A Wife in Time (Silhouette Desire)

by Linz, Cathie

  Oh, hell, who was she kidding? She’d lost her composure some time ago—probably from that first moment when she’d walked out of the historic Whitaker house and had a bad feeling. She’d lost even more when she’d read the nineteenth-century date on that circus handbill posted to the lamppost.

  While the idea of time travel might sound romantic and exciting, she had to admit that the reality was downright...scary. This was completely unknown territory for her, and she wasn’t real fond of unknown territory.

  Okay, so she knew something about the time period, at least. But she was certainly no expert. She didn’t even know when yellow fever had been cured, for cripes’ sake. That information would have come in mighty handy tonight.

  So what was she doing here? Most time-travel claims she’d heard or read about seemed to revolve around big historical events, like the Civil War or the American Revolution. Now that Susannah thought about it, no doubt that was a similar phenomenon to so many people believing they’d been Cleopatra or someone equally famous in a previous life. Everyone wanted to be a major player. No one wanted to get lost in the shuffle.

  Susannah had ended up in a shuffle, all right—a time shuffle. But did she end up in the midst of historical actions of monumental consequence? No, of course not. She ended up on a quiet street in Victorian Savannah, sharing a bed with a man who kissed like the devil and was sure to drive her nuts.

  Okay, so she was grateful not to have landed in worse times. But given this time period, she could have ended up in the Vanderbilts’ Fifth Avenue mansion—that might not have been too hard to take. Or she could have ended up in one of New York City’s many tenement buildings. Or in a sod house out in the middle of Nebraska. There was such a great diversity in American life-styles during this decade—the Western frontier still in its formative stages while New York City was rapidly becoming the most crowded place on the planet. Some days on the subway in her own time period, the city still felt that way.

  Even so, Susannah longed to be back on that familiar crowded subway. Biting her lip to hold back the tears, eventually she decided that perhaps the best way to deal with this lost feeling was the way she dealt with the hassles attached to living in New York City. She marched right on, as if she knew exactly what she was doing, the look on her face daring anyone to give her a hard time. If it worked on Manhattan’s subway, certainly it would work in Victorian times? Weren’t they supposed to be gentler times?

  You need to help me.

  The words stole into her consciousness. She could hear them as if they’d been clearly spoken. But she heard them inside her own head.

  “Elsbeth?” Susannah whispered uncertainly, exhaustion catching up with her, washing over her and tugging her into slumber’s arms.

  Don’t be afraid.

  Remembering that any communication with the ghost had been cut off the last time she’d attempted to speak aloud, Susannah used her thoughts to talk to her. Elsbeth, why am I here?

  To help me.

  Susannah struggled to keep her thoughts together. She was so tired.... But I can’t help you. We got here too late.

  No. You can still help me. Clear my name.

  The idea crept into Susannah’s consciousness just before she finally fell deep asleep to dream of a man with blue eyes and a gambler’s smile.

  * * *

  Susannah woke slowly the next morning with no clear idea where she was or what was going on. Had she been dreaming she’d jumped centuries? Had a ghost really talked to her? In that hazy world between waking and sleeping, she blearily opened her eyes. She saw nothing but white. Brilliant, blinding white.

  Thoughts hit her brain with lightning speed. Had she died? Her heart dropped, no wait...it must not be beating in the first place—not if she was dead.

  She vastly preferred the time-travel angle to being dead.

  At least she was in heaven. White denoted that, right? Although, come to think of it, it certainly was hotter than Hades. Surely she hadn’t ended up...elsewhere? For what? Lying on her driver’s-license application? No one put their true weight on that damn form!

  “Are you going to lie there all day or are you going to get up?”

  Startled, Susannah flipped onto her back and stared at Kane. “You!”

  “You were expecting someone else in your bed?”

  Bed... The white she’d seen must have been mosquito netting! “I wasn’t expecting—”

  “Dreaming about my married brother, were you?” he interrupted her, his voice hard. Susannah looked too damn inviting in the morning. She’d looked sexy as hell in the middle of the night when he’d gotten up to remove his shirt and slacks, sleeping only in his shorts. He’d woken this morning to find her curled against him, the quilt she’d insisted on using as a divider somehow having been kicked to the foot of the bed. She’d felt so soft and appealing. In sleep, her face was as angelic as a child’s. Yet the attraction he’d felt for her had been completely adult.

  Kane couldn’t allow himself to fall for her tricks. So he’d leapt out of bed as if bitten by a snake, while Susannah had merely rolled onto her other side and gone on sleeping.

  “I was not dreaming about your brother,” she hotly denied, wondering if that could actually have been a note of jealousy she’d heard in his voice a moment earlier. “If you must know, I thought...” Her voice trailed off as, in the clear light of day, she was reluctant to admit she’d been confused and panicked enough to briefly think she’d died. She could just imagine what he’d make of that. “Never mind. You wouldn’t understand. It’s hot in here.”

  “Excuse me, princess, for not turning on the air conditioner,” he drawled with a mocking little bow in her direction.

  “Very funny.”

  “I’ll tell you what’s funny. These clothes.” He pointed to the borrowed pants he was wearing. “These don’t have a zipper. They have a button fly.”

  At his having said that, her eyes naturally strayed to the fly of his pants. How could they not, after what he’d just said? The pants fit him loosely, but not loosely enough that she couldn’t tell what was beneath the material. He had narrow hips and wide shoulders. Her eyes slid upward to his face, where she saw him smiling smugly at her. “Enjoying the view?” he inquired.

  “Not really,” she denied. “I was merely studying the clothing. I bet zippers haven’t been invented yet.”

  Picking up his rented slacks, Kane absently noted, “I bet there’s a fortune to be had for the guy that does invent the zipper. Maybe I should—”

  “Don’t even think about it,” she interjected, climbing out of the mosquito-netted bed. “You’re not stealing the invention from whoever did come up with the idea.”

  “That wasn’t what I was suggesting. I was going to say maybe I should wear the slacks I came in, instead of these things.”

  “And how do you propose to explain that zipper on there?”

  “What makes you think anyone will be looking at my fly?” he countered.

  “Trust me, someone will notice.”

  “Then what do you suggest I do?”

  “Keep your pants on. The ones you’re wearing, I mean.”

  “They’re awfully loose. I didn’t find any belt. Just these things.” He held up a pair of suspenders and batted his baby blues at her.

  She eyed him suspiciously, not putting it past him to pretend not to know how to use suspenders just to get her to do them up for him. “There should be a button somewhere on the waistband of the pants. Just fasten the open loop at the bottom of the suspenders over it.”

  He put them on backward, just to aggravate her, no doubt. She should have let him go out that way. Instead, she redid them properly, trying to keep a cushion of air between them. It didn’t help minimize the effect of being so close to him, her fingers trapped between the waistband of his pants and the linen shirt. It was last night all over again, and an all-too-familiar forbidden heat stole through her.

  His slow gambler’s smile let her know that he was aw
are of her discomfort. To pay him back, she sharply snapped the suspenders against his chest.

  “Hey!” he protested.

  “Hay is for horses, straw is cheaper,” she retorted with an old-fashioned idiom her grandmother had often used. “Mrs. Broadstreet offered to clean our clothes,” she reminded him, “but I don’t think that’s a good idea. I think we should keep them out of sight. Stuff them under the bed. Or carefully fold them and put them under the bed. You may need to wear them again.”

  “Not to mention returning them to the rental place that owns them,” he told her.

  “Oh, my gosh, I hadn’t even thought of that. I bet we’re still being charged for these clothes.” She groaned at the idea.

  “I’d say we have bigger things to worry about at the moment. But first, don’t you think you should get dressed? It’s eight-thirty already, and we’re supposed to have breakfast at nine.”

  “I would have gotten dressed faster if you’d been able to put your own suspenders on,” she retorted even as she hurried over and gathered the pile of clothing Mrs. Broadstreet had lent her. “I won’t be long,” she said before slipping behind the dressing screen. This time she made sure where the light—in this case, sunlight—was coming from so that he couldn’t observe her every move.

  It took her five minutes to figure out what item of clothing went where, before even attempting to put it on. Even though she’d edited a book about this era, reading about it and actually wearing the stuff were two different matters. She put on almost everything their landlady had left for her, skipping only the corset, preferring to use her own bra instead. Same with the underwear. The next layer was a muslin chemise and a god-awful-looking bustle.

  “Three hours a week spent on moronic stair machine to minimize my buns and here I am wearing something that makes that part of my anatomy look even larger than it already is,” Susannah grumbled under her breath.

  She felt a little less ridiculous once she’d put on the final layer of clothing—a blouse, which was white and had long puffy sleeves, and a lovely blue skirt that did button around her waist, for which she was grateful. She put on the cotton stockings provided, which were actually more like long socks. There were no shoes provided, so she wore the black velvet flats she’d put on in 1995. At least they were comfortable.

  “What’s taking you so long?” Kane impatiently demanded from the other side of the room.

  “Getting dressed in this time period is harder than it is in my day,” she admitted as she stepped from behind the screen, still trying to do up the tiny buttons on the cuff of her borrowed blouse. There was a formfitting red jacket to match the skirt, but the fact that it must be eighty degrees outside prompted Susannah to put off wearing that for the time being. She knew she wouldn’t be allowed out of the house without putting it on, however.

  Reaching into her purse, she removed her makeup bag and stood in front of the mirror on top of the dresser. She looked as pale as Elsbeth’s ghost. Although proper ladies might not wear makeup in this day and age, she needed something.... A discreet dash of mascara helped, as did the old-fashioned remedy of pinching her cheeks and biting her lips. She’d already used deodorant while dressing, and now she made use of her toothbrush.

  “Toothpaste!” Kane exclaimed, spying what she had in her hand. “You’ve got toothpaste! Where did you get it?”

  “A drugstore on the Upper East Side.”

  Kane eyed the tube longingly. “I don’t suppose you’d be willing to share some of it?”

  She should have turned him down flat. She was sure if the shoe were on the other foot, he’d turn her down. Or make some outrageous suggestion about what he’d want in exchange for the toothpaste. An idea occurred to her....

  “I’d be willing to share, providing you don’t make any more rude allegations regarding your brother and myself,” she offered.

  “Allegations?”

  “You know what I mean.”

  “You’re still denying that you had an affair with my brother?”

  “I’m categorically denying it. I have been since I first heard you make the ridiculous suggestion.”

  “So you’re asking me to abandon my belief in my brother’s honesty for a dab of toothpaste?”

  Put that way, it did sound rather shallow. But she stuck to her guns. “If we’re going to be stuck in such close quarters, it would be much easier if we weren’t at each other’s throats all the time.”

  “Oh, I don’t know,” Kane murmured, his voice suddenly darkly sexy. “You’ve got a lovely throat....” His gaze went to her creamy skin, visible at the opening of her blouse, the top two buttons of which she’d left undone.

  She was so shaken by his gaze, not to mention the passionate implication in his voice, that she almost squeezed the toothpaste tube in half. As it was, she tore her eyes away from his and made a point of not looking at him as she focused on braiding her hair and pinning it at the back of her head before putting on her great-grandmother’s garnet jewelry set again.

  As she was putting the toothpaste away, she found a small tube of a combined sunscreen/insect-repellent she didn’t even know she had. Since it was only a sample size, she’d have to use it sparingly.

  And since she didn’t want Kane dying or getting sick on her, leaving her alone to cope with nineteenth-century culture shock, she offered him the sample tube, as well. She needed to be able to talk to someone who knew about World War II, President Kennedy, Reaganomics, the Beatles, Princess Di, Bill and Hillary. “You can use some of this, too,” she added.

  “Without having to sell my soul for it?” Kane inquired mockingly.

  “Do you want it or not?”

  “Thanks,” he said grudgingly.

  “If the mosquitoes don’t kill you, thanking me will, huh?” she noted with a grin.

  Kane made no reply, for he already knew he was in more danger from Susannah and her passionate sensuality than from any damn mosquito. He had to do something, had to stay focused on getting out of this mess.

  “You’re right,” he said abruptly. “It would be easier if we called a temporary truce. We’ve got our hands full trying to figure out what we’re doing here and how to get back to our own time zone. I’m willing to table the issue of my brother until then. What do you say?”

  “I agree. We’ve got enough other things to worry about at the moment.” Things like yellow fever, not to mention her feverish attraction to Kane. Yes, Susannah had enough other things to worry about, all right!

  * * *

  “Good morning,” Mrs. Broadstreet greeted them at the bottom of the stairs. “I trust you both slept well?”

  “Yes, thanks,” Kane replied.

  “Actually, I was a bit concerned about yellow fever,” Susannah began as their landlady led them into the dining room.

  “Oh, visitations of yellow fever have been rare in this area. We haven’t had anything lately such as they had up in Memphis several years back. The sea breeze here is most wholesome.”

  “How reassuring.”

  “The outbreaks of fever have been much reduced since the time when I was a girl,” Mrs. Broadstreet went on to say.

  “I’m glad I didn’t visit earlier, then,” Susannah noted dryly.

  “I hope you’re hungry. I’ve had a nice breakfast prepared for you.”

  Actually, Susannah was dying for a bagel and cream cheese but she smiled her appreciation for the effort Mrs. Broadstreet had gone to. The meal was huge, and was a fried breakfast similar to those she’d been served when she’d visited England a few years back. Only this breakfast had ham and grits as well as eggs. All fried in butter or lard, no doubt. Her cholesterol level would go through the roof at this rate!

  The coffee was good, hot and strong. And the jam in the jam pot was homemade, as was the bread, which was delicious. Susannah stuck to bread and jam, nibbling on her fried eggs and ham enough not to appear rude. The grits she couldn’t manage at this time of morning. No doubt they were an acquired taste.
r />   A maid, in a plain black dress and white apron, served them. She acted as if she didn’t speak much English, and was not the most graceful of people. When the maid broke a glass after almost dropping a plate, Mrs. Broadstreet moaned and confessed, “It’s hard to get good help these days. They take off as quickly as they come. That’s enough, Gerta,” she said as the maid began to weep noisily. “You may go back to the kitchen.”

  As Mrs. Broadstreet efficiently cleared the rest of the table, Susannah couldn’t help noticing the older woman’s discreet stares at the fingernail polish Susannah was wearing. She’d been eyeing her nails ever since Susannah had first sat down at the table.

  When Kane engrossed himself in the newspaper that had been placed beside his dish, Mrs. Broadstreet finally couldn’t resist asking Susannah, “Did you injure yourself that your nails are all red like that?”

  “No. They’re painted that color.” And her with no nail-polish remover.

  “I’ve never heard of such a thing,” Mrs. Broadstreet murmured.

  “It’s the latest fashion.” Having said that, Susannah got up from her chair almost to fall over it due to her lack of mobility in the tight skirt. Seeing Mrs. Broadstreet’s confused look, Susannah felt compelled to explain, “Er, I’m more accustomed to hoopskirts.”

  “Well, I do have a trunkful of those up in the attic. You may borrow one of those, if you’d prefer. I’ll get Mikey to bring the trunks with those old gowns down and you may try them, see if they fit.”

  “But not right now,” Kane announced, clearly impatient to be going. “We’re already late for our appointment. We really do have to hit the road—I mean, get moving. Leave.”

  “I’m ready,” Susannah declared, reluctantly putting on the accompanying coat to her outfit. At this rate, maybe she’d sweat the extra calories off!