“Yes, all my parts work. I’m not impotent. But I am sterile.” He shifted to lie on his back and stare up at the damask canopy. “One of the metal fragments that entered my flesh apparently injured me in a way that prevented my seed from reaching my…er…staff. So although I can make love and find release, my spirit has no seed.” He lowered his voice to an aching whisper. “I can’t sire children.”
As the full ramifications of that struck her, her blood slowed to sludge in her veins. Dear heaven, if that was true…With a sinking dread, she dropped her gaze inexorably to the scars on his loins. Now she noticed those that crisscrossed his privates.
“Are you sure?” she asked, still not wanting to believe it.
With a sigh, he tucked his hands under his head, exposing his tufted underarms. “Countless doctors informed me when I was first wounded that I might never sire children.” Firelight streaked across his rigid jaw. “And countless years of my sowing my wild oats without ever producing a by-blow have proved them right.”
The torment shadowing his features deepened. “Why do you think I fought this marriage so hard? Because all women—and you in particular—deserve husbands who can give them children. I can’t.” He paused, and in the stillness the crackling of the fire sounded as loud as pistol shots. “If you stay married to me, it will always be just the two of us.”
The words echoed in her brain, a solid blow to all her recent joy. No children. Ever.
Suddenly so many things made sense. His irrational behavior that day she’d brought the children here. His violent reaction to her attempts to seduce him. The way he seemed to desire her one minute and resent her the next.
She ought to be glad it wasn’t her he objected to, yet all she could think was No children, ever. No babies like Lydia or scamps like Jack. In a daze, she slid off the bed and wandered the room until she found her chemise. But even the motion of putting it on couldn’t silence the endless clamoring of her fevered brain.
No children, ever.
When she faced him again, he was sitting up with his back propped against the headboard and his lower body now covered by the golden counterpane. He watched her with a furtive gaze that turned remorseful when he caught sight of her probably dumbfounded expression. “I know I should have told you before I took your innocence.”
She thought of all she’d suffered by believing that he considered her unsuitable to be his wife, and anger flared to life inside her. “You should have told me long before then.” Sarcasm lent her words an edge. “The day I arrived to announce that I was your wife might have been an appropriate time.”
He stiffened. “It’s not something a man likes to admit to just anyone. I’ve never told a soul before you. Well, except for Genevieve. But she considered my sterility an advantage. For everyone else—”
When he glanced away, a muscle tightening in his jaw, she felt an unwanted stab of sympathy. How hard it must be for an English lord expected to sire an heir and carry on a dynasty to learn that he couldn’t do it. He would certainly never admit such an unmanly lack to his friends.
But what about to his family? “Does Nat know?”
“No.” He frowned, as if some thought had occurred to him, then shook it off. “He wouldn’t understand.”
“How do you know if you don’t tell him? He’s your brother, for heaven’s sake.” When his surprised gaze shot to her, she stalked up to the bed. “But that’s the trouble with you, Spencer. You won’t tell any of us a thing. You engineer these elaborate schemes to protect your family from scandal, but you don’t bother to inform them of why you’re doing it. You simply march on with your usual arrogance, telling us it’s none of our concern while you shut us out of your life.”
His eyes glittered in the firelight. As she turned to walk away, he snagged her arm and tugged her down to sit beside him. “When you first arrived, you took me by surprise. It’s not as if I owed you any explanation then. I hadn’t been the one to manipulate you or deceive you. And since I had no intention—or so I thought—of continuing our marriage, I saw no point to revealing a secret I considered very private.”
“Yes, but what about later? When you realized I cared for you?”
He swallowed. “I was afraid you’d say it didn’t matter. And that I’d want so badly to believe you that I’d be lulled into thinking it was true. I was afraid that when you came to your senses and realized it did matter, you’d want to be free of me. I was afraid that the pain of losing you after having you would be too much to endure. I thought it better not to risk it.”
She stared down at her hands. “Far better to let me think that you considered me a silly fool with no social graces and nothing but my body to commend me.”
“Devil take it.” He clasped her by the chin, forcing her to meet his gaze. “I thought you believed my tale about my career. If I’d had any idea you thought such nonsense—”
“You would have told me the truth?”
He released her chin abruptly. “Perhaps. I don’t know. I only realized tonight how you were interpreting my resistance to marriage.”
“Yes, what about tonight? What made you change your mind about our future? Why are you now willing to risk the pain of losing me, as you put it?”
A feverish need shone in the silvery depths of his eyes. “I realized I already couldn’t bear to lose you. And I hoped that if we shared a bed, you might stay. At least for a while. It was utterly selfish and wrong, I know, but I can’t regret it. I—” His voice dropped to a choked whisper. “I’ve never wanted anything as much as I want you, Abby.”
Her pulse quickened. He looked so earnest. How much had that admission cost a man as proud and seemingly self-sufficient as him? Still, he’d said nothing of love. And what did he mean, “at least for a while”?
“Let me see if I understand you,” she said. “You want me to remain your wife.”
“I have no right to ask it under the circumstances, but yes. I’ll take however long you’re willing to give me and consider myself fortunate.”
Temper flared in her chest. “You value yourself too little, Spencer.”
“I value you too much. You have a right to expect children. I can’t provide them. Eventually that will bother you. When it does, I don’t want you to feel as if you’re…trapped in this marriage. There’s no reason we can’t put my initial plan into place five months, two years, ten years down the road. You’re still young, after all.”
She gaped at him. “Whatever do you mean?”
“When you tire of our childless marriage, we’ll go to America, dissolve it legally, and separate.”
“After living together and being together for years—”
“The courts don’t have to know that. We can invent a reason we didn’t find out until—”
“It’s not the logistics I’m questioning. How could you think I’d leave you after living with you for more than a day?”
His lips tightened into a grim line. “I’m giving you an out, that’s all.”
“Maybe I don’t want an out. Maybe I believe that marriage should be ‘until death do us part.’”
“I’m sure you do. For now. But I can’t give you children, Abby.”
“Still, there are other options. You don’t have to have children of your own blood. There are foundlings and—”
“No.” His face shone starkly angry in the flickering firelight. “I won’t take in foundlings.”
Alarm seized her chest. “Why not? Surely you don’t really believe that nonsense about a child’s lineage dictating his character. Even if you do, we could find some gentlewoman who has made a mistake—”
“It has nothing to do with bloodlines,” he snapped.
“If you don’t care whether the child is of your own blood, then I don’t see what difference it makes who gave birth to it.”
“It makes a difference, believe me. It always makes a difference.” The bitterness in his tone gave her pause. “There are bonds of blood between a mother and her own child th
at don’t exist between a woman who merely takes in another woman’s child.”
“A mother,” she echoed. So that’s why he was being an idiot, suggesting a marriage with no permanency and forbidding even the possibility of adoption. “I notice that you say nothing about the bonds between a father and his child.”
“That’s different. The father doesn’t carry the child, but the mother—”
“You’re saying that if a woman doesn’t carry a child in her own womb, she will not love or care for it properly.”
He looked flustered. “I’m only saying it’s not the same, that’s all.”
“She really hurt you, didn’t she?”
“Who?”
“Your stepmother.”
Releasing an oath, he slid out from under the counterpane and went to jerk on his drawers. “It has naught to do with her.”
“It has everything to do with her. She married your father under certain conditions and then wanted to change them. She mothered you, then abandoned you.”
“It wasn’t her fault. She expected what any woman has a right to expect, and when she realized what she’d given up she regretted it.”
“As you think I’ll do.” Anger mingled with pity to clog her throat. “So you’re taking no chances. You won’t commit to a wife whom you’re sure will leave you eventually, and you certainly won’t bring any children into a marriage where the mother might abandon them because they lack some essential ‘blood bond.’”
“Abby—”
“Better to prepare yourself for heartbreak from the beginning, right? That way you won’t be surprised when the woman turns out to be just what you expected—a soulless creature with no honor, no sense of responsibility, and no loyalty.”
He whirled on her, eyes alight. “You always twist what I say to make it seem as if I think ill of you.”
“Don’t you?” She approached him with an aching heart. “A woman of character stands by her choices. She doesn’t leave a man she loves and children who need her simply because she changed her mind. But apparently you think I’m not a woman of character.”
“I think you’re too young and inexperienced to know what you want from life. It’s no reflection on your character if in time you discover you want more than I can give.”
“Every person, young or old, risks the possibility of their life not turning out as planned. Especially when it comes to marriage. They might find they aren’t suited for marriage after all. Or their spouses might die of an early illness. Taking a risk on another person is what marriage is all about.”
“Don’t talk to me of risk,” Spencer said fiercely. “I’m risking more than you can imagine by continuing this marriage, knowing what could happen.”
“Knowing what could happen and planning for it are two different things, Spencer. There’s no risk in holding your heart in check and refusing to consider adoption. Because if anything goes wrong, you’ve lost nothing. You already knew it would go that way. But there’s no gain in that, either. It’s like a man who must leap a chasm to reach his heart’s desire on the other side. If he tells himself he can’t make it and never even tries, how can he gain his dream?”
“What do you want from me?” he asked hoarsely. “You want me to build a life and a family with you, knowing what could happen? I don’t think I can do that. But I don’t want you to go, either.”
She swallowed. “Then I’ll need a few days to think about this. Because if I stay, it will be forever. Maybe you can be married by halves, but I can’t.” She steadied her gaze on him. “So I have to decide if I can give up any possibility of having children, my own or someone else’s, simply because you won’t risk it.”
“And if you can’t?” he bit out.
“Then we’ll finish out your plan as before—maintain our pretend marriage until you find Nathaniel and then go to America to dissolve it.”
“I don’t want that, damn it,” he exploded. “Why can’t you just let things go on as they are?”
“Until I grow so in love with you that I can’t break away? All the while watching the years pass as I realize I never made a conscious decision to give up everything for you? The outcome will be exactly as you predict—my bitter regrets might poison any sweetness between us. I won’t take that chance.”
She started toward the door to her bedchamber, but he reached out to stay her. When he drew her back into his arms, she stiffened.
“There’s no reason you can’t share my bed in the meantime,” he murmured into her hair.
“No.” She wriggled free of his too tempting embrace. “You aren’t the only one with a heart to protect. I love you, Spencer, but I won’t let you use my love—or my enjoyment of your lovemaking—to bend me to your will. I’ll come to your bed if I decide to stay, and not before.”
He jerked her around to face him, his eyes steely bright. “We’ll see how long you resist me when I’m actively seeking to seduce you.”
“If you so much as attempt to steal a kiss,” she threatened, “I’ll move out of this house and into Clara’s until I’ve made my decision. Is that understood?”
A muscle worked in his jaw. “All right, no kisses. For now.” He approached to tower over her, every inch of his taut, muscular frame screaming his confidence in his ability to sway her. “But only because I allow it and not for very long. Rest assured that if you dawdle about making up your mind, no one—not Blakely, not Lady Brumley, and for damned sure not Clara—will stop me from claiming you as my wife.”
“At least for a while, right?”
He glowered down at her. “I wouldn’t be the one leaving in the end.”
“How do you know? If there’s no solid promise between us, you could just as easily tire of me as I could of you. After all, you could dissolve the marriage with one little trip to America.”
“But I wouldn’t,” he protested.
“No, of course not,” she said bitterly. “You’re a man of character. I’m the one whose character is in question.”
“Devil take it, Abby—”
“You’ll have my decision in a few days.” Sick at heart, she turned toward the connecting door to her bedchamber.
“Wait!” he said when she laid her hand on the knob.
“Yes?”
“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about my sterility before. You had the right to hear of it while it could still do you some good. I should never have been so selfish as to ruin you for marriage to any other man when I knew I could only offer you half a marriage.”
She flashed him a wan smile. “After you, there could never be any other man. I was ruined for marriage long before you took my innocence. But I don’t regret it. So neither should you.”
Neither should you. The words echoed painfully in Spencer’s ears as he watched her walk out of his bedchamber for what might be the last time.
That awful thought stole the breath from his lungs and the joy from his soul. If she didn’t decide to stay, he honestly didn’t know what he would do. Life would mean nothing to him without her here. But how could he meet her terms?
Devil take her bloody stubbornness and talk of risk. He was the one who had to live every day with the knowledge of his inability to produce children. What did she know of risk?
She came halfway around the world to be with you on the word of your lying brother and a few paltry letters. She tried to make herself into what she thought you wanted. And even though you made her no promises, she came to your bed, knowing it would ruin her for any other man.
All right, so perhaps she did know something about risk. But she was too young to realize how time could wear on a person, remind her of things she’d missed, make her regret her choices…
The way Dora had regretted hers.
Bloody hell, this wasn’t only about Dora. All women wanted children, or at least all the ones he knew.
A woman of character stands by her choices.
Yes, but would Abby stand by hers? The urge to have babes of one’s own was powerf
ul. Why else were all his friends procreating like rabbits?
Returning to his bed, he swore at the sight of her virgin blood staining the golden counterpane. To hell with her lofty ideas about risk and marriage. No matter what her decision, he had to keep her here long enough to show her the wonderful life they could have together.
At least she’d said she wouldn’t leave until he found Nat. That would buy him time to convince her. In fact, the more time that passed without Nat’s being found…
A slow smile crossed his lips. Abby wouldn’t be leaving him anytime soon, not if he could help it.
Chapter 22
In certain situations, servants should be seen and not heard.
Suggestions for the Stoic Servant
Early in the evening on Monday, only two days after the night Abby and Spencer had made love, a knock came at the door of Abby’s bedchamber while she was in her dressing room, drying off from her bath.
“Mrs. Graham, would you answer that?” she called out. “It’s probably Marguerite with my gown.”
“About time, too,” Mrs. Graham said from the other room. “Dinner’s in an hour.”
Abby heard the door open and the murmur of conversation, but she never heard the door close. Curious, she donned her wrapper and strolled out into her bedchamber. No one was there. Had Mrs. Graham gone to check on the gown? If so, she was being terribly lax—she’d left the door ajar.
Rubbing the towel through her hair, Abby strode up to close it, then stood transfixed by the amazing sight that appeared through the crack.
Heavenly day. Mr. McFee and Mrs. Graham, locked in an intimate embrace.
She really shouldn’t spy. But didn’t she have a right to know what went on with her own servant? Someone had to look out for the woman’s interests, after all. Although, judging from the passionate kiss he was bestowing on Mrs. Graham, the butler himself aspired to that position. Or was it their first such encounter?
Holding her breath, Abby peered through the crack. When after a moment Mr. McFee actually slid his hand down to squeeze Mrs. Graham’s ample bottom, Abby nearly bit her tongue through while trying to hold back her laugh.
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