A Properly Conducted Sham (Most Imprudent Matches #5)

Chapter 38

Chapter Thirty-Eight

BENNET HALL, SURREY - NOVEMBER 7, 1816

CHARLOTTE

It was midday when I woke again, groggy, disoriented, sore, and still exhausted in my usual chambers. Worse still, missing both of my Leopolds.

Neither of the whisperers in the adjoining sitting room were Lee’s. Mrs. Griffith’s stern directives swirled with the voice of the other woman—not my nurse, but the wet nurse—I loathed her.

The sniveling, obsequious, nasal tone of her unintelligible words set my teeth on edge. Something about her—I couldn’t abide her after a single meeting. I had already vowed to see her returned to London as soon as was feasible.

The midwife murmured something I couldn’t make out. The words clearly upset the nurse. Her volume rose, frustration clear.

“That is precisely why he should not hold the babe. The child was screeching at the mere sight of him. And who can blame the boy? I wanted to scream at the sight of?—”

“Mrs. Hyde,” Mrs. Griffith interrupted. “Try to maintain a little bit of professionalism please.”

“I am stating facts. It took me forever to get the little one settled. And?—”

A sharp rap on my door interrupted her hateful spittle. Lee popped his head into my room with a relieved grin.

The sitting room door snicked closed from the side wall. Apparently the knock was enough to alert them to the cracked door.

Once Lee confirmed I was awake, he strode across the room and settled beside me at the side of the bed. Gingerly, he helped me press up to sit back against the headboard.

“There you are!” he murmured. “I did not anticipate they would move you back to your chambers. I probably should have, but… I apologize.”

“Do not apologize. I did not think either. Where is Leo?”

“The wet nurse took him. Do you wish for me to find him?”

Yes . I shook my head. “I am sure he’s quite all right.”

“How are you feeling?”

I rolled my eyes. “Tired, sore, hungry, thirsty. Need I go on?”

He chuckled at my list of ailments and dropped a kiss on my forehead.

“Food and tea are on the way. I’m not certain what help I can offer with the rest of that.”

I shrugged. Lee had a talent for solving a great many of my problems, even the ones I previously thought unsolvable. But he was not capable of miracles.

Without warning, his hand caught mine and pulled it up to his lips. There, he pressed a gentle kiss to the back of my knuckles. If my insides hadn’t so very recently been ripped out by Leo, I might have felt that gesture in more than just my heart. As it stood, my husband still left me giddy and missish.

He made to let go of my hand, but I tangled our fingers together. I dragged him over to my side, encouraging him to prop his back against the headboard next to me. He made a token protest about his boots on the bed coverings that I shushed away. Obliging me, he draped his free arm along my shoulders and tugged me gently into his chest. The moment was nearly perfect. So very close. It was only missing little Leo.

“I know it is not proper…” I began, unsure of how to voice my desires.

“Very little about you is,” he replied, a teasing grin etched across his face. I turned to his free hand, distracting myself with inspecting it. Oh, his hands were lovely. Big and strong, soft and warm, and—green?

“Why do you have paint on your hand?”

Lee made to pull his hand back, but I held fast, thoroughly distracted now. “I was—I did a… thing.”

“You did a thing?” I drew the syllables out, hoping they would become sensical as they hung in the air.

“Do not worry about it. What were you saying?”

I rather thought I would worry about it. But unless he had painted Leo, this was his home. What he chose to do to it on the day I brought a child into this world was not entirely my business.

I dropped my voice to a low whisper, barely audible even to me. “I know there is a proper way to do things… With Mrs. Hyde and such. But I just… I do not like Leo being so far from us, from me. I…”

“You wish to… nurse him yourself?” He joined in my whisper.

I nodded slowly, even though I could not read his expression—shocked, disapproving, ambivalent? He was inscrutable. “I… yes.”

“Very well, if you’re certain. Do you wish to try it a time or two first? Rather than dismiss Mrs. Hyde and be left bereft?”

That was—he was… “That is a good notion. I do not suppose—could we look into others, if I’m unable? I… there’s something about her.”

The tiniest bit of tension, so small I hadn’t noticed its presence, evaporated. Leaving him freer in its wake. “If you wish it. Anything you wish.”

Before I could reply, Mrs. Griffith entered from the hall, her arms laden with a tray overfilled with tea cakes and the last of the fresh fruits.

She froze at the sight of us, curled together on the bed, heads dipped conspiratorially. “You best not be trying anything, Lord Champaign. She won’t be well enough for some time, and you won’t be anticipating this the way you did your vows.”

Lee blinked slowly at her. Then I caught the edge of a bit-off smile while he stared at her with the entire force of his scarred, stern, wealthy, earlish countenance. It should have been foreboding, but she scoffed and strode easily to my side and setting the tray atop my lap. Her efforts broke my husband’s stern expression, and he let out a delighted chuckle.

“Yes, you frighten everyone into submission, I’m sure. But you’re a harmless pup compared to some of the ladies I order about during the worst pain of their lives.”

And wasn’t that thought enough to make even the burliest man blanche, my massive husband included.

“That’s what I thought, my lord.”

Lee cast his gaze away shiftily, unwilling to give the intuitive woman any further insight into the state of our marriage bed.

She made to shoo him out of the room to examine me. An unpleasant prospect, certainly, and not one I particularly wanted Lee to witness. His support had been wonderful for the birth, but I could avoid any further traumatic images for the both of us.

“Can you bring Leo? I find myself missing him.”

He nodded with alacrity and slipped into the sitting room eagerly. Mrs. Griffith watched him go with a wistful sort of expression.

“Lord, he is an attentive one. Handsome too,” she commented once Lee had shut the door. “He seems a good man, if you don’t mind me saying. No truer test of a man’s character than a birth. I’ve had more than a few I wanted to clop ’round the head. That man loves you something fierce.”

It was impossible to know how to feel about that. I quite agreed that he was handsome. It was an understatement. But that Lee loved me… Perhaps she merely thought those words would offer comfort to her patient. He was fond enough of me. Attracted. But in love… No.

“You don’t believe me?” she asked while she fussed with her examination. “Ah well, you’ll learn someday. When a man looks at a woman the way that one looks at you, he’s in too deep to claw his way out.”

No sooner had she settled the bed coverings back around me than a rap sounded on the door. Lee walked inside with a sleeping bundle in his arms. He strode over and deposited our son into my arms. This man was a natural with a babe, gentle, but unhesitating and confident.

And then I peered at the bundle of perfection in my arms. With the blanket covering his dark shock of hair—no, Lee was his father. The color of his hair made no difference. Besides, my hair was dark—in the right light. It certainly could not always be described as blonde.

Lee settled back on the bed beside me and wrapped his arm around my shoulder. The limb was heavy, warm, strong, and supportive. I felt more than saw his fingers tangled in the bedraggled ends of my braid.

And then I glanced up. And his eyes met mine. Stormy sky irises were filled with so much feeling. Sentiment? Surely it wasn’t love. I was an obligation, a favor he happened to find pleasant. But there was something there. And it looked a lot like love. Giving it another name didn’t make his expression any less tender.

Before I could find words, little Leo woke and began to wriggle irritably.

“I know you’ve employed Mrs. Hyde, but if you’d like to try feeding him, I’d be happy to explain,” Mrs. Griffith interjected. I had entirely forgotten her presence and, given the slight jolt that shot through Lee’s arm, he had as well.

“That’s not really the… done thing. Is it?” I hesitated.

“Whatever pleases you is the ‘done thing’ my dear. And also, I told you.” She tipped her head in Lee’s direction, and my cheeks heated uncomfortably.

My husband’s head swung back and forth between us, searching for an explanation I wouldn’t be sharing. And Mrs. Griffith better not be sharing either if she wished to retain her employment.

A combination of genuine desire for instruction from the capable woman and desperation to avoid the subject of whatever feelings Lee may or may not have for me drove my answer.

“Yes, please.”

Lee started to pull away, to leave us to privacy, but Mrs. Griffith tutted, saying, “Oh please. This is the least horrifying thing you’ve seen all day, my lord.” And he settled back down in chastened silence with flushed cheeks.

In the crisp, businesslike way she managed everything except comments about the state of my marriage, she explained the process and helped me convince an increasingly more irate Leo to latch on.

Once he did, she bade us adieu and left our little family in peaceful, loving solitude.