Written in My Heart by Caroline Linden

Author:Caroline Linden [Linden, Caroline]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Literature & Fiction, Short Stories, Single Author, Romance, Regency, Single Authors, historical romance, romance short story, Regency romance
Amazon: B00GLAE8ME
Barnesnoble: B00GLAE8ME
Publisher: Caroline Linden
Published: 2013-11-10T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter Four

Ethan leaned over the rail and took a deep breath, searching for the first sight of coast to break through the mist that shrouded the Channel. Thankfully, his regiment was being sent back to England rather than in pursuit of Bonaparte. It was probably due to the fact that the regiment had suffered tremendous casualties, but he didn’t want to think about that now. It was simply too painful to think about his dead mates. Selfishly, he only wanted to go home. “Yes.”

“Is that all you can say of her?” Morton laughed. “No wonder she’s not your wife!”

“I always imagined her as a fetching blonde,” said Bingley in a wistful voice. “Pretty and neat, sitting at her desk writing about the miller making eyes at the girl in the baker’s shop or the dog ruining the clean floor.”

“No,” said Ethan. “Her hair’s dark.”

“Dark like tea? Dark like treacle?” prodded Morton. “Come, man, we want details.”

“I can’t wait to see proper English lasses again,” put in Bingley. “Blond, brunette, red-haired, even gray-haired. My mum will be the loveliest sight I’ve ever set eyes on, I think.”

“Proof you haven’t got a wife, either.” Morton laughed. “You’d find it hard to think of aught else if you did.”

“Dark like mahogany,” Ethan said, leaning to the left. Was that a spit of land, nudging up out of the sea? He wanted it to be, so very desperately. “With dark eyes.”

“Will she be waiting for you as eagerly as you’re straining to be back at her side?”

“Jane?” He was startled into a laugh. “Who said I was straining to be back at her side? That is—she’s not my Jane, so I can’t possibly be straining to get back to her.”

“If she’s not your girl, why did she write to you so devotedly?”

He glared at Morton, who had attached himself to them since Waterloo. The man’s mouth was never closed, and he was very fond of asking pointed and intrusive questions. “That’s the way she is. She promised to write to me, and she did.”

“Every week? For three years?” Morton shook his head. “The girl’s in love with you, fool.”

Ethan was taken aback. “I doubt it. We were children together.”

“It’s very possible,” put in Bingley. “Although if you don’t want her, I’d like to meet her.”

An instinctive refusal rose in his throat. Ethan cleared his throat to keep from saying it. “Whatever for?”

Bingley shrugged, leaning against the ship’s rail. “She’s got pretty handwriting. I feel like I would know her voice, just from hearing you read her letters. And any girl who’d write that often must be a very loyal one. I daresay my girl hasn’t waited for me.”

“You don’t know that….”

“I do, actually.” Bingley gave a crooked smile. “My sister wrote that Sarah started walking out with James Hill.” He raised his shoulder again. “Not that she ever wrote me half as many letters as Jane wrote to you. I didn’t expect her to wait.” He turned toward the sea, squinting as the stiff wind blew his long hair into his eyes.

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