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“I don’t know,” I lie. “I think he’s a drifter. I noticed him in town the other day.”
Part of that isn’t a lie. I do think he’s a drifter. And I did notice him the other day. Many many times, all through the night.
Richard’s pale eyes narrow. “He looks as though he knows you.”
But at that moment, almost like he heard, Phillip shifts his gaze away, as though I’m a stranger, as though he was mistaken for waving at me.
It crushes me soul and I swallow hard.
“See? I guess he thought he knew me but was mistaken.”
Richard pauses, but I’m not important enough for his concern. He returns his attention to the matter at hand.
“I’m going to leave you in the dress shop, while I attend to a few things.”
I know his “few things” include visiting the brothel so that his depraved, unnatural wants may be attended to, but I don’t indicate that I know. Instead, I simply nod.
He leaves me at the shop and I disappear inside.
I obediently wait inside a dressing room while they prepare my gown, and when they offer to help me put it on, I decline. I can dress myself, for God’s sake.
“Can I be of assistance?”
Phillip’s silky voice is in my ear just as I’m struggling to fasten the spine full of pearl buttons.
“How did you…you can’t be… they can’t see you here!” I finally manage to say, while at the same time throwing my arms around his neck and clinging to him. His scent is so familiar and I suck it down.
“Don’t fret, ma Cherie,” he tells me. “No one knows I’m here.”
His fingers deftly fasten my buttons and he stands behind me in the mirror.
“You are beautiful,” he whispers, his lips on my neck, his hands flattened against my belly.
My belly.
I feel instantly queasy and turn to him, clutching his fingers.
“Phillip, I… I must tell you something.”
He waits and he’s calm, and the words come tumbling out.
“I’m pregnant. It’s yours.”
His smile is immediate and radiant and for just a minute, I entertain the notion that he’ll sweep me out of this room and away from this town and everything will be okay.
But that hope is dashed when he nods.
“That pleases me, ma Cherie. We’ll always be connected by this, my heart.”
His meaning slams into me.
He doesn’t intend to be with me at all.
“But…” I stammer. “I want to be with you. We could be a family. Maybe we could make everything work.”
His look is sympathetic. “You must take care of your mother,” he reminds me. “I cannot do that. I don’t have roots, Livvie. I don’t have a place in the world or means to care for her or for you. Take this chance. Raise our baby to be a Savage. He’ll be esteemed and so will you. I cannot do that for you.”
My heart crumbles into dust and I can’t even cry because I am shocked, so so shocked.
