Marrying Mischief

by Lyn Stone

  Suddenly, Emily brought her clasped hands down on Carrick’s gun arm, forcing it downward. His shot went wild as she raised one knee. Carrick screamed and Nick lunged simultaneously.

  All three of them landed in a tangle. Carrick struggled, keening, one hand between his legs where Em’s knee had struck and the other flailing the useless pistol about. He’d never had the chance to cock the damn thing again, thank God. Nick pinned Carrick’s wrist to the floor and jerked the gun from his hand.

  “Get off,” he ordered Emily. “I have him.”

  Emily rolled to one side, well away from Carrick, and bounced lithely to her stockinged feet. She pranced over to the draperies and tore off one of the cords that held them back. “Here,” she said as she tossed it over. “You’ll have to tie him. My hands are still shaking and my wrist hurts like blue blazes.”

  Nick trussed up Carrick with the drapery cord and tied his feet together with the man’s neckcloth. He hurriedly checked for hidden weapons, then left him lying where he was.

  He approached Emily, who understandably looked rather shaken. “Let me see your hand.”

  She nodded and presented the one she had injured.

  After feeling the small bones and moving it gently, he cradled it in his palm. “Your wrist is intact, but something is broken. You broke your promise to me and threw yourself directly in harm’s way,” he said softly. “How old was that promise? Moments?”

  “I had my fingers crossed,” she admitted, offering that little one-shouldered shrug she always employed when guilt plagued her. “Mischief just seems to follow me wherever I go.”

  He laughed softly and tweaked her nose. “You are mischief! What a dull life I’ve led these past few years without you.”

  “I’ll certainly try to be more circumspect in future,” she avowed, blue eyes twinkling.

  “Of course you will.”

  Emily worried that Nick might pardon his cousin’s perfidy in the interest of avoiding a scandal, but he promised he would ensure the man never troubled them again. He had locked Carrick, still bound, inside the empty pantry off Guy’s kitchen. Then they had saddled Nick’s mount and ridden the short distance back to Kendale House. There, he left her with a promise to return as soon as possible after concluding his business with the police.

  She now languished in the room where Nick had spent part of his childhood. It was a large, airy chamber with a smaller and more modest version of the bed in the smoke-damaged master chamber.

  Clad only in her shift after her bath, she tried to sit still while Rosie buzzed around her, fussing over the fact that a bit of Emily’s hair had been singed the night before and had to be cut. Scissors snipped here and there until Rosie seemed satisfied with the results. Obviously that was not all that troubled the maid. “Out with it, Rosie. You are bursting to ask me something, I can tell.”

  “Do you want one of the old gowns to wear?”

  “That is not what is on your mind,” Emily admonished.

  “They was still packed in the trunk that come from the carriage wreck. I aired ’em out.”

  “Rosie?”

  “Ye’ll turn me off if I tell ye.”

  “No, I won’t.”

  “Mr. MacFarlin asked if I’ll walk out with him,” Rosie admitted with a worried look.

  “I’ve no objection at all.”

  Rosie huffed and crossed her arms over her chest. One foot tapped nervously. “He’s wantin’ to marry me, if ye must know. His lordship won’t like it.”

  Emily bit her lips together. Rosie might be right. “I…I suppose I could speak to him, if you like,” she offered, not altogether certain she was up to broaching the subject with Nick. “Just because you and he were once intimate, I should hope he wouldn’t prevent—”

  Rosie’s clapped her hands over her reddened cheeks. “Blimey, ye know about me and Percy? How in the world? We was so careful!”

  “Not you and Wrecker. I meant you and Nick. His lordship.”

  Rosie was already shaking her head, her eyes widened so the whites showed all around. “Me and Lord Nick? We never! Who told you such a wicked lie?”

  Emily jumped to her feet and rounded on Rosie, shaking a finger under her nose. “You told me. You confessed it that first night!”

  “No, no, no,” Rosie groaned. “Not him. Lord Ambrose, his da! The old sport never showed no good side unless he was naked, but he cut a right smart figger in bed, he did. He was the one!”

  Emily whirled around, covering her mouth with one hand to keep from sobbing with relief. That would hardly be appropriate. When she thought she could speak calmly, she turned again and faced the maid. “Then why would you think my husband would not sanction your marriage to Mr. MacFarlin?”

  Rosie blinked, then shrugged. “Why, most lords think staffers marrying in the same house causes all sorts a troubles. It ain’t usually allowed.”

  “Not marrying might cause more trouble,” Emily guessed, voicing her thoughts. “I think he will agree.”

  “Oh, thank ye, Lady Em! You’ll speak to him on our account, then?”

  “Definitely. As soon as may be,” Emily said, holding out her hands to Rosie. “I wish you all happiness, Rosie. Do you love him?”

  Green eyes brightened with tears. “Oh, Lady, my Percy’s a fine man, he is. Ain’t no bloke ever been so nice. He fetched me flowers from the garden out back. And he give me this,” she said excitedly, reaching in her pocket to withdraw a simple silver ring with two hearts engraved on it.

  “How lovely,” Emily said, hugging Rosie on an impulse. She knew it wasn’t proper, but she couldn’t help recalling the cheery little red-haired girl who had once been simply her friend.

  They were both in tears and laughing. Rosie finally stepped back and reached out to touch Emily’s face. “Lord Nick made it all right, didn’t he? Last night after the fire? You and him?”

  Emily nodded.

  “Good enough! Why, you’ll be rounding out with the next little lordship next thing we know!”

  The thought had never entered Emily’s mind, but it was more than welcome now that Rosie put it there. She ran a hand over her stomach and imagined what it would be like, carrying Nick’s child, nurturing a son or daughter. Being a mother.

  “You’d best get dressed,” Rosie advised.

  “The blue day gown,” Emily said, looking forward to feeling the soft batiste envelop her like a mother’s embrace. She wished she could share her happiness and her hopes with her own mother and also with the Countess, who had surely watched over her like a guardian angel. Every single venture had proved successful.

  Glancing down at her hand where the blue stones sparkled in the ring Nick had given her on their wedding day, she imagined them winking at her. And she smiled back.

  Nick hurried to Kendale House as soon as he had seen to his cousin’s incarceration and Munford’s release. Carrick’s trial would not take place for a while. There would be a right to-do about it in the news when it did happen, but there was no help for it. Emily was safe now, that was all that counted.

  Munford had been irate about his false arrest, but when Nick had returned the clipper ship, Madeline, for a mere fraction of its worth, the man had turned ecstatic. He couldn’t wait to reclaim her when she returned from her current voyage to the Indies.

  Nick knew Emily would be waiting for him now. Guy had laughed at him for happily grinning throughout the proceedings at the station house, but Nick could not seem to think of much besides Emily and how she had taken down not one but two full-grown men in defense of him. He wanted to crow.

  It was ridiculous to take pride in such wild antics, but he couldn’t help himself.

  When he arrived at Kendale House, Jems, the under-butler, opened the door for him and advised him that Upton had gone, and had not been seen since the fire.

  Good riddance, Nick thought as he bounded up the stairs.

  When he opened the door to his old room, Emily greeted him with the sweetest smile. If he hadn’t kno
wn her so well, he might have taken it at face value. Emily was up to something. “Let’s have it. What have you done now?”

  She wrinkled up her nose and laughed. “Not what I’ve done, but what I’m going to do.”

  He took her hands in his and drew her to him for a kiss. “And what, dare I ask, will that be?”

  She ducked her head shyly. “I’m going to have a baby. A fat, raven-haired, brown-eyed little boy with no musical talent and a title hanging over his head. What do you think of that?”

  Nick laughed. “Good for you! Have two while you’re about it, the heir and the spare. Then you can start on the girls.” He kissed her again. “Tell me, do you plan to do this anytime soon?”

  She leaned back in his arms and looked up at him. “I’ve already begun.”

  “Silly widgeon, it’s too soon to know that.”

  Even as he said it, she was shaking her head. “No, it isn’t! It’s a feeling I’ve had since I first realized it was possible.”

  Nick frowned. “Emily, are you quite all right?”

  “Well, you’ll think I’m not, but that’s as may be. Take off your clothes.”

  “What?” he asked on a gust of laughter.

  “Take off your clothes and get in bed. We have to make sure I’m not wrong about this,” she warned, frowning at him now. She set about unbuttoning her own gown, her arms at an unnatural angle trying to reach the buttons in back.

  “Turn around,” he coaxed. “Allow me.” He undid her buttons and untied the laces on her corset, then watched with interest as she promptly shed her gown and stepped out of it and her petticoats. Clad only in a thin silk shift and her stockings, Emily looked incredibly enticing. She shot him the most daring grin. “Well? Go on.”

  He wasted no time in stripping off his own clothes, then took her hand and walked with her to the bed. The afternoon sun streamed through the windows. Birds chirped in the cherry tree that towered up to their window. The room smelled of spring lilacs.

  Though he was certainly aroused by her eagerness, Nick wanted to prolong the interlude. There was an innocence and sweetness about it somehow, as if they were offering one another all their secrets in the bright light of day. Pledging to share everything there was to share. He looked at her and saw the incredible love in her eyes that he had seen there before when she was seventeen. He knew she must see the same in his, for he felt it to the depth of his soul.

  “I trust you,” she whispered.

  “And I love you. Now I know what the poets mean when they speak of love,” he replied as he took her in his arms. “Now I know.”

  He lowered her to the bed, their bodies fitting together so perfectly he felt it would destroy the moment if he began to move too soon.

  “So, do you intend to pause and read me a sonnet?” she asked, shifting sinuously against him, a mischievous note in her softly spoken question.

  He kissed her neck, touching his tongue to the rapidly fluttering pulse there. “Sorry to disappoint you, love. As soon as you’re too far gone with child to do this. Then I will read.”

  Epilogue

  “Nicholas! Nick?” Emily cried as she came dashing down the stairs. “The most awful thing!”

  He caught her in his arms the moment she swung around the newell post and nearly fell. “What’s happened?” he demanded, glancing up the stairs. “Is it Guilford?”

  She nodded frantically. “Yes! You must call Dr. Mershon again. Baby Guy…he swallowed my ring!” She held up her hand to show him it was missing. “I took it off to bathe him and…somehow he got it…and gulped it right down!”

  “Listen. Be still and listen to me, Em.” He brushed her flyaway curls from her forehead and smiled down into her eyes. “Remember, Em, when he swallowed the rock? It was much larger and everything came out in the end.”

  “This is not amusing!” she cried. “I can’t be without that ring, not even for a day!”

  He drew her down to sit on the second step and almost had to restrain her. “Take a deep breath. There now, tell me why you’re so panicked. Are you worried about the baby? He’s almost two, Em, not an infant. The ring will not harm his insides. It’s not sharp. Trust me, you’ll have it back in short order.”

  She buried her face in her hands and attempted to steady herself. “All right,” she said finally, uncovering her face and sucking in a deep breath. “It’s all right.”

  Nick frowned. It was not like Emily to carry on so. She had been perfectly calm—well, for the most part—since the early weeks of their marriage. She had made the transition to London Society with an ease he would never have believed. Though most of their friends considered her a bit eccentric, they all loved her dearly. She had been a credit to him in his work, providing opinions that deserved great consideration when presenting his speeches to the House. And what a brave soul she had been when carrying little Guilford Nicholas and giving birth to him.

  But something had overset her terribly and it surely consisted of more than Baby Guy swallowing a ring. God only knew the child had ingested almost everything he could find that would fit between his teeth.

  “That ring has become my talisman, you see,” she explained haltingly. “I sort of…depend on it.”

  Nick stifled a laugh. “Oh, Emily, surely you, of all people, are not superstitious!”

  “No, well, not exactly. It’s just that I feel your, uh, your mother sort of looks after me when I’m wearing her ring. I feel lost without it.”

  “That’s absurd,” he declared. “It never belonged to Mother.” Her look of profound shock concerned him more than her silly notion. “Why did you believe it was hers?”

  She grasped his arm. “The necklace?”

  “Yours, too. I bought the set to give you as a betrothal gift the week before I kissed you and Father sent me away. I’d planned to ask you to marry me. I told you that.”

  “No!”

  “Yes. The moment I saw the set with gems the very color of your eyes, I spent my entire quarterly allowance and borrowed ten quid from Michael to purchase it for you. Ask him.”

  She deflated like a punctured balloon. Nick slid his arm around her for support. “So you see, it wasn’t my mother looking after you from the Great Beyond. It was you who took care of yourself.”

  Her brows drew together as she looked up at him. “But her clothes. Whenever I wore them, I felt safer, more dignified, more like a countess. Her essence seemed to be in them somehow, shoring me up.”

  “Not at all. She never even wore them, you know. She only had them done up so the dressmaker would be required to visit her once a week. The only thing I ever saw her wear in those last years were fancy nightrails and wrappers. Her maid asked for those and a few of the simpler dresses when she was leaving after Mother’s death. I told her to take them. As far as I know, you haven’t a stitch that ever graced my mother’s form. What do you think of that?”

  For a long time Emily remained silent, thinking. Then she smiled. “I was a goose, wasn’t I? But you know, Nick, I thought she was the most wonderful person. Like a queen holding court, the epitome of the English noblewoman. I think I grew to love her, yet we never exchanged more than a few words.”

  Nick embraced her so that she leaned back against him and he spoke against her ear. “You want to hear something truly ironic? I used to sit on Mother’s bed and tell her of your wild antics.”

  “Oh, no, you did no such thing!”

  “I did. Remember that gallop across the meadow on old Bessie? How you grabbed that branch that should have raked you right off her back? I had to ride up and fetch you off it so you wouldn’t drop and break both legs. There were dozens—perhaps hundreds—of tales of your almost daily scrapes. But somehow, you always landed right side up, laughing at the world. My mother lived through you, I think. She craved those stories and thought you were the bravest girl she’d ever known. I can’t believe she didn’t mention them to you when you visited with the vicar.”

  “No, she never did,” Emily said, soun
ding a bit sad. “But she winked at me once.”

  Nick stood up and pulled Emily to her feet. “Let’s go up to the nursery and see if our lad has found dessert for himself. I do hope you moved my old coin collection to a higher shelf. The little fellow will jingle when he walks.”

  She laughed and slid her arm around his waist as they trudged upstairs. “You got more mischief than you bargained for when you wed me, didn’t you, Kendale?”

  “I’m not complaining,” he assured her with a hug. “You compensate quite well for it.”

  She smiled that sweet smile again, the one that always set him on guard. “I am so happy you think so,” she said. “For I must warn you, there might be more on the way.”

  Nick closed his eyes for a moment to savor the news. He could swear he heard his mother’s laughter.

  ISBN: 978-1-4603-6012-5

  MARRYING MISCHIEF

  Copyright © 2002 by Lynda Stone

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