Red Crystal Romance: #1 Emma

by Diroll-Nichols, Karen

  “For what, Miss?” Nancy didn’t want to offend and looked at Emma patiently.

  “Well…I don’t know…” Emma reached up and pulled the ribbon from the end of her braid. “For hair brushing,” she said quickly, bare feet crossing the room to the vanity and lifting the heavy brush in one hand.

  “Hair brushing,” Nancy couldn’t help giggling again, something that increased when Emma joined her. She followed Emma to the trunk, her eyes widening. “Hair brushing,” she repeated and took the brush from Emma. “I can do that,” she said, waiting and watching.

  “Yeah…I like this trunk…” Emma looked at the bed and pulled one of the sheets from the tangled collection, folded it and draped it over the bowed top of the trunk. Her plump lips were pulled into a taut bow as she faced the trunk again. She stepped closer and placed her hands on the top before making a little leap and squeal.

  “Oh, Miss…be careful…” Nancy knew her new mistress was different. Vastly different than the members of the upper classes that she’d seen, watched and listened to at the salon.

  “It’s okay…I’m good…just a little…positioning…” Emma was caught on top of the trunk on her tummy, wiggling as she moved a little further up. She sighed. “It’s really quite comfortable, Nancy,” she said with a slight nod, hanging her arms down beside her as she shook out her long hair. “Alright…it kind of stretches you out nicely…”

  Neither Emma not Nancy were prepared for what came next.

  Emma was laid out over the trunk.

  Nancy stood just behind her with the heavy silver brush in her hand.

  Lucas knocked once and opened the door.

  “Emma? I’d like a moment…” Lucas knew his mouth was open after that last word. And he knew his spectacles were clean, so he wasn’t seeing things. Things like Emma’s round, heart shaped bottom covered in nothing but pantaloons and her new maid standing with a large hairbrush in her hand.

  No, of course not.

  “Oh, sir!” Nancy blushed bright red, her gaze going from Lucas to where his eyes landed. “Hair brushing. We emptied the trunk and Miss Emma thought it would make…oh, my…”

  Emma burst out laughing, her hands up and trying to look over her shoulder.

  “I think I would like to speak with Emma, Nancy. You’re dismissed for the evening,” Lucas stepped forward and took the brush from her hands, his eyes never leaving the upturned bottom. Emma’s laughter still rang through the large bedroom as Nancy nodded quickly and left the room, the door closing firmly behind her.

  “Oh…wow…you shouldn’t have done that. She’s going to believe there’s something wicked going on now, Lucas,” Emma made a move to shove her hands to the sides and rise only to find a very firm palm in the center of her back. “Hey! What do you think you’re doing? Let me up, please.” She demanded, trying to push against the lid of the trunk and finding his weight a little more than she could get out from under. She stopped moving altogether.

  “I wanted to speak with you about our arrangement, Emma,” Lucas felt her body go limp beneath his palm but he wasn’t fooled and remained alert.

  “I shouldn’t have unpacked. I can stuff things back in the trunk, it isn’t a problem,” she said hastily, cursing at the hair that she couldn’t get out of her face to look over her shoulder and see him standing there. Staring at her ass. “Umm…do you think you could let me up, please? We can talk…better…”

  “And why would you repack your trunk, Emma?” Lucas leaned against the heavy trunk, his palm in the middle of her back but itching to stroke over the crème colored behind.

  “I don’t belong here. I don’t belong much of anywhere, I never have but that isn’t your problem,” she said with more confidence than she was feeling. It wasn’t like she had skills that translated to whatever she’d been thrown into. But she’d make something work. Somehow.

  “You are my responsibility, Emma. You do belong here and I want you to live here,” he sighed when she tried shoving hard against the trunk and bolting upright. He looked at the brush in his other hand, flipped it around and brought it down hard on one of the rounded cheeks.

  “Oww! What the hell…” Emma ground her teeth and tried shifting to the side, wrenching her arm behind her and grabbing at his wrist. “Let me up! You…you…”

  “Hmm…it’s been a long time since I’ve spanked anyone,” Lucas said quietly, raising his arm again and stopping only when she quit moving. “Are you prepared to listen, Emma? Reasonably and logically?”

  “Yes,” she finally said after a long pause. “Umm…why have you spanked someone before?” She had a funny idea. An idea that made a part of her more than a little twitchy.

  “I learned some interesting things about myself when I traveled and attended various universities,” Lucas hadn’t thought about those times in years. And suddenly, the sight of her crème colored behind turned up for the taking had brought it all back.

  “Alright. I’m listening to you. Although my listening ability would be greatly improved if all the blood weren’t rushing to my eyeballs,” she grumbled, closing her eyes and hoping it was a half decent answer.

  “I need you to know that I’ve enjoyed our conversations today. Even when they made less than sense to me at times,” Lucas tossed the hairbrush to the bed and put his hands around her waist. He lifted her to her feet and stared down at her with more interest than he’d ever felt for any of his designs or inventions. He understood lust and physical desire. As much as it could be understood. He didn’t understand what had drawn him to her and kept calling him back.

  Emma resisted the urge to rub her behind, backing against the trunk instead and staring at him. Her head shook slowly. She wouldn’t let it happen to her again. She’d rather be alone then hurt like before.

  “I’m sorry,” she said quietly, shifting her gaze to the floor.

  “You’ve no place to go.”

  “You’re being forced into this. You should go to balls and…and other things in London and find a nice, young girl and do like you’re supposed to,” Emma said firmly, trying to search her memory of the habits and rituals of the period.

  “How do you know what I’m supposed to do, Emma?” Lucas went to the comfortable chair he’d spent the last two days in, just watching her as she slept. Listening to the soft cries and pleas coming from nightmares she didn’t even recall. He’d spent half a night bathing her brow with cool water and holding her against him. She had no recollection of either event. But it had been the only thing to calm her, soothe her from the frightening places her subconscious had taken her.

  “I just know. I know that parents parade their daughters to the lords for choosing and that’s how matches are set,” she hoped she had the wording right. “I know that you’re intelligent and cute and you have a nice sense of humor.”

  “Are we to trade compliments?”

  “It was wrong of them to do this to you.”

  “What of what they’ve done to you, Emma?”

  “I’m not important. I told you, I don’t belong here. This…this isn’t my place…my time,” she murmured, going to the bed and climbing into the center. She lifted the pouch she’d found. It resembled a soft sided shoulder bag and was very heavy. Emma pulled a leather pouch from inside and opened the strings, dumping the contents onto the surface of the bed.

  Gold coins tinkled and jangled against one another into a stack.

  Lucas watched her eyes widen and then she looked over at him, picking up a coin and examining it, trying to remember what she knew about English money.

  “This isn’t American money,” she said cautiously, sighing and stacking the heavy coins.

  “Those are British crowns,” Lucas told her, trapped in watching her sitting Indian style in the middle of the large bed. Slender fingers carefully stacked the coins. Long, dark hair hung around her face and shoulders from a haphazard center part, the lights reflecting and bouncing around her. “It seems you’re quite well off, Emma.”

  “A
m I? Do you believe it’s enough for a small house and quiet life?” She asked, sounding hopeful. “I’ve enough to visit a book shop. I need a…” she searched for the words he would understand. “A journal…a diary, of sorts and something to write with.”

  “You’ve enough for a book shop, Emma,” Lucas couldn’t stop the grin. “Not a dressmaker?”

  She waved her hand at the open doors of the wardrobe. “I shouldn’t need clothing for the next decade. But I do need to find sewing things…thread and needles. Mrs. Neilson can probably help me with that.”

  “Why would you choose to live alone, Emma?”

  A low, unhappy laugh slipped from her lips.

  “It’s best…it’s simply best.”

  “I could simply lease you the room,” Lucas said, his brain going quickly over all the possible solutions to her departing his home. She wasn’t the type to adhere to convention and he got the impression that she probably didn’t care what society thought of her.

  “That would hardly be fair when you found a wife, Lucas.” She yawned and let the coins tinkle into the pouch, setting it aside and pulling a stack of papers from inside the larger cloth container.

  “What have you uncovered, Emma?”

  “I think I was hoping for a birth certificate. Some kind of…proof of me, I suppose,” she shrugged.

  “And those?” Lucas rose and walked to the bed, taking the large sheath of papers.

  “Don’t know. Certificates,” Emma shoved the rest of the unexplored pouch to the end of the bed and stretched out in the center of the sheets and pillows. “It’s been one very, very long day. So strange…a dream that won’t end…” she murmured drowsily, everything finally taking its toll on her.

  “Certificates,” Lucas read over the writing, sifted through the stack and raised one eyebrow. He’d lock them in the safe for now. Evidently someone made certain Emma Carstairs would be sufficiently taken care of in the future.

  He went quietly around the room, extinguishing all the lamps but one near the WC, turning it on very low before going to the door. He stood for a long few minutes in the open doorway and decided to leave it open, along with his own. He wasn’t sure what might be haunting Emma, but he wanted to hear if she needed him.

  Chapter Five

  A dream. Emma tossed her head and burrowed down, the image of a tall, muscled man with dark blonde hair and teasing eyes that hid behind round lenses. Most of her life had been dreams. Make-believe and pretend. Lies because it was far easier to lie than hurt someone you loved.

  She woke with a start. The night was warm, the windows wide open to allow the scents of so many things enter her room. It was the night when it seemed worse.

  There was no hiding from the memories. No hiding from herself.

  She’d slept but awakened and it was all the same. She hadn’t returned to what she knew was reality. Her reality. Maybe she was dead. Maybe her wish had been granted and this was what was left afterwards.

  No, she lay facing the open window. Hot tears formed in her eyes and fell to the sheets clutched beneath her head. Her dream, her wish had been for nothing. She wanted darkness and nothing. No fears; no feelings; no pain, no longing. No dreams and definitely never to wish again.

  Instead, she lay in as foreign a place as could possibly be. In a time when women were chattel and nothing more.

  She wondered if the depression she’d known her entire life had slipped somehow to insanity. A shuddering sigh broke from her lips before she squeezed her eyes closed and let the tears fall.

  You could think positive, she told herself. Just as you had done all of your life when you finally managed to get a grip. It doesn’t matter what you want, she tried being more firm with herself. It matters what is, and this clearly is for the moment the life you’ve been thrown into.

  She sniffled and shuddered.

  Then jumped with a loud scream.

  That wasn’t exactly what he meant to happen.

  Lucas winced at the startled scream. Her body, still clad in the pantaloons and camisole, bolted upright and tumbled from her knees back against the top of the bed. Feet scrambled and arms clutched the large pillow to her chest.

  “Oh – my – god.” Emma let her head fall back against the headboard, her eyes closed as she tried to slow her breathing. “Are you trying to kill me, Lucas? Or just scare me to death?”

  “That was not my intent,” he said quietly, his nightshirt hanging loosely against his frame. “I heard you crying and was concerned. I didn’t mean to frighten you, Emma.”

  Her palm swept hastily to her cheeks, swiping and rubbing the damp center on the pillow she held before her.

  “I’m fine. Thank you for worrying. Must have been a…a bad dream,” she finished with a low sigh. That was when she realized the room wasn’t completely dark, her gaze found the softly glowing sconce hanging near the bathroom. She caught sight of the glow in his glasses and smiled. “You left the light on for me.”

  “You were exhausted and fell asleep,” Lucas shrugged, taking a step closer to the bed and silently cursing the effect her disheveled look was having on his body. Tousled and warm, that’s only part of what he saw and a fraction of what he wanted to feel against him. He’d never been able to define attraction to a point of satisfaction that he could understand one of his many friends claiming to have fallen in love at first sight.

  There were too many variables, his scientific mind argued. Too many unknowns. And yet here he stood with a cock thrusting against his nightshirt.

  “I’m sorry,” she wasn’t sure what else to say. Emma kept her eyes on the surface of the bed. He was either attracted to her or simply horny. Or maybe he woke with the erection, she mused, letting her mind wander. “I’m alright. Thank you for leaving the light on for me.”

  “Would you like me to stay? Keep you company until you sleep again?” Lucas leaned his palms on the bed. “Strictly platonic,” he added gruffly, hoping the edge of the bed served to conceal the rise of his cock.

  “Platonic,” Emma repeated, nodding and shifting to her side. She tugged the light sheet over her and wrapped her arms around the long, soft pillow. Fingers left only long enough to sweep the dark hair over her shoulder. Now that she knew she had funds, she planned to walk and explore the town in the morning. Nancy had spoken of a salon and she hoped she could get this mass of hair cut off.

  Lucas now wondered if he were dreaming. Thirty-two years old and he was agreeing to platonically lie in bed with a woman. A beautiful, enticing woman. He knew better. He knew the rules of his society, even if she were unaware of them.

  “Good night, Emma.”

  “You were here when I was unconscious, weren’t you?” She asked after a quiet pause.

  “You’re intent upon ignoring the suggestion that you allow memories to return to you gradually, aren’t you?”

  “I’d have no memory of being unconscious,” she returned logically. “I have no memories at all. Not of my past, my relatives or even coming to your country.”

  “You traveled by ship,” he said softly. “I heard about you from my father and several of his friends. Not you, per se,” he adjusted quickly. “But of your father and his business, which thrives on the western coast of America. You lived in San Francisco.”

  “A nice city by the ocean. They have earthquakes,” she said quietly.

  “You can remember that?”

  Emma sighed. “I…I just know things. I can’t see me there. I know there are hills…and…cars to carry people around…” she sighed. She’d hated history and it was now coming back to bite her. “Trollies…”

  “They’re completing work on them this year,” Lucas said, lying on his side and staring at the back of her.

  “You’ve been there?”

  “I have. Interesting place…built by a lot of Orientals and hard-working pioneers,” he recalled striding around the hills and buildings that populated the small area of island.

  “Did you like it? Traveling, I mean,” she
gave into the urge and shifted to the other side to look at him. The single low gaslight glowed behind him and reflected off the lenses he wore. She found herself wondering if he wore them all the time. For everything. “Why did you travel? Curiosity?”

  “To learn. My grand-father had left me this property as well as a great deal of money. I was quick to keep it from my father. Invested some and used some to travel.” Lucas thought about the four years he’d spent choosing his destinations. “I enjoyed arriving. I wasn’t so keen on the traveling part.”

  Emma smiled. “You would make an itchy traveler. Wanting to do things and bored to tears with nothing but pacing to do until you arrived.”

  “A very apt description,” he admitted with a chuckle.

  “What did you learn? At school?”

  “I visited some schools, but not many. I was more interested in how the cities had been developed and people who were creating new ways for things to be accomplished. The road designs and how the sewer system ran. There is so much diversity and similarities between cultures and peoples.”

  “How to build a better mousetrap,” Emma said with a little smile, swallowing her yawn and settling down next to his shoulder.

  “Improvements, changes and slight alterations,” he agreed in thought. “A way to do something good for less and for more people. I must have at least two hundred drawings and ideas, not to mention several journals filled with observations and thoughts for ways to improve day to day life.”

  “Better drainage, ways to clear smoke from the kitchen…and underground train station,” Emma breathed a deep sigh. “You’re a very good man, Lucas. Good to your staff. Can I see them?”

  “See them?” He blinked into the dim room, the heat in his body continuing to rise, despite the cooling effects from the sea.

  “Your drawings. Your journal?” Emma pushed up onto her elbow and stared down at him. “Can I see them? Please?”