***
Andrew forced himself to consciousness through the cozy certainty he should remain wrapped around the delightful, warm curves sharing the bed with him.
In the next brutal instant, he stifled the impulse to scramble off the mattress, for he had fallen asleep in Astrid’s bed—in her very arms. No sounds came from the lower floors, and if he’d had to guess, he would have estimated that dawn was an hour away.
So he had time, minutes anyway, to resolve what he’d been too cowardly to deal with as Astrid had drifted off in his arms hours earlier.
“Don’t go.” Astrid punctuated her command by taking his arm and wrapping it around her middle.
He should invite her to make a visit behind the privacy screen. She was still shy about pregnancy’s effects on her body, and the idea that she’d be shy about anything with him was dear and painful.
“I’ll stay for a bit.” He didn’t want to leave her alone in this bed, and he didn’t want to leave her alone, but he was going to. “You did not respond to my proposal.”
And because he needed to see her face when they had this most miserable discussion, he hoisted her over him so she sprawled on his chest. By the embers in the hearth, he could see her braid was a mess and her cheek bore a wrinkle from where it had been pressed to the pillow.
“Did you propose, Andrew? I heard you describing a scheme hatched by our brothers, not an offer of marriage.”
Peevish. She was peevish that he’d not gotten down on bended knee and prettied things up. She was going to be more peevish still.
“If we were to marry”—not when we marry—“I would not get children on you.”
She paused midnuzzle on his chest. “Then we won’t have children. You’ve told me there are precautions to prevent conception. Besides, we are likely to have a brace of nieces and nephews, so it hardly matters.”
The better to focus both of them on what needed to be said, he took her hand as it began a southerly peregrination. “I’ve told you about certain precautions. I’ve also told you no precautions are a perfect safeguard, and the only way to prevent conception for certain is to remain celibate. I am telling you”—he forced himself to make the words pass his lips—“if we marry, I will be your bodyguard, your friend, and until you deliver this child, I will be your lover. After that, I will not be intimate with you lest you conceive my child.”
For no child should have him for a father. He’d been certain of that since before his sixteenth birthday, and he was certain of it still.
Astrid curled her fingers around his, her grip fierce. “You are saying you would be celibate rather than risk another child?” Oh, the hurt in her voice, but still he’d insist on hurting her further.
“All I can promise you is I will be celibate with you.” Even if it meant more years of subsisting on thin soup, breathing the stench of cooked cabbage, and missing her.
“Andrew, why? I would gladly bear your children, and if—”
“I would not be a good father,” he interrupted before the entire conversation blundered into more questions and worse pain. He kissed her knuckles and wrapped his arms around her, but being Astrid, she did not let the matter lie.
“Is it that you do not want to have children with me?”
He gathered her closer, hating Herbert Allen for planting a seed of self-doubt in the mind of a woman who didn’t deserve that misery. He hated himself for nurturing that seed, but for the first time, and with surprising ease, he hated Julia Ponsonby too.
“If I were to have children with any woman, it would be you. I am not willing to sire children at all, though, and thus you have the terms of my offer.”
Also his heart on a platter, which was no improvement on the bargain. Would that he had perished in that damned accident and Adam had survived. Would that he could assuage Astrid’s doubts with tales of familial insanity or inherited weakness, but the weakness was his and his alone.
“I cannot accept such an offer, Andrew,” she replied, sadness in every word. “I do not know why you have so little faith in yourself, and I know not how to argue the point. I think we are saying good-bye.”
She was brave, and she deserved so much better.
“Ah, love, don’t cry,” Andrew whispered, shifting over her to kiss her cheeks. “Please, please don’t cry. I should never have taken liberties with you, knowing it would come to this, but believe me, Astrid, it is for the best that we part now.”
“No, Andrew,” she said through her tears, “you do not have the right of it, not this time. You are being stubborn, misguided, and f-foolish. I am glad we took liberties with each other, but I wish you would reconsider this rule you have made, or at least tell me why it is so important to you.”
She asked for so much more than she knew. She asked for him to watch the love in her eyes turn not to fond recollection or puzzled indifference, but to dismay and even hate.
He kissed her forehead as her weeping subsided. “Shall I take myself off to Enfield or disappear back to Sussex? Gareth and Felicity will understand, if it would be easier on you not to have to see me.”
Astrid bit his nipple, and not gently. “You want my permission to slink away, Andrew Alexander? I think not. You have said we are friends, and that is not how I would have my friend treat me. I will go back to Town with Douglas, armed with warnings of your suspicions, and I will be careful. Once I am gone from here, I understand you will keep your distance. But you will stay this weekend, and you will be the doting brother-in-law you’ve always been.”
“If that is your wish,” he said, inordinately relieved she wasn’t sending him away, equally concerned she would be going back to live in the Allen town house while he remained in the country—of course—thoroughly loathing himself because their dalliance was ending exactly as he’d foreseen it would.
With Astrid hurt.
“My wish is that we remain friends,” she said. “Someday, you know, I will be too old to have children, and I am waiting to hear what excuse you come up with then.”
As an attempt at humor, her words were paltry, but as an olive branch, they sufficed.
“You are forgiving me.” He wished she wouldn’t. He wished she would make him beg and suffer, and most of all, he wished she would make him reconsider.
“I am not forgiving you, Andrew. There is nothing to forgive.”
She bludgeoned him with her tolerance, pushed him overboard into seas that heaved with guilt and bewilderment. More guilt. Now he wished she’d bite him again, this time hard enough to draw blood.
“Astrid, promise me if you feel at any time unsafe with the Allens, if you have any evidence Douglas means you ill, then you must allow this marriage. Your pride, and even your feelings for me, aren’t worth your life.”
“Of all the arrogance…” Astrid huffed out. “You would ask me to be your wife, expecting me to look the other way while you sought pleasure with others? And what of me, Andrew? I am supposed to become a nun, sacrificed on the altar of your antipathy to fatherhood? Do you expect me, knowing my feelings for you, to lie with other men while you smile and wish me best of luck?”
Astrid on a verbal tear was frightening. She wielded truth like a delicate épée, slicing cleanly to the bone with every stroke.
And yet, Andrew parried her ripostes. “If we worked at it, we could come to tolerate married life. I am asking you to put your safety and that of your child above your infatuation with me. In time, you will understand I’m not worth these feelings you have for me. In time, you might even be relieved I would put no demands on you. But love me, hate me, or disdain me altogether, I would very much rather have you and your child alive to do so.”
She bit his shoulder in a fashion Andrew found… thoughtful. “I will promise, you misguided, lost man, to marry you if it becomes clear there is a threat to my life or that of this baby. I do not, however, agree to any of your ot
her terms, and I further demand that should we marry, you promise me we will live together as if we were truly man and wife.”
Andrew had long since reached a place of bleak resignation with this discussion, but rallied himself to think through that demand. He couldn’t very well protect her if he was living in Italy and she was left raising a child in Sussex. And as to that, while fashionable couples often spent some of the year apart, they also spent much of the year quite publicly together. He at least owed Astrid the appearance of a true marriage—should it ever come to that.
“I accept your terms.”
“Thank you,” she rejoined pleasantly. “I compliment you on the first bit of sense you’ve shown all night.” With that, she tucked herself into the curve of his body and went quiet.
In a just world, they would have had a chance at building a life together; in reality, tragedies, bad decisions, and unfairness abounded, and he would never be worthy of her.
And he would never have the balls to explain to her why.
He made love to her by way of consolation to her and penance for himself, aroused her with tenderness and care and a wealth of longing. She joined him in a sleepy haze and wrapped herself around him, apparently accepting the pleasure—and the loss—their joining signified. He couldn’t bring himself to tell her good-bye, simply could not say the words.
Andrew told the woman he loved, with his hands, with his body and his kisses, that he was full of regret for causing her pain. He told her he did care for her, so very much, and he told her when his body slipped from hers and he left her bed this time, he would never, ever come back.
***
Douglas Allen kissed Astrid’s forehead in greeting. He had the sense she loathed the contact, and considered it, in some convoluted way, the least he could do for her. Anger had become his best antidote to overwhelming melancholy, and Astrid had reason to be melancholy, probably more reason than she knew.
But he had to admit as he stepped back, she looked better. Her eyes were no longer a flat mask of pain, and her face showed emotion besides sadness and bewilderment.
“The country air and the company of your sister have improved your spirits.”
“Nonsense, Douglas,” Lady Amery cut in. “Astrid is wan, she has lost flesh, and she looks quite worn out to me. Lady Heathgate has no doubt been at her wit’s end with concern for her sister.”
A slight smile flickered between the sisters, the last being no doubt true. Douglas noted the glance and felt a stab of old irritation. His brothers had exchanged the same kind of looks around him constantly.
“We shall soon have her back to Town, where she may recover from the rigors of her visit to the country.” He addressed himself to Astrid, because she was a woman blessedly comfortable with plain speech. “If that is your wish?”
“Perhaps we need not make plans at this point,” Heathgate interrupted, slipping an arm around his wife in a startling display of informal affection. “I’m sure you would all like to be shown to your rooms and get settled before we gather for luncheon.”
“I, for one,” said Henry, his grin much in evidence, “would like to see the stables. I’ve been told you’ve a prime eye, your lordship.”
Viscount Fairly shoved away from the mantel where he’d been silently perusing the company with his unnerving eyes. “I’ll join you,” he said, “and we can leave Lord Heathgate to complete his morning’s correspondence.”
“Capital!” Henry rejoined.
Douglas would have liked to go with them, but that would have left no one to escort his mother to her room. He gave the marquess a bow and offered his mother an elbow.
They followed Lady Heathgate up the stairs, Lady Amery chattering about the manor house’s lovely appointments. Douglas was inordinately relieved to tuck his mother into her room and follow his hostess down the hallway to his chamber. The room was commodious and comfortable, and that was a relief too, for despite determined self-discipline, Douglas remained a man who enjoyed his creature comforts.
“Your hospitality, my lady, is all that is generous.” He bowed to her formally in the corridor, seeing his valise had been brought up already.
“You must consider yourself family while you are here, my lord,” she replied. “I have enjoyed having my sister’s company, and thank you for your willingness to share her with us these weeks past.”
“She seems to be doing better, and for that, you have my gratitude. In Town, she just… She was not coping well. I was at a loss as to how to assist her.”
Douglas followed his words with the slightest hint of a self-conscious shrug and another bow, and withdrew into his room. Having gained the precious blessing of solitude, he opened the valise, took out a stack of letters, and prepared to bail against a tide of correspondence as endless as it was depressing.
***
Dinner passed as pleasantly as lunch had, if small talk, small portions, and a small case of queasiness qualified. Astrid had made certain to seat herself neither next to nor across from Andrew, which left her immediately across from Douglas.
While Andrew conversed, flattered, and played the part of a cheerful guest, Astrid pushed braised carrots around on her plate and thought of skipping stones. Whenever she looked up, somebody was studying her—Felicity, Gareth, Henry Allen, or Douglas.
Though not Andrew. Never Andrew.
She put a forkful of carrots in her mouth and chewed slowly, then had to pretend to sneeze into her napkin to preserve herself from swallowing food that agreed with her even less than the company who had come to call.
When Felicity rose and invited the ladies to join her in the family parlor, Astrid thought to make her escape above stairs, only to find Douglas hovering at her elbow in the corridor.
“Might I offer you a turn about the gardens, my lady?” He held out an arm and assayed what for him was probably a smile, though it looked to Astrid like an inchoate case of dyspepsia. Perhaps the condition was contagious. “The evening is cool, but there are matters I would raise with you privately.”
“I’ll get my shawl.”
Douglas was nearly as tall as Andrew, and had an elegance to his frame neither of his brothers shared. Those attributes were none of his doing, but Astrid also had to credit the man with a curiously pleasant, cedary scent.
Her condition was making her daft, or making her nose daft. She repaired to her room, gave the quilt a longing stroke, and chose a lavender shawl. Let Douglas be warned that her mourning no longer consumed her, and she would not be a slave to convention merely to appease his sensibilities.
“Shall we use the back terrace?” she suggested, not waiting for him to offer his arm again. He stayed by her side, nonetheless, as they meandered around the side of the house to the largest terrace, the one that bordered the fading flower beds. The full moon had risen, making the whole scene eerily well lit.
“So, Douglas,” she said as they strolled along, “what would you discuss with me?”
He was not like some men—like Herbert—charging ahead and leaving a diminutive lady to trot after him.
“You are my brother’s widow,” he began, as if rehearsing a sermon, “and as such, certain funds should now become available to you. We have, in fact, discussed these monies on more than one occasion.”
He’d tried to discuss them while she’d considered smashing clocks. “We have. Briefly.”
“There is no other way to say this, but your funds are sorely depleted. I do apologize to you for this mismanagement.”
An opening salvo, no doubt intended to unnerve more than it apologized. “And how were my funds mismanaged, specifically?” She kept her voice pleasant, merely curious.
“I do not want to speak ill of my late brother, but his grasp of business principles was… not sophisticated,” Douglas offered, as if this were the more difficult admission.
“Is ownership, then, a com
plicated business principle, Douglas? As in, the dower portion of the settlements was mine, and was not his to use. That money was the one thing I, as a wife, could expect to remain in possession of, despite becoming my husband’s chattel. Your brother’s fault lay not in his grasp of business principles, but rather, in his grasp of morals.”
They strolled along a walk of crushed white shells, which the moonlight made luminous. Perhaps the surrounding darkness enhanced her awareness of scents, for Astrid could divine the odor of rotting undergrowth beneath the fragrance of the flowers and Douglas’s cedary scent.
Douglas bent and snapped off a white chrysanthemum. “I cannot know my brother’s motivations.” A martyr prayed for his executioner’s forgiveness in the same patient, condescending tones.
“Douglas, let us be honest.” Lest she spend the rest of the night among the chilly flowers and Douglas’s chilly remorse. “Herbert was not a bad man, but he was self-indulgent and immature. He wasted money on himself, his leman, his dogs and horses and cronies. Your brother stole from funds that should have been saved for my exclusive use, and because he was head of the family, no one stopped him.”
Though Astrid did not think Douglas would permit himself the same latitude.
“I can see your grief is abated.” One could not tell with Douglas where thoughtful observation ended and dry sarcasm began, but he was at least trading honesty for honesty.
“Do you begrudge me an abatement of grief, Douglas? Particularly when what has speeded me along has been nothing other than the reality of Herbert’s betrayals?”
Perhaps the full moon did incline people to lunacy, for Astrid felt a bout of histrionics welling.
White chrysanthemums stood for truth. Douglas tossed his into the hedge. “You speak in the plural.”
“Of course I do. Tell me which of the wedding vows Herbert kept, Douglas, and explain to me how this frittering away of the only funds I have wasn’t also a betrayal.”
Andrew: Lord of Despair (The Lonely Lords) Page 12
