Meanwhile, she herself had grown fixated on thereasonhe believed she required protecting. She’d not been able to get the threat of his... feral, rough, and raw desire from her mind. Night after night she sat opposite his bed and listened to stories of his adventures around the world, of fights with pirates, survivals in the face of ocean squalls, and near misses with sharp, rocky coasts. It was impossible not to be stirred by such stories, and even more stirring was the prospect of being held by a man with the courage and skill to fight and sail andsurviveas Stoker had.
My needs are raw, my desires are wholly untamed,he had told her,and I have discovered during my time here that I have only the loosest hold on my self-control.
Sabine examined this threat on a nightly basis. She thought about it while he perused one of her maps, or slipped food to her dog, or relayed some daring rescue from his past. All the while, she thought,Yes. Yes, I should like to experience all of that.
And yet, the notion of how to manage it escaped her. She’d grown so frustrated one evening, she had burst in on Mary Boyd in her workshop.
“Is it possible,” she had asked, “that some women enjoy... wild, untamed relations with their husbands—and the pace and, er, ferocity of that kind of exchange is appropriate? That is to say, decent?”
If Stoker would not subject Sabine to such passion, at least she would learn if anyone else ever did. Or would. Or had.
“Well, it’s clear why you’ve been taking your dinner in your rooms with Mr. Stoker this past week,” Mary had chuckled, arranging swaths of fabric across a sofa.
“Oh no, nothing has happened. I was just wondering. In general.”
“In general?” asked Mary.
“In theory. Because, when I was younger, if ever I gave any thought to the type of husband I might one day have—a very rare thought, I assure you—I suppose I had the rather vague notion of someone quiet and bookish. Accommodating and helpful. Someone who would never contradict me or endeavor to inflict anything upon me or restrict me.”
“Quite so,” clucked Mary. “The girlhood Sabine wished for a sort ofeunuch stewardas her husband, and how useful he would be. I dare say most women have thought the same one time or another. But now?”
Sabine had shrugged. “And now all I can think about is Stoker, and how he might, er, inflict or restrict me. I mean, in a manner.” She’d blushed to the tips of her ears and turned to go. “I can’t believe I’ve come to you with this. I’m sorry.”
“Pray don’t succumb to bashfulness now, Sabine,” Mary had called. “Our days with you are diminishing rapidly, I fear. I’ll not waste a single opportunity to relish your thoughtful questions before you fly away.”
Sabine had stopped and looked back over her shoulder. “Oh no, Mary, you mistake me. This is only supposition. I’ve no plans to go away, none at—”
“Deny it all you like, but I have a sense about these things. I made the same predictions with the other girls, and how right I was.”
Sabine had slowly turned back. “Perhaps, but Willow and Tessa never regarded their arrangements as true marriages of convenience. They were always going to fall in love.”
“And what were you always going to do?”
Sabine had shrugged. “Remove my uncle from Park Lodge. Go home. Look after my mother. Curate my father’s work.”
“Well, there is nothing that says that you cannot do all of those thingsandfall in love.”
I’m already in love,Sabine thought, shocking herself.
She spun around.
“Are you quite alright, dear?” asked Mary.
Sabine blinked at her. “I... I believe I may already be in love with him.” Her voice was a rasp. The tower of teetering footstools beside her could have crashed down on top of her and she would not have been more stunned at this revelation.
Sabine asked, “Is this possible?”
Mary chuckled. “But of course it is possible. I find it highly unlikely that you would harbor a sick man in the cellar if you had not fallen in love with him. You are a generous girl, I’m sure, but you are notthatgenerous.”
Sabine laughed, but she wasn’t really listening. She thought back over the weeks since Stoker had come.Was it possible that she did nothost Stoker in her bedroom so he could heal, or so he could advise her about smuggling, or even because she enjoyed his company? Certainly, all of those things were true; but was it also true that she kept him in her bedroom because she could not bear to let him go? It is why she waited twelve days to share him, even for an afternoon, with the Courtlands. She awakened each morning, thinking about him, and she tossed and turned in her bed at night, fantasizing about him.
“I think I do,” she whispered, more to herself than Mary. She lowered herself into the chair.
Mary went cheerfully on, “Of course you do, dear. And you may rest assured that there is no impropriety in loving your husband with a bit of wildness thrown in. Likely you were attracted to some ferocity in him all along. His passion will answer that need inside you. The reason I could foretell of eventual love matches for all of you brides is because otherwise sensible young women do not consent to marry disagreeable strangers, no matter how dire their situations. All three of you agreed to marry, however suddenly and anonymously, because of some spark of promise each of you saw in these men. It was a great stroke of luck and more than a little bit of providence. And now you will have to see it through to the end, won’t you? Passionate lovemaking and all.”
“I had not thought that far along,” Sabine had admitted. She had barely allowed herself to consider kissing Stoker—in fact, she was quite preoccupied with it—and had not looked beyond. But the moment Mary had said the words, a vague, distant tableau began to flicker in the back of her mind, like a disjointed reflection on the surface of a pond. It was hazy and unclear, with blank gaps representing missing details that were not yet formed, but she saw herself and Stoker—
Well, she could not say where they were and what they were doing, but she realized that the image of them sharing a life together had been hovering there for quite some time—and whatever it was, she wanted it, very badly.
