The Reckless Love of an Heir

by Jane Lark

  He jogged down the stairs, his palm running over the polished dark wooden bannister.

  The door of the family drawing room was open. He could not hear Susan’s voice, and yet as she was so often quiet it did not mean she was not there.

  She was not, though. His gaze had scanned the room in a second. His mother sat with his sisters and Percy.

  “Where have you been?” Percy asked.

  “Nowhere, and everywhere. I am looking for Susan. Where is she?” The desire to see her had become desperate.

  His mother looked up. “She went to the library, Henry.”

  He nodded. “Thank you.” Then turned away without another word.

  It took him a few minutes to walk to the library, and as he walked he thought about the spring, about walking to the library when he’d been tired and needed somewhere to sleep and discovered Susan leaning over her painting. That day had been the beginning of a change in the direction of his life. It had been the first time he’d really noticed Susan.

  The door was shut—to protect her precious retreat and her privacy. He turned the handle, uncaring if he intruded.

  She was sitting on the sofa where he’d lain in the summer, reading one of the books.

  He shut the door. She’d not heard him open it. She’d not looked up. He walked across the room.

  Her hand lifted and her fingers slid her spectacles up the bridge of her nose.

  He smiled as he neared her, and then she looked up. His heart leapt only because he was near her, he had not even touched her.

  She straightened up. “Hello. Did you speak to your father?”

  Damn. The words cut through him. In the moment before she’d spoken he’d intended to kiss her, but that desire died within him. Instead he sat down beside her, on the other end of the sofa, leaning forward and resting his elbows on his knees. “Yes.”

  She stood up and walked across the room, he presumed to return the book she had been looking at to a shelf. “What did he say?”

  “That he cannot cope with the fact he was not there to hold William when he died.” Henry’s voice rasped. He swallowed. But the emotion welling up would not be swallowed down.

  “Did you tell him that was foolish?” She was over at the bookcase behind him. He could not see her.

  “Yes.” He swallowed three times. “He cried.”

  “Oh.” From the sounds of the rustle of fabric she was coming back to him, quickly. “Did that upset you?”

  “Yes.” His answer was choked by the ball of emotion blocking his throat.

  “Oh, Henry.” Her hand fell on his head, and clasped his shoulder, and she drew his head against her stomach.

  His arms lifted and clung about her waist as her hand stroked over his hair. Love. This was love. The tears that he had not wept since William’s death. The tears he’d longed to weep at William’s bedside, the tears that had been choking him ever since he’d carried William’s body down the stairs at Eton, the tears he’d swallowed back while his father had cried, escaped in rivers as he clung to Susan.

  She did not say, it will become easier, or that time heals the wounds of such losses, or that he should not cry for his brother but celebrate the short life William had lived. All of those things he knew, but had not spoken to his father either, because in this moment what he needed, was what his father had needed—just to cry out his loss, anger and guilt—and have someone care.

  After a while he became aware only of her slender fingers resting on his hair and of his arms wrapped about her waist holding her as Gerard had held him at William’s bedside, and his breathing against the fabric of her dress next to the warmth of her body.

  She still did not speak as his tears dried.

  Nor did he. He just held her.

  This is what love was. It would never have been like this with Alethea, thank the Lord he had discovered this affection for the right sister.

  He let Susan go and looked up. “Will you sit on my lap?”

  She smiled and slipped off her shoes, then slid her spectacles a little farther up the bridge of her nose as he leant back, resting one elbow on the arm of the sofa. She sat sideways, as she had done last night with her knees bent up. Her head rested against his chest. His arms surrounded her and held her in place.

  “Do you remember when you were painting in here and I came in to sleep?”

  “Yes I remember.”

  “The room seemed a dozen times more peaceful with you quietly painting near me. I think that was when I first began to know that you meant something to me. Something I had overlooked for years.”

  Her cheek rubbed against his black waistcoat as she snuggled in closer to him. “When I watched you, while you were sleeping. You seemed so different that day from the boy I had known—”

  “And disliked.” A rumble of amusement rang in his chest at the thought of her accusing words. Reckless and self-centered. But she had been right about him. He had behaved wrongly towards her, following Alethea’s equally selfish lead, the two spoilt eldest children who thought they were owed everything as their right.

  Her head lifted, her hair brushing against his neck above the collar of his shirt. “Very well, the boy I had disliked. I could see so many of your bruises, and you looked so… wounded and not arrogant at all.”

  “Arrogant was that a charge you threw at me too? I had forgotten if it was. But that was also true, along with reckless and self-centered. Well I am doing my best to be none of them now.”

  “I know.”

  His hand lifted and he would have stroked her hair but it was secured in a bun, instead he ran a curled finger down the bridge of her precious nose, below her spectacles. “I love you.”

  “I love you too, but you should sleep, Henry, I would guess you have hardly slept in nights. Take this moment of peacefulness. I shan’t leave you. I will sit here and read and make sure no one disturbs you.”

  She would have risen but he held her down. “No. Stay here. If I am able to sleep it will be with you in my arms.”

  She sighed, yet her head rested against his chest again. “Shut your eyes.”

  ~

  The sound of a gong woke Susan. Dinner. Henry’s hands lay on her head and her shoulder. His fingers moving, stroking in tiny circular movements.

  She sat upright. “Have you slept?”

  He smiled. “Yes I woke only a moment ago.”

  “Oh.”

  His arms fell away from her. She stood as the gong sounded again.

  “We are not dressed for dinner.”

  “I think we will be forgiven. It is only our family.”

  Our family. Yes. She would not worry if she had been at home, and Farnborough was home now.

  “Do I look dreadful? Is my hair tangled?” Her fingers lifted to press against it looking for strands that might have slipped free from the pins.

  “You look beautiful, and only as though you have not dressed for dinner, and no one will care.” He stood up and tugged his black waistcoat down to straighten it. He was not wearing his coat, only his waistcoat and white shirt. It made him appear so slender, enhancing the look of his figure.

  “Come along and cease your fretting, I feel rested for the first time since William died and I am not going to allow you to feel ashamed for enabling it.”

  No one looked at either of them oddly in the dining room, it was just a family meal, and Aunt Jane—Jane—smiled at Susan regularly throughout the meal as Henry’s father laughed quietly, occasionally, at things Gerard and Stephen said. It changed the tone of the conversation. Percy became more exuberant, speaking of horse races and Susan joined in because she knew about race horses as her father bred them. Then Uncle Robert even joined the conversation. Percy grasped at his responses and turned to him, asking him his view. Uncle Robert spoke more quietly, but he continued to speak.

  Susan glanced at Henry and caught his gaze, he smiled.

  When she looked away, she saw his mother—Jane—watching his father with a soft smile and moisture
in her eyes.

  Chapter Thirty-two

  “Susan!”

  “I am in here!” Henry’s father had been working in the library and so she had brought her paints up to their sitting room to work, and was currently trying to capture the light as it fell on what was probably one of the last yellow rose buds of the season. It was already autumn.

  He walked into the room from their bedchamber. He’d probably thought she had come up to rest. Samson, who had been sitting beside her, rose, tail wagging, and crossed the room to welcome Henry.

  “You are painting.” He stated the obvious, but he liked watching her paint as much as Samson did, and the words were spoken with that expression. “I have a letter for you, from London.” He lifted it and held it out to her as he walked across the room, while she wiped off her brush then set it down and straightened up, picking up another rag to wipe her hands.

  “From, Mama?”

  “No. It is Alethea’s writing.”

  Emotion spun through Susan tumbling down from her head to her toes. She had not heard from Alethea since the day Susan had married Henry. She put the rag down and held out her hand to take the envelope, then looked at the address. She had missed her sister so much. Her fingers shook making the letter tremble as she broke the seal and pulled open the envelope then withdrew the folded paper.

  She had written once, on the afternoon of the day that Henry had wept for William. She had written and told Alethea how much she loved her. But she had told her how much she loved Henry too, and explained that she could no more have set Henry aside than she could Alethea. She had said that she’d tried, but she loved him too much to watch him fret in pain over her either and that she just could not have lived without him, even if it made her selfish and cruel.

  Henry reached out and took the envelope from her, then set it down by her painting as she began to read.

  She looked at Henry. “She is to be married. The Earl of Stourton proposed and she has accepted.”

  “I am glad. She will be happy too, then.”

  Susan looked back at the letter then read more. “She says she has forgiven us,” she spoke as she read on, “and that I may happily have you with her blessing because she is far more in love with Stourton than she ever was with you.”

  A sound of amusement from Henry lifted Susan’s gaze. “She says she is glad now that she let me have you and did not fight.”

  “Susan.” His hand lifted and curved about her cheek. “Sweetheart do not take a single word of that to heart. I was never Alethea’s to give, you do not have me because she allowed it. You have me because you are the right woman for me, and my heart knew it. In reality I have always been yours.”

  Tears filled Susan’s eyes, blurring her vision.

  Henry’s fingers lifted her spectacles off the bridge of her nose, then he kissed away one of her tears, before wrapping his arms about her.

  “I am sorry. I am far too emotional these days. I weep over the slightest thing.”

  “That emotion is good.” His chin rested against her hair as she leant into his chest.

  “Will we go to London for the wedding? It is to be in St George’s”

  “Of course. When?”

  “At the end of July.”

  “Then you will be very plump and our secret will be out in the open.”

  She smiled against his chest. “It will be out in the open long before then.”

  “I suppose. But I have enjoyed keeping it ours. Shall we go down to the drawing room, Mama just called for tea.”

  “Yes.”

  As she turned away to tidy up her paints, his hand fell and caressed her stomach.

  He touched the place where their child had begun to grow all the time even though it was scarce weeks and she did not show at all.

  They walked downstairs together, with her holding Henry’s arm as he held the bannister. He’d become ridiculously over protective, to a silly extent, since they had learned about the child. She was to only walk downstairs either holding his arm or the bannister, and she had been banned from riding. He’d told her very bluntly he would not allow any reckless behaviour when this was their child. Which had made her laugh at him, and she’d swallowed several hundred words of argument he’d probably previously thrown at his father.

  She had not fought against his riding ban as yet, though, because her stomach felt so constantly queasy she was not in a mood to ride.

  They sat and drank tea with Sarah, Christine and Henry’s mother, and shared Alethea’s news. His father was still busy in the library. Henry went to join him when the tea was cleared away. He’d continued to help his father with the estate management, only now it was not like a child thrown into deep water, but he and his father worked together, with his father showing Henry the way of things and handing over certain responsibilities when Henry was ready to accept them.

  Susan excused herself and returned to their room to rest, in the company of Samson, who now acted her shadow whenever Henry was elsewhere.

  Henry woke her when it was time for dinner, and they changed together, with him lacing her corset because he feared a maid might secure it too tightly and hurt the child. She smiled at his image in the mirror as he stood behind her and lay both hands over her stomach.

  He smiled at her.

  She turned and clasped his hand. “Come along Monsieur Cat.”

  “Monsieur Cat…” He frowned at her.

  “You smile at me all the time as though I am the freshest cream.”

  He laughed, then he answered, “But how am I to help feeling so happy when your eyes glitter with pleasure as though whenever I touch you we are about to begin a waltz.”

  After dinner the family, as it was, without the boys who were at school, or Percy who was at university, gathered about the pianoforte. Henry’s mother played, with his father sitting beside her turning her pages, while the rest of them sang. Henry stood behind Susan as he had done upstairs before they’d come down, with his hands gently resting on her stomach.

  It was still early when Christine claimed that she was tired and said she would retire, and Sarah then said she would walk upstairs with her and retire too.

  “We shall go to bed also,” Henry stated, letting Susan go.

  “Not for a moment.” His father reached out and caught a hold of Henry’s sleeve to stop him. “We wish to speak with you.” He looked at Sarah who was walking across the room to leave. “Will you close the door.”

  Henry turned to Susan, and whispered through the side of his mouth. “We are in for some sort of scold I think…”

  She smiled.

  Henry’s father stood. “It is not a scold.”

  His mother stood. “It is a scold.”

  His father looked back at her with a humour filled smile then looked at Henry. “We believe we are expecting a grandchild and our son has been neglectful and forgotten to inform us.”

  “Is it true?” His mother’s voice had slipped into pure excitement as she looked at Susan. “There have been all the signs, you have missed breakfast more days than not in the last three weeks, and you yawn and then retire in the afternoons, and Henry,” she looked at him, “you are forever touching Susan’s stomach.”

  When Susan looked at Henry his smile matched his father’s and mother’s. “It was supposed to be our secret.” His expression instead said how thrilled he was to have been caught out.

  “Oh, Susan! That is so wonderful!” His mother rushed about the piano and grasped Susan in a firm embrace.

  “Congratulations.” His father embraced Henry.

  “Oh I am so happy for you both.” His mother let Susan go then turned to hold Henry. “But now I shall be itching to tell all my friends, and Ellen and Edward.”

  Henry settled an arm about Susan’s shoulders. “If anyone is to tell anyone, Mama, it will be us, and Susan’s parents should know before your friends or Edward.”

  “But that is so cruel, my tongue will be bursting to say it.”

  Henry’
s father settled a hand about his mother’s waist. “Let the boy have his moment of wonder and pride my love, do not be cruel and steal it from him, the announcement is part of the excitement and we have stolen this moment from him.”

  She looked at Henry, then Susan. “Were we cruel? I could not continue pretending that I had not guessed.”

  Susan clasped his mother’s hands. “You were not cruel at all. It is wonderful that you know, Mama. It is only that we wished to be certain—”

  “But you are certain…”

  “Yes, absolutely certain.” Susan was held once more.

  When his mother let her go, Susan added, “I will write to my mother tomorrow, and then within a week you may tell whoever you wish.”

  “But I shall write to Edward,” Henry stated.

  “And then I will not have many others to tell. Ellen and Edward are in London with the girls, Ellen will tell.”

  Susan looked at Henry. Then Harry would know, and all of Henry’s friends. He had not seen them much in their months of mourning. They would see them when they travelled to London for Alethea’s wedding, though. He’d changed so much since they’d married, or rather since William’s death, she wondered if his friends would even recognise Henry as he was now.

  When they retired, after they’d made love, and she lay on her back with her head resting on his arm and he lay on his side beside her, drawing idle circles on her stomach with his finger tips, she asked him, “Do you ever wish that you were not married, and that you were free to live as you used to?”

  “You mean to race my carriage hell for leather to Brighton, Bath or York and topple it over on the road. No, I do not, darling. I am more than happy with our life. I need nothing to inspire me other than your company, this is a very pleasant, if perhaps a tamer source of adventure.”

  Epilogue

  There were tears in his eyes, clouding his view. Henry wiped them away with the heel of his palm. Foolish. So foolish to weep and yet the tears would not be held back now they’d begun. Susan lifted her hand and it stroked across his hair, as his fingers stroked over the softest hair on his daughter’s head. The baby was so tiny. He could not believe how tiny she was, and yet he’d seen his brothers and sisters as infants, but this was his daughter.