Listed: Volumes I-VI by Noelle Adams (9)

 

NINE

 

Emily’s stomach churned with anxiety as she slanted a discreet look over at Paul.

They were in the back seat together, being driven over to the Masons' for the party in Emily's honor. He looked handsome and urban in a black dress shirt and slate gray trousers, and his expression was as composed as always.

But something was wrong. Emily knew something was wrong.

She was very much afraid it was because they’d had sex the evening before.

She was still a little sore—a pang of pain she’d feel every now and then that reminded her of how Paul had been deep inside her last night. This morning, even though she'd been disappointed when she woke up to find his side of the bed empty, the feeling had inspired a silly kind of pride.

Now it just intensified her anxiety.

For her, the sex had been better than any fantasy. Yes, it had been rather uncomfortable, and yes, it had been occasionally awkward since she hadn't really known what she was doing. But that was to be expected. And being with Paul that way, so intimately, so deeply, had totally blown her away.

He had enjoyed it too. She was absolutely sure he had. He’d been so sweet, so careful, but he had also been into it. He’d been just as overcome with desire as she’d been, and he’d needed the consummation just as much. Emily was certain of it.

Which was why she couldn’t understand why he’d withdrawn from her today.

He hadn’t been rude or cold. He’d been just as polite and attentive as ever, asking her about how she felt and making sure she didn’t need anything. But he’d spent most of the day working, beginning well before she'd awakened. Even when he was with her, it felt like he wasn’t really there.

It made her want to cry, and she had no idea what to do about it.

Paul hadn’t said anything in the four minutes since they’d gotten in the car and left the house. The silence was really starting to get to her. It wasn’t like they always had to talk when they were together—they were quiet a lot—but this silence wasn’t companionable or peaceful.

It was stiff and uncomfortable, and Emily felt a chill of nerves as she tried to process what it could mean.

Mostly just to make conversation, she said, “Thanks for coming with me tonight.”

Paul gave a half-shrug, his eyes focused on the sidewalk out the window. “It’s no big deal. Why wouldn’t I come with you?”

He was her husband. Perhaps he assumed accompanying her to parties thrown for her benefit was part of his spousal duty, but Emily was pretty sure he would have rather stayed at the house.

“I don’t know. I mean, not everyone here understands us, you, our marriage. I guess I thought it might be kind of awkward for you. It means a lot that you're willing to come.”

Paul’s eyes had darted over to her face, but now they shifted to window again. “It’s no big deal.”

Emily gave up on that conversation, since he clearly wasn’t going to share anything genuine with her.

Maybe she was expecting too much. Their marriage was only supposed to be one of convenience and sympathy, and it had already ended up placing a much greater burden on Paul than she had imagined when she suggested it.

In the last couple of weeks, she'd come to a series of revelations about him—all of them thrilling and gratifying. She'd realized she could be there for Paul when he needed her, offering him comfort and support. She'd realized he could actually have a good time with her, be happy in a way she rarely saw him. She'd realized he was genuinely attracted to her, a revelation so shocking it had taken a whole day to process. She'd realized she was more than just a duty and responsibility to him.

But maybe she was expecting too much in terms of emotional connection.

Paul cared about her and was attracted to her and, for the time being, was enjoying being with her, but she was a passing phase for him. That had always been the fundamental truth of their marriage. Their relationship, whatever it was, would only last for a few months.

Emily could invest in the marriage emotionally as much as she wanted, since she wouldn’t be alive to deal with any consequences.

It wasn’t fair to expect Paul to invest emotionally in their marriage the way she did, though. In fact, it would be insane if he did. She couldn’t be selfish about this. She had to think more about Paul's needs than her own.

She needed to do better about not expecting so much from him and not getting her feelings hurt if he didn’t reciprocate.

With this worthy ambition, she resolved that she wasn’t going to let Paul’s reticence today bother her. It probably wasn’t personal. She wasn’t going to pry into his privacy or make him feel guilty about any perceived slights.

He didn’t owe her anything. In fact, she owed him more than she could ever repay.

So, when the driver pulled up in front of the Masons’ row house, Emily was ready to have a good evening with her friends, even with a perplexing husband by her side who refused to talk to her.

Paul was reaching down to grab the bag of hostess gifts they’d brought for Mrs. Mason when Emily threw her worthy resolve out the window.

“Are you sorry we had sex?” she burst out, her hand gripping her seatbelt strap, which she hadn’t yet unbuckled.

“What?” Paul blinked at her, clearly taken aback by the abrupt question.

Emily swallowed hard, desperately trying to read some sort of expression on his guarded face. Sometimes, it was so easy to read his feelings, but sometimes he was so unknowable she wanted to scream. “Last night,” she explained. “Are you sorry we had sex?”

“Of course not. Why would I be sorry?” He was actually looking at her now, his gray eyes scanning her face with a strange urgency. It was definitely an improvement on his avoiding her gaze completely, which he'd been doing most of the day.

“I don’t know, but you’ve been acting kind of…kind of standoffish today. So I was starting to worry that you…regretted it.” She was suddenly embarrassed for even bringing the subject up. “Or maybe it’s something else. I know you have a lot of other stuff going on. It might have nothing to do with me. But I just got worried.”

“There’s nothing for you to be worried about. I don’t have any regrets about last night.”

“You don’t?” she asked, a note in her voice that was almost a plea. “You’re sure? Because it was so…it was so special to me. But, if it wasn’t good for you, I’d understand. We can talk about it, though. You can just tell me. I’m not going to expect you to do anything you don’t want to do.” Her voice wobbled dangerously on the last few words at the thought that she might be something Paul didn’t want to do. "You won't hurt my feelings."

“Emily,” Paul said hoarsely, sounding much more like himself than he had all day. He reached over until he was cupping her cheek with one warm hand. “Emily, that’s not it at all. It was good for me too. You must have seen how good it was for me. That’s not it at all.”

“Then what…” She trailed off, not sure if she had the right to demand for him to tell her the truth. Commanding herself to get a grip on her spiraling emotions, she forced herself to smile at him brightly. “Okay. As long as things are okay with us, I'm good. We don't have to talk about it. Everything's fine.”

She got out of the car, feeling too hot, a little dizzy. Her cheeks were flushed with embarrassment or some other emotion.

Paul had gotten out of the car too, faster than she would have expected. He took her arms and pressed her back against the closed car door, gently but unwaveringly. “Emily, if you’re upset about something, then everything is not fine.”

“It’s not?” she breathed, very stupidly. She gazed up at his tight face and intense eyes, and the sight of him that way relaxed the ache in her chest at the same time as it tightened a coil of desire between her legs.

This was Paul. The real Paul. He hadn’t really retreated from her after all.

Then, realizing how foolish she'd sounded, she added, "I wasn't upset."

“Yes, you were. I’m sorry if I was withdrawn today.” He stroked her face until his hand tangled in her loose hair. “It has nothing to do with regretting last night.”

She let out a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding. “So you don’t regret it?”

Paul leaned forward until he’d brushed her mouth with his. “I don’t regret it,” he murmured against her lips.

With a thrill of relief and excitement, she wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled him against her with an entitlement she’d never experienced before.

She couldn’t believe she had the right to hold him this way, kiss him this way. She'd been his wife for a while now, but she'd never really felt entitled to him like this before.

They kissed deeply, emotion and sensation washing in hot waves through Emily’s body. It was hard to say how long the kiss would have lasted had they not been interrupted by the sound of a car door slamming not far behind them.

Their lips parted, and they both turned to look in the direction of the closing door.

Emily saw Laura Mason staring at them, evidently having just gotten out of the cab that was pulling away from the curb.

Emily eased away from Paul a little, suddenly overwhelmed by a familiar insecurity. She thought she’d grown a lot in the last few months, particularly in being more confident in her ability to attract men. In fact, just the minute earlier, she'd been reveling in the fact that Paul Marino was attracted to her.

But seeing Laura now brought all of Emily's old insecurities back.

Laura used to date Paul—way back when.

He’d dated her longer than anyone else. Everyone thought he’d really fallen for her.

But Paul was Emily's husband now. She was taking good care of him, and he seemed to be happy with her in these few months they were together.

Laura couldn’t have him.

“Emily,” Laura said, giving her a breathtaking smile. “It’s so good to see you.”

“You too.” Emily forced herself to remember that Laura had always been decent to her. She pulled out of Paul’s arms, which were still draped loosely at her waist, and walked over to greet the other woman.

Laura gave her a little hug, and then her eyes drifted over to Paul, who was standing in the background, watching quietly. “Hi, Paul,” Laura said, her striking dark eyes a bit uncertain, as if she didn’t know what to expect from him. “How are you?”

“I’m fine.” He gave Laura a strange little smile that made Emily’s gut twist even more. “How’s life treating you?”

“Good.” Laura’s smile broadened. “Great job. Great apartment. It’s so strange to be back.” She turned to look at her family’s house.

“Yeah,” Emily agreed. “We feel the same way.” She took Paul’s arm as they started to walk toward the door. Maybe it was petty, but Paul was hers—at least for the time being—and she wanted to make sure everyone knew it.

Paul shifted the bag he carried into his other hand and didn’t pull away from her as they walked.

“You look great, Laura,” Emily said, resolutely trying to be nice, to feel nice. “I love your hair like that.”

“Thanks.” Laura brought up a hand to brush down her dark waves. “You look good too. Different, somehow.”

 “Oh, well, I’m dying, you know, so that probably explains it.”

When she felt Paul stiffen beside her, she realized she’d let her insecurity push her into the defensive irony that had been habitual when she was younger. “Sorry,” she said hurriedly, giving Laura a sincerely apologetic smile. “I’m sorry. Thanks for the compliment. I shouldn’t be so prickly.”

Laura’s eyes were full of pity as she smiled back. “That’s okay. I’m so sorry about…about…”

“I know,” Emily interrupted, so Laura wouldn’t have to finish the statement. “Thank you.”

She didn’t want Laura’s pity. She didn’t want anyone’s pity, but she knew it was unavoidable. Laura wasn’t trying to be patronizing or superior.

It was just that Laura had always been the epitome of the princess, the blessed life that Emily had never possessed, and it was hard to fight those feelings even now.

Emily smiled up at Paul as Laura opened the front door. Paul didn’t smile back, but his eyes were soft on her face, and he reached over to brush a strand of hair out of her face.

When Emily looked back, she saw that Laura, Chris, and Mrs. Mason—the latter two had come to greet them at the door—were all staring at her and Paul.

Emily felt strangely embarrassed. She used to daydream about somehow landing a fantastic man and taking him to a party where she could show off to all her friends. Paul was better in every way than the men she used to dream of, but she didn’t have any desire to show him off tonight. In fact, she’d rather no one had witnessed the little moment they’d shared just now. It had felt private. Just between her and Paul. It seemed like no one else would really understand.

She usually wasn’t the kind of person who got embarrassed at the drop of a hat, but she felt suddenly hot as she smiled at Chris and Mrs. Mason in greeting.

It was even hotter in the house.

* * *

Emily looked around for Paul but couldn’t find him.

He’d been talking to Laura for a long time—far longer than Emily was comfortable with—but their conversation had broken up a few minutes ago.

The party seemed to be going pretty well. Chris had been friendly and sympathetic, and she felt better about having the tension resolved between them. She was feeling surprisingly tired, though, despite it not even being nine in the evening. Plus, the Masons’ living room was too crowded, so Emily was overly warm.

She wanted to find Paul. She supposed he’d been trying to give her some space to talk to her old friends in peace, but she didn’t want space or peace. She wanted Paul beside her. She wanted to make sure he was all right. She wanted to make sure people were treating him right and not holding against him either his father’s conviction or the fact that he’d testified against him.

“Hey, Emily,” came a soft, feminine voice from behind her.

Emily turned to see Laura approaching, carrying a cup of punch and smiling. “Hey. Have you seen Paul?”

“I was talking to him a few minutes ago,” Laura explained, “but I don’t know where he is now.”

“Oh.” Emily rubbed her hot face with her left hand, wishing she were outside where it was cooler.

“Your ring is gorgeous.”

Emily stretched out her hand so Laura could better inspect her engagement ring. “Thanks. I really like it too.”

“Paul has good taste.”

“Yeah.”

“Are you two…” Laura cleared her throat, as if she weren’t sure how to ask the question. “Is it just a marriage of convenience? That’s what I was thinking, since it happened so suddenly and everything, but then it looked like you two were…he was kissing you and…”

“We’re married,” Emily replied, a little coolly. “Why shouldn’t we kiss?”

“I know. I didn’t mean to offend you. It’s just that I never thought the two of you would ever…I mean, you’re not the most obvious couple, so it surprised me that you were…”

Emily sighed. “I know we’re not an obvious couple. But we have an understanding, and it works for us.”

“Oh,” Laura breathed, as if she were relieved about something. “That’s good. I mean, it's good you two have an understanding.”

“What do you mean?” Emily felt a tug of dread in her chest, although she couldn’t exactly pinpoint why.

“I just mean I would have been worried if you’d thought Paul was in love with you. I mean, not long ago, he was really into....” She trailed off as if she were embarrassed. “I mean, he didn’t seem interested in you at all before. So it would have been hard to swallow that he’d suddenly fallen in love out of the blue. And it didn't seem like…But as long as you have an understanding, I’m sure it’s fine. I’m glad he’s helping you do all the things on your list.”

Laura’s eyes were open and sincere, and Emily could tell she was genuinely concerned and trying to help. But, as she processed what the other woman had said, it felt like Emily’s heart had been ripped from her chest and stomped into pulp on the ground.

Evidently, Laura had been the one to dump Paul last year, and he’d just been talking to Laura for a long time. Maybe she’d picked up some sort of continued interest.

Not that Paul would do anything. Emily was absolutely positive about his commitment and faithfulness to her.

But she hated—she absolutely hated—the idea that Paul might be yearning for someone else, that he’d rather be with someone other than her, even for these few months.

She knew he was attracted to her, and she knew he cared about her.

But love was out of the question for them, since they didn’t have a future. He could fall in love with someone else, though. Maybe he already had. Emily knew now how deeply emotions ran in Paul. If he loved someone, he would love her all the way, no holds barred.

He was committed to Emily for these few months, but he could be biding his time to pursue a future with someone else. The future he really wanted.

And the thought crushed her. It just crushed her.

“Yeah,” Emily agreed, her voice weak but with at least a semblance of normality. “He’s been great. Will you excuse me? I need to find the restroom.”

Laura said, “Sure,” so Emily was able to escape.

She didn’t go to the bathroom. She slipped out of the hot, confining house and went out to the small yard, toward the toolshed. The evening was cool, and she breathed deeply, trying to purge herself of her silly, immature worries and resentments.

She couldn’t be selfish. She just couldn’t. Even if he’d wanted to, Paul could never have a future with her. Their relationship had always been temporary, and so—even if she were the kind of woman he might fall in love with—he would never let himself do so.

She would never want him to love her. It wouldn’t be fair. It would leave him wounded when she died, and she couldn’t bear the thought of that.

But it still hurt. It still hurt to think that Paul would want to be with someone other than her. She’d thought they were happy together for the moment.

Her eyes were filled with tears she couldn’t quite suppress, and her cheeks burned almost painfully with emotion. Her shoulders shook a few times as she stared at the Masons' toolshed.

She’d always been tougher than this. She’d never been so sensitive.

Dying was really disrupting her emotional stability.

“Emily?”

She recognized the voice, coming from behind her, and it made her chest hurt even more.

“Are you all right?” Paul asked, approaching her quickly.

She fought through the emotion in an attempt to compose her face. “Yeah. I’m fine.” Her voice didn’t come close to sounding convincing.

Paul reached her and grabbed her upper arms in both of his hands, turning her to face him. “Emily, what’s the matter? Why are you crying?”

She hadn’t really been crying, but she was now. The concern in his voice and the urgency in his eyes broke her control, and she buried her face in his shirt and let herself cry for just a minute, releasing the coiled tension and the bewildered confusion of so many unanswerable questions.

Paul’s arms wrapped around her immediately, tightly. He smelled so familiar—clean, masculine, faintly expensive. Like Paul. She breathed him in as she cried.

He let her shake against him for a minute, and his arms never loosened. Finally, he murmured, “Baby, please tell me what’s wrong.”

He’d called her “baby” last night in bed. It had felt so intimate, so possessive. It sounded that way now too, although with an entirely different resonance.

Sniffing and trying to compose herself, she pulled her face out of his shirt. There was a damp spot on the fabric now from where she’d been crying. “I’m fine. It’s really not a big deal. I was just overly emotional or something, and I overreacted.”

“Overreacted to what?” Paul asked, an edge to his voice she rarely heard. “Did someone do something to you?”

“No,” she assured him, “Everyone has been really nice. It’s just…” She trailed off, self-conscious about admitting what had so upset her. She was still way too hot, even in the cool air, and now she was also feeling weak and kind of dizzy from the overload of emotion.

“It’s just what?”

Emily sighed resignedly and gave up, since Paul wasn't likely to let this go. “I was just talking to Laura, and it brought up some of my old issues. You know, I always saw her as the girl all the guys wanted, the girl I could never be.”

Paul’s eyes narrowed, and she felt his body stiffen slightly. “So you were feeling insecure?”

“Yeah. Everyone was into her. You were into her too, right?” She felt another hot flash and dropped her eyes.

Paul’s body stiffened even more. “You were feeling insecure about me?”

She couldn’t meet his gaze. “It wasn’t that I thought you would do anything. I know you wouldn’t. It was just…it was a lot like at that restaurant in New York. Only worse, because it was with Laura. I told you it wasn’t anything serious. It just got me going, for some reason.”

Paul tilted her chin up so she would have to look at him. “Emily, you can’t seriously think I’m interested in Laura.”

She sniffed. “I know you wouldn’t do anything.”

“I wouldn’t want to do anything.” Paul sounded indignant, almost angry. “How could you even think such a thing, especially after last night?”

Emily felt like squirming. “Well, I know under normal circumstances you never would be with me, so why shouldn’t I think you might prefer to be with someone else?”

“Emily!” he choked.

She was starting to feel a little guilty at her assumptions, since Paul seemed so absolutely outraged by the idea. It was also very comforting, that he was so offended at the thought that he might be yearning for someone else while he was married to her.

Feeling like she needed to explain herself a little more, she said, “I know we—our marriage—we’re temporary. It’s always been that way. So I know you’ll want to and need to move on with your life after I…after I’m gone. I know I have no right to be bothered by it, but it does bother me to think that you’d rather be with someone else when you’re with me.” She rubbed her face. “It’s such a strange situation to be in, knowing I’m going to die. So it messes up my normal emotions. I’m not usually this weepy. At least, I don’t think I am. I’m sorry if I wasn’t fair to you.”

“Emily, there’s no one else I’d rather be with.”

The ache in her heart suddenly burst into flutters. “Really?” she breathed, gazing up at him.

“That's the truth.” His eyes were intense, almost hungry, and she had no way of understanding what the expression meant.

“Oh. Good.” She swallowed hard. “Me either. I mean, there’s no one else I’d rather be with than you.”

Paul pulled her into a hug so tight he almost cracked her ribs. “Good,” he replied, the one word muffled by her hair.

When they pulled away, Emily felt relieved, happy, and kind of embarrassed by her overreaction. In an attempt to move on, she asked, “So has the evening been too bad for you?”

“No. It’s been fine.”

She peered up at his face. “Are you sure? Were the Masons’ nice enough to you?”

“Yes. They were fine.”

She wasn’t sure if he was speaking the truth, since he looked a little guarded at the question. He obviously didn’t want to talk about it, and it probably wasn’t the best time anyway.

They went back into the house, and the heat inside swallowed Emily up. She really wanted to go home. Now that the emotion was resolved, she felt shaky and totally drained. It would be rude to leave the party early, though, since the Masons’ had planned it just for her.

She told Paul she needed to go to the bathroom, and while she was there she splashed some water onto her face to cool down and revive herself. They only needed to stay another hour, and then they could go home.

When she returned to the living room, she saw first thing that Paul was talking to Mrs. Mason across the room. He was smiling, and it seemed to be sincerely, and Emily was glad to see it.

Laura came over to ask if she was all right. She thought maybe Emily had been upset by what she’d said earlier.

Emily had absolutely no energy for such a conversation. She tried to assure Laura she was fine, but she was having trouble putting together an articulate sentence of more than a few words.

She couldn’t figure out what was wrong with her. Maybe the emotion had taken more out of her than she’d realized. Maybe she was just tired from a long day. Maybe it was just too hot in the room. She felt flushed, she was sweating a little, and she felt like she was swaying on her feet.

Laura was expecting her to respond to something she'd said, but Emily couldn’t even remember what had been said.

She took a few deep breaths and suddenly realized she needed to sit down. Her knees felt like they were going to buckle. Her vision blurred over and then darkened. She swayed forward. Would have fallen had strong arms not caught her around the waist.

Emily leaned against Paul, who must have pushed people out of the way to get to her so quickly. He put a hand on her forehead, then on her cheek, then back on her forehead. “Oh baby,” he murmured. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

She blinked up at him blankly, having no idea what he was talking about. “Is something wrong with me?” she asked, wondering why she couldn’t seem to stand up without Paul’s support.

“You’ll be all right.” Paul turned to Mrs. Mason, who must have followed him across the room. “We need to get home.”

Mrs. Mason nodded, her eyes full of sympathy and understanding. "She can lie down here if she needs to."

But Emily tried to pull away. “We can’t leave. The party’s not over yet.”

“You have a fever. I don't know how it spiked so quickly.” Paul stroked her hair back from her face. His other arm was still around her waist. “Thanks for offer," he said to Mrs. Mason. "But I need to get her home.”

“Oh, no,” Emily mumbled, realizing that feverish was exactly how she was feeling. A surge of dread and disappointment overwhelmed her.

She really didn’t want to have another fever. She’d been hoping to have sex with Paul again when they got home, but obviously that wasn’t going to happen now.

Now everyone at the party was looking at her like she was a freak, like she was an object of pity, like she was on death’s door.

All of which might be true.

She knew she said goodbye to people and thanked the Masons’ for their hospitality, but she couldn’t really remember any of the conversations.

Then they were walking to the waiting car—or Paul was walking and Emily was stumbling along, leaning on him.

They must have gotten home, but Emily had no memory of it.

***

Emily’s body ached, and she felt like she was trying to break through a thick fog of heat and pain as she fought to open her eyes.

Before she could do so, she felt something cool and wet stroke her face. “Paul,” she breathed weakly. She wasn’t anywhere close to thinking coherently, but she somehow associated the sensation of relief with that name.

She managed to force her eyes open, fuzzily expecting to see a handsome, familiar face and deep gray eyes.

Instead, she saw a woman with a plain, square face and brown hair pulled back in a single braid. “Sorry,” the woman said with a quick flicker of her lips. “Just me.”

Amy. Emily managed to connect a name with the face. “Hi, Amy,” she croaked, aware enough now to realize that it would be rude to express brutal disappointment over the fact that her nurse was tending her rather than her husband. “How are you?”

“I’m doing just fine—thanks for asking.” She wiped the damp cloth over Emily’s face again and added, “He’s sleeping, but he said he was to be woken up if you need him. Would you like me to get him?”

Emily shook her head, wishing it didn’t ache so much, wishing she wasn’t so feeble. Now that she was awake, she felt absolutely miserable. “He should sleep.”

She had no idea what day or time it was, but she was certain Paul needed rest.

She shifted in the bed, which she discovered was the big four-poster bed in the master bedroom of Paul’s house in the neighborhood. The covers were pushed down to her knees, something she’d probably done in her sleep. Since Amy was cooling her off, Emily felt a little chilled, so she reached down to pull the covers up again.

She was wearing boxer shorts and a tank-top that she had no recollection of putting on. Her hair was pulled into two, low ponytails, but she didn’t know how it had gotten that way.

The clock on the bedside table said it was 6:05 in the morning. Then the memory of the previous evening—the Masons, Laura, getting struck by a sudden fever—came rushing back into her mind.

She groaned, as the full consciousness of what was going on made her body ache even more.

“It’s time for some pills,” Amy said briskly. “They should help you feel better.”

Willing to do anything that might make her feel better, even raise her pounding head, Emily let Amy help her up enough to swallow some pills with cool water.

“When did you get here?” she asked, after she was able to drop her head again.

“An hour or two ago. Your husband didn’t think you were fit to travel back downtown—which was absolutely right—so he called to see if I could come out here instead.”

Emily stirred restlessly under the covers, hoping the pills would take effect soon. She didn’t really want to make conversation, but it was only polite to try. “It was nice of you to come all this way.”

“It wasn’t so far. Your husband even offered to send a car. I guess you all had a bad experience with that other nurse the agency sent, and he didn’t want to risk a stranger.”

Swallowing back another groan at that memory, Emily managed to say, “I’m glad you came.” A wave of heat washed over her, and she pushed down the covers again impatiently. Then she realized that she was in Paul’s bed, in Paul’s room. “Where’s he sleeping?” she asked, without any segue.

“In one of the guest rooms. He’d stayed up with you until I arrived, and he looked totally beat.”

Emily’s eyes strayed over to the door of the bedroom, vaguely hoping to see Paul there. She felt strange and disconnected—in the house that didn’t feel like home the way the apartment did—and she wanted to make sure he was all right.

She just wanted to see him.

“I can wake him up,” Amy said mildly, evidently catching her gaze and interpreting it correctly. She’d picked up the thermometer from the bedside table and reached over to take Emily’s temperature. “He said I could wake him up for any reason.”

Emily shook her head. She wasn’t needy enough to allow Paul to be woken up just because she missed him.

“Your fever is starting to go up,” Amy said. “Do you feel up to taking a bath? I’d like to keep your temperature down as much as we can.”

Emily didn’t want to get out of bed. She didn’t want to take her clothes off. But she was also feeling so sickeningly hot that she couldn’t stop wriggling. So she said, “Okay.”

* * *

Emily was so hot it felt like she was smothering, like she couldn't suck any air down her lungs.

With a surge of panic, she arched up and cried out instinctively for help. “Paul! Paul!” It felt like she was screaming it, but her mouth and throat were too parched to generate more than a broken gasp.

Then wet coolness was being wiped over her face, and she took a shuddering breath of relief. Then there was water at her lips, and she gulped it down desperately. More coolness. More water.

Then she was finally able to relax back onto her pillow. “Paul,” she breathed hoarsely.

When she opened her eyes, she fully expected to see her husband leaning over the bed, cooling her down. She saw Amy instead.

In spite of all the other aches in her body, she still felt a sharp pang of pain in her chest as she wondered why Paul wasn’t here when she needed him.

Amy pulled back the wet cloth she’d been wiping Emily’s face and neck with. “If you’re all right for the moment, I’ll run get him for you.”

Emily was aware enough now to think coherently, and she managed to shake her head, despite how much she wanted Amy to do exactly what she’d offered. “No. Don’t. I’m fine.”

“He’s just down the hall in the library. It won’t take a minute.”

Emily just shook her head again.

Amy soaked the wash cloth in the bowl of ice water on the table beside the bed and wrung it out with professional efficiency. “Are you sure? He said I was to get him immediately if you needed him.”

“I don’t need him.” Emily desperately wanted to see him but also desperately didn’t want to be any more of a burden on him than she already was. “He needs to catch up on work.”

Amy’s brown eyes were uncharacteristically gentle. “I don’t know how much work he’s actually getting done today. He’s really worried about you.”

Emily’s face twisted with emotion, and she writhed on the bed.

“He was in to check on you a little while ago,” Amy added.

It seemed unfair that she kept missing his visits. It felt like she hadn’t seen him in ages. “I didn’t know he was here.”

“You were asleep. It’s the medication—makes you druggy. But that’s got to be better than being wide awake and miserable.”

Emily nodded, tossing her head on the pillow. It was much better this time, with consistent doses of the good medicine Dr. Franklin had prescribed to her during her last fever, but she hated feeling so out of it. And she hated not being aware of Paul at the few times he was with her.

“Are you up for another bath?” Amy asked, putting down the wash cloth and straightening up. “Your fever spikes in the afternoon, and I don’t want it to get any higher.”

Emily didn’t feel up for anything, but she let Amy help her sit up on the side of the bed. She breathed deeply to fight the waves of dizziness.

When Amy returned from the bathroom, where she must have been drawing the bath, Emily said, “At least I haven’t been delirious yet.” She tried to be grateful for whatever she could so she wouldn’t feel sorry for herself.

When Amy just helped her to her feet and didn’t answer, Emily asked, “I haven’t, have I?”

“No. You’ve talked in your sleep some, but that’s normal. You haven’t been truly delirious.”

Emily limped through the large bedroom, leaning heavily on Amy. When she got into the bathroom, she was greeted to the soothing scent of lemon and eucalyptus. That bath was still running, and the large tub was half filled. “I talked in my sleep?” she asked, feeling a stab of anxiety. “What did I talk about?”

Amy tsked her tongue and helped Emily pull off her tank-top and shorts. “Now don’t be worrying about that. I’ve learned to not even pay attention in such cases, since it’s just a lot of disconnected words and thoughts.”

“Was I talking when Paul was in here before?” Emily asked, realizing she sounded almost childish but absolutely incapable of doing otherwise. The idea of babbling out her private thoughts in Paul’s presence was mortifying. Waves of heat slammed into her, and she wasn’t sure if it was the fever or embarrassment. “What was I saying?”

Assisting Emily as she lowered herself into the tepid bath, Amy started to say something, which Emily guessed was another attempt to brush off the subject. But maybe the nurse could tell that it was going to fester in Emily’s mind if she didn’t answer the question, because she paused, restarted, and said, “You were talking about camping and Anne of Green Gables.”

That didn’t sound too terrible, and Emily was able to relax as she stretched out in the tub, the water blissfully cool against her hot skin. She breathed deeply and closed her eyes.

When she’d determined that Emily was all right, Amy left the bathroom and went into the bedroom, probably to straighten up the room and remake the bed, which she usually did while Emily was in the bath.

As Emily’s body cooled down, it also started to ache more. She tried not to think about feeling this way for three more months.

Feeling even worse.

Until she finally died.

She didn’t want to do it.

She just didn’t want to do it.

She wanted Paul, and he wasn’t here.

A few tears slipped out of her eyes, and she brushed them away impatiently. Being sick was definitely making her emotionally unstable. She’d cried more in the last month than she had her entire life. She took a shaky breath and tried to control herself.

Emily gasped in surprise when Amy’s voice broke into the silence. The nurse must have come back in to check on her, since she was standing in the bathroom doorway now. She must have seen Emily crying.

“Let me get your husband for you.”

Fighting the impulse to accept the offer, since it was exactly what she wanted, Emily shook her head. “I’m really fine. This has been hard on him. He shouldn’t have to help me all the time.”

Amy was silent for several moments. Then she said in a voice that was matter-of-fact, almost bland. “I’ve been doing this a long time. And, in my experience, it’s easier for someone who loves you to be able to help—in any way they can—than to sit around and do nothing.”

Emily didn’t correct the other woman’s assumption. She didn’t have the energy to explain that Paul didn’t really love her. She kind of liked the way it sounded anyway.

She shook her head again, shifting her position and making the bathwater ripple. “Please don’t get him,” she mumbled.

“Okay. It’s your choice.”

* * *

Emily spent the afternoon in a groggy, uncomfortable haze—sometimes dozing off and sometimes just tossing restlessly on the bed. Her fever didn’t spike so high she became delirious, though.

She hadn’t seen Paul all day, not since the previous evening at the Masons’ party. If he occasionally came to look in on her, it was when she was asleep. Somehow his absence made everything worse.

Slowly waking up again, out of a restless, feverish sleep, she felt a cool cloth on her face. “Paul,” she gasped instinctively, although she was becoming lucid enough to realize her caretaker was almost certainly Amy.

“I’m here, baby,” a familiar, male voice broke through the heated darkness. “I’m here.”

Emily’s eyes flew open and she saw him, leaning over her. She saw his face, his rumpled dark hair, his eyes. She gave a silly little sob of relief.

Paul’s face twisted briefly, but his voice was mild when he said, “It’s not quite time for more medication yet. Can I get you anything else?”

She shook her head, realizing he must have misinterpreted her sob. “I’m okay.” She looked around the room and realized it was otherwise empty. “Where’s Amy?”

“She’s getting some rest.” He stroked the cool cloth gently over her face again, dampening her hairline and then sliding it down to her neck.

“Oh.” She tried to think clearly, but she couldn’t do so. She stared at the bedside clock, and it took a long time for her to register that it was almost eight in the evening. “Did you get a lot of work done today?”

“Not very much.”

“Oh.” She experienced another hot wave of achiness and twisted on the bed, desperately trying to find a cool spot and get comfortable. When she was able to speak again, she mumbled, “Maybe you should go back to the apartment so you can focus better. I’m fine here with Amy.”

There was a long silence, during which Emily earnestly but futilely tried to adjust her covers so she wouldn’t somehow be both hot and cold at once.

Then Paul replied, “I will take that suggestion as a symptom of fevered delirium and thus won’t be offended by it.”

Emily sucked in a surprised breath and tried to focus up at his face. While his voice had been very dry, his expression did look a little stiff. “Sorry,” she muttered, guilt doing nothing to ease her physical condition. “I just hate for you to have to deal with all this.”

“You need to stop worrying about me.”

“I do worry about you.” She squirmed some more and tried to shake her sheets into feeling better against her skin. It didn’t work. They were hot, slightly damp from her perspiration, and smelled like sickness. She gave a little whimper of frustration.

“Amy said you could have another bath if you wanted one,” Paul told her, standing up and looking down at her. “And I can make the bed up with clean sheets while you’re in there. Does that sound all right?”

“Yes, please,” Emily rasped, desperately wanting to get out of the icky bed. Acting on instinct, she reached her arms up toward Paul, so he could help her get to her feet.

He reached down for her and eased her up, but his face twitched slightly with what looked like amusement. Emily had no idea what would be funny.

“Are you laughing at my hair?” she asked, a little dazedly, as she leaned against Paul and tried to get her balance. Her legs felt ridiculously weak.

 “How could you possibly think I would laugh at your hair when you’ve been so sick?”

“Oh.” She clung to his gray t-shirt and looked up at his face. She was too groggy to effectively read his expression. “Why were you laughing at me then?”

“I wasn’t laughing at you.”

She wasn’t sure she believed him. She was too ill to pursue the matter, though, so she let him help her into the bathroom.

When she got there and stared down at the empty bathtub, she was suddenly stumped. “Oh.”

“I didn’t have a chance to get the bath ready,” Paul explained, leaning down to turn on the faucet and check the temperature of the water. When the water was the temperature he wanted, he pulled the tub stop and took a couple of small bottles from a shelf. He poured in a few drops of each. Then he turned back to Emily, who was still staring at the puzzlingly empty tub. “It will just be a minute before it fills up.”

“Oh.” She blinked up at him. “That’s why you were laughing at me.”

“I told you I wasn’t laughing at you,” he said with a smile that was almost fond.

“Liar.” She wasn’t insulted. In fact, his expression was intimate in a way she liked. She was hot and shaky, though, and she desperately wanted to get into the bath. She should never have gotten out of bed until it was ready.

Paul had leaned over to feel the water in the tub again. Evidently satisfied with the temperature, he straightened up. He looked at Emily for a moment, and then he sat down in the white accent chair that had seemed to her completely useless when she first saw its position in the bathroom.

“Come here,” he murmured, reaching an arm out toward her.

Emily was far too hot and sticky to feel like cuddling, but she let him draw her onto his lap anyway. She didn’t have the strength to keep standing, and she didn’t want to sit in only an inch of water in the tub.

Paul was hot—way too hot—but she liked the way his arms wrapped around her tightly, and she liked the inexplicable tension she could feel in his body as he held her.

She buried her face in his soft shirt and felt like she was falling apart, felt like he was barely holding her together.

When the tub filled most of the way up, she pulled away from him. He exuded too much heat—it was making her too hot. And the churning emotion she sensed in him was making her confused and shaky.

The bath was cool and mild and peaceful, and Paul was none of those things.

* * *

She was ice-skating on fire.

The whole rink was on fire, and she kept falling down, the ice burning her as much as the flames were.

She struggled to pull herself up, but every time she did her ankles or knees would buckle again. Over and over again.

Paul was skating too, except he was on the opposite side of the rink. He skated like a professional, doing turns and jumps and even a couple of spins. She called out to him frantically to help her. She was burning alive and needed his help.

But he was too far away or too focused on his skating. He didn’t hear her. He didn’t save her.

She kept falling, kept burning, kept struggling to get off the smoldering ice. Until she made it to the edge of the rink and stumbled off.

But she stumbled off into nothing.

She was falling, kept falling, helplessly falling through the air into a vast, blue emptiness.

She was skydiving, but her parachute was burned away. And she was on fire, falling at a sickening speed, all by herself. Her heart pounded, and panic surged through her scorching body.

She was falling like Lucifer in a ball of white-hot fire, with only hell waiting at the end of the drop.

She screamed for help, and then she saw Paul. He was skydiving too, but he still had a parachute. He was good at this. He could catch up with her, grab her, save her. She cried out to him for help, over and over again.

He could hear her. He had to hear her. But he didn’t respond. He pulled the cord to his parachute and surged upwards as it deployed.

She kept falling. Far away from him.

She should have died when she hit the ground, but she didn’t. She landed in a lake. But the lake suddenly erupted in fire, and she was trying to swim through it naked.

She didn’t want to skinny-dip in a lake of fire, and she flailed her arms and legs desperately, trying to get herself out.

Through the smoke and flames, she saw that Paul was standing on the shore. But his back was to her, since he didn’t want to see her naked body.

She shrieked for him to save her, but he never even turned around.

And then the lake turned into her old house. And it was hell. Scorching, sulphurous, pitch black despite the fire.

She was burning alive, and she saw her father in the flames too, much farther into the depths of the house than she was.

She cried out to him to come back to her, not to leave her alone.

Then she saw Paul behind her, near the entrance.

She sobbed for him to help her, to please help her and her father. But Paul wouldn’t dare step into hell. Not for her.

Demons came to drag her farther in, and she fought them off as hard as she could. She needed to get to Paul. She needed to get to her father.

And she couldn’t seem to reach either one of them.

Then the demons dragged her down into a molten lake, and she screamed. She screamed. She screamed because she knew this was finally going to kill her.

But the lake was cool. Somehow, it was cool, and she sobbed. She sobbed. She sobbed with relief.

“Daddy,” Emily gurgled, breaking out of her delirium so suddenly it felt like the world had ripped into pieces. “Daddy, help me!”

“Emily,” someone said. It was Paul, she realized, not her daddy. “It’s okay. It’s okay.”

She was sobbing, she realized. Genuinely sobbing. It hadn’t just been a dream. She was in the bathtub, and Paul was basically in it with her, his arms wrapped around her tightly to control her writhing. “Paul!” she choked, overwhelmed with relief and gratitude that she was alive and Paul was here.

And broken again at the realization that her father had been dead for two years.

She clung to Paul blindly, trying to climb out of the water so she could get even closer to him. “Paul,” she gasped, incapable of saying any other word.

He held her so tightly she couldn’t breathe, and he buried his face in her wet hair. “I’ve got you, baby,” he rasped, as if his voice was too strained to use. “I’ve got you.”

It wasn’t until Amy spoke that Emily realized she and Paul weren’t alone. “I think her fever has finally broken,” the nurse said with a calm, matter-of-fact tone that was like a balm on all the frantic urgency. “If you’re able, Mr. Marino, it might be a good idea to dry her off and get her back to bed. We don’t want her to get chilled.”

Emily was wet and naked, and Paul was just as wet, although he still had on his clothes.

She realized that Amy must be right. Her body wasn’t aching the way it had been. She wasn’t scorching with heat. She was actually a little chilly in the cool of the room. She couldn’t seem to let Paul go, though—not even to dry off and get back under the covers.

Since she wouldn’t let go of him, Paul ended up carrying her back into the bedroom. He released her just long enough to help her into the clean pajamas that Amy had retrieved. Then he pulled off his soaked t-shirt. His trousers were damp too, but Emily didn’t care.

She huddled against his warm, hard body, dragging him into the bed with her. Her teeth were starting to chatter, but she nestled against his heat. He pulled the covers up over both of them.

He held her just as tightly as she wanted, and he was still holding her a few minutes later when she fell into an exhausted sleep.

* * *

Things had changed when she woke up. She could see from the edges of the window coverings that it was nighttime. The sheets on the bed seemed to have been changed again, since they were clean, crisp, and cool. Her body felt weak and drained but blissfully without heat or pain. And Paul had changed clothes—he was now wearing a t-shirt and pajama pants.

He was also sound asleep.

But he was still holding her against him, her body pressed up against his side and her cheek pressing against his chest.

She felt absolutely wonderful, exulting in the relief from fever, achiness, and delirium. Something was deliciously satisfying about the way Paul was asleep beside her—that he’d lowered his guard, relaxed, let go.

But she was curious enough to make the effort to raise her head and look at the clock.

It was just after three-thirty in the morning. She had no idea what day it was.

Her slight stirring must have woken Paul. He shifted beside her and, when she looked down, his eyes were opened.

“Are you all right?” he asked thickly, his eyes still groggy from sleep.

“Yeah,” she murmured with a tender smile, emotion rising up without restraint in her chest. “I’m better.”

He returned her smile and pulled her into a soft hug, and she adjusted until she was comfortable in his arms.

“How long was I sick?” she mumbled.

“Two days.”

“Oh. It felt like longer.”

“Tell me about it.”

Something about the dryness in his voice touched her, and she squeezed him hard with a sudden overflow of feeling.

“So we can still go camping?”

“Of course. You can take it easy today and, if you’re recovered, we’ll leave tomorrow.”

She let out a sigh. “Sounds good. Didn’t want to waste all my wonderful birthday presents.”

Paul gave a huff of soft laughter.

She settled against him happily, looking forward to going to sleep again.

It wasn't long before she did.

* * *

Paul was in a really bad mood.

Emily had never seen him in this kind of mood before. He’d been angry with her. He’d been withdrawn. He’d been frustrated and impatient. But she’d never seen him just generally grumpy for no apparent reason.

The closest she’d seen him like this was that day in Egypt when he’d been annoyed by their guide, Akil, and then she’d gotten into a fight with him over leaving the sights early. His mood then, however, had clearly been prompted by a specific situation—no matter how irrational his response to it was.

But there was no explaining what was wrong with him today.

He was just in a bad mood.

They were flying to Prince Edward Island for their camping trip, and Emily had woken up cheerful and excited. Paul had been quiet over breakfast, but she hadn’t let it worry her. He’d been as considerate with her as normal as they'd gotten ready to leave for the airport.

But things had started to go wrong when they’d been about to take off in the private jet he’d chartered—a ridiculous expense, but he said all the commercial flights were too long and roundabout. Their takeoff was delayed because of severe weather in the area. While Emily was anxious to get to PEI, and delays at airports were always frustrating, she wasn't too worried about it. It wasn’t like she was squeezed into a coach seat on a hot, crowded airplane for hours. She could stretch out and read Shakespeare. Waiting an extra hour or two just wasn't that big a deal.

Paul had not been pleased, though, and his displeasure had been evident to everyone around him, including the airport manager who ended up apologizing to Paul more than once for a weather situation he had no control over.

Emily had tried to get Paul to drink his mimosa, telling him he needed more vitamin C but mostly just hoping a little champagne would take the edge off his mood. He’d eyed her with cool impatience and obediently drunk the flute of mimosa in four gulps.

His mood hadn’t improved.

Emily quickly grew annoyed, but she didn’t reproach him. Not until he snapped at the young woman serving them on the plane. Emily asked for no zucchini in her vegetable and cheese omelet, but it arrived with zucchini in it. She didn’t think it was a problem, and she just started to pull out some of the unwanted zucchini and eat the rest of the very tasty omelet in perfect contentment.

But Paul called the server over and made Emily give the woman the plate back until they could get the order right. Emily had never seen him be anything but perfectly polite to service workers, and even now he didn't say anything directly rude or offensive. But his manner was brusque, and his tone was very, very curt.

The young woman serving them was clearly upset by Paul’s terseness. Emily could see it in the woman's face as she returned the omelet to the back of the plane. So Emily made a perfectly reasonable comment to him about how he didn’t have to take out his bad mood on the people around him.

They got into a long, heated argument. Over absolutely nothing. Finally Emily was so frustrated and indignant that she’d just given up. The jet was able to take off at last, so she read Shakespeare for most of the trip while Paul made calls and worked on email.

She listened to him get in arguments with four different people on the phone, over various issues connected to his work that weren’t going the way he wanted them to go. From what she could tell from overhearing only one side of the conversations, none of the issues seemed all that important, but Paul definitely acted like they were.

By the time they landed at the Charlottetown Airport on PEI, Emily had absolutely no patience left with her husband. Because of the way the day had gone so far, she wasn’t at all surprised that there was a hold-up as they tried to get through customs. It wasn’t long, but it was enough for Paul to speak sharply to several more people.

She was actually a little embarrassed. He never raised his voice, and the words he said were always basically civil, but his tone and his expression made it clear he was displeased with everyone he encountered. Because they’d arrived on a private jet, airport employees were going out of their way to accommodate him and so were flustered when he was so obviously unhappy with them. Emily tried to smile sympathetically and speak kindly to whomever he was terse with, thanking them for everything they did to help.

She didn’t try to talk to Paul. Obviously, any attempt at friendly conversation would be futile.

When they’d gotten off the plane, Paul had tried to get her to put her leather satchel on the baggage cart with the rest of their luggage for the porter to wheel to the car. She’d refused, ostensibly because she’d wanted to have her laptop and Shakespeare with her for the car ride to the north of the island but mostly because he’d been so bossy about ordering her to give it up.

Now she was regretting her stubbornness, though. Her bag was really heavy with the laptop, Paul’s old hardback edition of Shakespeare, and several other potentially useful items she’d tucked away in it. Although the airport wasn’t large, they did have to walk a bit to get from their gate to where the car was going to pick them up.

She didn’t complain though, since she’d been the one who insisted on carrying the satchel.

If Paul was just walking at a normal speed, it wouldn’t matter. He was moving through the airport with long, impatient strides, however, and Emily could barely keep up.

Eventually, she stopped trying. She was out of breath. Her satchel was too heavy. There was no reason they needed to hurry. And Paul was infuriatingly grumpy.

She wasn’t going to run to keep up with him.

When he noticed she was no longer beside him, Paul turned around and walked back toward her.

She glared at him, but he just ignored it. Without speaking, he reached over and lifted the strap of her satchel off her shoulder and moved it onto his.

Then he just started walking again.

Emily stared in outraged astonishment at his lean back and long legs in his expensive clothes.

Why the hell had she ever thought it was a good idea to get married to such a presumptuous, bad-tempered man?

She was tempted to just sit down on the floor of the airport in well-deserved retaliation. She didn’t though, since it was a rather childish impulse. She walked after him, not trying very hard to catch up. As it happened, she did catch up because Paul had simply stopped in the middle of the hall, evidently waiting for her.

She hoped his waiting was a sign of remorse at his gruff mood, but he didn’t say anything when she fell into step with him. She didn’t say anything either, mostly because she didn’t trust herself to speak without biting his obnoxious head off.

They eventually made it to the hired car waiting for them, and Paul returned her satchel after they’d both climbed into the plush back seat.

Paul’s phone rang then, and Emily listened to him have a brief conversation with someone who had evidently called to tell him that a project he was working on was put on hold indefinitely.

When Paul hung up the phone, Emily slanted him a look of annoyed impatience.

“What?” he demanded, catching her expression.

She rolled her eyes and looked away, determined not to get into another argument with him, since nothing could be resolved until he was out of this mood.

“If you have something to say,” Paul said in a clipped tone, “then just say it.”

“If I have something to say!” she repeated in outrage, her patience snapping like a twig. “What the hell is wrong with you today?”

“Nothing is wrong with me. There have been a number of frustrations—”

“That’s ridiculous!” she interrupted. “You’re acting like people have engineered all these things on purpose to spite you. I don’t care if you’re in a bad mood. You can’t take it out on everyone around you. You’re acting like the world is out to get you today. I'm telling you it’s not!”

He gave a long-suffering sigh. “I do not think the world is out to get me. I’ve had a lot on my mind today, and things aren’t going smoothly, but there’s no reason for you to overreact just because I expect a certain level of service and—”

“A certain level of service? People are running in circles trying to accommodate you, and you’re treating them all like crap. I’m sorry if things have frustrated you today. I’m sorry if thunderstorms and computer problems and legal contracts signed years ago have all conspired to give you a very bad day. But you can’t do anything about them! It’s all out of your control. It’s out of your control! Why the hell are you getting so uptight about little things you can’t do anything about?”

Paul lips tightened ominously, but he just looked away from her, gazed out the window of the now-moving car.

She breathed raggedly and stared at his impassive profile. For no good reason, she suddenly recognized that he didn’t just look tense and grumpy.

He looked wounded somehow.

“Paul,” she began again, her voice softer and broken by a surge of concern. “Paul, what’s going on? Has something happened?” She wanted to scoot over and hug him, to press herself against him in some sort of comfort. But he was too stiff and standoffish, and she was sure her advances wouldn’t be welcome.

“Nothing has happened,” he said coolly, looking back at her with eyes that now gave nothing away.

“Then why are you in this mood? It’s not like you at all.”

“Can we just drop it?”

She flinched slightly at his clipped tone and withdrew immediately. She pulled her Shakespeare out of her satchel and opened it up to the Merry Wives of Windsor. She pretended to read.

* * *

Emily woke up in a comfortable bed in a picturesque room at an inn near the Prince Edward Island National Park on the north coast of PEI. Paul had gotten them a suite for the three days they’d be camping, just in case Emily got sick or decided she’d rather have a real bed and bathroom.

Emily wasn’t planning to use it, since she was determined to go through with their camping plans, but she hadn’t objected when Paul suggested they spend the afternoon in the suite so they could comfortably shower after traveling, she could rest, and he could get a little work done before they went to the campsite.

She had taken a long bath in a lovely, claw-foot tub and then had taken a two-hour nap. She was tired from the frustrating morning and still kind of worn from her latest bout of fever, and she’d slept harder than she usually did in the middle of the day.

When she woke up, she felt comfortable and drowsy. She glanced over at the clock and saw it was already four-thirty in the afternoon. They would have to get moving soon if they were going to get to the campsite and set everything up before dinner.

Reluctantly, she rolled out of bed, glancing idly in the mirror and disturbed by the sight of her tangled hair and sleep-flushed face. It was much cooler here than it had been in Philadelphia, so she’d put on an oversized sweatshirt after she’d gotten out of the shower, and it didn’t do anything to flatter her figure.

She tried to smooth her hair down, and then she wondered what Paul was doing. Maybe he was finally out of his bad mood.

With this hope, she got up and padded across the room wearing socks but no shoes. She opened the bedroom door and looked out into the main living area of the suite.

Paul was there, standing with his back toward her, looking out the window at the view of the coastline. He was holding his phone to his ear with one hand and combing his fingers through his hair in evident frustration with the other.

“No,” he gritted out to whomever he was speaking to. “That’s not good enough. I’ve told you for weeks now we’re on a very limited timeline, and I’m expecting real results.”

He sounded urgent, almost angry. Much more tense than with anyone else he’d talked to all day.

After the other person replied, Paul continued, “I don’t want to hear excuses. You told me the resources you would need to make this happen, and I’ve provided everything you requested. This is the most important thing on my radar. Do you understand? The most important thing. You can’t possibly think I’ll accept ‘we’re trying our best’ as an acceptable report.”

Emily had stepped out into the living area, but now she froze. She had no idea what Paul was talking about. She’d had no idea he was working on a project that was evidently so important to him.

She had no idea what it might be.

It bothered her that he had something going on in his life—something so important to him—that she was absolutely ignorant about.

After a long pause, Paul made a rough sound of frustration. “That’s not good enough. It is not beyond your control when I’m willing to provide you with whatever you need to control it. Listen to me. You will make this happen.”

Emily’s heart pounded frantically, and she wasn’t even sure why. This project—whatever it was—was ripping Paul apart. She could hear it in his voice, see it in the tense line of his neck and back.

“Fine,” he said, after the other person evidently told him something more acceptable.  “A week from today I’ll be expecting to see some legitimate progress.”

He disconnected the call and kept staring out at the scenic view of the coastline and the blue-gray waves of the Gulf of St. Lawrence. She saw him take a long, shuddering breath, as if he were trying desperately to rein something in.

Her heart went out to him, no matter how grumpy and unreasonable he’d been today.

“What’s wrong?” she asked, moving over to him with an instinctive need to comfort.

Paul jerked visibly and whirled around to give her a cold glare. “Damn it, Emily. Tell me you’re there next time.”

She ignored the complaint and reached up to put a hand on his shoulder. “Paul, please tell me what’s wrong.”

He gave a tight shake of his head and looked away from her, back out to the view from the window.

She slid her hand up to his face and made him look back down at her. “Paul, please.”

Something softened in his eyes. She saw it, but he was still holding his body far too tensely. “It’s nothing you need to worry about.”

“But I do worry about it,” she insisted. “If it’s bothering you this much, then I do worry about it. Why can’t you tell me what it is?”

Paul took another slow, ragged breath. His eyes devoured her urgently, but his features were painfully impassive and his voice was strained as he spoke. “It’s just a project I’m working on. A project that I’m…I’m very invested in. I was really hoping there would be progress by now, but there’s…there’s just not.”

“I’m sorry. What’s the project?” she asked, gratified that he’d told her at least that much but really wanting to know more. Anything so important to Paul was necessarily important to her too.

He opened his mouth, as if he would tell her. Then he closed it again. He cut his eyes away from her face. “It’s complicated. And I can’t really go into it.”

“Okay.” She swallowed over her disappointment because he was obviously still so upset. “Can I help at all?”

He shook his head, and his features relaxed into a bittersweet smile. “No. Thank you, baby.”

She released a sigh and pulled him into a soft hug, overwhelmed by the compulsion of her tender emotions and something almost like fear. She tried to process the reality of how deep and complex and conflicted and haunted a man Paul really was.

Comforting him, taking care of him, being married to a man like him would never be easy or simple. Not if she tried to do it for real. It would be hard, littered with hidden landmines she would have to learn to avoid, full of long-standing walls she would somehow need to get past.

In some ways, Paul was almost simpler when she was sick. Then he showed her nothing but care, protection, and tenderness. It was exactly what she needed from him, and it was a real part of who he was at the core.

But it wasn’t the only part. He was so much more than just that. He had so many more frightening depths and mystifying complexities.

If she’d been planning to be alive for more than a matter of weeks, if she’d been expecting to spend months, years, decades as wife to Paul Marino, she might actually be a little panicked by the prospect.

But she could do it. She was sure she could be a good wife to him—a real wife. With a little more time and experience.

Not that it really mattered. Three months wasn’t long enough to work through all the barriers Paul had erected around his so sensitive soul. She would do whatever she could to make him feel better at any given moment. She could give him what he needed for today. And that was all she would ever be allowed to do.

It took Paul a minute, but he eventually returned her hug. When did, his arms tightened around her with a surprising intensity. She hugged him more tightly too, responding to the need she felt in his body.

When he pulled away, Emily was somehow sure he’d forced himself to do so, like he wasn’t allowing himself to take what he needed.

Her heart was still pounding, and her hands shook a little as she watched him go over to sit behind the desk with a mumbled thanks.

He was going back to work. Or pretending to work. Or whatever he was doing.

But he was hurting just as much as he’d been the minute before. She was getting better at reading him, but it was still sometimes so hard to do what her intuition prompted her to do.

This time, however, the compulsion was just too strong.

So, ignoring the sharp pangs of insecurity and nervousness that needled at her, she walked over resolutely to the desk and plopped herself down on Paul's lap.

He huffed in surprise. “Emily,” he began.

She didn’t want to hear him object to her position. She was afraid it would make her feel rejected. So she wrapped her arms around his neck and hugged him like she’d been doing earlier. “Surely you don’t need to work anymore today. You were supposed to be taking the weekend off.”

Paul’s body was incredibly tense, stiff, almost awkward, but his voice was dry as he murmured, “I don’t have regular vacation time. I’m still on probation, you know.”

“You deserve a vacation anyway. You won’t be able to work when we’re camping, so you might as well stop now.”

He evidently ignored her dubious logic and relented to her attempt to comfort him because he started to adjust her on his lap, until they both were more comfortable. Then his arms went around her again, just as tightly as before.

They just held each other for a few minutes. Emily felt the heat of his body, felt the hard lines of his chest against hers, felt the tension in his muscles gradually start to relax as his uneven, ragged breathing slowed down.

Her body responded strangely as his body softened against hers. An ache of desire clenched between her legs, growing even deeper as his body relaxed even more. It was an inexplicable reaction, since there was nothing sexual or even romantic about their embrace.

But she was definitely becoming aroused from the intimacy, the closeness, the entitlement with which Paul was holding her, and she shifted restlessly in his lap in response to the throbbing at her center.

Paul’s body felt softer now, except for the tightness of his arms around her. But, as she shifted, she felt another part of his body that was no longer soft.

She moaned throatily at the way the bulge in his trousers felt against her thigh. She rubbed herself against it instinctively.

“Baby, don’t,” Paul said thickly, after his breath had hitched.

“But I want to.” She moved both hands up to tangle her fingers through his thick hair. “Paul, I want to.” They’d only had sex the one time because she’d gotten sick the following day. Since he’d claimed to enjoy it, though, she assumed it wasn’t supposed to be a one-time event.

“I know.” He eased backward in his chair, trying to withdraw from her. “But we can’t.”

She stiffened with a sharp stab of hurt and disappointment. “You really don’t want to have sex with me ag—”

“I do,” he interrupted, his body almost painfully tense again. “I promise I do. But I can’t right now. I…I just can’t.”

Since he sounded serious—and rather upset—she dropped her hands to his shoulders. She also stopped trying to rub against his erection. “Why not?”

When he glanced away without responding, her fingers tightened on his shoulders reflexively. “Paul, you have to tell me.”

“You know the mood I’ve been in today,” he explained hoarsely, his face twisting slightly as if the words resisted being spoken. “I’m still in that same mood. I can’t take you to bed when I’m like this. I couldn’t restrain myself. I might…I might hurt you.”

Emily gasped, astonished, overwhelmed, and—ludicrously—just a little bit thrilled. She took a deep breath to process what he’d said, what he’d meant. Then she said, “I don’t think you’d hurt me. I can…I can take what you give me.”

Paul closed his eyes and looked away sharply, as if he were trying to hold back some sort of ferocity, but his expression was sober when he met her eyes again. “I won’t do it. Not when I’m like this. It’s just your second time.”

She didn’t like the idea that she wasn’t up to any challenge, and she definitely didn’t like the idea that she wasn’t able to offer Paul what he needed. But part of her could realize the reasonableness of his concern. He had been incredibly gentle and patient last time, and it had still been really uncomfortable—she’d still been really sore afterwards. While she hoped it would be better the next time, her body just wasn’t accustomed to sex yet.

She drew her brows together. “You really think you’d hurt me?”

“I might,” he admitted. “In this mood, I would want to be…rough.”

She felt that hot, little thrill again at the idea of rough sex with Paul, but she smothered it because this was real life with real stakes and not some naughty fantasy. “I trust you, Paul,” she told him, with absolute honesty. “I just don’t think you’d hurt me.”

He made sound in his throat she didn’t quite understand and looked away from her again. “Thank you. But I don’t trust myself enough to risk it.”

She could tell he meant it, and it wouldn’t be fair for her to argue about it anymore or make him feel guilty. So she was disappointed but strangely touched as she climbed off his lap. “Okay. It’s really okay.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be,” she said with a genuine smile. She tried for a teasing tone to break the thick tension. “You’re going camping with me, aren’t you? I know what a sacrifice that is for you. You’ve got nothing to be sorry for.”

* * *

It poured down rain that night.

The clouds had rolled in as the day progressed, but it wasn’t raining when they got to the campsite. And it wasn't raining when they set up their tent in a beautiful private spot surrounded by trees and only a short walk from the beach.  And it was overcast but still not raining when they grilled marinated chicken breasts, corn on the cob, and peaches for dinner and watched the sun set.

Paul’s mood had improved as the day went on, and Emily enjoyed the evening very much. While they were in a national park, it felt like they were the only ones around. It was too late in the season for there to be a lot of people camping out, and the natural beauty and the privacy were tranquil.

It looked increasingly like it might rain, so they put the grill and other supplies back into the rented SUV they were driving, so they wouldn't get wet overnight. It got dark earlier than they were used to, so it was only eight o'clock when they went over to the public washroom and shower facilities to get ready for bed, since neither one of them were particularly interested in primitive camping. Emily put on a sweatshirt and flannel pajama pants to sleep in because the temperature was dropping rapidly.

It started to sprinkle on their way back, but Emily made it into their very expensive two-room tent without getting too wet. They’d set up the self-inflating air mattress made for camping and the rest of the bedding in the tent earlier, and she happily puttered around, organizing various supplies they might need during the night and zipping up one of the screened vents they'd left open earlier.

Paul, however, had stopped by the back of the SUV to grab a small cooler of bottled water, since Emily was afraid she’d get thirsty before morning.

He got caught in the sudden downpour and was drenched by the time he reached the tent.

“Damn,” he muttered, leaning over to get in through the flap and then fastening it tightly behind him. “It couldn’t have waited two more minutes?”

Emily couldn’t help but snicker, although she was sure she wouldn’t have found it funny had she been the one getting drenched. When he gave her a peeved look, she smiled at him apologetically and handed him a towel she’d had the foresight to bring into the tent earlier.

Paul wiped the water off his hair and face and then took off his soaked t-shirt so he could dry off his damp chest too.

She looked on with interest, admiring the strong, graceful muscle tone of his chest, arms, and abdomen.  It was very dark outside, and the room of the tent was lit only by the light of two lanterns. It cast odd but strangely compelling shadows on Paul's body.

When he caught her looking at him, she gave him a bright smile. “Sorry you got so wet.”

“It’s fine.” He reached over toward the stack of his neatly folded clothes in a corner of the tent. “What’s a little water?”

Emily listened to the rain pound on the tent above her as she watched Paul pull on a dry black t-shirt. “It sounds like a lot of water. I guess we’ll see how well your luxury tent holds up.”

“Your luxury tent. It was your birthday present.”

She reached over and grabbed a sweatshirt to hand to him. “You should wear this. It already feels kind of cold out, and it will just get colder with the rain.”

He took the sweatshirt and seemed to consider it. Then he shook his head. “I don’t like to sleep in long sleeves. I’ll put it on later if I’m cold.”

She started to argue, mostly because camping was her idea and she hated the thought of his getting too cold, but he was perfectly capable of deciding whether he needed a sweatshirt or not, so she bit back her automatic objection. He usually didn’t even sleep with a shirt on, so she supposed he was compromising by wearing the t-shirt. Instead, she said, “So, seriously, do you think this tent will hold up to the downpour?”

“It better. It was marketed as the best—made to use in four seasons and to withstand any sort of weather.”

He was wearing the jeans he’d had on all day because, she assumed, he hadn’t wanted to change into his pajama pants in the public restrooms like she had. He started to undo the top button of his wet pants but then glanced over at her.

She smiled again. She supposed she could have gone into the sleeping room of their tent to give him some privacy, but she didn't really want to. “I’ve seen everything you’ve got,” she teased. “Don’t be shy on account of me.” She was genuinely amused by his expression, but she was also trying to cover a little self-consciousness with irony. There was something oddly personal about watching him undress in a context that wasn't sexual.

Paul couldn’t restrain a chuckle as he shucked his wet jeans, a little awkwardly because of the space limitations in the tent and the wetness of the fabric. He didn’t take off his underwear, so she assumed they hadn’t gotten wet.

His long, masculine legs were well worth looking at as he pulled on his pajama pants.

She was sitting on a comfortable folding chair, and she accepted the bottle of water Paul offered her with thanks. She started to take a sip but gasped a little when a strong gust of wind whipped at the fabric of their tent.

“Seems to be holding up,” Paul said, pausing to observe the stability of the tent. “If it fails us, we can sleep in the back of the SUV.”

“That’s not the same. Camping should take place in a tent.”

"Then we'll have to trust the tent. Were you ready for bed, or did you want to do something?"

Emily reflected for a moment. Sex was obviously off the table because of Paul's mood that day, and she wasn't feeling particularly inclined in that direction anyway. She could read. Or she could see if Paul had any ideas for entertainment. But it was so dark it felt like it should be much later at night than it was, and she was getting tired. So she concluded, "I think I'll just go to bed."

She didn't assume that Paul had to go to bed at the same time, but she was pleased when he followed her into the second room of the tent without comment.

She looked in satisfaction at the high-quality air bed, made up temptingly with pillows, sheets, and queen-sized sleeping bag. She'd never camped very much as she was growing up, but the few times she had before had been uncomfortable in a number of ways. These sleeping arrangements didn't seem uncomfortable at all.

She crawled under the sleeping bag, and Paul got in beside her. She immediately scooted over to cuddle up against him. That was how they normally fell asleep now, and the rain and dark night made her want to snuggle even more than usual. She sighed with pleasure when he wrapped his arms around her.

“If you get too cold, we can’t stay out here. I’m not going to risk your getting sick.”

“I’m not going to get sick. I feel perfectly warm right now.” She did. Paul’s body always generated wonderful heat, and the sleeping bag was the kind that was supposed to be good for sub-zero temperatures. The tent was supposed to hold in heat too, so she figured they were protected on all fronts.

The sheets of rain pounding down on the tent were unsettling, even though the tent itself never leaked. She could smell the outdoors, the dirt, the rain, and she jerked in surprise every time a gust of wind blew violently against their tent.

“You okay?” Paul asked, after a few minutes in silence. He’d turned off the lanterns and they were surrounded now by nothing but pitch darkness.

“Yeah. It’s a little strange, since I’ve never really been a camping person, and I'm not used to it. Even in the tent, I feel a little…exposed. But it’s kind of cool really, as long as the tent doesn’t collapse.”

“If it collapses, someone is going to hear about it.”

She laughed softly at his dry voice in the darkness. "Like everyone heard it from you today?"

"Yeah," Paul muttered. He shifted slightly. "Sorry about that."

"That's okay. Everyone gets in a bad mood occasionally. Even me."

Paul's huff of amusement blew gently against her hair. "That I can believe."

She liked the fondness in his voice, even though she couldn't see his face. She burrowed against his heat, loving the feel of his lean, hard body against hers and the strength of his arms around her. She didn't even mind that he was wearing a shirt, although she liked his bare chest better.  “It actually would be kind of nice to sleep out under the stars. I think that’s what I was imagining when I wrote the list.”

“Maybe we can tomorrow night. If it’s not raining or too cold. We’ll have plenty of time to commune with nature tomorrow.”

She smiled at the thought. “I hope it doesn’t rain all day. That would suck.”

“The weather report said there were just supposed to be occasional showers this weekend.”

“Good.” She shifted against him, feeling cozy but not really sleepy. She supposed this could have been a romantic moment, cuddled up next to her husband in the middle of a rainstorm. But she didn’t have any desire to take off her clothes, and in her baggy sweatshirt and thick pajama pants, she wasn’t feeling remotely sexy.

She felt very pleasant. But not sexy.

She adjusted her position again, trying to get used to the feel of the air mattress. It really wasn’t too bad—certainly much better than sleeping directly on the ground. It wasn’t like a normal bed, though.

In the midst of her wriggling, she felt something surprising against her middle. She shifted against it again experimentally.

Paul’s breath hitched.

“Oh,” she said, surprised and oddly gratified by the feel of his obvious arousal poking into her. She couldn't understand why he'd gotten turned on, since he couldn't see her and she was wearing thick, baggy clothes, but it made her proud nonetheless. “I didn’t mean for that to happen.”

“I know you didn’t,” he said, in a slightly aggrieved voice. “But you might rethink all that squirming next time.”

“I wasn’t squirming. I was just trying to get comfortable.”

“Either way…”

Emily started to feel a little guilty, since she could now sense a visceral tension in Paul’s body, in addition to the feel of his substantial erection beneath the soft fabric of his pants. While it was nice to get an ego boost, she didn’t really want Paul to suffer. “I’m sorry. Is it really frustrating for you, since you’re in that mood and can’t do anything about it?”

There was a strangely resonant pause, broken only by the lashing of rain against their tent. Paul held himself very still as he said, “I’m not in that mood anymore. If you wanted to, we could have sex.”

“Oh.” Emily tried to peer at his face, but—even though her eyes had adjusted some to the deep darkness—it was just too dark to see anything more than the general shape of his head.

She was torn. Part of her thought it was crazy—absolutely crazy—to turn down sex when Paul was offering it. But the other part of her wasn’t really in the mood, since she hadn’t been expecting it and she was too cozy right now to undress or get urgent and sweaty.

“We don’t have to,” he said mildly, evidently reading her hesitation correctly, “if you’re not in the mood.”

“You know I really want to have sex with you normally. It’s just kind of cold,” she explained. “And I’d have to take my clothes off. And I didn’t think we could today, so I wasn’t—”

“It’s fine, Emily. Believe it or not, I can make do without sex.”

She giggled at his irony, but there was something in the words and in his bland tone that she thought was remarkably sweet. She stretched up in the general direction of his head. She planted a kiss somewhere in the vicinity of his lips. It felt like it landed on his chin, so she moved up a little until she reached his mouth.

He kissed her back, his tongue gently exploring her lips and then nudging questioningly into her mouth.

The kiss was very nice. She reached one hand up to stroke the nape of his neck like she was learning he really liked. She felt more tender than aroused, but she enjoyed the sensation of his skillful mouth against hers, his hot, tense body against her, even with several layers of clothing between them. She loved the low moan he made into the kiss as she caressed his neck.

It was the strangest feeling. She’d never understood she could feel this way. She didn’t feel any pressing desire for an orgasm herself, but something thrilled inside her at being close to Paul, at pleasing him, at being there for him.

When he pulled his mouth away, she murmured, feeling strangely shy, “We can. I don’t mind.”

His muscles tightened palpably, but his voice was controlled—just a little thick—as he replied, “No. We’re not going to do it unless you’re in the mood too.”

She started to argue but decided against it. Instead she leaned over to kiss him again, missing at first but shifting until she was able to settle her lips against his once more.

He responded immediately, one of his arms tightening around her and the other hand sliding down to cup her bottom, pressing her pelvis gently against his.

Feeling a surge of pleasure—more emotional than physical—Emily eased her hand in between their bodies until she found the length of his erection through his pajama pants. He groaned against her mouth and jerked his hips slightly when she gently squeezed.

He tore his mouth away, breathing raggedly. “I’m sorry, baby. If we’re not going to have sex, we better stop.”

Her heartbeat had accelerated, and pleasure and tenderness coursed through her. “But I wanted to do this,” she breathed, applying gentle pressure to his arousal. “Can’t we just do this?”

“You want to…” Paul was so tense from leashed desire now he was almost shaking, and she really wished she could see his face.

She squeezed him intimately again and stroked his neck with her other hand, loving the way the texture of his hair mingled with his warm skin. “I was liking it,” she told him, feeling a little embarrassed but not enough to withdraw. “Is it not good for you?”

Paul released the most textured groan she’d ever heard, the sound doing something intense to her chest and even generating a little ache between her legs. “Yes, it’s good. If you’re sure…”

She kissed him again. Then said against his lips, “I’m sure. I like it.”

Before she’d even articulated the last word, he’d claimed her mouth again in a deep kiss. Very daring, she slipped her hand beneath the waistband of his pajama pants so she could get a better grip on his erection.

She’d never really given a hand job before, and she wasn’t exactly sure how to best do it. But she loved the feel of his hard, hot flesh under her palm, and he started making little pumps of his hips, so she figured that was the rhythm he wanted.

She tried to keep kissing him, but she started to lose her coordination as she got so excited about the way his body grew more intense, hot, tight. It felt like something had coiled inside him, about to be unleashed.  And it thrilled her. It thrilled her.

She massaged him as best she could, responding to the urgent little thrusts he started to make into her hand. But sustaining the kiss was soon beyond her.

It seemed beyond him too. His mouth broke away, and he panted erratically against her hair.

She could sense the change in his body. He radiated heat, and the carnal tension shuddered all through him. The slight jerking of his hips got faster.

“Oh, fuck, baby. I’m going to…I’m going to…”

She was holding her breath now, pumping him hard and fast. Then she felt him unleash, let go, release.

He came with a hard groan, his body freezing for a moment before it let go. She kept squeezing him through the contractions, and he mumbled out words—she couldn’t recognize any of them except "baby" and her name.

She was overwhelmed with pleasure, with tenderness, with emotion so deep she couldn’t find a name for it. Her fingers had tightened on the back of Paul’s neck in her excitement, and she was afraid she might have scratched him. She softened her grip and stroked him gently again. Then she released his softening erection, caressing him there a few final times.

Her hand was a little sticky from his come, but she didn’t mind. It made her feel almost proud of herself in a silly way. When she pulled her hand out of his pants, she sat up until she could reach the box of tissues she’d brought with her. She wiped off her hand and then cleaned Paul up too.

Paul was still gasping, lying limply on the mattress. When she'd cleaned up as best she could in the dark, she cuddled up happily next to his hot, replete body.

“Thank you.” He pressed a light kiss into her hair. “You didn’t have to do that.”

“I wanted to,” she told him. Since the only part of him she could easily reach was his shoulder, she kissed him there over his shirt. “I liked it.”

“I can take care of you now if you want.” He sounded warm and drowsy, like he wouldn't mind going to sleep, but she was sure the offer was genuine.

“I’m good,” she said. She’d gotten a little turned on, but not enough to make it worth the effort of trying to reach orgasm when she was so cozy and content as it was.

“Maybe later.” He adjusted, pulling her into his arms more securely.

“Definitely later,” she agreed. She nestled against him, listening to the rain. It didn’t sound so torrential now, and the tent was still nice and dry. The air was very cool, but she was warm with Paul under the sleeping bag.  “I think I like camping,” she murmured, rather foolishly. It felt like she might drift off to sleep at any moment.

Paul sounded like he was about to fall asleep as well. “Maybe I like it too.”