When Nick knocked on her door, Leah was dressed, thank the gods, and sitting at a vanity, plaiting her long hair. He watched in silence as she wound the coil at the back of her neck, jabbed pins into it, then rose, a faint smile on her face, making her look tidy, capable, and self-contained.
Just as she’d looked when he’d first met her, when she’d been steeling herself for the prospect of marriage to Hellerington.
“Are you sorry you married me?” The question came out of Nick’s mouth without his willing it into words, and he saw Leah was as surprised by it as he was.
“I am not,” Leah said at length. “Not yet. I think in any marriage there are moments when husband or wife or both succumb to regrets, or second thoughts, but you were very clear on what you offered, Nicholas, and what you did not. I am not at all sorry to be free of my father.”
“That’s… good.” What had he expected her to say? Leah wasn’t vicious, and she’d had few real options. “May I escort you downstairs?”
“Of course.” Leah smiled at him, but her smile was tentative, and Nick’s silence as he led her through the house was wary, and their marriage had indeed begun the way Nick intended it to go.
He pushed that sour thought aside as he introduced Leah to each maid and footman, the senior staff, and the kitchen help. From there, they moved to the stable yard, where the stable boys, grooms, and gardeners presented themselves. When the staff had dispersed, Nick led Leah through the gardens, where the tulips were losing their petals, the daffodils were but a memory, and a single iris was heralding the next wave of color on the garden’s schedule.
On a hard bench in the spring sunshine, they decided to tarry for two weeks at Clover Down before presenting themselves at Belle Maison. The earl had sent felicitations on the occasion of Nick’s nuptials, and yet Nick felt an urgency to return to his father’s side.
“He has asked you to join him at Belle Maison?” Leah’s hand was still curled over Nick’s arm, though they sat side by side.
“He has not, and he has told me on several occasions not to lay about the place, long-faced and restless, waiting for him to die. He’s sent my sisters off to various friends and relatives, all except Nita, that is. George and Dolph are similarly entertained, and Beckman is off to Portsmouth to see to my grandmother’s neglected pile.”
“What does Nita say?”
“I hadn’t thought to ask her. I’ll send her a note today, but I think I should also consult with my wife. How do you feel about going to the family seat when death hangs over it?”
“I have no strong feelings one way or the other,” Leah said. “When your father dies, there will be a great deal to manage, and I suspect Nita will appreciate some help then. It might be easier to help if everything were not a case of first impression for me.”
“True,” Nick said, realizing he hadn’t thought matters through from the most practical angle—the angle the women would be left to deal with when Bellefonte went to his reward.
“Two weeks then,” Leah said, “and you’d best let Nita know that as well. We’ll likely leave here before the neighbors start to call, and that might be a good thing.”
Which meant what? Nick didn’t dwell on her comment, but instead drew her to her feet.
“I’ve something I want to show you.”
“I am at your disposal, Nicholas.”
As they made their way through the stables, the feed room, and the saddle room, to a space tucked against the back wall of the barn, Nick reflected that he liked it better when she called him Husband.
“This is a woodworking shop,” Leah said, scanning the tools hung neatly along the walls and the wood stored and organized by size along another. “This is yours?”
“It is. I have one in the mews in Town, and another at Belle Maison.”
“Your hands.” Leah picked up Nick’s bare hand and peered at it. “I’ve wondered what all the little nicks and scratches are from, and this is why you have them, isn’t it?”
“Mostly.” Nick eased his fingers from hers. “I like to make birdhouses.” He pulled a bound leather journal down from a high shelf. “I can show you some of my designs, if you like. You take the stool.” He pulled it up, and Leah had to scramble a little to take her seat. Everything in the room was scaled to Nick’s size—the stool, the workbench, the drafting table, even some of the tools were proportioned to fit Nick’s hands.
And yet, she looked as if she’d been made to fit in this room with him, on this fine mild morning, sharing a little of himself he hadn’t shown to anyone else.
“This is one I made for my stepmother,” Nick began, opening the book. He’d drawn sketches, and then colored illustrations all over the pages. She studied each one, asking questions as if birdhouses mattered.
“This is lovely.” She traced the lines of the birdhouse on the page. “It looks like a garden house, a little hanging gazebo, with trellises and flower boxes. How could you even see to make such things?”
“I wear magnifying spectacles,” Nick said. “The next one was for my papa, though a birdhouse is hardly a manly sort of present. I was eight, though, and had found my first personal passion.”
“Eight is a passionate age,” Leah murmured as she followed his castle with a finger. “Was this for your papa?”
“I only had illustrations in my storybooks to go by, but it was my version of Arthur’s castle. My father loomed in my awareness with all the power and mystery of the legendary king, of course.” And now his father lay dying, and Nick’s birdhouse had weathered to a uniform gray where it hung outside the earl’s bedroom window.
He would repaint Papa’s birdhouse when they repaired to Belle Maison.
They spent most of the morning in Nick’s shop, the time passing easily and pleasantly. Nick showed her sketches of the current work in progress, the birdhouse design intended for Ethan, then suggested they repair to the house for lunch.
As she slid off the high stool, Leah linked her arm through his. “Do you ever miss your mother, Nicholas?”
“I never knew her, but yes. I wish I’d known her. Do you miss your mother?” Nick posed it as a question, but any woman would miss her mother at the time of her own wedding.
“I did,” Leah said. “When I went to Italy, I missed her terribly, but it was her idea that I go. And as to that, she proved prescient. When I left England I didn’t realize I was carrying a child. I was twenty and figured my body was just upset, which it was. Darius guessed before I did, and thank God he was his usual blunt self about it, or I might have done something stupid.”
“Something stupid?” Nick stopped short in their progress past the single iris and stared down at her as her meaning sunk in. “You would have taken your own life?”
“Young people can be dramatic when they think they are in love.” Leah regarded the iris as she spoke.
“Irises symbolize messages,” Nick answered her unasked question. “You would really have taken your own life, but for your pregnancy?”
“I don’t know, Nicholas.” Leah watched the iris as if it might change from purple to white while she stood there. “My father had killed my husband, and there was to be no recourse. I could not prove we had married, because Aaron had taken charge of all the formalities. I was alone, disgraced, deflowered, and not even afforded the status of widow or access to such funds as a widow enjoys. Then too, my mother’s health had failed, and I foresaw the rest of my life, alone in that house, with Wilton’s criticisms and castigations my daily fare.”
Nick’s hands slid to either side of her neck, and he leaned down to rest his forehead against hers. He showed her a few birdhouses, and she trusted him with her darkest memories.
“Promise me”—he gripped her gently but quite firmly—“promise me no matter what happens between us, Leah, you won’t let this marriage make you so miserable you think of taking your own life.”
She laid her hands on his and peeled his fingers away. “I was young, feeling sorry for myself, and grieving. I promise you, I will not contemplate such measures, not as a function of being married to you.”
“Not as a function of anything,” Nick shot back. “You are too… You just… It wouldn’t be right.”
“I agree,” Leah said, resuming their progress. “I saw that, when my son died. Life can be difficult, but death
