Intimate Deception (31 page)

Most of all he tried not to look at the worry and concern on Wedgewood’s face. He found that impossible. He knew that fear. Had lived it twice before in his life. Was going to have to live it again.

Vincent refilled his empty brandy glass and made for the open terrace doors. He needed to escape. Needed to breathe in some fresh air and clear his mind of the nightmares eating at him.

He walked outside and braced his outstretched arms against the balustrade. His chest heaved and his head throbbed as he took one gulping breath after another.

He stared out into the blackness. He didn’t know how he’d survive it when Grace’s time came. He could barely stand to stay here knowing what was going on up above.

“I think it’s bloody inconsiderate of them to put us through such torture,” Wedgewood said from behind him.

Vincent turned to face his brother-in-law. He hadn’t realized Wedgewood was there. Vincent looked at him. Saw the worry. An agony he understood all too well. “How do you do it? This isn’t your first. How do you survive the waiting?”

Wedgewood crossed the distance that separated them at a slow, thoughtful pace. “I don’t know. There’s a time during it when I’m not certain I can.”

Wedgewood lowered himself to the railing and sat. He lifted his gaze and stared at the stars. “At times like this, you tend to pray harder than you’ve ever prayed in your life. You surround yourself with friends and family who know exactly what you’re going through. You want desperately to suffer the pain for them because you know it’s your fault they’re going through this. And you’d gladly trade places with them because you know if something happens you’re not nearly so important as they.

“Then, as the hours stretch on, you bargain with God that if He lets her come through this birth safely, you’ll never touch her again. That you’ll never risk getting her pregnant. But you know you’ll never keep your promise because you can’t wait to hold her in your arms and make love to her again.

“So you die a little inside with every minute that drags by and pretend to all the world that your nerves are made of iron and you’re in control.”

Vincent took in everything Wedgewood said and felt the words press against his chest like a painful weight. That was exactly how it was.

“Don’t mind me,” Wedgewood said, finishing off his brandy. “Blame my maudlin behavior on too much brandy, too little sleep, and too much time to think.”

The mantle clock struck one o’clock and Wedgewood pushed himself away from the balustrade. “We’d best get back inside before Adledge loses his country estate to Carmody. The man’s deucedly pathetic at cards.”

Vincent took a deep breath and followed him inside. Adledge hadn’t lost his country estate to Hansley—only his London town house and his firstborn.

Wedgewood made Hansley give back Adledge’s heir and told them they could fight over the town house in the morning.

A few minutes later, a servant brought in a tray with hot tea and coffee and plates of sandwiches and the pastries the kitchen had spent all day baking. The hours stretched by with interminable slowness and eventually each of them found a spot to relax and doze for a few hours.

All except Vincent and Wedgewood. The uneasy feeling that overwhelmed them prevented either of them from falling asleep.

The sky turned a lighter shade of black, then a vapid gray, and finally a riot of pinks and blues and purples and oranges. Vincent didn’t know how he’d survived. How Wedgewood had. The deep furrows on Wedgewood’s forehead showed he hadn’t fared well.

“Bloody hell!” Wedgewood muttered beneath his breath, pacing the room like a caged tiger.

Vincent stood by to offer any assistance that might be needed but knew there was nothing he could do. Knew there was nothing any of them could do.

Wedgewood walked to the two double doors that opened to the terrace and threw them open. The sun was already in the sky, the day having begun. And yet the house was as silent as a tomb. Not even the servants dared to come anywhere near while the master stalked the rooms like an angry predator.

His footsteps echoed to every corner of the downstairs as he paced from the study, across the large foyer, then to the bottom of the stairs where he stopped and waited for someone to come down to give him the latest news.

But no news came.

“What’s taking so blasted long?” he demanded, striding back into the study. “It’s been twelve bloody hours. It’s never taken this long. Never.”

“Patience, Wedgewood,” Baldwin said, nervously shuffling the cards they’d used the night before.

Carmody rose from his chair and stretched his arms above his head. “Yes. Sometimes it takes longer. Remember my first? I didn’t think he’d ever make an appearance.”

“My second one was like that,” Adledge added, moving a cup from one side of the table to the other. “Thought I was going to lose my mind before it was all over.”

“Well, that answers where it went,” Hansley said.

“Where what went?”

“Your mind.”

They all laughed, but the jovial good humor with which they’d started out the evening before was gone. Now their humor was tinged with caution. Their seemingly carefree attitudes held a hint of wariness. They all knew it had been an exceedingly long time. And no one had come down to check on them or give them any news for hours now.

Tension hung in the room like a black pall. Vincent saw the worry on Wedgewood’s face, saw the frown lines deepen, the sunken look in his eyes turn darker. Vincent recognized the haunting fear. He felt it too. Couldn’t breathe because of it.

“I can’t wait any longer,” Wedgewood growled, pushing himself away from the mantel where he’d been leaning. “I’m going up to see what’s taking so long.”

He bolted across the room and had just neared the doorway when Grace and her sisters, Lady Josalyn and Lady Francine, entered the room. Their cheeks were flushed, their eyes red-rimmed, and all three looked exhausted. Vincent couldn’t tell more than that. Their expressions didn’t reveal more.

Wedgewood’s shoulders stiffened, and Vincent took a step closer to offer support if needed.

“The birth was difficult,” Grace said, “but Caroline is fine. You have a daughter, my lord.” She dabbed at a tear on her cheek. “A beautiful, healthy daughter.”

Vincent heard Wedgewood’s cry of relief then watched him race toward the door, stopping barely long enough to give his three sisters-in-law a hasty kiss on the cheek.
Without a backward glance, he ran across the foyer and up the stairs.

Vincent couldn’t move. He stood frozen in place as if his feet were cemented to the floor. His blood roared in his head, his heart thundered in his chest, his relief overwhelming.

He looked at Grace and she suddenly seemed so very small and fragile to him. The expression on her face told him that what she’d gone through helping her sister birth the baby had stolen all her strength. That the ordeal had stretched her nerves so tightly she was close to shattering.

He took a step forward and lifted his arms. She ran to him and he wrapped his arms around her and held her.

Her tears flowed harsh and jagged, her body trembled violently. He held her close and let them fall. Let her pour out all her fears, her relief. The two sisters who’d come down with her were doing the same. And his three brothers-in-law whose wives hadn’t come down were no longer in the room, but had gone upstairs.

Vincent held Grace and comforted her. When he thought she’d calmed enough, he stepped with her out the doors onto the terrace and held her longer.

“I thought we were going to lose her,” Grace said on a shudder. “The babe was turned wrong and nothing we did helped.”

Vincent couldn’t bring himself to say anything to her. Couldn’t bring himself to say the reassuring words he knew she needed to hear. All he could do was hold on to her and tell himself that it wasn’t Grace who’d been in danger. That when her time came it would be different.

His heart pounded in his chest and he willed it to slow, but it wouldn’t. He fought to push aside the panic suffocating him, but couldn’t do that either. It was all too real. He didn’t want to think of losing her. Not Grace. He wouldn’t survive. He’d come to care for her too much to think of a future without her. He knew he even—

“Vincent.”

“Vincent!”

Her voice pulled him back from the black hole into which he’d sunk, from the nightmarish quagmire that threatened to suck him under.

“Look at me. My time will not be like Caroline’s. I’m healthy. The babe’s healthy.”

“So was she!”

“Yes, but I’ve promised you nothing will happen. And it won’t. Do not doubt me in this.”

But how did she know she would not be like Caroline? How could she ask him not to doubt she would survive birthing the babe when he knew the risks as well as she?

Vincent held her in his arms and gazed into the sincere look in her eyes. Then he lowered his head and crushed his mouth against hers. He kissed her with a desperation greater than he’d ever felt before. Then he kissed her again.

He couldn’t get enough of her, couldn’t get close enough to her. She answered each of his kisses as if she felt the same. As if she were desperate to calm him.

But the seeds of doubt and fear had already been planted, and Vincent knew nothing Grace said or did would make them go away.

G
race paced the whole length of the downstairs—around the circumference of the foyer, past the open staircase on one side of the room, down a short hallway, into the music room, through the connecting door to the library, across another hallway to the dining room, then down a wide corridor that led back to the foyer, and past another open staircase on the opposite side of the foyer. When she reached the middle of the room, one of the footmen would rush forward with a chair so she could sit and rest for a few moments before she stormed through the house again.

The chair was positioned in the center of the foyer facing the entrance so she would not miss him the minute he walked through the front door. The repeated trek through the house was to calm her nerves and cool her temper before he arrived.

Her efforts were not working.

She was as furious with him now as she’d been since Josie and Francie and Sarah left over an hour ago. Since they told her the news they thought she already knew. The news they thought for sure he would tell her.

How dare he.

How dare he!

Grace bolted from the chair and began her trek again.

Carver came up beside her. “Perhaps Your Grace would like to rest in the music room for just a little while,” he said, as discomfited as she’d ever seen him. “Perhaps a nice cup of tea would—”

“No, Carver. A cup of tea won’t help. Only His Grace’s head on a platter will help.”

“Y…yes, Your Grace,” he stuttered, backing away faster than Grace thought Carver could move.

Grace sat back down in her chair a moment longer. Her feet were swollen, her back ached, and she didn’t walk when she moved, she waddled. Each time she passed the mammoth gold-embossed mirror on the foyer wall, she realized she was probably the largest expectant mother in all of England. And she still had at least three, perhaps four weeks until her babe would make an appearance.

What was he trying to do to her?

The change in him was driving her mad. It had begun after Caroline was delivered of her daughter.

Before that night, she’d seen the worry on his face. Saw it in the way he watched her, held her. She knew her pregnancy concerned him. Now his worry didn’t reach the surface. He kept his emotions hidden, as if he’d convinced himself his fear didn’t exist.

This new course of defense frightened her more. It was as if he’d found a way to separate himself from his fears—from her. His answer was to immerse himself in work. And in his search for the man who’d tried to kill them.

Vincent was a man possessed. Possessed with whatever it took to keep the wall secured around his heart. Well, she
wouldn’t let him get by with it any longer. Not after what she’d found out today.

She pushed herself from the chair and took two steps to repeat her way through the dining room, then stopped short. The front door opened and she turned.