A Shop Girl at Sea

by Rachel Brimble

  ‘Yes, ma’am.’

  She nodded and walked along the short pathway into the street.

  Slowly closing the door, Samuel looked up the narrow staircase, took a deep breath and started up the stairs. He hesitated outside Amelia’s door, uncertain how welcome he’d be when she was in bed. He knocked.

  ‘I’m quite all right, Mrs Cambridge. If I need anything, I’ll come down.’

  ‘Amelia? It’s Samuel.’

  ‘You need to leave,’ she said. ‘You shouldn’t be here.’

  ‘Of course I should, I love you. Open the door, Amelia. Please.’

  A few silent seconds passed before the lock clicked and she pulled open the door.

  Shock reverberated through Samuel’s entire body. In just three short days since he’d seen her, she seemed to have lost weight. Her skin was pale and her eyes too wide in her beautiful face.

  ‘What happened?’ He stepped into the room and took her in his arms, tucking her head into his neck and kissing the top of her head. ‘Are you sick?’ He held her at arm’s length and looked deep in her eyes. It wasn’t sickness he saw, but fear. ‘Amelia? What is it? Did someone hurt you?’

  She eased from his arms, walked back to bed and slid under the covers, sitting up against the headboard. ‘You need to go.’

  He placed the roses on a chest of drawers and sat down on the side of the bed. ‘Talk to me. Tell me what happened. Please.’

  ‘I don’t think I can.’ She squeezed her eyes shut. ‘I thought it would be easy enough to tell you we can’t be together when I next saw you, but now you’re here…’

  ‘What do you mean we can’t be together? I love you and you love me.’ His heart stuttered painfully. ‘Don’t you?’

  Tears glistened in her eyes as she nodded.

  ‘Then…’ He took her hand and lifted it to his lips, pressed a kiss to her knuckles. ‘Let me help you. Has someone upset you at Pennington’s? Somewhere else?’

  She ran her gaze over his face, her brown eyes sad and desolate. ‘Oh, Samuel. Promise me you won’t do anything.’

  Caution wound a tight knot in his stomach as he struggled to not clench his fists. ‘Tell me, Amelia. Everything will be all right. I promise.’

  She exhaled shakily. ‘Mr Evans grabbed me on the way home from Pennington’s on Tuesday night. He… pushed me into a shop doorway.’

  Anger ignited and hummed through Samuel’s blood. He tightened his grip on her fingers and she pulled away. ‘Don’t be angry. It will do no good.’

  He stood and pushed his hand into his hair, his body trembling. ‘He works at Pennington’s?’

  ‘Yes, but—’

  ‘I’ll bloody kill him.’ He snatched his hat from the chest of drawers. ‘I’ll bloody kill him.’

  ‘Samuel, please, listen to me.’

  He stared at her, his love for her making his heart ache and his anger rise to a murderous level.

  ‘Don’t you see?’ She shook her head, her fingers tightly clenching the edge of the eiderdown. ‘This is the way it is for me. Men look at me and see something… I don’t know what they see, but they attack. Not you, of course, but others. I don’t want to be a victim, Samuel. Not anymore, but I just can’t go back into Pennington’s right now.’

  ‘You don’t need to go back.’ He shook his head. ‘We’re going to New York. You’ll be with me and I’ll keep you safe.’

  ‘I’m not coming.’

  He stilled. ‘What?’

  Her eyes glinted with unshed tears. ‘I’m not coming. You need to go without me. Build a life where you have a woman beside you who doesn’t invite trouble, who attracts beasts and violence. Please, Samuel, can’t you see who I really am? I’m just something to be used and discarded. You won’t want to be with me in time and as much as I can’t bear the thought of not being with you, it’s better we separate now than later.’

  He slowly put his hat on the dresser, his mind scrambling for the words to make her understand, make her see how beautiful and mesmerising she was. Walking to the bed, he sat down next to her and took her hand. ‘You’re beautiful. You have eyes like melted chocolate that light up when you smile and laugh. Your figure must be the envy of a thousand women, but you seem unaware of it.’

  ‘Samuel, please.’

  ‘You are unassuming, kind and warm. But the men you’re talking about don’t value those things, Amelia. It’s the power they want. They use violence because they are too inept, too weak, to spend the time and care they should in the hope a woman might want to be with them. Their failings are not your fault. They are no woman’s fault. It’s these animals who need to change, to alter their actions and thoughts, not you. I love you. I want to marry you. Please, come to New York with me. Let’s get away from here and start again. Just me and you. Always.’

  Her gaze travelled back and forth over his face to linger at his lips before she met his eyes. A flash of determination darkened them, colour seeping into her cheeks.

  ‘Do you really believe it is nothing I have done or am doing, that makes me look as though I want male attention?’

  He cupped her cheek and looked hard into her eyes. ‘You have never done anything wrong, do you hear me? And neither has any other woman who has been attacked or assaulted. I love you with all my heart. So much so, I will stay here, in Bath, if that’s what you want.’

  A tear rolled over her cheek as she softly smiled. ‘I don’t want that. I want you… and New York.’

  Relief flooded through him and Samuel leaned forward, pressed a gentle kiss to her lips. ‘I’m glad.’

  She pulled back and threw back the covers, her gaze full of love and trust. ‘Make love to me, Samuel. Let me feel our love. Please.’

  Epilogue

  Two weeks later…

  New York’s shores came into view, emerging over the horizon and bathing Amelia in a glow that warmed every inch of her, inside and out. The Statue of Liberty shone beneath the humid, early evening heat, rising through the mist like a woman certain of her destiny. A woman free.

  Amelia drew in a long breath and slowly exhaled, absorbing every second of this moment as she and Samuel arrived in America to start their new life.

  His arm slipped around her waist and he pulled her close to his body, his physical strength unquestionable, but it was his internal strength, his unbending spirit, that had succinctly captured her heart on her very first sea bound trip.

  ‘Are you happy?’

  She turned and looked into his beautiful eyes. ‘Very. I’ve never been happier.’

  ‘Good.’ He smiled. ‘Me neither.’

  Amelia looked across the sparkling water and memories of their lovemaking, the many times she and Samuel had explored and satisfied one another, heart, body and soul over the last fourteen days, washed through her. On her left finger, she wore a diamond and sapphire ring that he’d given her when he proposed marriage, promising to forever keep her safe and cared for.

  She’d needed no such promise, just him. Like this, beside her, strong and proud and ready for their next adventure.

  ‘With Fiona living with Benedict now, and Katherine and Ma going along so much better, I hope we’ll be left in relative peace,’ Samuel murmured against his ear as he stood behind her and pulled her back against his solid chest. ‘We have my savings, your savings and my job. We’ll go along quite nicely, I think. Living, working and loving one another.’

  ‘And once I get work at RH Macy’s, we’ll have my income and yours from Grand Central. We’re going to be just fine. I know it.’ She turned in the circle of his arms and kissed him, her tongue naturally seeking his as it always did. Slowly, Amelia pulled back. ‘I don’t think I would have had the courage to take this trip or the one back from New York without you, you know.’

  ‘Yes, you would. You, Amelia Wakefield, are capable of anything you set your mind to.’

  ‘Maybe.’

  He kissed the tip of her nose. ‘Definitely.’

  Fighting the insecurity that contin
ued to ebb and flow inside her, Amelia faced the water again and pulled a small, drawstring bag from her purse. She looked at Samuel as his smile dissolved. He nodded.

  With slightly trembling fingers, she pulled open the bag and scooped out a handful of sequins and laid them in Samuel’s hand before scooping a second handful. Their eyes locked for a long moment before she quickly faced the water, lest she surrendered to the open wound across her heart for all those that had died on the 15th of April.

  Each a lost soul who may, or may not, be recovered from the cold, vast ocean. All people who deserved to never be forgotten. She prayed the Titanic was remembered forever. That the next generation and the next were taught of the catastrophe so that such tragedy was never repeated ever again.

  She and Samuel held their hands over the railing and together they said, ‘For every single one of you.’

  The sequins fluttered and shone as they twisted and turned and flew, sprinkling across the water like a thousand silver hearts. Once they had disappeared, Amelia turned to Samuel, tears pricking her eyes. ‘Elizabeth said that Mr Weir’s wife was so grateful to receive his watch. I wish I could have brought her husband home with us instead.’

  He nodded and kissed her forehead. ‘I know you do.’

  Taking a deep breath, Amelia looked across the water. ‘God bless you, Mr Weir.’

  Samuel drew her close once more as they sailed towards the dock, closer to where fate awaited them. So much had happened in her and Samuel’s life. So much pain, so much disappointment and shame, but the moment Amelia had stepped into Pennington’s years before, everything had begun to change.

  And now she hoped that change happened for Samuel.

  She would miss Bath’s finest department store so much. Mostly, because it had given her what it continued to give so many others.

  Freedom.

  Smiling, Amelia stared at the Statue of Liberty. ‘Pennington’s is a place everyone in the world should visit at least once,’ she said, her eyes squinting under the glare of the sun. ‘It has something very special. Something obtainable for anyone who takes the care and dedication to look for it.’

  ‘Magic.’

  Surprised that her brilliant, strong, pragmatic Samuel would use such a word, she faced him. ‘What?’

  He grinned and pulled her tight to his body, her breasts crushing again his hard chest. ‘Magic. That’s what Pennington’s is, no doubt about it. I felt it when I walked into the store alone and I felt it again when I was looking for you. It’s a special place, Amelia. It holds the power of possibility. It’s given you a new life and given me the love of my life.’

  Her heart melted under his loving gaze and astute words. ‘It’s given me everything.’

  Lifting onto her toes, she pressed her lips to his, revelling in the love she had for her future husband and all that awaited them.

  Thank you, Pennington’s. Thank you so very, very much.

  Acknowledgements

  My first acknowledgement is to the hard work, patience and never-ending smile of my fabulous new editor, Rhea Kurien. Without her support and expertise, there is every chance I would have given up on the challenge I gave myself to include the tragic sinking of the Titanic in this book. I am thrilled that her encouragement inspired me to keep going!

  I’d also like to thank the authors of all the amazing non-fiction books, accounts and letters I read while researching this book. Without them, I would not have learned as much as I felt I needed to in order to honour the trauma, love and hope I pray I’ve managed to convey during the writing of A Shop Girl At Sea.

  Finally, I’d like to thank all the amazing readers and reviewers who continue to love the Pennington’s series and constantly contact me asking when the next book will be released. Love you lots!

  Rachel x

  About the Author

  RACHEL BRIMBLE lives in Wiltshire with her husband of twenty-two years, two grown daughters and her beloved chocolate Labrador, Tyler. Multi-published in the US, she is thrilled to now be writing for Aria in the UK.

  When Rachel isn’t writing, she enjoys reading across the genres, knitting and walking the English countryside with her family… often stopping off at a country pub for lunch and a chilled glass of Sauvignon Blanc.

  Become an Aria Addict

  Aria is the digital-first fiction imprint from Head of Zeus.

  We are Aria, a dynamic digital-first fiction imprint from award-winning independent publishers Head of Zeus. At heart, we’re avid readers committed to publishing exactly the kind of books we love to read — from romance and sagas to crime, thrillers and historical adventures. Visit us online and discover a community of like-minded fiction fans!

  We’re also on the look out for tomorrow’s superstar authors. So, if you’re a budding writer looking for a publisher, we’d love to hear from you. You can submit your book online at ariafiction.com/we-want-read-your-book

  Get in touch: aria@headofzeus.com

  Subscribe to our newsletter

  @Aria_Fiction

  @ariafiction

  @ariafiction

  Addictive Fiction