“You’re all I have,” Jack said later, after he made love to Chelsea a third time that night.
She was completely satisfied and joyful beyond any imagining. Rolling off him, she lay on her side and rested her head on his shoulder. He pulled the covers up and held her close.
“How do you mean?” she asked.
He stared up at the ceiling and ran his thumb over her bare shoulder. “I mean that from my vantage point, there is no one else in the world who cares anything for me. I have no thoughts of any loved ones to give me a sense of importance. I feel as if I could draw my last breath tomorrow, and no one would notice or care. Except for you.”
She leaned up on one elbow. “But that is not true. I would not be the only one. That is only what you feel because you cannot recall any of those people who care for you. In reality, they do exist and are probably sick with worry and searching for you this very moment. You just don’t know it.”
She kissed him tenderly on the mouth, then lay back down again, thinking about all the friends and acquaintances he must have, the siblings and cousins, uncles and aunts and parents.
Somewhere in a hidden place inside her, jealousy surfaced, because those people would know so much more about him than she did—for she knew nothing, only that he could be whisked away from her tomorrow, like a leaf on the wind, if someone arrived to claim him.
But that was selfish, she knew. It was wrong to think such things, to resent those people in his life, so she closed her eyes and strove to strengthen her heart just a little and enjoy this without feeling too deeply, for she did not know how long it would last.
“I want to remember my life,” he said, still stroking her shoulder, “but at the same time I do not. What if I don’t like it? What if I am vindictive or dishonest, or at odds with a family I despise? What if I am married to a woman I hate?”
She leaned up on her elbow again and listened to his fears with secret apprehensions of her own.
“Or a woman you love,” she added.
His expression stilled and grew serious. “That almost seems like a worse possibility.”
“Because you would always have to live with the knowledge that you were unfaithful to her.”
Because of me, and this thing I have done. She grew uneasy.
“Yes.”
“But you don’t behave like a married man,” she reminded him, hoping to ease his mind, as well as her own—for what would she do if he did have a wife? She had taken that possibility very lightly before, when she decided to enter into this affair. She had stuck her head in the sand, shutting her eyes against all the possible consequences that might cause pain in the future.
She had not wanted to face any of that. All she’d wanted was to become this beautiful stranger’s lover and therefore escape her marriage to Lord Jerome. Clearly she had been superficial in her thinking. She had not known how profound or vulnerable her emotions would become in such a short time.
“No, that’s right,” he replied as he raised his hand to rub at his forehead. “Nor do I feel like a married man. But I am quite certain I do have responsibilities. Just in the last few minutes, I’ve begun to feel some concern, as if I am supposed to be somewhere or be doing something, and that it might be urgent.”
She frowned. “Last night you said you understood about duties and responsibilities, and you were happy to help me defy my mother. Perhaps you have been avoiding this urgent thing for the same reason—because you do not want to do it.”
“I suppose only time will provide the answers to those questions. Otherwise,” he said with a more lighthearted sigh, “you will be stuck with me.”
She kissed him on the chest and smiled, and let her heart fall open, just for a moment. One moment, that was all. “I can think of worse things.”
But as she lay her head back down on his shoulder, her mind fluttered with anxiety, because this was the first time he had shown any signs of recollection. He was suspicious that there was an urgent duty he must attend to. It weighed upon his conscience.
If that was so, and he remembered what it was and felt compelled to leave, it would mean the abrupt end of their affair.
But that was not all. There was also the unalterable fact that she had already given her word to Sebastian and Melissa that if she became pregnant with this man’s child, she would send him away without ever telling him, and give the child up to be raised by them.
She had been very wrong to think that this plan would be straightforward or easy. It was nothing of the sort. Her emotions were involved, as well as her conscience, and she suspected that in the coming weeks she was going to have a very difficult time with this plan she had concocted. She would have to think very carefully about how best to resolve it. Or back away from it completely.
Just before dawn, Chelsea woke to the sound of a bird chirping outside the window, and knew she would soon have to leave and return to her own room before the servants were up and about.
She did not want to leave. She wanted to remain here in her lover’s arms, and make love with him all day until they couldn’t breathe, move, or even think anymore.
Despite her fears and apprehensions—or perhaps because of them—last night had been the most incredible night of her life, surpassing even the previous one, which seemed, at the time, the summit of all pleasures. The first night had been the end of her virginity, after all, and therefore changed her life forever.
But last night she’d immersed herself more deeply in her emotions, for she did not know how long this would last and wanted to experience everything more fully. There were no words to describe the rapture she had known, not only when they were making love, but also while they were talking or simply holding each other, listening to the waves outside the window.
She had been consumed not only by pleasure and desire, but by a profound mixture of joy and sorrow that made her realize how much of life she’d been missing. She had not known it was possible to feel so much, to want to laugh and cry, all at the same time, and despite her fears and regrets, her self-reproach and misgivings, she was grateful for this emotional experience. Last night she finally realized how dead she had been over these past seven years, living through the characters in her stories, and this morning she felt reborn.
She was also feeling shamelessly aroused—again—and could not resist the pull to touch Jack. She slid her hand across to where he lay stretched out on his back, gorgeously nude under the sheet. He appeared to be in a deep slumber, for he was breathing softly, so she began to stroke him.
At the first light touch of her hand, he turned his head slightly on the pillow and let out a quiet, low moan. Chelsea continued to toy with his impressive masculine anatomy, which was increasing in size and stiffness with every devoted caress she offered.
His hand came up, cupped her head and guided her down across his chest, pushing gently on her shoulder until her lips were almost touching the place where he was most eager for her attentions.
Recalling how he had kissed and tongued her the first night and driven her to the highest peaks of human ecstasy, she took him in her mouth and slid her tongue down the length of his erection.
Eyes closed, still drowsy in sleep, he moaned again.
“Elizabeth…”
Chelsea’s eyes flew open and she sat bolt upright. “What did you say?”
He jerked violently awake and sat up, too, not unlike the first night when he had regained consciousness and thrown her to the floor like a madman.
“What’s going on?” he asked, glaring at her, then glancing down at his erection.
“I was…I was kissing you.” She did not have the courage to tell him where, exactly, she had been kissing him, or how much he seemed to be enjoying it. “And you just called me Elizabeth.”
“Who’s Elizabeth?”
The flame in her heart blew out. Jack was experiencing an unconscious memory from his real life. A sexual memory. He had not been thinking of her in his sleep. He’d been dreaming of someone else.
Somehow she managed to speak calmly and sensibly, while on the inside all her dreams and joys were sinking into a dark, dread-filled abyss. “I don’t know. I was hoping you’d be able to tell me.”
He sat up on the pillows and lowered his forehead into a hand.