Julian said softly. “Independence Day,” she repeated, her awestruck whisper echoing the first thought that had come into her consciousness on awakening. She lay still, letting the smile of that revelation play over her face. Then she turned her head to look at Iliana, asleep beside her. My friend, she thought, easing herself up carefully on one elbow, the better to watch that sleeping face in morning light gauzed blue by the curtain. My … lover. The word still stammered in the brain. Yet there the lover was, her breathing calm, her hair tousled against the pillow, those beryl-gray eyes—the color of rain, Julian had declared—moving rhythmically in a secret dream visored by the lids and the lashes that curved over the cheek. Full and rich, the features of that face, even when in repose, but never more so than when animated in conversation. The cosmopolite with the naughty smile, the connoisseur of wines and cheeses, olives and Caravaggio, music, chiaroscuro. The patient watcher, who knew how to wait—and then how to woo when the time was right.
