Pleasures of a Notorious Gentleman (13 page)

“I will in the morning.” He sounded impatient, irascible. She merely nodded and glanced down at her clenched hands, hands that had comforted him. “I’m sorry.”

She lifted her gaze. “No, don’t apologize. You’ve been through an ordeal.”

“No more so than you. I know I’m not the best of patients. Why didn’t you have a servant tend me?”

She tugged on the blanket, bringing it closer to his chin, as though she needed to occupy her hands. “Caring for those who suffer from infirmity is what I was trained to do.”

“But now you have a son who needs your attention.”

“I see him often. Jeanette is very skilled at caring for him. She’s been with us almost since the beginning.” She touched his knee. “And I kept my promise. You have your leg.”

“So I noticed. Thank you for that.”

She shook her head. “I don’t think Dr. Roberts had any plans to amputate it. Not like they had planned with your arm.”

Good God! They’d tried to take his arm? How bad had it been? Instinctively, he touched the large thick scar. He’d wondered how it had come to be.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I’ve upset you. You probably don’t like to think about that time. I know I don’t.”

He took a risk—“You tended to me then, when my arm was wounded.”

“Yes. At least this time you didn’t call out the names of at least a dozen other ladies.”

He gave her an ironic grin. “Is that what I did before?”

She nodded, a light twinkle in her eyes. “When your fever was at its worst. You had quite the harem.”

“I suppose a lot of secrets are spilled in delirium.” Perhaps memories as well.

“They are all safe with me.”

He did not doubt her words. “War is harsh. A lady shouldn’t be exposed to it. Why were you there?”

She sank onto the chair, as though her legs could no longer support her, and folded her hands in her lap. “My life seemed without . . . purpose. There were dances and visiting. But it all seemed so trivial. I wanted to do something to help those who were in need. I had a younger sister. She became very ill. Mother had passed, and it was left to me to take care of Maryanne. She died. I often thought if I’d only known more that I could have prevented her passing somehow.”

His gut clenched with the knowledge that she carried that burden. “It was not your responsibility to cure her. Your father should have sent for a physician—”

“He did. And I know in my head there was nothing I could do, but my heart wonders. I was quite inconsolable after Maryanne’s passing, so Father indulged my whim to learn nursing. I had only just completed my four months of training when I learned of Miss Nightingale’s pleas for nurses to accompany her to the Crimea. The articles in the newspapers were depicting such madness there. Our soldiers didn’t have supplies. There were no adequate hospitals.” She released a self-conscious laugh. “I’m not telling you anything you don’t know.”

Only she was. He’d been so focused on what had happened to him and what he’d lost, that he’d not given any thought to discovering what might have happened to others beyond him. Even his family—he’d assumed they’d gone through nothing of consequence other than the birth of Westcliffe’s son.

“Since you weren’t here,” she continued, “you might not realize there was a public outcry that something be done. It called to me. Not in the way that God called to Joan of Arc, of course, but I knew I had to do something more than gather linens for bandages. So I arranged an interview with Miss Nightingale and I was selected to go with her.”

He heard the passion in her words, and it shamed him that his had not been the same. His brothers had already bought him a commission by the time he had tea with Claire, the last afternoon he remembered. His mother’s influence had kept him safe at home, away from any of Victoria’s little wars. He’d picked a hell of a time to let go of his mother’s skirts. But after listening to Mercy’s story, he couldn’t confess any of that. It made him feel petty and small. It made him feel as though he’d truly been lacking in character, as his family had claimed.

“It gave your life purpose, then?” he asked her instead.

“It gave me John.”

Chapter 6

N
ow that he was on his way to recovery, he was left to his own company more often than he’d have preferred. Mercy was no longer constantly at his bedside. If not for the occasional squalling of the babe, he would have thought she’d left the residence entirely. But in the short time he’d come to know her, he knew she’d never leave without the child. Where the child goeth, so went she.

“Your wound is healing nicely,” Dr. Roberts said as he examined the wound. “How does it feel?”

“Not nearly as painful as it was.” He could touch it now without flinching. As a matter of fact, the pain was so diminished that he had hope that he’d eventually walk without the blasted limp.

“I should think it would be good for you to start moving about. Nothing too strenuous. No riding as of yet, but a short walk might do you some good.”

After Dr. Roberts had left, Stephen took his advice, drew on his trousers along with a loosely fitting linen shirt, left his bed, and using his walking stick, hobbled to a chair by the window. The vast sky was gray, the clouds dark, yet he watched as sunshine—
Mercy
—strolled through the garden, holding her son, his son.

He’d barely given any notice of him after that first viewing. She cradled him now, and in spite of the distance separating them, the love etched in her face as she gazed down on the child backed the breath up painfully in his chest. It was pure adoration, without resentment of any sort. An angel gazing down on wonder.

The child had turned her world upside down, had forced her to leave her mission of mercy, had caused her shame, had ruined her reputation, had led her here. Her future was uncertain, yet still she held on to him as though he were the only thing of any importance.

He wondered if she’d ever feel that way about the child’s father.

Because of the way they were facing, of the boy, he couldn’t see much more than the light blond curls. Like Stephen’s, they’d no doubt darken as the lad grew older. He tried to recall the color of his eyes. Blue, he thought. Like his.

He wanted to join them. If he took it slowly, perhaps he could at least get nearer, close enough to watch her holding the child, to see the joy in her eyes. How much courage it must have taken for her to face her father and then to deal with Stephen’s family. Strangers. She’d had no way of knowing how they might react. She could have taken the secret of being with Stephen to her grave, but she’d ruined her chances of a good match with a decent fellow when she’d chosen to keep the child. What an extraordinary decision for a lady of quality. She could have found someone to take the child in and no one would have been the wiser.

She was a remarkable woman of determination and courage. She was not the sort he usually took to his bed. She was so damned serious and responsible. She placed others’ needs above her own pleasures. She didn’t have a flighty bone in her body.

She’d have not become intimate with him on a whim. Yet, for the life of him, he couldn’t see himself going to the trouble it would have required to seduce her—not when there were always willing women who required far less effort. Had he simply been bored? Had he considered her a challenge? Could he have—by God, could he have possibly fallen in love with her?

It would have been a first for him. He squeezed his eyes shut, trying to see beyond the black haze. It suddenly seemed vital to remember her. But no memories of her surfaced, not even a shadow of one.

A brisk knock sounded, one he instantly recognized as belonging to his mother. He welcomed the distraction. “Come in.”

She walked in with her usual poise and grace. He didn’t remember a time when she hadn’t been formidable, although he was fairly certain that Westcliffe did. He was five years Stephen’s senior, remembered a father that Stephen didn’t. Their contradictory memories had never bothered him before. The recent gaping hole in his life made him view everything differently. Now he longed for memories he’d discarded carelessly. Strange to realize that they needed to be nurtured, thought of often, or like the bloom of a rose, they simply withered away. Once gone they could not be regained.

He chided himself for the morose thoughts. He’d been too young to have memories of his father. It was as simple as that. But memories of Mercy, those perhaps he could regain with a bit more exertion.

“I just had a word with Dr. Roberts,” his mother said sublimely. “He’s most pleased with your progress.”

“Well, then, I consider myself a success.” Stephen glanced back out the window, aware of his mother coming to stand beside the chair where he sat.

“What has your interest so?” she asked, peering over his head. “Ah, I see.”

He didn’t like the implication that he was at the window
because
of Mercy, like an unschooled lad experiencing his first infatuation. “I didn’t know she was there when I came to have a look. I merely wanted to gaze at something besides the canopy over my bed.”

“Of course, dearest. I thought nothing else. Although I will concur that she is of far more interest than a canopy.”

In silence, they watched Mercy for several minutes. She held the boy aloft, smiled brightly at him, then brought him in close to the warmth of her body, layering her cloak over him.

“It’s dashed cold out there, but she says the boy needs the briskness of fresh air,” the duchess said. “She is a strange one, wanting her window open at all hours. She bathes daily. Constantly washes her hands.”

“No doubt trying to rid herself of the filth of the military hospital.”

She jerked her gaze around. “You remember it?”

“I know something of the conditions of the place from when I woke up there recently.”

“Yes, of course. Silly of me to think you meant your memories went farther back than that. Far enough back to include her.”

“We spoke at length, she and I, while she was tending me. I am left with the impression the situation in the hospital was much more unpleasant for her.”

“You talked, so then she knows of your . . .”

He could see her struggling to find the correct word that wouldn’t cause him any embarrassment. “Affliction, Mother. I have an affliction. And no, I didn’t tell her of it. It’s bad enough she saw me trembling like a leaf in the wind in the hallway when my blasted leg gave out on me.”

“It was not your fault that you took a fever or that some imbecile physician didn’t do his job properly. It’s a wonder you didn’t die.”

“Because of the efforts of a man who in his eagerness to save me overlooked a bit of metal. I wouldn’t be so quick to find fault. You don’t know the conditions under which he worked.”

Silence greeted him. He was not usually so understanding of shoddy workmanship, but he felt an exception might be in order. He’d returned home. Many hadn’t.

“What are you going to do about her?” his mother finally asked. Not exactly a smooth change of topic, but then his mother had never been one to mince words.

He shifted his gaze up to her. “Have you no doubt the boy is mine?”

“None whatsoever.”

Well, then, he’d best get on with what needed to be done. “Will you have the servants prepare a warm bath for me?”

“What of your wound?”

“I can bathe without getting it wet. Send in my valet as well.”

It was a painstaking endeavor to properly prepare himself. In the tub, he’d required assistance from his valet. Then the man had begun to shave away several days’ worth of bearded growth on his face.

Stephen wasn’t quite certain why he bothered to make himself presentable. Mercy had seen him at his worst. The night he’d trampled through the rain, when he’d finally given into the pain, given into the haven of her arms. He’d taken advantage of her once, in a foreign land. He had no intention of doing it on English soil.

Yet she drew him like the nectar of a blossom drew a bee. With her, he could almost forget that he didn’t remember—

Until she began to talk of her time away from England’s shore. They shared memories, they shared experiences. They shared horrors and filth and wretchedness. He cursed himself for entertaining her in a place such as that—and then he would wonder if they’d both needed the escape. Certainly, he would have done all in his power to take her to heaven even if beyond them hell had reigned.

He’d been sixteen when he’d learned the wonders of a woman’s body. Westcliffe, bless him. They’d never been close, but in that one regard he’d been an exceptional brother. He’d taken Stephen to his first brothel, introduced him to a woman with impeccable talent and patience. As a callow youth, Stephen had disappeared behind a red door. When he’d emerged the next morning, he’d been determined that in this one area of his life he’d best his brothers. They were titled. They had respect. Westcliffe had already acquired a reputation as an unprecedented lover. Stephen had decided he would surpass him, his would be the name whispered about London’s wicked circles.

No lady had been safe from his amorous attentions.

The thought of him taking advantage of Mercy sickened him. But he couldn’t imagine that he’d held any true affection for her. They couldn’t have known each other long. Their time together had been brief. And yet he’d managed to do with her what he’d done with no other woman. He’d brought her harm. He’d ruined her reputation. He’d saddled her with a child.

And what had she done as retribution? She loved and cared for his son. She might very well have saved Stephen’s life. She asked nothing of him except that she be allowed to remain in the boy’s life. Her father was the one insisting upon marriage, and while Stephen had not initially been impressed with the man, he couldn’t deny that if he found his own daughter in the same state, he’d insist the man do right by her—only he’d do it with a pistol at the offending man’s back.

None of this leaving her with the man, expecting the right thing to be done. By God, he’d ensure it or the blackguard would answer to him.

The sharp pain nipped at his chin. “Dammit, man!”

“I’m sorry, Major,” his valet said. “I didn’t realize you were going to clench your jaw so suddenly. My fault entirely.”

“Hardly. Let’s just be quick about this, shall we?”

His hair needed trimming, his nails clipping. He couldn’t recall the last time he’d truly cared about his appearance. He’d dressed appropriately and with some style each morning only because he’d not wanted to disappoint his mother. But the particulars that he’d cared about when it came to women—he’d given little thought to.

When he was finally dressed to disarm, he tossed his greatcoat over his shoulders, snatched up his cane, and went in search of Mercy.

She was returning to the residence, the boy snuggled in her arms, hidden beneath her heavy woolen cloak. A smile wreathed her face as he approached and he felt it like a kick to his gut.

“You’re barely limping,” she said, as though he’d made a major accomplishment, when in truth he had absolutely nothing to do with the healing. “Jolly good for you. Has the pain diminished?”

“Yes, somewhat. I feel confident that I’m well on my way to recovery. No little thanks to your efforts.”

She blushed, but her eyes sparkled. “I did nothing really.”

He nodded toward the bundle in her arms. “Should he be out here?”

“The air does him good, I think. But we’ve been walking about long enough. I was going to take him in now.”

He was astounded by his disappointment. The cold was bracing, and rain scented the air. Still he wanted to linger in her company, take a turn about the garden with her at his side. “Dr. Roberts said I should not overdo. As this is my first venture out, I should probably be content I made it this far without stumbling and head back in myself. Would you be kind enough to join me in The Duchess’s Sitting Room?”

“Will your mother mind?”

He found himself smiling as he hadn’t in a long while, and he couldn’t for the life of him explain why he was amused. “It’s not my mother’s room per se. I believe it is where the first duchess preferred to spend her afternoons with her ladies, and it has been named The Duchess’s Sitting Room ever since.”

“If we’re not imposing on anyone, then yes.”

He waited until she fell into step beside him. He wanted to offer her his arm but hers were full. “That is where we differ, you and I,” he said solemnly. “If I wanted something, I’d not care one whit if someone was imposed upon.”

“I know that’s not true. I witnessed your stubbornness and refusal to be tended until every wounded man around you had first been seen.”