A Scandalous Marriage (8 page)

Adam frowned in silent disapproval. His mother made an impatient sound, clutching Devon’s purse tightly. “I can see you won’t listen to me. Well, then have it your way. I’ll be over at your aunt Lisbeth’s.

Come fetch me when the brat is born and
she
is out of my house. I’ll not have her here a day longer than necessary.” She flounced out the door and was gone in a blink.

Adam stood in the middle of the room, staring at the door. Devon doubted if the lad had ever gainsaid his old goat of a mother.

Leah moaned, bringing Devon’s attention back to her. He stepped back into the bedroom and rested his hand on her brow. Cold sweat covered her skin. Her breathing was shallow.

“Is she all right?” Adam asked.

“I don’t know,” Devon answered candidly. “Is there a midwife available?”

“Yes, Old Edith. Leah has talked to her several times.”

“Is she close by?”

“Only through the woods and around the far hill. Maybe a fifteen-minute walk.”

“Use the horse by the door. Bring her here.”

Devon didn’t have to say it twice. Adam started for the door.

Devon called after him, “Be careful. The animal has thrown a shoe. Don’t push him.”

Adam nodded, but at the door, he paused. “I love her.” He stood waiting as if expecting Devon to challenge him.

When Devon didn’t answer, the lad left.

Devon wasn’t certain Leah had heard Adam’s declaration. Her eyes were closed, her focus on the life inside her. Devon sat on the edge of the bed and, taking her hand in his own, rubbed the tender skin of her wrist with his thumb.

Her eyes opened. “Devon, I’m afraid. I don’t want to lose my baby.”

“It’s going to be all right, Leah. I’ll make it all right.”

His words seemed to reassure her. She relaxed slightly, staring at some distant point in the room, anticipating the next wave of pain.

Even in the throes of labor, and after all that had happened between them, she still attracted him.

Devon wasn’t surprised Adam had fallen under her spell. He, too, had been that foolish once, but that was the past.

He was wiser now.

The midwife, Old Edith, was a Scotswoman and one of the ugliest people Devon had ever met. Her pushed-in face looked as if someone had punched her and left the fist mark. She had more hair on her upper lip than she did on her head, but he could have kissed her when she entered the bedroom, dropped her canvas bag of supplies onto the floor, and, with calm authority, ordered him out.

He gave Leah’s hand one last reassuring squeeze and then hurried into the other room, where Adam waited in white-faced silence.

Each man took an opposing corner of the sitting room. The bedroom didn’t have a door. Only a curtain of off-white homespun separated the two rooms, so Leah’s soft cry as the midwife examined her was all too clearly heard.

When Devon had been in there, he’d managed to calm her a bit. He’d reasoned that she had to ease into the pain. To try and relax. And it had seemed to work. But now she sounded as if once again she was lost in the tempest of pain and fear.

“Is the baby really yours?”

Adam’s young voice intruded on Devon’s thoughts. Almost as an afterthought, the young pup added

“my lord?” in a less than respectful voice.

Devon considered his rival. Leah could do far worse. Adam was maybe twenty, stocky of build, with golden brown hair and eyes green with jealousy. Devon had no intention of answering him. One of the few perquisites to being a viscount was the fact that one didn’t have to answer to inferiors. It wasn’t a game Devon played often, but he could when he wished.

Adam’s face flushed a bright red as the silence stretched between them. His fists clenched.

Devon silently dared him to try it. He wouldn’t mind a good mill to take the edge off this moment.

Suddenly, the curtain was flung back from the bedroom door. Old Edith stepped into the room. She instinctively noticed the animosity in the room. Her glance flicked to first one, and then to the other.

She spoke, her Scottish burr thick. “Adam, where is your mother?”

“She left.”

“To your aunt’s?”

Adam nodded.

“Good, you go there too,” the woman ordered. “I will send word when the lass drops the babe.”

“But, I don’t—”

“Adam, I don’t need you here.” Her words were sharper than any admiral’s command. “You are in the way. Begone.”

He shot a frustrated look in Devon’s direction. “What about him?”

In the other room, Leah moaned softly, a moan that ended with her whispering Devon’s name. The sound of it hung in the air a moment. Adam had his answer. He abruptly turned on his heel, threw open the door, and left the cottage.

Devon crossed to the door and firmly shut it behind him, but not before he noticed the sky had grown darker, the clouds more ominous. The air let in through the open door chilled him to the bone.

Old Edith moved to the fire. Kneeling, she began to build it up. “We need boiling water.”

“I’ll fetch it.”

“The bucket’s over there.” She nodded to the wooden pail by the door.

Glad to have something to do, Devon started to cross the room when Old Edith’s voice stopped him.

“The lass’s labor is not normal. Something happened to set it off.” It was not a question but a statement, and yet Devon knew she was asking him what he had done.

He went very still. In his mind he could see the image of Leah falling, hear the sound of her body hitting the frozen earth. “Will she be all right?” His voice was almost that of a stranger.

Old Edith sat back on her haunches. “That’s not for me to decide. It’s in God’s hands now, but it will not be easy for her. She may lose the bairn.”

Coldness gripped his heart. “And her? Could we lose her?”

“Birthing is always dangerous.”

If anything happened to Leah, Devon would never forgive himself. It wouldn’t be possible.

“I’ll get water,” he said stiffly.

“Aye.” She watched him open the door and then said, “Are you the father of her babe, my lord?”

Devon turned to her.

“Aye, I know who you are,” she said. Her squinty eyes seemed to bore right though him. “A fine friend of our own Lord Ruskin you are. We’ve heard tales. Your name is well known.”

At that moment, Leah called for him.

Old Edith’s lips twisted into a grim smile.
“Auch,
she needs us. You’d best get that water and then wait out in the other room. It will be a long night.”

Numbly, Devon went to do her bidding.

The first hour did not pass quickly. Or the second.

Devon had tossed his jacket and neckcloth onto the table. He was not a patient man. Waiting did not suit him. He paced the perimeter of the outer room, listening to Leah’s soft moans in the bedroom and worrying. And it did not sound as if Leah was coming closer to having the baby. The pains were not steady and regular.

This was his fault. He shouldn’t have chased her. He didn’t even understand why he’d done so.

When he thought he heard her call his name, he decided he had had enough. Impetuously, he flung back the curtain.

Old Edith sat on the far end of the bed. Leah lay on her side, her legs bent, her eyes shut. She was naked save for the sheet covering her body. Her arms hugged her belly protectively. She appeared oblivious to the world around her, concentrating completely on the child struggling for life.

“There must be something I can do,” he said almost desperately. “We can’t just let her keep on like that hour after hour.”

“Have you ever been in a birthing room, my lord?” Old Edith asked bluntly. “It takes time. The babe comes when it is ready. It knows no clock but its own. Your only choice is to leave us be and wait.”

She might have had her way, except Leah opened her eyes. She reached out with one hand. “Devon.”

He hooked back the curtain and knelt beside the bed to take her hand. “Dear God, Leah, I’m sorry. So very, very sorry.”

Another pain started to build. She cried out, her body tensing reflexively to the pain.

Modesty be damned. Devon slipped his arm beneath her shoulders and began coaching as he had before the midwife had arrived. Leah had seemed to be doing better then. “Try and relax, Leah. Don’t fight it.”

“They are hard pains she’s having,” Old Edith said. “But nothing’s coming of them.”

Devon didn’t want to ask the questions crowding his mind. He feared the answers. Instead, he began running the side of his thumb up and down along Leah’s spine, pushing the sheet down. Her skin felt clammy and cold. It worried him. Leah’s head rested against his arm, and he could feel the movement of the pain through her body. He massaged harder, wanting to ease those tight muscles.

Leah looked up at him with half slit eyes. “That feels good. It helps. Thank you.” After a few minutes, she relaxed.

Old Edith stood. “Well, it seems as if you might have an idea about how to go along after all, my fine lord. I’m going for a spell of fresh air. I’ll be back in a moment.” She left them alone, slipping outside to see to her private needs.

“This is my fault,” Devon whispered to Leah. “All my fault.”

“I shouldn’t have run away,” she answered in a voice slowed by fatigue.

“I surprised you. You weren’t expecting to see me here.”

She shook her head. “No, I didn’t mean today. I meant in the beginning. From London.”

Devon went still. “So your parents don’t know you are here?”

“No one knows. I left by myself.”

“Why, Leah? Why did you run away?”

She lifted her lashes, and her eyes flashed with irony and her old spirit. “Isn’t it obvious?”

Why could she not have turned to the man who had done this?
He didn’t ask the question that burned in his mind. Now was not the time. Instead he said, “You could have come to me.”

“I didn’t think you would want me.” Another spasm gripped her body.

Not want her
? He’d begged her to leave with him.

She squeezed his hand as she rode the pain. He brushed his lips across her forehead, wishing he could bear the pain for her. He’d never felt so helpless in his life.

Outside, the gathering storm began. Drops of ice hit the window, softly at first, and then harder. Old Edith burst through the front door and slammed it shut. “I made it just in time.” She hobbled into the bedroom. “How are you doing, lass? Do you feel the baby?”

“Just pain,” Leah answered.

“Any movement?”

Leah shook her head, too tired to answer.

The midwife rested her hand on Leah’s belly, her gaze focused on the far wall, her mind working. At last she said, “I must check the babe. I’ll have to ask you to leave the room, my lord.”

Leah’s hands tightened their hold on his arm. “No, please let him stay.”

“This is no place for a man,” Old Edith said decisively, “excepting, of course, the father of this bairn.”

“I’m not leaving,” Devon replied.

Old Edith’s sharp eyes met his. “So are you saying you are the father?”

“Yes,” he answered. After all, what difference did it make? He’d already said as much to the Pitneys to scare off the lovesick Adam.

Leah made a sound of protest, but Devon silenced her. “Leave it be. Think about the baby. There will be time for explanations later.”

Old Edith performed her examination with quick efficiency. Devon didn’t watch. Instead, he cooed to Leah, knowing this was hard for her.

The midwife folded the sheet back down and stood up.

“Is my baby all right?” Leah asked drowsily.

“Oh, yes, he’s going to do fine,” Old Edith assured her, but her eyes and nose had turned suspiciously red. She walked into the next room.

“Let me get you some water to drink,” Devon said. Leah nodded, and he followed Old Edith, dropping the curtain behind him as he left. Cornering the midwife by the fire, he demanded quietly, “What is happening?”

She refused to look at him as she poured hot water into a cup to brew tea. She replaced the kettle before answering, “I don’t know. Sometimes things don’t go easily for a first babe.” She shrugged, her casual gesture belied by her need to swipe a tear from her cheek.

A beat passed, then Devon confessed, “She fell.”

Old Edith considered this information. “Well, that could be the problem. She might have torn something inside. Or it could be something else.”

Anger surged inside him, causing him to lash out, “Don’t you know anything?”

“Aye! I know that girl can die in there and the babe with her,” she whispered furiously. “Even if I knew why her pain isn’t regular, I don’t know there would be anything I could do to help her.” She turned away.

Rex had lost his wife during the birth of his last son. Her death had barely registered with Devon at the time. Mary had been a colorless woman, and their paths had rarely crossed. Now in this room, with the ice relentlessly pelting the cottage and full witness to Leah’s struggle, he thought of Mary. Poor Mary, dead and forgotten.

Devon stared at the cup of hot water, watching the tea slowly steep as he struggled with her meaning.

Leah could die.

“No,” he denied. “We can’t let her. It’s not possible.”

“Oh, it’s possible,” Old Edith answered. She pulled a pottery flask from a skirt pocket and poured a generous drop in the cup. Liquid courage.

“Devon?” Leah called him, her voice weak.

“Go to her,” Old Edith said. “She needs you right now more than she needs me. But don’t tell her. If we are going to save her, we need her fighting. Go on.”

His feet moved like lead weights. He pushed back the curtain.

“Are you and Old Edith fighting?”“ Leah asked.

He knelt, taking her smaller hand in his. Tears stung his eyes. Hardening his jaw, he forced them back and attempted a smile. “Old Edith doesn’t mince words about my obligations as the father of the baby.”

“But Devon, you aren’t—”

Her voice broke off in a gasp as again a contraction took hold of her. Old Edith came to the doorway holding her teacup, her experienced gaze watching.

“Is it supposed to hurt like this?” Leah moaned. “I feel as if I’m being ripped in two.”

“It can,” was the midwife’s terse reply.