by Darcy Burke
Miriam dropped a curtsey before Richard’s disarmingly casual sister-in-law. A feral growling from nearby raised the hairs on the back of Richard’s neck. He frowned, staring out over the lawn. A bush rustled.
“GRRAAR!”
A small boy leaped out of a planter. Miriam gasped. The boy squealed with laughter as a very large and muscular man rose from behind the bush and snatched the boy in midair. Together they fell safely onto the grass, where the man pretended that the boy had bested him.
Beside him, Miriam fought a smile. Her smile faded as the man rose, plucked the boy from his chest and hoisted him to his shoulders without seeming effort.
“Richard. Meet your nephew, Bennett.” The large man’s voice was a low rumble. Miriam’s gray eyes widened at the sight of the thick raised scar around his neck. Seeing it again even shocked Richard. His brother had been dragged back to England with violence. Edward wore no cravat with his loosely buttoned shirt, rumpled waistcoat, and buff trousers with grass-stained knees. “Welcome home, Richard.”
“Thank you. Edward. My wife, Miriam Northcote, nee Walsh.” Richard bent to greet the boy whose arrival into the world had knocked Richard even further out of the line of succession for the Briarcliff earldom. “Good day, Master Bennett,” Richard said, offering the boy his hand. The little boy’s innocent hazel eyes gazed up at him with sudden shyness. He buried his face in his father’s hair.
Would he be cruel, or kind? Surely the child had heard stories of his uncle’s attempts to have his father locked away in an asylum.
“I have brought you a gift. Climb down from your father’s shoulders, and you may open it directly.” Richard held a parcel concealed behind his back.
“Oooh!” The boy wiggled and practically fell over his father’s head in his eagerness to climb down. He grabbed two hanks of the earl’s longish hair. The earl grimaced and set his son down on the flagstones.
“Bennett, dear, what do you say to your uncle?” prompted the countess.
“Thank you, sir.”
Miriam smiled. Bennett looked just like his father, but with his mother’s honey-blonde hair. Perhaps that would darken as he aged. “How old is he?”
“Almost two and a half. He arrived quite soon after our marriage.” The countess did not blush in making the admission. She looked levelly at Miriam, assessing her with warm but guarded hazel eyes. Her eyes were quite striking, beautifully shaped, and heavily fringed with lashes. Richard had placed a small parcel on the patio. Bennett was happily ripping at the ribbon with his uncle’s assistance.
The paper was peeled back to reveal a brightly painted wooden horse, exquisitely crafted with joints to move its legs. Delighted, Bennett grabbed his father’s knee and pretended to gallop.
“Thank you, Richard. It is a delightful pony. Miss Walsh, won’t you have a seat?”
Richard glanced sidelong at Miriam. She offered no words to contradict him. Try as she might, shyness glued her lips together.
“I would return your gesture if I were able,” the countess laughed. “Come, you must be famished. There is a light luncheon awaiting us in the dining room.” The earl took his very pregnant wife’s arm and carefully helped her up the short step into the house. The tenderness with which he handled his wife brought an unexpected lump to Richard’s throat. She glanced at Richard with a hint of sadness at the corners of her mouth and in her eyes. It seared him with the heat of regret.
“It feels false to pretend that we are married,” she said.
“I shall follow your lead if you wish to tell them the truth. Tell them everything. I guarantee my sister-in-law won’t be the least bit shocked,” Richard said with bitterness.
“Oh, I intend to. I’m waiting for the right moment,” Miriam snapped. “They have had weeks to anticipate a wedding. I hate to crush their hopes, yet it must be done.”
A familiar wheeze squeezed her chest.
“Are you having an attack? London’s air is notoriously foul. We can remove to the countryside.”
“I am fine. Or will be in a few minutes.”
Richard hesitated. “I care about you. Give me a chance to prove that, Miriam.”
She laughed. The sound cut him deeply.
“Admit it. You never wanted me for myself either.” Richard’s ire rose in a barely checked tidal wave of emotion that threatened to swamp his tenuous equilibrium. All he wanted was to settle down with this woman who had stolen his heart. Set them up comfortably as a gentleman shopkeeper. The days of his dreams for a title and status were gone. Fifteen minutes in Edward’s presence had proved that to him.
“Excuse me?” Miriam turned on him with a scowl.
“You were exactly like Lizzie. You only wanted what I could give you.” They would have their argument now, before it could blow up in front of his family.
“Are you delusional, Richard?” Miriam laughed again, this time with amazement. Richard’s hands fisted at his sides.
“You and Lizzie both only wanted my status as a nobleman and freedom from the men in your lives. You, from Livingston; Lizzie, from Arthur.”
Miriam’s mouth flattened into a thin line.
“Even knowing this, I thought you saw something within me worth loving. I clung to that ray of hope so desperately that I did everything within my power to protect you from your friend’s schemes. I placed our financial power in your hands. I made arrangements to take you as far away from her as I could. I gave you a means of dissolving our union, should you wish to do so.”
“By filing for an annulment,” Miriam choked. Were those tears shimmering in her eyes? Richard wished for tangible proof that she understood why he’d married her.
“I did not marry you because Lizzie forced me to, Miriam. I married you because I wanted to. Give me a chance, and I will prove to you that no other man could ever love you as much as I do.” Tenderly Richard raised his hand to brush a small spot of dampness from her soft cheek.
“Ahem. Am I interrupting? The countess will join us for a late luncheon and then retire for the afternoon.”
“Brother.” Richard pulled away. “The decision is yours, Miriam,” he whispered. “You must make it soon.”
They silently joined Harper and Edward in the dining room.
“I must beg you to pardon the lack of flavor in the food. I have been nauseous for every single day of the past eight months,” she explained. “The mere smell of food is enough to send me into a queasy fit. The midwife assures me that morning sickness subsides after three or four months, but with twins I find I can scarcely eat anything other than bread and potatoes.”
“And ices. Her ladyship does love pistachio ice cream.” The earl’s voice was peculiar, a low rumble. He had quickly changed his shirt and shrugged into a jacket, but he was not wearing a cravat. Miriam tried not to stare at the sight of the thick scar visible at the base of his throat. Miriam recalled what Richard had told her about his brother being hauled out of the jungle by the neck and winced. What an injury that must have been.
“Only when formed to look like vegetables. I have to pretend I am eating something with nutrition.” Harper winked across the table at him.
They were joking, Richard realized. It was such an easy thing to miss. The earl and his countess were so easy with one another, and with their son. Despondent envy curled through him.
“What are you doing in London in the middle of the summer?” Richard asked. “Ordinarily everyone who can afford it flees for the countryside.”
“We are here for several reasons, the most important of which was to greet you and Miriam. We were so very surprised and pleased to receive your letter, Richard. The progress you have made in America is impressive. I can see the changes in you, and they are very much for the better. Am I to understand you and Miriam have already wed?”
“Legally, yes,” Miriam interjected. Richard’s head jerked up as he stared at the woman who had just declared herself his wife. Beside her, Mrs. Kent poked at her luncheon of boiled eggs and rolls as if
nothing shocking at all. Miriam lifted her chin defiantly. “We had planned to have a second ceremony here in England, when the time is right.”
He smiled faintly. Miriam returned her attention to the food. A pink stain colored her cheek.
“That can be arranged,” Edward observed.
“We are waiting for our ship to arrive. The Thetis,” Miriam informed the Earl. “Then, we shall celebrate our union.”
She was giving him a chance. Richard didn’t know whether to kiss her or run to the docks in search of the ship that by rights ought to be only a few days behind them.
“The second reason we’ve remained in London is that I wanted to be close to the doctor Edward has found. The doctor did not want me to travel to the country in the spring, fearing that I might lose the babies. Twins are risky, so we are taking every precaution. In the country, one can wait for quite a while before a midwife or doctor arrives. I have a midwife, who is here in residence with us, working under the supervision of London’s best surgeon.”
“A surgeon? That seems an unusual choice,” Richard observed. He continued to cast glances at Miriam, but she avoided his gaze.
“When I was living with the tribe in Brazil, I witness a healer save two women’s lives by making an incision in the abdomen to remove a baby. After the operation the wound was stitched shut with a paste to prevent infections. Both women and their babes survived the operations,” Edward said. “We found a surgeon who has studied the procedure to a great extent under James Miranda Stuart Barry in South Africa. He is willing to perform the procedure if it should become necessary to save Harper’s life.”
The besotted look his brother and sister-in-law exchanged again stirred pangs of jealousy. Why did his and Miriam’s path have to be so much more difficult?
“There is also your pet project keeping us here.”
The countess blushed. “Yes, my Home for Troubled Girls.”
“What do you mean, home for troubled girls?” Miriam asked.
“Before I married, I was apprenticed to a psychiatric doctor and the owner of a prestigious asylum. This is how I met Edward, actually. When the facility closed, some of my former patients were sent to sub-standard asylums. If you have ever had occasion to visit the average asylum, you will know how dreadful such places can be.”
“Miriam and I tend to avoid such places,” Richard interjected with a warm look at her. Miriam lowered her gaze. He had not won reconciliation yet.
“I decided that there was a need for an asylum suitable to protect women from the kinds of abuses that can occur when they are confined to care,” Harper continued. “I set about forming a committee to raise funds. It was shocking to me how much women were willing to contribute, merely to be in good graces with the new countess.” She made a face. “Mind you, these were many of the same people who refused to speak to me when I was introduced as the granddaughter of a baroness.”
“You don’t have to enjoy their company to build something worthwhile,” Edward observed.
“I know, darling. I have you to remind me of my good fortune, and what a joy it is to be able to share some of it with those less fortunate.”
Edward squeezed her hand right there at the dinner table. Richard wanted to be appalled, but all he could muster was morose dejection knowing if he tried to touch his wife’s hand, she’d probably slap it away. He deserved that. He knew he did.
“You managed this project while becoming a countess and bearing your first child?” asked Mrs. Kent.
“Not exactly. We are still searching for an appropriate location. We had thought to perhaps let Richard’s cottage as a temporary location, but then the opportunity for Richard to gain a peerage arose, and we decided he might better wish to use it as his country seat. It was also a way for me to develop contacts within society, which has proved useful for the other reason we remained in London this summer.” The countess smiled proudly at her husband.
“I have taken up the customary role in the House of Lords,” Edward added. “It is monstrously tedious, negotiating with every single interested member. There is a vote planned for early September.”
Another affectionate squeeze. Richard risked another glance at Miriam. This time, her eyes were on him with an intensity of emotion that made him shudder. Perhaps, there was hope for affectionate squeezes at the table and without having his hand swatted away.
Chapter 21
Miriam nearly collapsed with relief when she was shown to a separate bedroom from Richard’s without having to ask. Mrs. Kent’s room was immediately next door to hers, while Richard’s connected through an internal, adjoining door. Miriam had been assigned a maid, who had stored her belongings carefully in an ornately painted wardrobe.
Alone. She needed this time to recover from what she had done. A single word from her, and Richard would have left her alone. Fool that she was, Miriam hadn’t taken the way out he’d offered her. Miriam checked and re-checked the adjoining door. She attempted opening it only to discover that it was locked from the other side. Richard must have heard her scuffling near the door because he knocked, received Miriam’s permission, and hesitantly entered her quarters.
A few weeks ago, she’d have given anything to have him come to her bedroom. Now, Miriam was confused to still want the man who had betrayed her so badly.
“Tell me everything about your plan with Lizzie,” Miriam demanded without preamble. If she were to salvage this adventure, Mrs. Kent was right. She had to go after what she wanted. How long could they maintain the fiction of being happily married newlyweds if she and Richard didn’t talk?
At first, Richard was eager to explain himself. “The night Lizzie came to me with this idea, I turned her down flat. I heard her out as she described her scheme, which she apparently mistook for consent. I told her outright that her scheme was a fantasy, and that it would never work. That is when she told me she was pregnant. She knew it would force my hand.”
Richard sat back and ran his hand through his hair. “I didn’t know whether or not to believe her. Lizzie will say anything to get what she wants, no matter how tenuous its relation to the truth. I told her that if she wanted her scheme to work that she needed to stop coming to my rooms in the middle of the night. I was unequivocal in telling her that she had to be completely out of the picture from that moment forward. Lizzie did not like the fact that I was ending the association. I implied that I would go along with her scheme just to get her out of my cabin. It was cowardly of me. I have no excuse other than I could not bring myself to leave the mother of my child friendless, no matter how much I disliked her. For me, any relationship with Lizzie ended that evening.”
Miriam swallowed. “Lizzie put you in an impossible position.”
She could acknowledge that much truth. A vise tightened around her chest. Richard’s dark eyes pleaded with her to believe him, but Miriam didn’t know if she ever could.
“Yes. I felt I deserved Lizzie, because I have not lived a virtuous life, Miriam. I have reveled in every type of sin known to man, as well as a few I may have invented.”
Her imagination furiously conjured every kind of pleasure she had never experienced. Richard gave her a small, knowing smile. Miriam felt heat spread across her cheeks and pulled her wrapper closer around her neck as she tucked her bare feet onto the chair in her dressing alcove.
“Once Lizzie had planted the seed of courting you, I couldn’t stop thinking about you, Miriam. You looked like a nymph playing in the sunlight on the beach the next morning. I found you utterly irresistible.” Richard stalked the short length of her room while speaking.
“Unfortunately, that gave Lizzie the impression that I was going along with her scheme. She took up with your cousin Spencer in a bid to incite my jealousy. When that didn’t work, she grew angry and began snooping through my mail to find information she could use to coerce me. I had hoped she might reconcile with Arthur and leave me alone but no. Until she appeared on the New Hope, I had no idea that she would go to such lengths.
Lizzie is completely out of control.”
“You’re scaring me.” But what Miriam felt was more complicated than fear. Regret at having befriended a woman who had never valued her beyond her money, apparently. Lizzie had only included her in the fun because she had been planning to cheat her all along. Miriam had played an unknowing part in bringing Lizzie into Richard’s life. She felt ashamed of her naivete.
“I don’t mean to. Apart from being obnoxious and dogging our heels, I doubt Lizzie intends any real harm to either of us.”
“And the buggy you took me riding in?” Miriam demanded. It had bothered her, once she had taken the time to think it over. He hadn’t owned one, yet he’d procured a very fine one on a moment’s notice.
Richard said nothing. Miriam knew she had him even before he spoke.
“Yes. I borrowed it from Lizzie. I did not wish to disappoint you, and I had no other means to obtain one.”
Miriam groaned. “Why is getting the truth out of you like pulling teeth? Can’t you simply speak honestly for once?”
Richard fisted his hands in his hair. “I’ve not had much practice with honesty. I am trying, Miriam. I swear.”
“Try harder,” Miriam said, scowling. Richard’s footfalls came closer. Her pulse quickened at his approach.
“I am sorry. I never expected to fall in love with you. I tried to warn you about me. But now that I have you, I find I am desperate to keep you.”
He caressed her curls, and Miriam leaned her face against his hard stomach. Hot tears stung her eyelids. “I don’t know how to forgive you, Richard. I hate to think you were right when you said I had used you for the same reasons Lizzie did. You are not wrong, though.”
She exhaled a shuddering sigh.
“Miri, You're not the culprit. We had a rocky start. I wish to begin again, if you can give me that much. Let me court you, properly, the way you deserve. Without falsehoods and pretenses.” He stroked her hair gently, soothingly.
