Free The Gallows Bride by Rebecca King

a
bedroom.
    Battling
the blackness, Jemima was vaguely aware of a flurry of activity
within the room. It took all her remaining energy to open her eyes
as the soft mattress dipped beside her. She wasn’t surprised to
find Peter staring gently at her. The tenderness she saw reflected
back at her warmed the deepest parts of her heart, that she had
once considered frozen forever.
    “ I’ve missed you,” she whispered softly, summoning the
strength to place a trembling hand against his chiselled jaw. She
studied the changes in his face since the last time she had seen
him.
    Although
still a rich mahogany, his hair was tinged with grey at the
temples, giving him a mature, yet debonair look. There were dark
circles beneath his beautiful dark blue eyes, indicating his rest
hadn’t been peaceful of late, or frequent enough to sustain him.
There were deeper grooves bracketing the firm lines of his lips,
and more creases beside his eyes than she remembered. But it was
his eyes that conveyed the most. There, in the shadows, was an
inner torment that disturbed her: a glint of some deeper suffering
that would remain with him throughout his life. She wondered what
he had meant earlier when he whispered, “You’re alive.”
    “ Can I ask you something?” she whispered, suddenly needing to
know as much as he could tell her.
    “ Of course - you can ask me anything,” Peter answered
honestly, unable to resist placing a tender kiss on her dry,
cracked lips.
    “ Why did you think I was dead?” She saw the instinctive flinch
he wasn’t quick enough to hide and waited, knowing somehow that he
had believed her dead, and this was the cause for the hidden
shadows in his gorgeous eyes.
    “ You can’t remember?” The thick slashes of his brows drew
downwards as he studied her.
    Jemima
shook her head slowly. “Nothing.” Her gaze locked with his. “Tell
me.”
    Peter
shook his head regretfully. “I think you should get some rest
first, and something to eat before we go into all of that.” He
raised a hand when she took a breath to protest. “I will tell you
my darling, of course I will, but we need to make you more
comfortable first. When you are feeling a bit better, I will tell
you anything you need to know.” At that moment, Peter couldn’t deny
her anything – except the truth. The memories were too raw. He
needed time to understand the latest twist before he could put the
events of the past few days into any logical order.
    Their
brief moment of privacy was shattered as Eliza entered, closely
followed by two maids.
    “ Now, Jemima and I are the same size, so we will need another
dress,” she informed one of the maids, “oh, and the essentials.
Could you ask Lady Isobel if we could impose on her good
nature?”
    All too
soon a veritable army of maids and footmen arrived with buckets of
steaming water, and a tin bath.
    Within
moments, Peter found himself unceremoniously shooed out of the
room, and the door closed in his face. His last sight of Jemima was
of her sitting on the side of the bed, holding a hand to her head.
He cursed, staring at the wooden panelling on the door for several
moments, before reluctantly turning on his heel and heading in
search of the others.
    With
startling speed, Jemima found herself stripped and sitting
shoulder-deep in the luxuriously warm water, watching her tattered
and very smelly dress being eaten by the flames in the hearth,
listening to Eliza bustle about the room, all efficiency and
maternal fussing.
    “ That was the only dress I had,” she informed her sister
ruefully, wondering what she was going to wear now.
    “ Isobel, Dominic’s wife, is sorting you out a couple of
dresses to wear,” Eliza stated matter-of-factly as she began to
help Jemima wash her hair. “The doctor has been summoned and should
be here shortly, and Cook is preparing you a tray of
food.”
    Eliza’s
actions were so mundane that Jemima found herself struggling to
mentally keep up with her sister’s