A Bride for Adam

had been through worse. She had to grab the bedpost several times. How she fell asleep during the storm, she’d never know, but she did. Perhaps she was tired from cooking and cleaning all day.
A huge clap of thunder woke her, and she stiffened; something was different. The ship rocked, but she didn’t need to grab the bedpost; someone was holding her.
“Adam?” she asked, hoping it was him.
“Go back to sleep. I’ve got you.”
Greta let out a breath of relief. Adam was lying beside her, holding her around the waist. Despite the storm, it felt heavenly.
“Aren’t you needed out there at the helm?” she asked.
“I have two more hours before my watch, so hush and go back to sleep. Manny is handling things just fine.”
Greta reached down and squeezed the hand that held her.
When Greta awoke in the morning, the room was still pretty dark, but Adam was gone. If she thought she’d loved him before, she loved him even more now. She wished she could stop the annulment, but that was impossible from the middle of the ocean. There was no one she wanted to spend the rest of her life with more than she wanted to spend it with Adam. Greta wanted to spend every minute with him. She felt different when she was with him. He made her feel confident and useful. He appreciated her more for herself than for just being Seth’s wife.
She stood on the bed and peeked through the porthole. There were still black clouds in the sky, but the ship wasn’t rocking as much, and the thunder, lightning, and rain had all stopped.
Greta smiled as she smoothed out the quilt on the bed. Adam had slept beside her and had even held her. She picked up the pillow his head had been on and hugged it, dropping it quickly when she heard Adam’s key in the door.
He knocked before entering. “You’re up.”
Greta smiled. “I can stand without falling over, too.”
“We rode out the storm, and the only damage was a broken yardarm.”
Greta frowned up at him. “Can we still get to Liverpool?”
“Sure, we can, but Calvin is making a new one in the workshop as we speak,” he said. “We just need to lash more of the pole to what remains. If we’re lucky, it will hold.”
Adam continued, “I’m sorry I had to invade your bed last night. I climbed into mine with wet clothes, but I didn’t relish sleeping in a wet cot. I knew you were unsettled about the storm and wouldn’t mind if the Captain held you in place for four hours.
“I also wanted you to know why my bed was wet when you made it today.”
Greta smiled. “I might have wondered.” She felt herself blushing. “And I didn’t mind your company at all.”
“Can I walk you to the galley?”
“I’d hoped for some water to wash and do my hair.”
“I think it’s calm enough for me to bring you some, and then I’ll braid your hair.”
Greta gave him a smile that she thought would tell him what her heart was feeling.
Day after day at sea, and it seemed like some of the glamour of the trip had worn off. Greta was bored, and she missed her daughter, yet, as soon as she saw Adam, her spirits rose. She wondered what he thought of her. Did he think of her only as a duty he had to perform for Seth, or had he become a bit enamored with her? The way his hands had lingered on her hair, the way he looked after her every need...was it possible he cared for her, too? Should she turn to Miles Tanner? She had promised him that as soon as the annulment went through she’d allow him to court her.
Miles Tanner. She hadn’t thought about him in weeks. He was tall, lanky, and muscular from working on his family’s farm and in the lumberyard. He wasn’t handsome—he was a bit on the plain side—but he did have a charismatic smile.
How could she find out if Adam’s only reason for his “courting” her on this trip was to carry out his promise to Seth? Was he truly fond of her? She wanted her marriage to be a love match.
Greta awoke one morning to notice that something had changed. The ship wasn’t moving as it once had. She quickly dressed and tied her hair back before running up on deck to see that Eve was docked in Liverpool. The wharf was a busy place, and it amazed her that so many people were hustling about. Some were climbing onto ships; some were disembarking. There were kiosks selling fish and other things that Greta couldn’t make out from the distance. Carriages pulled up and down the alley near the wharf. She decided then and there she’d stay on the ship; she was only bound to get lost out on the shore.
She sighed. That meant there was just one more sail before they’d reach Philadelphia, and then she’d be just a train ride from Bethany—how she missed her.
Adam wasn’t around. She supposed he was supervising the unloading of the cargo. She turned and looked upward to see the crew taking down the sails, and Greta wondered how long they’d stay in port. She was anxious to set sail for home.
It started to rain, so Greta returned to the cabin. In her haste to go up on deck for a view of Liverpool, she’d failed to lock her door. She let out a gasp when a man with a scraggly beard and yellowed teeth was standing by her bed. Greta backed up against the desk. “What do you want?” was all she could think of to say.
“Well, now,” the scraggly man said, “we’ve decided our captain was too bossy, and we’re sailing without him. I’m the captain now.” He