Vicar's Daughter to Viscount's Lady (Transformation of the Shelley Sisters 2)

‘Not much,’ he said, wandering into the room. ‘Not enough. A pint of knock-me-down, but I’m still standing.’ His eyes were shuttered, wary, a strange contrast to his careless slouch and loosened neckcloth.

‘Why did you not come home?’ she demanded. ‘Look at the time! Your luncheon has gone to waste, I was worried…’

‘Are you turning into a shrew, wife?’ Elliott picked up the bonnet and reached out to drop it on her head.

Bella slapped his hands away and the hat went flying. ‘Where have you been?’ He frightened her like this.

Elliott picked up the hat and laid it back in its box with exaggerated care. ‘In the inn.’

‘Is it muddy in there?’ Bella demanded, gesturing at his boots.

‘No. I walked round the pond, I seem to recall.’

‘I was worried,’ Bella repeated, laying a hand on his forearm. Elliott looked down at it and she lifted it away.

‘The footmen would have told you I was in the village,’ he said. ‘Must I account for my movements to my wife now? What do you think I was getting up to? Debauching local innocents?’

That hurt, as it was obviously meant to. ‘No,’ she countered sweetly. ‘I assumed you were getting drunk in the local tavern and perhaps getting into a fistfight.’

‘I would have enjoyed that. As it is, I am not drunk, I have not fought anyone and now I am home. How have you spent the time?’

‘I went to church and then I went to see the family chapel. Daniel showed me. I was upset because—’ Because I realised I loved you. ‘And then I came home and entertained Daniel for luncheon. He is being very kind.’

She stalked over to the bell pull and yanked it. ‘I suppose you would like some luncheon now?’

‘You rang, my lady?’ Henlow appeared, calmly oblivious that the drawing room was a litter of packages and underwear, his mistress was standing, elbows akimbo, in the middle, and his master was mired in mud.

‘Thank you, Henlow,’ Elliott said. ‘Her ladyship has changed her mind.’ The butler bowed himself out, still expressionless.

‘I am not hungry,’ he snapped before Bella could catch her breath and call the butler back.

‘What is the matter with you?’ she demanded. She was not scared of him, not exactly, but she was scared for them. This was not the Elliott she had come to know. His eyes were fixed on her midriff and she realised she had laid a protective hand over the swell of her belly. ‘Don’t shout at me, I am certain it upsets the baby.’

‘I am so sorry,’ Elliott said, not sounding so in the least. ‘I should not have forgotten that everything revolves around that confounded child.’

‘Elliott! How could you? Our baby—’

‘Rafe’s son,’ he fired back and then caught himself, his face pale and his eyes dark with emotions she had never seen there.

‘But you married me because it might be a boy,’ Bella said, struggling to understand. ‘You said it must be the heir if it is a boy.’ And then she recalled the shadow that had crossed his face when she had teasingly remarked that she hoped the baby was a boy because they would have such fun together. ‘You resent it, don’t you? Elliott, it is an innocent baby. If you are angry, be angry with me, not the child.’

‘I am not angry with the child, or with you,’ he flung at her over his shoulder as he kicked aside some fallen underwear on his way to stand and stare out of the window. ‘I am not even angry with Rafe although, God knows, he deserves it. I am furious with myself.’

‘With yourself?’ Bella stared at the broad shoulders, braced as though he expected her to throw things at him. ‘You mean, because you want it to be your son? But you said—’

‘I know what I said. I know what I should think. I know what is the right and honourable way to feel,’ he said without turning around. ‘So that makes me dishonorable and wrong, does it not?’

‘Oh, Elliott. No.’ Bella wrestled to find the right words. What have I done to him? ‘It just makes you human. I should have realised, I should have thought.’

‘Don’t blame yourself,’ he said, his voice flat. ‘I don’t want your guilt to add to mine, thank you.’ She stood and stared at him. He was dishevelled, he smelt of the ale house as he stood there shedding mud on the Chinese carpet, and she loved him. And now he showed her the truth of what she had done by imagining she loved his brother.

This was not simply inconvenience and expense and the end of any choice for him in who he married. This was pain and guilt for him and the loss of a father’s love for her child.

Chapter Eighteen

‘Elliott, I do not know what to say. I do not know how I can ever make this right.’

He turned and smiled at her. It was quite a successful smile, all things considered, and it reminded her, with a jolt, of all the reasons she loved him and why this hurt so much. ‘There is nothing you can do, Arabella. I am just going to have to learn to deal with it.’