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Tia Osiris walked up to her, her throat clicking in a sound that was mixture of amusement and affection. “It has been a long time since I’ve seen that particular hungry glint in your eyes, mi Corazón. It was high time someone made you jump through a few hoops for a change. A woman like you requires a bit of a chase.”
What this would require was a lot of cleanup. Things had never gone well for Cora whenever she mixed business with pleasure, and she didn’t see any reason why this would go differently. This time, at least, Manuela had no interest in her money. “The last thing on my mind is romance, Tia, so please don’t look at me like that,” Cora told her aunt as she headed for the door.
“Querida, everyone needs a little romance, a little love.”
Cora denied that delusion with a severe shake of the head. “I have loads of love. I have you, Alfie, Cassie and Frede. I don’t need anything more.” She clearly needed something. Why else would she be running after Manuela when she was obviously being baited?
“My hat,” she said, practically growling, the frustration of the last ten minutes seeping into her bones. She told herself this was her merely doing her due diligence. She could not finish the railroad without Manuela’s land, and she would not get the land if the blasted girl got herself killed in Montmartre.
“Are you sure you don’t want me to come with you?” Alfie asked, as a footman opened the carriage door for her.
“Alfie, I love you. You are the light of my life, but I will have Pierre physically remove you from my carriage if you insist on getting in.” The strapping footman blanched at her words and her stepson relented with a grin, then threw his hands up in a sign of defeat. “Believe me, son, what is about to happen in that brasserie is not fit for your young eyes.”
He laughed, but she was deadly serious. Manuela Caceres Galvan thought she wanted debauchery... Cora would make sure she got exactly what she’d been so diligently looking for.
Twelve
“That message you sentto the duchess will only start trouble, Manuela,” Aurora warned a while later as their carriage slowly took them up the hill leading to Montmartre.
“If you recall, Aurora, trouble is exactly what I’ve been after since we arrived in Paris and so far have not seen even an inkling of.” It might be true that the note she sent off by messenger was the equivalent of placing a steak under a caged tiger’s nose, but Cora had begun this chess game. Manuela was merely making her move. She was particularly proud of the final line.
Your Grace,
It is with my deepest regret that I write to inform you that I will not be available for our morning ride. I have been called away this evening to attend a divertissement at Le Chat Tordu in Montmartre. I’ve been advised that their offerings may keep me from my bed until the early hours of the morning. It seems prudent not to make any plans before noon. Please send my regrets to the horse.
Warmest regards,
Manuela Caceres Galvan
Manuela wasn’t certain what reaction that taunt would draw from the duchess exactly, but she suspected there would be one. At this point, she didn’t much care what it was.
“What games are you playing at, Manuela?”
“I only wish any of this was a game,” she exclaimed in frustration. “I bargained for a bacchanalia, and so far all I’ve done is discuss the benefits of Ceylon tea with Cora’s lovely but quite older friends. Then there was the harp recital and the lecture on what seemed to be a species of sapphic beetles.” That last one had truly pushed Manuela to the very limits of her patience. If Cora wanted to play dirty, Manuela would see her in the muck, preferably at a location in Montmartre. “If the duchess is unable or unwilling to provide me with the erotic tryst I deserve, then I will find it myself!”
Aurora choked, pointing at the coachman, which only made Manuela more cross. “Oh, for goodness’ sake, Aurora, no one cares what we do here. Who is this French coachman going to tell our affairs to?” Manuela reminded herself that Aurora was in this carriage because she was trying to be supportive, and it would do no good to take her frustrations out on her. “I know this all seems silly to you, but it is something I desire greatly. It’s a chance I won’t have again.”
“Manuela, you could just stay in Paris. There are thousands of Caribbean and South American people settled here. You met some yourself at that dinner you went to with the duchess. Paris has always been a place where people come to find their own way of being.” Aurora spoke from personal experience. When every door had been closed to her in her own homeland, she’d come here to Paris to study medicine. “It is especially true for women who, for whatever reason, can’t pursue what they want in their own countries. Ironically, in some ways, there is more freedom here.” Aurora paused for a second, her gaze troubled. Manuela could only assume she was thinking of her own issues with her family, but as always her friend didn’t dwell too long on what was beyond her control and focused on what was. “People do it all the time. Look at Antonio,” Aurora insisted.
“Antonio is a man and an engineer,” Manuela reminded her impatiently. “I don’t want to end up in some hovel as a laundress because I decided to pursue my passion.” Aurora flinched at that, and Manuela sighed.
Even as she’d said it, she’d considered the women she’d met in Paris. The paths they’d chosen. The lives they’d created for themselves. Perhaps not glamorous ones, but they were lives with dignity and purpose. She thought of her mother, of the whispered recriminations about what she’d cost them all. Her own guilt for what her indiscretions had caused. The reality was that the Parisian life Aurora spoke of could never be hers.
“I just want you to be happy,” Aurora finally whispered, her gloved hand reaching for Manuela’s. She knew her friend meant well, that she sincerely wished to see her happy, but Aurora didn’t quite know the full truth of Manuela’s circumstances.
“I never told you or Luz Alana how bad things became with my family.” Aurora’s hand tightened on hers, but Manuela turned her face away, looking out into the Parisian night. “Father didn’t just get into debt with the factory, he lost it. There were a few years after Abuela died when we were living hand to mouth.” She heard Aurora’s sharp intake of breath.
“Leona, why didn’t you tell us?”
“My parents didn’t want anyone to know.” She shrugged, even as her face heated with that old humiliation. “And you had your own issues to deal with, between your work and your father and brothers. Luz was so preoccupied with the business, and then her father passed.” It was more than that, of course. It had been mortifying. She’d never even realized her family was in the situation it was until too late. Until the debtors were coming to the house and demanding their money. Until they couldn’t pay the staff who had worked for them for years. Until they almost lost the roof over their heads. “When Felix started courting me, Father had been assaulted by a debt collector only a week earlier. He’d kicked him so hard he’d broken a rib.”
“Manuela!” Aurora’s shocked voice did nothing to ease her remembered pain. She hated those memories. She’d never spoken to anyone about that day, about those months of constant worry. Of her parents’ screaming fights that usually ended with her mother coming into her room to remind her they wouldn’t be going through any of it if she hadn’t done what she did with Catalina. She’d barely slept for months, tortured by guilt and increasingly desperate as their situation worsened.
The fear of her father being thrown in jail, her mother’s frantic sobbing about being ostracized by their friends. That had been the worst of it. To know that their community, the families her mother lived to impress, would all turn their backs on them if they ever knew of their situation. She’d spent long nights fearful of what the future held for them, despairing of what would happen if they were found out. There had been days, weeks, during that dark period when Manuela told herself she’d do anything to never be that afraid again.
“Felix swooped in and offered to make it all go away if I married him.” He’d seemed like a godsend then, and for the first time in so long her parents didn’t look at her like she was to blame for all their troubles. “He was looking to buy a place for himself in society, a way to gain some influence with the wealthier families in Caracas and the Caribbean Coast as he expanded his business there. Despite my family’s troubles, we are still well-established in Caracas. The Caceres and the Galvan names are still respected.” Aurora grunted at that, but she didn’t argue. She knew the truth of it. “I was the perfect accessory for that process.”
Manuela’s family, at one time, had been the biggest supplier of candles in the Caribbean and the northern coast of South American. They had also been tied to two of the most respected political figures of the region, the great Juan Pablo Duarte and Felix del Rosario Sanchez. Consuelo and Prospero Caceres Galvan found their daughter and their self-respect a low price to pay for to regain their financial security.
