He leapt to his feet, running his fingers through his hair. Two of his father’s three wives had died in childbirth. And he had never really recovered from the loss. Especially not from the first. The love of his life. And suddenly, he knew exactly how the old man must have felt. The prospect of carrying on living without Midge was too ghastly to contemplate!
And more than that, he knew that if the worst should happen, it would indeed be all his fault. He clenched his fists, a streak of resolve running through him. He would just have to make damn sure nothing happened to Midge!
‘I will get Dr Cottee to come and look at you in the morning,’ he decided. She must have the best of care. Stay in bed all day every day if that was what it took to keep her safe!
‘What is it? What’s wrong?’
Midge was staring up at him with her huge grey eyes clouded with anxiety.
‘Nothing, nothing at all,’ he lied, his stomach roiling with fear.
‘Then why ask Dr Cottee to look at me? Does he even know anything about having babies? I thought you said he was an expert in nervous disorders?’
‘Well, I feel nervous,’ he admitted, then immediately felt a pang of contrition. He should be reassuring Midge, not spelling out the dangers and terrifying her too.
Though what he most wanted right now was to clutch her tightly and never let her go!
Instead, he had to get away from her, fast, before she picked up on his fear.
‘You need your rest,’ he said grimly, backing away from the bed and the temptation Midge presented, lying there looking so achingly vulnerable.
He hardened himself against the hurt look she gave him as he fled from her bedroom. If he stayed, she would winkle his deepest thoughts from him. She had the knack of doing that. He had told her things he had never confided to another living soul!
He slammed his door behind him, and leaned back on it, his whole body shaking.
He hated to have to admit that his father was right about anything, but he was already learning how painful it was for a man to be so much in love with his wife.
Chapter Ten
Monty knew, the moment he set foot in his father’s study, why he had been summoned. The doctor’s gloating expression said it all, even before the earl offered his congratulations.
Dr Cottee bustled over with a glass of what looked like the best brandy in his hands. His father lifted his own glass towards him in salute.
‘To the Claremont heir,’ said the earl with blatant satisfaction. For once, the faint tint of disapproval that always hovered at the back of his eyes was entirely absent.
Monty mechanically swallowed the contents of his glass and sat down heavily in the nearest chair.
‘You know I thought you had made a mistake, marrying that girl, given her family history,’ said the earl. ‘For a long time, everyone believed Lady Framlingham was barren. You are most fortunate that she has not inherited that particular weakness. But,’ he continued, a peevish tone creeping back into his voice, ‘there still remains the question of whether she will be able to carry a son to full term. Her mother was singularly unsuccessful in that respect.’
The doctor got to his feet, folded his hands over his ample stomach and adopted what Monty supposed he thought was a professional demeanour.
‘We will need to be extremely careful of her ladyship’s health.’
Monty felt all his fears from the night before swarm up and wrap their determined fingers round his throat.
‘You have to put a stop to her careering all over the estate with those boys,’ snapped the earl. ‘Especially on that damned horse! Most capricious beast in the stables!’
Monty had a vision of Midge’s body flying through the air, to land with a sickening thud on the turf whilst Misty galloped off into the distance.
‘No more riding.’ He nodded. ‘Definitely no more riding.’
‘Also—’ the doctor cleared his throat ‘—it has not escaped our notice that you and she engage in marital relations with rather exceptional frequency.’
Monty hung onto his temper with grim determination. It felt as though the doctor had been spying on him! And what the devil did he mean by all this ‘we’ business?
‘That will have to cease, of course,’ said the doctor.
Much as he would have liked to tell the doctor it was no damned business of his how often he made love with his own wife, concern for Midge’s health prompted him to ask, ‘Are you saying it would be dangerous to continue?’
‘In the early stages of pregnancy,’ the doctor replied, ‘any woman, no matter what her background, is particularly vulnerable to the risk of miscarriage. We would not wish to do anything that might jeopardize her health, or that of the heir, would we?’ Dr Cottee then went on, at interminable length, about exactly what was, and what was not permissible for a woman in ‘a delicate condition’ to do.
‘Naturally, I do not wish to do anything that might harm the unborn babe,’ Monty snapped, though he refused to assume, as they were doing, that the child Midge was carrying was the male heir his father longed for. It might very well be a girl. He had a brief, intense vision of a pretty little thing with a thatch of unruly hair and a sunny smile, just like her mother’s.
‘Then you must make sure she behaves herself from now on,’ bit out the earl.
Yes. Midge would never forgive herself if anything happened to her baby, because of any carelessness on her part.
‘Then if you will excuse me,’ he said, slamming the empty glass on the table and getting to his feet, ‘I shall go up to her straight away.’
He stalked to the door without waiting for his father’s permission to leave. Midge was pregnant. He had made her pregnant. So now it was his duty to keep both her and the baby safe.
Poor Midge. It was not going to be easy for a girl with so much energy to sit about all day, which was what the doctor’s strictures would mean. He seemed to think the most strenuous thing she ought to do was take a brief stroll through the gardens. And as for him…he strode along the corridor that led back to the west wing, his brows creased into a scowl as he envisaged the torture of retiring to his lonely bed, which would seem far more empty now that she had shared it with him. He was going to spend night after night pacing the boards or wracked with the nightmares her soft and fragrant presence had kept at bay.
Hell, never mind the nights! How on earth was he going to keep his hands off her during the daytime?
Well, somehow he was going to have to find a way, if that was what it took to protect her.
He gritted his teeth as he thrust open the door to their suite, already mourning the loss of the intimacy that had made such a difference to his formerly bleak existence.
Midge’s eyes widened with apprehension when she caught sight of the expression on his face.
‘No need to look like that, Midge,’ he snapped. ‘It’s not the end of the world.’ Only the end of the freedoms they had enjoyed. ‘I have just come from my father. Dr Cottee has confirmed my suspicion that you are going to have a baby.’
Midge glowered up at him. What had he got to look so irritated about? He had not been the one to undergo the most intimate and embarrassing examination any doctor could devise for a female patient. The moment Dr Cottee had left the room, she’d called for hot water so she could wash the feel of his slimy hands from her body.
It was only once she was fully clothed, when the feeling of revulsion had abated somewhat, that it occurred to her that he had not told her what the result of that examination had been. She had already been