Ch 33

"What did the message say?" Lilian asked as she watched Joseph fold the last of his shirts and place it into his suitcase.

"Pardon me, dear?" Joseph asked over his shoulder.

"The message from your mother, Joseph, what did it say?"

"It said my father is very sick. I cannot delay, my dear. I must hurry home to his bedside at once. Surely you understand?"

Lilian masked her disappointment with a gentle smile. Joseph had never abruptly left the country they were in. Sometimes she suspected that Joseph didn't trust her around men as he never allowed her far from sight.

"Of course I understand, darling. I will hate traveling to Africa alone, but if I must, I must."

Joseph shut and locked his suitcase. "I will meet you in Africa."

Lilian half-smiled when Joseph turned to face her. "Darling, you must be more careful. Your neck will bruise."

Joseph nodded. "I will, my dear. I simply missed a step. Nothing to fret over."

-0-

Erik knew what would transpire if he brought Corinna up to his room. He wanted nothing more than to shut and lock the bedroom door and give into his desire. He mentally pictured each motion of kissing her lips, touching her hair, undressing her and taking her to his bed. He wanted to feel the warmth of her skin, the languid movements of their bodies joined in passion.

Corinna's hand rested on his arm as they walked up the stairs, her fingers brushed over his shirt sleeve in quick, nervous movements. Erik glanced at her from the corner of his eye and saw her enigmatic smile.

She was nervous but she would not protest entering his room if he asked her to join him. Perhaps it was her innocent beliefs that he would sit her down on the bed and merely show her his designs. Or perhaps it was her desire to lay with him.

Whenever he turned to face her his voice would escape. Instead they communicated with shy smiles and gentle caresses, little glances attempting to stay proper and dignified. Even if he had wanted to speak, Erik's throat felt so dry that words were impossible. She had drained him of speech and filled him with something he had never experienced before.

Once they reached the door, Corinna's hand slipped away from his arm and dropped to her side. Her eyes stared at the lock, at the only barrier keeping them apart.

Erik fumbled for his key and felt Corinna lean in closer to him. The heat of her body made his knees feel like liquid. He turned to ask her if she wanted to come inside but stopped when he saw the slight smile on her face.

She was apprehensive. Behind her smile her eyes betrayed a fear of the unknown. Whenever he looked at her, Erik forgot that she was five years younger than he. Her English accent and well-bred manners gave the illusion of a proper young woman. Erik had seen girls her age with years of experience pleasing men in Persia. It was not uncommon for men twice his own age to take girls her age or younger to bed for the night.

But Corinna was not a slave sent to please her master. She was an innocent, a naïve girl following a man she trusted and considered a friend—just as he trusted her and considered her his only friend.

He couldn't be presumptuous, not if he wanted more than an hour or two of her time.

"It will only take a moment for me to gather my drawings. Would you prefer to wai here?"

Disappointment flickered in her eyes followed by a soft smile of relief and a nod of understanding. "I should. If Ursula comes out she would be disappointed in me if she found me in a man's room at night."

Erik nodded. "Of course," he answered.

"But she really wouldn't have anything to worry about," Corinna added as he unlocked the door.

-o-

Corinna wondered if she had frustrated Erik by remaining in the hallway. He had nodded and smiled before he turned away from her and unlocked the door. She was not so young as to think he would invite her in for a cup of tea. According to her aunts, there was only one thing men such as Erik Levesque wanted in young ladies like Corinna. He would leave her broken-hearted and in a miserable situation that would disgrace her and her family.

"Do you think there is still hot water available for tea?" he asked over his shoulder.

"Yes, I believe so," she answered timidly.

Erik walked into the room and quickly lit the nearest lamp. He shook out the match, tossed it into a ceramic bowl and placed his hands on his hips while he glanced around. He had his back to her, which allowed her the best opportunity to admire him from a distance.

Her heart raced merely from looking at him. She wondered what he had done to make his hands so rough and his muscles beneath his shirt so defined. The sight from the previous day was still vivid in her mind when she had seen those scars. She had shyly turned away when she saw him speaking to Joseph, embarrassed to be caught ogling a shirtless, handsome young man.

Her father had only told her that he was an architect but it was obvious he was accustomed to strenuous labor. She knew by the definition of his arms and chest that he was a hard worker. He had done more than merely design. He had built as well, she assumed.

In the back of her mind Corinna wondered what had earned him those terrible whip marks. Perhaps he had not pleased his former employer.

Corinna blocked out her curiosity and searched for something to feed her newfound interests. Her mind wandered like a butterfly in the breeze, aimlessly finding the favored path. She could imagine him in the rock quarries beneath the midday sun, sipping water from a canteen before dousing his short, dark hair. Corinna pieced the scene together detail by detail, imagining the men working all around, chisels in hand as they whistled and sang to themselves. There he would stand, surveying the area with his hand shielding his eyes, shirt tossed aside and beads of sweat trailing from his chest to his bronzed stomach. She could see him unshaven, stroking the divot in his chin as he oversaw the building on a sheet of paper become a home erected before his eyes.

He would touch the earth with his hands, rubbing flecks of stone between his fingers, gathering dirt and dust beneath his fingernails and over his knuckles. Strong, steady hands wrapped around the chisel's wooden handle as he struck the earth.

Corinna released a soft sigh.

Hands, she thought, and her knees weakened. How deftly his long fingers and broad palms had moved over her shoulder and across her neck. She felt a shiver of excitement and a secret fire rise within at the thought of his gentle caress. His touch had been so warm, so comforting. There was nothing of him to fear, Corinna thought with a contented smile. He would take care of her.

She wanted those hands around her again. She wanted to feel the little trickle of ecstasy she had felt watering her soul the moment he had grazed her cheek with his finger. She wanted the sudden rush, the flood of abandonment to all senses she felt with him on the porch the moment she was certain he would kiss her.

What did his lips feel like? Were they as soft as his caress or as rough as his hands? It didn't matter. Corinna wanted an innocent peck to become a hungry, passionate exploration, the sort of joining her cousins in Southern India whispered about when their mother and the servants weren't around to overhear them speaking of their lovers.

Erik turned and caught her staring at him. She turned away as quickly as she could but heard him chuckle.

"Yes?" she said, taking a half-step forward.

Erik shrugged. "You."

"What about me?"

Erik bent down to retrieve a tube, his body disappearing behind the bed. "Everything," he answered.

Corinna's brow furrowed. "Are you making fun of me?"

He turned around and hastily shook his head, bracing himself on the bed as he rose. "No, not at all." A smile changed his expression to something that made her heart race. "I wouldn't. Ever. I--"

His lips parted as though there was something else he wanted to say but he turned around before the thought was given a voice.

"You what?"

"Are you ready?" Erik asked with his back still turned.

"Yes," she answered breathlessly.

She was ready.

Corinna had every intention of telling her father she was in love with Erik. When he returned to India, she would tell him what she wanted. When he saw how happy his daughter was, he wouldt give Erik permission to ask for her hand.