Behind the Mask

by Linda Winstead Jones

  She found she rather liked his idea of being more involved in the actual working of the land. What had John’s father been thinking, to suggest that he travel all the time and leave her here? She didn’t mind at all that such a decision might mean tight purse strings for a while. No matter what he thought, she had not agreed to marry John because his family had money.

  She stopped in her tracks. Why had she agreed? And without so much as a token protest? She was a good, obedient daughter, that was true, but if she’d found the idea of marrying John Travis repulsive, her father never would have insisted.

  Tessa made herself imagine, clearly and truly, what she would have done if her father had arranged a marriage with William Markland or Lloyd Erwin. They were both family friends, both less than ten years older than she, both pleasant enough.

  Something in her stomach churned. She would have refused. She would have put her foot down and declared that this was the nineteenth century and she would not be auctioned off like a horse. Not that she put her foot down often, mind you, but in such a circumstance she would have done so. But when her mother had mentioned marriage to John Travis, she had not whimpered a single protest.

  Because in the back of her mind, or deep in her heart, or maybe in both, she wanted to be his wife. Because of that pitter-patter.

  She’d been intrigued with John since her fifteenth summer. She had thought about him often over the years, been disappointed when his family called and he was not with them, had even dreamed on occasion of that kiss she had wanted so badly as a girl. The idea of a lifetime with him wasn’t hard to conjure up, in her mind. She saw it well. Their days and nights together, their children, their home.

  The idea of him leaving her here alone was horrendous. She didn’t mind facing Nell when she had her husband beside her; she didn’t mind facing anything when she knew he was near. She could not imagine facing a day without him. Tessa stopped pacing and stared toward the open doorway.

  “I love Johnny,” she whispered. “I do love him.” She wasn’t sure if she should be elated or terrified. The realization grabbed her heart and squeezed a little. “This is what love truly is. It’s when everything comes together right. It’s when you need someone and think of them all the time and want what they want. That’s love.” She tried to imagine what it would be like to be married to another man. Any other man. And she shuddered at the very thought.

  “Nell?” she whispered. “Are you here?”

  Her great-aunt’s image came together slowly, forming out of thin air on the opposite side of the room, several feet away. Apparently, Nell had remembered this afternoon’s request for less startling appearances.

  “There’s no more need to worry,” Tessa said softly. “I love my husband, I know that now. We’re going to have a wonderful life together, here, in this house. So tonight...” She heard booted footsteps as John ran down the stairs. “I’m not ready to tell him just yet,” Tessa whispered quickly. “I don’t want to scare him.”

  Nell disappeared much more quickly than she had appeared.

  In a matter of seconds, Tessa’s smiling husband filled the doorway and offered her his hand. “Time to come to bed, wife,” he said softly.

  Tessa doused the lamp in the parlor and then took John’s hand. In the dark, he led her to the stair hall and up the spiraling staircase.

  The words I love you were on her lips, but she didn’t want to share her love for John with him while he thought of her as a business partner. She wanted him to love her in return. Maybe, in time, he would. She wanted that with all her heart. Until then, she would keep her love inside, a warm little secret.

  Another lamp burned upstairs, but it wasn’t in the room they had shared for the past two nights. It shone across the hall. In Nell’s room.

  “Oh, Johnny,” Tessa protested, hanging back as he tried to lead her through the doorway.

  “Maybe it’s the room,” he said. “Maybe we’ve been sleeping in Aunt Nell’s bed, and she didn’t like it.”

  “Actually,” Tessa said as she glanced around suspiciously. “I’m almost positive this was Nell’s room.”

  “What makes you think that?” John asked as he closed the door behind her.

  “Just a guess.” She didn’t want to tell her husband that she’d been talking to their ghost again. She remembered too well the horrified expression on his face last night, when she had confessed that she’d spoken to Nell.

  The room was lovely, she had to admit. John had moved the linens from the other bed to this one, but that was not all he’d done. He’d gathered a few colorful pillows from other rooms in the house and tossed them onto the bed. Lamps and candles burned softly, along with a low fire that gleamed in the fireplace.

  Autumn wildflowers, varied and colorful, had been hastily arranged in a tall vase which sat on the table by the bed. “It’s beautiful,” Tessa whispered.

  “Only the best for my wife,” John said. There was promise in that simple statement.

  Tessa wanted to take her husband’s face in her hands and tell him that she loved him, but she didn’t. She didn’t want to be clinging or pathetic; she wanted the two of them to be equal, inside this bedroom and out. She had never before thought that for a marriage to work the husband and wife had to be equal, but that made sense to her now. John had his strengths, and she had hers. Together they could do anything.

  The time to tell her husband that she loved him would come, but that time was not tonight.

  Oh, she was such a coward! She was afraid if she told John she loved him, he would look at her as if she’d lost her mind. This wasn’t a love match; it was an arranged marriage. One that was working out quite well, she had to admit, but still... He had said it himself. They had a satisfactory arrangement; they were suitable partners.

  And now she knew that he could break her heart if he wanted to. A woman in love was vulnerable. She could be hurt in so many ways.

  Tessa began to unbutton her blouse, but John stopped her with his hands over hers. “Let me.”

  She stood there—hands at her sides, heart pounding so hard she was surprised John couldn’t hear it—while he slowly unbuttoned her blouse. He kept his eyes on the task, watching each button come undone as if it were fascinating work.

  His hands were captivating. Hard, large, capable hands. When he had finished unfastening her blouse, she took his wrists and studied his hands as she had that afternoon. This time she raised those hands and kissed each palm, one and then the other. Her hands looked impossibly small against his wrists, pale against his tanned skin. So many things about them were a stark contrast, but then, that was the way it was meant to be, she decided as she kissed his palm again.

  “Tessa, darling,” John said huskily, “I want you to touch me.”

  Tessa, darling. Oh, she loved the sound of those words coming out of her husband’s mouth. She dutifully lifted a hand to his chest, laid the palm there so she could feel his heartbeat against her hand.

  But that apparently wasn’t what John had in mind. He took her wrist and guided her hand down, across his ribs, past his flat belly, until her fingers brushed against the hard length beneath the twill of his trousers.

  “I know you’re innocent,” John said in a low voice, “and I don’t want you to be surprised when the time comes. I want you to know exactly what’s going to happen with us.”

  John lifted his hand away, but she did not. After a moment’s hesitation, she raked her fingers along the ridge. Something in the back of her mind whispered that this was not going to work! He was too big, too hard; she could never take him into her body.

  But another, stronger part of her whispered something entirely different. It was going to work very well. Without taking her hand away, Tessa lifted her face, silently asking for a kiss John quickly gave her. She throbbed at her center as John took her mouth. They kissed, and she touched him until he moaned low in his throat and stepped back.

  Tessa opened her eyes. “Did I do something wrong?”

/>   “No,” he assured her quickly. “As a matter of fact, you’re doing everything very, very right.”

  She stood beside the bed, blouse undone, heart thudding, knees shaking. But she wasn’t afraid. She was definitely not afraid. This was the man she loved, the man she would spend a lifetime with. He was hers, she was his, and he would never hurt her.

  While John watched, she took down her hair. It didn’t take long; a few pins removed and the thick strands came tumbling down.

  “You have the most magnificent hair,” he said softly.

  “Thank you.” She didn’t stop with the loosening of her hair, but unfastened her skirt and let it fall. That done, she drew the blouse over her head and dropped it to the floor. Her chemise and drawers were more revealing than her nightgown, but not much. Still, she felt the hot rush of a blush rise to her cheeks.

  She sat on the side of the bed and kicked her skirt aside. “Are you just going to stand there and watch me undress? You usually manage to get those clothes off rather quickly at bedtime.” She smiled as John began by whipping off his shirt.

  Then he sat beside her on the bed and ran the tip of his finger beneath the lacy trim of her chemise. “I want to see you,” he whispered, pushing one thin strap off her shoulder and then bending his head to kiss her there. “I need it, the way I need to breathe.”

  Much less self-conscious than she had been until tonight, Tessa lifted the chemise and pulled it over her head, leaving her sitting there before her husband wearing nothing but a thin pair of linen drawers.

  John put his hands on her shoulders and pushed her gently onto her back, and he followed her slow descent, staying close at all times, kissing her neck, her shoulder, and then taking a nipple deep into his mouth.

  Tessa moaned at the unexpected pleasure that shot through her like lightning. She shuddered with that pleasure, shimmied down deep. Her hands rested on John’s head, threaded through the dark blond strands as he suckled and laved. Her eyes drifted closed as John’s hands began to untie the tapes that held the last remaining piece of clothing on her body.

  The bed lurched. John did not stop. The lamp on the bedside table flared high, and so did the fire. They ignored it. John pushed her drawers down and placed his hand on her inner thigh, high up, almost touching her where she had begun to throb and ache.

  “You touch me everywhere,” she whispered, “and I feel it here.” She laid the flat of her palm over her belly, letting the hand slide low.

  “Oh, Tessa,” John moaned.

  One leg on the old bed broke, sending it crashing to the floor at an odd angle, as a half-dozen candles flickered and went out. Together, John and Tessa began to slide toward the low end, but John reacted quickly. He snagged her around the waist as he reached up and grabbed a post at the head of the bed.

  He lifted his head slowly and looked her in the eye. “Are you okay?”

  “Fine,” she whispered, surprised by the huskiness of her own voice.

  His hands were occupied. One held her; the other kept them from sliding to the floor. So he used his mouth, kissing her neck, her shoulder, her breasts. His skin brushed hers, and it was beautifully intimate, strangely promising. Tessa felt herself slowly but surely melting; she felt herself... There were no words. She’d never experienced anything like this! Her body was alive, and she wanted everything John was offering her, and more.

  He lifted his head and kissed her mouth. “Put your arms around my neck and hold on,” he instructed as he took his lips from hers.

  She did as he asked, wrapping her arms around his neck, holding on and hanging there as John returned his now-free hand to her thigh. Her heart kicked; her fingers teased the longish strands of hair at the back of his neck.

  Another bed leg broke, sending them on yet another short, jolting ride. She held on tight.

  “That’s better,” John said as he lifted her leg and placed it over his own. “A little more even.”

  “Yes,” Tessa whispered.

  John’s hand raked up her thigh while he kissed her so deeply her head started spinning. She moaned, her heart leapt, something low in her belly clenched. A third bed leg snapped, and they slid across the sheets, just a little.

  Tessa held on with one arm, so she could reach down and touch John again. She traced her fingers over the hard ridge beneath his confining trousers, imagining what it would be like to have him inside her. Tonight the imagining was temptingly wondrous, not at all frightening. The unknown could be beautiful; she was certain of it.

  He moaned, and the last leg of the old bed broke. The bed was now firmly on the floor.

  “Much better,” John said hoarsely. With both hands free, he was able to give her his undivided attention. Fingers teased her inner thigh, rising slowly, stroking and caressing. His thumb brushed against her intimately, and her entire body reacted. Her legs parted. His mouth latched on to one breast, and she thought her heart would come through her chest.

  “Now,” John said, unfastening the top buttons of his trousers.

  “Now would be good,” Tessa said breathlessly.

  The window opened and closed, snapping loudly. The fire flamed high and then almost went out. The bed shook violently. Candles around the room sprung to life again, flames spiraling unnaturally high.

  She didn’t care about any of that, and apparently neither did John. It was time for this, past time, and unlike their wedding night, she wanted her husband so badly she ached deep inside.

  Colors bright and varied teased her as the flowers John had picked were tossed onto the bed. The vase that had once held those wildflowers seemed to float above them, tipping to the side until a thin stream of water escaped and fell over John’s head.

  “Aunt Nell!” Tessa shouted, exasperated.

  “She’s not stopping me, not now,” John said as he swiped water off his face.

  Her eyes met his. She wrapped her arms around his neck. “Nothing can stop us now.”

  The vase swung down, moving quickly through the air. “No!” Tessa shouted.

  But her warning came too late; the vase crashed into John’s head. He managed to look surprised, for half a second, and then he collapsed atop her.

  7

  John opened one eye very slowly. Tessa sat on the bed, holding his head in her lap, cradling him and crying as she brushed her fingers through his hair. “What happened?” he croaked as he opened the other eye.

  “You’re not dead.” She patted his cheek lightly.

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Thank goodness.”

  No, he wasn’t dead, but his head did throb. Tessa continued to comfort him, sniffling instead of sobbing now, apparently forgetting about the fact that she was still naked. His cheek was pressed against her belly, there where she had confessed that he touched her. In a moment, when his head quit throbbing as though it were about to come off, he was going to kiss her there. Taste her. Start all over again.

  “Come on,” she said before he got that chance, scooting out from under him and assisting him from the bed which was littered with scattered pieces of shattered porcelain and wildflowers, and had a big, swirling wet spot to one side.

  “She hit me over the head with a vase?”

  “Yes. Don’t you remember?”

  “No.” He remembered being so close to making love to his wife that he couldn’t think of anything else. That was all he remembered. That was all he wanted to think about now.

  Tessa assisted him as if he were wounded, leading him to a ladder-back chair by the window. “You just sit here a moment,” she said gently, as if he were a child. She grabbed her chemise and quickly pulled it on. Evidently, she had not forgotten that she remained naked. Too bad. He liked her naked. He needed her naked. His head felt as if someone had swung an ax down into it, and he closed one eye against the pain as Tessa grabbed the quilt and one pillow from the very broken bed.

  “Come on,” she said, carrying the quilt and pillow under one arm and offering him the other.

&
nbsp; John didn’t need assistance, but he stood and took Tessa’s arm anyway. It was nice, the way she tried to support him as they stepped into the hall.

  “We can’t sleep in that bed,” she said sensibly. “It’s covered with broken vase pieces.”

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “I thought another room would be different. I thought maybe she’d leave us alone tonight.”

  “So did I,” Tessa muttered. She assisted him to the bed in the darkened room, laid the pillow out for him, and fluffed it, and when he leaned his back against the headboard, she covered him to the waist with the quilt.

  “Where are you going?” he asked when she stepped away from the bed.

  “I need to fetch another pillow, and put out those candles, and bring the lamps in here.” She smiled at him weakly, the smile half lit by the light coming from the room across the hall. “Will you be okay?”

  “I want you to come to bed,” he said.

  “I will. In a minute.”

  He closed his eyes as she crossed the hall. Damn, his head hurt! That hag of a ghost was determined to ruin his marriage. They had been so close. Tessa had been lying there, relaxed and aroused, reaching for him. And he had never wanted anything so much in his entire life as he wanted her.

  Tessa’s voice was soft, but it drifted to him from across the hall. “How dare you?” she asked angrily. “You might have killed him.” There was a short pause. “Oh, don’t give me that. You’re not at all sorry!”

  John closed his eyes. His wife was talking to a ghost again; and it seemed that the ghost was talking back.

  She rushed back into the room, lamp in one hand, pillow in the other, and tears on her smiling face. “Do you need another pillow?” she asked, her voice quick and soft. “One of the sheets isn’t too wet. I’ll shake off the shards of glass and hang it by the fire to dry. How’s your head?” She didn’t wait for an answer, but tossed the pillow onto the bed and set the lamp down on the bedside table, before turning and rushing back across the hall.