Chapter Twelve #2
Lark finally succeeded in pulling out his cufflinks and placed them on his bureau. “We love each other. That’s not news.”
“No. I just wanted to hear you say it.”
“You don’t want to get married.”
Anthony rubbed his face. “No. I truly do not.”
“Charlotte Rockingham is a perfectly nice girl. That story she told at dinner about the fox that got loose near Covent Garden last week was quite funny. Unlike some of your other prospects, she’s clever and has some conversational skill.
She’s pretty enough. She’s not a terrible candidate for a wife. ”
“Oh, not a terrible candidate? A ringing endorsement.”
“You know what I mean.”
Anthony crossed his arms. “I’m definitely not interested. And I thought if I made some kind of promise to my mother about marrying sometime in the distant future, she would leave me alone, but no. She’s like a dog with a bone.”
“So what is your strategy now? Humoring her but reporting back that every woman you meet is dull and ugly and unworthy of the Beresford title?”
That had been the strategy. “I suppose.”
“Hard to make that argument with Lady Charlotte. I found her perfectly charming.”
“Should I be jealous?”
“You say that in a way that implies I was jealous.”
“You were. Why else would you have invited yourself to dinner and then stared at me all through the meal as if you thought to murder either me or Charlotte with just your eyes?”
Lark tutted and went about fiddling with his breeches. Anthony had already helped him out of his boots, at least. Presumably Lark could take off the rest of his clothing, but it looked like a struggle.
He stood and said, “Since you already dismissed your valet and are incapable of undressing yourself, I shall step into the role.”
“It’s not necessary.” But he lifted his arms and let Anthony help him out of his breeches and stockings.
“Do you think I should get married?” Anthony asked. “Because sometimes, it sounds like you do.”
“I most assuredly do not, but it seems inevitable.” Lark grunted as Anthony succeeded in getting the fastenings of his breeches undone, and now seemed disgusted with the whole thing.
He stepped away from Anthony and pulled them off, grunting the whole time.
“And I suppose,” he added, tossing his breeches over a chair, “I am unnerved by the fact that you and I are in love but can make no public show of it. I hated telling you to stop coming to the club so frequently, but I worry the wrong person will find out about us.”
Anthony nodded. “There’s a vote scheduled for next week on an anti-sodomy bill. I plan to vote against it. I don’t care who knows. A man’s business should be his own.”
Lark rubbed his forehead. Anthony helped him out of what was left of his clothing and then took off his own breeches and stockings.
“But,” Anthony said, “I do agree that our lives should not be so…public. That anyone in this whole blasted city cares what either of us gets up to on our own time is the real travesty. If I could move through life without worrying about the scandal sheets, I’d be a lot happier.”
Lark pulled off his shirt. “I’d propose we move to the country to live in obscurity, but you love the city too much.”
“Too true. And I would miss my social malfeasance being reported in the papers, I admit. I suppose what I actually want is for society to acknowledge that there is nothing wrong with us.”
“You’d have as much luck persuading the aristocracy to do manual labor.”
“Hmm.” Anthony took in the sight of his lover, sans clothing.
They’d achieved an easy, casual regard for each other that often allowed them to just be comfortably.
But Lark really was a handsome man. His dark hair had grown a bit long lately, just enough to cover the shells of his ears, and his eyes were just as piercing as they always were, but he also had a wonderfully fit body and all that smooth, pale skin…
Anthony ran his hands over Lark’s chest, his shoulders, the back of his neck, the ends of his hair. “We should go to bed.”
Lark lowered his eyelids and shot Anthony a wry look. Then he kissed Anthony, so clearly they were thinking along the same lines. Anthony smiled into the kiss, reveling in it.
The gender of one’s partner should not have signified.
Anthony’s love for Lark wasn’t hurting anyone.
Why should they not be able to be together?
He didn’t care about marriage. Marriage was an institution primarily meant to legitimize heirs.
There would be no heirs for Anthony and Lark, so there was no need to marry.
But they should be allowed to spend their lives together without familial pressure to do otherwise.
Anthony loved Lark. He parted his lips and deepened the kiss and put his arms around Lark’s shoulders to hold him there. He pressed their bodies together, loving the contours of Lark’s body against his own.
“I love you,” Anthony whispered.
“I know.” Lark sighed. “I love you, too. But this is doomed.”
“Then come to bed and let’s make the most of it.”
Lark nipped at Anthony’s lower lip. “All right.”
*
In all, Penny and the Hastings ladies stayed for two weeks, and though Grace was sad to see them go—especially Penny—she was grateful for the silence and solitude she gained in their absence. Plus, she was itching to return to her pottery.
She was, however, beginning to feel like she’d kept an illness at bay through sheer force of will.
Once her guests were gone, she’d spent more time vomiting than she cared to admit to anyone, although the household staff of course knew something was wrong.
Grace talked them out of calling a doctor because she didn’t think it was that serious.
She just needed whatever it was to work its way through her body.
Still, when she resumed her pottery lessons with Catrin Davies, Catrin seemed to notice right away that something was off. “You look too pale, my dear.”
“I’m all right.”
“No, something is off with your coloring.”
Grace sighed. “Should I be offended?”
“I’m merely making an observation.” Catrin looked her over slowly. “You are ill.”
“I lost my accounts this morning,” Grace said. “It doesn’t feel like anything serious. I’ve just felt a bit unsettled for the last couple of weeks. I thought at first it was something I ate, but perhaps it is a mild illness. Nothing rest won’t cure.”
“You’ve been ill for a fortnight and have not seen a doctor?” Catrin narrowed her gaze at Grace, and then something seemed to light up behind her eyes. “Oh,” she said.
“What?”
“When was the last time you saw your husband?”
Grace didn’t know what that had to do with anything, but she said, “About three months ago, I’d guess.”
“That timing makes sense.”
“What timing?”
“Do you truly not know?”
Grace just stared at Catrin, not understanding what Catrin was saying.
“I have two children,” Catrin said.
Grace already knew that. Catrin talked about her children—a boy and a girl—all the time. She still didn’t see what Catrin was getting at, unless…
“I went through the exact same thing with both of them. Right around the third month. When was the last time you had your courses?”
“Oh, it must have been…” But Grace slowly realized they hadn’t come at all since she’d been in Wales. She hadn’t really given it much thought. Her courses had always been irregular, skipping a month here or there was not unusual, but it truly had been three months since her wedding.
She clapped a hand over her mouth.
“Before your wedding?” Catrin supplied.
“But it can’t… how can it…”
“You’re tired all the time. Sometimes weird smells make you feel like you need to toss up everything you’ve eaten that day. You’ve gained a little weight, and not just from our fine Welsh cuisine.”
“Yes, but—”
“You, my dear, may be increasing.”
Just then, a wave of nausea hit Grace. She excused herself and ran into the back garden.
When she returned, she didn’t feel any better, but Catrin had gone to the water pump in the kitchen and gotten Grace some water.
“Drink this.”
“A baby? I’m to have a baby?”
“Did it really not occur to you after you and your husband…had marital relations.”
“No,” Grace said honestly. “I didn’t think about it at all.”
Catrin smiled. “Charmingly naive of you. Is not the whole point of consummating a marriage to an earl to make little earls?”
“I suppose, but we never talked about it. I assumed we’d have children eventually. But now?”
“You should see a doctor to confirm it. But yes, I think that is why you are feeling not quite yourself. All the signs are there.”
A baby. Grace had logically known this was a possibility, but the way her mother had explained marital relations had made the process of conceiving a child sound so dry and dull—an indignity to be tolerated—and not like the beautiful intimacy Grace and Owen had shared.
Mother had never talked about how it could feel to be with a man, how Owen made Grace’s body sing, or how being with Owen had made Grace feel closer to him.
Everything they’d done together had been thrilling and exciting, the opposite of dry and dull, and somehow it had just never occurred to Grace that in her time with Owen, they could have conceived a child.
And yet, as soon as Catrin had said it, Grace knew it was true.
“But I don’t know anything about having a baby. What do I do? I can’t have a baby,” Grace said.
Catrin smiled. “Women have been having babies for thousands of years, my dear. You can do it, and I will help you. What are friends for, after all?”
“It hurts, doesn’t it? It must be terribly painful.”
“I’ll be honest, a lot of it is terrible. I got over the initial sickness pretty quickly, but I was often very uncomfortable. And yes, when you push that baby out, it does hurt a great deal. But then the doctor places your child in your arms and you forget all about your pain.”
Grace was dubious of that. And now she felt terrible.
“I have to…” Then Grace bolted for the garden again.