The soles of Edward's shoes clicked across the bare wooden floorboards as he surveyed his newly acquired property, unable to keep the smile from tearing at his face. He did not see the large empty space, recently gutted by a fire; did not see the cold walls where evidence of smoke damage clung like a jilted lover. Instead, his vision rose before him, transforming the space into a glittering palace. Spreading his arms wide, he embraced the possibility that the building held. He dragged the heavy mahogany frame of a desk and two chairs into the centre of the room, placed last Friday's copy of the London Times on the table and smoothed the page that contained his cleverly worded advertisement. Checking his pocket watch, he took a deep breath, sat at his desk and prepared himself for his first appointment.
She spilt into the room, ten minutes late, her flyaway hair tumbling from under her hat, which she pulled off unceremoniously and threw onto the desk beside him. Without pausing for a breath, she began to apologise for her tardiness, bombarding him with details of her journey and her subsequent excuses. When she finally stopped talking and raised her eyes to his, he surveyed her critically. She was not unattractive, with pretty wide eyes and a smile that illuminated her face, transforming her plain features into those of radiance.
'Miss Clark?' he asked, hoping that he had caught the correct name from within the confused mess of her monologue. He motioned for her to take a seat opposite him. She threw her frame into the chair carelessly. Edward peered at her from behind the wall of notes which he was quickly rereading, and frowned. 'Don't,' he snapped, 'slouch.'
Her brows flew upwards with surprise and she quickly rearranged her body into a more satisfying pose. Supressing a smirk, Edward make a positive mark against her name.
He flattened his palms against the desk and held her gaze levelly. 'Why do you want to work for me?'
Unable to withstand the heat of his burning pupils as they starred into hers, she dropped her eyes and starred at her hands. He noted with distaste that she had bitten her nails to the skin; that her fingers bled.
'I don't know,' she began, nervously, 'I guess, I just...' Her face broke into that beautiful smile, and he felt his chest contract. 'I've fallen, completely, head-over-heels, for a man, and he desperately wants to marry me but we're both oh-so poor and he has this terribly clever plan about making his fortune in Australia. And he's said it's going to be an awfully exciting adventure, if only he had the money to get there. So I thought that I'd work for you for a few months, earn enough to get married and to travel to Australia and then...' Words failed her, and she merely grinned wildly, prettily, assured of her own genius.
Edward felt his face set into the mould of cynicism. 'And your beloved is happy with this plan; with the idea of you sleeping with other men?'
She flushed, whispered so delicately that Edward had to strain to hear: 'He wouldn't know.' Taking in his dismayed face, she continued. 'I could keep it a secret. It would only be for a little while. And I wouldn't be doing it because I want to; it would be to fund our future-'
He held up his hand to silence her mid-sentence and, as she blinked in confusion, he waved his hand dismissively. 'Thank you for your time but I do not feel that you're the appropriate candidate for this venture. I wish you and your fiancé the best of luck.'
She snorted in anger, turned on her heel and stormed from the room, scattering falling hairpins across the floor as she moved.
The second candidate was a timid girl with thin limbs that jutted from her body at awkward angles. It was almost impossible to determine her age: poverty, malnourishment had stunted her growth so that she had the eerie look of a perpetual child. Her hair hung down her back in a thin, lank mass; her eyes appeared to be too large for her head as she stared at him as if pleading.
When he beckoned her closer, she flinched. It was like looking into a mirror of his former self, and this thought cut Edward deeply. He spoke to her softly, desperate to reassure, fighting the irrational urge to pull her into his arms, to protect her from the external world. She trembled as she spoke to him, refused to meet his gaze and to answer his questions with definite responses.
Finally, she broke and the truth surface to her lips with chest wrenching sobs. 'Please don't make me,' she begged, falling to the floor before him, a mass of weeping rags. Fighting the tears that streaked across her dirty pinched face, she confessed that her father had forced her to apply in a bid to save their family from poverty. Fear made her shrink and, afraid that she would disappear, Edward wrapped a paternal arm around her and guided her from the room to the front door where her father was waiting.
With venom in his voice, he reproached the man; threatening him with untold acts of violence should any harm come to his daughter, before bolting from the scene. As he slammed the door shut behind him, he became aware of the familiar sensation of his body as it cried for blood; that steady, deadly pulse in the base of his throat that screamed for atrocity. His hands shook as he forced himself into a state of composure, desperate to shake the trappings of the past from his skin. Placing his head in his hands, he massaged his temples, waited for the calm to overtake him.
He did not see her enter; rather it seemed that she appeared before him like a spirit. He watched her wordlessly as she moved towards him, marvelling at how the cut of her dress moved as she walked, betraying the sinews of her skin that lay beneath the black silk - a secret ready to be uncovered. Her face was half obscured by a veil of black lace that fell, like a shadow, from the edge of her hat and grazed her features. She sauntered slowly, revelling in the anticipation that her slow steps caused, watching, with her careful dark eyes, as he strained to get a better view of her. She slipped her slim body into the chair opposite him and smoothed her skirt beneath her, before gently removing her hat and brushing tendrils of her hair back into place.
She lifted her eyes to meet Edward's, for the first time, and he reeled. He watched her features as the light lit them, feeling the pull of recognition; certain that he had met her before. She could not be described as a classical beauty but she was striking, with sweeping lashes that framed her wide green eyes, a strong, straight nose and a small but round mouth that held an all knowing smile. She arched her brow as she held his stare, assessing him critically, as a wolf would watch its prey. When she had judged him to be satisfactory, assured herself that she had found a glimmer of honesty in his blue eyes; a degree of sincerity in the blush that gently coloured his face as he stared at her, she slipped her black gloves from her dainty, child-like digits and proffered him her palm.
'Olivia Ayre,' she whispered, looking at him from under her lashes.
'Edward,' he breathed, feeling the pulse that beat beneath her skin.
His perfectly formulated questions, those that he had spent hours perfecting, were dragged from his head by the rapids of his thoughts, as he drank her in. His dry lips moved of their own accord. 'Who are you?'
Her smile was devastating. 'I'm nobody,' she declared softly.
'I doubt that,' he breathed.
She laughed sardonically. 'Would I be here if I wasn't?'
Averting his eyes, he found himself troubled by her honesty. 'Tell me about yourself,' he demanded quietly; his voice coloured by the steely dominance that crept into his command, desperate to learn about the mystical creature before him.
Without answering, she stood and turned from him and slowly, sensually began to unbutton her bodice. Her fingers moved slowly, teasingly. She did not break his gaze and he found himself drawn into the inky blackness of her dilated pupils.
'What are you doing?' he breathed, hypnotized by the way the fabric fell away to reveal the gentle curve of her shoulder; the line of her collarbone.
