Stop! Stop this at once! What are you thinking?
‘I realize that,’ I stated coolly. ‘To what purpose have you initiated this superfluous form of physical contact?’
‘Oh, shut up!’
The room was silent for a moment, while my brain ran over the sentence my ears had received, double-checked that I had heard correctly, and slapped a big red label on it saying INSUBORDINATION!
‘I beg your pardon?’ My gaze bored into her like an iron drill - she didn’t seem to care. ‘I am your employer! You will address me with respect!’
‘Fine. Shut up, Sir!’
Correction: she definitely didn’t care.
‘That is not what I was referring to, and you—’
‘Blast you!’ Her eyes flamed, melting the iron in mine along with the ire in a millisecond. ‘I thought you were dead, too!’
In that gaze of her, worlds of words were contained that didn’t need to be spoken. She did care. Oh yes, she cared very much. Just not for courtesy. The soft hand in mine suddenly felt like a burning brand.
‘In that case,’ I managed, ‘you should have ceased searching. No point in chasing something that is already lost. It would be a waste of mon-’
A tug on my hand cut my words short. Before I could protest, before I could even blink, she had raised my hand to her lips and…
Something touched my palm.
Soft.
Ethereal.
Like the touch of a butterfly’s wings, or maybe a rose petal. Only - a rose petal I could have easily brushed off. This touch, I knew deep down, I would remember for the rest of my days. It was burned into my skin, and…
…and since when have you become so mind-numbingly poetic?
I was going insane! That was it. The two harpies’ madness was rubbing off on me. I had to get out of here now!
‘I said,’ she whispered in a low voice that I would have heard through a hurricane, ‘shut up, Sir!’
Our eyes met, and there was silence again. But it was a different kind of silence. One unlike any I had ever experienced. Silence had always been a tool for me: calm silence to think in, cold silence to let people sweat, dark silence to make them beg for mercy. This one wasn’t cold, or dark, or anything but she and I, together.
‘It must really be you.’ Shaking my head, I looked up at her, my eyes unwavering, intent. ‘No figment of my imagination would dare to speak to me like that.’
I watched as she raised her free hand and, with uncustomary caution, let it join the other one, enclosing my long fingers with her smaller ones as best she could.
‘I’m always real for you.’ The words tugged at something in my chest. Probably a muscle I had pulled while being shipwrecked.
‘More than just real. You’re always you.’
‘Glad to be of service, Sir.’
Raising my free hand, I crooked one finger, in a gesture she had better not deny. ‘Come here.’
She raised an eyebrow. ‘For what? Do you want to initiate a bit more superfluous physical contact?’
‘Miss Linton?’
She raised her eyebrow even higher, as surprised as I was at my sudden use of the female address.
‘What, not “Mr Linton”?’ she enquired. ‘I thought I would have to pretend to be a man while I worked for you. I thought it would cause too big a scandal, otherwise.’