How to Wake a Sleeping Lady

by Wolf, Bree

  Leaving behind the house and the people within, Grant guided Nessa down the familiar slope to the back of the gardens where tall hedges afforded a certain privacy. Her arm was looped through his, and yet, he thought he felt a certain reluctance in her as though she were not comfortable with his touch. “Something has been on your mind,” he finally said when she remained quiet. “Will you not tell me what it is? I admit you’re beginning to frighten me.”

  Stopping, Nessa looked up at him as she studied his face as though she were seeing him for the first time. What was she searching for? “You’re right,” she said after a while. “I do need to speak with you.”

  “Has something happened?” Grant asked, reluctantly releasing her hand when she pulled away and took a few steps back. “Something has changed. You’re looking at me as though…”

  “As though what?” she prompted, her eyes wide and watchful as she waited for his reply.

  Grant sighed. “As though you do not know whether or not to trust me.”

  Bowing her head, she inhaled a deep breath before looking at him again. “You do know me well.”

  Grant felt his muscles clench at the doubt in his wife’s gaze. “What changed?” he asked, unable to bear this cold distance between them. “I thought we had…grown closer. Was I wrong?”

  Swallowing hard, Nessa briefly closed her eyes. When she opened them once more, the look in her eyes had softened. “You were not wrong.”

  “Then what happened?” Grant pressed as he ran his hands through his hair in agitation. “What happened yesterday that would change everything we had?”

  To his relief, Nessa, too, seemed overwrought with this new distance between them. Her jaw clenched as though she wished she could simply will it away while the look in her eyes beckoned him closer, longing and desire dancing in her warm gaze. “Doubt,” she finally said, spinning on her heel and walking a few paces away before turning around once more and retracing them back to him. “I know…I mean, I think I know how I feel, and I want nothing more but to be able to trust that,” she whispered as her eyes traveled over his face looking for confirmation that she was, indeed, right to do so. “And then something happens that unhinges everything, and I don’t know enough to give it proper context. With my past experiences all but nonexistent, I have nothing to hold on to, nothing to balance me, nothing to help me judge the present.”

  “What happened?” Grant asked, seeing her confusion as well as the longing to hear his assurance that all was well and forever would be. “It is me you doubt, is it not?”

  Nessa nodded. “Cornelia brought me a letter,” she told him, folding her hands in front of her as though needing something to hold on to. “A letter I wrote to her before the accident. A letter that suggests that…I wasn’t happy with you.” The last few words dropped from her lips in a hurry as though she could not bear to speak them any more than he could bear to hear them.

  As contradicting emotions tore at him, Grant focused on the one thing that gave him hope: Nessa’s desire to hear him contradict it. If she did not care for him, she would not be so agitated, so confused, so heartbroken. The look in her eyes was almost pleading, and his heart rejoiced at the thought that, perhaps, she did love him after all.

  “I was happy,” he finally said, willing her to believe him. “Very happy. Of course, we had only just barely recovered from losing our son. Life was not…as it once had been. Before. But joy was slowly returning, and I still loved you as I did the first day we met.” He swallowed. “And you loved me, too. I’m certain of it. Never have you been someone to hold back.” Slowly, he stepped closer. “You’re honest and straightforward and utterly outspoken. If you hadn’t been happy, I would have known.” His hands reached for hers, and she didn’t pull them away. “I would have known because you would’ve told me.”

  Tears shone in her eyes as she looked at him, and her fingers curled around his, clinging to him in a way that made his heart soar.

  “Do you believe me?” Grant asked, unable not to. “Can you trust that what I’m telling you is the truth?”

  “I want to,” Nessa whispered as she blinked back tears. “Every fiber of my being is telling me to trust you. And still, there’s a part of me that doubts…everything. I cannot help it. I feel I should as it is my only defense. I have nothing else to protect me.” She swallowed and, before he could reply, she hastened to add, “There’s something else.”

  Grant frowned. “In the letter?”

  “Sort of,” Nessa replied, licking her lips nervously. “My father believes that…it is not my handwriting. At least, he says it is a possibility.” She scoffed. “Not that I would know.”

  Grant could see her confusion as it turned into annoyance with touches of despair hovering on the horizon. “Not your handwriting? What do you mean?”

  “I don’t know what I mean,” Nessa growled out, her voice betraying the depths of her emotions. “I don’t understand any of it. At least to some extent, it looked like my handwriting, but…forced, as though crafted with great effort. Connie said the letter bore your seal.”

  “What exactly did it say?” Grant asked as his wife’s unease slowly crossed the barrier between them and began to spread through his own body.

  “It…” she began, then shook her head. “It’s upstairs in my chamber. You should read it for yourself.” Looping her arm through his once more, she pulled him back toward the house. Her feet moved with urgency as though she could not wait a moment longer to have her question answered. They went up the stairs and down the corridor in silence, each lingering on their own thoughts.

  Still, Grant was grateful that Nessa was the person she was and had openly addressed him with regard to her doubts or he might never have learned what had forced them apart once more.

  Her bedchamber was only dimly lit by the weak sunlight reaching in through the windows. During their walk through the gardens, clouds had gathered, forcing the sun to retreat and only allowing it to cast small, forlorn rays upon the earth. It seemed befitting their current situation, and Grant felt a shiver run down his back as he watched his wife approach her vanity. With sure fingers, she pulled open a drawer…and then stopped. Her eyes narrowed before her hand reached inside, feeling the insides of the drawer. “It’s gone,” she mumbled, bending down to peek inside. “It’s gone.”

  “Are you certain you put it in that drawer?” Grant asked as he walked up to her, seeing her agitation grow in the way her hands moved, rapidly and without patience.

  “Of course, I am!” Nessa snapped, helplessness tingeing her voice more than anger. Closing her eyes, she took a step back and covered her face with her hands. “How can it be gone?”

  Refraining from searching the other drawer, Grant gently put a hand on hers, urging her to look at him. “I’ll ask around and have the servants keep an eye out,” he assured her, hoping she would not insist he do so this minute. “Why don’t you tell me what it said?” Her eyes rose to meet his, and the forlorn look in them made him want to take her into his arms. “Tell me, please.”

  Swallowing, she nodded, her eyes wide as they held his. “In it, I ask Connie to send me a letter, begging me to come and visit her. I ask her to make up some emergency because I believe that otherwise you…would not allow me to travel. I beg her not to speak to you about this, promising her to explain everything once I arrive.”

  Grant swallowed, remembering the odd look Cornelia had given him after Nessa’s accident. “Did she believe the letter to be yours?”

  Nessa nodded. “She had doubts but, in the end, she thought I had written it.”

  “That would explain it then,” Grant mumbled as his thoughts raced.

  “Explain what?” When he remained quiet, his gaze focused on the wall behind her, Nessa grasped his hands, shaking him slightly. “Grant?”

  Swallowing, he shook his head in order to clear it. “I’m sorry,” he mumbled, trying to sort through the chaos in his mind. “After…we lost you, Cornelia looked at me in a…strange w
ay.” He frowned, trying to find the right words. “There was doubt in her eyes. Suspicion, perhaps. I couldn’t make sense of it. The way she looked at me told me that without you we had nothing more to say to each other. Still, I didn’t pay her much attention then. I had…other things on my mind.”

  Nodding, Nessa said, “She told me she was trying to make sense of my letter and find out what I had wanted to talk to her about. However, since I asked her not to speak to you, her hands were tied.”

  “I see,” Grant mumbled, hating how Cornelia had to have seen him then. “And your father thinks you did not write it?”

  “He said it was a possibility. I wanted to ask you the same question. But now that the letter is gone, I guess we’ll never know.” Shaking her head, Nessa tried to remain calm. “I don’t know what to do now.”

  “Perhaps your cousin or your father has the letter,” Grant suggested, reaching for her hands when she made to cross them in front of her. More than anything, he feared that she would shut him out.

  Nessa shook her head, but did not pull away. “They wouldn’t take the letter without asking me.”

  “We can still talk to them.”

  Nessa scoffed, clearly dissatisfied with their options.

  “Look at me,” Grant said as he placed a hand under her chin. “Do you believe that you wrote that letter? That you were unhappy with me?”

  “That’s just it,” Nessa exclaimed, taking a step back so that he had to release her. “I don’t know. I don’t know anything.”

  “But what do you believe?” Grant pressed, following in her wake as she backed away.

  Her lip quivered as she regarded him. “It doesn’t make it true only because I wish it was,” she whispered, her voice barely audible.

  Grant inhaled a slow breath. “What do you wish for?” he asked, pleased when she stopped retreating and held his gaze. “What is it you want?”

  Her jaw clenched as though she were about to answer, but then thought better of it. “What I want doesn’t matter. Only what is true does.”

  “There are no guarantees.” Reaching for her hand, Grant pulled her toward him. “In the end, it all comes down to faith.” He swallowed, knowing that the moment had finally come. Either she would accept him or not. “Do you trust me?” he asked, reaching out to brush his fingers over her cheek. “Do you want me? Do you believe that we belong together?”

  A shiver went through her, and her eyes misted with tears as she looked up at him.

  “What do you feel when I look at you? When you look at me?” he whispered as he pulled her into is arms. “When I touch you? Is this where you want to be?”

  Her hands came to rest on his chest, feeling his heart beat fiercely in his chest. “It hasn’t done that in a long time,” he told her as his arms pulled her closer. “It only does that around you.”

  A smile tickled the corners of her lips, and she leaned into him. “What if I’m wrong?”

  “Trust yourself,” Grant whispered as his hand reached to cup her face. “Deep down, you know whether or not to trust me for even when we want something with all our hearts, a part of us still rebels against it if it is not good for us.” His hand skimmed along the line of her jaw, feeling the silkiness of her skin, and he inhaled a deep breath, breathing in the warmth of her body as she rested in his arms. “God, how I’ve missed you, Nessa!”

  Blinking back tears, she smiled up at him. “I’ve missed you, too,” she answered his expression of longing with an equally powerful one of her own. Her hazel eyes shone brightly in the dim light of the room, and Grant could see that her heart had spoken, stopping his own in its tracks when she suddenly surged upward and pulled him into a kiss.

  After all these years, the feel of Nessa—his Nessa!—in his arms overwhelmed Grant and all thinking ceased. There were still questions and doubts, uncertainties and suspicions, and yet, in that moment when he scooped his wife into his arms and carried her to the bed, Grant could not remember a single one. “I love you,” he whispered when he gently laid her down, feeling her arms close around his neck and pulling him back down to her, her lips seeking his.

  Kissing him with a passion that Grant remembered only too well, Nessa ran her hands down his neck and over his shoulders. Her fingertips brushed over his skin as she moved her hands back up his neck to cup his face. Then she pulled back and in the dim light, her eyes shone like dark pools as she looked up at him in wonderment. “I love you, too,” Nessa whispered, “and I think I have for a long time.”

  Tears came to Grant’s eyes and he pulled her into his arms, vowing that no matter what the future held, he would never let her go again.

  She was his, and he was hers.

  As they always had been.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  An Echo of the Past

  With Connie and Audrey extending their stay until the ball, Wentford Park had become a place of joy and laughter. The sun shone brightly, and a soft breeze rustled through the leaves as the two young girls further furnished their little fortress, their eyes shining just as brightly and the smiles on their faces warming their mothers’ hearts like nothing else ever had. Pillows, cushions, blankets and the occasional trinket disappeared from all over the house as the two rascals—as Nessa’s father referred to them with a wickedly delightful twinkle in his eyes—continued to make the small wooden tree house their home. A place to drink cooling lemonade and eat sweet cakes. A place to confide in one another and laugh away the afternoon. A place where the world was as it should be.

  “Do you think it possible that one of them took the letter?” Connie asked as they slowly strolled across the lawn between the house and their daughters’ fortress. Shielding her eyes from the sun, she glanced at the dense cluster of trees.

  Nessa shrugged. “I asked Milly, and she didn’t know what I was talking about. She said she hadn’t been in my chamber.” Sighing, Nessa tried to ignore the small shiver that seemed to linger on her skin whenever she thought about the letter and all that it entailed. “I don’t think she would lie to me.”

  Connie nodded in agreement. “I admit I didn’t truly believe so myself. After all, what interest could they have in such a letter? Still, it would have been an easy explanation.”

  Smiling as she saw her daughter wave at her from within the thick canopy of trees, Nessa lifted her hand and returned the greeting, feeling her heart warm at the thought of her little girl.

  Over the past few days, Nessa had spent many hours thinking things through and she had come to the conclusion that her husband was right. Whether she remembered her past or not, she ought to trust in herself and do what felt right. Being at Wentford Park felt right. Loving her daughter had become as essential to her as the air she breathed. Her father’s warm care and her cousin’s devoted friendship made her feel welcome and safe and happy. And her husband…

  “I know that smile,” Connie remarked, a teasing grin on her face as she looked at Nessa pointedly, her brown eyes narrowing.

  “What smile?” Nessa asked, embarrassingly aware that the corners of her mouth refused to come down. Heat warmed her face, and yet, she couldn’t stop smiling.

  “That smile!” her cousin exclaimed, pointing a finger at Nessa’s reddened cheeks. “I’ve seen it before, and I know what it means.”

  For a brief moment, Nessa froze, her eyes widening as she looked at Connie. “You do?” she asked, intrigued to think that a subconscious part of her knew how she fit into the life she could not remember. “What does…what does it mean?”

  Connie’s grin deepened and a wickedly amused look came to her eyes as she reached for Nessa’s hands, pulling her closer. “You remember him, don’t you?” she whispered, her brown eyes searching Nessa’s face. “You’ve only ever had that look in your eyes for him.”

  Swallowing, Nessa shook her head. “I do not,” she confessed, unable not to feel disheartened by the look of disappointment on Connie’s face. “I wish I did.”

  Connie paused, finger to her lips as th
ough she were considering something of great importance. Disappointment turned to speculation and then to triumph. Again, her gaze narrowed and her eyes swept over Nessa’s face, looking for evidence. Then she spoke, “If you truly do not remember him, then there is only one other explanation for that look on your face.”

  Intrigued yet again by her cousin’s observation, Nessa felt her hands tighten on Connie’s of their own accord. “What is it?”

  Her cousin grinned. “I’m sorry to inform you, my dear, that it seems you’ve fallen in love with your husband all over again.”

  For a moment, the two women looked at each other in silence, Connie’s words hanging between them in midair. Then Nessa felt a smile stretch across her face and saw an answering one blooming on her cousin’s. Laughter bubbled up and, before long, they were embracing each other fiercely, happiness washing over them like the soft summer breeze.

  “It’s true, is it not?” Connie demanded after they’d sufficiently recovered. “You’re in love with him.”

  Overwhelmed, Nessa knew not what to say.

  Ever since Grant had found her at the abbey, she had prayed every day for her memory to return, determined that without it she would be unable to move forward in her life. Could one love without the memories that connected one to another? Was that possible?

  Judging from the warmth that spread through her heart whenever she thought of her husband, it seemed that it was. “I think I do love him,” Nessa whispered, shock momentarily freezing her limbs as she stood stock still in the middle of the garden, her hand clutching her cousin’s for fear she would lose her balance and fall. “I must be in love for there is nothing else that would explain how I feel.” Blinking, she met her cousin’s joyous gaze. “Whether or not we will discover an explanation with regard to that letter, I…I trust him. I believe him. I know that he loves me.” A deep smile claimed her face. “Me, and no other.”

  “I admit I’ve always thought so,” Connie agreed, squeezing Nessa’s hand in affirmation. “I know I had doubts, but I no longer do. I see that you’re happy, and that he is, too. You belong together. You always have.” A deep sigh left her lips. “However did he manage to convince you?”