Forgiveness
After Joseph and Verona went home, Christian and Satine went to bed with hardly a word spoken between them. Neither of them slept, however, and both were aware of the other's discontent, but they still couldn't seem to manage a way of bringing it back. As the sun rose and splayed shades of brilliant orange and gold across the ceiling, Christian rolled over onto his side to look at Satine, and saw that she had been staring at it as well.
"I'm sorry," he said tentatively.
Satine turned her head to look at him, brows furrowing in faint confusion. "For what?"
Christian winced at the sight of the bruise that surrounded her left eye; the area was swollen and puffy, and the dark purple mark stood out in silent accusation. Even though he hadn't been the one to put it there, he thought he might as well have.
"For . . ." he trailed off in frustration, and pushed himself up onto his elbow, gazing down at her with a pained expression. "Everything. I just want – I just want to take care of you, but instead I keep hurting you."
Satine, alarmed by this train of thought he was having, pulled herself into a sitting position, propping pillows at her back. "Christian . . ."
"No, Satine – I should have known better, I should have seen it before . . . Alexander, he had asked me about the story – about making Sarah a courtesan," he admitted, shaking his head slightly.
Satine listened quietly as he spoke, and when he was finished she gave a slight shake of her head. "Christian, you can't blame yourself. It's not your fault. You had no way of knowing."
He drew in a breath at the words that were meant to be comforting, but went on anyway. "I'm just – I'm worried I'm not . . . I'm worried that I'm a failure."
"At what?" she asked, surprised.
"At – at life . . . at making you happy –"
She frowned and started to interrupt, but he continued before she could, confessing, "I'm afraid I'm going to be a failure at being a father, too."
Satine sighed softly, then reached over to brush his hair back from his forehead. "Christian . . . come here, sit up."
He obeyed, and she leaned up to look him straight in the eye as she spoke. "If there is one thing you certainly are not, it's a failure. You are the most talented, gifted, and loving people I know, and I feel blessed simply to know you. No one has ever made me happier, and you're going to be a wonderful husband and father. I know it."
She paused, smiling at him, then asked in a lighter tone, "You wouldn't doubt my word, would you?"
Christian sighed lightly, but with contentment, then leaned in and kissed her gently. "I love you, Satine."
"I love you, too," she responded, and leaned against him, resting her head on his shoulder.
He settled back with his arms around her, but his expression again turned to one of worry as he again recalled the events of the evening before. It had all repeated itself in his head countless times over the night, and each time had been a little more troubling.
Because he knew Alexander Castleton was a very determined man.
As a result of the evening prior, that entire day was filled with tension – not between Christian and Satine themselves, but over anxiety of what was likely to happen. When a knock sounded at the door, Christian went to answer it, and Joseph practically burst into the room, with a long-suffering looking Verona at his heels.
"Guess what I've found out," Joseph announced triumphantly.
He got blank looks in response from Satine, who was sitting on the couch, and Christian, who moved to shut the door behind him.
Verona glanced sidelong at her husband, and said ruefully, "Dr. Paris here has been doing detective work. By the way, good morning, Satine, Christian."
"Oh, yeah, good morning," the aforementioned man said cheerfully.
Curious as to just what could make the Egyptologist apparently turned investigator so excited, Christian crossed back over to sit beside Satine, a brow lifted in question. "What is it?"
Verona coughed into her hand, and moved to sit down as well.
"A method to the madness, so to speak," Joseph went on, perching on the arm of his wife's chair. "You see, I've been asking around about Mr. Castleton, and it turns out he has been married – and that his ex-wife left him for another man."
The others blinked, so Verona clarified, "And my dear husband here thinks that is why he holds so much contempt toward Satine – not because of her in particular, or her past . . . occupation, as it were . . . but because of his own general distrust of women. The fact that she used to be a courtesan, well, that only adds to his reasoning."
"Ah," Satine said, settling back into the couch cushions and leaning against Christian.
"It certainly makes things a bit more clear," Christian allowed. "Though that still doesn't forgive what he did."
"Oh, no, by all means not," Joseph said, shaking his head. "Striking a lady, much less one in Satine's – well – delicate condition."
Verona grinned momentarily at the flush that seemed to be creeping up her husband's collar – after all the brash, risqué things he had said to her when they first met, here he was acting almost genteel about the topic at hand – then she turned back to Christian and Satine and offered a nod of her own.
"He definitely deserved to have his nose broken." She sniffed indignantly, then added, "The bloody bastard."
"Verona!" Joseph exclaimed, but he grinned nevertheless at Verona's language. "Anyway, I –"
Whatever he intended to say, however, was interrupted as someone knocked on the door.
Christian shot a glance around at the others, then rose and moved to answer it.
As expected, Alexander Castleton stood in the hallway, a bandage over his nose – confirming that it had indeed been broken – and a rather nasty bruise on his right temple from a blow Christian didn't even remember landing.
He stared evenly at Christian, his brown eyes steady, and asked in a neutral tone, "May I come in?"
For a moment, Christian allowed himself to entertain the notion of simply slamming the door in the man's face – he really didn't want him in his home, especially not after what he had done to Satine – but with a curt nod of his head, he stepped aside and opened the door wider in silent beckoning for the man to enter.
Castleton stepped into the room, glancing about at the gathered individuals, and gave a slight nod of greeting, then focused his attention back on Christian. "Could we talk?"
Taking the cue, Verona rose and cleared her throat a bit. "Satine, why don't you come back with Joseph and me – we have some artifacts from our latest dig you might like to see."
Satine looked straight at the American publisher for a moment, then got to her feet and nodded to Verona. The three excused themselves from the room soon afterward, leaving Christian and Castleton alone, facing each other in silence.
They looked a perfect picture of the scuffle they'd gotten into, at that, with Castleton's ruined nose and the bruise over Christian's cheekbone, though the former really looked the worse for wear.
Christian paused, reluctantly contemplating the situation, then offered, "Have a seat."
After they'd settled as comfortably as possible under the circumstances, Castleton spoke up again. "I'd like to apologize for my actions last night."
"I'm not the one you should be apologizing to," Christian replied flatly.
The other man flushed visibly, and Christian took some comfort in seeing that he had the good grace to look at least a bit embarrassed about it.
"In any case, I am sorry. I forgive you for my nose . . . and I'd like to make amends," Castleton said, his tone somewhat strained.
Christian said nothing, and so Castleton went on.
"You're a talented writer, Christian, and I'd like to see you get published. In short, I don't see why this little incident should affect our professional relationship –"
Christian offered him an incredulous stare for his trouble.
"You don't see why, Alexander?" he interjected sharply. "After all those things you said to my fiancée, after you hit her, after you endangered not only her, but my child, you expect to come here and act as if nothing's happened? I trusted you – and you betrayed what friendship we had. I can't just go back from that."
Castleton shifted around in his chair, staring at the writer in return.
"Christian," he said slowly, carefully, "You owe me. I got you out of jail, I paid off that Duke and got him out of your hair – you're here now because of me. I just want to do the right thing – can you really not find it in yourself to forgive me for one mistake?"
Christian drew in a breath, gazing evenly at the American man. "I don't think I can trust you again," he said quietly. "I can forgive it, but I can't forget it, and I hope you'll understand that."
"No, I don't understand it," Castleton said, looking disappointed. "But I hope you understand something – I wasn't exaggerating when I said you owe me. I could ruin you. Don't forget, Christian – you signed a contract."
"I did," he acknowledged with a nod. The words left him chagrined, because, plainly, they were truthful. Castleton did hold the power to ruin Christian. "And I'll hold to it – but you can't expect a friendship."
"I suppose I can accept that," Castleton replied, getting to his feet. "I'm sorry it had to come down to this, Christian – and I do assure you that you needn't worry about any of it happening again."
"I'm sorry things had to turn out this way as well," Christian agreed, rising as well.
Castleton offered a hand, which after a moment Christian accepted and shook.
"Well, then, I'll see you next week for your new pages."
"They're quite lovely – what are they?"
"Ushabtis. They're amulets of a sort that were placed in the tombs with the dead as guardians."
"And these are authentic?"
"Yes. Joseph and I generally don't like to remove things from the tombs – it's an issue with disturbing the dead – but another party had already been through ahead of us and retrieved the remains, so there wasn't much use in leaving the rest of it undisturbed."
Christian poked his head through the open door of the Parises' second bedroom, which was used mostly as a study and a place to store the couple's various artifacts and texts. Getting no response to his knock upon the front door, he'd taken the liberty of letting himself into the apartment, and had followed the voices to that end of the hall.
"Am I interrupting?" he asked, offering a small smile to the trio within the room.
"Of course not," Verona responded, setting the artifact she'd been showing Satine back into the curio cabinet it had come out of, along with two more like it.
"How'd it go?" Joseph questioned.
"He apologized," Christian said, entering the room and moving over to Satine's side. "And . . . I forgave him."
Then he went on to relate the entire tale to the three of them, explaining Castleton's apology, the details of the contract, and his reasoning behind forgiving the man for what he had done.
For their part, Verona and Joseph blinked, while Satine seemed to accept this, simply turning to watch Christian with a concerned expression.
"Well, that's all fine and noble," Joseph said slowly, "but what d'you mean, you forgave him?"
"I forgave him," Christian repeated. "I know it's strange, but it's complicated, and – well, it just felt like the right thing to do."
"I think it was the right thing," Verona offered encouragingly. "I mean, you don't want that hanging over you – it's best to just move on and let it go. I've never been a big believer in holding grudges – I think it comes back to haunt you if you do, and it only pulls you down."
Satine smiled at Verona's words, then leaned up and kissed Christian lightly on the cheek. "Verona's right, darling. You made the right decision."
And for the first time in a very long time, everything felt lighter again.
Author's Note: Before I get any flames for having Christian forgive him, think about it – Christian is who he is, and all in all a rather kind person. Plus, I felt like drawing this out any further would be like beating a dead horse – I was getting depressed of the angst, so expect the rest of the story (which will not be much longer – I'm already at sixty-one pages!) to be happy fluff.
This chapter is dedicated to Arauka Pilininge, for allowing me to use Verona and Joseph, and for being a loyal beta reader and best friend.