Chapter Ten

" M y lady." Ann had retrieved a cup of tea from the laden breakfast tray and neared Ophelia with it.

It was not the tea, but whatever food odour wafted from the tray made the Countess retch for the umpteenth time that morning. Better to say that week. The chamber pot stayed empty, just like her heaving stomach. If nothing changed, she would have to resort to calling the doctor.

The fact Leonard had travelled to the country to spend some time with Arjuna and Nalini gladdened her, or that husband of hers would be all over the place because of a simple indisposition. It had to be that as no other symptom accompanied it. She felt as though she travelled on a ship over rough seas. Not that she'd been on one; but her cousin Matilda had sailed the globe to meet her duke and described the condition in detail.

The retching gave her a reprieve, and she registered Ann's pleated brows. On a show that she was already recovering, she pushed her sallow hair from her sweaty face and sent a brave look at the lady's maid.

"At least a little," Ann insisted, pushing the cup closer.

Ophelia yielded, if only to make the other woman happy. With trembling hands, she picked up the cup to draw a tentative sip. As soon as the beverage hit her tongue, she heaved again. Quick reflexes made Ann secure the China as the lady turned to the pot, or the tea would have washed the sheets.

At that exact second, the chamber door exploded open, and a dishevelled Earl barged into the frilly room. "Can anyone explain what is going on in this house?"

Ophelia lifted her wide eyes to him. Her already waxen face blanched even more. "What are you doing here?" He could not just have turned tail and walked away from his guests.

"Knott sent me a worried message." Leonard peered around the chamber before his falcon gaze latched on her less-than-neat appearance. It surveyed every inch of her. Then his expression crumpled.

"He alarmed you for nothing." Ophelia rebuked. "It is just something I ate."

"One week and it did not go away by itself," he retorted. He swivelled to Ann. "Why the hell has no one called a doctor?" He raked his hand through his windswept hair. The scoundrel must have ridden like a madman.

"I will do it right away, my lord." Ann's tone faltered at the scowl the earl threw at her. With a curtsy, she scurried away.

That enclosed husband and wife in a gritting silence.

Anger arose in her. At least, it put the dizziness to rest for a while. "You put the servants to spy on me." She followed her first impulse to accuse him.

Ophelia received a thunderous glare for her trouble. "I did no such thing."

"You did not need to inconvenience yourself," she said, hoping that her mouth was at least clean. "I was going to call the doctor, anyway."

That made him near the bed and sit on the mattress facing her. "It is my wife we are talking about." His voice had gone an octave lower, his gaze notching down to a worried hue.

She pretended a tired sigh. "And they say women are the drama queens." Her hands folded on the sheet covering her. "I am not at death's door, as you can see."

Eyeing down at those hands, Leonard took them in his, massaging the damp, cold skin with his warm, firm palms.

"No, but I want to be by your side, regardless." His tone reached her ears in a silky timbre.

"You abandoned your guests," she chided.

He scoffed. "They were more than happy to let me go for a good cause."

With brave determination, she fought another wave of dizziness. "I will call for a bath to be presentable for the doctor," she said. If Leonard continued looking at her, as though nothing else mattered, she might fall for him faster than a comet singeing the skies.

He squeezed her hands once again as his stare bore into her. With visible reluctance, he stood up. "I will send Ann in." And left her with the view of the wild state he came in.

Leonard looked at the Countess' closed door with a sense of foreboding. He filled his lungs to dispel it.

Back in Brighton, he enjoyed the royals' company. But at the same time, he was beating himself up for leaving the Countess in London. He should have insisted she come with him, even if she preferred to stay in town. And Leonard would not confess to a single living soul that he'd missed her, the thoughts of her never leaving his mind. The butler's note had got him worried, but it also provided a reason for him to rush back to her. He'd become too used to cuddling with her in the night, basking in her warmth and softness.

The minute he'd received Knott's message, a lump had formed in his guts. He gave half-baked excuses to the Chandrakars and had been on his horse in a question of minutes. He raced from Brighton to London as though he was at Ascott. And made it in five hours instead of the average six. Already in the townhouse entrance, he jumped from his horse, and then rushed inside, expecting the worst.

Even if he found his wife only below the weather, the sight of her pale face and tendrils of hair glued to her sweaty skin had been enough to take him off kilter. After he'd done that over-dramatic entrance, he cared nothing for his state of mind. The way he felt about the whole thing scared the daylights out of him. He tried to tune down his churning insides but managed only to press them down rather than eliminate the daunting emotions.

His alert eyes found the wooden panel again. Knott had informed him that the doctor had entered her chambers not five minutes ago. He'd been sitting in his study, finding a way to make sense of all this. Fine, let us get this over with.

The rap on the door met with a ‘come'. Contrary to the grand entrance from earlier, he rolled the doorknob with quietness and stepped inside with slow paces. And stopped short. For it was not a man taking his wife's pulse with a focused expression on her pocket watch. On the bedside table, several vials with varied contents lay in haphazard order.

"Where is the doctor I ordered to be called?" He had to force his eyes not to shut tight at his gauche opening. Goodness, his wife would never stop calling him a drama queen now!

The plain woman in her mid-thirties turned to him as if she owned the room, the house even. "You must be the Earl of Ramsgate." She made a curtsy that smacked of a mere symbolic one. "I am Emily Slater, the apothecary."

"And the doctor?" Leonard insisted, ashamed to admit that he sounded like he did not give a fig at what she said.

"Doctor Darren Archer is engaged elsewhere, so I came in his stead." Without a single ruffled feather, she turned back to Ophelia.

His eyes snapped to the Countess. "Mrs Slater is one of the best in the land," his wife defended. "Her valuable input practically solved the Duke of Rutherford's case."

Oh, yes. His friend had given him a detailed account of what had transpired in his absence. Doctor Darren had also been involved in the case. "Still, not with a medical training."

"Your lordship," the apothecary turned to him like a soldier on a drill. "I do not need to be a medical professional to tell you that your family is about to become bigger."

The apothecary's image blurred in Leonard's eyesight. "Excuse me?" He had to force the question to come out in flawless English.

She eyed him as if he was daft. "Lady Ramsgate is with child."

Did the woman drop this cannonball and expect him to remain standing? Like a phantom, he walked to the foot of the bed and sat on the cushioned bench there. Slowly and with a dazed mind. "Are you sure?"

Mrs Slater gave a shrug, indicating the obviousness of the answer. "Of course, I am! As an apothecary and as a woman," she clarified.

"She is not sick then." This time, he could not avoid the blurt.

"Quite the opposite, my lord." Came the non-nonsense reply. Her head turned back to the Countess. "My lady, nibble on dry toasts or biscuits to stave off the sickness." Ophelia nodded in understanding. "And do not forget, drink plenty of fluids."

Ophelia looked at the apothecary with a faint smile. "Thank you, Mrs Slater." She adjusted the fresh bedsheets around her. "Please, talk to Ann. She will see to your fee." Leonard harboured no doubt that it would be a staggeringly generous one.

The petite woman beamed at the lady as she curtsied to him and left.

Alone at last, Leonard's and Ophelia's eyes met with a clash; and held for long moments.

Her clean hair collected in a bun with tendrils framing her delicate face. The tendrils floated when she tilted her head with an observant gaze at him. "You do not look too happy."

That made his entire body snap at her. "I am stupefied!" He vented with air chuffing out of him.

A quizzical expression smothered her. "It is not like women never became with child."

A self-deriding snort filled the room. "Oh, I do understand it's been happening for a while." He sprang from the bench to pace the Aubusson. "Being involved in the process is quite mind-boggling, though." And ‘happy' sounded like such a trite word for the veritable hurricane razing through him.

"You can say that again." She eyed him from under her lashes as if daring him to reproach her.

Leonard could contain himself no more. In two strides, he neared the bed and knelt on the carpet by her. His hands rose to cradle her face. "I have no words to express my exploding joy." His rasp came more breath than voice.

"Leonard." Her face softened with the whisper.

His arms went to circle her, his head resting on her midriff. When her hand came to thread his hair, a deep sense of peace invaded him. The scent of her, the warmth and softness did something to him he had no name for. But he did not wish to find a name for anything, just to close his eyes and stay there, if possible, forever.

All kinds of conflicted emotions flooded Ophelia as her eyes lowered to the dishevelled Earl wrapped around her. Tenderness, confusion, and sorrow to begin with. Past and present meshed together to build a big confusing blur of which she could make no sense. And that would not be the time for such insights as Leonard lifted his head with slow purpose.

Their eyes met, and she had not the slightest idea of what hers showed. His pride and admiration were all over the place in unmistakable signs. Those dark eyes brightened, the side grin pulling in wonder, his palms roaming to her midriff as if they touched the finest crystal.

"I never asked you if you wanted children." His rasp caressed her ears, as the question perplexed her already misty brain.

It took several blinks of her eyes to think what to reply. Or how to put all the clogged emotions into words. "Yes, I did," she blurted. "I do." She used the pause to find the words. "That was the reason I extracted a second marriage license." Her lips pressed together as though she tried to take back the too-revealing answer, if a tad clumsy. She could have skipped the reminder of that occasion at this tender moment.

The mention of that rather foolish mistake of hers seemed to cause him to retreat. His arms slid off her and he unfurled his tall frame away from the bed. She pushed the sense of bereavement down as his hardened stare pinned her to the spot.

"Of course," he gnarled as his jaw jerked up. "But I am your true husband, and this is my heir you are carrying." He might not have liked what she said, but it was a fact, whether he accepted it or not. In her mind, she tried to write off the embarrassing memory.

A careful nod moved her head. "Or heiress," she defied because a girl would receive all her mother's assets for one.

The cynical twitch that moved his lips drew her eyes to them. "Which means we would have to keep trying, I suppose."

She cared nothing for the hot flush that heated her cheeks, causing an unwilling lowering of her lashes. When she lifted them again, she found his undiluted scrutiny on her. "If you excuse me," she intoned. "I will call for some tea and biscuits." It was either he left, or she caved in and invited him to her bed.

A curt motion moved his jaw. "I will be in the study if you need me." Her gaze followed him as he pivoted and left.

Her stare remained on the closed door for long minutes. Invite him to her bed? What would be the point in the face of this latest development? Her attention dipped to her still-flat abdomen. A new life grew there. The wonder of it took her by storm. It was what she'd been angling for, and now that it happened, it plunged her into a thousand thoughts. Not least of them were the apprehensive possibilities involved in childbirth. She put them aside, though, and held her midriff with a soft grin. It was here at last, and she would make the most of it.

Anne came in with a tray, and Ophelia took it with a grateful smile. The dry delicacy did calm her stomach and sent her into a fitful night's sleep.

"Oh, Ophelia, what good news!" Matilda exclaimed as the Countess, her cousin, and Elvina sat in the latter's lady drawing room sipping tea the next afternoon.

The Countess could barely wait to meet the duchess and their friend to talk about her recent discovery. Mrs Slater's advice had worked like a charm and Ophelia felt much better, making it possible to be here today.

This morning, even before she got up, she munched on the dry bread the lady's maid had left in a bowl on the bedside table. By the time she descended to the morning room, she succeeded in taking a cup of tea, grateful that the Earl had already left for his errands.

"I am glad that you will get to experience motherhood just like you wished." Elvina smiled at the Countess.

Ophelia never hid that fact from her friends. In turn, they supported her even when she insisted on marrying without being certain of her husband's whereabouts—not her best moment, she admitted to herself. Only now did she see it, after the Earl returned and the reasons for his disappearance became clear. Not that knowing eliminated all her misgivings or even the lonely years she had to cope with.

"You are right." Ophelia smiled as she said it. "But I can't help the daunting feeling inveigling itself in my happiness." All the hundreds of childbearing stories she'd heard through the years meshed into what hers might turn out to be.

"Worry not, my dear cousin." Matilda held her hands. "We will be there for you every step of the way." As Ophelia's eyes moistened, her friends held her in tender understanding.

While Ophelia opened her heart to her friends, Leonard sat in his club with a brooding scowl on his rugged features. His wife had the power to throw him from one end to the other of the emotional spectrum. First, he lusted after his countess almost every hour of the day. Then she took his seed and was in the process of making another human being with it. And when he least expected it, she answered his question with that candid tone he began to associate with her. And the trouble was not that she told him the truth, but the blasting blazes of jealousy it unleashed in his guts, which were unused to such tempestuous episodes.

Yes, he did not deny that his contribution to his heir was reduced to very little, but the chest-beating pride it caused to mushroom in him gave him that almost inevitable impetus to roar as though he owned the world. Even if his wife was the one doing the hard work in this bargain of theirs.

"You look like you lost at cards big time." The Earl lifted his head to spot the Duke of Rutherford and his brother by marriage, Percy Russel, standing by his table. That the cotton mill magnate managed to be in this club attested to Rutherford's power to make that happen.

Leonard threw his whisky down his throat before he answered the Duke's taunt. "I do not gamble, so that is your wrong bet."

With no one inviting them, the other two men dragged chairs and sat at the Earl's table. "There are few other reasons for that mood other than losing money." Russel joked.

Leonard thumped the glass on the wooden surface. "Try the news that you will be a father."

"Ramsgate, that is the best kind of news!" Hadrian congratulated.

"And you are glowering because?" Percy dug.

"It is as humbling as if a thousand horses trampled on you." It cost Leonard to put this into words.

"I can only imagine." Hadrian commiserated.

"This calls for an entire bottle of the best brandy," the magnate said as he signalled to a passing footman.

Glasses full, they raised them in cheers and took a deep drink.

"But you are happy, I hope," Rutherford insisted.

Ramsgate's lips pulled to one side with a scoff coming from them. "Happy is such a na?ve word for this mind-blowing event!" And extracted a nod of agreement from the others.

"I will drink to that," Russel said, and the three of them finished the first round.

Ophelia had dinner in solitude, having heard that her esteemed husband went to his club to meet his friends. The information did not make her angry; if anything, she used the occasion to put her emotions in order. Well, at least she tried. As for the success level, she could not vouch for it.

Winter and Autumn had lounged about her feet on the Aubusson, making her solitude a very cosy one.

At that moment, she lay in her bed, in the bedchamber assigned for the Countess in residence. The decision to have an early night came with natural ease. She snuggled in the fresh bed linen, determined to have a restful set of hours. Her eyes closed as she took a deep breath.

The connecting door clicked; her eyes snapped open. Her husband neared the bed in his pajamas trousers carrying a candle. Their eyes met in the scarce light. Just like the flickering flame, her feelings lit up at the sight of him tall and broad, five o'clock-darkened jaw in tow.

"Make room for me, woman." His voice was not quite slurred, but she detected a difference.

"You have been imbibing." She did not mean it as an accusation. The Earl did not indulge often. She would not make waves if it happened once in a while.

"Nah," he dismissed. "We had only a few drinks at the club." A broad shoulder lifted and fell. "Celebrating, you know." The pause served for his eyes to drag over her covered form. "If you please." And waved his hand.

It took a few seconds for her brain to react. At last, she moved to one side, conveying her agreement to his presence. He lifted the covers and slid inside, one arm banding her. He pulled her to him as they snuggled in the cosy bed.

The warmth, his solid frame and her willingness caused her muscles to give as she leaned against him, unable to lock the sigh of satisfaction in her throat. It floated in the air in an audible puff.

For long minutes, neither said a thing. She had the impression that he, too, had a hard time resisting the moment's intimacy.

"Are you feeling better?" His rasp fanned her ear, peppering her skin with goosebumps. A waft of fine brandy reached her nose, adding to her heightened senses.

"Very much," she answered. "Mrs Slater's advice helped a lot."

"I will make sure to keep her by your side." His arm tightened as he pulled her closer.

"I can do that myself; you know." Her quip came coated with a mocking smile. Her wealth could afford the best doctors, midwives, and apothecaries, though her intention was not to boast but to show she wished to take care of herself.

"Of course you can." His face dived into her loose hair. "But I want to have a bigger role in this other than supplying a sample of my seed."

Her lips breathed a little laugh at his wording. "Is this what being a father looks like to you?"

"I am new to this. In time, I will learn what it entails." That he did not pose as Lord of the Know-all counted points in his favour.

"That makes two of us." It served as a reminder to him as much as to her; she did not wish to lose sight of that.

"It is underway. There is no other option." His possessive hand splayed over her belly, caressing up and down.

"Clearly," she blurted, distracted by his tender ministrations. Added to the sensuousness of the moment, she felt on the brink of bursting.

"I came here to help you with a good night's sleep." He inhaled the scent of her hair. "We can deal with any serious matter in the morning."

A faint nod of agreement moved her head before she fell into a deep slumber.

When the first light of dawn touched her eyelids, Ophelia opened them and realised that she and her husband lay tangled in the sheets, wrapped in one another. Careful not to wake him, she freed herself from the warmth in which he'd cocooned her and got up.

In her dressing room, Anne helped her dress a simple morning frock before she headed for the morning room for her breakfast.

Ophelia was taking a sip of tea when the Earl's bass bathed her ears. "Early riser, are you."

Her head snapped to him standing at the door frame, a solid shoulder leaning on it. "As usual." That heart of hers jumped when he crossed his arms and drilled a look at her.

A casual push from the wood sent him in slow strides inside the morning room, his gaze never leaving hers.

Knott rushed to serve the Earl as he took his place at the head of the table. Leonard picked up the egg spoon and proceeded to break the shell.

"I am moving to my townhouse tomorrow," Ophelia informed as she sat ramrod straight and lanced her husband with a glare.

His spoon clattered on the table as his falcon eyes lifted to her. "Leave us," he ordered the butler and the footman.