By the Bay Ch. 02

A smile flirted with his lips as he trekked back to the house, wondering what she'd made for dinner and if she would allow him to have his meal in the kitchen again.

*

The next few days settled into comfortable routine. After that first day of indulgence, Jay woke before dawn thereafter, going for his customary morning run before returning to the house for a bath and breakfast. Instead of the drab butter and toast morning meals that she had been asked to make, Jay had coaxed Anita into making a few local treats. She'd allowed him to sit in the kitchen and watch her make them, too. In fact, she seemed delighted that he wanted to try the food of her culture. He could've sworn he'd seen dimples when she'd smiled when he'd told her he'd like a change of breakfast.

He met the other maid, too. She was short and plump in a motherly manner, with eyes that could rival a squirrel's. When he'd asked her, she'd told him that she was a mother of four, and that her family was on the other side of the island. She only worked at the house during the weekdays, and left to be with her family during the weekends. She was staying at the house this weekend only because of his arrival.

Jay was definitely comfortable with the situation. After a week of being there, he felt more than rested, and all the memories from his past seemed like another person's. He wrote to his mother and chided her -- as best as a son could -- for her meddling in his affairs, and sent a note to his sister who was pursuing higher education at Cambridge University. Those two people were the only aspects of the past that he thought about. Everything else, he buried deep within his subconscious mind.

*

He awoke one particular morning to find the pre-dawn light speckled with pinks and blues. The sun itself was a mere shadow on the horizon, its blaze shadowed by clouds.

Inspiration struck him like a fist, and he threw the thin bedsheet aside and clothed himself quickly before grabbing the typewriter and settling himself on the chair in the balcony.

Hour after hour, he sat there, unmoving as he exhausted the spark of inspiration that had lit his mind. Words appeared on the page, some of them a mistake that needed correcting, but others, the perfect addition to another reality. He immersed himself in another world, a world that he made up as words flowed from his fingertips.

It was nearing noon when he realized that everything he'd wanted to write was already on the page. He was looking through the stack of printed paper when he heard someone humming inside the room. He recognized her voice immediately as she picked out a tune, naïve to the fact that she was being watched.

She wore the tighter white dress today -- yes, he did notice that one of her dresses was tighter than the other -- and was stripping the bed of its linen. She roughly folded the material and set it aside before laying a new set of sheets on the bed. As she crossed his mirror, he watched in fascination as she took apart the bun she'd made of her hair and tied it into a tighter knot. Her hair was longer than he'd thought it had been. It fell to her hips in strands that were neither curly nor straight. And it smelled of jasmine, he knew. Sweet, sweet jasmine.

He moved to stand at the doorway of the balcony, crossing his arms over his chest, waiting for her to notice him. She did so almost instantly, for he was blocking the sunlight that lit the room.

He laughed when she gasped at the sight of him and took a step back.

"That's what you get for coming into a man's room uninvited," he said with a shake of his head as he made for the cupboard.

"I-I'm sorry, sir. I did knock."

Anita swallowed thickly, trying not to look in his direction. Her heart was thudding two times faster than it usually did, and her chest felt tight. She had known she'd regret entering his room without being sure that he wasn't there! But how was she to know that he'd be sitting in the balcony? He was usually out exploring the island at this time.

She peeked at him from beneath her lashes. Gods, the man was positively naked! His shirtless chest was bared to her gaze, the shade of his skin a very appealing gold. But what shocked her even more were the tattoos on his body. A dragon rose up from a cauldron of fire on his abdomen, and what looked like a foreign language made a band around his right arm. The tattoos stirred her, lured her. It was unexplainable. Anita bit her lip and averted her eyes yet again.

Plucking a fresh shirt from the cupboard, Jay drew it over his head before turning to her. He was surprised that she was still standing there, but he supposed that she couldn't leave the bed half-made. If he'd learned anything about her, she was always as neat as a pin, and wouldn't leave things half-done.

"Should I return later?" she asked in that soft voice of hers, so different from the one she'd used when she sang.

"No, no. Don't let me stop you from your chores. I was almost done, anyway."

He watched her for a moment more as she turned back to the bed. Then he, too, collected his papers from the balcony and set them in a drawer in the room. He was in an excellent mood, his blood still humming from the rush of creativity. It was a perfect day, too, he thought to himself when he heard the little green bird that haunted the garden, sing. A perfect day in a perfect place.

He combed his hair out, letting it curl around his neck, all the while watching her in the mirror. She set about her task quickly, replacing all the linens faster than he could imagine possible. His eyebrows rose in admiration as she shook the old sheets out, jiggling certain body parts as she did so. She looked up, and her eyes met his in the mirror. He smiled, and she looked away very quickly.

He rubbed his stomach. "So what's for breakfast?"

*

Later that day, Doctor Jean came by again to remove the bandage. The bruises had healed completely, and there wasn't even a blue patch to hint that she'd been hurt. The doctor smiled, patted her knee reassuringly and told Jay to call on him if anything untoward happened.

Anita was glad to have the bandage finally removed. She'd only been able to take basin baths because of it. Tonight, she'd promised herself that she would take a nice, long soak in the small tub.

An hour after the doctor left, she stood in the kitchen, peeling potatoes for dinner. The Duke had left the house, saying something about a ship carrying books coming into port. Nanthini had left for her home yesterday, and it was up to Anita to do the laundry and clean the house today. Meera, too, had decided to spend time writing and had taken to some secluded part of town where she could find peace. She'd promised, however, to be back by dinner.

The house was quiet as she diced the potatoes, her humming the only flaw in the stillness. She was making fish curry today, since there'd been fresh fish in the market. It had been a while since she'd even tasted fish, and she felt her mouth water at the mere thought of the tender meat. She hoped that the Duke would like it, as fish curry was usually a little sour, different from other curries.

She remembered the day he'd asked her to make food that she liked to eat, not just drab English meals. She'd nearly laughed, for she held exactly the same sentiment for English food. They were all so bland -- like curry without spice. She'd been overjoyed that he liked the food of her people, and only too eager to cook some for him.

She slid the potatoes into the pot, together with an unripe mango, lady's fingers, curry paste that she'd made last night, several spices, and four cupfuls of water. Then she put the lid on it and grabbed the basket of dirty clothes that was by the door.

Outside, on her knees, she shook out each article of clothing before soaking it in a basin of water. Meera's schooldress and underthings went in first, then Anita soaked her own clothes.

From the bottom of the basket, she pulled out the Duke's shirt, the same one he'd worn on the night she'd first met him. She shook it out, making specks of lint disperse themselves. As she did so, she caught a whiff of his smell in the air. It reminded her of something musky, and she knew he applied the scent from a little bottle he kept on the dresser. In fact, she'd seen him do so just that morning.

Her cheeks warmed at the thought. She couldn't believe she'd been privy to such an intimate thing, and worse, she couldn't believe that she'd invaded the man's privacy while he'd been half-naked. Even so, she seemed to have been more embarrassed by the situation than he'd been, and she was the one with all her clothes on. Actually, she thought now, she doubted that he'd been embarrassed at all!

An image of his tattoos flashed in her mind, and her hands twisted in the soft cotton. She didn't understand her reaction to those beautiful ink-marks, but they churned low in her belly, making her bite her bottom lip. She just had to close her eyes to see his gaze in the mirror, heated, unblinking, dangerous… attractive. She hadn't understood that look or why it had been directed at her, but she'd felt the effect of it right down to the ties of her petticoat.

Could she admit it even to herself? She felt an attraction for the Duke. He was kind, patient, so handsome… but there was more. An unspoken something that stood between them. She couldn't understand it, much more, explain it.

It's probably just me, she thought sadly. Perhaps being twenty-three and unmarried is taking its toll on me.

Shaking her head, she put all the clothes in the basin and began the process of washing.

She paused halfway through, her hands immersed in soapy water.

A shudder of repulsion went through her. What was she thinking? Attracted to the Duke? Hadn't she learnt anything from her mother? After everything she'd seen happen before her eyes, how could she still think about any kind of attraction to a white man? Was she crazy?

I probably am, she thought, squaring her shoulders. She was crazy for feeling anything for the kind of men who would leave a woman pregnant with their child and return to their all-proper England without so much as a goodbye. Crazy, she thought. Crazy and stupid.

But the Duke isn't like that.

She ignored the voice in her head, steeling herself from the emotion that welled in her. The memory of her mother had been brutal, clearing any thought of the Duke from her thoughts. She could not afford to think of him as anything more than her employer. If she did, she might find herself with a child in her belly and no one to claim as its father.

Stupid and crazy, she reminded herself. Stupid and crazy.

*

Jay returned to the house just as the sun disappeared over the horizon. He was feeling more excellent than he had that morning, if that were humanly possible. The ship that had docked today had been carrying trunkloads of new novels from America and Britain, and he'd sifted through every single trunk of books to find the ones that interested him. The captain of the ship had promised to deliver all the books he'd selected by the end of the night, and Jay could not wait to get his hands on "This Freedom", a novel that had caused a large buzz in America.

He smiled as he entered the house, and instantly caught the tantalizing whiff of curry in the air. His stomach churned, reminding him that he hadn't eaten since his late breakfast.

"Anita," he called out as he dropped his bag by the door. When she didn't respond or come out to meet him, he went into the kitchen to look for her. She wasn't in there either, but he could see her from the kitchen window, peering over the rear gate as though she were looking for someone.

He called out to her and she turned at the sound of his voice. Then she turned away to take one more look over the gate before running back to the house.

"Is everything all right?" he asked as she entered the house through the back door.

"Yes, sir. Everything is fine."

"Are you sure?" he asked, raising an eyebrow. She looked rather flustered.

She nodded. "Would you like your dinner now, then?"

He could tell from the lines of worry on her face that everything wasn't all right. But he decided to wait for her to tell him. "Yes, thank you."

*

Her hand trembled as she served him his after-meal tea. He noticed that fact right away, and took the cup from her hand before she could spill the hot liquid onto his lap. Still, she wouldn't tell him what the matter was. He watched her silently as she nibbled worriedly on her lips as she cleared the table.

He leaned back on his chair and sipped the steaming brew, not knowing why he was feeling edgy all of a sudden. Something was troubling her, yes. But why should that affect him?

A loud crash from the kitchen had him sprinting towards the noise, only to find Anita on the floor, trying to clean up the mess that the spilled vegetables had made.

"I-I'm sorry," she said, her voice wavering. "I'm so butter-fingered…"

"Anita." He stopped the needless flow of her words by calling her name. He knelt next to her and righted the overturned pot.

"What's wrong?"

"Nothing, sir. I just have to clean this mess." Her voice cracked, as though she were on the verge of tears.

"If you tell me what it is, I may be able to help you."

Her eyes rose to meet his, and he could see the glimmer of tears in them. His chest tightened at the sight for reasons he did not want to decipher. But as he watched, she blinked them away with dainty flicks of her lashes.

"I… my sister is missing."

*

Hey guys,

Hope you're enjoying the story! I've received a few questions about the context of this story and what it would mean to Anita and Jay's relationship, and I'll be addressing them slowly in the next few chapters.

Your feedback really means much to me, especially when I'm writing. Sometimes, I take a break just to come back and read them. They make me reassess the story from time to time and wonder if certain ideas and characters are believable. You guys really are my 'reality check' consultants (and I really need one, trust me).

Anywho, chapter three coming soon! Thanks so much for reading!

Cheers,

Lily.