She shrugged. “It’s expected. They want grandchildren. They want me to marry their friends’ son. That family will be angry if I say no.”

“They would rather lose you than lose their friends?”

“Let’s just say they hope to get everything they want.”

“But they risk losing everything.”

“I guess they must be comfortable with that possibility.”

My anger, which had been steadily growing, came out in a rush. “I hate them.”

Sid looked up at me.

“They’re selfish,” I said.

“They want what they believe is best for me.”

“But it isn’t.”

“No,” she said softly, “it isn’t.”

I shook my head. “What about that girl?”

Sid sat up. She ran a hand through her hair, trying to get it to settle. She stood, walked to the window, and opened it. The salty harbor air drifted in. The rising sun burned through the dawn. The sky was a thin blue, with a sheen like hammered metal. “She grew up,” Sid said. “Last I heard, she was engaged to a man.”

“Does that bother you?”

She shrugged. “It’s not like it was true love written in the stars.”

“She probably wishes she still had you.”

“Well”—she smiled, but her heart wasn’t in it—“who wouldn’t?”

“I would.”

Slowly, she said, “Is that what you want?”

“What do you mean?”

“To think about me while you’re in that young man’s bed.”

I stared.

“People want all sorts of things,” she said. “It’s not the strangest desire to want to be with one person but imagine another.”

I left the bed and came to her. “I don’t want to be with him.”

“No?”

“No. I don’t love him. I just said I did. He expected it, and I worried what he might do if he didn’t get it.”

She leaned one shoulder against the wall, looking down at me, her brow furrowed, her hands stuffed in her pockets.

I said, “I want you.”

Her expression changed. It deepened with decision. Her mouth slipped into a slight smile that looked almost self-mocking. “Do you?”

“Yes.”

“Nirrim, I can’t be good to you.”

“Then be bad.”

Her hands still in her pockets, she leaned to brush her face against my neck. She kissed my throat. The heat of her mouth was everywhere except on my mouth, her body nudging me up against the wall. Her tongue found my quick pulse. “Touch me,” I whispered.

“Not yet.”

Her mouth seared through my thin silk dress, her tongue dampening it. I felt her gentle teeth.

“Kiss me,” I said.

“Not yet.”