Demon Bound

partner.
    “Yes,” she finally said. “I met him at the site.”
    Why did she bother to flatten her tone, to try to dissuade further questions? Jake would ask anyway.
    “So you worked with him after you married?”
    “No. We traveled to England for the wedding. My parents returned to Egypt immediately afterward; Henry and I were to return later, but . . .” Henry had lost his passion for Egyptology. Had wanted to concentrate on making a perfect life with his delicate flower of a wife. Had been certain that by remaining in England, his family would grow to accept her and love her. “We did not.”
    “Because of Teqon?”
    “Yes, in part.” She increased her pace, her heart pounding. “I don’t wish to speak of this.”
    Jake’s disappointment was clear. This hadn’t been idle curiosity or prying, she realized; he was genuinely interested in her .
    What a coward she was. She’d been so foolish, all those years ago; now she was so afraid that Jake would know it.
    Surely that was foolish.
    “All right,” Jake said. “Back to el-Amarna, then. Were you there when they found the—”
    “Never compare me to a flower.”
    If he was taken aback, he didn’t show it. His gaze was steady on her face. “Okay.”
    “I loved Henry. He was kind and generous. Intelligent and humorous. Always trying to please everyone, to think the best of them, to care for them.”
    His jaw clenched. “A paragon, I get it.”
    “Yes. Yes, he was.” She took a deep breath. “And I was terribly unhappy.”
    Oh, dear God, how wonderful it felt to say that. Like Sisyphus, dropping his boulder and letting it roll. Despite knowing that it wouldn’t change anything, for a brief moment the relief of its missing weight overwhelmed the compulsion to bear it.
    “You want me to kill him?”
    “He’s dead.”
    Jake spread his hands. “Look where we are.”
    He could make her smile so easily. “I hope no one ends up here just for being weak.”
    “Weak? So you rode over him.”
    “No. As I said, he was very caring and intelligent. And he was quite certain that he knew exactly what was best for everyone—particularly me. He knew better than I what would make me happy.” She sighed. “And it hurt him so when I was not.”
    Jake’s voice seemed very flat and controlled. “So it was your own fault that you weren’t happy. And your fault that he was hurt by it.”
    “Yes. Because I did not—could not—do as he thought best, do what he asked me.”
    Oh, and she had asked far too much of him. When she had expressed her disappointment in the marriage bed, he’d explained that he loved her far too much to degrade her in that way—and that he was shocked by the carelessness of her parents, that she’d even known of such things. And when she’d screamed her frustration at him, he’d beg her to stop—wondering why she couldn’t see that he only wanted what was best for them, that he only lived to serve her and to make her happy.
    And at the beginning, though they had regarded her with disdain, his family had not been so terrible. They kept their distance, and she hadn’t minded. She was quite capable of keeping herself occupied.
    But then they had begun to remark upon her strangeness, to advise Henry to curb her reading and studying, her correspondence. Such activities were too taxing, they argued—and Henry would follow their direction. How Alice had grown to hate that mix of subservience and condescension in him. Despised how he could never admit that they or he might be wrong.
    Then she’d miscarried, and he’d been convinced it had proved him right. And they’d tried again.
    Oh, so gently.
    Jake’s voice broke in on her simmering thoughts. “You know what a load of—”
    “Yes. Yes, of course I do. Now.” She shook her head. “No, that is a lie. I knew then, too. I tried to leave—to return to Egypt.”
    “You ran off by yourself?”
    “Yes.”
    “Just unhappy, huh?”
    She smiled a little to acknowledge the understatement. After her second miscarriage, she’d been desperate to return to her family. “I had little choice. Henry had begun vetting my letters, saying to any request for my parents to visit that it would be too dangerous. My father was so old, you see. And surely news of my melancholy—which could be cured if I would simply take Henry’s advice—would only upset my father’s health.”
    She stopped, surprised by the bitterness in her voice. Not that it was there, but that she was expressing