Chapter Nineteen
CHAPTER NINETEEN
A melia woke slowly, the midmorning sun filtering through her heavy curtains. She stretched out a hand, reaching for Ash, but her fingers met only the soft fabric of her blankets. She stilled for a moment, wondering at herself. Ash had never been in her bedroom and yet she missed his presence in it. Maybe it meant nothing; maybe it was because she had not seen him yesterday. For the first time in a while, she had spent the whole night in her own bed. She’d been feeling out of sorts the day before and had sent a message to Ash that she would not be at the ball they had both planned to attend. She hoped that her letter had been clear, that she would not be meeting him in the summer house, either; she hadn’t wanted to be explicit in case her missive was intercepted but she did not like the thought of him waiting for her to show up only to find that she never did. She hated that for herself and would not like to inflict it on others.
She stretched, trying to establish whether she was feeling better or whether it was purely the luxury of being on a comfortable mattress. As she moved, her stomach turned over in a desperately alarming way. She stumbled out of bed and was left with seconds in which to grab a chamber pot before emptying the contents of her stomach. When the retching was finally over she had no energy to climb back onto the mattress. Instead, she lay like a landed fish, flopped against the soft fabric of her favourite rug. She hadn’t been sick like this since she was a child and for a moment all she could do was lie there in shock, unable to believe that her body was attacking her this violently.
‘ That ,’ said Sienna, appearing in her bedroom doorway, ‘was vile.’
Amelia could only groan.
‘I suppose you are too weak to deal with it.’
Amelia whimpered; perhaps she was dying.
She heard Sienna’s footsteps coming deeper into the room ‘Oh, dear. You do look very poorly. Let’s get you back onto the mattress and then I will deal with that awfulness.’
But Amelia wasn’t done with the chamber pot.
Sometime later, she was back in the bed, the sheets pulled up to her chin. Sienna was gently stroking her hair, pushing the damp strands from her forehead. ‘Are you feeling any better?’
‘A little. I could eat some toast.’
Sienna’s eyes widened. ‘You want to eat! Are you sure? I don’t think I will ever eat again after that ordeal.’
Now that Amelia thought about it, she was ravenously hungry but only for toast. If something else was presented to her she knew, without having to have it in the same room as her, that she would be violently ill again. ‘Yes, I would like some if that is not too much trouble.’
In the background Sienna was talking to Amelia’s maid, Anne, but she could not concentrate on their words.
Some time passed. Amelia wasn’t sure how long as she stared dazedly at the ceiling. Anne handed her some breakfast; the two slices of thick toast the most delicious Amelia had ever tasted. She wolfed them down as if she had not eaten in months.
‘I think I could get dressed now,’ she told Sienna and Anne. ‘I believe I have an appointment at the modiste.’
Her maid and sister exchanged glances. Anne nodded and Sienna came to sit on the edge of the bed, taking Amelia’s hand in her own. ‘I don’t think that’s a good idea.’
‘But I must,’ Amelia protested. She had picked out a particularly beautiful dress and she wanted to see Ash’s face when he saw her in it for the first time.
‘Amelia.’ Sienna glanced back at Anne, who nodded again. ‘Amelia, is there any chance you could be pregnant?’
Amelia snatched her hand back. ‘No. That was a cruel thing to say. You know I cannot have children.’ Sienna looked to Anne again. ‘Why do you keep exchanging glances?’
‘I think Anne may be better able to explain this than me.’
‘Explain what?’
Anne came forward, blushing furiously. ‘My sister, my lady, didn’t have any children with her first husband but she’s ten with her second. It’s not always the woman who can’t have babes, no matter what men might say.’ Anne made to step backwards but then added in a rush. ‘She is very sick at the beginning, especially in the morning and then also…very hungry.’ Anne went an even deeper red and this time stepped back until she hit the wall. Amelia had the impression Anne would like to blend into it, if that was at all possible.
‘When did you last bleed?’ Sienna asked, her cheeks turning slightly pink.
‘I…’ Amelia tugged the blanket up higher as she counted backwards. ‘No, that can’t be right.’ She counted again and again. But it was no use. She was good at numbers and her first count had been accurate.
‘Well?’ prompted Sienna.
‘Eight weeks ago,’ she said quietly as the truth settled on her. She was never late, had almost been able to set her watch by the preciseness of her monthly bleed: Saturday afternoon, every twenty-eight days. It was astonishing she’d not noticed its absence when at one point in her life she had once been so centred on whether it would arrive or not. Pregnant, she was pregnant. All this time, all that longing, and she’d been so busy trysting with Ash that she hadn’t realised it had finally happened.
‘How is this possible?’ Amelia caught the look on Anne’s face and realised that she and Ash had not been as discreet as they’d thought. Her maid knew exactly how this situation had come into effect.
‘Don’t worry, Ash will marry you when he finds out.’ Amelia looked at her sister and realised she and Ash had not been discreet at all.
In the back of her mind she knew she should feel something like shame or embarrassment, especially as this had come to pass when she was in front of her innocent younger sister, but right now she had no feelings at all; she was completely numb. She was pregnant and she was not married. In the eyes of the world, she was ruined. All season she’d been trying to protect Sienna’s reputation and instead it was Amelia herself who had pulled the family into disrepute. Despite all that, a bubble of joy slowly formed in her stomach, rising through her until it was like her whole body was fizzing with excitement. She was going to have a baby, something she had thought impossible, and it was Ash’s, the best person she knew. Whatever happened next, she would love this baby, this unexpected miracle, with everything that she had.
She and Ash would have to marry. There was no other way forward. All the time she had spent debating with herself whether or not it was a good idea to wed again was moot. She had to for Sienna and the unborn child’s sake. She waited for the inevitable horror to fill her but it never came. Instead, a fluttery sense of excitement swept through her. She could see it, a life with Ash, waking up with him in the morning, his soft, secret smile across a ballroom, a fleeting reassuring touch of his fingers. And his laughter, the way it sometimes exploded out of him, creasing his dimples and lighting up his eyes. She could imagine growing old with him, sharing triumphs and failures, and she knew that he would not try to control her; he would champion her. She should have mentioned her change of heart to him before this, so that he would know that she chose him and not just because of the baby.
‘I need to speak to Ash,’ she said, pushing back the covers.
‘Yes,’ agreed Sienna.
‘I don’t know how he will react.’ She hoped he would be pleased but there was nothing to say he would feel the same excitement as she did. They had been lying together all this time and he hadn’t specifically mentioned marriage, even if she had thought he had alluded to it two nights ago. Her stomach turned at the realisation that, while she’d been considering it again, Ash, in an echo of the past, had not mentioned it explicitly. But no, Ash would not abandon her, would he? A little voice reminded her that he had done so once before, but she pushed it away. That had been different.
‘Don’t be a goose. You know exactly what he will say,’ said Sienna, breaking into her thoughts. ‘The man has stars in his gaze whenever he looks at you, which is often. He will be thrilled.’
Amelia closed her eyes as her toes brushed the floor. She knew Ash cared about her, knew that he adored her body and the time they spent together. It would be all right; it had to be.
As she pushed herself to standing, the room spun and the contents of her breakfast made a very unwelcome reappearance. It was going to be a very long morning.