August Sunrise (The Silver Foxes of Westminster Book 2)

by Merry Farmer

  Perhaps it was that hollow feeling that spurred her to get out of bed a few hours later, after Alex had risen, washed, dressed, kissed her, then gone about his day. She’d recovered as much as she could in bed. And the balmy, August morning called to her. So when no one else was around, she scooted to the edge of the bed, threw back the covers, and swung her legs over the side to stand.

  She’d gotten up to use the chamber pot for the past several days, but this time, instead of climbing back into bed, she walked to the window. Her body was stiff and weak, but that wasn’t about to stop her. If anything, it pushed her on. Her stupid, useless body that was no longer able to do what it was supposed to do. She would demand that it at least carried her to a better view.

  The result of her efforts was the reward of gazing out over Winterberry Park’s gardens and the sun-kissed Wiltshire countryside. She perched on the windowsill and took a deep breath of country air. To her London-raised eyes, the green and blue of hills and sky was something out of a fairy world. It didn’t matter how wilted or crushed she felt on the inside, the world of Winterberry Park was verdant and thriving.

  “Oh! Ma’am, you’re out of bed,” Ada exclaimed as she came through the door with a tray containing Marigold’s breakfast. “Are you sure that’s wise, ma’am?” she added as she rushed the tray to the table, then strode to Marigold’s side, as if she might fall over any minute.

  “I’m tired of being in bed,” Marigold said with a sigh.

  Ada greeted the comment with a wide smile. “That’s a very good sign, ma’am.”

  Marigold dragged her eyes away from the view out the window to give Ada a weary smile. “Is it?”

  “Yes, ma’am. It means you’re well on your way back to normal.”

  Marigold continued to smile, but her heart felt heavy. Normal for her now was as unfamiliar as darkest India. “I think I might like to get dressed today,” she told Ada, pushing herself to stand and walk to the table where her breakfast waited.

  “Yes, ma’am,” Ada replied, her smile so joyful Marigold couldn't help but match it. “I’ll pick out something soft and comfortable for you.”

  “Thank you, Ada.”

  Marigold sat to eat as her maid flittered across the hall to her dressing room, leaving both doors open. Marigold uncovered her breakfast and found that she had far more of an appetite for the sugared oatmeal and buttered eggs than she thought she’d have. Her tea tasted surprisingly good as well.

  So this is what recovery feels like, she thought to herself as she poured herself a second cup.

  She was nearly finished, with Ada waiting patiently in the doorway, when the sound of James’s laughter drifted up from the garden. Her chest squeezed tight, and sadness poked holes in the contentment Wiltshire and breakfast had given her. She forced herself to stand, feeling somewhat stronger for the meal, and walked back to the window.

  James was playing in the garden below while Ruby watched him, her little girl sitting on a blanket beside a bed of August blooms. James was dressed in short pants and a short-sleeved shirt, and appeared to be imitating a frog. He jumped around the fountain that splashed in the center of the garden, his dark hair, so much like Alex’s, catching the sun and shining.

  Marigold swallowed, tears stinging at her eyes. If she didn’t do something, James would be the only child Alex would ever have. A child he couldn’t publicly acknowledge was almost worse than having none at all.

  She took a breath and turned away from the window, facing Ada. “I’m ready to dress now.”

  “Yes, ma’am. I’ll help you across if you need it.”

  She stepped forward, but Marigold waved her away. She would have to learn to stand on her own, starting immediately. And as soon as she was dressed, she would have to make her way downstairs so that she could find Alex and do what was right by him.

  Alex liked to take his precious time at Winterberry Park easy. He valued his few months of peace and quiet more and more as his position in the government grew. On an August day as pleasant at the one that had dawned that morning, he would normally have gone out riding or dropped in at the local cricket club to see if they needed a middle-order batsman. But with Turpin still walking free after what he’d done to Marigold, the sunny summer day was his battlefield.

  “Has The Times printed its follow-up piece yet?” he asked Phillips as he paced in front of the large desk in his study, rubbing his still-healing arm. He was healing fast enough to find the splint and sling a damn nuisance.

  “They printed a piece about the search for The Turpin Maid, as they’re calling her,” Phillips reported, hands behind his back like a good soldier. “But they don’t seem willing to accuse Turpin outright.”

  “And what about the missing driver?” Alex asked on, switching directions to pace the other way.

  Phillips let out a frustrated breath. “Scotland Yard is still searching, but Commissioner Stokes is wary of looking for a criminal from Wiltshire when their jurisdiction is London.”

  “Did you tell him that the crime almost certainly originated in London?” Alex demanded, stopping his pacing to glare at Phillips as though he were the gum in the works.

  “I did,” Phillips answered with equal irritation, not taking the intense questioning personally. “And while he agrees that what happened here is consistent with other complaints and suspicions he’s had about the likes of Lord Shayles, he can’t prove anything, so he can’t do anything.”

  “Turpin and Shales are as thick as thieves.” Alex rubbed a hand over his face. “If one is involved, I’d bet my life that the other is as well.”

  “I can attempt to investigate on my own,” Phillips began.

  Alex held up a hand. “It’s too dangerous. As much as I appreciate your enthusiasm, efforts like this are best left to Malcolm Campbell.”

  “Yes, well, if he ever needs a dogsbody….” Phillips crossed his arms and glared.

  Alex sent him a weak smile and a nod. “Thanks, but I need you to keep me in touch with the political climate in London. I won’t leave any stone unturned until Turpin is stripped of his office, at the very least. I—”

  He stopped dead, his jaw dropping and his heart racing. Marigold had stepped into the doorway to his office. She was dressed, though the simple gown hung awkwardly on her frame, emphasizing the weight she’d lost. Her golden hair tied back in a braid, and her skin was pale with splotches of pink on her cheeks. She stood on her own, but Ada hovered behind her, looking ready to catch her if she fell over.

  Alex didn’t want to wait for that to happen. He rushed forward. “What are you doing?” he asked as he reached her side, scooping her into his arms and carrying her to the leather sofa near the empty fireplace.

  “I wanted to dress,” she explained. “And come downstairs. It’s been nearly a month since I set foot outside the bedroom.”

  “You need to rest and regain your strength,” Alex argued, bristling with worry. He wasn’t sure he could take it if she had a relapse.

  Whatever her physical state, she was well enough to send him a flat, almost irritated look. “How am I supposed to regain my strength if I don’t test it?”

  “Slowly,” he answered, as firm as she was prickly. “By changing rooms upstairs or practicing walking up and down the hall. Not by coming all the way down here.”

  “But I needed to talk to you,” she said, lowering her eyes. The pink of her cheeks grew even more pronounced.

  Alex glanced to Phillips, then on to Ada.

  “I’ll take this opportunity to strip your bed, air things out, and put new sheets on, ma’am.” Ada spoke quickly, clearly flustered, then fled the room.

  “And I’ll check on the business we discussed, sir.” Phillips bowed, then strode out of the room.

  As soon as he was alone with Marigold, Alex moved to draw her into his arms, but she pushed away. A stab of disappointment hit him, and while he could easily have overpowered Marigold in her current condition, he respected the boundaries she was setting and scoo
ted to the other side of the sofa.

  “What did you want to talk to me about?” he asked, snakes filling his stomach. He didn’t like the sober look on her face.

  “I’ve been giving this a lot of thought,” she began, quiet, still staring at her hands as they twisted together on her lap. It was so far from the bold, vibrant Marigold he had married that pain radiated through his chest. She left a long silence between them before she continued. “We haven’t been married long, so I don’t think it would cause much of a scandal. Especially since your entire purpose in marrying me is now…defeated.”

  The snakes in his gut writhed as dread filled him. “I don’t understand.”

  Slowly, painfully, she dragged her eyes up to meet his. “I can’t give you the heir you need, Alex. A man in your position, in the position you could soon hold, needs an heir. Especially if your political contributions are deemed valuable enough for you to be granted a title, which I’m certain they will be. Since I have been rendered useless to you,” she paused to swallow, glancing down again, “I think that you should divorce me so that you can find a wife who can bear your children.” She gulped for breath as she finished, blinking back the wetness that had formed on her lashes.

  Alex gaped at her, dread turning to horror, not so much over the suggestion she had made, but because of the potent grief that radiated from her. “Marigold….” He shifted toward her, reaching for her hands with his good arm.

  She backed way with a gasp, still not looking at him. “We are fortunate, I suppose, that your grand bill supporting the rights of women has not yet become an enacted law. There are far more ways for a man to divorce his wife at present than there are options in the other direction. I shall return to London, to my father’s house, and after the appropriate time, you can claim abandonment and—”

  “No.” He clasped his hand around hers in spite of her efforts to pull away. Her eyes fluttered, and she looked up at him, her expression helpless and hopeless. “No,” he said, louder and more insistent. At last. With his heart in pieces and his gut tied in knots, he knew how to be a good husband. “Marigold, I will not divorce you.”

  “But I’m a complete failure as a wife,” she argued, emotion overcoming her, tears making her green eyes shine. “I can’t do the one thing that I wanted to do for you more than anything else. What’s the point of us continuing on when I’m useless now?”

  Pain far greater than any he’d suffered in the wreck clawed at him. It tore him apart to see her laid so low, to see his beautiful wife questioning everything about her that he loved. He cursed his broken arm, as it kept him from embracing her as fully as he wanted to, but circled his right arm around her as intimately as he could.

  “You are not useless to me.” His voice was hoarse and his emotions intense, but he knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that she needed to hear him say it. More than she needed jewels or platitudes or anything that money could buy, she needed to know how much she meant to him. “You are beautiful and witty and clever.”

  She shook her head, tried to wriggle away from him, then gave up. “How can you say that when we barely know each other?” she asked, staring at him incredulously. “Wasn’t that the problem between us to begin with? We rushed headlong into this marriage based on a physical attraction that serves no purpose now.”

  His instinct was to explain to her that sexual intimacy served a great many more purposes than reproduction, but sense kept his mouth shut. That wasn’t what she needed to hear. “I won’t deny that we were hasty on our way to the altar, but I married you with the full intention of staying married to you for the rest of my life.”

  She didn’t seem at all convinced. In fact, she shook her head, shoulders slumping.

  He brushed his good hand under her chin, tilting her up to face him. A confidence that he’d never felt with Violetta, that he’d never felt at all, filled him. “I want to be married to you,” he said. “Not any other woman, even if she’s as fertile as a rabbit in springtime. I can’t imagine any other woman being as bold or passionate as you. I can count the number of women I’ve known who match your intelligence on one hand with fingers left over. And buried in the volumes of things we should have come to know about each other before marrying is the fact that there have been shockingly few women in my life that I have cared for enough to make my own.”

  It wasn’t exactly an admission of love. He wasn’t sure it would be right to bandy about with those words when they truly hadn’t known each other long enough for them to be as true as she would need them to be when he said them. But he could feel it coming. Love was creeping up on him like the sunrise, inevitable and beautiful, and with it came everything he felt he’d been lacking in his life.

  “I will not divorce you,” he repeated. “And perhaps you’re right. We are fortunate that the law will not let you divorce me so easily. But I promise you.” He cradled her hot cheek with his good hand. “I will move heaven and earth in my position within this government to give you the right to do just that if you so choose.”

  She let out a breath that was halfway between a sob and a cry of joy, slumping against him.

  Alex gathered her into his lap as best he could with one broken arm. “We’re partners, my darling,” he said, brushing her hair away from her face and kissing the remnants of the scars and bruises from the wreck that marred her beauty. “We may have entered into that as foolishly as two obstreperous children, but it’s too late. The deal is done. We’re a unit now, and we still have to take the political world by storm. Together.”

  “I don’t deserve you,” she sniffled, burying her face against his neck.

  Alex let out an ironic laugh. “Believe me, my darling, you do.”

  She burst into another strange sound, almost like a laugh, but wet and sniffley, and threw her arms around his neck. They sat there like that for a while, just holding each other. It was more than Alex ever could have asked for. His heart slowed to a strong, steady thump, and the snakes in his gut slithered away, leaving him with a sense of peace. At last, he could see the way forward. He could see himself as the man he’d always wanted to be. He only hoped that Marigold could feel half of the relief he felt, in spite of the suffering she must still be going through.

  “If you think it would help,” he said quietly after a time, “I could ask my friend, Armand Pearson, to visit.”

  She blinked and sat straighter. “The doctor? The one who inherited an earldom when his brother died?”

  “That’s the one.” Alex nodded and smiled. “We served together in the Crimean all those years ago. He was part of our motley band of friends. Most of us were injured at Sebastopol, you know. Armand struck up a friendship with Florence Nightingale herself, and when he returned home, he left the army to study medicine.” He paused, stroking the side of her head, feeling more awkward than he should have. “Armand has become particularly interested in women’s medicine these last few years. He’s been corresponding with an American, Dr. J. Marion Sims, in regards to women’s reproductive issues. He may have some insight on the situation.”

  “Do you trust him?” Marigold asked, looking as though she wasn’t inclined to herself.

  “With my life,” Alex reassured her.

  She nodded. “Then if he has time to visit, and if it’s what you want, please, invite him.”

  “I will.” Alex smiled brushing his thumb across her cheek.

  On a whim, he leaned close and kissed her lips, lightly, tenderly. They had so much to build back up between them that it would be tragic if he pushed things and ruined them.

  But Marigold kissed him back, as tentative as a new lover. It was a far cry from what they had shared in the early weeks of their marriage, but beneath the hesitation, he sensed hope.

  Chapter 16

  “I’m afraid the scarring is extensive,” Dr. Pearson said with a long exhale, removing the frightening-looking instruments he’d used to examine Marigold.

  She lay on her back on top of the bed, her legs propped awk
wardly on pillows so that Alex’s friend could perform his examination. Dr. Pearson’s assistant hovered in the corner of the room, ready to assist. It had been a strange, embarrassing, and awkward examination, but Alex sat on the bed with her, her back supported against him, holding her hands to reassure her. He seemed to trust Dr. Pearson—or Lord Helm, she wasn’t sure which title took precedent—so she swallowed her fear and told herself she should as well.

  As soon as Dr. Pearson shifted her skirt back into place and stood, walking to the wash-table to scrub his hands and instruments, she pushed the pillows aside and sat as demurely as she could in Alex’s arms.

  “Was it that bastard Miller’s fault?” Alex asked in a resentful growl, holding Marigold close.

  Dr. Pearson frowned, finished scrubbing his hands, then turned to them. “I believe it was. To attempt any kind of examination or so-called treatment on a woman in the midst of miscarriage is incompetent at best and barbaric at worst. And going by what you’ve told me about the resulting infection, one can only assume this Dr. Miller is woefully uneducated about Dr. Lister’s advancements in sterilizing medical instruments or the use of carbolic acid before examinations or surgeries.” He was clearly furious at the thought.

  Caught between two men fuming over the blatant incompetence of a third and the consequences that incompetence had wrought on her, Marigold sighed. “What’s done is done,” she said, pulling out of Alex’s arms and standing.

  Weeks had passed since the first day she’d gotten out of bed, August had given way to September, and the misery she’d first felt at her body’s new, useless state had faded into a dull ache deep in her gut. The same way that Alex still winced and complained of weakness and an ache in his left arm when it rained, even though his bone had healed and the splint and sling had been removed.