As we turned toward the town, he put his arm around my shoulder. I felt its weight, warm, reassuring and decidedly alive, and slipped my arm around his waist and we strolled like the lovers we passed, toward Northampton.
~*~
The Cosy Nook had been a favorite restaurant for Mark and I. Mark would ridicule its kitsch name but he could not deny the food was good. The host, who knew me of course from those trysts with Mark, didn’t bat an eye when I arrived without a booking and in the company of a different man.
He seated us outside on the broad terrace overlooking the river where we could watch the colorful canal boats tied up to the riverbank. The delicious warmth of the English summer day folded us in its velvety embrace.
On a whim, I requested two glasses of champagne.
Nat took a tentative sip and pulled a face. ‘I would rather have ale.’
I smiled. ‘For us, champagne represents good fortune, something to be celebrated.’
‘And what are we celebrating?’
‘I don’t know,’ I admitted.
A triumph over the immutable laws of nature and physics? Proof there really are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamed of in our philosophies, or was it simply that whatever the years between us, just for today, just for this moment, we were a man and a woman enjoying a lovely meal in a beautiful place.
I ordered a beer for Nat and finished off his champagne.
‘What would you do if you had to make a choice, Nat?’ I asked at last.
‘A choice between my time and this one?’ He sighed and looked away at the canal boats below us. ‘There is so much here.’ I could hear the hunger in his voice. ‘The war is killing my spirit, Jessie. I take no pleasure in fighting my own countrymen and, even worse, having to watch my own people die.’
‘Then why are you fighting?’
‘Did I have a choice? I have served the king at court. I owe him my complete loyalty.’
‘He is going to lose, Nat. The next battle, Naseby, will be his last. After that his cause is lost.’
‘So Alan tells me.’ Nat’s lips compressed in a grim line. ‘I won’t see it. I will already be dead.’
I looked away, tears springing to my eyes. He reached out and stroked my cheek.
‘I can’t change history,’ he said gently. ‘I don’t want to change history. Imagine if I go back and tell the king not to take the field at Naseby...what difference will that one conversation make to what is to come?’
This was the same conversation I’d had with Alan.
I shook my head. ‘Maybe none.’ I sighed. ‘What it might do is prolong the war. I know the king’s forces are spent and are no match for parliament’s New Model Army. They will have to meet someday.’
He smiled. ‘For someone who professes to know nothing of history, you are well informed.’
‘You don’t have a brother like Alan and not pick something up, but don’t tell him.’ I smiled in return
He traced a pattern on the back of my hand with his finger. ‘To return to your question, Jessie. I am not sure it will be something about which I have to make a decision. My grandmother...’ He broke off and picked up his beer, swilling the contents.
‘What about your grandmother? You mentioned her before. What has she to do with this?’
He set down the empty glass and sighed. ‘My grandmother is the one who has sent me out of time.’
‘That’s ridiculous. What is she? Some sort of witch?’
‘Yes.’ The word hung on the air between us.
I gave a nervous laugh. ‘Now you’re being seventeenth century. Whatever else you may believe, there are no such things as witches.’
He raised an eyebrow. ‘No? Then why am I here? Dame Alice knew what she was doing when she sent me to you.’
‘But how could she possibly know me? Know about me?’ A foolish thought crossed my mind. ‘Maybe it is not about me, but the cottage? When I bought the cottage a year ago, it had been empty for decades and before that there had been little done to it. Until I moved in and renovated, it would have looked almost the same to you as it did to the last owner.’
‘Now it is you who are being fanciful,’ Nat said.
I shook my head. ‘No, I think the key to this is the cottage. It is the one link between your time and mine.’
He shrugged. ‘It’s only a link. I could just have easily walked into the Church of St. Matthew at Chesham. That is little changed.’
‘Then tell me about your grandmother?’
‘No. We have talked enough about my family. What of your family?’
‘Just Alan and I. Our parents were killed in a car accident five years ago.’
I felt the gaping hole in my chest that their deaths had left, as it always did at mention of them. Nat’s fingers tightened on mine.
‘I am sorry to bring back such painful memories.’
I shook my head. ‘It’s silly. After all this time I shouldn’t get emotional but I do. I miss them every day…’ My voice quavered and it was my turn to look away.
Nat stroked my cheek again, curling a lock of my hair around his finger.
‘Tell me, Jessie, my witch, has anyone told you recently how lovely you look with the sun on your hair?’
My expression must have given him the answer because he laughed. ‘I see another failing in the good Master Westmacott.’
I pushed the vegetables around my plate with my fork. Mark had never told me I looked lovely. He had told me he admired my professional skills or that I had cooked a nice meal, but never had he spoken to me the way this man did.
‘Modern courtship is not like that,’ I muttered.
He tilted my face up to look at him. ‘Then I have something to teach you after all.’
I gave a snort of laughter. ‘I know all about seventeenth-century men. There was nothing in their books about pleasing the lady.’
The gray-green eyes closed for a moment before he said, ‘Not all men.’ He looked at me with a fierce intensity, and my breath caught in my throat. ‘You forget I have lived in Italy and some time in France.’
His gaze held mine. Mesmerized, I found myself unable to break eye contact. I wanted to drown in those mysterious depths.
‘And what did you learn in Italy and France?’ I whispered, hardly trusting myself to speak.
He picked up my hand and turned it over. He lifted the palm to his lips, brushing it with the softest butterfly touch and my breath caught in my throat. His lips moved to my inner wrist. The blood in my veins jumped and my eyes closed. I should have snatched my hand away, sent for the bill, but I couldn’t move. It was as if I had melted into the chair.
‘I found another book of poetry on your shelves this morning,’ he said. ‘Andrew Marvell? ‘If I had world enough and time, this coyness lady were no crime...’ He lowered my hand, caressing the palm with his thumb. ‘I don’t have world enough and time, Jessica.’
‘No,’ I whispered hoarsely, ‘and no one has ever called me coy. I’ll get the bill.’
~*~
We spoke little on the drive home. We didn’t need to. The air between us crackled as if it were charged.
I parked the car in the drive and barely had time to press the lock button before he caught me in his arms. The warm evening closed in on us as his lips met mine. My heart beat so hard, I felt sure he could feel it through my cotton dress.
His fingers meshed my hair, pulling the light combs free. I tugged at his t-shirt, until my fingers glided across the smooth, hard contours of his back. I could scarcely breathe as our lips touched. I closed my eyes, drowning in the moment, wanting it never to end.
‘Key,’ I mumbled, breaking contact and scrabbling by touch for the lock on the front door.
The door yielded and we stumbled across the threshold. It closed behind us with a thump as Nat booted it shut with his foot. He lifted me as if I weighed no more than a feather and carried me upstairs to my bedroom, where he unceremoniously dumped me on the bed then rapidly dive
sted himself of his disheveled clothing.
I have heard men described as beautiful but as a doctor I had never found the male body particularly attractive. Well, most male bodies. Nathaniel Preston looked pretty good for someone who was nearly four hundred years old. I may have already remarked that his chest and arms would do credit to a determined body builder. The flat planes of his stomach tapered to narrow hips and strong, lean rider’s legs.
My breath came in short gasps as he knelt over me.
‘I wish you were wearing that fetching outfit I first beheld you in,’ he murmured. His eyes appeared to gleam, reflecting the light from the hall. ‘I think I like the twentieth century. Now off with that ridiculous chemise.’ He tugged at my summer dress. I heard fabric rip but didn’t care.
He stopped.
‘What is that?’ he inquired, and I realized he referred to my bra.
After much deliberation that morning, I had selected a lacy piece of nonsense with matching briefs. A slow smile creased the corners of his eyes. From the way he looked at me, I may as well have been wearing a red satin bustier and crotchless knickers. I didn’t know whether to feel incredibly sexy or somewhat guilty.
‘My...er...corset?’ I ventured.
He laughed and lay beside me, propping himself up on one elbow while he explored the intricacies of the modern brassiere, running his finger around the beribboned edge. The exploratory finger never quite brushed my nipples which ached for him. When I caught his eye I could see he was teasing me.
He slid his fingers around the back and encountered the fastening. His eyelids flickered in concentration, and with one hand, he undid the hooks and eyes with a dexterity that would have done credit to any modern Lothario.
He pushed the inadequate lace confection aside, and his gaze lingered for a moment on my breasts before he bent and kissed first one and then the other, flicking his tongue at my nipples. My back arched. I could have screamed, in my desperation for him.
I don’t know what sort of education had been intended for him on his ‘grand tour’ of the continent. A handsome young man in possession of a good supply of gold coins would have found no shortage of interesting women, willing to impart their knowledge to him. Nat gave me good cause to thank those nameless ladies for their generosity of spirit.
Time stood still. Three hundred and fifty years may have stood between us but I knew I had found my soul mate. We were meant for each other. I closed my eyes and willed myself to forget everything except this man and the touch of his lips and his hands.
Afterward, as we lay tangled in each other’s limbs and the bedclothes, I spared a brief thought for Mark, and my other lovers, who had approached lovemaking in much the same way as they took to the cricket field--pads on and straight bat. Nat had none of that twentieth-century reserve.
‘What are you thinking?’ he asked.
I propped myself on one elbow and ran my fingers through the hair on his chest.
‘I was wondering about your wife,’ I said.
His lips tightened. ‘Anne was not like you. I tried to teach her but she didn’t want to know. She was a godly woman who believed intercourse was for one purpose only, the begetting of children.’
I kissed him gently. ‘Then that, I am afraid, was Anne’s loss. Now it is my turn...’ I straddled his hips and took charge.
Chapter 4
The Rules of Cricket
Beyond the window, the birds begin their morning song. Some things never change. At home I would hear the voices of the servants, who awake long before the dawn. Here are only the birds and the occasional passing carriage.
Jessie the Witch lies in my arms, her hair spread across my chest. It is the color of the dark honey Alice would bring in from the hives in the orchard and smells just as sweet, but I know the smell comes from the strange soap in a bottle she keeps in the room with the bath.
‘Alice?’ I call her in my head. ‘Is this what you intended? That I should fall in love with a woman who is not of my time?’
I hear her say, ‘Yes, that is how it should be. You are meant to be together.’
‘But I am to die. I cannot leave her to mourn me.’
‘We all must die,’ Alice answers me.
At that thought my flesh turns cold. I kiss Jessie’s hair and she murmurs in her sleep and holds me closer. I cannot die, not yet. Not when I have found my soul mate.
~*~
I woke and found my limbs still tangled in Nat’s as if I hadn’t moved all night. Stretching my body against his, I sighed in contentment.
‘You’re awake? Do you mind if I move my arm? I can’t feel my fingers,’ Nat said rather unromantically.
I rolled off his chest and lay on the pillows, looking up at the ceiling. I smiled and raised a hand to touch my lips, which still tingled from the previous night, as I remembered.
Beside me, Nat lay back and watched me, his hands behind his head. He had the sleek, contented air of a lion that had just eaten its fill. I shivered as I thought of the feline analogy. No lover I had ever been with had given me what I had experienced last night.
I stole a glance at the clock radio beside the bed and sat bolt upright. Nat rolled over and propped himself on an elbow. ‘Jessie? Are you all right?’
‘It’s seven,’ I said. ‘I’m due at work in half an hour. I’m going to be late.’
He put his hand over mine. ‘Don’t go.’
It would have been so easy to ring in sick and just lie beside this man, but I swung my legs off the bed.
‘I have patients,’ I said, bending to kiss him, ‘but you know something? I’m going to take some long overdue leave from tomorrow.’
I didn’t speak the words hanging over our heads. We didn’t know how much time we had so we needed every minute of every day.
‘What do you suggest I do today?’ he inquired as I scampered around the bedroom retrieving my work clothes.
‘Alan said he would call in this morning. I think he’s up to something.’
Fully dressed, I bent and kissed him on the lips, resisting the strong hand that wound around my neck, pulling me into bed.
‘I’ll be home by six tonight,’ I promised. ‘And then we can plan for the next few days. I have so much to show you.’
The corners of his lips twitched into a smile. ‘If they are as interesting as last night, I can hardly wait. Hurry home, Mistress Shepherd.’
~*~
‘Well, look at you!’ my dear friend, Lily French, announced when I arrived late for work, breathless and disheveled. ‘The rumors must be true.’
‘What rumors?’
‘This is a hospital, Jess. There are no secrets. According to the gossip, you were seen yesterday in Northampton with a cute guy.’ She smiled. ‘And the best bit, Mark is walking around with a face like the grim reaper.’
A satisfied smile tugged at the corners of my mouth and Lily gasped. ‘Oh, it’s true. Who is he? Go on, tell.’
‘At break,’ I said. ‘I have patients waiting for me.’
When I fetched my coffee later that morning, I had to remind myself to be careful about what I said to Lily, who waited for me at a table in the canteen. Like any woman in love, I longed to share it all, but this story was one too strange for the telling. While falling in love with a man I had only met three days ago might not sound so strange, there was the little matter of an age difference that defied explanation.
‘So?’ Lily wheedled, raising a cup of canteen tea to her lips.
I shrugged. ‘What’s to tell? He’s just an old family friend who’s staying over for a little while.’
‘A little more than a friend from the grin on your face, Dr. S!’
‘It’s just a bit of fun. He’ll be heading home soon and that’ll be it.’
‘Bloody men,’ Lily said. ‘Love you and leave you. Well, you may as well enjoy it while you can. Where’s he from?’
‘The Falklands,’ I said, mentally scanning the globe for somewhere far and remote.
L
ily looked taken aback but before she could respond, Jenny slid into the chair beside me.
‘Jessie, I want to know all about that gorgeous guy you were with yesterday. You should see him, Lily, eyes to drown in.’
I drained my coffee and stood. The chair scraped on the linoleum floor. ‘Nothing to tell.’ I caught the disbelieving look she shot me. ‘Really.’
Just to complete the triumvirate, on my way to my wards, Mark lumbered across my path. I wondered what I had ever seen in him. I found myself looking at his receding hairline and his paunch as if seeing him for the first time. I shivered as I remembered the delicious hardness of Nat Preston’s stomach beneath my hands....and my lips.
‘Dr. Shepherd,’ he said, stepping in front of me. ‘Mr. Westmacott? What can I do for you?’
Now he had my full attention, he seemed to forget what he had intended to ask me.
He lowered his voice. ‘I think I left some things at your house. I meant to collect them yesterday.’
‘Oh, you mean your tracksuit bottoms?’
‘And a t-shirt I was rather fond of.’
‘Oh, those. I gave them to charity,’ I said.
As I made to go past him, he grabbed my arm. I looked down at the restraining hand and said in an icy tone, ‘Let go, Mark.’
‘Who was that guy?’
I glared at him and he released me. ‘Just a friend.’
Mark stared at me, his face flushed and breathing shallow. For a moment, I almost felt sorry for him and put my hand on his arm.
‘Mark, I’m moving on. Time you did too.’
He gave me a reproachful look as he turned and stomped down the corridor.
~*~
When I got home that evening, Alan and Nat were sitting on my sofa, drinking my beer while Alan tried to explain the rules of cricket to Nat.
Nat stood as I entered.
‘Jessie,’ he said, sweeping his hand at the sofa. ‘Come sit down with us and perhaps you can explain to me what it is about this sport that your brother finds so entrancing?’
‘Call yourself an Englishman?’ I chided as I plopped down next to him
As his arm slid around my shoulder, Alan cast us both a sideways glance.
Secrets in Time: Time Travel Romance Page 6
