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“She died back in Norfolk. She was twenty. I was nineteen. I loved her like nothing else in this world. She was the only other person I’ve felt peace with like I do with you.”
Her heart clenched. She tightened her grip on his hand. “What happened?”
“She got pregnant. It wasn’t exactly a surprise. She’s the one who taught me how to touch a woman. We were…happy together that way.”
Melisande nodded, picturing a younger, eager version of him. He must have made a lovely husband.
“Everything seemed fine, and then one day it wasn’t. She got headaches. Her feet swelled. In the end, she started having fits. Seizures. The worst one killed her. Happens to some women when it gets close to their time, the doctor said.”
“I’m sorry.” Her throat thickened with tears when she saw that Bill’s eyes were damp. “I’m so sorry.”
He scrubbed a hand over his face. “I never thought I’d get over it. Never thought I’d marry again. When the need for a woman got too bad, I’d go to a brothel. Not often. Not until you.”
She tipped her face up and kissed him gently. “I’m glad I brought you some peace, then.”
“You did. But the thought of having babies… I know that’s all some men want, but that ain’t something I dream of, Melisande. It scares me half to death.”
She pressed a hand to her belly. It had scared her too, when she’d come up pregnant at fourteen. After that, not being able to have a baby had made her life simpler, but she knew anyone else would say it was one more thing that made her less than other women.
“So you’re saying you don’t want me if I keep whoring?”
“No, I’m not saying that.”
“Then can’t we just have this?” she pled. “On Sunday mornings? Something to look forward to?”
“Yes. As long as you know I’m aiming for more. I won’t lie about that.”
She looked down at their hands clasped together, unable to meet his gaze. “Anything more than this scares me.”
“Why?” he pressed, his thumb stroking hers.
“Because wanting something makes it powerful. You could hurt me. Badly.”
“I never would,” he promised, but everything she felt for him already hurt, didn’t it?
Chapter 5
‡
By Tuesday afternoon, her Sunday with Bill felt like a world she’d left behind years before. Melisande sighed so often over her lunch that one of the other gi
rls asked if she was sick.
No, she wasn’t sick. She was only in love.
She’d read stories of romance in books and had always thought it foolish. Drivel written by women who had no idea what their husbands were up to outside the house. But now when she wasn’t with Bill, she missed him. Anytime she wasn’t occupied—and often when she was—she thought of him.
Work was unbearable. All she wanted to do was sneer at every man who touched her, knock his hands away, so she could get back to remembering that morning in Bill’s room.
Five more days before she’d see him again, and then only for a short time. But she couldn’t indulge his fantasy that she could leave this place. Even if he could afford a larger place without her income, they’d be hard pressed to find someone to rent to them. And there’d always be people around who wouldn’t like it. He could lose his job. His friends. Surely he wouldn’t want her for long if he lost everything else.
And then there was money. This was the only work Melisande knew. Even if she could find work as a maid or some such, she wouldn’t earn half as much as she did now, and she’d have to depend on a man who wasn’t her husband to provide the rest.
If she walked away from this, she wouldn’t be a whore, but she’d have even less than she did now.
Sighing again, she got up from the table and cleaned her plate, nearly making it out of the kitchen before Madame called her name. Melisande winced and stopped, waiting to see what the woman wanted. It was never anything good.
“Melisande,” she snapped, “take this girl up to the empty room.”
