The Golden Cross Read Online Free PDF Page A

whisper in the darkness, its shimmering softness a delight to her senses. The wet sand was firm beneath her feet, the steady crash and roar of the sea a wonderful accompaniment to the song of the stars.
    Her companion smiled in appreciation of her beauty, his teeth gleaming through the mask of shadow, and Aidan’s heart surged upward as her hands gripped his.
    This is but a dream, but it is yours to enjoy
. Sonorous music reverberated from some celestial place, filling the night with warmth and emotion and feeling. Aidan danced without thinking, feeling the music, the warmth of the sea breeze, the pleasure of her companion. This was no sailor who’d spent too much time in his cups; this was a man who admired her, who appreciated her, who thought her special and worth seeking. She knew without asking that he had not come from the tavern; she must have found him as her heart wended its way to the sea.
    A sudden flash of light seared the back of her eyelids, dispelling the ocean, the man, and the music in one bright slash.
    “Ow!” she yowled crossly, bringing her arm over her eyes as she squirmed on her pallet. “Shut the door!”
    “Get up, Aidan, the merchants are already stirring. Orabel, comb your hair and wash your face. Is that mud on your hands?”
    Lili’s voice. Always Lili’s. She was a mother hen to all of them, though Aidan was the only one to have been carried in that expansive womb.
    Aidan lifted one eyelid enough to see her mother’s stalwart form moving through the small chamber that served as home to Lili and six other women. In exchange for one meal a day and a roof over their heads, the girls contributed 50 percent of their earnings to Lili, who passed the money on to Bram. Bram asked no questions about where the money came from; he only insisted that the girls bathe at least once a week and not pick any pockets while they were inside the tavern.
    All the women but Orabel and Aidan had already rolled up their pallets and stashed them in the corner; they were undoubtedly outside by the rain barrel, trying to tidy their faces and knot their hair. Bram wanted his barmaids to look approachable.
    Aidan sat up, stung by a sudden bitterness. Why did morning have to come so soon? Why did it have to come at all? Life had become a series of endless mornings on this seasonless island. One day was much like the next, bringing the same chores, the same inane flirtations, the same prayers that some sailor would pass out in the alley with enough money in his purse for the girls to buy a decent meal or a badly needed pair of shoes. Only in her sleep had Aidan found any sort of peace or pleasure, and morning came all too soon when she’d been forced to stay up half the night listening to some young seaman blubber about the friend he’d lost off the coast of Spain.
    She leaned forward and hugged her knees, knowing that at any moment Lili would appear at her side and issue her usual dire warnings. If Aidan didn’t get up and clean her face, she wouldn’t draw any man’s attention. And if the men wouldn’t look at her, how was she supposed to gain their trust? Without their trust and interest, how was she supposed to catch a husband?
    “I’m about as likely to catch a husband in Bram’s tavern as I am to find gold in the sewer,” Aidan murmured. She squinted her eyelids tightly, trying to conjure up the image of the mysterious stranger who had danced with her by the sea, but the noise and distractions of the street outside were too great. Bram had already thrown open his doors, and the first wave of thirsty seamen would soon flood the tavern. Anxious for whiskey, wine, and women, the men had little else on their minds.
    She’d leave it all if she could. Cory O’Connor had never intended for his daughter to become a barmaid. She had been well educated in London; her father had employed a governess to teach Aidan how to read, write, and sew. But when the Black Plague swept London in the summer of Aidan’s