These Broken Stars(6)
For a girl who spends more nights in someone else’s room than her own, Anna is a prude when it comes to me. I can’t help but wonder what my father has promised her in exchange for keeping an eye on me on this trip—or what he’s threatened her with should she fail.
I know she’s only trying to protect me. Better her than one of my bodyguards, with no reason to cushion the truth when reporting to my father. Anna is one of the only people who knows what Monsieur LaRoux is capable of, when it comes to me. She’s seen what happens to men who look at me the wrong way. There are rumors, of course. Most guys are smart enough to steer clear, but only Anna knows. For all her lectures, I’m glad she’s here with me.
Still, something in me won’t let it go. “One conversation,” I murmur. “That’s all, Anna. Do we have to go through this every time?”
Anna leans in so she can slip her arm through mine and put her head on my shoulder. When we were young, this was my gesture—but we’ve grown, and I’m taller than her now. “I’m only trying to help,” she says. “You know what Uncle Roderick is like. You’re all he has. Is it such a terrible thing that your father’s devoted to you?”
I sigh, leaning my head to the side to rest it on hers. “If I can’t play a little when I’m away from him, then what’s the use in traveling on my own?”
“Major Merendsen was rather delicious,” Anna admits in a low voice. “Did you see how well he filled out that uniform? He’s not for you, but maybe I should look up his cabin number.”
My stomach gives an odd little lurch. Jealousy? Surely not. The movement of the ship, then. And yet, faster-than-light travel is so smooth it’s like standing still.
Anna lifts her head, looks at my face, and laughs, the sound a delightful, well-practiced tinkle of silver. “Oh, don’t scowl, Lil. I was only joking. Just don’t see him again, or you know I’ll have to tell your father. I don’t want to, but I can’t not do it.”
Elana, Swann, and the faceless tuxedo return with a hover tray in tow, laden with drinks and hors d’oeuvres. The girls have given Anna enough time to chastise me, and they’re all smiles as they slide into the booth to join us. Anna sends the tuxedo back to the bar because her drink has a stick of pineapple in it rather than cherries, and she and the other girls titter to one another as they watch him walk away. It’s clear why Anna’s chosen this one—he’d give the major a good run for his money in the filling-a-suit department.
Anna begins describing the tuxedo’s enthusiastic attempts to court her, much to the amusement of Elana and Swann. Sometimes this kind of conversation is all I want—light, easy, and not remotely dangerous. It takes the spotlight off of me and puts Anna at center stage, so that all I have to do is smile and laugh. Usually she’d have me in stitches by now. But tonight it feels hollow, and it’s hard for me to let myself go.
I glance at the door now and then, but though it swings open and closed dozens of times, it’s never to admit Tarver Merendsen. I’m sure he knows the rules as well as I do, and there’s not a person aboard who doesn’t know who I am. That he spoke to me at all is a wonder. Though my father made a show of letting me travel by myself for my birthday in New Paris, the truth is that he’s always there, in some way or another.
There is one tiny comfort, though. At least he left of his own accord, and I didn’t have to end him in front of all my friends. After all, on a ship carrying over fifty thousand passengers, the odds of ever encountering again the major’s crooked smile and distracting voice are next to nothing.
The next two nights Anna and I skip the salon, and go straight to the promenade deck after dinner. We walk arm in arm, and talk out Anna’s gossip. I know she’ll still spend the entire night in our adjoining suites draped over the foot of my bed, chatting. Though she never seems to show the effects of not sleeping, I inevitably wake up with purple smudges under my eyes, standing out like bruises on my fair skin. Outside of these voyages, Anna and I never get to spend so much time together. Here, we can be like sisters.
And so we walk. Swann is with us as well, of course—I can barely get out of bed without her at my elbow—but if she listens to us, she doesn’t comment.
Though Anna’s said nothing else about the major, he hasn’t been far from my thoughts. Most of the lower classes, when they speak to me, try to pretend they’re on my level. They fawn over me, dancing attendance, so phony it makes my teeth ache. But the major was candid, genuine, and when he smiled, it didn’t seem forced. He acted like he truly enjoyed my company.