36. Epilogue

"There." On his knees, Callum grunted as fabric ripped under the blade of his dagger. "I almost have it."

Nemity shrieked. "Cold—too cold."

Damn.

Callum slid his blade away from the skin of her belly. Deuced hard to get a blade between her dress and her skin these days.

He glanced up at her face. "Isn't the whole point of this to get this one spot cold?"

"Yes." She scrunched her nose. "But not that cold."

He heaved a sigh, setting the blade down on her outstretched legs as he flipped up the bottom flap of the round hole he'd just cut into the middle of her dress over her belly, then adjusted all the mounds of blankets on the sofa around her—across her chest and arms, and moving up to wrap around her head with just her face peeking out.

He tucked the flap of fabric from her dress he'd just cut free under the thick blanket across her ribcage, then set his hand on her bare belly. "Is that better?'

Both of her hands wiggled out from the depths of the blankets and rubbed across her bare belly, scratching at the skin. "Yes." Her eyes closed, drawing in a deep breath as a gust of cold air from the open window behind her swirled around them. "Yes. Better. Better."

His brow furrowed at her pale complexion. "You are certain there is nothing to be done?"

"There is nothing." Her eyes stayed closed as she spoke, scratching her belly. "It is something just to suffer through. That is what the midwife said. And she says the same thing every time you bring her here every other day. It is the same thing the other midwife you had brought all the way from Edinburgh said. The nausea will most likely last for a few months and then dissipate."

"Except it has already been a month and a half, and those women aren't watching you nibble away at the crusts of bread, then inevitably heaving it out not but an hour after you eat. You're wasting away."

Her eyes opened to him and she pointed at her belly bared to the air. "This. This is a help. Trust me, Cal. I trust them, so trust me. You forget that Mrs. Jorge said my mother was the same with me—she could only nibble at food for three months before she felt better."

A frown set hard on his face. "Then you need to nibble more."

"Maybe in a little bit. Let me just let this last wave settle down, and then I'll try again." She pointed to the Times that he'd shoved off to the side of the sofa when the last dry heaves hit her. "Take my mind off the dizziness and read me more of the paper. Please."

He swallowed down the argument on his tongue. She sounded so damn exhausted.

He wanted—needed—her eating. Something. Anything. They'd tried every food available, and nothing was sticking in her belly.

He'd give her fifteen more minutes, then he would try again to shove something down her throat.

Still on his knees, he picked up his blade just as the Yellow drawing room door opened.

Thomas stepped into the room, saw Callum's dagger hovering above Nemity on the sofa, and he flew into instant action, barreling across the room, aiming to tackle Callum, a roar bellowing from him. "What the hell?"

Callum jumped to his feet, dodging out of Thomas's way and throwing a hand up to stop him. Glaring at Thomas, he sheathed his blade. "Don't you knock?"

Thomas angled himself between Callum and Nemity. Foolish ass. "Mr. Flourin sent me in here—and I see you holding a blade above Nemity and I— " Thomas's words paused as he glanced over his shoulder down at her. "What in the bloody world is going on here?"

Callum looked down at his wife, assessing her current state as an outsider would. She was splayed out on the long sofa, mounds of pillows behind her, blankets covering every inch of her except for the round hole he'd made in her dress where her bare belly was exposed to the air.

Peculiar, yes.

He had to give the bewildered look on Thomas's face its due.

Thomas looked back to Callum. "And why is it freezing in here?"

Nemity poked her thumb toward the open window behind her. "The window is open."

Thomas took a step back so he could look at both Callum and Nemity at the same time, his brow furrowed. "Do tell me why the window is open in the middle of winter, and then why your belly is wide open to the air?"

Nemity glanced at Callum and grinned. He was freezing as well, moving about here in just his lawn shirt and trousers with little heat from the tall flames in the fireplace. But he wasn't letting Nemity go through this alone. Not after what he did to her—setting his seed so deep in her womb she was carrying his babe within a month of their wedding. Probably before it, even.

He wasn't a good enough man not to be inordinately proud at that fact. So he would suffer the cold if that is what she needed.

"Wait." Thomas stilled, his stare centering on Nemity. "What is wrong with you? You look like you are at death's door."

"Strike those words from this room," Callum growled.

Thomas glanced at Callum, then looked back to Nemity. "Fine—strike that. You look like hell caught you between its teeth, gnawed on you for a while, then spit you out."

"Charming." She gave him a sardonic smile.

His look swept up and down the mound of her body covered with all the blankets. "Seriously, Nemity, what is wrong with you?" Actual concern haunted his eyes. He shifted his stare to Callum.

Callum avoided his eyes, looking to Nemity. They hadn't shared this news with anyone outside of Springfell, so this was her call to make with her cousin.

She exhaled a long breath. "I am with child, Thomas. And it has been making me vomit every other hour for weeks now."

His eyes widened. "A babe? But you've only been married for two months."

She nodded, a true smile catching on her lips.

"And you haven't eaten? You need to eat, Nemity."

Her eyes lifted to the ceiling. "Thank you for that brilliant observation." She looked to Thomas. "I am trying. Believe me, Callum is doing everything he can to get food down my throat."

His hand motioned to her body. "Why are you buried under all the blankets but your belly is bare?"

Her hands settled across her stomach. "Because my belly is raging hot and the rest of me is freezing because I need the fresh air to calm my flipping stomach. Callum was very helpfully cutting a hole in my dress so my belly could breathe when you came in."

Thomas stared at her for a long moment, and then the ass had the audacity to chuckle—though he attempted to stifle it as he ran his hand across his face. He looked to Callum for confirmation of everything she was saying.

Callum nodded.

Thomas chuckled again. "Well, this is…this is good news. But why aren't you in bed?"

"We're trying to make life as normal as possible for Georgette and Jacob," Callum said.

Nemity nodded, or at least the blankets wrapped around her head moved like she was nodding under them. "They watched their mother sick in bed for a year, and I'll not do that to them. When they come in, I find a way to sit upright and pretend all is well enough."

"Admirable." Thomas looked out the row of windows overlooking the gardens, now dormant with the season. "Where are they?"

"They're down at the stables with Mr. Youngstrom working on training the puppy you found on your land and tossed into their hands two weeks ago." Callum pointedly cleared his throat. "The one you didn't even bother to find us to tell us about."

Thomas had the good sense to look sheepish for one short second. "I wasn't sure what to do with it when I found it. Giving it to the children seemed the most obvious choice."

"Aside from the fact that you sprung it on us—the children do love it. They named it Slider," Nemity said. "You could have told us, though. Come and said hello."

"I had to get back to Ravenstone."

"As you always do." Nemity pinned a stare on him. "So why did you make the journey here today?"

"Oh. That." His arms folded over his ribcage and he set his stare on Callum. "What have you done?"

"Done with what?"

Thomas's voice went hard. "You're meddling."

Callum shook his head. "Meddling in what, Thomas? You're making no sense."

"Meddling in my life."

"What could you possibly be even talking about right now?" Nemity asked as she drew her hands back under the cover of the heavy blankets.

Thomas looked to Nemity then back to Callum. "After my last driver quit, my solicitor replaced him with a new driver that seems to have an unusual interest in my life—in my whereabouts."

Callum's brows lifted. "Don't you usually have to tell your driver your whereabouts when you use him?"

"Yes, but this—this man is suspicious. Either that or I'm going mad. But he is suspicious."

"How so?"

"Stop with the innocent questions." Thomas sliced a glare at Callum. "Is he one of your guardians?"

"How in the world could that even be arranged?" Nemity asked, drawing Thomas's attention. "Can you blame your last driver for quitting on you—look at the position you put him in when you left me."

"Granted, that was unfortunate. I made mistakes." Thomas heaved a sigh. "But when he quit he was replaced with this odd new driver."

"So get a different new driver, Thomas." Callum's hand flipped into the air. "You think Nemity or I have had any time—while dealing with this—to meddle in your life?"

"But—"

"It really is a rather conceited level you've managed to reach, Cousin," Nemity chimed in.

Thomas's mouth clamped closed, his jaw twitching.

For a few long seconds, he looked ready to blow into a rage, but then he looked to Callum, then to Nemity and her bare belly, and he bowed his head.

"Forgive my intrusion." His words strained out through gritted teeth. "Be well, Nemity. Please do manage to eat something that will stay in your belly."

Without waiting for a reply, Thomas stalked out of the room, swearing under his breath as he closed the door behind him.

Callum stared at the closed door for several moments before shaking his head and moving to the side of the sofa that held Nemity's feet.

He slid his hand under her calves and the pile of blankets atop, then lifted her legs, moving to sit down. Settling her feet on his lap, he pulled out the newspaper that had crumpled against the side of the cushions and began smoothing it straight.

She nudged his thigh with her heel. "Tell me what you're really thinking. He's getting worse, isn't he?"

Callum set the paper onto the arm of the sofa and slipped his hands under the pile of blankets to find her bare feet and he started rubbing them.

He considered for a moment what to tell her, then sighed. "I would rather have Thomas worrying about going mad, than having him hating himself as he was when he was sinking deep into darkness—like he was when we last found him at Ravenstone a month ago. I think this is progress. He came here on his own accord. To yell at us, yes, but he came. At least he's obsessing about something outside of himself for a change."

"He still has so much anger in him, but then he goes and finds a puppy and gives it to Georgette and Jacob." She shook her head. "It is like the good in him is scratching for the surface, looking for a shard of wood to keep him afloat in the sea of his anger. But then in the next moment, he is swearing under his breath and storming off."

He looked to her, squeezing her feet. "He'll get there."

"How do you know?"

"I don't." He shrugged. "But one can only be angry at the world for so long, right?"

Nemity laughed. "Have you met Lady Agnes?"

He chuckled. "True."

Her toes wiggled under his fingers. "If he thinks he is going mad now, wait until he sees what is in store for him next." Even through her haze of nausea, a mischievous glint sparked in her eyes.

She leaned fully back into her pile of pillows, her face finally relaxing for the first time in what seemed like forever. Seeing it, he took a real breath, deep into his lungs. A cold, but real breath.

All would be well, if only because his wife plotting out the saving of her cousin would keep her mind off of her rebellious stomach. If Thomas thought for one second that Nemity would leave him alone to live his life in the sorrowful state it was currently in, he had another thing coming.

His stare shifted to the tall flames of the fire in front of them, and he continued to rub her feet, happy to sit in the comfortable silence before Georgette and Jacob and Slider came bounding back into the room. That was the worst—when Nemity put on a strained smile for them and all he could do was worry about her.

"I think you've finally done it." She'd opened her eyes and was staring at him, for how long, he didn't know.

"Done what? Achieved the perfect temperature for all parts of your body and that babe in there?"

She shook her head. "Tamed the lioness."

He laughed, full and hearty.

He shouldn't take that much pleasure in one little moment, not now when his wife was so miserable, but he couldn't quite help it. "I don't think I tamed anything. There's no taming the wild in you. You've simmered, yes, but the second this constant nausea passes, I dread the day that I'll be trying to drag you in from the forest with the babe heavy in your belly."

She smiled, nuzzling her cheek into the side of the blankets wrapping her head, the blinks of her eyes starting to grow heavy. "That will be nice. Springtime. I can almost feel it."

"Just imagine you're there, sitting on the side of the grotto where the sunlight comes down, and you're swishing your toes in the water, the smell of budding trees filling your nose."

She nodded, her eyes closing. "I can almost taste it. That spark of spring on my tongue with the scent of the linden trees filling the air. Georgette and Jacob splashing in the pool. Laughter ringing the air. When everything feels alive again."

She drifted off.

He sat, still, holding onto her feet, watching the soft lines of her face. Contentment sinking deep into his chest, into his soul.

His entire world, wrapped up in this one wild little wood nymph.

Somehow, her luck had spread, turning into his very own luck to hold for all of his days.

***