Page 32 of An Unwilling Earl
She forced herself to relax, to sink back into the still warm water, to close her eyes and think about more pleasant things. But her mind went to the darkened hallway and thekiss.
Her lips began to tingle again, and she touched them, but they were no different from this morning. They were just her lips.
But she was different.
She’d been kissed.
So many times she had wondered what her first kiss would be like, and now she knew. And it had been wonderful. Frightening. But wonderful.
There could be no more kisses. She was aware of that. Aware that letting Jacob into her heart would be a grave mistake. She had a plan. A mission. Get to America and become a different person. Only then would she be completely safe.
But at least she would have the memory of her first kiss.
Even if her aunt’s voice in her mind had cut it short.
Mrs. Smith entered with a gown draped over her arm. She had carried Charlotte’s clothes out, pinched between her fingers, her nose wrinkled. When Charlotte had asked what she was going to do with them, Mrs. Smith had said they were not even fit for the burn barrel, but she was putting them there anyway, and she would find Charlotte more appropriate clothes.
Now she held up a lemon-yellow gown, several years out of date and with far too many bows for Charlotte’s taste. But the thought of new, clean clothes overrode everything else.
“It needs some taking in and letting out in places,” Mrs. Smith said. “But I’m a fair hand at stitching and I’ll see to it. For now, it will have to do as is.”
Charlotte grabbed the towel sitting on a stool by the tub and stood, clutching it to her.
“There are undergarments as well,” Mrs. Smith said. “I put them on your bed. Ring if you need me.”
Upon closer inspection, Charlotte discovered that white sprigs of flowers covered the yellow gown. The sleeves came to her elbows, and there was a waterfall of lace trailing from the edge of the sleeve. Being raised as an only child by a widowed father, Charlotte hadn’t been exposed to too much in the way of lace and bows. Her gowns had been utilitarian and simple. Probably because she had liked to play outside and she’d ripped or stained most of her clothes.
She turned her back to the mirror and looked at herself over her shoulder, shocked at how prominent her shoulder blades were. She was withering away to nothing.
Mrs. Smith entered and looked her up and down. “That’s much better. I’ll have to take the waist in and lower the hem. Maybe a bit of lace at the hem will work.”
Inwardly Charlotte grimaced, but she would not complain. It was the most color she’d worn since her father had died. Aunt Martha didn’t believe in wearing brightly colored clothes. It was sinful. Although Charlotte could never understand how color was sinful. Hadn’t God created color? When she’d asked her aunt, she’d been slapped and sent to her room.
Mrs. Smith buttoned up the back of the gown, while Charlotte watched her in the mirror.
“Where did you get the gown?” Charlotte asked, curious as to why a confirmed bachelor like Jacob would have a woman’s gown in his home.
Mrs. Smith pursed her lips and tugged a little harder than necessary on that last button. “It was his beloved late wife’s.”
“Oh.” Charlotte felt shame wash over her. Mrs. Smith turned her around and fiddled with the pleats of the gown, making sure they lay just right. “If it will be too difficult for him to see me in this I can wear the clothes I came in with.”
Mrs. Smith dropped her hands to her sides. “You most certainly cannot. Besides, those clothes have already been burned.”
For a moment Charlotte mourned the loss of her trousers and jacket with the wooden toggles. They were ugly and filthy, and they probably smelled to high heaven, but they had protected her, and they had been hers. Practically the only things that she could call her own.
“Did he love her?” Charlotte asked, curious now that she knew there had been a Mrs. Baker. Jacob had never once mentioned her, yet Mrs. Smith had called her “beloved.” Charlotte felt a strange sensation in the pit of her stomach. Like hunger, but not like hunger. She realized it was jealousy.
She was jealous of the late Mrs. Baker. How shameful to be jealous of a dead person. Certainly Lord Ashland, or rather Jacob Baker at the time, had lived a full life before meeting her.
“Oh, yes,” Mrs. Baker said. “They were a lovely couple. So much in love. ’Twas heartbreaking when she died.”
“Wh—what did she die of?” Charlotte was almost afraid to ask, afraid it would be too personal, that she was prying too much.
“Childbed fever. It was quite tragic. The poor thing suffered so at the end, and his lordship was near inconsolable.”
“I’m so sorry,” Charlotte whispered.
Mrs. Smith wiped a hand across a leaking eye. “It was just terrible. Poor man didn’t leave the house for weeks.”
