Chapter Ten

Phoebe nearly choked, she drew in her breath so sharply. And it had nothing to do with how delightfully scandalous she was pressed up against her husband, nor did it have to do with the wonderful kisses she swore she could still feel against her mouth or the molten need which had settled hot and troubling low in her belly.

For a moment, Phoebe did not comprehend his meaning, then she wondered if she misread the signs. She had been diligent in studying his language, even reading the sign manual and dictionary written by Charles Michel de l’Epée, a man Hugh said had the honor of being called the father of sign language. It had been quite fascinating to learn this new language and to discover that their British manuals had variations on certain signs. It was all so very illuminating, and it had helped her immensely along with the daily conversational lessons she had with her husband. “Please repeat,” she whispered, watching his face intently. “Did you…did you ask me to move into your chamber?”

He reached for the paper and quill, pressing them against her lap to write. Whenever he had a lot to say, he would do this, fearing perhaps she would not be able to keep pace as he expressed himself.

We will convert your room to be a nursery for the baby.

Emotions tightened her throat as he continued writing.

On our wing of the house, it is only our chambers, a few sitting rooms, a music room, and a smaller library. The nursery is on the east wing, and I’ve seen you standing in that room looking forlorn. I suspect you want to be closer to the child, so let us share my exceptionally large room and our baby will only be a connecting door away. Very unconventional, I know, but are we not the masters of our home? I daresay we can do whatever we want.

Phoebe flung her arms around his neck, hugged him tightly, and squeezed. She eased back, cupped his jaw tenderly, and pressed a soft kiss to the corner of his mouth. “Thank you!”

Before she could lean back, he turned his head so their lips were a mere whisper apart. He had such extraordinary eyes—cobalt with a fleck of sapphire. And in that beautiful stare, there was a faint glimpse of humor in his eyes and arousal so profound she blushed. Despite using every excuse under the sun to ravish her lips so often, he showed the most admirable restraint in not seducing her further.

“I have been here six weeks now,” she said, brushing a curl from his forehead.

He did not object to her tender ministration but leaned even further into her touch. She went frightfully warm inside. Each day they grew closer, but there was still a reserve in his gaze at times, as if he were a watcher of their interactions and not a participant.

It had made her feel odd, and she had been incredibly careful to maintain a facade of propriety, which he had smashed earlier with his request for her to be unrestrained. Now she wanted the same from him. That he was honorable and kind was a given, but there was so much more that felt unreachable to her. Phoebe wanted to know him even if he would never allow himself to love her. But that is quite fine, she staunchly reminded herself. I shall not love him, either. This is simply a business arrangement and a friendship.

Pushing aside the heaviness suddenly pressing against her chest, she asked, “How…how does marrying me benefit you?”

His eyes became hooded, piercing, and watchful, like a hawk. Unexpectedly, her heart jerked. “Hugh…will you tell me?”

He gently clasped her hips and urged her back against the cushions and the tree trunk. The position was comfortable given the paddings of cushion and blanket beneath her.

He shifted on the blankets, sitting by her feet so they could see each other clearly. The entire affair was far more serious than she had supposed. There was a flatness about his lips and a distance in his eyes that had not been present earlier.

“What is it?”

His eyes held her for long moments, then he signed, “I am a bastard.”

She took a quick breath of utter astonishment. Then the shock of discovery hit her full force, and she pressed a palm over her heart. “I beg your pardon?”

“I am not my father’s child. My mother had an affair, and I am the product of it.”

Her lips parted, and she took a few breaths before she said, “You are not a bastard. Please do not refer to yourself as such. While your father might have been someone else, the earl claimed you as his child.” She rested a hand on her high mound protectively. “Just as how my child is legitimate because of our marriage.”

A glint of something undefinable moved in his gaze. “The ton will not see it as such.”

“They will not have a choice.” Then she recalled the paintings in the hallway and that Caroline and the other little boy in the picture looked nothing like the earl, either. A heavy suspicion lodged in her heart, and he watched her with flat eyes, surely waiting for her to arrive at the inevitable conclusion.

A deeper understanding of why he wanted an influential family to connect with his settled inside her. Dear God. She stared at him, horror icing through her. If the ton was aware of this, or even speculated upon his legitimacy and caused a scandal, the duke and duchess would not stand in support.

“Hugh,” she whispered achingly, considerably dismayed. He had given her so much, and not even in that regard would she be able to be there for him. “You will have my full support and loyalty in every way.”

She owed him that even if society would dare to try and cut them because of old rumors and scandals. Phoebe squeezed his fingers. “I will be there in every way. If they try to cut you or Caroline or all of us, I shall certainly not spare them my indifference or anger.”

His mouth hitched in a fleeting smile. “I know that much about you. It is one of the reasons I married you.”

A warm feeling suffused her entire body. “But my parents, they are the ones with the power to shape society’s opinions to their will. The duke and duchess…they are deplorably proper. They…I…”

“When needed, your father will provide his support.”

Phoebe was stunned. “It is useless to think that he would!”

“I will be able to compel him to do so.”

She wavered, trying to comprehend his certainty. “How could you possibly do that?”

A touch of a smile curved his lips, and the hint of ruthlessness to it faltered her speech. She watched his fingers and expression carefully as he signed.

“Many of the investments your father is deeply entrenched in, the Winthrops own the controlling interest. If the duke’s support is required in any manner, he would have little choice but to give it.”

A lesson her father had always impressed upon his children was recalled to her mind. Within the ton, those with money and a title are the most powerful. A position the duke himself immensely enjoyed. If that money was threatened even a bit, his admirable position would be endangered. Her thoughts whirled. “My father partakes in investments where you own the controlling interest?”

Hugh’s fingers moved. “Several.”

“But you did not know we would be married,” she said, a bit of confusion twisting through her.

He signed slowly, and she watched his expression and fingers keenly.

“The earl and I have planned my return these last few years as if we would head into battle. The most powerful and influential families of the ton have been studied, secrets, scandals, financial weaknesses and strengths collected. The value of marrying any one of their daughters is incalculable. When you fell into my hands, I daresay we were beyond fortunate.”

She arched a brow as a spurt of amusement caught her off-guard. “Fell into your hands? How odiously ominous. But I do understand now…I am the doorway needed to reach my family and many other powerful connections in the ton.”

A piercing disquiet filled her, and she tried to push it away. It was the power of her connections why his father had not protested their match. She was still amazed Hugh had married her given he must have possessed other choices. Phoebe realized then a part of her wished there had been something inside of him that had reacted to her as a woman…something in him that wanted her without the connections more than anything else.

He nodded once, his eyes carefully measuring her reaction.

“Do you suppose society is aware of your family’s secret?”

His flinch was subtle, but it was there. “Years ago, they were very much aware, and the scandal of it all but ruined my father. To protect us, he took his children and left England. We have not returned since.”

“And once you do…there are those who will stir those old rumours with the violence of a winter storm.”

“Yes.”

A lesser family would simply stay away from it all, as many did who had fallen to ruin. The entire family would eschew all of society and bury themselves away in the country with little opportunities for any pursuits, whether it be studies, marriage, or the frivolous kind—all would be made impossible.

If any family that had been cut dared to return to town without the approval of those who deemed themselves the arbiters of high society’s circle, they would find themselves shunned socially, politically, and even financially as bank doors and investment clubs would be closed to their queries. Those powerful lords and ladies in the ton could be merciless when they deem a family should stay away.

Memories of how terrible they had been to her brother set her throat to aching. Only that he had been even more ruthless and uncaring of society’s opinion had seen him, his darling wife Evie, and his band of children, whom he had taken into his heart and home, safe. And her family, Hugh and Caroline, would face it shortly. And it seemed her husband might be just as cunning in dealing with the lot.

Phoebe was decidedly unsure of just how she should feel about her assessment of him in that moment. She found him vaguely disturbing and terribly compelling. “Is that why you advertised for a wife? Not wanting to wade through the scandal and idle gossip you would have faced in the marriage mart.”

“The old earl is dying with only a few weeks left to live. Advertising seemed the most expedient way of satisfying his wish before…”

“Dying! I cannot credit it!” The earl, while he avoided her most ardently, did not act like a man who hovered at death’s door. “Are you certain?”

“I am.”

“You do not seem alarmed by the prospect that something so dreadful hovers.”

“I have accepted it, and so has he.”

Her heart ached for him, and that notion that he was so very carefully contained with his emotions occurred to her again. Do you not feel? She was tempted to ask but wisely held her reckless tongue. “Will you be taking Caroline with us when we return to England?”

He glanced away toward the small waterfall for several moments before lifting his hands and signing, “Yes.”

“Are you worried about her reception?”

“She is dreadfully improper and has big dreams in her heart. Those dreams will take her to London for a come out that must be spectacular.”

Phoebe hesitated, torn by conflicting emotions. “She is also not the earl’s daughter,” she said softly, unable to understand how their mother could have been so terribly selfish. “Where…may I ask where your mother is?”

“In Edinburgh. She is quite famous for her charm and beauty, and the papers take great pleasure in recounting her famous exploits.”

“Is she to return home soon?” It had been several weeks since they had married, and no one had mentioned the marchioness. Phoebe had even wondered if their mother had died and had thought it odd no portrait of hers hung in the hallways.

“Unlikely, since she left us some fifteen years ago and has never been back once.”

A shock went through Phoebe’s entire body; then their gazes collided. “She left?” The scandal must have been horrifying. Good heavens. “By her own choice or did the earl…”

His eyes chilled, and discomfort curled through Phoebe.

“By her own will. The confines of marriage and children were gathered to be dull. We are uncertain since no explanation has ever been given.”

How abominable of her. Phoebe leaned forward and grasped one of his hands. She laced their fingers together, wishing to comfort him in any manner she could. He allowed this, a curious expression in his eyes. “I am so terribly sorry for the pain you must have endured and must still suffer knowing she is here in Scotland and quite uncaring!”

A brow arched, his gaze grew even more remote, and when he tugged his hands from hers for a moment, she felt bereft.

“You mistake the matter. It is of no consequences that she is gone. Good riddance to her disloyalty and inconstancy.”

She winced at his flat dismissal. “But surely should she return—” It was that remarkable indifference in his mien that caused her to stop speaking.

An uncomfortable silence lingered, and she couldn’t say what madness prompted her to ask, “And if one day I should leave?” Phoebe discerned that the reserve she had always sensed within him was rooted deeply in this very moment. It felt silly that she asked, and she took a breath to beg him to ignore her words when his fingers leaped to life.

“If it is after you have done your part of the bargain, if you are to leave, it would be of little consequence.”

“Oh!” she gasped, almost overcome by mortification. Phoebe believed she interpreted it correctly to mean that she was of little to no consequence to him. She realized in that moment he had no expectations of her, beyond whatever had prompted him to marry her. The awareness left her feeling wretched.

His eyes caressed over her face, searching every nuance of her expression. How stricken she must appear, and she schooled her features into a pleasant mask. The ache that filled her heart was bewildering because it was all for the man before her. How he must have hurt when his mother left, enough so that he seemed to exile his emotions from all states of feeling.

She recalled with perfect clarity then, his letters and how indignant she had initially been at his dismissal of love.

I do not plan to leave you, she promised him silently, a soft smile curving her mouth.

The shift in her countenance had him canting his head and staring at her.

“Your smile, it is very beautiful.”

Her cheeks coloured under the heated intensity of his gaze. How foolish! To blush so easily at a compliment as if she were a silly girl fresh from the school room. “You flatter me, thank you.” Before he could respond, she continued, “I would like to dip my feet in the brook.” The cool water had a wonderful way of easing the ache she oftentimes endured in her ankles, and this ritual had become a part of their morning routine.

With spry grace, he pushed to his feet before coming over to her. It was always so difficult to get up, and Phoebe suspected that soon they would have to stop coming here, because surely her belly would only get larger. The doctor had informed her she had at least two months to go before the birthing, and to Phoebe’s mind, each day her belly grew an inch. He came down to almost her level, and she wrapped her arms around his shoulders and braced as he eased her to her feet.

Once standing, she did not release his shoulders as she normally did but peered up at his face, which had remained carefully inscrutable. She lifted her fingers to his forehead and brushed aside that stubborn curl of hair once more. He gripped her hand, as if he could not bear that tender ministration.

But instead of pushing her away as she’d anticipated, he kissed her fingers. Phoebe made no further attempt to speak, nor did she dare question him any more about his past. They spent the rest of the day together, and she couldn’t recall ever having a grander time playing chess, cribbage, and even reading.

That evening, after taking a tray in her room, having been too exhausted to dress up for dinner, Phoebe lay in bed on her side. They hadn’t talked again about what her moving to his chamber meant and when exactly she would do so. Tomorrow she would inform Sarah, and then they could start discussing the colour to do over the walls and the type of fabric she would require to swath the windows and to hang over the crib.

An odd sort of anxiety beat in her breast, and with a great struggle, she shifted and turned onto her back. It felt as if the roasted duck in cream sauce and asparagus she had eaten an hour ago would rush back up and she would cast her account. With a frustrated groan, she turned on her other side. At that moment, the connecting door opened, and her breath audibly caught.

Her husband framed the doorway, dressed in a dark blue silk banyan. Phoebe pushed to her elbows and tried to sit up, hating that it was getting so difficult. Her heart pounded when Hugh padded over to her, and Phoebe couldn’t help gasping when he dipped, placed one of his hands beneath her shoulder and the other under her hips, and effortlessly lifted her into his arms and made his way to his chamber.

Oh God! Her heart raced so fast, she feared fainting.

“Are you…are we to sleep together?” she asked, flushing at the squeak in her voice.

He paused on the threshold to enter his room. It took immense courage for her to lift her head to peer up into his face. He returned her stare, and her throat dried at the tenderness in his eyes. They also hinted an unfathomable message she could not decipher.

Her lips parted on a soundless sigh when he lowered his head. But he did not kiss her lips as she had anticipated, just pressed a kiss to her forehead. Her heart pounded, and though she was in his arms, Phoebe swore her knees trembled.

The warmth of his lips vanished from her skin, and he moved with her, entering his chamber. Inside his room was dark, except for the low-burning fire at the far-left corner. He walked with her over to the large canopied bed in the center of the room. She pressed her face into the crook of his throat and inhaled deeply of his warm, masculine scent. Her heart surged, and a shiver of longing chased wickedly along her spine. He carefully deposited her on the bed and lowered the canopy before going around to the next side of the bed and climbing on.

They lay facing each other, and she could barely discern his features with that small flicker of light from the hearth. Yet she could feel his eyes on her. I’ve never slept beside another, she wanted to say, but her tongue would not obey. Phoebe wasn’t certain how long she lay there unable to sleep. She shifted several times, trying to find comfort, to no avail. It had been like this almost every night for the past week, and she dreaded the idea that it would go on for another two months.

With a soft groan, she turned to her side. There was a dip on the bed behind her, and her entire body came alive as Hugh’s presence drifted nearer. A warm hand rested on her hip, and she felt his curiosity as if it were a tangible entity.

“My lower back aches dreadfully,” she confessed, wincing at the pitiful sob in her tone. “And my feet ache. From my knees down to my ankles. Dr. Edward swears these are all symptoms of pregnancy, but I have been intolerably miserable these past few days!”

A kiss was pressed to her shoulder, a touch meant to soothe, and it did, for the tension leaked from her body. His warmth left her, the bed dipped, and though she strained to hear, he did not leave the room. He came back on the bed, and when she looked about, his shadow was below hers.

She swallowed when he took her foot into his arms. Something cold touched her skin, and she gasped but did not tug her foot from his grasp. A scent rose in the air; it was oddly pleasant, an aroma of lemon and peppermint. He rubbed from the tip of her toes, down the bottom of her feet, around her ankle, and up to her knees. The relief she felt in her leg was beyond wonderful. He attended to both feet for several moments before he stopped.

“Thank you,” she said in a soft, drowsy sigh, turning on her side.

Her eyes flew open when his length pressed closer from behind. But it was the shock of feeling him reach around her shoulder to deftly unbutton her nightgown that had her faltering into alarming stillness. Phoebe couldn’t breathe. She dared not breathe. Oh, but how her heart trembled as she welcomed his touch. She offered no protest; in truth, she was not capable of speech.

The silence in the darkness of the chamber felt thick and perilous.

Phoebe’s chest rose and fell erratically when he eased the nightgown from her shoulders. She even helped him when he encouraged her to rise slightly, so he could ease the material from her other shoulder. When she realized the action would bare her breasts to the night air, she gripped his hand, which still held a bit of her gown. Her action had both their hands resting against her bare skin, right above her cleavage. She hadn’t worn a chemisette to bed, not liking the friction it caused against her breasts that were increasingly tender and sensitive.

She bit down on her lower lip, gripping the front of the unbuttoned nightgown. “I…I…I am naked beneath the gown,” she said huskily.

Hugh offered no response—of course he could offer none, she thought inanely.

He shifted closer, and she closed her eyes as he pressed a kiss to her bare shoulder. The contact jolted her, and her entire body trembled for a second. Birds took flight in her stomach, and with a sigh, she leaned back against him. She bit her lips even harder when he turned his head and brushed another kiss right at that spot below her ear…then down to her neck. Her trembling fingers released his hand and her gown, which fell and was only stopped by the high rise of her belly.

The chilled air rushed over her skin, pebbling her nipples and raising fine bumps on her skin. Phoebe had never been so aware of another person in her life, and the dull ache in her heart almost felt unbearable as she waited with helpless fascination for him to act.

Her belly went hot with a frightful surge of hunger when he coasted his hands over her shoulders and down, dragging her nightgown with it. She gasped when something cold touched her skin, and that breathy sound transformed to a moan as his fingers started a deep massage into her lower back.

The pleasure of it was incredible, the ache which had been a torment these few nights easing immediately. Her maidservant had tried to assuage her pain and discomfort, but her fingers lacked the strength of Hugh’s. Several pillows supported her as she lay on her side, so scandalously bared as her husband spent several minutes kneading her back, and sometimes even up to her shoulder. All the tension leaked from her, and peace seeped over her entire body.

“Hugh, I am falling asleep,” she murmured drowsily, her lashes fluttering closed.

He paused, and Phoebe smiled when he pressed a kiss atop her shoulders as if to say, Sleep, then. Then he resumed his ministrations, just a bit more tenderly this time, but just as relaxing and sublime.

Something indefinable turned over inside of her. Phoebe hoped she was not still that silly girl who longed for sweet sentiments. The old dreams of the forever kind of love she’d always hungered for, the one that would allow her to live a life of joy, was forever from her reach. This man did not believe in fate or love. The simple fact was their marriage was only built on the use they had of each other to save their family. Nothing more.

Do not be silly, Phoebe! she told herself fiercely. Do not go wishing for more than he will ever be able to give. The possibility of feeling more for him, only to never have those sentiments returned, sent a painful jolt of apprehension through her.

That way only led to heartache, pain, and disappointed expectations. And I am smarter than that. Dear God, please let me be smarter than to fall hopelessly in love with Hugh Winthrop.