Free Desperate Measures (Regency Undone) by Claire Firth

strong sedating drug.  She had felt no emotion at the time and no true emotions since.  She felt numbed inside and out - as if life happened around her and she was no part of it, merely an observer.
     
    Up in hers and Guy ’s room, she crushed the memory.  If ever she got to the time with her new husband where she took him in her hands, at least she could be confident that he would not die on her.  He was undoubtedly made of sterner stuff. 
    Which was a concern in itself.
    She allowed her maid to help her undress and prepare for bed - finding the soothing action of the brush passing through her hair, a balm to her tattered nerves. ‘Is there anything else, your Grace requires?’
    ‘ No Lucy, thank you.   I can see to myself now.  That will be all.’
    When Guy knocked on Isabelle ’s door some thirty minutes later, she heard him, but kept her eyes tightly closed and made no response.  He walked into the room and she could sense him standing by the bed looking down at her.  She had made sure to tuck the bedclothes tight around her body so that all that was showing was her head and she prayed to God that in the dim light he would not notice the pink flush of colour she could feel stealing into her cheeks.
    She was aware of every sound he made as he moved quietly around the adjoining dressing room.  She heard him dispense with his valet’s service and then felt the dip in the other side of the bed as he sank in next to her.  What had seemed a comfortably large bed when first she had viewed it critically, now seemed more the space of a child’s cot as she felt his large and solid length settling in beside her.  Her body was taut as a wire as she lay there and waited.
    Nothing happened.  He turned on his side away from her and all was still.  A few minutes later, the quiet steady rhythm of his breathing told her that he was asleep.
    She did not know what time it was when she awoke - only that the dim light of dawn filtered through the curtains into her room, and that although her face felt cold with the crisp December air whipping around her head, her body felt gloriously warm as it had never done in a bed before.  The reason for that soon became clear as slowly she registered the fact that she was lying on her side with Guy ’s warm body curved to her own behind her; one of his arms draped loosely across her waist.  He was clearly in a deep state of sleep and she lay there for a moment uncertain of what to do. 
    Her first thought was to register the unusual fact that she was not instinctively scrambling away from him with the need to be free, but this was followed very quickly by the next, which was that she undoubtedly should be if she wished to avoid any intimacy between them.  But if she did try to draw away, not only did she run the risk of waking him, but she would also have to forego this wonderful cosy warmth, so different to the usual chill she struggled with at night. 
    Slowly the tension eased from her body.  It was so comfortable.  She could not bring herself to do anything that would change that.
     
    When Guy awoke the next morning, it was to the familiar though rather distant memory of his arms wrapped around a deliciously female form, his body tucked into hers in a way that instantly made him harden.  Of its own volition, his hand slid up to cup the warm breast beneath the cotton gown.  It was unexpectedly full and soft and he squeezed it sleepily, nuzzling the soft neck so exquisitely exposed to him at the same time.
    ‘Oh.’
    He felt the form in his arms stiffen in outrage and immediately he became alert, recognising the hair on the pillow, remembering where he was and the circumstances.
    His hand stilled, but it did not withdraw.
    ‘ I’m sorry, Isabelle,’ he murmured in her ear.  ‘For a moment I forgot …’ he almost said, ‘who you were,’ but fortunately recollected himself just in time.  ‘Myself,’ he said instead.
    ‘ That’s as may be, Sir.’  Isabell