Ring. Sister. Piano (Book 4 of The Powder Trail)

Chapter Twenty Six: The Province of Angels

Five minutes. And she would hold him to it. She would probably stand over him with a pocket-watch and snap the case shut when his allotted time ran out. He would either have to talk very quickly, or find just the right words – words that could do the work of a three-volume novel in five minutes. He wished he was Joel.

But would Joel have been able to make her feel the way he had made her feel last night? For the first time in his life, Jack didn't wish he was anyone else, because last night had happened to him. And even if there was no particular merit in it – even if it was sheer, dumb luck – it was his dumb luck. It would have been different for someone else, and he wouldn't have changed an atom of it.

He waited in the Faculty lounge, while Sarah bustled about, opening shutters and lighting fires and setting out the breakfast things. She would normally have done this before anyone was up, but it seemed she had only just got back from her sister's. 

Still, she knew. She knew even before Jack asked, without meeting her eyes, whether she would be so kind as to take up some hot water to the young lady in his bedroom.

"She's not staying, Sarah," he added, when he couldn't bear her triumphant smile any longer.

"Then why do you look so 'appy?" Sarah countered. 

"Because I'm a man?"

She looked a little put-out by this, as though she'd been relying on him to uphold her romantic ideals, and he had let her down. "So you're just going to let 'er go?"

Jack smile disappeared for the first time that day. "I have to."

"You're not even going to fight for 'er?"

He winced. "God, no. No more fighting, for or over this woman. She needs peace now."

He wondered if he would still be saying this when Robin came back. And the pianist – how quickly the pianist had dwindled into insignificance when he had seen Robin standing with her on those steps! They would both be back. But he had something they'd never had, not even Robin. She loved him.

"She saved my life, Sarah," he said quietly. "She's in charge."

Sarah looked mollified, as though she had readjusted her romantic ideals to fit him in. She was a strange one, Sarah. Not in love with him, and probably not in love with Ellini, but in love with the idea of them as a pair. He supposed you learned to be selfless and maternal when you spent your life looking after dreamy academics who could barely tie their shoes.

He found he was ravenous. He ate all the toast Sarah brought up, once she had taken care of the hot water, and then sent her down for some more. But he didn't sit down. He couldn't. There was a counter – almost like a bar – running the length of the Faculty Lounge, and he took up station behind it. He was not afraid of himself anymore – perhaps he never would be again – but he still thought it would be a good idea to put a physical barrier between himself and Ellini. Also, it would conceal his inevitable erection.

He drank too much coffee, and his mind raced, but not in any productive directions. He wondered what Ellini made of his sudden indifference. Could she really believe that, now he'd got what he wanted, he was only too happy to let her go? No, she had been there last night – she'd heard his delirious babbling. She was well-practised at undervaluing herself, but she couldn't go that far, surely? She was staying because she thought he had a plan – some elaborate scheme like the liberation of the prison colonies – and she wanted to see what it was. She wasn't afraid of being caught. She just wanted to marvel at him, one last time. God, this was going to be hard.