“Now, then, isn’t that about the prettiest baby you’ve ever seen?” Mrs. Stucker asked. “I know you’re tuckered out, Mrs. Fairchild, but perhaps you’ll take a little tea or broth.”
“I’ll go see what I can find,” Anna said, yawning.
She slowly stumbled down the stairs. When she got to the landing, she noticed a light gleaming in the downstairs sitting room. Puzzled, Anna pushed the door open and stood there a moment, staring.
Edward sprawled on Rebecca’s damask settee, his long legs hanging off the end. He’d removed his neckcloth and unbuttoned his waistcoat. One arm draped over his eyes. His other arm stretched to the floor where his hand almost enveloped a half-empty glass of what looked like James’s brandy. Anna stepped inside the room, and he immediately raised his arm from his eyes, belying the impression that he had been asleep.
“How is she?” His voice was raspy, his countenance ghastly. The fading bruises stood out starkly in his pale face, and the stubble on his jaw made him look dissolute.
Anna felt ashamed. She’d forgotten about Edward, had assumed he’d gone home long ago. All this time he’d been waiting downstairs to see how Rebecca fared.
“Rebecca is fine,” she said brightly. “She has a baby girl.”
His expression didn’t change. “Alive?”
“Yes.” Anna faltered. “Yes, of course. Both Rebecca and the baby are alive and well.”
“Thank God.” His face hadn’t lost the strained look.
She began to feel uneasy. Surely he was overly concerned? He’d just met Rebecca tonight, hadn’t he? “What is the matter?”
He sighed and his arm returned to cover his eyes. There was a long moment of silence—so long she thought he wasn’t going to answer the question. Finally, he spoke, “My wife and babe died in childbirth.”
Anna slowly sat down on a stool near the settee. She hadn’t really thought about his wife before. She knew he’d been married and that his wife had died young, but not how she’d died. Had he loved her? Did he love her still?
“I’m sorry.”
He lifted his hand from the brandy glass, made an impatient movement, and then let it settle on the glass again as if too weary to find another resting place for it. “I didn’t tell you to elicit your pity. She died a long time ago. Ten years now.”
“How old was she?”
“She’d turned twenty a fortnight before.” His mouth twisted. “I was four and twenty.”
Anna waited.
When he next spoke, the words were so low she had to lean forward to hear them. “She was young and healthy. It never occurred to me that bearing the child might kill her, but she miscarried in her seventh month. The baby was too small to live. They told me it would have been a boy. Then she started bleeding.”
He took his arm away from his face, and Anna could see that he was staring sightlessly at some inner vision.
“They couldn’t stop it. Doctors and midwives, they couldn’t stop it. The maids kept running in with more and more linens,” he whispered to the horror in his memory. “She just bled and bled until her very life bled away. There was so much blood in the bed, the mattress was soaked through. We had to burn it afterward.”
The tears she’d withheld for Rebecca’s sake ran down Anna’s cheeks. To have lost someone you loved so horribly, so tragically, how awful it must have been. And he must have wanted that baby very badly. She already knew that having a family was important to him.
Anna pressed a hand to her mouth, and the movement seemed to bring Edward out of his reverie. He swore softly when he saw the tears on her face. He sat up on the settee and reached for her. Without any sign of strain, he lifted her off the stool and onto his lap and settled her there so she sat across him, her back held by his arm. He brought her head to his chest.
One big hand gently stroked her hair. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have told you about that. It’s not for a lady’s ears, especially after you’ve been up all night worrying about your friend.”
Anna allowed herself to lean against him, his masculine warmth and the petting hand wonderfully comforting. “You must have loved her very much.”
The hand paused, and then resumed. “I thought I did. As it turned out, I didn’t know her that well.”
She tilted her head back to see his face. “How long were you married?”
“A little over a year.”
“But—”
He pushed her head back to his chest. “We hadn’t known each other long when we became engaged, and I suppose I never really talked to her. Her father was very eager for the match, told me that it was agreeable to the girl and I simply assumed…” His voice roughened. “I found out after we were married that my face repulsed her.”
Anna tried to speak, but he hushed her again.
“I think she was afraid of me, too,” he said wryly. “You may not have noticed, but I’ve something of a temper.” She felt his hand touch the top of her head softly. “By the time she was pregnant with my child, I knew that something was wrong, and in her last hours she cursed him.”
“Cursed who?”
“Her father. For forcing her to marry such an ugly man.”
Anna shivered. What a silly little girl his wife must have been.
“Apparently her father had lied to me.” Edward’s voice turned as icy as winter. “He desperately desired the match and, not wanting to offend me, forbade my fiancée to tell me that my scars revolted her.”
“I’m sorry, I—”
“Shh,” he murmured. “It happened a long time ago, and I have learned since to live with my face and to discern those who would try to hide an aversion to it. Even if they lie, I usually know it.”
But he didn’t know her lies. Anna felt cold at the thought. She’d deceived him, and he’d never forgive her if he found out.
He must’ve mistaken her tremble for continued sadness at his tale. He whispered something into her hair and held her closer until the warmth from his body had chased her chill away. They sat quietly then for a little while, taking comfort from each other. It was beginning to grow light outside. There was a halo around the closed sitting room curtains. Anna took the opportunity to rub her nose against his rumpled shirt. He smelled like the brandy he’d drunk—very masculine.
Edward leaned back to look down at her. “What are you doing?”