Duty to Love by Morgan King

pervading her limbs and a slight chill along her skin. Her
body was positioned awkwardly, and there was no cover over her.
    As
she stretched, her foot brushed against something warm and hairy. Startled she
looked down. At a slight distance, but decidedly next to her, lay Arthur.
Moving to gain some space she shifted on to her side and back. Her bottom
pressed into something warm and hairy. On the other side of her, no longer at
any distance, lay James.
    She
remembered.
    If
she hadn't remembered she wouldn't quite believe it. Making
love with two men. It was beyond anything she'd ever even imagined
before. It had felt so right, yet lying in bed between two men, one her husband,
the other therefore her lover, the haze of arousal was gone, and Amelia feared
she'd erred
    She
wasn't normally the sort to reflect on choices already made and carried
through. The very act of doing so gave rise to a sickness in her heart. Was it
right to love two men?
    Moving
with restrained haste she crawled to the edge of the bed. She desperately
didn't want to wake either man, and spent a few anxious moments searching for
her nightgown. Slipping her arms into the sleeves, she hastily tugged it down
her body before moving across the room to the dividing door.
    Stepping
into her room just served to intensify her discomfort. She felt so out of place
within herself, and nothing around her was helping to remind her of who she
was. Where were her clothes? She should call Mary to help her get dressed. It wouldn't
be the first time, but it rankled that she was without choice. As a countess was
she never expected to dress herself?
    Amelia
wasn't used to feeling the weight of others’ expectations. How she could
possibly live up to them? Hadn't she already failed? She only had to think of
her family finding out how she had willingly spent the night with her husband
and another man, and a sense of failure consumed her.
    She
had to get away from this room that wasn't hers, this house that wasn't hers.
She rang for Mary.
    A
few minutes later Mary knocked on the door tentatively.
    “Come
in.”
    Mary
sneaked a glance towards the bed, not so surreptitiously that Amelia didn't
notice. Was she expecting to find Arthur in the bed? Were they supposed to have
slept in her bed?
    “Where's
my water? Where are my clothes?” She didn't think she'd ever been so short with
anyone, but she’d never felt so unsure of herself before. So
unprepared to live her own life. As Francine’s younger sister, not so
pretty, not so biddable, and less likely to marry well, little thought had been
given to preparing her for marriage until Francine’s death.
    At
first she had been a little angry with Francine for leaving her, leaving her
alone, leaving her to step into someone else's wedding dress. Now she just felt
the loss of her sister’s presence in her life. Someone with
whom she could talk over feminine concerns and who could help steady her
nerves.
    Arthur
and James had put her in this position. She needed to be able to think over
everything that had happened without them trying to influence her. She needed
some breathing space, to get away from everyone else but herself, whom she
needed to confront.
    She didn’t
want to forever be allowing other people to choose what was best for her. Marriage,
and even a relationship with both Arthur and James, was a fresh opportunity for
her to determine the direction of her own life.
    Washing
and dressing rapidly she dismissed Mary, who had fetched her water and laid out
her clothes in silence. Then she descended the grand staircase—there was no way
to avoid it. She could, however, creep through the back kitchens to her
destination. Cook murmuring, “Morning, Miss,” to her even made her smile. Maybe
she was still that young miss and not the Lady she should have been addressed
as.
    Upon
reaching the stables she went in search of a horse to ride, only to find her
own horse, Snail, looking at her over a door, frisking her head from side