Sweet Love of Mine

Chapter Seven

Chapter Seven

His eyes felt dry and irritated.

Sebastian stirred, faintly aware of an innate discomfort swelling his sinuses. Ignoring the sensation, he endeavoured to plough back into the dark recesses of his subconscious. He was successful for some time until an uproarious sneeze jolted him wide awake. Startled, he twisted and braced himself for another that was currently building within his nose as he took stock of the discordance within his body. His eyes were irritated and swollen, and a burning itch had settled on the top of his palate in a spot his tongue could not quite reach to relieve. His nose… Christ, his nose. It felt as if he’d been in a brawl and come out second best.

Carefully, he began to pry open his eyes and found the source of his vexations.

Mackerel, Emily’s mangy aging housecat, sprawled across his ankles with a self-important look of pomposity on his flat black face despite the state of disrepair his coat was in. Age had not been kind to the mottled street cat, claiming clumps of his fur and exposing crinkled, crusted patches of dark skin. He also smelled as if he were rotting from within. Sebastian had forgotten Emily’s obsession with the animals. He’d also forgotten his most distasteful allergic reaction to them. With the stuffiness of his nose prominent in his mind, he swatted Mackerel off his bed with an ankle. The cat reluctantly complied and hopped down slowly, swinging round with his crooked tale in the air and pointedly giving him a glare. Bloody ridiculous creature, he thought disgruntledly as a mighty sneeze exploded from him.

Mackerel began to make disturbingly high-pitched hacking sounds, his jagged mouth stretched wide over the patterned rug adorning the floor.

“Oh, God.”

Another sneeze wracked his frame and he hurriedly procured a shirt and a pair of breeches which he climbed into and snatched the mangy cat up by the scruff of its neck. It mewled hoarsely in protest but the complaints went unheard or ignored as Sebastian plundered out his chambers and down the hall, then the stairwell. The person he sought was found relatively sooner than he expected and Sebastian jarred to a halt a few steps away from her, startled at her position.

It was late in the day- closer to lunch than breakfast- and Emily seemed to be indulging in the bright rays of sunshine that slithered through the panes of glass at the large window that overlooked the busy street in front of the house. It was her usual spot, the very same one she had spent two years at when she was younger, and Sebastian had thought that he’d never see her perched on that bench ever again. Yet there she was now, her profile turned away from him as she stared distantly out the window. Her bright hair was amassed intricately atop her head, tucked neatly beneath the soft blue fabric of her bonnet. A matching dress covered her body and he decided that it was a colour that suited her, unlike the atrocious reds and pinks Sophie insisted she wear to the more formal occasions. Her presence in what had become an unlikely spot made him pause to consider and the implications made him frown. It did not bode well if she were still harbouring child-like fantasies of ever seeing her mother again. Involuntarily, his heart gave a little pang of sadness.

Mackerel timeously hissed which drew Emily’s attention to him. Her lovely emerald eyes widened on his face before dropping to the struggling cat in his fist. “Mackerel!” she gasped, tripping lightly to her feet and closing the gap between them. She snatched her cat from his grasp and held it to her bosom, glaring at him for good measure. “What have you been doing to my pet?”

Sebastian dragged his eyes away from the disgruntled feline pressed to her ample breasts and endeavoured not to frown his vexations at her or acknowledge that he might be jealous of that bloody cat. “I found him by my feet,” he explained, irked, and his voice was a gravelly rasp, caused by the stuffiness of his nose.