Ruined by Rumor

by Alyssa Everett

“I can’t remember the last time I took a nap in the middle of the afternoon,” Alex said wistfully.

  “This is a perfect day for napping. It’s so gloomy outside, and I like listening to the patter of the rain on the windows. It makes being in a warm bed feel so cozy.”

  “In that case,” he said, looking down at the rug and fidgeting a little with his watch fob, “would you like to go up to bed now?”

  “To take a nap?”

  He glanced up at her from under his lashes. “Well, we could do that too.”

  It was a miracle she didn’t swoon. Alex, proposing something shocking? In the middle of the day? With the servants certain to note their absence? “I would love to go to bed.”

  She stole upstairs with him. In the corridor outside Alex’s room they ran into Hobbes, his valet, carrying a pair of Alex’s boots. Spotting them, he halted in his tracks with a look of surprise.

  “Take the rest of the afternoon off, Hobbes,” Alex said decisively and without explanation as they breezed past. “I won’t be needing you until dinner.”

  Hobbes bowed. “As you wish, my lord.”

  Roxana was beginning to think there must be some kind of enchantment at work. Not only was Alex roaming about the house like a man with too much time on his hands, but they were sneaking up to bed together in the middle of the afternoon—and he didn’t seem the least bit bashful about it.

  When they reached her bedroom he closed the door behind him and, without a word, began taking off his clothes.

  Roxana giggled, a mixture of nervousness and sheer giddiness, and likewise began to undress. When she got down to her stays, Alex came to stand behind her, his hands working deftly on the strings. She had never before felt so thoroughly married as she did at that moment.

  Outside, a burst of wind blew rain against the window. Though the day was gloomy, just enough light remained to make candles unnecessary. His hand slid up her back. She turned to face him, and they kissed.

  Somehow they managed to continue kissing even as they stripped off the last of their clothes.

  Roxana didn’t know what had got into him, or into her either. Suddenly they were like wild animals, all over each other at once. They were kissing, touching, gasping—and all this mounting energy was directed toward one goal. They wanted each other, and wanted each other badly.

  Backing her against the wall, he kissed her ferociously, his chest mashing her breasts, his weight braced on one arm as the other snaked down between them. It was such an astonishing attack it left her breathless. He slipped his hand between her legs, finding her already wet and eager.

  She reached down and wrapped her fingers around his arousal. He made a noise in his throat, a choked sort of groan that sent a throb of desire through her. Covering her hand with his, he showed her how to touch him, and as they went back to kissing she marveled at how he felt, rigid and silky and warm, so different from anything she had expected before her marriage.

  They both came up for air. “My God,” he said—half wonder, half growl. He must have been as astonished as she was at their abandon.

  “The bed.” She panted the words, fervently if not very articulately.

  They all but fell atop the feather mattress together. Though Roxana suspected he would have gone on kissing and touching her, she squirmed against him, twisting her hips under his in an unspoken demand.

  “Ah.” He gave her one of those swift grins that changed his looks completely, and entered her in one slick, powerful thrust.

  Roxana ran her hands eagerly over his shoulders. How good it all felt, how right. He caught her mouth again with his, kissing her deeply and hungrily as they moved together. The din of thunder rumbled through the room, joining the patter of rain and the rhythmic creak of the bed. Usually he was nowhere near so forceful—she might almost have called it rough—but it was exactly what she wanted.

  “Oh,” she gasped between kisses. “Oh, this is…”

  But she couldn’t finish the sentence, because even if there had been words to express the driving need licking at her veins, she lacked the presence of mind to string the words together.

  She moved with him, thrust for thrust. That strange sensation began building inside her, the one from her wedding night and so many times since—that sense something overpowering and unfamiliar was about to happen, something she couldn’t control. Always before, she’d grown anxious and fought the feeling off. This time, desire had her too powerfully in its grip.

  Before long, Alex was breathing harder, panting with effort. Soon his face would take on that grimace of concentration that always signaled it was nearly over, a look almost of fierceness she never saw under any other circumstances. Don’t stop. She strained against him, not even knowing what she was pleading for. Please don’t stop. Even the words in her head began to fail her, until all she could think was please, please, please.

  Suddenly a breathless sensation like nothing she’d ever felt before took hold of her—as if her very soul were suspended in midair. For a split second, she forgot to breathe. Then her world seemed to explode, and she arched against him as waves of bliss washed over her. She couldn’t help crying out.

  She was still gasping in wonder when Alex drove into her and stilled, locked for a few brief moments in his own paralyzing pleasure. He groaned and the heat of his seed pulsed deep inside her.

  As she drifted dizzily back to earth, he rolled with a sigh onto his back. They had been breathing so hard, their heartbeats galloping out of control, that for the space of nearly a minute they both lay panting for air.

  As their breathing slowed, the storm rumbled outside the windows. Alex gave a deep, contented sigh. “‘I never heard so musical a discord, such sweet thunder.’”

  The peaceful quote should have sounded strange after such a frenzy of passion. But she had that hushed feeling, too, as if she were floating, disembodied, in the warm bed. Her eyelids were growing heavy. “So that’s what you meant when you said it would get better.”

  He turned his head and grinned at her.

  “I can’t believe we just did that,” Roxana said dreamily. “What will the servants think?”

  “They’ll think I’m the most fortunate man who ever lived.” He reached over and pulled her closer. “I’ve been wishing all my adult life to spend an afternoon this way.”

  There was a note of gladness in the timbre of his voice—not just gratitude, or even the exhausted contentment that normally follows what they had just done, but real gladness.

  She peeped across at his expression. She knew he did not really mean he’d wished all his life to spend such an afternoon with her, but there was something more than mere gallantry behind the words. He had a look of the most profound happiness on his face, as if at that moment, there was nothing more he could have wished for in the world.

  Well, perhaps there was one thing more.

  Snuggling closer against him, Roxana took his hand in hers and set it on her abdomen. “Alex, I believe we’re going to have a baby.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  For what thou art is mine:

  Our state cannot be sever’d; we are one,

  One flesh; to lose thee were to lose myself.

  —John Milton

  The weather cleared the next morning, and they went back to their routines. This time, however, Roxana spent the day smiling and humming to herself. When she called at the dower house and her mother-in-law asked how marriage was agreeing with her, she broke into an enormous grin and said, “Oh, famously!”

  For Alex’s happiness was contagious. When she’d told him she was going to have a baby, he’d been momentarily stunned into silence. Then he’d said with a note of awe in his voice, “I think I understand the meaning now of overjoyed.”

  She’d closed her eyes, hoping to store up every detail of the moment so she could savor it later. “It might not be a boy.”

  “As long as it’s healthy and you’re healthy, I don’t care.”

  In that moment, she ha
d almost believed him.

  Ever since, he’d been beaming every time she set eyes on him. And she felt exactly the same way.

  It was odd how one rainy day could change her whole outlook. She’d been convinced her life had taken a wrong turn. Now she saw that while Alex might not love her in the same way George did, he clearly felt some affection for her, especially now that she was carrying his child. He must have found her at least a little attractive, too, or he would have stopped coming to her bed at night now that she was enceinte. Instead, after he’d heard about the baby, he’d had only a single question when he’d joined her in bed that night. “You’re sure this is all right?”

  “Fairly sure.” She’d glanced down at her still-flat middle. “I must be almost two months along, and it hasn’t hurt the baby yet.”

  In the days that followed, they grew closer still. He took more breaks from his work, wandering out of his study at random hours to search through the house until he found her. They went riding together, Alex careful to hold his horse to a pace that did not tax her riding abilities too badly. They took long walks together, too, Leander tagging along at their heels. They even slipped upstairs again one afternoon for a quick, furtive and breathlessly satisfying assignation, after which they spent the rest of the day giving each other slyly jubilant glances.

  This magical happiness crept into every corner of their lives. Where before Roxana had never known Alex to sing anywhere but in church, his pleasant baritone voice began to appear more and more about the house. When they talked, he no longer turned stiff and nervous the way he once had. Perhaps she’d become better at reading the signs when he was growing uneasy, or perhaps he’d simply become more comfortable with her, but now they spoke more like old friends than polite acquaintances. More than once they lay in bed together, talking about everything and nothing until the wee hours of the morning. The sleep she missed hardly seemed to matter the next day, since through some strange alchemy, she did not feel much need for sleep, or food either for that matter.

  “My heavens! What’s got into you?” her mother asked during one of Roxana’s visits to Riddlefield. They were in the middle of the mundane task of sorting through Harry’s old clothes, setting aside any still sturdy enough to donate to the workhouse, Roxana smiling to herself. “Since the moment you arrived, you’ve been bouncing around, full of the joys of spring.”

  Roxana laughed happily. “It’s a surprise. You’ll find out on my birthday.”

  She and Alex had decided not to tell anyone else about the baby just yet. They were saving the news for the eve of their departure to London, when they planned to give a small dinner party to mark Roxana’s twenty-fourth birthday and bid everyone au revoir.

  So life was sweet and the future looked bright—until she awoke one morning to discover she was bleeding.

  It was only a small trace of blood, but it brought her heart to her throat. She’d been feeling better every day, the morning sickness fading, but now something was clearly wrong.

  She sat on the edge of her bed for several minutes, terrified and on the verge of tears. It was probably nothing. It had not been much blood, really. Perhaps a little bleeding wasn’t unusual, and everything might still be well.

  But after breakfast, the bleeding was heavier—frighteningly so—and it grew worse as the morning went on. She took to her bed and sent for Dr. Massey, only to learn he’d been called away to set a broken bone. She wanted to send for Alex, too, but he’d been out all morning on estate business and she had no notion how to reach him.

  The cramping grew so painful it took her breath away. Whenever a spasm hit, she had to grit her teeth, white-knuckled, until it eased. By noon she’d turned cold and begun to tremble all over.

  Finally Dr. Massey arrived and set about giving her a thorough and mortifyingly personal examination. Roxana stared up at the green silk that lined the tester above her bed and tried to think of happier things—Harry’s puppy, Alex’s face on the day of the threshing machine’s first run, the dancing at the Harvest Home celebration.

  “You’ve lost the baby,” Dr. Massey said when he finished, confirming with just four words the bitter end of all her hopes.

  Rearranging her gown, she opened her mouth to thank him and burst into tears instead.

  He looked genuinely regretful as he rolled his turned-up sleeves back down. “I’m very sorry, Lady Ayersley. But these things happen, and more often than most new brides imagine. Often, there’s no identifiable cause.”

  Given Dr. Massey’s characteristic pessimism, it was the most encouraging speech she had ever heard him make, yet she could only nod, striving to listen with something approaching self-control. She’d wanted this baby so much, and she and Alex had already had so many dreams for its future.

  Dr. Massey took a bottle from his medical bag, added several drops of the contents to a glass of water from the bedside pitcher, and handed her the glass. “Here, drink this. It’s a little laudanum to help with the pains. I’ll leave the bottle, and you should take eight drops every few hours until the spasms ease.”

  Dutifully, she drank the water down. At least finishing it slowed her sobbing to mere sniffles.

  Dr. Massey drew his coat back on. “The pains should ease in a day or so. Send for me if the bleeding grows much heavier, or if you should turn feverish.”

  There was a rap on the door, and it opened in the same instant. Alex, his face paper-white, looked from Dr. Massey to where she lay propped up against the bed pillows. “What’s wrong?” He sounded as breathless as if he’d run up the stairs. “I saw your carriage in the drive.”

  “I’m sorry, my lord, but Lady Ayersley has miscarried.”

  “Miscarried?” Alex stared at her, a look of dull shock in his eyes.

  Dr. Massey nodded gravely. “I’m afraid so. But her ladyship is young and healthy, and once nature has taken its course, there’s no reason she can’t try again.” Closing his medical bag, he added in a voice of forced casualness, “Before I go, my lord, would you be good enough to spare me a moment of your time? I’d like to have a word with you privately.”

  “Oh…of course.” Alex was still looking at Roxana.

  Dr. Massey bent and set a fatherly hand on her shoulder. “Well, I wish you well, my dear. For today, take a little cold broth if you have the appetite, and don’t get out of bed. Beginning tomorrow, do only as much as your strength allows.” Straightening, he picked up his medical bag and started out.

  Alex remained standing just inside the room, his face blank.

  Dr. Massey looked back from the doorway. “Lord Ayersley?”

  Alex turned to him. “Yes?”

  “We were going to have a private word.”

  “Oh. Of course,” Alex said for the second time. His eyes swung back to Roxana’s. “Are you all right?” He sounded bewildered, as if it had just occurred to him that perhaps she was not feeling quite the thing.

  She sniffled and wiped tears from her cheeks. “Yes,” she said in a small voice.

  “You’re sure?”

  She nodded. Striving for a little dignity, she reminded him, “Dr. Massey is waiting.”

  He looked as if there were something more he wanted to say, but after a moment he simply turned and followed the doctor out the door.

  Roxana watched him go. She hoped he would come back and spend a few minutes with her when he finished speaking with Dr. Massey. She knew how much he’d wanted this baby. She wanted to tell him how very sorry she was for having disappointed him.

  She’d never had laudanum before, however, and she had no notion how strong it would be. If Alex did return after his talk with Dr. Massey, she was already fast asleep.

  * * *

  Alex cast a last worried look at the door to Roxana’s room before giving Dr. Massey his attention. She’d looked so pale and fragile, propped up in bed, tears on her cheeks. If he’d had the faintest idea she would need him, he would never have been stupid enough to ride over to the home farm.

  H
is medical bag in hand, the doctor faced Alex with a faintly belligerent expression. “How long have you been married now, Lord Ayersley—almost three months?”

  Alex dragged his thoughts back to the doctor. “About that, yes.”

  “And how long would you like to be married?”

  Alex blinked at him, perplexed by the question. “I beg your pardon…?”

  “Is it your aim to send your wife to an early grave? Because if so, you’re off to an excellent start.”

  Alex was so jolted, he simply stared.

  Dr. Massey glowered at him. “One has only to look at her to see how thin and frail she is. And now I find she’s suffered a miscarriage, losing a two-or three-months child and an alarming amount of blood into the bargain.”

  His words made the hair on the back of Alex’s neck stand up. “But I—it’s not as if I wanted her to miscarry—”

  “I expect not. But if you have even one whit of consideration for her, you’ll give her the time she needs to recover before you make any further demands on her health. You do understand what I mean by that, I trust?”

  “Yes, you mean I’m not to—we can’t—”

  “Exactly.”

  Then, with a final disapproving glance, Dr. Massey turned on his heel and marched grimly down the stairs.

  * * *

  Roxana slept most of the day and all of the night, and took breakfast the next morning on a tray in her room. The pains had subsided, but they’d left her feeling empty and sad.

  She was sitting up in bed, staring vacantly at the wall, when a rap sounded on the door. “Come,” she called, her voice rusty from disuse.

  Alex stepped inside. He looked so dependable, dressed soberly in his dark coat. For one weak moment, she had the urge to scramble out of bed, bury her head against his shoulder and burst into a fresh flood of tears.

  Instead, she smiled wanly. “So you’ve come to visit the invalid.”

  “How are you feeling?”

  She sighed. “Better—and not so well.”

  “I sent word to your mother. I thought she would want to know.” He came and sat at the foot of the bed with his back to her, his weight making the ropes under the feather mattress creak. After a pause, he said, “I realize this is a terrible disappointment, but Dr. Massey did say we can try again some day.”