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One year later
“Be careful,” Beryl yelled, hoping the wind didn’t whip her words away to the other side of the cove.
Then she shook her head. Pointless!
Two of her younger brothers were splashing in the water with Philip, who’d fashioned a sailboat for them to take turns learning how to “haul wind,” as her skilled husband put it. He’d already taught them all how to swim during an earlier visit, including her two sisters who sat at the water’s edge with her youngest brother.
Her parents were somewhere on the other side of the peninsula having a quiet day, which Beryl didn’t begrudge them one whit.
Philip came bounding up the beach toward where she was setting up a picnic around Leo, sunning himself on one end of the table her husband and brothers had dragged onto the sand.
“What on God’s blue-watered earth do we need to be careful of, woman?” he asked, merriment in his beloved dark eyes.
She shrugged. “I don’t want them to go out too far in case...”
He put his hands on his hips. “In case there are pirates in the cove?”
She offered him a smile.
“There’s already one right here on the beach,” she teased but sent a glance past him to her siblings.
Philip took the pitcher of lemonade out of her hand, set it beside the cat, who opened his eyes, hissed, then stretched lazily amongst the stack of plates, though she’d put the basket of bread and the cold meats at the other end. Leo closed his eyes again.
“That’s rather disgusting,” her husband remarked. “There’ll be fur in the food.”
Then he took her in his arms.
“Come now, Lady Carruthers,” for so she was called as a knight’s wife, which he never tired of saying. “You are usually so fearless. What has got into you?”
“Everything is simply so perfect,” she confessed. “I want it to stay this way. My family is so happy. Thank you.” She pressed her cheek against his chest.
This wasn’t the Angsleys first trip to her and Philip’s Newquay home. For this two-week visit to the Cornish coast, her family had arrived by train a week earlier. Her parents had rented a cottage close by, though her brothers and sisters spent most of the time at her house, and only went back to their rented home to sleep.
And, in any case, they spent nearly all day, every day on the beach, and when they weren’t, they were exploring the caves or flying kites.
Philip had talked of adding on to his boyhood home when he’d first brought her to Cornwall. Between her family and his, they seemed to always have visitors who wanted to enjoy a seaside holiday.
Beryl had protested. For when they were not living on the Robert, taking her father back and forth to Spain, their coastal home seemed positively palatial. She hadn’t imagined it would need to be larger.
However, she now knew things were soon to change. She had no idea why she’d kept the glorious secret to herself. Perhaps it was the bustle of cleaning and preparing for her family’s visit. Or maybe it was simply that saying something out loud would make it real, and then their lives would irrevocably alter.
Suddenly, though, she couldn’t keep it to herself any longer.
“I missed my monthly flow,” she muttered against her husband’s warm body.
She felt Philip grow entirely still. Then his arms tightened, even as he drew back and looked down at her.
“What did you say?”
“My courses have stopped.” There, she’d finally said it plainly.
He paused, a myriad of emotions fluttering across his handsome, tanned face.
“Do you mean you’re carrying our child?”
“That’s usually what it means.” She offered him a tentative smile. “Promptus et fidelis,” she added, which had become her mantra since marrying this wonderful man.
“Well, sink me!” he exclaimed.
Throwing his head back as if he were bellowing up to the crow’s nest, he yelled, “A child. My child!” Then he looked down at her again and grinned, sending her insides into a spiral of longing and love.
“Our child,” he whispered. “The luckiest on earth.”
In the next instant, he swept her off her feet, cradling her high against his chest. Beryl always felt safe held in his strong arms and often stroked their sculpted muscles when lying beside him during the peaceful, salty nights at sea or at home — arms meant for building boats and raising sails and for levering his tantalizing body over hers in bed when he made love to her and for...
Carrying her to the water?
“Our child will love the ocean as I do,” her joyful captain said.
“Philip!” she cried out as he strode with her straight into the gentle sea.
The cool water contrasted with the warm sun, making her cling to him and shiver.
“You are mad!”
She heard her siblings laughing and then the teasing response of her husband.
“No, my lady. I’m a pirate!”
Finis
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