| |
“I have placed you in your old bedroom, Archie,” the Duchess, no, Millie, said as she welcomed Cecilia and Archie in the entrance hall.
“But there is no adjoining room,” Archie said, voicing Cecilia’s thoughts exactly.
Millie’s pale blue eyes went wide with surprise and her mouth thinned as if she was trying to hold back words. Then a slight movement of the shoulders seemed to indicate that she had shrugged whatever statement she had been about to make from her body.
“I did not know that you required separate rooms,” she said in a voice that was almost neutral. Only the slightest hints of disapproval lingered on the words “required” and “separate”.
“Well,” Archie began. His eyes strayed to Cecilia.
“Well,” Cecilia took over. “As it turns out, Archie snores and I am a light sleeper.”
This was oversharing to an extent that made Cecilia blush instantly, but Millie was Archie’s mother after all. If Cecilia could not mention bodily functions in front of her, who could she mention them to? Although she would have preferred not to do it in the entrance hall where maids and footmen were flitting through, carrying luggage, flowers, tableware, and whatnot.
“Oh, I didn’t know,” Millie said and sent her son a look as if he should have told her that he had begun snoring the instant it had happened. “Well, I will put you in the pearly suite for now. It has two rooms. Then when Lord and Lady Lindley arrive in three days you will have to move out in the morning.”
Millie turned to Cecilia and put her small hand on her arm. Her new mother-in-law was even shorter than Cecilia was.
“I am sorry, my dear, but I really cannot have guests sleeping in the family wing. I will have Mrs. Higgins, our housekeeper, give you a pair of thick cotton swots for your ears. Hopefully, it will be enough to help you sleep.”
Cecilia’s stomach felt like a knot as she saw the compassion in the elder woman’s eyes. It felt like a betrayal, but she could not bring herself to tell Millie the truth.
The pearly suite was just as grand as any of the other rooms Cecilia had seen in the estate. It consisted of two spacious bedrooms with a shared dressing and washing room in between the two. It gave her a sense of having a buffer between the two of them. She sighed as she sank backwards into the soft mattress and closed her eyes for a moment.
She was not certain how she would have handled having to share a room with Archie for the duration of their stay. The four nights would be hard enough. Her body yearned for him, yet her mind could not let her have him. Each night she would touch herself when she thought of what he had done on the second night of their marriage. And her body knew that being with him, having him inside her, would only feel even better.
She was roused from her musings when Archie knocked on the door.
“Enter,” Cecilia muttered and struggled to sit up right in the soft bed. It was like being attacked from behind by a cream pudding.
Archie entered, before she had struggled her way out of the bed. He went to the side and offered her a hand that she took with trepidation and let him help her up. The touch of his warm naked hand was making her skin come alive with a prickling sensation that was immediately followed by goosebumps.
“Are you alright? Not too cold?” Archie asked and looked at the fireplace where the fire had just been lit, not warming the room fully yet.
Cecilia nodded and extricated her hand from his.
“I’m quite alright,” she told him and went to her trunk to be able to turn her back on him. “Thank you for securing us separate rooms,” she muttered as she rummaged for a shawl that she was quite sure she had brought. She needed to take something from the trunk at least.
“Well...” Archie sighed. “I thought you would prefer it.”
Cecilia did not know how to respond. They had been married three weeks and he had not come to her bedroom since the two first nights. Even though her monthly courses had started on the third night, clearly he had to know that they were over by now. Or had he already lost interest? Perhaps the adjoining rooms were not for her benefit but for his? Well over a hundred people would be staying at the estate for the wedding, there could easily be an unsatisfied wife or a merry widow among them that he had planned to take to bed.
“I’m ready,” Cecilia blurted as she turned from the trunk with a pale blue shawl that did not go well with her pale green dress, but there was nothing to be done about it now.
The upstairs drawing room was a riot of running children, chatting adults, a fuzzy infant, and nannies and maids trying to make the whole debacle a little more comfortable for everyone. All of Archie’s siblings had arrived before them and all of their children were presently in the drawing room.
Cecilia was glad that Archie kept her at his elbow as they made their way around the room and greeted his siblings: Lady Charlotte, who was a more well-proportioned and gray-eyed version of Hester, and her husband Lord James and their four daughters. Lady Lucy Winterbottom, who was the spitting image of Millie, her husband, Edmund Winterbottom and their two sons and daughter. Archie’s brother Henry, the Marquis of Seacourt, who was a bit shorter and had more golden-brown hair than Archie but had the same build and startlingly blue eyes. His wife Edwina was holding their infant son in her arms; the boy had finally calmed down but began to cry immediately when his mother turned from the conversation and started shouting orders at her two oldest boys.
Lord Gregory who was a bit shorter than Archie with a squarer face and the same brownish blonde hair as his eldest and youngest sister was standing with Lady Hester in a corner with Flint, his brother Percy Eavesgrave, his sister Lady Addinggrove, and her husband Lord Addinggrove. Their son Arthur was most likely among the children rummaging around on the floor. Cecilia and Archie joined them as they stood a bit to the side and watched the mayhem unfold in front of them.
“The children will leave in ten minutes,” Percy Eavesgrave said as they greeted him.
“Percy,” his sister chided him and swatted his arm.
“Well, I could tell that Miss Gaywood was thinking it,” Percy Eavesgrave said with an easy smile.
“Lady Archibald,” Flint corrected him before either Cecilia or Archie had a chance to say anything. Cecilia gave him a wide-eyed stare. They had hardly spoken since she had returned from the accidental elopement with Archie. She had been wondering how the sight of him would affect her, but it had stirred no emotion whatsoever. All her emotions seemed to be centered on the man standing next her, her hand still resting in the crook of his elbow. She had felt the muscles tense slightly as Flint had spoken.
“Lady Archibald, of course, I apologize,” Percy Eavesgrave said with an easy smile.
“There is no reason to apologize,” Cecilia told him. “And I suppose that we can use each other’s Christian names since we are going to be family after all, can we not?”
She looked first at Archie, who did not return her gaze, but was looking at first Flint, then his sister. She turned to look at Flint herself who just gave her a perplexed look. It was Gregory who spoke.
“Certainly, we could,” he said with a smile that Cecilia recognized from her second brother, Bran, who had been born just after Algernon. David was a year younger than her but with the temper of an ass and the rage of a bull to match Algernon’s firstborn dominance and superiority. Bran had usually been the peacemaker between the brothers. Apparently, in the Montagu family that role had fallen to Gregory.
“Although, I think I have forgotten your Christian name, Lord Addinggrove.” Gregory smiled as he looked at the man.
“Michael,” Lord Addinggrove answered jovially.
They were interrupted when Lucy’s sons, Hugo and Charlie, came running and wanted their uncles to join their game. Both happily complied. Sophia and Michael went to check on their own son, Percy seemed to vanish all together and Cecilia found herself standing alone with Flint and Hester. The three of them sent each other awkward glances as if it was a game where they had to guess who was hiding something in their hand.
“I suppose you are looking forward to the wedding,” Cecilia asked and supposed that meant that she was the one who was least comfortable with the silence between them.
“Yes, very much, thank you,” Flint answered with a relieved smile.
“Good, I am very happy for you.” Cecilia looked only at Flint as she spoke. They might not have a chance to speak alone. Nor did she particularly want to, but she needed both of them to know that she was happy for them. The mess that she and Archie had created was entirely of their own making. It had nothing to do with Flint or Hester. Or at least only partially, but certainly not to the extent that she blamed them for it.
Flint gave her a sincere nod and Cecilia could feel how Hester stepped closer to him as Cecilia and he kept eye contact. Cecilia swiftly switched her gaze to meet Hester’s violet and penetrating stare.
“Where will you honeymoon?” she asked Hester. It might be that this woman did not care at all about her wedding, but certainly they had to have planned a honeymoon.
“We will go to Barford Abbey for the first couple of weeks of the marriage,” Hester answered and sent her husband a look of undisguised happiness. “Then we have been talking about traveling to Kent to see the waxwings that will be wintering there... but we will have to see about that.”
“I thought we had agreed on Kent,” Flint said and sent her a quizzing look as a furrow deepened between his brows.
“Yes, well... certainly,” Hester said in a voice that clearly stated she did not want to discuss this in front of Cecilia.
Whatever was going on between the two, Cecilia did not want to further their disagreement. She was certain that it was merely a misunderstanding.
“Well, we will probably be going to London after the wedding,” she offered as a way to change the subject and swallowed the bile that threatened to rise in her throat. It was obvious that Archie was looking forward to leaving for London, since she had not been able to share his bed.
Her statement immediately started Flint on a near monologue of the people he knew to be in London and which operas, plays and exhibitions he had heard of. Hester stood beside him, silently watching their exchange. Cecilia stole glances at her from time to time, as she kept the conversation going with Flint. Hester’s cheeks had a bit of plumpness to them that she had not noticed before, even her bosom seemed to be larger, and there was a certain glow to her overall demeanor.
Flint was mentioning a talk he had heard of that he would have gone to see but which he of course could not now. He sent Hester a smile, and she returned one that, even though it was closemouthed, made her eyes sparkle. Cecilia did not know why it was the sparkle that finally made her connect the dots, but as soon as she had seen it, she knew: Hester was expecting. She recognized the plumpness of the cheeks and the fullness of the bosom as a sign of pregnancy from her married sisters.
Her whole world tilted a bit at the thought of the two people standing In front of her, who were not even married and yet expecting a child. And here she was, married a little more than three weeks and she had not even consummated her marriage. She briefly glanced at Archie who was still playing with his nephews on the floor. It seemed that someone had ordered them to play more quietly; at least they were sitting on the floor playing with marbles instead of running around.
The sight tugged at her insides. For some reason, she had assumed that he would make a great father and the way he behaved with his nephews only confirmed it. But he would not be sitting with her on the sofa, holding her hand and watching their sons on the floor as Lucy and Edmund did at the moment.
“If you will excuse me,” she said breathily. “I think I will go see the baby. I only saw him briefly when we greeted the Marchioness... I mean, Edwina, I suppose.”
Flint and Hester nodded and already before she had turned from them, they were turning towards each other, closing themselves into their own little bubble in the surrounding chaos.