief time, I had considered her as the potential to be more as I tried to purge myself of the love that I had felt was doomed, but as her true nature of manipulative treachery and malice had been revealed, the admiration I had once felt had turned into contempt.
I had mourned the loss of what she might have become had the cruelty of her jealous towards Rose not manifested, but I knew that I could never truly forgive her…not when she had deliberately placed Rose's life in danger by setting her up to take the fall for her treason and for leaving Christian alone in a world where he had needed her.
"After breakfast?" I offered as he smiled and nodded once before casting a quick glance towards Lissa. It wasn't a look I would normally associate with him when looking at her, but it made me suddenly all the more curious to find out what he was up to in Philadelphia.
Pressing my lips to Rose's temple, Christian hooked his arm around Lissa's waist as he pulled her to his side. Eyeing him quizzically, Lissa smiled before kissing his cheek and murmuring against it. "What was that all about, by the way?"
"What was what about, Lissa?"
"Don't play coy with me, Christian Ozera…you know what I'm talking about."
"I do?"
"Yes, you do." Rose interjected cuttingly as she shifted against me to glare towards Christian; I tightened my hold on her in silent warning, but she ignored both it and me. "She's talking about you throwing me under the bus with Abe."
Scratching his chin contemplatively, Christian's black brows rose as he thought through her accusation and his answer. He might have apologized to me, but he wasn't above goading Rose when the chance presented itself. "No…no, I don't think I did that. All I was doing was helping out a fellow Moroi who has to deal with a stubborn dhampir in his life. You know what I'm like; Rose…I'm all about helping others."
Muttering condescendingly beneath her breath, Rose shook her head. "Yeah, you're a real champion of the people, Christian. Just bear in mind that I'm naturally vindictive, have a very short fuse and a very, very long memory."
"I already know that, Rose…but maybe you should remember that your boyfriend is my guardian and I have personally seen him hand you your ass before, so be careful with your threats."
Feeling her hackles standing on end at the implication that she was easily defeated, I murmured into her ear to calm her down. "Let it go, Roza. You know he's baiting you for his own amusement, not for anything else. It's not worth getting worked up about."
Winking at Rose cheekily as she stood fuming in my arms, Lissa quickly interceded before Christian could set her off. "Enough, Christian. Leave Rose alone, please." We both knew just how volatile the pair were around each other and although we had avoided bloodshed between father and daughter, the open warfare that these two practiced in was far more destructive because they already knew every weak spot the other had.
Smirking down at her, Christian grinned broadly but seemed no less inclined to listen. "Arguing is how we communicate, Liss. And besides, Dimitri's got a tight hold on her so she can't do anything."
"You think that Dimitri can protect you from me, Christian?" Rose voiced dangerously as I felt her body coil in preparation. I knew that she would never actually attack him, but her anger was slowly turning into physical aggression.
"Yes," he answered mockingly. "But you'd probably made him regret it for the rest of his life."
"Oh, enough, you two." Lissa griped quietly as she turned slightly to smack Christian lightly on the chest "Dimitri and I have had enough arguments for one night." Facing us again, Lissa's face showed the regret for her decision before her words could.
"I'm really sorry for inviting Abe, Rose. If I had known he would upset you like this, I would never have even suggested it. I just wanted the two of you to spend time together that wasn't because you had to, but because you wanted to. I shouldn't have done that…I should have listened to you when you said it was a bad idea."
Leaning back against me, Rose shook her head at Lissa's apology whilst smiling more naturally than before at her concern. "It's okay, Liss. I knew why you suggested it and if it was anyone other than Abe, the gesture would have been appreciated. He didn't really upset me; he just caught me off guard. I would never have expected that he wanted to marry Janine."
Reaching out as a way of showing that she didn't hold her responsible for anything, Rose tangled their fingers together and squeezed. "I'm fine…don't worry about me, okay?"
Holding my tongue, I narrowed my eyes at her blatant lie but only because it seemed to pacify Lissa for the moment…she was anything but fine.
Parting, we split at the doors as I reassured Christian that I would meet him the next day and headed towards our suite through the quietly empty hallways of palace housing. Greeting the occasional guardian stationed at the junction points of the corridor's, we passed the glass patio doors leading out into a central quadrangle that had been converted into a private garden used exclusively for the reigning monarch.
Pausing at them, we stood together and watched the gentle fall of late November snow. Blanketing everything it touched in frost and suspended animation, the pre-dawn light filtering slowly through the breaks in the treeline cast glistening light through the ice encasing the leaves and bark.
Shivering lightly, Rose burrowed deeper into my side. Even though the buildings had central heating for winter, the touch of icy coldness still seemed able to penetrate the well-insulated rooms. Pulling her securely into my arms, I wrapped them around her as I cradled her to my chest and rested my chin on the top of her head.
"You can try and lie to Lissa and hope that you've convinced her, but I'm not Lissa and I'm not buying the 'I'm fine' story, Roza."
Chuckling softly, Rose curled her arms around my own as she rested her head on the centre of my chest. "Well now there's the problem, comrade. You don't believe me when I lie…it's very annoying. You're lucky I put up with you."
"That's not the reason you put up with me, Rose."
"No, you're right…it's the sex."
Muffling my laughter into her hair, I inhaled deeply and pulled her along with me as we slowly walked towards our rooms and our arms looped around the waist of the other. "Tell me what you're really thinking, Rose…what you're really feeling; Abe's confession shook you. You can try and deny that as much as you like but I know you better than that. Silence is not your natural state."
"I don't know where to start thinking, Dimitri," she muttered, laying her head against my shoulder. "Or what to feel. When we sat down for dinner I was expecting lots of things from Abe and for the most part he delivered, but I wasn't expecting him to confess to wanting to marry my mother."
"I mean, I had always hoped that there must have been something more between them than simple biological urges, but I don't think that I've ever thought it was deeper than mild affection. I mean, they're such different people. My mother is upstanding, morally righteous and would never put a foot wrong and my father breaks rules and laws left, right and centre and is morally ambiguous…they have nothing in common."
"You," I answered simply as I opened the door to our rooms and gently ushered her in. "They have you in common, and before there was you, there mild affection as you put it, was obviously far stronger than anyone realised."
"Yeah, fine, I'll give you that, but how could two people who are the polar opposite even get together in the first place?"
"Who knows? Opposites have been known to attract…and listening to you describe your parents, don't you think that they sound a little like us, but in reverse? I'm like Janine and you're like Abe and we manage to make it work."
Looking up at me in astonishment, Rose opened her mouth to protest, but abruptly shut it as she realised I was right – the look she gave me was fierce disgruntlement; like she knew she couldn't argue against me and wasn't happy about it.
"We're also very different people, but our core beliefs are the same and that's our common link." I reminded her gently as I shut the door firmly behind us and steered her towards the lounge. "It's why we understand each other so well."
"So that's what keeps us together? A common link of knowing the difference between what's right and wrong?" Rose teased as she rubbed her hands up and down her arms in a bid to create friction and changed course, heading towards our bedroom.
"Partly…it's also because I can't keep my hands off you."
"Back to sex then, huh?" Rose asked as she chuckled beneath her breath. Kicking off her heels as she went, they lay haphazardly on the thick cream carpet of the living room as she disappeared.
Shaking my head in mild exasperation as it felt as though I was always picking up after her, I bent to retrieve them and carried them in after her.
"I'll acknowledge that I'm more Abe and you're more Janine, but I think you have a little more Abe in you than you'd like to admit, comrade." Rose called over her shoulder as she flipped the light switch for the bathroom and went in.
Frowning at her remark, I walked towards the walk-in closet with her shoes. "Why do you say that?"
"Because Janine Hathaway would never have slept with her seventeen-year old student, but Abe Mazur definitely would have."
Stopping in my tracks, I turned towards the bathroom as I growled out. "You were almost eighteen, Rose. And I told you we couldn't!"
"Almost doesn't count," she sang out as her words echoed faintly against the walls of the bathroom. "And as I remember it, I agreed that we couldn't, but it was your lips on mine, not the other way around."
Pocking her head around the door, she grinned cheekily at me. "Don't sweat it, comrade. They say woman end up with men who are exactly like their father's, so I guess my theory must be right." Winking at my scowl, she chuckled throatily as the bathroom door closed.
Shaking my head indignantly at being compared to the likes of Ibrahim Mazur; a man who was no better than a glorified gangster, I walked into the closet and placed Rose's shoes neatly on the rack as I slung off my tie and hung the jacket. Rolling up the sleeves of my navy blue dress-shirt, I thought of a hundred instances that I could argue against the comparison, but I also realised that despite my indignation, parts of what Rose had said was true.
So many factors had contributed to that night in the cabin…the night we had first made love. Many of them had been based on my own fear that I would somehow lose Rose after the events of Spokane, the plane trip back from Court and her Spirit-induced rages, but the main reason had been the defeat of my own resistance against her.
She was right; Janine would have stayed resolute, but Abe's wouldn't have.
It gave my perspective a slightly different angle of approach when regarding Abe…and also made me more determined to listen to his warning.
Glancing over to the right, I listened for Rose before walking to the back of the closet. Crouching, I pulled out a pair of old combat-training boots sitting against the far wall. They were heavy-duty and scruffy from use over the years and were the perfect hiding place.
Of all the things that Rose loved to filch from my side of the walk-in: t-shirts, boxers…socks; shoes were the one thing that she couldn't and so she would never have given them a second thought.
Digging into the right boot, I found the small box I had been hiding since long before Rose had turned twenty in March. Clutching it, I rose quickly and shoved it into the pocket of my slacks. We might never have seriously discussed marriage, but that didn't mean I wasn't eternally optimistic about the possibility of it.
Replacing the boot to make it look as though nothing had been disturbed, I padded quietly back into the lounge and headed to the hearth.
Quickly building a small fire to chase away the last of the lingering cold in the room as the dawn crested the tree-line, I stood at the mantelpiece and stared down at the flames as the kindling caught; my fingers finding the box as they rolled it restlessly around in my pocket.
It was only then that I noticed that my hands had begun to tremble.
…to be continued.