“You’re the perfect height,” he murmured against her breasts, and the room’s underwater light filtered over his stocky shoulders as his shirt dropped atop her dress on the floor, followed by her slip and stockings, his braces and trousers.

“If you’ll give me a moment—” Mab remembered with a jolt, stepping back and reaching for her handbag. “I have to do something first.” She wordlessly showed him the little bag with her rubber device to prevent conception, feeling herself flush. On their wedding night she had taken care of matters when she changed out of her wedding dress; later, as he searched his wallet for a packet of French letters, she’d simply murmured, No need, I saw a doctor and was fitted for, you know . . . He’d grinned, put his wallet aside, and that had been that. But now she had to disentangle from him, take her bag awkwardly into the loo, fumble about in there while the clock outside ticked. Oh, this was awkward! She came out again, naked and self-conscious, aware she was blushing.

“Lovely Mab.” Her husband didn’t seem embarrassed at all, taking her back into his arms without any haste. He was solid, brown, stocky—he looked like he should have been walking a farm, not the corridors of the Foreign Office. He smiled, running a hand down Mab’s long, pale-skinned leg. “How did a hill-bred cob like me land such a long-boned thoroughbred?” he said, kissing each of her shoulders.

Mab had always thought husbands would want things proper—done in the dark, under the covers; she could remember the rhythmic nighttime grunts coming through the thin wall when her father had still been at home. The wedding-night suite at Claridge’s had been all shadows in the candlelight, and Francis had made no objection when Mab slid under the sheets; he’d come under them as well, and pulled her silently against him. Now he reached over and flicked the light on, and when Mab climbed under the covers, he turned them back. “Let me see you,” he said quietly.

No, Mab almost said. She didn’t know why it made her uneasy to be looked at; she wanted to prickle and hide; she wanted to pull him over her and get on with it. She didn’t really like being naked, being seen. She didn’t know if any of that flashed through her gaze, but he came on his side instead of moving over her, pulling her back snugly into the curve of his chest. “. . . Like this?” Mab blurted, startled. It occurred to her that for someone who had instructed both her billet-mates in the facts of life, there were a good many things she didn’t know.

Francis kissed the space between her shoulder blades. “Like this.” He rubbed the length of her back, up and down, probably feeling the tension Mab couldn’t stop from coiling through her, having someone at her back where she couldn’t see them. “Trust me,” he said against her spine.

I don’t really trust anyone, Mab couldn’t stop herself from thinking. Such a cold, hateful thought to have in bed with your own husband who had never given you any reason for wariness, but she couldn’t help it. She could feel herself going rigid in his arms, and she couldn’t stop it, but he just slowed, lips resting in the hollow behind her ear, one broad arm cradling her against his chest, one hand stroking unhurriedly up and down the length of her body. He stroked until her wary muscles loosened, and then he stroked even more slowly until they began to wind taut again for another reason entirely. Mab bit her lip as his hand traced over her belly. “Trust me,” he said again against her ear, and Mab saw the outline of the rain sliding down the windowpane outside, making rippling shadows over his arm as his hand slid lower, agonizingly. Lower. “Relax . . .” He stroked her so slowly, unfolding her a touch at a time. Her back arched hard against him as she squeezed her eyes shut, and he only held her tighter against his chest, tethering her to the bed, tethering her to the world.

“I have you,” he whispered as the shudders racked through her, and she felt his lips at the nape of her neck. Mab opened her eyes, limp and dizzy, trying to turn and pull him over her, but he only wrapped her more firmly in his arms, his knees behind hers, his shoulders behind hers, every inch of her already cradled inside his body before he moved into hers. Dimly Mab could hear the rain beating as they rocked together, nested like a pair of spoons. She gripped at his hands where he held her, hanging on for dear life, feeling the answering squeeze of his fingers as they fell into each other.

Francis didn’t pull away afterward, only unwound one arm enough to pull up the covers over them, tucking the warm edge around her shoulders. Mab opened her mouth to say something, she wasn’t sure what—Do you think we’ve missed tea downstairs? Goodness, it’s raining hard!—but to her horror, she burst into tears. She didn’t know why.

Francis moved a hand through her hair, tipping her head back against his shoulder. He kissed each of her wet eyelids. “You can trust me, Mab,” he said very quietly.

She lay silent, her body limp and boneless, her eyelids still leaking, and she thought, Maybe I can.

But when she woke in the soundless blackness of three in the morning, his half of the bed was empty and she saw him sitting at the open window again in his half-buttoned shirt, staring into the night.

THERE WAS A note on her pillow when she woke in the morning.

Darling Mab, Francis had written. I went for a walk at dawn. Yes, in the rain—I can see your eyebrows shooting up. They were. I always need a walk after night is done, weather regardless, and you were sleeping so soundly I didn’t have the heart to wake you. You snore, by the way. It’s delightful. Have a leisurely bath and I’ll bring you up some toast. —F

There was a postscript: I shan’t ask you his name, if you don’t wish to share it, but I am rather assuming he hurt you in some way.

Mab hesitated, fighting her immediate, spiky prickle of reaction, the urge to slam the door on that entire subject. She had never spoken about Geoff Irving or his horrible friends or that horrible night to anyone, ever. Had it been so obvious that someone . . .

Yes, maybe it was. If a man cared to look.

She still didn’t think she could force the words through her lips.

Maybe I don’t have to, she thought, eyeing the pile of hotel stationery.

Dear Francis—she couldn’t quite bring herself to say darling; it didn’t feel natural. She hesitated a long time, then wrote the words:

Yes, he did.

And I do not snore. —M

She was scrubbing her hair in the bath when she heard him come in on the other side of the door. She heard the crackle of paper unfolding, and she sat there in the tub, hugging her knees, water sliding down her naked back.

A moment later, a folded sheet of paper pushed under the bathroom door. She maneuvered an arm across the chipped black and white tiles and retrieved it.

I thought so. I shan’t mention it again if you don’t wish.

You do snore. But a very ladylike snore. Jane Eyre would snore like you. —F

Mab smiled, climbing out and wrapping herself in a towel. Wiping her hands dry, she fetched about and found a stub of eyebrow pencil from her cosmetics case. Cosmetics were too precious to waste, but she couldn’t resist scrawling an answer and pushing it back under the door, heart jumping absurdly.

Now you’re trying to impress me with books you haven’t read. I have never met a man in my life who read a Bront? novel. You wouldn’t believe how the fellows in the Mad Hatters griped about Jane Eyre. —M

She heard an answering snort from the other side, and took her time toweling her hair and fixing her little contraceptive device again. Her heart leaped when the sheet of paper came back.

I have too read Jane Eyre. Do you want a dog named Pilot someday, like Mr. Rochester? —F

Yes. —M

Mab came out, wrapped in a towel. Francis was bent over the desk, scribbling something next to a cooling rack of toast. His collar stood open; drops of rain sparkled on his hair. He looked up, smiled, dropped the pen at the same time Mab dropped the towel, and they collided in another rush. They were still kissing as he lifted her to the edge of the table—Mab made a noise, feeling high and insecure away from the bed. She had to cling hard against him, her arms about his neck, her legs about his waist.

“I’ve got you.” He put his lips to her ear, murmuring, “Thrash all you like, I won’t let you fall.” Mab clung, limbs coiling through his like a vine, his hands under her hips holding her steady, and by the end she trembled so she could hardly stand. Francis looked wry, touching a red mark on her breast and then rubbing his day’s worth of stubble. “I didn’t shave this morning,” he said. “Bachelor habit—I’ll have to do better.”

He was lathering up over the washbasin in the bathroom, all bare feet and trousers and braces, as Mab closed the door just for the purpose of sliding the note under it. She heard him unfold it.

Lunch?