“Lovely,” she said, smiling at him in the mirror. “You should call Miss Nebeker, though, to come help me.” The first thing that Ellen had done as a new marchioness was hire Miss Nebeker. “You also need to shave.”
“You don’t think my mother will approve?”
“Your mother would be horrified, and my mother would probably try to fire your valet.”
Quinn laughed. “Your point has been made. I will return shortly to escort you down the stairs, Lady Kenworth.”
Ellen took the comb from her husband and started to brush it through her own hair as she waited for him to send in Miss Nebeker.
When she was finally dressed and presentable, she found Quinn waiting in the corridor, making good on his promise to escort her. He’d been freshly shaved, and his cravat was well in place. He took her hand and pressed a kiss on it, then they walked down the stairs of the Kenworth Manor together.
Women’s voices rang out from the dining room, and Ellen was grateful the tones were cheerful. She entered the room with Quinn, and both mothers immediately turned to look at them.
“Well, there you are at last. We thought you were indisposed,” her mother said, her eyes bright and assessing as she scanned Ellen’s form.
It was too much to expect her mother to greet her any other way. There would be no kiss, no embrace. Ellen appreciated that her mother had come to visit at all and seemed to have a conspiratorial friend in Quinn’s mother.
“You look ready to deliver at any moment,” the dowager said.
So, Ellen wasn’t about to get any pleasant greetings.
Quinn squeezed her hand before he let go and moved to the sideboard. In that hand squeeze, she’d felt all the love and adoration that she could ever need, and she was grateful for it.
“Have a seat, wife, and I will make you a plate.”
Ellen heard the silent gasps from both mothers as if they’d been audible. Both women had likely never had their own husbands serve them in such a way. But Quinn took immense pleasure in doing the small things for Ellen, many of which she could still do herself. Instead of arguing with her husband that she was perfectly capable of filling her plate from the sideboard, she sat down as directed and turned a smile toward the mothers.
“I trust that both of your journeys were pleasant and you found your rooms to your satisfaction,” Ellen said. They’d arrived last night after Ellen had retired for the evening. So Quinn had seen to their comforts and told Ellen that she could welcome their guests in the morning.
“This estate is in better repair than I expected,” her mother spoke first. “I thought the room would have a draft, but it was quite warm. Perhaps a bit too warm.”
Ah, there was the complaint. Ellen merely smiled and took up her fork as Quinn set her plate before her. He knew her well and had filled the plate with her usual favorites. This made her want to lean over and kiss him, but the critical eyes of their mothers, in addition to the bulk of her swollen belly, stopped her.
“We could have the fire extinguished earlier in the evening if you’d like, Mother Humphreys,” Quinn said in a perfectly conciliatory tone.
He really was quite the excellent marquess.
“Oh, that won’t do at all,” her mother said, waving a hand toward the window. “If it rains today, then I don’t want the damp creeping in. If there’s anything I can’t abide, it’s the damp.”
“Well, then, we will watch for the rain,” Quinn said, glancing at Ellen and giving her a wink before he turned back to face the mothers.
Quinn had opened up an entire Pandora’s box by mentioning the weather.
His own mother took up the topic. “Those low clouds look quite threatening if you ask me. I’d advise everyone to stay indoors.” Her gaze landed on Ellen. “Especially you, since we can’t have you catching a cold while you are carrying a child.”
Ellen didn’t dare bring up her continued penchant for walking the countryside. Many times, Quinn accompanied her, but she often went out on her own. It was a way to get to know the tenants of the estate and have a bit of reflection time to herself. A bit of rain had never stopped her, and Quinn knew it.
She felt his hand squeeze her knee beneath the table, and she had to cover up a smile. Together, they would somehow survive the coming week with both of their mothers in residence.
The conversation at the morning table moved from concerns about the weather, to which names Quinn had been thinking of for his son—Ellen didn’t dare correct anyone that they didn’t yet know the gender of their child—and finally to local village gossip that the dowager seemed to have plenty of knowledge about and Ellen’s mother was very interested in hearing.
When the patter of rain started on the windows, Ellen’s mother straightened in her chair and said, “What did I tell you? Rain!”
Quinn’s mother shook her head. “Let us move to the library and order a fire. We will be set to read and embroider all day.”
Quinn joined the women in the library, and after another hour of conversation centering around herbs and poultices and their remedies for the aches and pains experienced by both women, he said, “I must take my wife to her rooms where she can rest for a short time before the lunch hour.”
Ellen had never been so grateful for Quinn in her life; well, at least today. It seemed she frequently found many things to be grateful for. Once in their private chambers, Quinn said, “I never thought I’d come up with a good excuse to take a break. But then I thought of my pregnant wife and how you’ve made it a habit of taking a nap each day. You are always the perfect excuse.”
Ellen laughed. “Now what will you do? They are in your library, and it looks like they’re there to stay.”
Quinn glanced toward the windows, where it was quite obvious that the rain wasn’t going to let up any time soon. An afternoon ride would have to wait for another day.
He stepped close to her. “I will read poetry to you until you fall asleep.”
Ellen sighed, hiding another smile. “How about you read me your diary?”
Early in their marriage, she’d discovered he kept a faithful diary. It took her another two months to convince him to let her read it. She became especially captivated by his diary entries during the time they were first getting to know each other.
Quinn raised his eyebrows as his hand settled at her waist. “You want me to read about the events of last week?”
“No,” she said, placing her hands on his chest. “You know the parts I want you to read.”
He grinned. “If you insist.”
“I insist.”
So Ellen leaned against her husband as they settled on the wide bed and listened to the timbre of his voice as he read to her about the day they met. She smiled as the memories swirled about her as he read his own memories. After a while, she no longer focused on the familiar words but on how it felt to listen to him while one arm was around her.
She felt herself growing more and more tired, and she yawned. “What will you write about today?”
He closed the diary, then laced their fingers together, not moving from his position.
“I will write about how I woke up next to the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen,” Quinn said.
Ellen scoffed. “Will you note how swollen my ankles are and how pudgy my hands?”
He lifted her fingers to his lips. “I will only be truthful and say that your elegant hands are soft, and when I hold them, I feel complete.”
Ellen lifted her head. “You are such a seducer.”
He promptly kissed her on the lips.
“You prove my point.” She rested her head against his shoulder again as he continued to speak in a low voice about what else he’d write in his diary.
Ellen closed her eyes, reveling in this cocoon of peace and love with her husband. Moving into Quinn’s home had meant she’d had to leave her little meadow. But she’d found so much more with this man.
Ellen hovered between the worlds of wakefulness and dreaming as she realized s
he couldn’t have come up with a better dream if she had written it down. Her husband adored her, and she adored him. Whatever might happen with their mothers’ opinions, or however many children she had with Quinn, they would live their lives together, in their own little meadow of happiness.
More Books by Heather B. Moore
About Heather B. Moore
Heather B. Moore is a USA Today bestselling author. She writes historical thrillers under the pen name H.B. Moore; her latest are The Killing Curse and Poetic Justice. Under the name Heather B. Moore, she writes romance and women’s fiction; her latest include Love is Come and Delilah’s Desserts. Under pen name Jane Redd, she writes the young adult speculative Solstice series, including her latest release Mistress Grim. Heather is represented by Jane Dystel of Dystel, Goderich & Bourret.
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Dear Reader,
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