Tangled (29 page)

David said no more. He did join Lady Scherer briefly in the breakfast room when he discovered her there alone, but he did not stay. She froze when he tried to talk with her. She knew the full truth, obviously. She knew that he had killed her lover. He wondered briefly if she had loved Julian, if after all it had not been mere boredom that had led her into the affair. Perhaps she had loved him.

Whether she had or not, it must be difficult for her to make polite conversation with the man who had killed him and prolonged the life of the husband who hated and probably abused her. He wondered if George Scherer had always been the same, or if he had treated her thus only as a result of her infidelity.

But he did not want to wonder. He did not want Cynthia Scherer to become a person in his mind at all. He wanted only to forget. And so he took his leave of her after he had exhausted the topic of the weather, and saw her only once more, when he and Rebecca were taking a formal leave of their guests that afternoon. David did not accompany them to the station.

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And so the magic of Christmas was gone. And with it some of the closeness they had both been feeling. Rebecca mourned her loss through a tea and a dinner and an hour in the drawing room, during which they discussed in great detail and with some animation what they would do at Stedwell once spring came and work could resume.

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But she could no longer keep everything bottled up inside as she had done until now. Questions, suspicions, fears gnawed at her like a toothache, making it quite impossible to think of anything else or talk of anything else or sleep without their constant intrusion.

What had he meant?

"David," she asked when he came to bed, late. She rather thought he was displeased to see that she was still awake. "Did you ask them to leave?"

He busied himself poking the fire, which did not need poking. "He is the sort of man who lives on war memories," he said. "He will probably bore everyone he encounters for the next fifty years with them, if he lives so long. You don't need to listen to those stories, Rebecca."

Why? The question was on her lips. But she did not have the courage to ask it.

He crossed the room toward the bed and dimmed the lamp before lying down beside her. He never did touch her, but tonight he seemed more distant, more silent than usual.

"David?" she said. But it was a question she could not ask. A lady did not ask such questions. And really she did not want to know the answer.

"Yes?" His voice was tense.

"Was Lady Scherer your mistress?" She could hardly believe the words had been spoken. She would do anything in the world to recall them, she thought. She did not know what she was unleashing.

There was a short silence. "Why do you think she was?" he asked.

"I don't think he feels gratitude at all," she said. 'I think he hates you, David. And I am sure that he hates his wife. You and she never look at each other, never speak.''

"And so," he said, "he must be bringing us together to taunt us with a former indiscretion—and in front of you."

"Yes," she said unhappily. "I am sorry, David. I should not have asked. It is not my business. It happened before our marriage."

"But it would make a difference if it had happened since?" His voice was harsh.

210 Mary Balogh

"Yes," she said. "Oh, yes, it would, David. Infidelity is the worst possible sin within marriage. It is, isn't it? I cannot think of anything that would be more calculated to make the other partner feel unloved and worthless. I would . . ."

"You would . . . ?" he prompted.

"I would want to die, I think," she said. "Though that is probably a foolish exaggeration. I think I would want to die, though. If you did that to me. If Jul—"

"If Julian had ever done that to you," he completed for her.

"I wish I had not started this conversation," she said. "I wish they had not come, David. Does it make you feel dreadful seeing her again and having to face him?" She drew a deep breath. "She is beautiful."

He surged over onto his side to face her. She could see him quite clearly in the dancing light of the fire. His face was taut with anger or with some other powerful emotion.

"Rebecca," he said, "nothing can be served by digging up the past.

Believe me, nothing can. Only misery for us both. Only a strain on a marriage that is imperfect to start with. I married you. I made the same commitment to you that you made to me. I have seen you make every effort since then to live by that commitment, I have done the same. And I shall continue to. Let's make a pact to leave the past where it belongs. Shall we? Please? I'll not allow those people here again."

There was comfort in his words—somewhere. He was committed to their marriage. Yes, she had seen that. He had put his past self behind him when he married her. He had changed. Yes, there was comfort in that. She might always have liked David if there had not been those flashes of cruelty—and the total reticence. She might even have fallen in love with him. Though that would have been impossible, of course. She had fallen in love with Julian.

"Yes," she said. "What you were in the past is none of my concern, David. You have been a good husband to me. I wish—" She sighed.

"I just wish memory could be cut off at will. I'll try. I'll not ask you such questions again."

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He did something then that he had never done before. He reached out a hand and spread it lightly over the swelling of her pregnancy.

"How have you been feeling?" he asked.

"Well," she said. "I feel very well, David. And so full of energy that I want to go running all around the estate."

"You had better not," he said. "Not if you don't want to suffer the worst tongue-lashing of your life."

She closed her eyes, hoping that he would keep his hand where it was. But he did not.

Only misery could come of digging up the past, he had said. And a strain on their marriage. Would misery and strain have come from a simple yes to her question? If she already knew about Flora, could knowledge of Lady Scherer make that much difference?

Or had he meant something else?

Both the Russian soldier and Julian had died from a bullet through the heart. No! There was no connection. None.

A marriage that is imperfect to start with.
Yes, it was imperfect. But not impossible. There had been happiness at Christmas—just a few days ago. But it was not a marriage that could withstand much strain.

The link that bound them together was very fragile.

He was right. The past was best left where it was. But then she had been right too. The past could not be forgotten at will. Especially when one did not know quite what the past had entailed.

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He knew as soon as he surged upright in bed, bathed in a cold sweat, that it had been a different dream. And somehow more terrifying. He had become accustomed to the other and knew how to handle it once he had pulled himself free of it. This one was new.

Julian had been standing at the foot of the bed. God, it had been so real. He had been standing there.

"Dave," he said with his sweetly charming smile, "you had better tell her, old chap. Do you think she will never find out? Scherer will tell her. He will, Dave—to spite me because he could not kill me himself and to spite you because you saw his humiliation. He'll tell her. Better to do it yourself. Just don't tell her about Cynthia and me.

It meant nothing, Dave, but Becka would be hurt. You won't tell her that, will you? But you had better tell her the other."

Lord God. No hatred. No accusations. No raging over the fact that he had married Rebecca and was lying in the bed with her. Just the sweetness and the charm— and the reluctance to have his own weakness known. It had been so damned real. As if he really had been standing there.

David looked over his shoulder. She was looking at him. He could see her eyes despite the darkness. She would be afraid to intrude upon his nightmare after that last time.

"I'm sorry," he said. "I woke you."

"David," she said softly. "If you ever want to talk about it, I am here. You don't have to bear it alone unless you wish to do so. I want you to know that."

He stared down at her. /
killed Julian.
Three words. He tried to hear himself saying them. He tried to picture her reaction. He tried to feel the burden fall away from his shoulders—onto hers. He would never say the words, he knew. Even if he could convince himself that it would be the right thing to do—for her as well as for him—he could not do it. Because those three words would have to be followed by an explanation.

She would be hurt to know the truth about Julian. That was what Julian himself had just said in the dream. Hurt? She would be destroyed by the knowledge. She would want to die, she had said. She would want to die even if it were he who was unfaithful to her. Just because he was her husband. How would she feel if she knew that Julian—the love of her life—had been unfaithful to her? No, there was no way on this earth he could ever do that to her.

"Thank you," he said.

He should get up as he usually did when he had the dream—the other dream—and go somewhere else for the rest of the night.

Perhaps it would come back and he would end up hurting her. But he did not want to get up. He wanted more than anything to unburden himself to her—to the last person he could allow himself to speak to.

He lay down again beside her, turned toward her, and saw that she had turned her head to watch him. Oh, God, how he loved her. How he wanted everything down between them—all the barriers, all the silences, all the armor. Even if there was nothing left at the end of it.

Just so that he could see her as she really was and she could see him.

So that for once they could gaze into each other's eyes and see through to the soul.

But there was no way of revealing himself without destroying her.

He did something he had wanted to do for months. He slid one arm beneath her shoulders and set the other about her waist and drew her against him. He held her there, not tightly, but firmly, fitting her against him, pregnant womb and all, and settled his cheek against the top of her head.

"Are we going to have a boy or a girl?" he whispered to her.

"A child," she said, turning her head to rest a cheek on his shoulder. "A living child, David. We are going to have a child."

"Yes," he said fiercely. "We are going to be a family, Rebecca. We are going to have a future."

The Honorable Charles William Neville was born late in the afternoon of a day in mid-May, one week earlier than expected, and hours sooner than either the doctor or midwife had predicted when they were first summoned to Stedwell. The labor was short and intense, the delivery fast.

It all happened so quickly that David himself knew nothing about it until he arrived home from one of his tenant's farms, where he had been helping to build a barn. His wife had refused to have him sent for, having been assured that it would be well into the night or perhaps even the next morning before she would be delivered.

His son was born a scant hour after David arrived and long before his anxious pacing of the drawing room had worn a path in the faded carpet.

For Rebecca it had not seemed either a short or an easy time. She had been in pain—with very little respite between bouts—since shortly after David had got up from bed. Though by the time she was quite sure of what was happening and rang for her maid, he had already left the house. She would not send after him.

She had heard that pain and exhaustion were quickly forgotten when one finally heard one's baby cry for the first time. She smiled and even heard herself laughing as pain and pressure all disappeared in a rush and someone was crying with lusty protest at such cruel treatment.

"You have a son, my lady," the doctor said, and she felt tears running down her cheeks, though she continued to smile and even laugh.

"Oh," she said, "let me see him. Where is David? Send for David."

But a husband, it seemed, was not to be allowed to

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enter the room until all evidence of blood and sweat and pain had been erased.

Her son was blood-streaked and fat-cheeked and pug-nosed and slit-eyed and bald as an egg. His mouth was a pink hole in his face and was roaring his rage. Rebecca gathered all his beautiful, wonderful humanity into her arms and wept and laughed for joy.

"Hush, sweetheart," she crooned to him. "Oh, hush. Mama has you all cozy and warm. Shh." She gazed in wonder at her son. For so long he had been real, moving and kicking and punching inside her womb, swelling her so large that David had commented just the week before that he was preparing his mind for the arrival of triplets. The child had been real, but not this real. This was the baby that had been inside her? This very real person?

"Shh," she said as her son finally paused to consider the fact that he was warm again. "What will Papa say if you are howling like that when he comes to visit you? You have to be on your very best behavior for Papa."

The baby was quietly surveying the world through unfocused eyes.

He had been very rudely disturbed, but he had found comfort again.

And the voice with which he was familiar again. But this was too bright a world for him to open his eyes wide just yet.

He did not like being taken by alien hands a few minutes later and unwrapped and washed. He did not like it at ail and was not shy about letting the world know his feelings. But finally, clean and dry and wrapped snugly, he was where he wanted to be again and that voice close by was lulling him. He stopped his crying.

The doctor, leaving the room with the midwife, promised to send David up. Rebecca gazed at the sleepy child snuggled into the crook of her arm and kept glancing at the door. What was keeping him?