And the Bride Wore Red

CHAPTER NINE

SOMETIMES he teased her about her preference for good sense.

‘If I really believed in good sense I’d never have come anywhere near you,’ she said indignantly.

‘You’re trying to reform me. I realised that ages ago.’

‘I’m not having much luck, am I? Sometimes I doubt myself. You know those marvellous roofs you see on old buildings, the ones that curve up at the corners? I read that it dates back to a Buddhist belief about evil residing in straight lines, so they should be avoided if possible.

‘But another book talked about architecture and rainfall, and how the curve was precisely calculated to give maximum benefit to the building. I hated that. I like the Buddhist interpretation much better.’

Lang’s response was to lift Ming Zhi from beside the bed, and address Olivia severely. ‘You’re slipping. That kind of sentimentality isn’t what I engaged you for.’

They laughed, cocooned in the safe refuge they offered each other. Their laughter ended in passion.

Another time Olivia recalled the night she’d met the Langs, and had seen him in the context of both his families.

‘They say a picture’s worth a thousand words,’ she murmured. ‘You told me how out of place you felt with your English family, but it only became real when I saw the photograph of you all together. You looked exactly like them, but I could still see you were a fish out of water.’

‘That’s putting it mildly,’ he said. ‘But, looking back, I feel sorry for them.’

‘Sorry for them?’

‘I know I was difficult. In some ways I’m not a very nice character. You said I looked like a misfit with them, and that was how I felt. But in my mind it was they who were the misfits, and I was the one who’d got it right, which isn’t very amiable in a fifteen-year-old boy.’

‘No, but it is very typical of fifteen-year-old boys,’ she riposted. ‘So you were a grumpy adolescent-join the club.’

‘That’s one way of looking at it,’ he said with a self-mocking smile. ‘The other way is that I’m stubborn, inflexible and set on my own way. Once I want something I won’t give up. Everyone else becomes the victim.’ He tightened his arms around her. ‘As you have cause to know.’

‘Mmm, I’m not complaining.’

‘Good, because I’ve got you and I’m going to keep you.’

‘Do I get a say about that?’ she teased.

‘Nope, you have nothing to say about it. You belong to me, understand?’

She couldn’t resist saying, ‘You mean, like Jaio belonged to the Emperor Qin?’

‘No way. She escaped. You’ll never escape me.’

‘What, no gallant warrior to ride to my rescue?’

‘The man who could take you away from me hasn’t been born.’

‘What happened to being patient and letting me decide in my own time?’

‘That was then. This is now.’

She chuckled. ‘That’s all right, then. I’ll forgive you if you’re a bit overbearing, or even a lot overbearing. Which you most definitely will be. Anything else you want to warn me about?’

He kissed her, adding thoughtfully, ‘Plenty. Take my career-I want to be the best. I have to be the best, whatever it means.’

‘This job that’s coming up?’

‘Yes. I’ve set my heart on it.’

‘But you’ve only been here three years. Aren’t you rushing it?’

‘I know the other likely candidates and they don’t worry me. Besides, the present incumbent hasn’t retired yet, and probably won’t for another year. I’ll be patient until then.’

The unconscious arrogance of that ‘I’ll be patient’ told her he was speaking the truth about himself. He was still the man who’d won her heart, gentle, charming, humorous. But she was learning that his apparent diffidence masked a confidence and determination so implacable that he himself was made uneasy by it. He flinched from it, tried to disguise it, but it was the unalterable truth.

As long as he was determined to keep her with him, she was happy to live with it.

Life wasn’t entirely smooth. On the night after the talent contest there was a dance for the passengers. Wanting to dazzle him, Olivia did herself up to the nines, including wearing one of the dresses she’d bought at the last minute before their departure. It was another cheongsam, this time in black satin embroidered with silver, and even more alluring than the last, which made Lang eye her wryly.

‘You wouldn’t be trying to make me jealous by any chance, would you?’ he murmured.

‘Think I couldn’t?’

‘We’ll have to see.’

She soon realised her mistake. The events of the night before had given Lang a reputation guaranteed to fascinate everyone there. The girls lined up to dance with him. Their men lined up to prevent them. When they couldn’t do that they danced with Olivia instead, hoping to aggravate him.

But they had mistaken their man, as Olivia could have told them. Lang seemed oblivious to everything except the succession of women in his arms, which was obviously the clever way to react, even if she did find it personally aggravating.

Watching him from a slight distance, she could admire his graceful, athletic movements. With her imagination heightened to fever pitch she mentally undressed him, feeling those same movements against her, not dancing but loving her powerfully. Her own dancing became more erotic, something she couldn’t have controlled if she’d tried. And she wasn’t trying.

Just once he looked directly at her and their gazes locked in the perfect comprehension that so often united them. He was doing the same as she, teasing and enticing until they were ready to haul each other off the floor and into bed. Excitement streamed through her, making every nerve tingle with anticipatory pleasure. If only he would make his move soon.

Meaning to urge him along, she allowed herself a little extra wiggle. The result was all she hoped. Lang bid his partner a hasty goodbye, made it across the floor at top speed and hoisted her into his arms.

‘You’ve gone too far,’ he said firmly.

‘I hope so. Better too far than not far enough,’ she said, reminding him of his own words in the zoo.

By this time they were halfway down the corridor. When they reached the door of their suite, Olivia opened it and Lang kicked it shut behind them. When he tossed her onto the bed she reached up to undo the cheongsam.

‘No,’ he said, removing her hands. ‘That’s my job.’

‘Then get on with it,’ she ordered him, edgy with frustration.

He needed no further urging. By the time he’d finished the dress was in tatters on the floor, followed by her underwear. When they were both naked he drew back, breathing heavily, kneeling beside her on the bed. His arousal was hard, almost violent, yet he had the control to stop there, looking down at her with a glint in his eyes that was new.

‘You promised to throw me over your shoulder,’ she reproached him. ‘What happened?’

‘I’m a gentleman,’ he said in a rasping breath.

‘Nah, you’re a coward. If you’d kept me waiting any longer, I’d have thrown you over my shoulder.’

‘That’s because you’re no lady.’ He lay down beside her until his lips were against her ear. ‘I watched you dancing all night, and believe me you are no lady.’

She gave a sigh of deep contentment. ‘I’m glad you realise that.’

His hands were touching her, but differently from before. The movements were fiercer, more purposeful, as though something that had been holding him back had disappeared, releasing him. Now he loved her with a driving urgency, with power, as well as skill, conquering and taking where once he would have waited for her to give.

At the end she was exhausted but triumphant. She’d always suspected that this forceful arrogance was one of the mysteries that lay behind his mild manners, and there was deep satisfaction in having tempted it out at last.

‘Are you all right?’ he asked quietly. ‘I hadn’t meant to be quite so-adventurous.’

The other Lang was back, the quiet one with perfect manners. But she’d seen beyond him now, and she liked what she’d discovered.

‘Perhaps we should try it that way a few more times,’ she said with a contented smile. ‘I rather enjoy not being a lady.’

He laughed. ‘Were you actually trying to make me jealous tonight?’

‘I suppose I was,’ she said in a pensive voice. ‘But you did quite a bit yourself.’

‘You couldn’t expect me to ignore your challenge.’

‘But it’s not fair. I have so much more to be jealous of than you.’

‘You think I’m not jealous of Andy?’

‘Who? Oh, him. You shouldn’t be. You know all about him, and I know nothing about your love life-unless you expect me to believe you’ve lived like a monk.’

She thought he paused a little before saying lightly, ‘Certainly not. I told you about Becky Renton-perhaps not everything, but-’

‘Spare me the details of what happened behind the bicycle sheds at school. I don’t even want to know about the girls you took to the Dancing Dragon.’

‘I explained.’

‘Yes, I remember your explanation-very carefully edited, which was probably wise of you.’

He regarded her wryly. ‘Do you want chapter and verse?’

Warning bells went off in her mind. This was straying into dangerous territory.

He was lying on his back with Olivia on her stomach beside him with a clear view of his face and its suddenly withdrawn look. Two instincts warred within her. She was curious about his life yet reluctant to sound like a jealous nag.

Let it go, she thought. She’d just had the clearest demonstration of what she was to him.

‘Of course I don’t want chapter and verse,’ she said firmly. ‘I know you must have played the field. It would worry me more if you hadn’t.’

She put an arm about his neck and lay over him, her face against his shoulder, feeling him curve his arm to hold her more closely.

‘There is one I’d like to tell you about,’ he said at last. ‘So that there are no secrets between us.’

‘All right. Go on.’ Now the moment was here she only wanted to back away, but it was too late.

‘I was like you for a long time,’ he said. ‘I never let myself get too far into a relationship. I knew where I was heading and I didn’t want anything to get in the way. But a few months before I left England I fell in love with a girl called Natalie.

‘Everything seemed perfect. We planned to get married and come to China together. But one day I found her looking through advertisements for houses, hoping to buy one for us to live in. When I reminded her about China, she laughed and said, “Isn’t it time to be realistic?”

‘I understood then that she’d never really meant to come with me. She’d thought of it as nonsense that I’d get over. When she realised that I was serious, she became angry. She forced me to choose between her and China, and so-’ He paused. ‘And so we said goodbye.’

Olivia had raised herself so that she could look down at him. He turned his head to look at her, and now she wished she could read what was in his eyes.

‘Did you ever regret letting her go?’ She had to ask, although she feared the answer.

‘She’d been deceiving me all that time, keeping a distance between us when I’d thought we were so close. Our minds would always have been apart.’

‘But if you loved her-it’s not just minds, is it?’

He glanced at her naked body leaning over him, the beautiful breasts hanging down so that the nipples touched him, and he caressed them gently.

‘No,’ he said softly, ‘it’s not just minds. But you and I have everything-minds, as well as hearts and bodies. Have you not felt that?’

‘Yes, from the first moment.’

‘You would never hide your thoughts from me, or I from you. I didn’t tell you about Natalie before because I was afraid you would misunderstand and think it had more importance than it has.’

‘And how much does it have?’

‘Some, for a while. But now none at all. She married someone else last year, and I’m glad for her. If we’d married it would have been a disaster, because we would each have wanted something the other could never give. There’s nothing there to make you jealous. The wisest thing I ever did was to wait for you.’

She lay down against him, reassured and content. It wasn’t until the last moment that it occurred to her that there was something ominous in the story, but before she could think of it she was asleep.

Only one person was welcome in their secret world, and that was Norah.

The boat had a computer link-up and Olivia had brought her laptop. Now they both enjoyed going online to her. She and Lang would embark on a chat as though taking up where they’d left off only a few minutes before. Norah liked him as she had never liked Andy, Olivia realised.

He talked about the Yangtze, describing the view from the deck until her eyes shone.

‘Oh, that must have been so marvellous!’ she exclaimed. ‘What a sight!’

‘Perhaps you’ll see it yourself one day,’ he suggested.

‘That would be lovely, but I’m old now. I don’t think there are any long journeys for me.’

‘Who knows what the future holds?’ Lang said mysteriously.

Listening to this, Olivia wondered if she was reading too much into a few words, but they seemed to lead in only one direction. If she and Lang were to choose a life together, she would have to move permanently to China. His life here was too settled to allow any doubt.

For just a little longer they could live in this private universe where the real world was set at a distance. But soon the practical decisions would have to be made.

They said goodnight and hung up. Lang was regarding her with a question in his eyes.

‘Something troubling you?’

‘I was just wondering about Norah. She’s very old, and when you talk of her coming here…’

‘She’s not too old for China. Old people get treated very well here, better than in many other countries.’

‘Yes, I know, but that long air-journey.’

‘Can be made a lot more comfortable with an upgrade.’ He gave her a conspiratorial smile, reminding her that the word had a special significance for them. ‘We just buy her a ticket in business class, where she can travel in comfort, stretch out and go to sleep. I think she’d like it here.’

‘Lang, what are you saying?’

‘I’m just looking ahead, down many different roads, but they all lead to you, my love. Let it happen as it will.’

Yes, she thought, that was the way. Fate, something she’d never believed in before, but which now seemed the only way.

Yet the flight arrangements he’d mentioned showed that he’d been thinking about this in detail, planning for the day.

He partially explained the mystery as they lay together later.

‘It comes from belonging to two different cultures,’ he said sleepily. ‘One side of me believes in fate and destiny, good luck, bad luck, being touched by another world we can’t control. The other side makes graphs and looks up flight timetables.’

‘Which side of you is which?’

‘They’re mixed up. Both cultures have both aspects, but they speak with different accents. Sometimes I tell myself how completely I belong here. I love my Chinese family.’

‘And they love you dearly too. Biyu talked of you being “a little bit English” as though that bit doesn’t matter at all next to your Chinese quarter. It must be wonderful to be so completely accepted.’

A slight shadow came over Lang’s face.

‘What is it?’ Olivia asked. ‘Have I said something wrong?’

‘No, it’s just that you speak of them accepting me.’

‘But they do, that’s obvious.’

‘I know it looks like that, and I’m probably imagining that the acceptance isn’t complete. I simply have this feeling that they’re holding back just a little.’

‘But why?’

‘I don’t know. All I can tell you is that I feel they’re waiting for me to do something, or say something. But I don’t know what it is.’

‘I think you’re wrong. They’re not holding back at all. They’re so proud of you, and they’re especially proud that you came here and chose them. Biyu did this.’ She tapped her breast. ‘And she said, “In here, he is one of us”.’

‘She actually said that?’ There was something touchingly boyish in his eagerness.

‘She actually said that. So doesn’t that prove you’re accepted?’

‘Maybe, but I don’t think even they know that something doesn’t fit.’

‘Then you have to be patient,’ Olivia said. ‘It’ll happen naturally, and you’ll all know by instinct.’

‘I didn’t think you believed in trusting your instinct.’

‘But it’s not my instinct we’re talking about.’

‘Perhaps it is. I think that whatever we seem to be talking about we’re also finding out about each other-and about ourselves.’

‘Yes, it’s alarming when you start to discover that you’re not the person you thought you were,’ she agreed.

‘What have you learned about yourself?’ he murmured, his mouth close to hers.

‘Things that alarm me. Things that I’m not sure I want to learn.’

‘Tell me about them.’

‘I’m just not the person I thought I was-but, if I’m not, then who am I?’

‘Does it matter?’

‘Of course it matters. What a question!’

‘I’m serious. Why do you have to know who you are? It’s enough that you are. And, besides, I know you. You’re a dragon lady-wild, brave, inventive, everything that’s powerful and good.’

‘To you, yes. But that would mean putting myself entirely in your hands.’

‘Don’t you trust me that much?’

‘It’s not that, it’s just-I don’t know.’

‘Believe me, I know what it’s like to put yourself in the hands of the woman you love and to realise that, if she understands you, it doesn’t matter whether you understand yourself because she’s wiser than you are.’

He might have been talking about Natalie, but the warmth in his eyes told her what he really meant.

‘Perhaps you should be careful,’ she whispered. ‘Who knows if I can really be trusted that much?’

‘I do,’ he said at once. ‘I’d trust you with my life, with my heart, soul and all my future.’

‘But we’ve known each other such a little time.’

‘We’ve known each other for over two-thousand years,’ he said. ‘Ever since the moment I caught a glimpse of your face and knew that I’d gladly give up everything else in my life in order to be with you.’

‘Is that you talking?’ she asked in wonder. ‘Or Renshu?’

‘Ah!’ he said with satisfaction. ‘I said you understood me. Yes, I’m Renshu, and so is every man who’s ever loved as much as I do. And I know one thing-I can’t be without you. You must stay with me for ever or my life will be nothing.

‘I know you can’t abandon Norah, but I don’t ask you to. She has been your mother, and from now on she will be mine too. She’ll be happy in China, I’ll make sure of that. Don’t you think I can?’

‘I think you can do anything you set your mind to,’ she said in wonder.

‘Does that mean yes?’

‘Yes, yes, yes!’

Flinging her arms about him, she hugged him with wild joy and he hugged her back powerfully. When they drew back to behold each other’s faces she saw that his was full of mischief.

‘I was so afraid you’d refuse me,’ he said meekly.

‘Liar, liar! You never thought that for a moment,’ she cried, thumping him. ‘You’re the most conceited devil that ever lived.’

‘Only because you make me conceited,’ he defended himself, laughing. ‘If you love me, how can I not have a good opinion of myself? I merely bow to the dragon lady’s superior good sense. Ow! That hurt!’ He rubbed his thigh where she’d landed a lucky slap.

‘I never said I loved you,’ she riposted. ‘I’m marrying you out of pity. No-Ah, wait!’ Her laughter died as something occurred to her. ‘You never actually mentioned marriage, did you?’

‘I didn’t think it needed mentioning. It has to be marriage. Of course, I’d really prefer to keep you as a concubine-No, no, I give in!’ He fended off a renewed attack, securing her arms and keeping her close for safety. ‘You don’t think Tao and Biyu and the others would let me deprive them of a wedding, do you?’

‘Shall we go back to Beijing and tell everyone?’

‘Not just yet. Let’s go off on our own for a while. You once mentioned Shanghai? Let’s go there. But, in the meantime, let’s dress for dinner. Put on your glad rags because you’re going to enjoy tonight.’