The Girl With the Make-Believe Husband

  Funny how nothing seemed to be actually happening in this dream; it was all about the feel of it. The cloudlike comfort of it all. Even his own body seemed eager to bask in the happy sensations. He’d woken up stiff, as he often did, but without the accompanying frustration of knowing nothing could come of it. Because in his dream he was curled up against a very delightful bottom, warm and plump, with a tantalizing little cleft that cradled him in a cozy, feminine embrace.

  His hand stole down to cup one of her cheeks.

  He sighed. Perfection.

  He’d always liked women, liked the soft curves of their bodies, the way their skin lay pale and tender against his. He’d never been a rogue, nor had he been indiscriminate. Years ago his father had pulled him aside and put the fear of God and pox in him. And so while Edward had visited brothels with his friends, he’d never partaken of the goods. It was far safer, and in his opinion probably a great deal more pleasurable, to lie with a woman one actually knew. Discreet widows, mostly. The occasional opera singer.

  But discreet widows and opera singers were not thick on the ground in the American colonies, and it had been a long time since he’d found himself so blissfully entwined with a set of female limbs.

  He did love the feel of a warm woman next to him. Under him.

  Surrounding him.

  He drew her closer, this perfect lady of his dreams, and then . . .

  He woke up.

  For real.

  Christ.

  This was no dreamlike mystery woman in his arms, it was Cecilia, and her nightgown had ridden up in the night to reveal her very bare, very delightful backside.

  He was still mostly dressed, having fallen asleep twice in his clothing, but his cock was protesting its confines mightily, and he really couldn’t blame it, pressed up as it was against Cecilia’s bottom.

  Surely no man had ever found himself in such an exquisitely frustrating situation. She was his wife. Surely he had every right to draw her closer, to roll her over and begin kissing her until she was insensible with desire. He’d start at her mouth, then he’d move down the elegant length of her throat to the hollow of her collarbone.

  From there it would be an easy slide to her breasts, which he still had not seen but was quite certain were perfectly sized and shaped for his hands. He wasn’t sure how he knew this, except that everything else about her had proved perfect, so why not this?

  And he had a feeling that at some point during the night before, he’d had one of those breasts cradled in his hand. His soul seemed to remember it, even if his mind did not.

  But he had promised her that he would not take advantage of this forced proximity. He had promised himself that he would give her a proper wedding night, not something fumbled and rushed with a man operating at only half strength and stamina.

  When he made love to her, she would have all the romance she deserved.

  So now he needed to figure out how to extricate himself without waking her. Even though every masculine fiber of his being disagreed.

  Some fibers disagreeing more than others.

  First things first, he told himself. Move the hand.

  He groaned. He really didn’t want to move his hand.

  But then Cecilia made a little noise like she might be waking up, and that seemed to jolt him out of his inaction. With a slow and careful motion, he pulled his hand away, letting his palm rest on his hip.

  She mumbled something in her sleep, something that sounded remarkably like “salmon mushie,” then let out a sigh as she nestled into the pillows.

  Disaster averted. Edward let himself breathe again.

  Now he needed to get his arm out from underneath her. No easy task as she seemed to be using his hand as some sort of childlike lovey, pressing it up against her cheek like a favorite blanket or stuffed doll.

  He gave it a little tug. She didn’t budge.

  He pulled with a bit more force, only to freeze when she let out a sound of sleepy irritation and burrowed harder against his hand.

  Sleepy irritation. Who knew there even was such a thing?

  Very well, he told himself, it was time to get serious. With an awkward shifting of his weight, he pressed his entire arm down into the mattress, creating enough of a depression for him to slide his limb out from under her without disturbing her position.

  Unentangled at last. Edward started backing away, inch by inch by . . . scratch that, he didn’t make it past the first two inches. It turned out that he had not been the one to cross the bed in the night, it had been Cecilia. And she apparently did not do things in half measures, because he was teetering right at the edge of the mattress.

  There was nothing for it. He was going to have to get up and greet the day.

  The day? He glanced toward the window. The dawn was probably more like it. Unsurprising, he supposed, since they’d fallen asleep relatively early the night before.

  With one final look at Cecilia to make sure she was still sleeping soundly, Edward swung his legs over the side of the bed and stood. He didn’t feel as weak as the day before, which made sense. He might have eaten nothing but broth the previous night, but he’d managed a proper meal when they’d first arrived at the Devil’s Head. It was remarkable what a bit of meat and potatoes could do for a man.

  His head felt somewhat better too, although some inner sense was warning him not to make any sudden, jerky movements. Which certainly ruled out a ten-mile ride up to Haarlem, but at least Cecilia had acquiesced on that score. He honestly didn’t think they would find news of Thomas up at the northern outpost, but he would take her there as soon as he was able. And in the meantime, they would continue their investigation here.

  He would not rest until they learned what had happened to Thomas. Edward owed this much to his friend.

  And now to Cecilia, as well.

  Still moving slowly, he crossed the short distance to the window and pulled the curtains back a few inches. The sun was rising over the New World, painting the sky with wide streaks of orange and pink. He thought about his family back in England. The day would have already started for them. Would they be eating their midday meal? Was the weather warm enough for a ride through the extensive grounds of Crake House? Or was spring still clinging to England, tickling the air with its chill and wind?

  He missed his home, missed the deep greens of the lawns and hedges, the cool mist of the morning. He missed his mother’s rosebushes, even though he’d never liked the cloying scent of them. Had he been homesick before? He hadn’t thought so, although maybe this ache had risen within him during the months that had gone missing from his memory.

  Or perhaps it was something new. He had a wife now, and God willing, children would follow. He’d never thought to have a family here in the colonies. He’d always pictured himself back in Kent, settling into a property of his own, not too far from the rest of the Rokesbys.

  Not that he’d ever pictured a specific woman in these hazy imaginings. He’d never courted anyone seriously, although everyone seemed to think he’d eventually marry his neighbor, Billie Bridgerton. He’d never bothered to disabuse people of this notion, and neither had Billie, but they would be a disaster as husband and wife. They were far too much like siblings to even think of marrying.

  He chuckled, thinking of her. They’d run wild as children, he and Billie, along with his brother Andrew and sister Mary. It was a wonder they’d all reached adulthood in good health. He’d dislocated a shoulder and had a milk tooth knocked out before his eighth birthday. Andrew was always getting into some scrape or another. Only Mary had been immune to the constant injuries, although that was almost certainly less due to chance than to her superior sensibility.

  And George, of course. George had never tested their mother’s patience with breaks and bruises. But then again, he was several years older than the rest. He’d had far more important things to do than scamper about with his younger siblings.

  Would Cecilia like his family? He rather thought she would, and he knew th
ey would like her. He hoped she would not miss Derbyshire overmuch, but it didn’t sound as if she had much left to tie her there, anyway. Thomas had expressed no great affection for their village; Edward would not be surprised if he remained in the army and rented Marswell out now that he was the owner.

  Of course they had to find him first.

  Privately, Edward was not optimistic. He had been putting on a brave front for Cecilia, but there was too much about Thomas’s disappearance that made no sense for this tale to have a happy ending.

  But then again, his own tale was filled with the improbable and bizarre—a lost memory, a found wife. Who was to say that Thomas would not be as lucky?

  The warm hues of the sky were beginning to melt away, and Thomas let the curtain drop. He ought to get dressed—or rather redressed—before Cecilia woke up. He probably wouldn’t bother with new breeches, but a fresh shirt was in order. His trunk had been set near the wardrobe, so he moved quietly across the room and opened it, pleased to see that his belongings appeared intact. He’d brought mostly clothing and equipment, but there were a few personal items mixed within. A slim volume of poetry he’d always enjoyed, a funny little wooden rabbit he and Andrew had carved when they were young.

  He smiled to himself, suddenly wanting to see it again. They’d each decided to carve half, and the result had been the most misshapen, lopsided rodent ever to grace this earth. Billie had declared that if rabbits actually looked like that, they would have been predators if only because all the other animals would faint with shock.

  “Then,” she announced with the great drama she always employed, “they’d go in for the kill with their vicious little teeth . . .”

  It was at that point that Edward’s mother stumbled onto the conversation and put a halt to it, declaring that rabbits were “God’s gentle creatures,” and Billie should—

  It was at that point that Edward had thrust the wooden rabbit in front of his mother’s face, resulting in a shriek of such magnitude and pitch that the children were imitating it for weeks.

  No one got it right, though. Not even Mary, and she could scream. (With so many brothers, she’d learned young.)

  Edward dug down through his things, past the shirts and breeches, past the stockings he’d learned to mend himself. He felt around for the uneven edge of the rabbit, but his hand brushed first against a small bundle of paper, tied neatly with a piece of twine.

  Letters. He’d saved all of the letters he’d received from home, not that his stack was anything compared to Thomas’s. But this small pile represented everyone who was dear to him—his mother, with her tall, elegant script, his father, who never wrote much, but somehow managed to convey what he felt anyway. There was just one letter from Andrew. Edward supposed he could be forgiven; his younger brother was in the navy, and as hard as it could be for mail to reach Edward in New York, it had to be even harder for it to leave from wherever Andrew was posted.

  With a nostalgic smile he continued riffling through the pile. Billie was a terrible correspondent, but she’d managed a few notes. His sister Mary was much better, and she had included a few scribblings from their youngest brother Nicholas, whom Edward was ashamed to say he barely knew. The age difference was great, and with such busy lives, they never seemed to be in the same place at the same time.

  But it was at the bottom of the pile, hidden between two letters from his mother, where Edward found the most treasured piece of his collection.

  Cecilia.

  She had never written to him directly; they both knew that would have been highly improper. But she included a note to him at the bottom of most of her letters to her brother, and Edward had come to look forward to these embedded missives with a longing so deep he would never have admitted to it.

  Thomas would say, “Ah, a letter has arrived from my sister,” and Edward wouldn’t even look up as he replied, “Oh, that’s very nice, I hope she’s well.” But inside his heart beat a little harder, his lungs felt a little tighter, and as Thomas idly skimmed through Cecilia’s words, Edward watched him out of the corner of his eye, trying not to scream, “Just read the bloody bit that’s for me!”

  No, it really would not have done to confess just how much he looked forward to Cecilia’s letters.

  And then one day, while Thomas was out, and Edward was resting in the room they shared, he found himself thinking of her. There was nothing abnormal about this. He thought about his best friend’s sister far more than would be expected given that they had never actually met. But it had been more than a month since her last letter—an uncommonly lengthy break—and Edward was beginning to worry about her, even though he knew that the delay was almost certainly the fault of ocean winds and currents. The transatlantic post was far from dependable.

  But as he lay on his bed, he realized that he could not remember precisely what she’d written in that last letter, and for some reason it became imperative that he do so. Had she described the village busybody as overbearing or overwrought? He could not recall, and it was important. It changed the meaning, and—

  Before he knew it, he was in Thomas’s things, fishing out Cecilia’s letters just so he could reread the four sentences she had included for him.

  It did not occur to him until he was done just how gravely he’d abused his friend’s privacy.

  That he was pathetic, he had realized all along.

  Once he started he couldn’t stop. Edward found himself sneaking peeks at Cecilia’s letters whenever Thomas was away. It was his guilty, stealthy secret, and when he had learned that he was being sent to Connecticut, he’d filched two of her stationery sheets for himself, carefully taking only the ones where the final sheet of paper was almost entirely directed to him. Thomas would lose very little of his sister’s words, and Edward would gain . . .

  Well, he thought he would gain a little bit of sanity, to be frank. Maybe some hope.

  In the end, he’d taken only one of her letters with him to Connecticut, opting to leave the other safely in his trunk. This seemed to have been a prudent plan. According to the people at the hospital, he had not had any papers or property when he’d been found at Kip’s Bay. Heaven only knew where Cecilia’s letter was now. At the bottom of a lake, probably, or maybe kindling for a fire. Edward hoped it had been found by an enterprising bird, torn apart to cushion a nest.

  Cecilia would probably like that, he thought.

  He did too. It almost took the sting out of the loss.

  He’d thought he’d kept it safe, always in his coat pocket. It was strange that—

  Edward froze. This was the most he’d remembered since he’d awakened. Nothing of what he’d done or said, just that he’d carried a letter from his wife in his coat pocket.

  Or had she even been his wife then? When was the date of their marriage? He’d asked her about it the day before, but they’d veered off the topic, and then—honestly, it was his own fault—he’d demanded that she kiss him.

  If he hadn’t got any answers, he had only himself to blame.

  This letter, however—the one in his hands—was the one that was most dear to him. It was the first time she’d written expressly to him. There had been nothing terribly personal; it was as if she’d instinctively known that what he needed most was normalcy. She’d filled her page with the mundane, made delightful by her wry perspective.

  Edward peeked over his shoulder to make sure that Cecilia was still sleeping, then he carefully unfolded the letter.

  Dear Captain Rokesby,

  Your description of the wildflowers in the colonies has made me long for spring, which is losing its fierce battle with winter here in Derbyshire. No, I lie. The battle is not fierce. Winter has crushed spring like a bug. We do not even have the pleasure of a fresh, powdery snow. Whatever precipitation we have gleaned has long since melted into a dirty, unpleasant slush, and I fear I have ruined two shoes this season. Not two pair, mind you, two shoes. The left of my slippers and the right of my boots. My frugal soul wants me to cobble
together a pair from what remains, but I fear I am too vain for the resulting fashion, not to mention far too poor of balance. The heel of my boot is an inch higher than that of my slippers, and I am quite sure I shall trip over everything, fall down the stairs, and perhaps crash a window. Ask Thomas about the time I stumbled over the rug in our drawing room. ’Twas a sad cascade of maladies that followed.

  Do keep yourself safe and Thomas as well, and I will beseech of him to do the same. I shall think of you often and keep you in my prayers.

  Your friend,

  Cecilia Harcourt

  Edward stared at the elegant script for several seconds after he’d read all the words, his forefinger lightly tracing the swirls of her name. Your friend, she’d written. Indeed, that was what she had been, even before he’d known her.

  His friend.

  And now his wife.

  Behind him, he heard the unmistakable sounds of Cecilia waking up. He hastily refolded the letter, tucking it back into the pile from his family.

  “Edward?” he heard her say. Her voice was still thick and sleepy, as if at any moment she might slide into an unexpected yawn.

  “Good morning,” he said, turning around.

  “What were you reading?”

  His hand tapped against his thigh. “Just a letter from home.”

  “Oh.” She was quiet for a moment, then softly said, “You must miss your family dreadfully.”

  “I . . . yes,” he said. And in that single moment he felt like a green boy again, faced with the beautiful girl across the room, the one no one had the courage to speak to. It was ridiculous, utterly mad. He was a grown man, and there had not been a woman who frightened him into silence for over a decade. But he felt as if he’d been caught red-handed.

  If she found out that he’d stolen her letters . . .

  He was mortified just thinking about it.

  “Is something wrong?” she asked.

  “No, no, of course not.” He shoved the entire pile of letters back into his trunk. “Just . . . you know . . . thinking of home.”