“My God, Sophie, we have to stop.”
He shifted so he was on all fours over her, then shifted again, wedging his body down between her spread legs. Sophie brought her knees up and locked her ankles at the small of his back, and when he might have spouted more ridiculousness, she levered up and kissed him with every ounce of frustration and desire she could muster.
“Vim, I want…” He kissed her before she could finish that thought, kissed her witless. His tongue creating a sinuous rhythm that had currents of heat ribboning down through Sophie’s body.
“Sophie, we can’t…”
“Can too.” She was a duke’s daughter, capable of a duke’s determination. She got her hand under the waistband of his breeches and sank her fingers into the bare, muscular swell of his flank.
“Naughty…” Vim muttered the word, but it didn’t sound like a scold, so Sophie moved her hand over and grabbed him outright by the derriere.
He pushed himself against her sex, provoking a wonderful, awful conflagration of sensations. Sophie wedged herself against him, and was mentally cursing the invention of clothing when a small sound penetrated the fog of her arousal.
Vim must have heard it too, for he went utterly still, lifting his head.
“The baby.” They spoke in unison, Vim with resignation and something that sounded like relief, Sophie with horror: she’d forgotten utterly that the child was in the room.
“Let me up.” She pushed at his shoulder, which was about as effective as pushing at Goliath’s shoulder when he was at his oats. “Vim, Kit’s awake.”
“He might go back to sleep.” The little thread of hope in his voice was almost comical.
“He never goes back to sleep.”
“I’ll get him.” Vim kissed her nose and lifted away, taking with him warmth and a world of unfulfilled wishes. Sophie was just getting up her nerve to toss the covers aside when Vim came back to the bed, the baby snuffling quietly against his shoulder.
“Make room. My Lord Baby is coming aboard for a progress on his royal barge.”
“Is he dry?”
“The royal wardrobe is quite in order, for now.” Vim climbed on the bed and arranged himself on his side, the baby propped against the pillows between the two adults.
“He’ll be hungry soon enough,” Sophie said, taking a little foot and shaking it gently. Kit grinned at her and kicked out gleefully, so she did it again.
“He likes a change of scene.” Vim was smiling at the baby as he tickled the child’s belly.
Sophie would not have thought to bring the baby to bed with them; she would not have thought to kiss Vim’s nose before she left the bed.
She would not have thought she could fall in love with a man because he put aside his lovemaking to tend to a baby, but as she watched Vim smiling at the child, enjoying the child, she realized she’d gotten one stubborn, long-despaired-of wish to come true: she’d fallen in love.
She tarried for a few moments, listening to Vim speak nonsense to the child about navigating the treacherous waters of pillows and blankets; then she climbed out of the bed and went to build up the fire.
* * *
Vim heard Sophie mutter something about heating up some porridge as she slipped into her socks. She was out the door a moment later, leaving Vim with his nose in the grasp of one happy, refreshed, and—thank the gods—dry baby.
He arranged the infant on his chest, a warm little bundle of comfort in an otherwise abruptly bleak situation.
“Attend me, young Kit.”
“Gah.” Kit made another swipe at Vim’s nose.
“I’ll seek retribution if you persist at this nose-capturing business.”
Kit thumped Vim’s chest and levered up, grinning hugely.
“Go ahead and smile, you little fiend. Do you know why the aristocracy have large families? Several reasons, the first being that any man who can afford to fuck his way through life finds it tempting to do so, and babies like you are the frequent result.”
“Fah!” Another thump. “Fah, fah, fahck!”
“Boy, you had better watch your language when Miss Sophie is about. Say damn. Much less vulgar.”
“Bah!”
“Bah is acceptable, used judiciously. The aristocracy have large families not just because they can, but also because their babies are kept well away from any situation where the pleasurable business of procreation might ensue. Babies belong in nurseries.”
“Bah-bah-bah-bah!”
Vim lifted Kit straight above his chest, which provoked much chortling and waving about of small limbs. “Perhaps you’ll be a balloonist.”
He brought the baby back down to his chest, cradling the child close.
“You saved me from folly, you know. Sophie Windham is dangerous to a man’s best intentions.”
No comment from the child, leaving Vim to realize if the baby hadn’t interrupted, Sophie Windham’s clothes would likely be tossed all over the bed and Vim buried inside her as deep as he could get, doing his utmost to make her scream with pleasure.
Make them both scream.
“There’s no reason not to,” he murmured against the baby’s crown. “She’s willing, I’m so willing my eyes are at risk of being permanently crossed, but I don’t think it would serve her…”
He fell silent, trying to think through how a man—a gentleman—ought to act under the circumstances. If she were merely a domestic—and the clues pointed as much in this direction as any other—then Sophie was not in a position to pursue marriage, but she brought marriage, commitment, and permanence to Vim’s mind.
Also hot, soul-shattering pleasure, a confusing combination if ever there was one.
Kit grabbed for Vim’s lower lip.
“Since when do babies come with claws?” He gently peeled Kit’s fingers away and examined tiny fingernails. So small, but Vim knew they grew quickly. “We’ll have to find some embroidery scissors and render you weaponless, me hearty.”
He lingered in the bed with the child for a few more minutes, but when a particular, determined look came across the baby’s face, Vim got them both quickly down to the laundry and dealt with the requisite change of linen.
“Are you baking again?”
He kept his tone casual as he carried the infant into the kitchen. Sophie looked up from the sink where she was peeling an apple.
“Adding some apple to His Highness’s porridge.”
“We made a stop in the laundry. Kit’s ready to tour the Ring at the fashionable hour.”
“At this rate, I’ll need to boil some laundry for him.” Sophie dropped some apple quarters into a pot simmering on the stove, sliced another fat quarter in half, and passed both sections to Vim.
He gave one to the baby and ate the other. “I didn’t finish telling you about the situation at Sidling.”
“That’s your family seat?”
She stirred the apples then stirred a second pot, as well. He could tell nothing about her mood from her expression, tone, or posture, her reserve being the equal of some monarchs Vim had encountered on his travels.
“Sidling has been in my family since Norman times, though the manor house itself is fairly modest.”
She peered over at him from the stove while Kit started waving a thoroughly gummed piece of apple about like a sword. “The name Sidling is very familiar.”
“It’s not particularly distinctive, but my aunt and uncle have been comfortable there, as have my cousins.” Or they’d grown comfortable there once Vim had been able to take over the finances.
“And this is the place that’s losing its heirlooms to thievery or something underhanded?”
She was putting together a tea tray now, her movements competent, graceful, and unself-conscious. Maybe she was the cook, or an undercook? Vim had to listen to her words again in his mind to register her question.
“We’ve come close to losing my aunt a time or two, as well, if Uncle’s letters can be believed.”
“How does one los
e an aunt? Is she in poor health?”
“Not physically, but she’s growing… vague. She wanders the estate, though I’ve suggested a companion could be hired for her.”
He’d insisted on it, in fact, with his uncle writing back angrily that a man who’d been married to a woman for more than half a century knew better than to assign that lady a nursemaid over the woman’s own objections.
Sophie got a pitcher of milk from the window box. “My father had a heart seizure not long ago. It threw the entire family into a tizzy.”
“How is he faring now?”
She set the milk on the counter and got a bread knife down from the rack built onto the rafter overhead. “Better than ever. The heart seizure was the excuse my mother needed to take him more firmly in hand, and I think the excuse he needed to allow her to do so.”
She cut several slices of bread, wrapped up the loaf, and set a small bowl of porridge, a clean napkin, and Kit’s little spoon at one end of the table. “If you’d see to the honors, I’ll make us some sandwiches.”
Kit put away a prodigious quantity of porridge and apples, necessitating another trip to the laundry. By the time Vim had changed the child, built up the fire in the parlor, and washed his hands, darkness had fallen.
Sophie brought a picnic to the servants’ parlor while Vim arranged the baby on the nest of blankets before the fire.
“There was something more I wanted to tell you, Sophie, about things at Sidling.”
She paused in the act of passing him a plate piled high was sandwiches. “This doesn’t sound like we’re about to have a cheerful conversation.”
“It isn’t cheerful, but it isn’t that remarkable, either. I’m my uncle’s heir, you see, and I’m expected to marry sooner rather than later.” And why she needed to understand this when he would not see her after tomorrow, Vim could not say.
She lifted the top off a sandwich of her own and added a dollop of butter. “I forgot to put on the butter, though there’s mustard enough.” The small silver knife looked elegant in her hand as she made neat little passes over the bread, spreading the butter just so.
“My uncle has three daughters, and each of them has at least two daughters,” Vim went on. He didn’t pick up his sandwich—his mouth for some reason had abruptly become dry. “I have seven of these cousins of some remove. At least two are old enough to marry, possibly more by now.”
“Are you inclined to marry one of them?”
She was fussing the baby’s blankets, folding over the satin binding around the edge of the blanket and smoothing her palm along its length.
“Sophie, I hardly know these women, but I’m responsible for them. At the very least, I need to dower them. My aunt and uncle hint strongly that it’s time I settled down, though the thought fills me with…”
He trailed off, trying to put a name to the heavy, anxious feeling in his gut. The conversation wasn’t going in the direction he might have intended, if he’d used enough forethought to have intentions about it.
“Yes?”
“Dread, the idea of dealing with those twittering, fluttering young girls fills me with dread.” He lifted his sandwich in one hand but did not take a bite. “Have you ever considered marriage, Sophie?”
“Not seriously.”
And she wasn’t considering it seriously now, either. That much was evident from her casual tone and the way she didn’t meet his eyes. His careful hinting around was getting him a clear response from her, just not the response he’d hoped for. Whatever she wanted from him, it was going to be temporary and quickly forgotten.
On her part.
“Eat your sandwich,” Vim said. “You can see why I need to be on my way. The situation in Kent is troubling from many angles, and it’s the very last place I want to be over the holidays.”
She made no reply but ate her sandwich in silence while the fire burned merrily and the baby figured out how to put his toes in his mouth.
Eight
Sophie got through the evening with a sort of bewildered resignation. She had waited her entire adult life and much of her girlhood, as well, to feel a certain spark, a lightening of her heart when a particular man walked into the room.
Vim was that man, but he wasn’t the right man. For once in her life, Sophie wished she had an older brother on hand to explain to her how it was with men.
How could Vim kiss her like that and speak of marrying a stranger—or possibly a cousin—in the next breath?
How could life finally introduce her to the man she’d been hoping she’d meet, only to limit her time with him so terribly?
How could she endure another Christmas watching her family lark about in high spirits, graciously entertaining hordes of neighbors in equally high spirits, while Sophie’s spirits were anything but high?
And how—how in the name of God—was she going to part with Kit when the time came?
“You’re not listening, Sophie Windham.” Vim brushed his thumb along her cheekbone. “Shall I put His Highness to bed?”
Sophie glanced down at the child nestled in her arms. “He’s almost asleep.”
She sat beside Vim on the worn sofa in the servants’ parlor while he read Wordsworth by the firelight. His arm wasn’t around her, and she knew why: those cousins in Kent, that aunt and uncle in Kent, that dread Vim had of marriage, those travels he’d undertaken for most of his life.
“Sophie, is something amiss?”
The concern in his voice nearly undid her.
“I do not want to part from this child, Vim. I wanted a few days to myself in this house because the good cheer others take in the season deserted me several years ago. I planned and schemed to have some time alone because I thought solitude would yield some peace, but it has yielded something else entirely.”
That much was honest. Kit let out a little baby-yawn and stuck his two middle fingers in his mouth as if aware of the weariness plaguing Sophie’s spirit. He was such a wonderful baby.
“I will travel on in the morning, Sophie, and I doubt our paths will cross again, but if you need money for the child, I will happily…”
She shook her head. The last thing she needed or wanted from him was money.
“Let’s get this baby into his bed, shall we?” She rose off the sofa, Kit cradled against her heart. Vim tidied up the blankets and folded them into the cradle, letting Sophie precede him up the main stairs, through the freezing hallways and into her bedroom.
In just a few days, they’d fallen into a routine around the child as if Kit had been theirs since birth. It comforted and it hurt terribly to feel that silent sense of synchrony with a man she wanted so much from.
Vim lit the candle by Sophie’s bed using a taper from the glowing coals in the hearth, then built up her fire and turned to regard her as she laid Kit in the cradle.
“Will you be able to sleep? I’m at sixes and sevens myself, having slept late and napped substantially. I expect women in their childbearing years get used to such disruptions of schedule.”
It struck Sophie that Vim didn’t want to leave her room.
“I’m tired, and tomorrow will come soon enough.” She wanted him gone, and she wanted him to hold her close, as he had in his bed that very afternoon. But more than that, she wanted him to want her in his arms.
So much wanting and wishing.
Vim sank into a chair by the fire. “I’ll wait until His Highness has dropped into the arms of Morpheus. Come sit, Sophie, and tell me about your brothers.”
She took the rocking chair near the cradle, though the topic was hardly cheering.
For a moment she rocked in silence, listening to the soft roar of the fire and the sound of the baby slurping on his fingers. “Bartholomew fought under Wellington. My brother Devlin went with him, though each had his own command. Still, they kept an eye on each other, and Dev was there when Bart died. The Iron Duke himself sent a note of condolence. He commended Bart’s bravery, his devotion to duty.”
“But you are a wo
man, a sister, and you wish your brother hadn’t been so brave.”
“I wish he hadn’t been such an idiot. My mother was spared the details, but Devlin was honest with his siblings: Bart approached a woman he thought was available for his pleasure. His command of the language was so poor he did not understand he was insulting a lady until pistols were drawn. It’s a surpassingly stupid way to die but entirely in keeping with Bart’s nature.”
“And you are angry with him for dying like that.”
Vim’s words, quietly spoken, no blame or censure in them at all, had the ring of truth. “I am angry with him for dying, simply for dying. Bart was the oldest, the one groomed for leadership, and he would have made a magnificent patriarch.”
“Was he a magnificent brother?”
Had he been? What was a magnificent brother?
“He was. He could be awful—he threatened to chase me around with earthworms until Maggie told me to threaten to put horse droppings in his favorite pair of riding boots. I have a deathly horror of slimy things.”
“All sisters do.” He slid off his seat and took the place on the floor beside Sophie’s rocking chair, sparing a glance for the baby. “He’s not getting to sleep as quickly as I thought he would.”
“Pondering the events of the day.”
“Pondering his next bowl of porridge. So what does a magnificent brother do, Sophie?”
“Bart could make you laugh. He could make fun of our parents without being vicious, and he could make fun of himself. He could also keep a secret. My mother did not want me riding out without a groom from the time I was ten or so, and Bart knew I often eluded the grooms. He’d mount up and take off in a different direction, but I knew he was there, a few hundred yards away, shadowing me. Devlin did the same thing.”
“And you let them look after you like that.”
“I wasn’t a complete ninnyhammer. One time my pony threw me—bolted at a rabbit or something—and I tore my riding habit when I fell. Bart caught the horse before it could go thundering back to the stables without me. Dev sneaked a sewing kit down the stables so I could repair the damage before anyone was the wiser.”
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