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“Or be thrown out and barred entry ever again,” she laughed, but her voice was shaky.
“Minnie always looks upon misfortune as a chance to experience life in a new and fascinating way.”
“Does she,” Portia retorted. “I’d prefer to avoid the misfortune in the first place.”
“How very unadventurous of you,” he mocked gently. “You should learn to live a little, Portia. Obviously you have led a very sheltered existence.”
“I think you’re right. Since meeting you I’ve come to realize how sheltered I am. But you see, I don’t want to have adventures. I prefer my days to be without surprises.”
Did she? She’d always thought so, until she threw caution to the winds and met Marcus at Aphrodite’s Club.
“Right at this moment I just want to go home,” she added, a little plaintively.
Marcus took her hand in his. “Well, you can’t, so you’ll just have to make the best of it. There are other women who would be overjoyed to spend the evening with Minnie and me.”
“Then I must not be like other women.”
He gazed down into her eyes. “No,” he said, “you’re not.”
Portia couldn’t help but smile. He really was very good at this.
Now he leaned closer, dropping his tone. “Forgive me.”
Portia looked up at him, trying to read him. He seemed sincere, but it could all just be part of the game. Nevertheless, she couldn’t blame him for what had happened. It had been her fault as much as his.
“I forgive you,” she whispered.
After one taste of the curry, Portia reached for her water. It was so hot it made her cough and her eyes stream. Marcus pushed a plate of buttered bread toward her, giving her a sympathetic smile, but she noticed he tucked into his own dish without much trouble. He was probably used to it. Just as he was used to listening to Minnie speak about her travels to foreign places. But she found it all new and fascinating, and after a time became so involved in the stories that she forgot about the curry.
“But how did you manage it?” Portia asked. “Didn’t your family worry?”
“Silly if they did. I was doing what I wanted to do.”
“But…” Portia waved her hand, searching for inspiration. “What of your responsibilities?”
Minnie and Marcus both looked at her as if she was speaking Hindustani.
“Your responsibilities as a woman…a sister and daughter. Your duty to your parents and your family. You must have thought of them.”
“Not at all. My responsibility was to myself, to do as I wanted to and not to waste my life trying to be the perfect daughter and wife and…and aunt. I don’t doubt I could have learned to embroider exquisitely and arrange flowers just as well, and pour tea without spilling a drop, but that wasn’t what I wanted to do. Imagine waking up and being too old to fulfill your dreams because you put mundane matters first? How awful! And who would care about your disappointment apart from you? One must follow one’s star, Portia, not turn one’s back on it.”
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nbsp; Portia realized again how alike Marcus and his aunt were. And the disturbing thing was, she envied them.
After the meal, they returned to the sitting room, and while they waited for coffee, Portia prowled about the room, inspecting Minnie’s collection. The paintings of men and women in various bizarre sexual positions made her eyes pop. She fancied Marcus saw her looking at them, her head tilted to one side in order to work out whose leg belonged to who, for she heard him give a snort of laughter, but when she turned to look he was studiously examining his brandy.
“No, I never married,” Minnie said, in answer to her question. “Never found the time. I had no desire to stay at home and have babies while my husband went out and had all the fun.”
A shocking point of view, and yet Portia was not shocked. Well, perhaps only a little bit, and it was a pleasant sort of shock. Minnie was being honest and outrageous, and probably stating what many other women didn’t dare.
“You left a trail of broken hearts,” Marcus said fondly.
“There was a boy, once, when I was a young girl.” Minnie retorted. “But I think the broken heart was on the other foot.”
“There was a boy when I was a young girl,” Portia said, surprising herself. She didn’t look at Marcus. She didn’t dare, in case he read the truth in her eyes. “I used to watch him, secretly. He never knew. Once, in church…”
She bit her lip. Should she do this? What if he guessed who she was? In some odd, perverse way, perhaps she wanted him to know the truth. Or did she hope that realizing she wasn’t the glittering creature he thought her would drive him away?
