Chapter 37
Chapter Thirty-Seven
BENNET HALL, SURREY - NOVEMBER 7, 1816
LEE
The hours after I carried Charlotte upstairs were long and horrid. I had only felt this impotent once in my life, and I had hoped never to experience it again.
Someone had fetched the midwife, Mrs. Griffith—much to Charlotte’s protest. She arrived quickly and set about her tasks with a businesslike efficiency that was honestly terrifying. Someone else had been sent to town to fetch the accoucheur and wet nurse Charlotte had engaged. Vaguely, I wondered whom I owed thanks to for the fetching, Brigs and Jack most likely.
The smallest bit of my tension eased at the midwife’s arrival, in spite of the woman’s complaints about our lack of preparedness. My eye roll matched my wife’s. As if we had expected an arrival weeks early.
The night grew so late that it was actually early morning, long after word came that Brigsby had returned with the nurse and no accoucheur, when Mrs. Griffith urged Charlotte into position on her side. And by the time the sun rose, a squalling cry came from near the foot of the bed.
My wife, sweaty, disheveled, and triumphant, collapsed back against me as Mrs. Griffith placed the babe in her exhausted arms. I brought a hand to each forearm to steady them.
“A beautiful boy,” the midwife announced.
And he was beautiful. He was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen—with a shock of dark hair, ruddy cheeks, and the tiniest fist in the world, trapped between my wife’s thumb and forefinger.
“He’s… perfect,” she breathed in exhausted awe.
“He is,” I agreed, then placed a kiss to her damp curls. “We never did talk about names.” I traced his cheek with a single finger.
“Leopold,” Charlotte said, then added softly, “Leo.”
And just like that, I was in love with my son. Leo. And he was—my son. My perfect, sweet son. And my brave, beautiful wife. They were mine.
“Leopold Bennet. It’s a good name. Do you not think?”
“Perfect,” I agreed.
“Do you wish to hold him?” Rather than wait for a reply, she shifted, nearly dumping the boy in my arms. He gave a short, disgruntled cry, his face scrunching in disapproval, and I did not blame him. I wanted to cry too.
The terror that had dissipated when Charlotte relaxed following the birth returned in full force. This was my son. I was responsible for him. And my hand was larger than his entire body. I was going to crush him with my oafish paws.
“Relax, you will not break him,” Charlotte teased, reading my expression with ease.
“I might.”
“You won’t. You will be an amazing father.” Something about her tone drew my gaze away from my grumpy Leo and to my exhausted Charlotte. Relief was there in her expression, fatigue, and something else… trepidation perhaps. It took a moment to place the source, but once I did, it snapped into place. She was still worried I would reject her, reject them, that I wouldn’t want a son who wasn’t from my seed to inherit. That I didn’t wish to be this boy’s father.
“I hope so.” He was mine in every single way that was worth anything.
I pressed a kiss on his forehead before returning him to his mother’s arms. Gently, I tugged her back against my chest and settled my chin against her shoulder where I could support her—prop up her exhausted form—and watch him.
“Lee?”
“Hmm?”
“I...” She trailed off into nothingness.
“You?”
“I… Never mind. I must admit, I am quite exhausted.”
“Let me take him for a while. You have earned a rest.”
Her nod was grateful, but there was still reluctance in her gaze when she handed Leo to me. Precious bundle in hand, I slipped out the door and down the hall. To the nursery.
The footmen did an exceptional job furnishing it during the chaos of the afternoon. A rocking chair sat by the window near a bassinet. An oversize Scotch carpet covered some of them, but yellow paw prints still lined the floor and lower walls, save the one I had altered weeks before.
My son fussed for a moment when I slid into the rocker. He made a sleepy snuffling noise before settling back down. Quietly, so as not to wake him, I hummed the tune to a song my mother used to sing. I had long forgotten the lyrics, but it seemed right in the moment.
Never before had I felt such instant possessiveness. Maybe it was a natural facet of becoming a father. Or perhaps, it was my burgeoning feelings for my wife. The source of the feeling was no matter. It had burrowed its way into my very being, the swell in my heart and the tumultuous sea in my belly were certainly permanent. I loved this boy, I loved him and his mother and, when they returned to town?—
Tap, tap, tap .
The underside of a tiny paw tugged against the door. Nothing in the world could have induced me to move, though, not even to scold the beast. The paw disappeared and the sound shifted to a scratch, scratch, scratch where the door meant the frame.
Cass possessed magical powers, and the door swung open, creaking heavily on its hinges. She chirped her way into the room while I eyed her warily. First, she perused the perimeter, stopping to inspect my handiwork with the paint and tossing me a look. Then she trotted over to the rocking chair.
“If you so much as think of scratching or biting him, I’ll have you sent to Wales in a donkey cart. Do not for one second think I will restrain myself.”
She added another chirp, hopped up onto her back legs, and dragged her front paws along my shin. Her claws remained sheathed.
“Understand?”
Chirp .
Tentatively, I shifted my arms out, allowing her to smell the blankets swaddling my infant son. Her front paw caught one of my hands, gently guiding the bundle lower. I obliged, filled with curious trepidation. She settled both paws on my hand and peered over the edge of the blanket to see Leo’s face.
After a moment of contemplation, she offered a nearly silent chirp and rubbed her cheek against my hand and the edge of the blanket before dropping back onto four paws.
Unwilling to press my luck, I pulled Leo back into my lap while Cass ran figure eights around my legs, soundless chirps accompanying her movements.
Convinced that the cat would behave for at least another half minute, I spoke to my son. “Leopold Bennet… I did not know it was possible to love someone so completely nor so quickly.” His face scrunched and he wrestled a little fist out from his blankets. I thought Charlotte’s hands were small, but Leo’s… I ran a finger along each one. His entire fist was barely wider than my thumb.
We were suspended here, the two of us, frozen in the time between breaths. And there, I waited for the moment when he would inevitably decide that he wished for his mother or his nurse. I was determined to enjoy every single second with him. Today, tomorrow, and every day between now and when they inevitably left me.
When I had made this arrangement with Charlotte, I had been so certain that the part I would regret was wedding her in the first place. Never could I have imagined how much I would hate the mere thought of the end of it. But that day ticked ever closer, the moment when I would send her back to London, this babe in her arms. Off to live their lives, dance, laugh, grow up, grow old, and fall in love…
An abrasive knock sounded, startling all three of us. The boy let out a disgruntled cry, and a woman, presumably the wet nurse, peeked her head in. Cass offered little more than a hiss in response.
“I just came to take the little lord off for a feeding, and it sounds as though I’m just in ti—Oh, good heavens!” The motherly, doting tone slipped from her voice and her hand flew to her chest.
It had been so long since anyone had reacted to my scars that it took me a moment to comprehend her reaction. The petite woman, whose dark hair was a shock against her pale skin—paler for the sight of me—pressed herself against the wall with something akin to terror.
Ordinarily, I would have been bothered by her reaction. I should have been, to be honest. But I was so full of love for my wife and my son and so astonished at the realization that I hadn’t immediately understood the cause of her fright—that I hadn’t thought to hide my face before she entered—that I couldn’t bring myself to care.
“Mrs. Hyde, yes?” I asked, keeping my tone soft in an attempt to prevent her from fainting. “You are the nurse my wife hired, I believe?”
“Y-yes.” She braved a step into the room.
I rose, standing to offer the quivering woman my crying son. He was probably quite hungry. He’d had a busy day after all. But at my movement, she scurried back into the wall once again.
I rolled my eyes, but otherwise refused to acknowledge the absurd display. With the utmost reluctance, I stepped farther into her orbit, holding my boy out for a moment before she finally reached for him.
Leo’s cries increased at the change in arms, and it broke my heart a little to take my hands from underneath him. Turning Leo over to her was physically painful, the fist around my heart tightening nearly more than I could bear.
“Thank you,” I muttered, more out of habit than actual gratitude as I backed away. She scurried out of the nursery, my son in her stiff arms and Cass right on her heels. Leo’s wails grew ever louder with each step.
Finally, she must have reached a distance where I could no longer hear his cries. That understanding left me tetchy and on edge. Desperate for some purpose, any purpose, I found Charlotte’s paints, tucked away in the top drawer. With no other useful occupation, I set about adding stamens and leaves to the rest of the paw prints. I could hardly make them worse after all.