think her name, I picture her face, and then I see another one, weathered with short-cropped steel gray hair and a pipe in his mouth.
Have we met? You look . . . familiar.
William’s footsteps clomp down the steps, Mrs. Shaw’s click-clacking after him as she asks about tea, and William mutters that refreshments might induce his solicitor to linger, so, no, they can skip tea.
I smile at that, and my gaze turns to the bed. It’s not the narrow child’s bed I remember, but a four-poster mahogany one, still no larger than a modern double. There should be curtains, but they’ve been removed.
Seeing the folded-back sheets, I remember how they felt against me last night, cool and featherlight and coarse. The perfect counterpoint to the fingers on my hip, warm and strong and smooth until they slid up to my waist, the callused skin of William’s fingertips tickling across my—
I yank my thoughts from that precipice and shiver with something between delight and dread. I told myself I wasn’t going to dream of William, and yet, I am. I curled up in bed thinking of him, and then I must have dreamed that I rose and saw him in the mirror.
This very room proves it’s a dream. It’s a child’s bedchamber, for one who is no longer a child. William would be Lord Thorne now, as Mrs. Shaw called him. His father died when he was ten, and his mother had been ill when I saw him at fifteen. His only sibling was Cordelia, five years his junior. As the lord of the manor, William would have the master bedroom, yet in my dream, I nonsensically see him in his old room.
I look back at the bed. If I crawl into it, will the dream end? Or will I then dream of being in it with him? Another shiver, delight mingled with dread again. That way lies madness. Best to keep this dream in the light of day. It will end soon enough.
I glance down at the dresser, the wood smooth under my hands. It’s more dressing table than modern dresser, with a wardrobe to one side and a washstand to the other, all in gorgeous gleaming mahogany. In less affluent families, furniture in a Victorian bedroom was recycled from lower rooms as it began to show wear, but the Thornes had the money to furnish their bedrooms new, and while this one is small, it’s well-appointed. Overdone, with more square footage allotted to furniture than is my taste, but that, too, was the Victorian way.
With no closets, most of the furniture is for storage, primarily clothing, and that includes the dressing table, topped with a horsehair brush, a pair of brown gloves, a pocket watch and several stickpins in an enamel tray.
I touch the washbasin pitcher. Without thinking, my fingers move to a crack in the handle, a rough spot under my fingertips. In my mind, I see my chubby five-year-old self demonstrating my ballet positions, and then executing a clumsy pirouette, hitting the pitcher and sending it tumbling to the floor. I wail in dismay as the handle snaps free and bounces over the hardwood, and I manage to clamp a hand over my mouth before anyone comes running. Tears stream from my eyes as I stare at the broken pitcher.
“I—I’m so—”
William catches me in a hug before I can get the apology out. “I’ll tell them I did it. Papa’s away, and Mama’s busy with the baby coming. I’ll hardly get in any trouble.”
“You shouldn’t get in any trouble at all. It’s my fault.” I pick up the handle and turn it over in my hands before spinning on him. “Do you have Super Glue?”
“Super glue . . . ?” His brow furrows in a way I know well. It’s the same expression I must make when he talks about an abacus or a Punch and Judy show.
“I’ll get some,” I say. “Uncle Stan keeps it in the cupboard.”
I brought a tube of Super Glue and fixed his pitcher, and it’s still here, with that barely noticeable repair. I run my fingers over the handle again and then look down, seeing my reflection in the water. When I touch the surface, it ripples.
The old pitcher is no family heirloom, just a cheap water jug, perfect for a child who might knock it over in the night. It’s out of place now among the lavish furnishings. As out of place as . . .
My gaze snags on what