Chapter 94
"Lady, look at this!" Vincent cried, tugging at my skirts.
My attention remained fixed on the figure seated across from me.
Millicent and I had taken to spending most of our days ensconced in the study, buried beneath a mountain of paperwork. I would finish my share, and then I would assist with hers. Autumn had settled upon the estate like a painted veil. The view from the tall windows was spectacular, all copper and gold leaves falling in poetic swirls that would make even the coldest heart pause.
And I, at present, was three months with child.
Millicent and I had refrained from any physical intimacy since the confirmation of my condition the previous month. That is, until this morning, when my noble and shameless beloved turned to Dr. Falconbridge and inquired whether intercourse might resume at this stage of gestation.
To which he responded with an enthusiastic yes.
Now, here we sat. The same arrangement as always. And yet, something was different.
Millicent read, annotated, and signed with such alarming speed and poise that I began to question whether she had trained in her youth with the military. I completed one letter, and she had already reviewed and dispatched five. I completed a contract, and she had bested me again, another stack signed, sealed, and finished before I had time to so much as stretch my wrist.
A chill ran down my spine.
This was not administrative diligence. This was a woman possessed by purpose. The moment that final signature was penned, I would be escorted to bed!
A month. A full month of restraint. I had offered her some alternative forms of affection in the meantime, hands, lips, breasts, between my thighs, all manner of lovingly devoted compromise, but Millicent had denied me every time with the same grave reason: she feared she might lose control.
Yes, I love it when she loses herself to pleasure. Yes, I find it maddeningly gratifying to be the object of her raw, unbridled desire.
But I also enjoy living.
"Lady!" Vincent tugged once more at my gown. "Look at this!"
I mentally batted away the shiver down my spine and returned my attention to the correspondence before me.
"Lady!" Vincent cried again, this time with greater indignation.
"My Lord," came a voice, soft yet firm, as delicate and composed as a porcelain teacup on a silver tray.
Isabell.
Her tone was so solemn I very nearly laughed. That tiny creature had been trained within an inch of perfection. Issac and Laura had fashioned her into the ideal aide, and I strongly suspected the child enjoyed it. She held her hands behind her back when she spoke, nodded precisely, and already wielded the power of subtle correction like a seasoned diplomat.
"Her Ladyship is your mother," Isabell said with unflinching decorum. "You must address her as such."
Vincent responded instantly.
"My mother is over there!" he said, and I caught the motion of his little finger pointing directly at Millicent.
"You have two mothers," Isabell replied, cool and composed.
"Then how come you have a mother and a father?" Vincent demanded, clearly feeling he had found a flaw in the system. "Every child has a mother and a father!"
I glanced toward Millicent. A small smile played upon her lips, though she said nothing. Her quill never faltered, and she continued to glide through her work like a woman possessed by divine focus.
"If you wish to frame it that way," Isabell said primly, "then Her Grace shall be your father."
"That is not true!" Vincent declared. "My mother is a woman!"
The contrast between the two of them was almost comical. Vincent was every inch a child, as he should be. And Isabell? Isabell was a child only in height.
I looked down at my still-flat belly, resting my palm there for a moment.
Please. Let this one be a girl.
I looked up and caught Millicent's eye, and she mouthed, a girl?
I nodded immediately, my smile spreading with involuntary warmth. Without pausing her work with her right hand, she lifted her left hand slightly and crossed her index and middle fingers with elegant precision.
My heart bloomed with affection.
Perhaps this child would be a calm, collected soul like Isabell. I dared to hope. After all, it had been three months and not a single wave of nausea, no strange cravings, no fainting spells. Not a single wretched symptom.
Surely, such grace could only come from a well-behaved girl.
We continued to work as the sounds of the children's exchange filled the study like birdsong.
In truth, it was not a conversation so much as Vincent's impassioned resistance against Isabell's calm and devastating accuracy. She, with all the serenity of a magistrate, spoke in crisp facts. He, with the fervor of a boy whose pride had been injured, responded with noise and flailing logic.
And then, amidst the background chorus of childhood chaos, I heard it.
"Mother."
The word was small, sweet, and spoken as he tugged again at my gown.
"Look at this, Mother!" he said, so innocently, so cheerfully, with not the slightest awareness of the avalanche he had just caused in my chest.
Everything in me stilled.
I froze mid-letter, my breath lodged somewhere between lungs and heart, my vision swimming at once, tears falling. That word, that word, had finally left my son's lips. And it was addressed to me. I wiped at my cheeks quickly, embarrassed at the flood. A soft laughter bubbled from my mouth.
"What would you have me look at, dearest?" I asked, drawing him closer.
He tilted his head, his small brow furrowed in adorable confusion. "Why are you crying?"
His puzzled expression only made me laugh more.
"Because I am happy," I said, brushing a hand through his hair. "You finally called me Mother."
"But people cry when they are sad," he replied, clearly feeling I had violated some natural law.
"People cry when they are joyful as well," I explained.
"I am confused," he declared.
I heard Isabell sigh. An exhausted, grown-up sigh that could have come from a retired senator. I burst into quiet laughter again.
"Do not trouble yourself with it now," I said. "Now, show me what you wished me to see."
With great ceremony, he slapped a painting into my hands. My heart melted the moment I laid eyes upon it.
It was, well, hideous, objectively. A chaotic swirl of colors and shapes that barely resembled humanity. But it was his. And more importantly, it was ours.
There were three figures. None of which resembled actual people, but by the hair and eye colors, I knew them instantly. Millicent stood on the left. Vincent was in the center, grinning with enthusiasm. And on the right, myself, unmistakably, white-haired and mismatched violet-eyed.
"A gift for you!"
"Oh, sweetling," I said, planting a rather enthusiastic kiss upon his forehead. "Thank you ever so much. I adore it. The finest gift I have received, thus far."
Which was, in the moment, entirely true.
"But you have missed one thing," I added, grinning.
"What do you mean?"
"Here." I took his small hand and placed it gently upon my stomach. "Your sister or brother is growing right here."
His eyes widened. "I am going to be a big brother? WOOOOW!" He turned instantly to Isabell. "Issie! Did you hear that?!"
Isabell offered a graceful nod and a serene smile. "Congratulations, My Lord. Your Ladyship. Your Grace."
Oh heavens. The child was perfect. I very nearly toppled out of my chair in a surge of affection. I fully intended to rise and bestow upon her the sort of overly emotional squeeze she likely considered undignified when-
Millicent set her quill down and rose from her seat with elegant finality and said, "I have concluded my work."
Oh no.
"Isabell," Millicent said, "might I trouble you to escort Vincent to the library, and ensure he is properly prepared for his lesson ahead?"
She turned to me and extended her hand.
Internally, I took several bracing breaths, prepared myself for what was surely to come, and accepted her hand. My other hand still clutched Vincent's glorious interpretation of our family. Millicent took the painting from me and placed it upon the desk.
"We shall retrieve it later," she murmured near my ear.
"Of course, Your Grace," replied Isabell dutifully, while Vincent groaned with dramatic despair.
And then I was led toward our bedchamber.
May the household staff pray for me.