Marie Wilson

Constance is lying naked on her bed - naked except for five bracelets, two necklaces and an anklet (she never her wears rings if sex is in the air). One lithe arm is curled around her purple halo of hair while the other lies dormant on her taut belly (it will be three years before there__l be a baby in there). Scents of verbena and lemons rise from her warm pink skin. She rolls over, revealing her voluptuous posterior to a man who is watching her from a window across the way, and reaches for a book under her bed.

The first time she saw Jag Silvertree she was watering the garden, and her clematis got soaked as she dreamt of melting into his face. The second time she saw Jag she knew she would never feel his angular jaw against her thighs. For Jag Silvertree carried around with him a hurt that she figured would stand out in a field of wounded soldiers.