by Heather Boyd
The man gave her an odd look. “The usual way, I imagine.”
Her old doctor in London had explained long ago that she’d likely never conceive a child, no matter how many times Heathcote joining her in bed. She had accepted she would never be a mother and gotten over the disappointment as best she could. Her husband had gotten himself a mistress who had then popped out illegitimate babies at an embarrassing rate, proving Esme the one at fault all along.
Even after her husband had died, Esme had never so much as worried her lovers could get a child on her. None ever had. Until now.
She pressed her fingers to her temple as her head throbbed with renewed vigor. “Surely there is room for doubt.”
“Of course, but I still expect you to deliver around Easter.” He peered at her closely. “Ah, I guess you hadn’t hoped for this blessing, after all?”
Hope had been a thing of the very distant past. She’d never dared allow it. “I thought I had simply eaten bad food. I’ve had the entire kitchen scrubbed out twice just to be sure.”
“Well, I am sure your servants will be happy they were blameless in your condition.” He smiled warmly. “Try not to panic, my dear. There is no reason you cannot deliver a healthy first child at your age.”
“My age?” She rubbed her temple again, fearing her skull would crack from the pounding there. Esme routinely lied about her age. She was a few years older than the doctor knew but she could see no reason to correct him. “That had not even occurred to me as a complication.”
“Many women past the first flush of youth go on to deliver safely. Four and thirty is a bit old for a first child, so I would suggest plenty of rest, good food, and a degree of company to distract you from any melancholy that might arise. Surely your husband will understand your fears. You must talk to him, or if you feel yourself unequal to the task, I could speak to him personally perhaps before I go.”
“Mr. Hammond is not my husband.” She raised her gaze to the doctor’s, heart sinking at her worsening predicament. “I am a widow.”
His eyes narrowed on her cherry-red dressing robe, and his frown grew even more pronounced. He glanced toward the door. She had been staying here as Mr. Hammond’s guest at his new estate for the past three months, and no doubt many assumed them related or involved in some fashion. Had Hammond suggested they were close? She wasn’t sure, but the doctor was clearly suspicious of their relationship.
He cleared his throat. “I am very sorry to hear it. Surely you have someone in your life to give you the support you need during your confinement.”
She sat up and forced her legs to firm so she could stand. She felt as weak as a newborn kitten that had been spun in circles by a terrifying child. “I do thank you for your time.”
The doctor caught up his little bag and swept from the room. Esme sank onto the bed again and closed her eyes, still unable to believe she’d be a mother at long last.
Hammond and the doctor conversed in low tones then all was silent save for Hammond’s heavy footfalls returning to her bedside. She snapped her eyes open and struggled for composure.
He stopped at the nearby chair and gripped the back with both hands. “What did the good doctor say?”
“Rest and bland food can help.” She glanced at his pale face and saw true concern. For all his wickedness, Hammond was a good man. He deserved the truth, but Esme couldn’t force the words out.
“Nothing more? No hint of why you’re retching?”
Pregnant. Esme swallowed the panic again. She had to think and she couldn’t do that with Hammond hovering over her. Her friend would never understand how utterly shocked she was feeling at that moment. If only Harriet were here, and not gone off with her son. Esme hadn’t the faintest idea what to do. She was not prepared for something like this. “Some, but I don’t believe him.”
Hammond sat beside her as Esme took a few steadying breaths. But there was no getting over the shock of the doctor’s suggestion. Dear God, how could she be pregnant at her age? She’d been so afraid she’d been about to die, casting up her accounts morning and night, never able to keep much at all in her stomach. She’d given up dreams of a child so long ago that she was afraid for even a moment to consider the possibility was real. “Esme, what did he say to you?”
“A young doctor could be wrong.”
“Perhaps.” Hammond slipped his arm behind her back. “Tell me what he said that he could be wrong about?”
“He said…” Dear God, how hard it was to confess to something she’d given up hope for? She tried again. “He suggested I might, well, it seems as if I am to have a…” Her throat closed and tears filled her eyes. How did women normally describe it? “This is difficult.”
Hammond waited patiently without speaking.
“It seems I am with child.” Inexplicable joy filled her as soon as the words passed her lips. In a few months, she would hold her son or daughter in her arms. The dream of her youth would become a reality.
“I see,” Hammond said slowly. His expression clouded over with remorse. “When are you going to do something about it?”
Richard’s face flashed before her eyes. Not the smug, arrogant mask he liked to slip over his features as he moved about society, but the one she’d come to know from hours spent in his arms. The wickedly confident man she’d come to love despite her misgivings, who still featured in her thoughts night and day. Particularly their nights—and the last one they’d spent together in the woods.
She dreaded telling him because she’d been so utterly confident she couldn’t give him what he needed most. A son. “I don’t know.”
“Can you find what you need here?”
Esme jerked around to stare at Hammond, finally understanding the question he was truly asking of her. He was not speaking of her telling the father of her child, but something much more dangerous. “I will not take such a drastic action as to end this, no matter how sick I have become.”
He exhaled loudly but then leaned close to kiss her temple. “Thank God for that. For a moment there I assumed you would take the path many widows take given your circumstances.”
She knew of women who drank boiled pennyroyal to abort a pregnancy because their situations did not allow them to keep a lover’s child. But that was not without considerable risk to their lives. She wouldn’t do it, not to herself and not to Richard. However, a woman of her position would face social ruin to be pregnant out of wedlock. She would be shunned. Held up for ridicule. If Richard didn’t marry her, if he couldn’t because he’d already committed himself to another, their child would be denied its birthright, excluded from the society it should have belonged too.
Nausea assailed her again and she pressed a scented handkerchief to her mouth. “I would never do that,” she whispered against the soft muslin cloth.
“Shall I have the house closed up?”
“No.” She glanced at Hammond. “Why would you suggest it?”
He smiled smugly. “Well, I imagine you do need to confront a certain earl about your condition sooner rather than later.”
She shook her head.
“Come now, I know the child is his,” Hammond continued. “Very shoddy of him not to practice restraint, but he will do the proper thing in the end, I’ve no doubt.”
He would but she’d sent him into the arms of other women. She’d demanded he marry someone else. She’d been wrong to deny him. It could already be too late. “Richard will not be pleased with me.”
Hammond rocked her and the motion stirred her stomach again. “He should have considered that before he was in your bed.”
“He did.” A light sweat broke out over her skin as she fought the nausea yet again. “I promised him I couldn’t bear a child. I never have before and he believed me. I believed me.”
“Nonsense. I saw how you were together when you thought no one was looking. It was only a matter of time. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, the pair of you are besotted.”
“Besotted?” Obses
sed was a better description for her state of mind then and now.
“He’s been rather wild since his house party I hear. Attending every party, dancing and drinking to excess. Flirting with any woman under thirty.”
Her eyes filled with tears. “He did what I told him to do. I told him to find someone else to love.”
“He’s not himself but he would be a fool to turn you aside and you know it. You are exactly what he needs in a wife and he does need an heir.”
“What if,” she swallowed as a new terror filled her, “what if there is a child and I lose it? The doctor suggested women of my age sometimes have difficulties.” Gingerly, she placed her hand over her belly, still unable to believe the situation she was in.
Hammond squeezed her gently. “Don’t borrow trouble before you need to.”
“You don’t understand.” She wanted to explain her terror but Hammond didn’t place enough faith in her fears. “You are correct that he would marry me. He needs an heir. Everyone knows it. But I have never been with child before and I am quite terrified to move. I cannot confess I’m carrying a child only to lose it in the process. I simply couldn’t bear it.”
“Well, you cannot hide the truth from him forever. Think of your reputation. Think of the child’s future. You must be married before the birth.”
“I know. I think it best I remain here until I am absolutely sure there is a babe and I am well enough for travel. Look at me.” She flung her arms wide and glanced down. Her breasts might be a touch tender, but her stomach beneath her gown was still as flat as ever. There was no outward sign she’d conceived, if her roiling stomach and sharper cheekbones were overlooked. “Do I appear the least bit pregnant? He’ll believe I’m trying to trick him like his last lover did.”
“Surely not.”
“Richard vowed never again to take a woman at her word. We discussed it one night after…” She waved a hand about. “It’s preposterous to turn around and suggest he do so with me without evidence. I won’t have him doubt me or, worse, laugh at the very suggestion.” She could not confess to Richard until she was absolutely certain. She couldn’t bear to build up his hopes only to dash them when this, whatever it was, might turn out to be but a mistake.
“You are wrong.” Hammond stubbornly shook his head. “No gentleman would ever laugh at any lady should she declare him the father of her child.”
“Nevertheless, I will wait until I am certain your doctor knows what he’s about.” Esme eased back on the bed as yet again a wave of nausea swamped her senses. She was so tired and weary. Casting up her accounts at all hours of the day and night and dreaming of Richard endlessly was utterly draining. She pushed at Hammond’s shoulder. “I need to be alone again, but promise me you won’t say a word of this to anyone.”
“I promise, but what are you going to do? Harriet expects you to return to Town next week.”
“I’ll write only to her about this.” She gagged, and scrambled for the pail beside the bed. When she was without her lunch, she lay down with Hammond’s assistance. She was still too ill to travel. She wasn’t going anywhere in anything that would rock her about. If anyone were to be disappointed, it would be her alone, so she would stay here for the present.
She pressed her head into the pillows as Hammond gently covered her with the comforter and rang for her maid. “I won’t return to Town. I will stay here until it’s absolutely necessary to leave.”
When she was sure, ready to believe herself, if there really was a need, she would seek out Richard. She didn’t look forward to the conversation, especially when it might require her to beg him to marry her just to give the child the protection of his name. That wasn’t a good way to start any marriage, but given the alternative future ahead, she just might have no choice in the matter.
Eighteen
Early December…
Prepared for battle, Richard stepped from the carriage and strode up the steps of the home Esme had moved to. It had been five months since she’d slipped away from his estate without saying goodbye. The problem for him was, he’d felt like an arse ever since and he’d missed her terribly. He’d been a fool to concede to her demand that he consider anyone else.
He was married in his mind to Esme. Even his cock seemed to think so, for it hadn’t risen even in the slightest except in remembrance of her.
And he was sick of pretending he didn’t care about her odd behavior. What the devil was she doing rusticating in the countryside? She belonged in the heart of the ton not hiding from it.
News of Esme’s avoidance of society hadn’t reached him for months after their parting. Society had been abuzz with the speculation of her whereabouts but no one had thought to mention she’d actually truly disappeared, and she had cut off everyone in her life.
In frustration and concern, he’d come up to London again hoping to find her, only to meet with no success. No one knew where she was; no one had spoken to her since his house party. In desperation, he’d barged his way into her London townhouse and forced a fortune on her cagey butler for news of her location, but only after he’d begged and pleaded and sworn he only had Esme’s best interests at heart.
Discovering she’d taken over one of Mr. Hammond’s houses in the country had relieved him. At least if she was with Hammond she’d be taken care of.
But there was something in the way the butler had delivered the news that concerned him. He’d asked if Esme would be returning to London soon and the answer had been a long time coming. It was no.
He rapped the knocker soundly and shivered in the chill air, while rehearsing what he wanted to say most of all clearly and succinctly. He was here to ask for Esme’s hand in bloody marriage again, and she had better accept his offer or there would be hell to pay.
The man at the door was instantly recognizable. The footman who had been in his employ until recently, Pip, took great pains to read the card Richard handed over as if they were strangers, rather than former master and servant. His expression gave little away but given the man’s sister was Esme’s maid, it meant he was in exactly the right place to find the woman he wanted.
“So this is where you found new employment,” he murmured, hoping to soften the man and get inside sooner rather than later.
“Indeed,” Pip replied in a tone worthy of Oswin’s tutelage.
Pip said nothing more than to bade him wait in the hall while he informed his mistress of Richard’s arrival.
While he cooled his heels during the long wait, Richard snooped into the nearby rooms. Knickknacks cluttered every space, and he groaned—Esme’s current home was a sleepwalker’s nightmare, and he’d been doing a lot of that lately.
“Lady Heathcote will see you now.”
He followed the servant through a doorway that had been previously closed and found Esme reclining on a chaise. Dressed in dark-blue velvet, she was bundled up beneath a thick quilt and had so many pillows strew around her body that only her head, shoulders and arms were visible. She looked deliciously warm and good enough to pounce on. He bowed instead. “Esme.”
“Lord Windermere.”
She did not stand and when he drew closer with the intention of kissing her cheek, he noted the pallor of her skin and the dark circles beneath her eyes. Hammond was not taking care of her after all, and he was suddenly furious. Good thing he’d come prepared to fight long and hard to get her back.
He sat down across from her. “You look beautiful posed like that.”
“Thank you.” Her eyes softened. They talked of the weather, his journey until she seemed at a loss for words. “Why are you here?”
“Isn’t it obvious?” He frowned. “I reached the end of your list and have come to extend you an invitation to return to Windermere. I feel badly about how things ended between us.”
Her brow rose. “The purpose of my leaving was to get out of the way.”
“You were not in my way. I wanted you to stay, remember, and you turned me down. You sent me off to seduce other women, which
I have to say wasn’t as pleasant to do when ordered to it as you must have imagined a man could find it.” He’d felt lost, uncertain, while they’d been apart. As much as he’d tried it her way, there had been no one on her list who could ever replace Esme in his affections. The time wasted on others had only revealed how utterly wrong she’d been about who would suit him for a wife. “I was surprised to find you’d given up London for this place.”
“I was leaving tomorrow.”
Richard’s pulse sped up at the idea he might have missed her if he’d delayed another day. “Where were you going next? Back to London, or to join Lady Ames, wherever that might be?”
“I’m not sure now,” she murmured, in a voice very unlike her usual forthright tones.
She met his gaze warily. To Richard’s eye she seemed uncommonly nervous about seeing him again. He smiled warmly. Ill kept or not, it was very good to be with her once more. He had so much to tell her of the past months she’d been away from society. “Jillian parted ways with Lord Hogan after the party and tells me she has no intention of keeping up the acquaintance.”
“I am not sorry to hear it.” She winced and glanced down at her hands. “I hope she suffered no harm from the association.”
“She seems more herself, I think. The way she was before her marriage.” Richard tilted his head to catch her eye. “You told me the truth about Hogan and I didn’t act fast enough for your taste. I learned what he was about, the truth of his nature, after the party. If not for your words of warning, my sister might be miserable today.”
“It is fortunate I knew of Lord Hogan’s past. I would not have Jillian hurt for anything.” She began to rise then sank down again. Her expression became strained.
“I should remember you are right about most things in the future and save myself the bother of questioning you.”
