The Dream by Jaycee Clark

family in London. Why do you continue in these questions? It’s as if you do not believe me.” She muttered, “All men are the same.”
    “I beg your pardon.”
    “Yes, you do that quite a bit.”
    He made a sound in his throat, not quite a growl, but she looked at him again.
    Instead of replying to her remark, he said, “It’s not about trust or belief, per se. Just a feeling I get that you are keeping something from me, regardless of the fact you are whom you claim to be—an American widow.”
    “Then what—“
    He interrupted her, “But when I feel something is being kept from me, it only entices me further to solve whatever mystery seems to be present.” He waved an elegant hand in her general direction. “Besides, I feel somewhat responsible for you.”
    Emily didn’t say anything for a moment, then she cleared her throat. “Why?”
    He only gave her a narrow-eyed look.
    “Isn’t it me who should now feel a responsibility toward you, since you are the one that saved my life?” She nodded, remembering the old proverb she’d read somewhere. “Yes, that is how it goes. You’ve merely gotten it backward.”
    He smiled. “So you plan to travel to London?” he asked, clearly ignoring her statements. “It is fortunate that I am familiar with any number of people in Town. Perhaps I know your family.”
    He very well could. She’d vaguely thought of that, as she’d planned on traveling alone and knowing they would part.
    “When the doctor says you are fit to travel,” he continued, “I will take you.”
    Emily studied him, and realized that his shirt sleeves were rolled up and that without his cravat she could see the corded muscles of his neck. And why hadn’t she noticed these things before? It was quite indecent. Not that she was some shy young miss and she had seen him without his waistcoat before, but still she noticed the strong muscles of his arms, the sinews of his wrists. Did noticing mean Theodore was right about her? That she would notice such things because of the blood in her veins, because…
    No. No. She shook her head.
    “No?” he asked.
    Why was it so impossible to think when she was around this man? She picked at the fold in her wrapper. “I’m sorry, do what?”
    “I said, when the physician clears it, I will take you to London to meet your family.”
    Take her? Panic fluttered in her chest and she straightened in her chair, wincing at the pull in her shoulder.
    “I thank you, my lord, but—“
    He held up his hand, palm out. “I insist.”
    The marquess taking her to meet her family? No, she couldn’t let that happen. She did not want company. She’d never met her grandparents, did not know how they would receive her. Or even if they would receive her. What if her mother didn’t recognize her? What if her mother weren’t in London and no one believed her? What if they turned her away?
    She had to think, to convince him. Rubbing her forehead, Emily cleared her throat. “My lord, Marquess .”
    “Mrs. Smith, I’ve given you leave to call me Jason, or at the very least Ravensworth . Many do. Come, must we really be so formal?”
    He did have a point. The man had saved her life, even if he constantly questioned her. But Jason was too…too…intimate, it seemed.
    “As you will, Ravensworth .”
    Jason swallowed his brandy to wash away the disappointment of her not saying his given name.
    He had no idea what it was about this small woman that was keeping him up at nights, but up he was. And it was more than suspicion, he knew, or mystery. What precisely it was, he was not certain he wanted to define—yet.
    “So do these relatives have a name?”
    She was gazing into the fire, but still he caught a spark of something on her face just before she said, “Why yes, they do. Mother. Sister. Grandparents.”
    He laughed, little minx. “What, no aunts, uncles or cousins?”
    Her smile was one-sided. He wondered what she’d look like with a full grin and laughter shining in