The Daughter of Doctor Moreau(72)

“You are in love with Eduardo Lizalde,” he said, and she looked away, her jaw tight.

He was dizzy from the alcohol, exhaustion, and desire, but he sat up and scooted closer to the foot of the bed while she rose and pressed a hand against the headboard, hair askew and looking prettier than she’d ever seemed to him. She must have been a sight after Eduardo made love to her, content and smiling. He’d always envy the boy that.

He ran a hand through his hair. “I know the way it is. You are hurt and you are lonely. When my wife left me I sought solace, but you are not going to find it between the sheets and definitely not at the bottom of a bottle.”

“That’s wise of you, and yet you drink yourself to death.”

“Maybe I don’t want you to be like me.”

“I’ll never be like you. I wasn’t made like you.”

“Copulating with me won’t make you any more human. It’ll make you sadder, when you open your eyes and see my face instead of his. Copulating with me won’t make up for what happened in the lab, it won’t wipe away the things your father confessed, and it won’t heal him.”

She looked offended, perhaps by his choice of words or his acrid tone. The tie of her nightgown was undone and offered him a perfect view of her neck as she swallowed and tipped her chin up.

“Maybe it’s not about any of that.”

“It’s about all of that, and even if it wasn’t I’ll tell you something else: I’m afraid.”

“I knew it,” she muttered.

“Not of you. But of loving you.”

“I don’t understand.”

For a minute he had a notion to keep quiet, and he even had the selfish craving to take back his previous words, to instead kiss her and damn the world. But he wanted to be honest, not play a card game with her despite his predilection for gambling.

“I once loved a woman who didn’t love me back and it broke me. I don’t want that again,” he said, his voice smooth and low.

Maybe it was not the only thing that had broken him. The brunt of cruelty, of the world, had taken its toll and marked him. But she’d been his solace and his hope, the balm from ugliness and wrongdoings. Then she’d left him and admitted that she’d never really loved him. It had been solely her misguided thought that he might have some money that led her to the altar; it had been his uncle’s business that had led her to him. When there were no coins to collect, she’d abandoned him. She’d written it all in a wonderfully brutal letter after he was mangled by the jaguar, and he’d written back, but in his dreams.

And afterward there had been no beauty in the world, nothing good or compassionate, so he’d wandered, aimless, and hoped maybe God might smite him, because Montgomery was too much of a coward to take a knife to his neck.

“You’ll share yourself with me for the span of an hour and then what? I’m two paces from loving you, two paces from having my heart destroyed,” he said and smirked. “Because you are not going to love me back, and when you leave me, like a ship run aground, you won’t care. It’s not because you’ll be cruel, it’s because it’s the way of the world. So if you want me, you’ll have to say you love me, and make a liar of yourself.”

She did not speak a single word, curling up on the center of the bed, blinking through the tears, not letting herself cry, holding back, but still terribly sad. At least she was calmer now; the aguardiente was making her lids heavy.

“I need someone who won’t leave me,” she whispered at last.

“You’ll have me for as long as you require my assistance.”

He could give her that. She needed it more than she needed his body.

“You’ll swear to it?”

“Yes.”

He felt exhausted, but he watched her until she fell asleep, knowing he’d never have the pleasure of that sight again.





Chapter 23


    Carlota


It was early when she awoke and stretched her body, her fingers touching the headboard. She turned her head on the pillow and saw Montgomery asleep in a chair next to his desk, his arms crossed against his chest. It did not look like a comfortable position, and she felt sorry for him sleeping like that.

Then she remembered that she’d kissed him the previous night and how he’d touched her before pushing her aside. The embarrassment should have killed her on the spot, but instead she felt better, even if she’d made a fool of herself.

She’d been heartbroken and raw. When Eduardo had looked at her it had been like a dagger to the heart. The way he flinched, the way his eyes fell on her before he walked out of the room…she wouldn’t forget that look.

She’d wanted to pretend that everything was fine and that she was still loved, that someone cared about her, because her father was a liar and she was monstrous and she thought the well of affection had run dry. But Montgomery had seen through her despair.

She stood up, picked her discarded robe from the floor, and touched him on the arm. He grunted and looked up at her.

“Good morning, Montgomery,” she said.

“Morning?” he muttered and rubbed his eyes. “Doesn’t feel like it.”

“The sun is up.”

“Mmm…let me sleep longer and maybe lend me a pillow.”