Smart Bitches, Trashy Books

Help a Bitch Out: Dress Buying Captain? Ahoy!

Bitchery reader Christine seeks your assistance:

I read this book probably five-ish years ago.  It was an historical set I believe in Maine or another north-eastern state sometime in the 1700 or 1800s.  The captain of a merchant ship makes a marriage of convenience with a young woman through the help of a parish priest or some such religious type person.  The hero needs someone to watch over a nutcase older female relative at his home while he’s away on the ship and the heroine needs to get the hell out of her sister’s (?) house because her husband has been trying to make the moves on her.

The heroine only has gray second hand clothes to wear which bugs the hero.  When he’s away merchanting, he buys a bolt of gray-blue fabric (because it matches the color of the heroine’s eyes) for her to make a dress out of but then he ends up giving it to his mistress who he of course declines to sleep with anymore.  He then purchases a yellow dress and matching hat and brings it back to the heroine, but the nutcase older female relative (who incidentally is a klepto and ends up stealing a bunch of stuff around the house and sewing the stolen goods into quilts) thinks the dress is for her and takes it.  The heroine is very touched by the gifts though and I think this scene ends with their first kiss.

The heroine ends up spending a lot of time with one of the hero’s friends while the hero is away.  The hero misunderstands the situation and gets jealous.  Eventually everything gets sorted out, the nutjob relative dies and the hero and heroine live HEA with the heroine traveling with the hero on his ship.

I thought I remembered the title of the book being ‘The Captain’s Wife’ but I’ve done numerous searches on the internet and come up with bupkiss.  If someone could tell me the title or author, I would be greatly appreciative.