by Nan Ryan
He yawned, turned Mary onto her side, drew her soft, naked body back against his own, and went to sleep.
Long before the first gray tinges of light appeared in the east, Mary Ellen awakened. Her eyes opened slowly. She was confused and disoriented. But for only a second.
She was, she realized quickly, lying naked in the arms of the despised Captain Knight in the middle of her parents’ big featherbed. She was on her side, backed up against him. His arm was around her, his hand cupping her breasts. His breath was warm on her neck, the crisp hair of his chest tickled her back, and his firm thighs cradled her bare bottom.
Mary Ellen’s heart pounded.
She squeezed her eyes shut and held her breath, terrified he might be awake. She lay very still for what seemed an eternity until she was finally sure he was asleep.
Only then did she open her eyes and cautiously move the Captain’s cradling hand from her breast. She lifted his heavy arm from around her waist, placing it gently on his hard thigh. Slowly, carefully, she disengaged herself from him and scooted away, her bottom lip caught between her teeth.
She paused when she’d managed to put a foot of space between them, then turned onto her stomach and ventured a look at his face. His eyes were closed, the long dark lashes resting on his tanned cheeks. He moved in his sleep, and Mary Ellen flinched. He turned onto his back and flung a long arm above his dark head. His breathing remained slow and even, and his chest rose and fell rhythmically.
Mary Ellen exhaled softly with relief and again started scooting on her stomach toward the edge of the mattress. It was a long scoot on this specially built bed, which measured seven and a half feet wide. She was terrified she would never make it without awakening the Captain.
Her wary eyes stayed on him the entire time.
Harsh reality set in as she looked at him lying there naked, so dark and hairy and masculine against the rumpled snowy white sheets. Dear Lord, what kind of fool was she? What had possessed her? How could she have done such an unforgivably stupid thing?
She couldn’t believe it. She had fallen right into bed with the cold, heartless cad who had used her to realize his own ambitions. She had been lying here naked all night in the arms of the man who’d broken her heart. She had made love with the cruel bastard who had jilted her when he’d attained his only real goal: an appointment to the Naval Academy.
Mary Ellen finally reached the edge of the bed. She turned, sat up, threw her legs over, and stepped onto the deep, plush carpet.
Overcome with anger, guilt, and regret, Mary Ellen burned with humiliation. She was appalled and shamed by what she had done. Backing away from the bed, she caught sight of herself in the huge French gold-framed mirrors and was further shamed. Her eyes went back to the bed. Staring at the dark man sleeping peacefully there, Mary Ellen cringed at the vivid recollection of their abandoned intimacy.
Hand over her mouth, brows knit with misery, she backed out of the bedroom, turned, and hurried through the dim sitting room, opened the door, and peered about cautiously.
She saw no one.
She tiptoed out into the dark, silent corridor, anxiously gathered up her discarded nightclothes, and hurried into her own bedroom. Once inside she leaned back against the door, her eyes shut, her heart drumming, and vowed she would never let Captain Knight compromise her again.
28
MARY ELLEN PUSHED AWAY from the door, felt her way across her darkened bedroom, and—with shaking hand—lighted a lamp beside her bed. She looked at the clock on the mantel.
Four-thirty.
No use going back to bed. She wouldn’t be able to sleep. Sighing with despair, Mary Ellen turned slowly and glanced at herself in the free-standing pier glass. Frowning, she moved closer, staring at the strange refection. Her pale hair was a wild mass of tangles falling into her face and around her bare shoulders. She raised her hands and pushed the disheveled tresses back and ventured closer to the tall mirror.
She stopped a few feet away.
And shuddered.
She hardly recognized the naked woman staring back at her. It was obvious what this wanton had been up to during the hot, dark hours of the night. Pale, bare breasts were still pinkened and sensitive from a lover’s heated kisses, and a small bruise decorated the inside of an ivory thigh. An unfamiliar soreness between her legs was a constant physical reminder of the dark Captain’s total possession.
Tears stung Mary Ellen’s eyes as mortification and regret engulfed her. She hated herself for what she’d done. For what she had allowed him to do. And she hated the arrogant, amorous Captain Knight for stripping her of her dignity.
His scent was all over her body, and she suddenly felt so dirty and unclean that she couldn’t stand it.
Mary Ellen turned from the mirror, snatched up the blue silk robe, and shoved her arms inside. She went to the bell pull beside the bed and yanked on it frantically. She tied the robe’s sash, then paced and fidgeted. Five minutes passed. She returned to the bell pull, tugged on it again, then waited impatiently. Pacing once more, she felt as if she were going to jump out of her skin.
Her soiled, dirtied skin.
She flew across the room in answer to the soft knock on her door. Blinking sleepily in confusion, old Titus stood there yawning and scratching his gray head. Mary Ellen grabbed his arm and pulled him inside.
“You’re to heat some water,” she told him anxiously, “and bring it right up here.”
“Miz Mary Ellen,” he protested, “it ain’t ebben five o’clock in the mornin’, and I’se—”
“Titus Preble, you get down those stairs right now and heat some water! You hear me? I need a bath and I need it now.”
Her tone and the wild look in her dark eyes kept him from saying anything more. The old house servant bobbed his head and went to do her bidding, but he was puzzled by her odd behavior, her uncharacteristic flash of anger. And he wondered at her change of habits. What was she doing up so early? And why was she ordering up a bath? Rarely did the young mistress of Longwood have a bath in the morning. She unfailingly bathed each night. He wondered what had gotten into her. But he wasn’t about to ask her. No, sirree. Wasn’t none of his business. Let her bathe in the middle of the night if that’s what she wanted.
Still, he muttered to himself as he heated the water and then struggled to get it up the back stairs.
Perspiring, out of breath, he finally delivered the hot water. Mary Ellen took one look at him and was immediately repentant. She was sorry that in her anger and guilt she had awakened Titus and yelled at him. Sorry she had ordered him to haul the water upstairs. He wasn’t able, hadn’t been in years.
“Titus,” she said apologetically, taking the heavy pail from him, “I’ll do it. You go on back to bed. I’m sorry I woke you. Forgive me for being so selfish.”
Blinking, the old retainer turned and left, more puzzled than ever.
As soon as he was gone, Mary Ellen stripped and poured the pail of steaming water into her tub. She scrubbed herself so vigorously her pale skin turned rosy. She soaped herself from head to toe, determined to wash away any lingering vestiges of Captain Knight.
When her body was as clean as a newborn babe’s, she rose from the tub, toweled herself dry, and began to dress hurriedly, anxious to be gone from Longwood before anyone—namely the Yankee naval commander—awakened.
It was a little past dawn when Mary Ellen cautiously opened her door and slipped out into the corridor. Glancing automatically at the closed door of the master suite, she felt a chill skip up her spine. But she offered silent thanks that the door was closed, the suite’s occupant apparently still asleep inside.
Mary Ellen flew down the back stairs and out into the early June morning. She was out of sight of the mansion before she finally drew an easy breath. She inhaled deeply of the cool moist air as faint pink rays of the rising sun colored a bank of low-lying clouds.
Mary Ellen hurried to leave River Road behind, then slowed her pace as she neared town. At this
early hour most of Memphis was still sleeping. The streets were almost deserted, not a single blue-coated Yankee in sight. It was so still she could hear the birds singing in the highest branches of the dogwood trees.
Mary Ellen reached Front Street.
She walked slowly down Cotton Row, pausing a moment before the frosted-glass windows that read “Preble Cotton Company.” The doors were closed and padlocked. No one was inside. No activity took place there anymore. There was no furious trading and selling inside the shuttered offices. No big contracts to purchase tons of the precious “white gold” that had put her hometown on the map.
Mary Ellen sighed sadly and moved on down Front Street, turning east when she reached Adams Avenue. A block up Adams she passed Saint Peter’s Catholic Church, feeling as though she should slip inside and say a prayer for forgiveness. She strolled past all the fine Adams Avenue mansions, pausing when she reached the old lace-embellished Wheatley house across from Shelby County Hospital.
All the big, beautiful mansions had been occupied by the Federals. But now, at dawn, with everything still and quite, none of the enemy soldiers were in sight. It was as if the horrible war had never happened. As though the Yankees had never set foot in her beloved Memphis and it had all been a bad dream and now she had awakened.
Oh, if only it were just a dream. If only none of it had ever really happened. If only the Union navy had never conquered the Queen City on the Bluffs. If only the compelling Captain Knight had never occupied Longwood. If only he had never…if she had never…if they had never…
Mary Ellen reached the three-story Shelby County Hospital.
“Why, Mary Ellen Preble, what are you doing here at this ungodly hour?” asked a weary surgeon in a bloodstained white coat, lounging on the hospital’s front steps. “What’s the matter? Couldn’t you sleep?”
Mary Ellen felt herself flush and hoped her terrible guilt wasn’t written all over her face. Nervously she smiled at the physician and said, “I? What about you? You were here when I left late yesterday. Did you stay all night?”
Rolling his stiff, tired shoulders, he nodded his sandy head. Then, rising slowly to his feet, he smiled, took Mary Ellen’s arm, and said, “I’m glad to see you, Mary Ellen. We’re so short-handed that I—”
“And that’s exactly why I’m here,” she said as he ushered her inside.
“Good girl. I’ve got a ward full of patients who keep hollering to have their bandages changed.”
“Leave it to Nurse Mary Ellen, Doctor Neal.”
Mary Ellen was hard at work when the summer sun rose fully. She was grateful she had something to do, something to keep herself occupied.
Still, as busy as she was, Mary Ellen was distracted. No matter how many wounds she cleaned and bandaged, no matter how many bed baths she gave, no matter how many letters she wrote home to wives and sweethearts for weak, wounded soldiers, she never managed to fully forget about the dark, handsome, able-bodied man at Longwood.
At midmorning she was hurrying down the long hospital corridor with fresh linens when unbidden came the vivid vision of the naked Captain Knight on his back with her bucking wildly astride him.
Mary Ellen stumbled and nearly fell.
Later, as she fed steaming hot broth to a patient whose arms were bandaged up to his shoulders, her mind flashed back to the silent upstairs corridor of Longwood and to what Captain Knight had done to her in the hot, inky darkness.
“Hey, watch it!” cried the startled patient, and Mary Ellen was horrified to see that she had spilled broth down the front of his pajamas.
“Oh, my goodness,” she said, setting aside the bowl of broth and dabbing anxiously at the spilled liquid. “Have I burned you? Are you hurt?”
“Naw, I’m okay.”
“I’m so sorry, how clumsy of me.”
“Something bothering you today, Miz Preble?”
“No. No, not a thing.”
Mary Ellen continued to be plagued with the shaming memories she’d rather have forgotten. She would forget, she told herself. She would not think of it again. But as the day drew to a close she thought of little else, and she dreaded going back to Longwood.
She didn’t leave at the usual hour. She stayed on at the hospital, purposely waiting until the summer sun was setting before she started home. Finally she could put it off no longer.
Her shoulders and back aching, exhausted from a long hot day at the crowded clinic and last night’s sleeplessness, Mary Ellen said her goodnights and walked out into the gathering dusk. She went wearily down the front steps.
And stopped short.
She blinked and squinted in the fading light. She saw, across the street, a solitary Union officer mounted atop a coal black stallion. Twilight was settling in, but she recognized the Yankee Captain by the set of his wide shoulders, the distinctive tilt of his dark head.
Waves of anxiety and shame immediately washed over her. She looked about frantically. There was no avenue of escape. No way she could get past him.
Mary Ellen gritted her teeth. Then she squared her tired, slender shoulders, lifted her hot, wilted skirts, and, pretending she had no idea he was there, set out down the street.
Captain Knight gently kneed his black stallion, and the big beast slowly moved forward. Ignoring her tormentor, Mary Ellen marched haughtily down the wooden sidewalk. The hint of an amused smile on his lips, the mounted Captain rode down the street beside her. Looking neither to the left nor to the right, Mary Ellen continued on her merry way.
Seething silently, she proceeded down the street until Captain Knight turned his horse directly into her path, blocking the sidewalk.
Mary Ellen was forced to stop.
Dark eyes flashing with fury, she looked up at the mounted man and angrily ordered him to get out of her way. Captain Knight swung down out of the saddle.
His silver eyes as cold as ice, he said, “When will you learn that it is dangerous for you to be out alone at night?” He inclined his dark head toward the end of the block, where a gathering of Union soldiers was growing. “You’d do well to believe it. See all those soldiers? They are lonely men, far from home. You’re asking for trouble.”
Mary Ellen snapped, “The only danger I’m in is in my own home!” Her jaw rigid, she stepped around him and the big black stallion and again headed off at a fast, determined pace.
For long moment Captain Knight stood there in the deepening dusk, watching her. He shook his dark head and his eyes narrowed. What a haughty little hypocrite she was. Last night, when there had been no risk of being found out, she’d been his willing and eager lover. Now, it seemed, she preferred to forget that it had happened. Well, he wasn’t going to let her forget.
A faint smile again touching his lips, Clay Knight decided that for as long as he remained in Memphis, Tennessee, the mansion and its mistress were his. And he would continue to occupy both.
Leading his stallion and keeping his distance, the Captain followed Mary Ellen to make sure she got home safely. He stopped at Longwood’s front gate, watched in wry amusement as she lifted her long skirts and flew up the steps. She disappeared through the tall fan-lighted doors with flashing flounce of white petticoats.
Once inside the house, Mary Ellen stopped in the kitchen only long enough to prepare a quick, cold supper on a tray. She carried it upstairs, hurried into her room, and locked the bedroom door. She tensed every time she heard the smallest noise, afraid it was the Captain climbing the stairs.
An hour passed. Two.
Exhausted, Mary Ellen went to bed. But she didn’t go to sleep. Lying there alone in the hot darkness, she was tortured by the knowledge that Captain Knight either was—or would soon be—just across the hall. His close proximity presented both a nagging threat and a powerful temptation.
Much as she hated to admit it, last night’s love-making had been thrilling beyond belief. So incredibly exciting, it was impossible to forget. And equally impossible not to yearn for more of the same.
Imposs
ible not to consider that all she would have to do to experience such glorious ecstasy again would be to get out of bed, cross the hall, and slip into his suite. She seriously doubted that he would turn her down. Was almost certain he would take her in his arms and make languid, lustful love to her.
Mary Ellen turned over impatiently, looked at the windows beside her bed to make sure they were open to catch any breeze off the river. They were. But it was close and hot in her room. Not a breath of air stirred the curtains, and she felt moisture collecting in the valley between her breasts and at the backs of her knees.
She kicked the top sheet to the foot of the bed, pulled the bodice of her nightgown away from her heated flesh, and blew down inside. It didn’t help.
She sighed.
And she pictured the Captain lying naked in the darkness just across the all. Pictured the thick raven black hair ruffling on the white pillow. The hard, handsome face with its cruel, sensual mouth. The corded artery that throbbed on the tanned column of his throat. The bare brown shoulders that were wide and well-muscled. The strong brown hands resting against the whiteness of the sheets. The chest with its mat of curling black hair. The drum-tight abdomen. The boyishly slim hips. The long, lean-muscled legs.
Her breath growing short, her top lip beaded with perspiration, Mary Ellen got out of bed. Irritably she unbuttoned her white nightgown. Blaming the hot gown for her discomfort, she drew it up over her head and off. She blotted the perspiration from her slender body with the garment, then dropped it to the rug.
Naked, she crawled back into bed.
But she was no cooler than before.
She tossed and turned, telling herself she did not want the Captain. She didn’t want to go to him. She didn’t want him to come to her. She wanted to forget last night had ever happened.
She would forget.
Punching her pillow, Mary Ellen murmured, “Damn you, Captain Knight! Damn you to hell! It’ll be a cold day in July before I let you touch me again.”
