Chapter 8 #6
“It’s not impossible, not by any means. My mother would have me believe I was conceived on her wedding night.” Despite the wreckage all around him and the travail lying ahead, Tye found this recollection cheering.
“Merciful Saints. I thought there were things a man did to prevent conception. Jasper assured me I couldn’t get pregnant.”
Tye did not dignify that with a reply.
“He was lying, wasn’t he? And those things to prevent conception, we didn’t do them last night, did we?”
He was not going to give her the Latin now. “I did not do them. I presumed unforgivably on my marital expectations with you.”
“Are you trying to make me hate you, Spathfoy? Or is that grave tone to make me think you’re sorry?”
She was growing increasingly agitated, for which he had only himself to blame. “I do not want you to hate me, Hester. If you’re carrying our child, I want you to marry me. I dare not insist that you do, but I can ask if marriage to me would be so terribly objectionable.”
She stopped her pacing and whirled to face him, hands on her hips. “You’ve betrayed my trust, Spathfoy. I cannot marry you.”
“Your judgment is not trustworthy when you’re tempted to accept my suit, but it’s faultless now that you’re rejecting me? Do you trust that judgment enough to visit bastardy on a child who might otherwise be heir to a marquessate?”
She was once again his personal tempest, ire and indignation radiating from her posture, from her eyes, and her words.
“I almost can hate you when you’re like this, Tiberius, all cold reason and precise diction.
Do not threaten me with ruin. Thanks to my previous bad judgments, I’m already ruined.
I did not permit you into my bed, I welcomed you there.
I’ll bear the consequences of that folly on my own, thank you very much. ”
She sounded exactly like his own mother when she was in high dudgeon over some folly of his lordship’s. In such a mood, a man could say nothing right, could not appeal to reason or sentiment.
Tye was halfway to the door when he realized he’d just word for word applied the very defenses he’d heard come out of his own father’s mouth on so many tiresome, sad occasions. He stopped, turned around, and kept his tone civil with effort. “What are your terms, Hester Daniels?”
“I beg your pardon?”
He advanced on her, pleased to see she stood her ground—it wasn’t as if he’d ever intend her bodily harm, for God’s sake. “What are your terms? On what terms will you marry me if you’re carrying our child?”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
At least she wasn’t shouting, and when he leaned over her like this, Tye could catch a whiff of her lemony fragrance and see the gold flecks in her uncertain eyes.
“I mean,” he said softly, “we are two intelligent people who will want what is best for our child. We can argue over whom to blame for the child’s conception—though I cannot view the matter as entirely unfortunate—but we must not allow an innocent child to suffer for our decisions. On what terms would you marry me?”
She blinked, some of the fight going out of her. “I will not live in England, not while your father is alive and making mischief like this.”
“Done. I have an estate outside Edinburgh, and my mother has just finished refurbishing it. What else?”
He’d surprised her, but the renewed fire in her eyes said she was rallying. “This child will be born on Scottish soil, Tiberius, promise me that.”
“I promise you that to the extent it can be brought about by mortal man. What else?”
She eyed him up and down. “If your idiot father is determined Fiona cannot live with her mother, than she’ll live with us.”
“I’m not sure I can arrange that. Quinworth seems to be legally in the right of the matter.”
“You can arrange it, Tiberius.” She folded her arms, looking very certain of her point.
“Something is driving your father’s decision to retrieve Fiona.
He’s ignored her existence for her entire life, and now he must have her posthaste.
Figure out what his motivations are, and you will be able to wrest her from him. ”
Her reasoning was sound, and it spoke to the puzzlement Tye had felt regarding his father’s behavior since the first mention of this Scottish venture.
“I will not make you a promise I do not know I can keep, Hester.”
“Then we do not have an agreement. You had best hope we don’t have a child, either.” She flounced out, every inch a woman intent on having the last word.
He let her have it, silently saluting the library door when she’d gently closed it in her wake.
They had managed to convert an argument into a bargaining session.
He decided to be encouraged by that. He was also encouraged that she’d used his given name occasionally, even to express her ire toward him.
Then too, she’d given him a great deal to think about regarding his father’s choices in this whole, misguided matter—he was encouraged by this as well.
Though she might not be pregnant.
And he might not be able to meet her terms.
And he was going to have to find his niece two ponies and a rabbit.
And he was leaving in the morning.
Tye went to the sideboard and poured himself a generous portion of whisky, downed it in one swallow, then poured another.