Ruined by Rumor

by Alyssa Everett

  “Why not?” Hurt, she stared back at him. “Don’t you want me anymore?”

  He rolled onto his back and sighed heavily. “Of course I want you. I’m not dead and I’m not insane. I just don’t think we should.”

  “But—” And then, because she knew him well enough now to tell he did want her and he was just as frustrated as she was, Roxana realized she had to stop talking and start listening, patiently and uncritically. “It’s plain enough something’s wrong. Can’t we discuss it?”

  He let his breath out in another long, tension-laden sigh. “I didn’t want to worry you, but—do you remember the day you miscarried, when Dr. Massey asked to speak to me privately? He told me you were too thin and too pale and too frail to suffer another setback any time soon. He said if I had a jot of feeling for you, I’d keep my hands to myself.”

  “Ah, so that’s why you haven’t come to my bed.”

  “No matter how much I may want you, I’m not about to put you in your grave.”

  Looking back into his drawn, worried face, she couldn’t help it—she burst into laughter. “What a crack-brained notion! Alex, I’m perfectly fine. I’m sure Dr. Massey only meant for you to wait a little while, until I was feeling more myself again. After seeing us together in your library on the night George jilted me, he must have formed the impression you’re some hot-blooded Lothario who can scarcely be troubled to take off his boots before flinging his fancy piece on the bed.”

  Alex raised one eyebrow doubtfully.

  “Well, perhaps not that bad,” she said, laughing. “But since we’re still newlyweds, he must have imagined a warning was in order. A temporary warning. But of course he said it in his usual dour way—and, Alex, you do take things so seriously. Even in the pink of health, I’ve always been thin and pale, and probably always will be.”

  “But if it isn’t safe…”

  She took his hand and set it over her heart. “It’s safe.” Solemnly, she gazed into his eyes from so near their foreheads were nearly touching. “I’m not going to die on you, I promise. How could I, when I love you and I mean for us to spend the next fifty or sixty years together?”

  With a groan, he rolled her under him and kissed her again.

  Once, Roxana had tasted brandy, and it made her throat burn in an oddly pleasing way. Now, kissing Alex with his weight atop her, the same heat flowed through her—only it warmed every inch of her. She could have gone on kissing him forever.

  But he drew away and looked down into her eyes. “You really love me?”

  “Of course I love you. I was only afraid to admit it after making such a fool of myself with George, and after you’d said you hoped to marry some other girl.”

  “I’ve never hoped to marry any girl but you. Even when you were engaged to George Wyatt, I couldn’t get over you.”

  She wrapped her arms around his neck. “I went to the fair once, when I was sixteen. I saw a string of pearls at a tinker’s booth and thought they looked elegant, but when I brought them home and examined them in better light, they turned out to be made of fish scales. I wore them to an assembly anyway, and after a few dances they began to peel. Mama has never let me live that down. To her, those pearls were the ultimate proof of a sad lack of discrimination.”

  “Are you trying to tell me I’ve proved a better bargain?”

  “That’s exactly what I’m trying to tell you. As husbands go, George would have been like those false pearls—all dazzle and shine at first glance, but really little more than fish scales and paste. You, on the other hand, are the kind of man I can respect for the rest of my life.”

  Alex broke into one of his swift, transforming grins. “Just don’t respect me too much. I mean, it’s all right if you have impure thoughts about me now and then.”

  Roxana grinned back and glanced down to where his arousal pressed hard against her abdomen. “You did say now and then, didn’t you?”

  “Why, yes, as a matter of fact I did.”

  She giggled and greedily pulled his head back down for another kiss.

  Epilogue

  Then farewell care, and farewell woe,

  I will no longer pine;

  For I’ll believe I have her heart

  As much as she hath mine.

  —Sir John Suckling

  “I think I should get to name it,” Harry said. “I did a fine job with Dinah, didn’t I?”

  “With a little help,” Roxana said. “But I think we should let Ayersley do the honors this time.”

  Harry pouted. “If I ask him, I wager he’ll let me.”

  “Knowing Ayersley, I suspect you’re right—which is why I have no intention of letting you ask him. I can only imagine what kind of name you would choose. Probably a horse’s name, or a ship’s.”

  They were all at Broadslieve for Christmas, her mother and Harry, her mother-in-law, Fanny and Mr. Dean, Alex—even distinguished, silver-haired Sir Julius Godfrey, the ton’s foremost accoucheur, whom Alex had bribed handsomely to make the journey from London. They had returned from church not long before and were gathered in the drawing room, a Yule log roaring cozily in the hearth. Roxana was sitting on the Axminster carpet with Harry, playing spillikins while their mother watched from a chair.

  “Have you and Ayersley given the matter any thought yet, Roxana?” her mother asked.

  “Ridiculous amounts of thought. I want Charles Edward, after Papa and Ayersley’s father, and he wants John William, after Locke and Shakespeare. I suppose we’ll end up calling the baby Kit either way, because of the title.”

  “And if it’s a girl?”

  “If it’s a girl, Miranda,” Alex said, strolling up from where he had been talking to Fanny and Sir Julius. “After Prospero’s daughter who says, ‘How beauteous mankind is! O brave new world, that has such people in’t!’ I hope she’ll be as awake to all life’s wonders.”

  Roxana glanced up at him, and when their eyes met they smiled at each other. Life was full of wonders these days.

  “Mama, they’re doing it again,” Harry said. “Giving each other those funny looks.”

  Lady Langley tactfully ignored him. “Lady Miranda Winslow,” she said, trying out the name. “Very pretty.”

  “Now if the baby would only hurry up and arrive…” Roxana glanced down at her ever-expanding middle. Having suffered one miscarriage, she’d spent the early stages of her condition terrified the same thing would happen again, but as the weeks and months passed without incident, she’d begun to relax. Alex’s tendency to hover had lasted rather longer—until just three weeks before, when he’d brought Sir Julius to Broadslieve to attend Roxana’s lying-in, and the eminent doctor had pronounced both mother-to-be and baby healthy.

  Alex watched as she dislodged several spillikins and lost her turn to Harry. Roxana had tried to talk Harry into spotting her a few sticks in consideration of her having a baby kicking her in the ribs, but Harry hadn’t seen it that way.

  “Roxana tells me you made some progress this year working on judicial reform,” her mother said to Alex.

  “Small but steady progress. It helps to have a beautiful wife who knows how to court votes.” He reached down to give one of Roxana’s curls a playful tug. “At the rout party we gave last spring, she positively sparkled. Half of Parliament would have promised her anything she asked.”

  “You’re going to give her a big head,” Lady Langley warned, though Roxana could tell from her smile how proud she was.

  “It will match her big middle,” Alex said with mock gravity, then dodged out of the way just in time to avoid Roxana’s swat.

  Roxana laughed despite her failed effort to smack him. “What Ayersley isn’t telling you is that he’s become quite adept at courting votes himself. He chats like a complete hand with all the members, and dances divinely with their wives.”

  “Roxana has been helping me practice my small talk,” Alex said. “Conversing with crotchety parsons, taciturn sea captains, boldly flirtatious widows…”

 
Her eyes flew to his, and at the twinkle they encountered, she struggled not to giggle. Alex had become particularly fond of their little play-acting sessions. They suspected the baby owed its conception to one evening when she’d pretended to be an incautious French émigrée.

  “Mama, they’re doing it again,” Harry said.

  Lady Langley, though clearly not sure what secret joke Roxana and Alex were sharing, smiled without comment.

  Mr. Dean appeared at Alex’s elbow. “You wished me to remind you to answer Mr. Bellingham’s letter before dinner, Lord Ayersley.”

  Alex made a rueful face. “So I did. Would you excuse me for a few minutes, ladies?” He bowed himself away. Roxana gave a small, happy sigh as he made his way out of the room. He had such a nice walk.

  “Mr. Bellingham? Another applicant for your job, Mr. Dean?” Lady Langley asked.

  “The front-runner, I believe, ma’am. He’s a younger son of the Bishop of Chelmsford.” Removing his spectacles, Mr. Dean polished them with his handkerchief. “I’ll be sorry to leave his lordship’s employ, of course, but Fanny and I are both excited I’m to be an MP.”

  Harry had been totaling up the spillikins, comparing his count to Roxana’s. “I win! Finally!”

  Roxana pushed herself up clumsily from her place on the carpet. “Congratulations.” To her mother and Mr. Dean she said, “If you don’t mind, I’d like to stretch my legs in the gallery before dinner. Sitting on the floor is not as comfortable these days as it used to be.”

  “Here, let me come with you—” her mother offered.

  Roxana waved her back into her chair. “No, you finish your sherry. I’ve been fretted over quite enough for one day.”

  In the corridor, evergreen boughs decorated every pedimented doorway. Roxana inhaled their fresh, woodsy scent, mingled now with the aroma of the roasting beef and mince pie that was to make up their Christmas dinner. What a happy Christmas this was turning out to be. And next year they would have yet another reason to be happy, a baby to fuss over—

  As she passed by Alex’s study, humming to herself, a hand suddenly shot through the doorway and pulled her into the dim interior.

  “Alex!” she said in surprise, laughing. “What on earth…?”

  He grinned down at her. “I’ve been dying to do this all day.” He kissed her—one of his fierce, ardent, knee-weakening kisses.

  When it was over, she blinked at him in openmouthed surprise.

  “Would you believe I had mistletoe hanging in three different spots in the drawing room, and you managed to miss every one?”

  “Oh! That was—quite a kiss.” It had left her more flustered than she cared to admit. They had done their best to behave themselves for the last month and a half, for fear of putting the baby at risk.

  But now it appeared Alex had other ideas. “I had an interesting conversation with Sir Julius this morning before you came down to breakfast. He said it’s safe for the baby to be born any time now.” Alex reached over and locked the study door. “And he also happened to mention—purely in a spirit of imparting scientific knowledge, of course—that lovemaking has been known to bring on labor. Wouldn’t you like to have a Christmas baby?”

  Roxana laughed. “You’re mad. What about my big middle?”

  “Just more of you to love.”

  She slipped a hand into his coat, wiggling closer against him. “As tempted as I am, I don’t know if I could do it now, I’m so enormous…”

  His grin held a delightful touch of wickedness. “Oh, I don’t know. We’re both resourceful people. I suspect we could find a way.” Alex sat down in the window seat behind him and pulled her into his lap.

  “I’m going to crush you.”

  “I’ve heard that’s a remarkably painless way to go.”

  She laughed and surrendered to his persuasion. Soon they were both very improperly occupied on the red velvet cushions, kissing each other hungrily, his hands buried in her hair. When he paused to nuzzle her neck, she sighed. “I’m so happy right now, I never want to leave this room.”

  He chuckled and quoted, “‘And now good morrow to our waking souls, which watch not one another out of fear; for love all love of other sights controls, and makes one little room an everywhere.’”

  She pulled back and regarded him quizzically.

  “Donne.”

  “Oh, no.” She slanted a teasing look at him. “Not done yet, surely!”

  “As a matter of fact,” he said, beginning to undo the laces of her gown, “I was just getting started.”

  * * * * *

  About the Author

  A fan of Halloween, springer spaniels and the perfect shoes, Alyssa Everett grew up in Florida, where from an early age her favorite books typically had dukes in them. A Harvard graduate, she married her college sweetheart and they currently live with their three children in small-town Pennsylvania. Ruined by Rumor is her second Regency romance. Her first, A Tryst with Trouble, was released in January of 2012.

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  ISBN: 978-14268-9378-0

  Copyright © 2012 by Alyssa Everett

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