"Love conquers all," Aphrodite promised. "Look at Helen and Paris. Did they let anything come between them?"
"Didn't they start the Trojan War and get thousands of people killed?"
"Pfft. That's not the point. Follow your heart." Rick Riordan, The Titan's Curse
----
XXXII.
Joe was in a state of shock as he stared up at his father. John Parish was utterly furious, and yet all Joe could think about was the very fact that Perrie was right then hiding mere inches from his father's boots underneath his bed.
He panicked at the thought of Perrie being discovered, and at the ramifications for her reputation. Joe's father was in such a state of anger that he would not have put it past John to shout out Perrie's supposed disgrace from the rooftops.
"Are you deaf? I told you to get up!" John snarled as he roughly pulled back Joe's bed linen.
Joe didn't respond facetiously, as he could have responded that he was, in fact, deaf. Perrie, however, did seem to want to respond, and as Joe swung his legs out of bed, he spotted Perrie's hand extend out from underneath the bed to reach for one of John's ankles.
Joe's heart stopped as he stepped down onto Perrie's hand. He did not put his weight upon it, but just held her hand still so that she did not do something impulsively. Underneath his foot, he could feel her hand struggled to get free, but Joe held her firmly there.
He needed to get his father out of his bedroom so that Perrie could leave without being spotted. He had barely comprehended what it was that his father had wanted him to do and where he had intended they go at this time of night.
"I have had enough of the both of you," John continued angrily before he stepped away from Joe's bed. The moment he was out of Perrie's reach, Joe released her hand, and it did slither back underneath the bed. "After everything I have done for you, God has yet cursed me with ungrateful sons. Your brother is a bugger, and you are a failure."
Joe, again, could barely hear his father. He kept one eye on his bed and watched for Perrie's launch at John. But even if he could not fully concentrate on his father's vitriol, Joe couldn't stand to listen to their father demonise Ed.
Ed had always possessed some virtue in their father's eyes. After all, their mother had been alive when birthing him. John Parish had never been a nurturing father to Ed, but there had been pride there in the fact that Ed was his heir, and that Ed was capable of making something of himself, and that included making a good marriage.
"Don't speak of my brother in that way," Joe sneered.
John's head snapped around and his steely gaze narrowed in the dim light of the bedroom. "Do you know of Edmund's disgrace?"
Joe was acutely aware that Perrie now knew of Ed's secret, but he knew that she would never betray it. The same could not be said for their father. He had not known if Joe was privy to the truth, and yet he had revealed it.
"My brother is not a disgrace," Joe said defensively. He felt the conviction suddenly and very deeply.
John laughed sarcastically. "You are a fool if you believe that. I don't think he believes that he is a disgrace or else he would have agreed to give up his sodomite excuse for a bedfellow when I demanded it of him."
What had made Ed give up the man he had known in Cambridge? David. If Ed had refused their father, then what had been the cause?
John answered that question in his next breath. "I threatened to turn him in. I should still turn him in. But he refused to give it up." He shook his head with disgust. "But there is one thing I can count on you for, boy. Your brother would give it up for you."
"Me?" Joe practically choked.
John grunted, as though he was reliving the heated exchange in his mind, and then he quickly returned to his original purpose for coming. "The both of you are entirely too soft. Get dressed and be downstairs in five minutes. I have a carriage waiting."
John then marched from the bedroom and shut the door roughly behind him. The moment he was gone, Perrie cried out, "Wicked toad!"
She scrambled out from under the bed and climbed to her feet, an expression of anger and frustration etched all over her face.
"Shh!" Joe hushed her frantically, and returned to her, placing his hands on her shoulders without thinking in order to settle her. Perrie stiffened. A moment later, he released her, and he instead went to the drawer of his bedside table and fetched a match to relight Perrie's candle.
"Why did I stay under there?" Perrie hissed to herself. "I should have shouted at him. I should have cursed at him. I know some unmentionable words, you know! I am not afraid to use them!"
"The last thing I want you to do is compromise your reputation," Joe murmured. "However, that is something that you seem determined to do quite often, Little Imp."
Joe had needed to utter that name that had quickly and quietly become entirely affectionate. Because Perrie smiled when she heard it now, and when Perrie smiled, something was right in Joe's ever chaotic world.
And smile, she did.
"I never cared for the rules," Perrie whispered flippantly.
"I know," Joe returned, just as quietly.
Colour filled Perrie's cheeks, and Joe felt his own smile burgeoning, something that felt entirely impossible to do at this very moment.
"You're not a failure, Joe," Perrie said then with great tenderness. "That man is a very bitter and horrid excuse for a father, and I am sorry that he is your experience for what a father is like. Because any person with eyes can see that you are the farthest thing from a failure."
"And you have eyes, do you?"
Perrie nodded. "Two of them, in fact."
Joe's hand acted of its own accord and reached out for her. He extended his index finger as Perrie's eyes closed, and he briefly brushed it over her eyelids, counting, "One, two," as he felt the fluttering of Perrie's eyelashes against his skin. It mimicked the feeling in his stomach at that moment.
What on earth was he doing?
But Joe could not help it. He could not help himself. He was completely and helplessly in love with her.
"What do you know?" he said hoarsely. "You do, indeed, have two eyes."
Perrie's eyes opened as she smiled up at him. Oh, he was completely lost. "Do you believe me?"
"Whatever did I do to make you think so well of me?"
"In and amongst our attempts to irritate the other into an early grave, you let me know you, and see you. How do you think I know it is you and not Ed? I see you." Perrie pointed her finger and settled it gently against Joe's chest over his heart. "I don't know all of you, but I would like to if you wanted to share it with me. Even this evening, you have confided in me, and I assure you that there is nothing you could say that could convince me that every one of your demons is not the fault of that man. Your soul is innocent, I promise."
He could see it all over Perrie's face. He could hear it in every word that she breathed. She cared so much, and Joe felt nothing but guilt and shame as he received it. He wanted it. The Lord knew that he desired nothing more than Perrie to love him. For he so loved her, he wanted that in return. But Joe knew it was wrong. Perrie did not deserve a man who had spent her life torturing her because of jealousy and envy. She did not know what Joe could be capable of in the future.
His demons might well have been the fault of his father, but like father, like son.
"What happened to your mother?"
Joe was shocked by Perrie's sudden question, and he could see that she had posed it with a hint of frustration, perhaps because she had seen that Joe had been struggling with her words of affirmation.
"My ... my mother?"
"You told me that you killed her," Perrie pressed. "Tell me what happened ... please."
Joe felt his throat thicken as he instinctively stepped away from Perrie. He heard the ticking of the clock on the mantle behind him and he knew that his father would be waiting and would return if he did not ready himself. Perrie could not be discovered in his bedroom. Joe did not want to go where his father intended on taking him, but his decision was already made for his brother.
Perrie had stated simply that Ed would have stepped in front of a bayonet for him, and Joe would do the same, despite what had transpired between them. If not even the threat of arrest could have persuaded Ed to give up the person he loved, a threat against Joe had. They were brothers first and always.
"I need to dress."
"You are not going to leave with him, are you?" cried Perrie, suddenly alarmed as Joe made his way to his privacy screen.
He had learned the hard way that he needed to make use of the screen provided for him in his bedroom.
"Will you stop shouting?" Joe hissed as he disappeared behind the screen.
"It was a loud whisper!" Perrie insisted as she joined him, placing her hands on her hips.
"What do you think will happen if my father returns and finds you here?" Joe challenged.
"I will call him one of the foul language words that I know and then I will kick him in the shin," Perrie replied pointedly.
Joe groaned before he forcibly manoeuvred Perrie out from behind the screen. He then pulled on the breeches that he had been wearing that day. They were the ones that Perrie had repaired. They were also the ones that she had ruined.
"I do not give you permission to leave this room, Joe!" Perrie declared from the other side of the screen. Joe could see the shadow of her pacing figure from underneath the panels. "I know what he was talking about. I am not entirely ignorant. He wants to take you and Ed to see ladies who ... ladies who know things!"
Joe was in the middle of removing his nightshirt when his curiosity could not help but be piqued. Joe knew exactly where his father intended on taking them. He, shamefully, had spent more than a few nights in similar establishments while training in the navy. But what did Perrie know? "What happens with those ladies, Perrie?" he asked quietly.
"I don't know!" Perrie snapped frustratedly. "Nobody will tell me! But I know that they kiss people!"
Joe could hear the embarrassment in Perrie's voice, and he chastised himself for even entertaining such an inappropriate conversation with her. But it made him smile, nonetheless. He wickedly felt hope that Perrie possessed just a little tinge of jealousy.
"You haven't mentioned what you heard about my brother." Joe swallowed as he buttoned his shirt, and he saw Perrie's shadow still.
"I heard nothing until I am informed by a person I respect." Her answer was so poised and simple, and yet so tender and feeling.
Joe fingers were frozen still as he replied, "I wasn't informed by my brother. I ... I had to find it out myself."
"Maybe he wasn't ready to tell you," said Perrie softly. "Maybe he wasn't ready to lose you."
"We have always only had each other. Always. Just you and me. You have always had me, and I have always had you, and I won't lose you. I can't lose you. I won't risk it."
The words Ed had spoken after the ball, when he had so clearly been grappling with something, rang clearly in Joe's mind. Maybe there was some truth to Perrie's theory. "He never could lose me." Joe roughly tied a cravat around his neck and then fed his arms into his coat. He walked swiftly out from behind the screen to collect his watch, which he had left on his writing desk, and held it in his palm tightly as a thought suddenly struck him.
For how long had he been lost to Perrie? He had kept her lock of hair for years, and had it never occurred to him to wonder why?
"I refuse to allow you to go." Perrie seized Joe's arm suddenly, before she snatched the pocket watch from him.
Joe's breath caught in his throat as Perrie darted across the room from him. "Perrie, give that back to me."
"No, not unless you tell me that you will not go to that place." Perrie held it behind her back and pressed herself against the far wall of the bedroom.
Joe did not think but to charge at her, grabbing hold of her at the waist merely to get her away from the wall. As he reached behind her, Perrie used her small height to weave underneath his arm and shuffle out of his grasp, all the while keeping hold of the watch. Before she could get too far, Joe grabbed Perrie again, though this time his booted foot caught her leg and he tripped, and as he fell down, he pulled Perrie down on top of him.
Perrie scrambled to right herself, though in doing so, she straddled Joe while holding the watch high above her head.
"Tell me what I want to hear."
"You're an insufferable little imp." Joe might as well have been telling Perrie that he loved her. Maybe he had meant it that way all this time. But he curled up, wrapping his arm around Perrie's back to support her, as well as to hold her in place, as his long reach easily captured the watch.
Perrie did not fight him, not when their noses were about touching, and he could feel her warm breaths against his lips.
And then his bedroom door opened.
----
The love I have for these two is getting close to being unmatched. I feel as though they're my children. I only want good things for my children ... so why am I determined to be cruel? This is a conflict I have within myself, and one I won't win as the evil overlord in me always rears her ugly head ... hehehehe
Anyway, I have to get up early-ish tomorrow morning, so I better get to sleep.
Happy stressing over who discovered them! Vote and comment xxx