Her Unsuitable Match, page 20
With reluctance, Myles turned around. He leaned against the closed door and rubbed at his good eye. “We are here to meet the family. And to get away from London for a time. The situation there isn’t ideal for one of my… delicate constitution.” He wrinkled his nose and lifted his gaze to his brother.
Winston snorted. “You’re no more delicate than a donkey.” But the concern in his eyes was genuine. “What aren’t you telling us about this marriage, Myles? And why can’t your wife know how you feel?”
“Leave it alone, Winnie.” Myles moved away from the door, back toward the window. The sun broke through the clouds for one glittering moment. “Know that my marriage to Lady Philippa is of significant benefit to our family. I intend to add to our sisters’ dowries. Our parents needn’t worry about them securing suitable matches.”
“The dowries? This isn’t a mercenary match for you, is it?” The disapproval in Winston’s voice smote Myles’s conscience harder than his concern did.
“No.” And that was all the answer Winston would get.
Winston stayed silent for so long that Myles wondered if his brother had left the room without him knowing. He turned around, only to find Winston still there. Staring at him.
“Loving your wife is a good thing, Myles. So long as she feels the same.” Winston’s shoulders drooped with his concern. “But you had better find out soon. Before you’ve given away so much of your heart that you cannot live without it.”
Myles could not think of a response to that. Part of the reason he hadn’t tried to tell Pippa, hadn’t even planned on it, was their contract. He’d agreed to give her complete freedom. The other part, though, had more to do with Winston’s concern. If she didn’t feel the same, Myles didn’t know how he could survive the heartbreak that would bring.
A knock on the door broke the silent tension in the room. Laurel called from the other side. “Winston? Are you in there? I need your help preparing the children for the picnic.”
“Coming, my heart.” Winston cast his brother one last worried glance. Then he opened the door and disappeared, leaving Myles’s thoughts more convoluted than before. And his feelings for Pippa remained as complicated as ever. He loved her. He wanted to protect her. Honor her. Be the reason she smiled, and laughed, and greeted each day with a vivacity that astounded him.
He wanted to be her reason to wake each day with delight and retire each night with contentment. How was he to accomplish any of that when he could not even convince himself to tell her the truth of his feelings? He hadn’t worried about it that morning when he’d woken next to her. And while they watched the rain, a quarter of an hour ago, he’d nearly kissed his wife without sparing the consequences more than a thought. Perhaps that would’ve ended in disaster, and he should thank Winston for interrupting.
Myles left the room, muttering to himself, “I need more sleep. That’s all.”
Though Lady Fredericka hadn’t been an ideal mother, she had certainly prepared Pippa for one important aspect of being a grown lady—mingling. As the guest of honor at the picnic, Pippa knew her duties well. She stayed near her new mother-in-law so Lady Greenwood might introduce her with motherly pride. When Sir Isaac and Lady Fox arrived, introducing the Earl and Countess of Inglewood, Lady Greenwood was overcome with delight.
After the appropriate introductions and remarks were exchanged, and the foursome walked to one of the trees where a rug and cushions and been left for the comfort of guests, Lady Greenwood leaned in close to Philippa.
“I have never entertained anyone above a baron, my dear. You simply must help to ensure our guests’ enjoyment.”
Pippa found her husband near the pond, teaching a swarm of children how to skip rocks. As she approached, he lowered himself to be eye level with a little girl, no more than five or six years of age, and held a stone up for her to examine.
“You see how smooth and flat this one is? Rather like a dinner plate. But smaller. A dinner plate for a doll.”
The child giggled and nodded her understanding.
“Here. Put it in your hand. Yes. Now turn just so.” He put his hands on the little one’s shoulders and turned her so she stood at an angle to the pond’s edge. “Thumb on one side, as I showed you. Arm back.” The little girl stretched her arm backward, then threw her rock. It skipped three times before sinking.
“I did it! I did it! Did you see, Henry?” She tugged at a boy’s arm—a much taller boy, who grinned down at the girl, then up at Pippa’s husband.
“Thank you for helping, Mr. Cobbett.”
“I want to try,” another child said.
“Everyone go find the perfect stone, then you can try.” The children scattered, some in pairs, but most on their own, searching the ground for rocks. Myles looked up at that moment, his gaze meeting Pippa’s. His smile widened into a grin, and he came slowly to his feet. “My lady. We were having a stone-skipping lesson.”
“So I see.” Pippa looked down at her feet and picked up the first stone she saw—round and flat, like a doll’s dinner plate. She approached with the rock in hand, turning it over in her gloved palm. “Would you be so kind as to give me a lesson?”
“You?” Myles’s grin momentarily faltered, then he spoke with lightness. “And here I imagined you to be proficient in all the skills that mattered.”
Pippa shrugged, affecting a frown. “Alas, I cannot claim to be an expert with this. Won’t you show me how you perform the task, Mr. Cobbett?” She batted her eyelashes at him, and her heart skipped merrily as she neared him. Flirting with her husband seemed a brilliant idea. She liked seeing him happy. And the flustered, crooked grin he wore was reward enough for her silliness.
“Might I inspect your rock, my lady?” He held his hand out, and she placed her stone carefully in his palm. He nodded to her gloves. “It will be easier if you remove them. And less dirty.”
She looked down at the yellow fabric, then brushed away as much dirt as she could with the other hand. Then she removed her gloves. “My rock, sir? Is it the right sort of specimen?”
“A perfect stone for skipping, my lady.” He bowed as he deposited the rock in her hand again. “Now. You must stand at an angle to the water.”
“Like this?” Pippa stood at a right angle.
“No, not quite.” He came up behind her, and then laid his hands gently upon her shoulders. “Turn just so.” He carefully guided her to rotate until she stood correctly. Then his fingers encircled her wrist as he turned her hand the right way. “Here, bend your elbow. Yes. Like that.” Very slowly, he pulled back her arm. “Now, when you throw, think of making the stone hit the water at an angle. When you release, snap your wrist as you would open a fan—in one quick movement—and let go.”
He stood so close, the buttons of his coat brushed the back of her gown. He guided her through the motion once, slowly. When he spoke, his voice was a soft murmur in her ear. “Like this, but with speed and force behind it.”
“You make it sound simple,” she said, her voice more breathless than she expected.
He released her, taking a step back. “Go on, Pippa.”
She swallowed, then repositioned herself to skip her stone. Then, trying to return to the earlier mischief she’d felt, she looked over her shoulder. “Like this?” She threw the stone, angled perfectly, and counted the skips as they went. Four. Five. Six. Seven. Eight.
“Nine, ten…” Myles’s voice faded as her stone disappeared beneath the water. When she turned to look at him, widening her eyes innocently, he narrowed his good eye at her. “Pippa. I didn’t think you a fibber.”
She laughed, finally. “I never said I didn’t know how to do it—I merely asked you to show me how you skipped stones.”
He looked back to where her stone had sunk beneath the water. Then at her. Then he released a short, deep laugh. He held his hand out, and she laid her bare hand in his. Myles drew her closer. “You did say you grew up playing out of doors. Who taught you?”
“My great uncle, Peter Gillensford. The one who left his fortune to Elaine.” Along the shore, children had started trying their luck with their stones. None had returned for another lesson. But they all laughed and giggled. Myles had done that. “Do you think I might borrow you from your pupils?”
“As they have all devoted themselves to practice, I doubt anyone will mind.” Myles allowed her to lead him away from the pond, toward Sir Isaac’s party. “Look who came.”
“Ah, and Doctor Johnson has joined them.” He nodded to a tall, thin gentlemen with a lovely woman on his arm. “I would especially like to introduce the two of you, if you have no objections.”
“None at all. I very much want to thank him for saving my husband’s life.” Pippa squeezed Myles’s hand and glanced up to see him looking at her with a softness she had begun seeing since their arrival in the country.
The afternoon passed in a blur of sunshine and laughter. The men ambled away from the women after the food and lemonade had been mostly consumed. Myles had taken Lord Inglewood and Sir Isaac to try their hand at the lawn games his family had provided. Pippa sat content in the shade between Lady Inglewood and Lady Fox. The three of them had spoken enough to have found connections between them, though tenuous. But it was enough for them to converse together comfortably.
“I have heard of the hospital your brother wants to build,” Lady Fox said during a lull in their conversation. She glanced from Lady Inglewood to Pippa. “Sir Isaac wanted to attend the ball in London last month, but we had already withdrawn to the country.”
“Oh, the Gillensford hospital for soldiers?” Lady Inglewood sat straighter. “I had nearly forgotten—Isaac mentioned it in passing to me when they first returned home.” Lady Inglewood was the younger sister of the baronet, a connection that had been made immediately apparent to Pippa given their kindly-meant teasing of one another.
“We have great hopes for the hospital.” Pippa turned her gaze across the pond, to the other side, where the men were heard laughing. She had met her husband at that ball. Something she didn’t intend to announce, though she grew increasingly grateful he had come that night. “Myles is devoted to the project. He has seen so much sorrow since the war. I know he hopes the hospital will provide a safe, comfortable place for soldiers to recover from their wounds. Those that are readily apparent, and otherwise.”
Lady Fox and Lady Inglewood exchanged a significant glance. “I know precisely what you mean,” Lady Fox murmured. She held a fan and wafted herself languidly as she spoke. “Given the way your husband feels, and the significant wounds he acquired, I am perhaps right when I suppose that he has nightmares?”
Pippa stiffened, a defense of Myles rising to her tongue, but then she saw the sympathy and knowledge in the other woman’s eyes. And in Lady Inglewood’s. “Does Sir Isaac…?”
“Things are getting better,” Lady Fox murmured, looking into the distance. “At least, I sometimes think they are. I should not be surprised if his dreams stay part of our lives forever. No one can live through such darkness without carrying the memory of it with them.”
Lady Inglewood laid her hand on her sister-in-law’s, then smiled at Pippa. “I do not think my brother would have come away from his home for this visit without Lady Fox’s support. The love of a wife makes all the difference in a man’s healing. But then, new as you are to your marriage, you have likely already discovered that truth.”
Startled, Pippa lowered her gaze to the rug on which they sat. “Yes, of course. I do all I can to support my husband.” But had she? Was escaping from London enough?
“The most difficult thing for me, in those early months of marriage, was convincing my husband that I loved him just as he was.” Lady Fox spoke with conviction and a determined tilt of her chin. “Our Society lays such importance on appearance, and on our gentlemen publicly eschewing all emotion. Isaac thought himself broken and therefore unworthy of my love. He didn’t think he could tell me things without causing me pain, or worse, making me pity him.”
Could Myles think such things about himself? He had said things…had apologized for things that she had dismissed in the past. Though she had compassion for her husband, was it enough? If someone thought themselves broken beyond repair—as Sir Isaac had—what would reassure them? If Myles hid how he felt, she could not help him.
“England needs the hospital,” Lady Inglewood said, conviction in her words. “I hope your husband will discuss the particulars with mine. If we can help in any way, I should like to. For Isaac’s sake, and everyone like him.”
Pippa agreed with them, then allowed the conversation to drift from that topic even while she made up her mind to speak to her husband. As soon as she had opportunity to do so. He needed to know how she felt. At least—some of what she felt.
A roar of laughter from the other side of the pond drew her gaze, and Pippa saw her husband among the laughing men. And then he looked at her. Despite the distance between them, she felt the moment their eyes connected. Her cheeks warmed as he touched the brim of his hat.
She shivered, despite the warmth of the day, and diverted herself with her fan. When she glanced up again, Myles still watched her.
And she wondered at the connection that had grown between them.
Eighteen
The night after the picnic, Myles delayed his rest as long as he could. He wanted to be certain Pippa had ample time to dress for bed and slip beneath the covers before he entered the room. Then she could pretend to sleep, and they could both pretend it meant nothing that he climbed into bed beside her.
They hadn’t discussed the arrangement since that first night, when he woke from the nightmare. It was something they both understood. And if it meant he slept comfortably, next to the woman he loved, Myles didn’t mind it at all.
When he entered the room, as quiet as ever, Myles paused in the doorway. The bed remained empty. For a horrible moment, he thought Pippa had disappeared. Left him. Went to sleep in another room, somehow. The thought chilled him, right through to his heart.
“Myles.”
Her voice brought his gaze to her, where she sat in one of the chairs before the fire. The flames were low, and the shadows many. His beautiful wife waited for him, with a night-rail over her gown and her hair plaited down one shoulder.
“Pippa.” He closed the door carefully behind him. “I didn’t think you would still be awake or…up.” It seemed their silent understanding wasn’t to remain silent any longer. “Do you wish me to leave for another hour?”
She shook her head, and for one moment Myles’s heart skipped with hope. Would she invite him to stay? Had something changed—did Pippa want more at last?
“I wanted to speak with you in private. I thought there might not be a better time for such a conversation than now.”
Despite his disappointment, Myles tried for levity in his response. “People are unlikely to interrupt us in our bedroom.” Though the implication of that statement made him wince, he cleared his throat and approached the chair opposite hers. “I am at your service, Pippa. What is it you wish to discuss?” And why was she already dressed for bed? Her bare feet peeked out from beneath the hem of her white linen gown. He cleared his throat and sat down.
“Something that Lady Fox said today, actually.”
“Ah. I liked the Foxes. And Inglewood. They are excellent company.” And he hadn’t thought it possible for them to offer offense to his wife, but why else would Pippa wear such a solemn expression?
With her eyebrows drawn together, and an almost pained smile, she said, “I like them, too. Very much. Lady Fox had much to say on the matter of the hospital.”
That didn’t strike Myles as any cause for concern. “As did her husband. I promised to write out all the details and send them that information along with how they might contact your brother.” He tapped the arm of the chair with the fingers of his left hand. “What else did the baronet’s wife say?”
Pippa shifted in her chair, clasping and unclasping her hands. Then she played with the ribbon at the end of her plaited hair and lowered her gaze. “She said something interesting about Sir Isaac. About what it was like, in the early months of their marriage. I had the feeling she wanted to give me advice. It seems he is also plagued by nightmares from his time at war.”
“I am aware of that.” Though it surprised him that his wife would divulge such a thing to a near stranger. And then, “Did you tell her I suffer the same?”
She lowered her gaze. “We spoke in confidence, Myles. One wife to another, about husbands who were wounded in war.” She chewed her bottom lip, a nervous habit he found endearing. Despite the breach of his privacy.
“I suppose finding herself with someone in a similar situation was unusual.” He could allow for that, despite the somewhat sick feeling in his stomach. “You said she offered advice.” He didn’t mean the words to sound clipped, yet he heard them that way.
Pippa folded her arms across her midsection. “Yes. Which brings me to the important part of this conversation. You must know, Myles, how much I admire you. I find you kind, and I feel safe when I am with you. You are a capable man.”
He stared at her, confused. “A capable man?” he repeated. “What does that mean, exactly?” And why did hearing her say that make him feel distinctly incapable?
“Botheration,” she muttered, looking heavenward as though beseeching the ceiling to open and the right words to drop in her lap. “What I am trying to say is that I do not feel—that is, I do not want you to feel any less of a man because of your injuries. Physical or otherwise.”
She had not truly spoken such a ridiculous sentence. Had she? Myles stared at his wife, incredulous. Every insecurity he felt about his missing eye, his scars, his nightmares, tumbled forward to snatch at her words and turn them over and over. Dissatisfied with them. Recognizing only one thing.
He spoke with a lowered voice. “Am I to thank you for that speech? Or for your pity?”
That made her dark blue eyes widen and glitter in the firelight. “It isn’t pity. It’s the truth.”
