Chapter Twenty-Seven
July 23rd, 1812
Exeter, Devonshire
Nell half-woke when Mordecai Black coaxed her back into her nightgown, but she didn’t fully wake until much later. There was no sign anyone else had been in her bed; the second pillow, the one he’d lain on, was smooth. Nell reached out and turned it over. The fabric was rumpled and a single short masculine hair clung to it. She touched the creased linen with her fingertips, touched that hair. Mordecai Black’s hair. Mordecai Black, who had held her for most of the night, who had dressed her in her nightgown again, who had turned over his pillow when he left.
I love you, Mordecai.
This time yesterday she’d been certain she was going to marry him—and then he’d ordered her from Exeter and her certainty had vanished—and now she was ce
