by Jo Goodman
"All of them?" Noah sat down in a chair and bounced Gideon on his knee. The baby wobbled and teetered and never stopped giggling. "They all fit the way this rose one does?"
"Yes. I am not so skinny and ill-fed as you think."
One eyebrow arched wickedly. "Only with one, er, two exceptions."
"You are incorrigible."
Noah gave his full attention to Gideon. "D'you hear that? I believe I am making progress. Yesterday I was insufferable. Today I am merely incorrigible."
Jessa threw up her hands in surrender. Ignoring Noah's laugh, she went to the table and served herself from the large platter Cam had brought earlier. "Did you eat breakfast?"
Noah nodded. "Gideon?"
"I fed him before I dared put on this gown."
"Then your food's probably cold by now. Do you ever get a warm meal?"
"Occasionally," she said, marveling at his mood. It was as if last night had never happened.
"Well, eat up. I came to take you and Gideon topside for some fresh air. C'mon, Gideon, we'll see if we can find something in the wardrobe to make your mother look matronly. Or at least respectable."
"There are always my dresses."
"I said respectable, not dowdy." After a few minutes searching in which he found nothing, he pulled out her traveling cloak. "This will have to do. I never gave a thought that you would require a pelisse."
"Noah, you've been more than generous. My cloak will be fine." Since she arrived in it, it hardly seemed to matter that she was seen in it again. "It is a perfectly respectable garment," she told him. "And you did say that's what you were striving for."
"She has me there," he told Gideon.
The hours they spent on deck were charmed in Jessa's eyes. They strolled the deck several times at a leisurely pace, taking turns holding Gideon. He wanted to crawl free and that, of course, was impossible. For all that Noah hated sailing, he was quite knowledgeable about how it was done. Or at least it seemed so to Jessa. He could have been telling her a series of lies and she wouldn't have known the difference—or cared. Like Gideon, she was content to simply listen to Noah's soft drawl, his lullaby voice.
Noah introduced her to various members of the crew with whom he was better acquainted. They were polite to Jessa, made a fuss over Gideon, and no one mentioned Hilary Bowen or questioned the circumstances of Noah's marriage. It seemed a good omen.
The sun was shining. The breeze was stiff. Nettles of salt spray stung Jessa's face when she stood at the taffrail. She leaned forward and raised her face to it, smiling. "Isn't it delicious, Noah? You can taste the air!" But when she glanced over her shoulder to see if Noah had heard he was turning away and she saw the dark, brooding look was back in his eyes. His deepest thoughts were closed to her and her own position was too precarious to permit prying. He could merely lift an eyebrow and remind her that she had no one to blame for her situation but herself.
Worse, she could not begin to understand what it was he still wanted from her. If he continued to desire her, she would have never suspected it by the way he acted toward her that night or each of the fourteen successive nights. Although he held her in his arms, fitting her body to the contours of his own, there was never any hint that he was interested in a repetition of the first night they shared a bed. He never kissed her. Except to keep her close to his side he rarely touched her. His compliments were even less frequent.
Jessa could have been relieved. She was a better worrier, so she practiced that.
Her routine was established around Gideon's schedule, and Jessa welcomed the stable pattern of her day. Noah spent a large part of each day in the captain's cabin. He read his law books there where he wouldn't be constantly interrupted by Gideon. He pored over letters he had received while in England from other members of the delegation who would gather in Philadelphia sometime in May. He studied the soon-to-be-revised Articles of Confederation, made notes, drafted plans, outlined and altered his ideas again and again. When he wasn't closeted away he was with Jessa and Gideon.
Jessa loved to watch him with Gideon. Sometimes she joined in their play, often she sat back and observed the special relationship Noah had established with the infant. Gideon, who wasn't used to any male attention, regarded Noah with something of a proprietal air. But Jessa also looked forward to those few occasions when Gideon was napping and Noah would unexpectedly walk into the cabin—she had never acquired the habit of bolting it—and spend time with her alone. It didn't matter if they talked or if they simply shared a quiet meal together, Jessa sensed in those moments slender threads of hope that he would not completely abandon her. She would never beg him to keep her, of course—not even for Gideon would she do that. But if he were to change his mind? Would it be so terrible to remain married to Noah McClellan?
"What are you thinking?" asked Noah. Jessa was lying on her back beside him in bed. Her beautiful pale hair was unplaited for once. Rivulets of molten gold and silver framed her face and fell over her shoulder. She was absently twisting one of the strands around her finger, a faint, thoughtful frown at the corners of her mouth. Noah turned on his side, bunched a pillow under his head, and stared at her clear, delicate profile. She never failed to look lovely to him and in some ways he resented it. There seemed to be a constant tightening in his loins and now was no exception. He drew his knees a little toward his chest.
Jessa tilted her head toward him. "Hmm?"
"I asked what you were thinking. You've been uncharacteristically quiet most of the day."
"Meaning I'm usually a chatterbox, I suppose."
"Hardly," he said truthfully. In the little over two weeks they had spent almost exclusively in each other's presence, Noah had discovered that Jessa was singularly reticent to discuss anything about herself. On the other hand, she was an excellent listener. Noah found himself discussing his law practice, his future work on the Articles, and his family with equal ease. She drew him out with seemingly no effort, and though it was clear she didn't understand a third of what he said about the problems of drafting a new guideline for the government, she made it possible for him to hear his thoughts aloud. "And you're shifting the subject," he said. "What's wrong?"
"Nothing, truly. It's merely that I've been thinking about what you've said of your work. You'll be going to Philadelphia, won't you?"
"Soon after I arrive at the landing. I'll be living there until the delegation designs something with a little teeth in it. Afterward, I will have to divide my time between my law practice in Richmond and politics in Philadelphia. I thought you knew that."
"I suppose I did. I just didn't really think on it before. I had it in my mind that you would be living with your family longer."
"My home is in Richmond, Jessa. I don't live at the landing year-round any more. I haven't since after the war. If you were to meet my family, you'd understand why."
"How can that be? They sound wonderful," she said, quelling a pang she recognized as hurt. She supposed she couldn't blame him for not wanting to introduce her to his family, but did he have to throw out the fact so carelessly?
"They are. And we're very close. It's just that there are so many of them. It can be overwhelming when the McClellans gather for the holidays or summer picnics on the James. Leah and Troy and their brood have to travel from New York, but everyone else either lives at the landing or very near. Gareth and his family have a home in Williamsburg, but they are always in and out because Gareth and my father raise the horses. Salem and Ashley and their three, no four, children are there when Salem is between trade runs. Rae and Jericho manage the plantation, so the landing is permanently their home. My mother and father love all the noise and confusion. I like it as well—but in smaller doses. In my place you'd feel the same. After a few days at the landing, you'd be happy to leave for Philadelphia."
Jessa doubted it. An only child, she had longed for brothers and sisters. Everything he told her sounded appealing rather than the opposite. She would have enjoyed the noise and confusion. In her own home she had
tiptoed and whispered through her childhood because her mother had a megrim or her father had a hangover. "If you did bring me to the landing as your wife how would you explain me to your family?" she asked. "Gideon and I would be something of a shock to them."
"Thinking about changing the terms of our marriage, Jessa?"
"No," she said quickly. "I was just curious."
"As long as that's all it is. I'm not prepared to take on any more responsibility than I already have where you are concerned."
"I understand."
"Good. The truth is that my parents would probably accept whatever I chose to say, even the truth. Stranger things than this have happened in my family."
"Oh?"
Noah shook his head. "Some other time." His eyes focused on her mouth. It was still slightly parted in the shape of her last word. "I've another matter on my mind." He bent his head and kissed her.
Jessa surprised them both by accepting him willingly. Caught off guard, she gave herself up to the pressure, the taste, the feel of his mouth on hers. All concern for caution dissolved; clear thought was swept away by the swift rush of desire. Her body echoed the bent of her mind.
Jessa's arms circled Noah's back, bringing him closer. She made her own demands now. It had been borne home to her more surely than ever that she had no place in his future. But she had the present and she could make what she wanted of it. Her responses to him were defiant in nature. Every time he touched her it became clearer that love did not matter in the grand scheme of things. She could answer his kisses without loving him and he had to know it. Love could only hurt her and it had no place in what was between them. Even if she was just learning that, it was clear Noah had known it from the beginning.
Jessa's fingers curled in his hair and held him against her. Her tongue teased his upper lip and she captured his hungry groan as the kiss deepened and their tongues battled.
Noah kicked at the comforter, pushing it away because it had wedged itself between them. He wanted to feel her flush to his body. His hands drew her closer while his mouth left hers and traced the column of her slender neck. He kissed the hollow of her throat, nuzzled the curve of her shoulder. One leg insinuated itself between hers; his knee nudged the hem of her shift upward. Noah's mouth trailed along the lacy neckline of her nightgown. One hand slipped from her back and cupped the underside of her breast, gently lifting the point to his mouth.
Jessa's back arched as his lips closed over her nipple. His tongue made a damp circle on the cotton shift. His teeth caught the material and the pearl tip of her nipple and tugged, demanding her uninhibited response and getting it. Jessa felt the rush of heat all the way to her toes. Her legs pressed against him and her hands fell from his head and clutched his shoulders as his attention was claimed by her other breast. Just when Jessa thought she could not tolerate the hot urgings of his mouth any longer, Noah released her. His breathing was soft and quick. She placed a hand on his chest, palm flush to his heated skin, and she could feel the racing beat of his heart.
His darkened eyes searched her face. For a long time neither of them moved nor spoke. Jessa wondered if he could hear the thunderous beating of her own heart. Finally, "Jessa?"
She didn't understand that he was asking a question. There was little inflection in the husky way he said her name. What she did know was that she didn't want to talk. She wanted his mouth again. She wanted his hands on her, touching her, caressing her, making her feel as if she were desired if only for these few moments. Jessa was shielded from her selfishness by her own innocence; she wasn't thinking of Noah's needs or of the fact that his wants might be different from her own. She didn't realize when she brought his mouth to hers and kissed him with the fullness of her own defiant passion that he would take it as the answer he had been waiting for. Jessa wasn't aware that he would want to touch and caress her more deeply, that he would want to be inside her.
Jessa's mouth trailed over Noah's face. Her lips brushed the hollow of his cheeks, the hard line of his jaw. She felt the strength and heat of him against her hip but she was unafraid.
Noah's knee pushed her shift higher. His hands joined the effort and his palms and fingers grazed the length of her legs. He stroked the inside of her thigh. The heel of his hand pressed against the soft thatch of hair on her mound. His fingers caressed. She was damp and warm, ready for him. He unbuttoned the front fall of his linen drawers.
At first Jessa shied from the intimacy of Noah's touch but then the heat was blossoming inside her and he had become so tender, almost reverent, that she forgot what he was doing to her and gave herself up to it.
Her breath came even more rapidly. Her head moved restlessly on the pillow. Soft, mewling cries parted her lips, then Noah was kneeling between her thighs, stroking her breasts, caressing the taut plane of her abdomen, and only when she felt the pressure of his erection against her parted thighs did Jessa have the cobwebs lifted from her mind.
She didn't ask herself how either of them had allowed things to go so far. There wasn't time. She said the one word that she hoped would turn Noah from her, the one word that would attack his pride and keep her secret safe. She closed her eyes and said, "Robert."
The name hung in the air between them.
Noah recoiled as if struck. He couldn't get away from her quickly enough. The skin of his face took on a gray cast while his eyes shuttered his pain.
Jessa had pushed her nightgown down her legs. Now it even covered her curled toes as she leaned one shoulder against the wall at the head of the bed. Her breathing was uneven and her hands trembled. "I'm sorry, Noah," she said. But her remorse was less for what she had said than it was for deceiving him. If he despised her it was no more than she despised herself. "I didn't mean to—"
"Don't say another word." Turning away, he buttoned his drawers and climbed out of bed. "You've reached the end point of my tolerance. I suppose I should have expected it from you. Sometimes you're so obvious it's laughable. Did you think I'd take you home to the landing in exchange for your favors? That's what you had in mind, wasn't it? A commitment from me?" He didn't give Jessa the opportunity to confirm or deny it. "You certainly miscalculated there. You have to keep your lovers straight." He found his breeches exactly where he had dropped them on the floor. With an angry sweep of his hand he picked them up and jammed his legs into them. They were uncomfortably tighter in the crotch than they had been when he took them off.
"Noah? Where are you going?"
"On deck. I'm leaving you to your ghost. Frankly, Jessa, there is no room for three of us in that bed."
Jessa watched him go, helpless to call him back. "Unless you were thinking of Hilary Bowen," she said softly to the closed door, "there were always only two of us here." Pressing her knees to her chest, Jessa laid her head against them and stared painfully dry-eyed at the milk white moon.
When Noah returned to the cabin, Jessa had once more taken up a bed on the window seat. He stood over her sleeping figure a long time before deciding what to do. Finally he picked her up, sliding an arm under her knees and her shoulders, and carried her to their bed. He laid her on the feather tick and then he climbed in. This time, however, it was he who turned his back on her and slept on the very edge of the mattress.
The strain that existed between them from that point on was a near tangible thing. Noah spent most of his waking hours in the captain's cabin or on deck. Jessa felt like a prisoner, but she enjoyed Noah's company even less. She had even taken to bolting the door so he could not walk in unannounced. Gideon was often fractious when they were together, sensing the tension between them. Because Noah seemed to genuinely enjoy Gideon's company, Jessa made certain she was occupied elsewhere while he played with the infant.
Cam was a frequent visitor to the cabin and he became Jessa's boon companion. Hardly more than a child himself, he was still often the only person who shared a conversation with her throughout the day. Even during afternoon strolls on deck the crew was reluctant to engage her attention. J
essa had no way of knowing this was because Noah had discouraged them from becoming too friendly with her. He had never felt any need to give the same advice to Cam. He might have done so if he had remembered how painful first loves could be.
"Where's your shadow today, boy?" Captain Riddle asked when he came upon Cam without Jessa. Even though the boy's hands were busy whittling a pipe, Jack could see Cam's thoughts were elsewhere. Cam's task didn't require the deep concentration he appeared to be giving it now.
Startled by the interruption, Cam's head jerked up and connected with the signal box he was leaning against. Rubbing the back of his head, a sheepish grin stole across his face. Cam squinted as he raised his eyes to the captain. "My shadow, sir?" He started to get to his feet but Jackson waved him back down and further surprised Cam by hunkering down beside him.
"Mrs. McClellan. Like salt and sea air the two of you are. Don't you usually escort her on deck about this time?"
Cam shifted uncomfortably. "She's not feeling quite the thing, sir."
"Oh? Not the same problem that afflicts Noah, I hope."
Since the sea was unusually calm today and the wind was mild, Cam didn't think seasickness was the problem. But he had a pretty good idea what was. He had glimpsed Jessa's puffy eyes and tear-stained face before she quickly turned away and told him she wouldn't be joining him this afternoon. He had also seen Noah McClellan looking very grim not twenty minutes before that. "No, Captain. It's not seasickness."
"That's good." He didn't say anything else, letting a silence build while he continued to look at the boy expectantly.
"I wouldn't treat her so shabbily if she was my wife," Cam finally blurted out.
Jackson Riddle blinked in surprise. He couldn't recall ever hearing Cam speak so vehemently. Somewhat to his regret he realized he had opened a veritable Pandora's box. He hadn't expected that Cam's thoughtful brooding was related to Jessa McClellan. "It's not really any concern of yours, Cam. What's between a man and his wife, well, it's just between them, you understand?" He cleared his throat, "Try not to take any notice of it. No such thing as smooth sailin' in a marriage." Too late he realized he had actually confirmed Cam's opinion that trouble existed between Noah and Jessa. Hell, how could he help it? All the crew knew something was amiss.