The Scandalous Duke Takes a Bride (3 page)

She nodded. “It’ll be a long process.”

“And what of your health?”

She sat up a little straighter, chin jutted out and full of pride. “Fit as a fiddle.”

“Don’t lie to me, Jez. I can see the weariness in your face. And it’s more than evident that you’ve shed a good stone in the last couple of weeks.”

She slumped back against the couch with a frustrated air. “It’s not polite for you to say so. And you know I’ve been under more pressure than the average person might have to face in all their life. Don’t worry about me. I promise I’ll fill out my clothes again in no time.”

“Consider it my duty to worry about you.”

Her smile faded from her lips as she pushed herself off the sofa to stand. “If I’m to be ready for this evening, I should head home.”

As Hayden stood he reached for her hand to ask her to stay longer. She shook him off before he even had a chance to touch her.

“I can have a carriage brought around for you,” he offered, even though it was only a few blocks to the Fallon residence.

“I think I’ll walk since it’s such a beautiful day.”

He pulled his hat from the hook near the door, intent on walking with her since he wasn’t ready to part ways.

Jez placed her hand over his chest to stall him. “I wanted to take in the fresh air and think for a while before I’m home. You needn’t walk with me. I’ll be fine on my own.”

Her head was bowed where she stood, her finger fiddling with a button on his shirt—so he couldn’t pull on his jacket, he thought.

“Jez…”

When she looked up at him he was struck speechless by the sadness clouding her vision. “I promise you I’ll be fine, Hayden. And if I’m not, you’ve always been my rock when I’ve needed you, haven’t you?”

He gave one succinct nod, but wondered whether she would really come to him if she needed his support. Their friendship seemed strained … maybe strained was an incorrect assumption, but she’d certainly been avoiding spending any great length of time with him alone since her husband’s funeral—ever since confiding exactly what length her husband had gone to in order to cut her out of the Fallon fortune.

“I know I’ve been out of sorts from all the changes in my life. I promise you that I’m working on being my old self again.”

He didn’t say anything, just let Jez take the hat from his hand and put it back on the peg next to the door.

When she stepped away from him, the footman opened the door at his nod. Hayden stood at the threshold, thinking he should follow her home, knowing that would anger her.

He would do it regardless.

A lady on her own was unacceptable to him. Especially when that lady was Jez.

Chapter 3

The estate of the late F—— has been busy with midnight visitors. With all the ins and outs, I can’t imagine it to be anything clandestine but more a flurry of activity to cover up something much darker than the simplicity of an affair.
Mayfair Chronicles,
June 1846 Lady Jessica Fallon, now fortunately and unfortunately the Dowager Countess of Fallon, opened her parasol even though clouds dotted the sky overhead. She turned to her friend one last time before she left him in his foyer.

His blond hair was a little on the long side—he usually kept it clipped short and pomaded as current fashion demanded. Stubble dotted along his jaw and chin, which was unusual; he was so put together that she often found she wanted to rumple him just to see him loosen up a bit. His dark brown eyes, however, were still the same—deadpan and serious as he watched her step outside without him to escort her.

He seemed eager to walk with her, but she needed to be alone right now. She’d delayed too long at his house and now she would suffer the consequences for not ending their time together much sooner.

“Thank you for everything.” She meant it. You could not ask for a truer friend than Hayden and she counted herself lucky to have met and befriended him all those years ago.

“I’d be happier if you’d allow me to escort you.” He folded his arms across his wide chest. He was of formidable height and quite fit from riding and regular fencing, two things he managed to find the time to accomplish every day. And as well he should ride daily, since he bred some of the finest Arabian horses in England.

“Don’t be a ninny, Hayden. I’m not even a ten-minute walk from here.”

His jaw clenched. He clearly didn’t like her insistence in this, but it couldn’t be helped. She blew him a kiss and walked down the steps of his townhouse. She knew he’d follow, and there was nothing to be done about that.

She needed time to herself. Time to think alone. To be reminded about how much of a pariah she was, no thanks to her late husband—and admittedly because of her own antics since the onset of her dreadful marriage. And while she should rejoice at finally being a widow, she simply couldn’t.

With Fallon’s death came uncertainty, and a sad end to the life she’d grown to love even with all the pitfalls she’d met over the last eight years.

She pressed her lace-gloved fingers to her temple to try to relieve the tension that had been building behind her eyes since she woke this morning.

She passed Lady Hargrove and her daughter, whose name Jessica could not recall at the moment. She gave them a cordial nod, but the countess ushered her daughter to the other side of the street, not daring to address a woman of Jessica’s reputation. Jessica would not dwell on how despicable that made her feel; otherwise, she’d be tempted to just stop and sit on the nearest set of stairs and cry out her frustrations for all to see.

That would be too delicious of fodder for the Mayfair Chronicler not to give their twopenny’s worth of thought on.

It was as Hayden suggested; Jessica’s lack of widow’s weeds did not help her in the eyes of society, but she refused to don black for Fallon. He was no true man. Real men did not require brute strength to instill their sense of justice and order in a marriage.

Society had welcomed a monster into their homes with open, trusting arms. She was the only person to ever see the ugly side of her husband.

As she approached her townhouse the first twinge of pain she’d been expecting for days stabbed deep inside her womb. She reached out to the railing and dropped her parasol as she tried to remain standing. Why now? Had she not been humiliated enough these past weeks that she now had to lose the babe in front of everyone? In front of Hayden, who trailed not twenty paces behind? This could not happen yet. Odd how the door was so close yet so far all at the same time.

She closed her eyes for a moment and took a deep breath as she weathered the nausea that came with the next wave of cramps. There were too many witnesses to show any weakness now. She needed to remain strong, determined.

She needed to reach the door and find a way into the safety of her home.

She forced a laugh past her lips and took in a deep breath as she picked up her parasol from the stone stairs of her townhouse. With every ounce of strength left in her, she climbed the rest of the way up the stairs without looking back to see whose eyes were upon her, witnessing her shame. Each step was more agonizing than the last as she pulled her weight up the last few steps like an anchor too long at sea and laden with kelp.

If she faltered now, everyone would see and guess at the truth. Not a day had gone by in her marriage when Fallon hadn’t humiliated her; she would not be disgraced on the street for her inability to carry the Fallon heir to term.

She would not.

If anyone so much as guessed that the rightful heir to the Fallon title was being ripped slowly from her body, then she might as well admit defeat now and leave this cursed house behind once and for all. But it was hers. And she would hold on to what was left of her life and she wouldn’t relinquish one miserable second to Mr. Warren before she had to. He’d have to pry her grip away from this house one stubborn finger at a time.

God, how she wished Hayden were at her side to help her, but she did not want him to see her so weak, so empty of the vivacity she normally prided in herself. This was her humiliation and loss to bear alone. Besides, she’d already told him too much.

On opening the door, the butler looked over her shoulder—probably to see how many enemies were watching her exposed back. She’d never seen a more welcome sight as he discreetly took her by the elbow, helped her over the threshold, and hastily closed the door to the outside world, cloistering them in the darkness of the foyer.

She must appear far worse than she thought, for his concern was etched deep in his old, wrinkled face.

“My lady?”

She patted his weathered cheek affectionately. “I’ll be fine, Wilson.”

Her teeth clenched tight against the next wave of pain that was far sharper than the last. Her knees buckled and she nearly collapsed before Wilson and a footman caught her around the waist to hold her upright.

And then she felt it. Warmth seeped between her thighs as her body finally let go of the babe it had nourished for nearly five months. She bit her lip hard against the sobs building in her throat.

There was no sense in feigning that everything was all right, not when it so obviously wasn’t.

As calmly as she could, she said, “Please take me up to my room.”

“Of course, my lady. Shall we send for the doctor?”

She shook her head vehemently. “Have Mrs. Harper come up to my room at once. She is all the assistance I require.”

Jessica made it to her private bedchamber with the footman’s help. Wilson wasn’t far behind, the worry growing in his expression as whimpers of pain passed her lips and a trail of blood trickled across the hardwood flooring, staining her ivory slippers. Once in her room, she crumpled onto her bed as another jolt of stabbing cramps tore through her body. She rolled to her side and pulled her knees up to her chest as she clutched her arms around her legs.

Wilson ran from her room calling out to Mrs. Harper as he took the stairs faster than Jessica had ever seen him move.

Jessica hadn’t thought a miscarriage could be so painful. She’d spotted and bled on and off for nearly a week, thinking that had been the extent of the whole ordeal. Even though the midwife she’d seen outside of London had assured her that that would not be the case, the old woman’s wise words hadn’t stopped Jessica from hoping otherwise.

She heard the jingle of keys before she saw Mrs. Harper, the housekeeper, enter her room.

When Mrs. Harper saw her on the bed, she rushed forward. “Oh, my lady. You’re as white as a ghost.”

“I’m c-cold.” Her teeth chattered together.

“You are shivering something fierce. I’ll have a hot bath run for you. That’ll be the quickest way to stave off the chill that’s taken hold of you.”

Jessica could barely nod her thanks at the housekeeper as she went to the bellpull to call up the housemaids. Jessica forced herself up from the bed and made her way to the washbasin in her room; she lost her breakfast and the little cucumber sandwiches Hayden had plied her with an hour ago. The dizziness was unbearable and she held the stand with both hands and anchored herself as she threw up again. There were hands supporting her as the retching subsided.

Mrs. Harper wiped Jessica’s mouth with a handkerchief.

“I need out of this dress.”

Mrs. Harper released the buttons at the back of Jessica’s dress. Before long the bodice and overskirts were removed, too. Her underclothes were soaked through with blood.

When her corset loosened, Jessica took a deep breath into her lungs, but the smell of lingering sickness had her covering her mouth again. Thankfully, she had nothing left to throw up.

Mrs. Harper assisted her back to her bed and pulled the coverlet down. “I’ll remove the bowl—there’s nothing worse than a bad smell to put you ill at ease again. I’ll give instructions to the maids on my way to the bathing room.”

“Thank you.”

Jessica hugged her arms tight around her midsection. A feverish chill dampened her skin. She’d thought the damage Fallon had done nearly over. She hadn’t expected the miscarriage to be so severe; perhaps it would have been like the rest had she not been as far along in the pregnancy as she was. It was almost like this was a sign that she shouldn’t have children.

Hot tears ran down both sides of her face. She didn’t bother to wipe them away but instead let them pool beneath her left cheek and dampen her pillow.

When the maid entered Jessica’s bedchamber, the young girl rushed forward. “You’ve fallen ill, my lady.”

Only Mrs. Harper and Wilson had known about the babe; the rest of her staff would soon know the truth Jessica had been desperate to hide since her husband had fallen ill. Thank goodness she had thought ahead and had fired most of the staff who had been loyal only to her husband. She’d given them all a month’s worth of wages and letters of recommendation, hoping it would keep them from telling truths Jessica wanted buried.

“I’ll need your arm if I’m to make it to the bathing chamber.”

“Yes, my lady.”

The maid helped Jessica to her feet and wrapped her arm around her waist to keep her from sliding to the floor.

Another wave of nausea had Jessica’s head spinning and her stomach in spasms again, so she closed her eyes and worried only about catching a decent breath. She let the maid lead her blindly to the drawn bath.