Meggie turned slowly, fully expecting to see Thomas lying beside her, on his back, still snoring, but Thomas was gone, none of him anywhere to be seen. And he’d been gone for a while. His pillow wasn’t even warm.
She looked at the small clock on the mantel. It was only seven o’clock in the morning. He’d left her very early indeed.
When she’d eased into bed long after midnight, her husband of one day—and one half of one night—had been sprawled on his belly, arms flung wide, taking up much more than half the bed. A single cover was to his waist, leaving him bare the rest of the way up. There was a lot of the rest of the way up to see. She’d seen the front of him and now she was seeing the back. Without considering what she was doing, Meggie raised her candle higher. He was a big man, long and smooth, not hairy on the back like he was on the front, very nicely made—she’d give him that—but nothing else. For a moment, no, just for the quickest of an instant, she wanted to pull the cover down, but she got her brain back, and backed away. She finally doused the candle, made herself into a ball, and hugged the side of the bed until her fuzzy brain became so vague, so empty of anything save visions of swimming in the sea, only she wasn’t really wet or even swimming, just there somehow in the water and it was cradling her, making her feel just fine. When she fell asleep, she slept deeply, not a single disagreeable dream to wake her in the night.
She sat up when she saw the door slowly opening, and there he was, her husband, just standing there, one booted foot inside the room, looking toward the bed, looking at her. A man had just opened the door to her chamber, hadn’t even bothered to knock and now he was in the same bedchamber as she was and he was looking at her. It was astounding, this husband business. The power it gave men over women and the most private parts of their lives. Actually, she’d had some power as well when he’d taken off his clothes for her to see him the previous night. Now that she thought about that, her skin turned warm, particularly the skin on her face.
“Meggie,” he said, not moving from the doorway.
He was smart, she thought, not to come any closer. “Shall I pack your dressing gown in my valise?”
“What?”
“Shall I pack—
“Yes, I see that you’re wearing it. Shall I ask you why?”
“I couldn’t very well go downstairs to get more champagne wearing my nightgown, one, I might add, that didn’t make it past the bed and to safety and is thus spotted with my blood and with you as well.”
He appeared flummoxed for a moment at this stark talk, then said, “I see. You know, a girl shouldn’t speak so openly about intimate matters, particularly her virginal blood and her husband’s seed.”
He would swear he saw her lips form a word, and he knew that word was moron.
“Why did you go downstairs for more champagne?”
“You haven’t seen Mrs. Miggs this morning?”
He shook his head.
“I finished the champagne you ordered up for my fantasy dinner—actually my lovely fantasy dinner spun out of a stupid girl’s head. It turned into quite something else, didn’t it?”
“As to that, I don’t wish to speak of it. I, ah, washed out your nightgown when I awoke this morning and hung it over the back of the chair. It should be completely dry shortly.”
“Thank you. You have erased the evidence—very wise of you.”
“The champagne left on the table wasn’t enough for you?”
Meggie began swinging her legs over the side of the bed. Her toes were a good six inches off the floor. She said in a chatty voice, “How very odd. You sound all stiff and disapproving, like a father whose child has sadly disappointed him. Surely that is an absurdity after what you did.” He would swear again that her mouth formed the word moron. He also realized that she was on the edge of saying it, and knew he couldn’t allow it. Maybe he deserved it, but that wasn’t for her to decide.