The Dangerous Viscount

by Miranda Neville

  “I believe it is a parasitical plant used in various medicines.”

  They all laughed at him and he didn’t mind.

  “What?” he said.

  “Nothing,” Minerva said.

  “We’re not letting any of that stuff in the house,” Diana said.

  “Yes we are,” Minerva and Stephen responded.

  Which set off a whole new round of Aristotle’s Bearding and presumably a deluge of correspondence.

  Sebastian continued to fend off Mr. Montrose’s attempts to weigh and measure Diana. For himself, he confirmed he was six foot one and one half inches and hadn’t changed his weight since the summer.

  “Come into my study, my boy,” Mr. Montrose said after he’d recorded the information. “I wish to talk to you.”

  His host cleared a place for him to sit, among the books, papers, and miscellaneous and mysterious objects that cluttered the small room, then took his own place behind the desk. There wasn’t usually anything formidable about Diana’s father. That Christmas Eve afternoon, however, his stern expression made Sebastian feel like a scrubby schoolboy.

  “So you intend to marry my daughter in three days,” he began.

  “Yes, sir. I am so fortunate.”

  “Diana is of age, of course, and her own mistress, but I would be remiss in my duty as a father were I not to enquire into the circumstances.”

  “I’ll do my best to answer your questions,” Sebastian replied cautiously. “Some information you require may be more properly obtained from Diana herself.”

  “Hmm. You must be aware that Diana is a very rich woman. Fanshawe left her his entire fortune. I don’t like to think of her being married for her money.”

  “Have you heard of the Saxton coalfield?” “I believe not.”

  “It is located in Northumberland on the Saxton Iverley estate and belongs to me. It is highly productive.” He named a sum that made Mr. Montrose whistle.

  “Good Lord. Your income is even greater than Diana’s.”

  “I’d take her without a single penny.” “You love her then?”

  Sebastian could only manage the same promise he’d made Minerva. “I will always do my very best to take care of her.”

  “I know it’s hard for we men to speak of our feelings but it’s all right, Sebastian—I may so call you, no need for formality here. It’s all right because I can tell that you do love my daughter.”

  Sebastian felt unable to deceive this kind, affectionate man a minute longer. If they were to be related for their remaining mutual lifetime, almost father and son, he preferred it to be based on honesty.

  “I hate to confess this, and perhaps I should let Diana do so but I fear she will not. Our marriage is not her choice. She is with child.”

  Montrose didn’t insult his daughter by asking if Sebastian was the father. “I see,” he said, pursing his lips and stroking his whiskers. “This isn’t news to gladden a father’s heart but since you are to be married, there’s nothing I can do but rejoice in the prospect of my first grandchild.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  “All’s well that ends well.” He chuckled. “That explains why Diana is so crotchety. I sympathize, my boy. I’ve been through this a few times myself. I can tell the marriage is your choice.”

  “But not hers,” Sebastian blurted miserably. “She wanted to marry Blakeney. I ruined it for her.”

  “Blakeney? Oh no! Of course she had a girlish tendre for him but he would be quite wrong for her. He needs to grow up.”

  “He’s two months older than me.”

  “Years don’t always matter. Blakeney’s still a boy and Diana needs a man. You, my boy, are a man.”

  Chapter 24

  “I hate Dr. Denman!”

  “Try not to get upset. Dr. Denman says it’s bad for pregnant females.”

  Diana gritted her teeth and prepared to dig in her heels. The rest of the family, including Henry who had surprised them by arriving from Edinburgh late on Christmas Eve, had already left the breakfast room.

  “How often must I tell you, Sebastian, that I cannot bear to eat any of this food.”

  “That,” he replied with odious patience, “is because it’s all animal food.” He waved at the array of breakfast dishes laid out on the sideboard. “Dr. Denman says pregnant females will often eat vegetables and fruit when everything else disagrees with them.”

  Diana began to feel an inkling of respect for the doctor, despite his obnoxious use of the phrase “pregnant females,” as though she were a member of a herd of milch cows.

  “I’m not going to eat vegetables for breakfast,” she said with diminished vehemence.

  “How about some fruit?”

  “Maybe. Grapes would be nice. I love grapes.”

  “I hate grapes,” he said.

  “That’s ridiculous. No one hates grapes. Not that it matters. We won’t have any unless someone robbed the Mandeville hothouses.”

  He rang the bell for a maid who looked dubious when asked what fruit the kitchen might have. “Maybe Cook has some stewed prunes.”

  Diana’s stomach lurched. “No thanks. I could eat an orange.” It sounded delicious. “Are there any left?”

  When the fruit arrived Sebastian insisted on peeling it, a task he performed with deft efficiency. “There. Once you’ve eaten it you can change into your habit and we’ll follow the hunt for a while, at a gentle pace of course. No jumping.”

  “My mother will think we are cowards.”

  “I can’t live my life worrying about other people’s opinion of me, and neither should you.”

  “I was thinking of you. I certainly don’t care what Mama thinks.”

  “So I noticed.” His tone was even drier than usual. “And since you don’t care if you are branded a coward, there’s no reason not to go out.”

  Half an hour later Sebastian gave her a leg up onto her horse and they left the stable yard to join the hunt gathering in front of the house. In spite of the irritating Dr. Denman, Diana admitted to herself that she was coming to appreciate the care of this man who would become her husband the next day.

  He looked good on a horse. In fact, he looked good to her almost everywhere. She still felt bruised by the events that had led to their forced marriage but began to see the possibility of forgiving him, of putting it all behind her and achieving a mutual accommodation. Or something even better. Perhaps they could be happy together.

  Once she stopped feeling sick she’d probably rescind her prohibition on bed sharing. She hardly yearned for a life of celibacy. She peeked sideways at the way his thighs straddled his mount and felt an answering throb in her own body.

  Maybe it wouldn’t be too long.

  At dinner that night, Sebastian’s wedding eve, Mr. Montrose drank to the health of the bridal couple.

  “This is the second time I’ve had to give away this daughter,” he said with suspiciously shining eyes. “I shall never forget the day my little goddess was born.” He groped for his handkerchief and applied it to his nose with a loud snort. “I always miss her when she isn’t here but I couldn’t relinquish her to a better man. And I expect you to visit us often.”

  Diana looked as though she were about to cry, too. Sebastian took her hand and gave it a squeeze. “We will, sir,” he said. “On one condition.” A flurry of protests rose around the table. “You must agree never to weigh Diana again.”

  “Thank you!” she said, and Minerva cheered.

  Her father surrendered with grace. “I announce a new rule. In future married women need not be weighed unless they wish it. It’s the same rule I’ve always had for Mrs. Montrose.” He raised his glass to his wife with a look of great affection. “You, miss.” He turned to Minerva. “In the hall, after dinner.”

  “There’s an incentive to find a husband, Min,” Diana said.

  “Minerva, married!” Stephen taunted. “Who’d marry her?”

  “I’d like to welcome Sebastian to the family, too.” Henry Montr
ose was a big man, both tall and broad. His incisive intelligence and mordant wit gave him a maturity beyond his twenty-four years. “I wish you years of joy and want to assure you that if you make my sister unhappy I shall dissect your body for anatomical study while you still breathe.”

  Sebastian wasn’t sure he was joking.

  Mrs. Montrose, who tended to be lost in her own world of horses and dogs, frowned at her son. “This is no time for threats. I suppose we should be grateful William and Rufus aren’t here to disgrace us. Sebastian, the first time you came here I told Diana she ought to marry you. This is the only time she’s taken my advice since she was ten years old.”

  Immensely touched, Sebastian noted that his betrothed was blushing but not, he thought, unhappily. A strange emotion welled in his chest. He couldn’t identify it, but he did like it. Then he noticed that Stephen had slipped away from the table and Minerva grinned like a mad thing.

  “You’re about to find out what mistletoe’s for,” she crowed.

  Twisting his head he saw the youngest Montrose standing behind him and Diana, flourishing a sprig of green with pale berries. “Kiss her, Sebastian!” Minerva ordered. Diana regarded him with huge blue eyes and parted her lips.

  This was a Christmas custom he could learn to love. Cupping her flushed cheeks in his palms, he brought his mouth to hers. She tasted of brandy and spices and her own indefinable sweetness that seemed to dispel the bitter memory of earlier kisses and promise a new beginning.

  He was sure the kiss, accompanied by a chorus of cheers, jeers, and whistles, lasted longer than was proper for a public mistletoe kiss.

  He wished it could last all night.

  Sebastian spent much of his last night as a single man perusing the work of Dr. Denman. He learned things about pregnant females he’d rather forget, such as their tendency to suffer from a variety of unappealing conditions like costiveness, hemorrhoids, and dropsy.

  But the good doctor was distressingly, maddeningly, inexplicably silent on the only subject that currently interested Sebastian: Could pregnant woman safely indulge in marital relations?

  There was a moment of almost unbearable excitement when he read that they were often prone to depravity of appetite.

  God, he hoped so.

  On further reading he learned this promising phrase merely referred to a whimsical desire to consume certain foods.

  Dr. Denman, accoucheur extraordinaire, had let him down.

  But surely, he reasoned, if making love to one’s pregnant wife was inadvisable, the doctor would have said so.

  Chapter 25

  Diana’s first wedding, performed with maximum pomp at St. George’s Hanover Square, had been very different. So had her feelings on the occasion.

  She’d been filled with excitement about becoming a married lady with a title and pin money to buy whatever she wanted. Her bridegroom, though she liked him well enough, seemed almost irrelevant. But what did an eighteen-year-old girl know about marriage, or anything else for that matter?

  Today she was too exhausted for an emotion as heightened as excitement. Anxiety and nausea had played havoc with her rest in recent weeks and she’d barely closed her eyes the previous night.

  The cause of her sleeplessness stood beside her at the altar, tall and unsmiling. He spoke his vows firmly but without inflexion, and when the time came slipped a gold ring on her third finger. It fit perfectly. Later she learned he’d sent a messenger to Chantal to discover the correct size. And when she had a chance to examine it, she found the ring chased in an exquisite design on the outside and the inner circumference engraved with their names. Not for the first time, Sebastian revealed himself to be both efficient and thoughtful.

  This time the person of her bridegroom filled her thoughts to the exclusion of all else. In many ways he mystified her. She was an open book, standing here in the village where she’d grown up, surrounded by her family and their household staff. She’d attended services in Wallop’s ancient parish church almost every week of her life until she left home. Sebastian was alone, without anyone to stand up with him. He’d declined to invite the Duke and Duchess of Hampton, his uncle and aunt, although they were in residence at Mandeville. (Blakeney, she’d learned with relief, had not joined his family for Christmas.)

  Whether he wanted one or not, he had a family now. Not only had her eccentric clan embraced him, he had a wife and would soon become a father. Diana began to hope she and Sebastian might be able to put their various transgressions behind them and make something of their marriage.

  But she needed to understand what had made her new husband the man he was. Only then could she truly know him.

  Once again Sebastian found himself sharing the breakfast parlor with one other person. The morning after his marriage his companion was not his wife. He’d left her sleeping in their shared bed.

  Henry Montrose munched his way through a plate heaped with roast beef and eggs while perusing a book propped against the coffeepot.

  “Sorry to disturb you, but may I?”

  Henry grunted and tilted his book, replacing it once Sebastian, who decided he liked his brand-new brother-in-law, had poured himself coffee. Given his mood, the company of a grunting, reading male was about all he could abide. He drank his coffee and brooded, until the subject of Henry’s volume caught his eye: a treatise on diseases of the lung.

  “Do you know the work of Dr. Thomas Denman?” he asked.

  Henry closed his book, marking his place with a finger, and held it on his lap. “Introduction to the Practice of Midwifery. A respected work on the subject. Why do you ask?”

  “Just married, you know. Thought I’d better be informed.”

  As a student of medicine Henry was likely one of the few men in the world who would find this explanation credible. “Good idea,” he said.

  Diana had felt very hot last night. Unfortunately she’d also been unconscious, all night. She was already asleep when he entered the bedroom and his deliberately clumsy preparations had failed to waken her. So he’d lain at her side feeling heat pouring off her body while he tried to quell his lust with a recitation of Dr. Denman’s symptoms: costiveness, hemorrhoids, dropsy, plus diarrhea, vomiting, and blotchy skin. None of these often contradictory ailments did a thing to lessen his burning desire. He didn’t believe he could survive another night like that without either jumping on her like a mad bull or suffering spontaneous combustion.

  How could she lie there and sleep when he felt like this? She must, he decided, be unwell.

  “According to Denman,” he said, “women often become feverish because of the way their blood thickens during pregnancy.”

  Henry nodded. “A result of the interruption of the menses.”

  “Denman advocates bleeding to alleviate the condition.”

  Henry frowned. “I’m no expert on the subject, but I’d be careful of that. You know Denman’s daughter married Croft who followed his father-in-law’s precepts.”

  “Croft?”

  “Princess Charlotte’s physician. He bled her frequently during her pregnancy.”

  Sebastian’s heart jolted. He’d been following the advice of a man whose ideas had led to the death in childbirth of the Prince Regent’s daughter, the heiress to the throne of England.

  All his life he’d relied on two infallible sources of logic and common sense: good books and his own sound brain. And now, when it really mattered, when it might literally come down to a matter of life or death, they had failed him. He’d promised to take care of his wife, and instead he might have killed her.

  When Diana awoke she first assessed the state of her stomach and found it to be good. This was one of the days she didn’t need to hold her head over a basin. A glance at the clock told her she’d slept for almost twelve hours.

  She stretched, contemplated rising, and dismissed the notion. Rolling over she noticed a distinct indentation in the pillow on the other side of the bed and caught a whiff of an alien yet familiar scent among the bed
linens. Apparently she had not slept alone.

  Poor Sebastian, she thought ruefully. What a wedding night! His bride had remained unconscious throughout.

  Of course he had no right to expect otherwise, and he’d only joined her because it was expected. The large spare bedchamber had been lovingly prepared by the housekeeper: the finest sheets, a blazing fire of sweet applewood logs, and arrangements of dried flowers and a bowl of potpourri from the still room. Something told her Sebastian had not greatly enjoyed these humble luxuries.

  Perhaps she’d make it up to him later, if she continued to feel as well as she did now.

  “Come in!” she called. Not Chantal with tea, alas. Her maid wouldn’t have knocked. The door opened to admit her husband.

  While his morning and evening clothes were now always impeccable, Sebastian looked best when dressed for riding. Which was strange in a way because he wasn’t by habit a countryman. His tall, wiry figure in a bottle green coat, buckskins, and top boots made her mouth water.

  “How are you this morning?” he asked with the concentrated concern she found touching, though occasionally irksome.

  “Excellent. I slept like a top.”

  “I noticed.” She was right: he hadn’t appreciated her unbridelike behavior.

  She stretched her arms high and gave a little wriggle so the covers fell back, revealing the shape of her breasts beneath her nightgown. “No wonder I slept so well. This is a very soft mattress, don’t you agree?”

  Sebastian’s jaw discernibly clenched.

  “But perhaps you don’t. You came to bed so late and got up early. Were you uncomfortable?”

  She hadn’t heard the sound in weeks but under stress he reverted to the grunt, the grunt tinged with a new quality of desperation. Though it was cruel to torture him so, she wanted to laugh.

  She also wanted to invite him to join her. But at this time of day there would be maids going about their business upstairs. She couldn’t face the idea of servants who’d known her as a child overhearing her engage in marital relations.