A Most Unsuitable Groom by Kasey Michaels (14 page)

The weeks moved on into July, then to the middle of July, with Mariah keeping herself occupied with William—hiding behind her own child—and Spencer busy either in the village or on weekly trips to Dover, many of them lasting several days.

They met at the dinner table and sometimes crossed paths in the dressing room that was William's nursery, as they did now, with the child already sound asleep after Sheila Whiting had filled his belly for him.

"I've come to say goodbye. I leave in the morning. Again," Spencer said as Mariah, who had been leaning over the cradle, straightened at the sound of the door to the hallway closing behind her. Strange how attractively maternal she looked bending over the cradle to gaze at their son, and how his mind immediately saw the difference, and the different sort of attraction she presented when she was looking at him, the man who would soon be her husband.

Mariah nodded, drawing her dressing gown more closely over her breasts and turned to enter her bedchamber, Spencer following after her. Once inside and still carefully a good twenty feet away from the bed, she turned to confront him.

He was dressed informally in just form-fitting dark brown country breeches, tall black boots and a full-sleeved white shirt open at the neck. But she was barefoot, clad only in her night rail and dressing gown, which made him seem positively overdressed...and her underdressed. In other words, he held an advantage over her, and she didn't much care for the feeling.

"And when do we see this magnificent ship, Spencer? I should think a fleet could have been built in all this time."

"Miss me when I'm gone?" he asked, grinning at her.

"As I'd miss a pebble in my shoe."

Spencer pressed a hand to his chest in mock pain, the two of them now used to this constant thrust and parry, for they had spent many hours together, usually with William as their chaperon, just as she'd teased. But they were getting to know each other and he hoped she liked him as much as he liked her, as a person.

They'd kissed again a time or two. But those kisses had been few and chaste. He hadn't pushed, had held back his desires, and he truly believed that she became more relaxed with him every day. Less fearful that he would simply
pounce
on her, as he was beginning to think he must have done when they'd come together under that blanket in the forest.

But they were still a long way from the sort of relationship Chance and Julia shared, or Elly and Jack had or Morgan and Ethan had. They still bad such a: long way to go. Until he was certain he could trust her. Until she was certain she could trust him.

"Ah, a mortal wound," he said, still rubbing at his
chest. And then he sobered, for he had come here for a specific reason and needed to keep their conversation civil. "Ainsley cornered me after dinner tonight, Mariah. In his opinion, we've put off the wedding long enough. I agree. I should be back by Friday evening and we'll be married on Saturday morning and William baptized, as well, as long as the vicar is handy. Please consider allowing Callie to stand beside you for the marriage ceremony, as she's a very roman-tical child."

Mariah's heart ridiculously began racing in her chest and she silently admonished it to return to its regular beat, a feat not easily accomplished as long as Spencer looked at her the way he was doing now. "And who stands behind you, with a pistol pressed to your ribs?"

"You think so little of your attractions, Mariah?" he asked her, taking two steps forward. God, how he wanted her. It had been six long weeks now, surely enough time for her to have fully recovered from William's birth. But no, he would wait. He'd waited this long.

With some effort, Mariah stood her ground. "Stop smiling like that, you look the idiot. And step back, you're looming."

"Looming? Surely not. I'm fully five feet away from you."

She pulled the dressing gown sash tighter. "It feels as if you're looming. You
are
looming over me."

"Menacingly so? Or provocatively so? This looming I'm doing, that you think I'm doing. You and I together, alone in your bedchamber. Does it frighten you, Mariah...or excite you? It's something I've wondered, something I've longed to ask."

"Oh, don't be so smug "

Now Spencer grinned, beginning to enjoy himself very much. She stood toe-to-toe with him, never afraid, and he admired her for that. "Looming
and
smug. Shame on me."

"Yes, shame on you. Shame on all of you. You just.. .you just take it for granted that I should be so very grateful to you and then do anything you say. Perhaps I've been using giving birth as an excuse. Perhaps I don't want to marry you. Perhaps I'm even considering the benefits of being a fallen woman. Perhaps I'm—stop
looming."
She pointed in the general direction of the fireplace and the chairs that flanked it. "Go. Over there. Sit down."

"Yes, ma'am" Spencer said, shaking his head. God, she was remarkable. "If it pleases you, ma'am. God knows I don't want another hole added to
my
head."

"And don't be facetious. I hate when people are facetious. I only did what had to be done," Mariah said, following after him and then sitting down in the facing chair. "Now, about this marriage."

"Yes, something else to be done only because it has to be done. That is how you see it, isn't it, Mariah? Or is it a question of religion, the choice of celebrant? Or perhaps one of marriage settlements? You wish to discuss an allowance?"

Mariah bit her lip for a moment at that last question. "An allowance? I hadn't considered any of that. Should I?"

Spencer shrugged. "I have no idea. You'll be my wife, Mariah. Anything you want, anything you wish, I'll provide for you. I've no intention of being cheeseparing or even stern. Although being stern does hold some small appeal. You know all of that business about you obeying me, being subservient to your husband in all things? That is in the vows, I believe. I could probably enjoy that."

"Oh, for heaven's sakes. And I thought we two could have a reasonable, mature discussion? I must have been out of my mind. You know, Spence, if it weren't for that child in there—"

"If it weren't for
our
child in there," Spencer interrupted, turning serious. "Nothing else can be more important than William. No one else can come first for either of us."

Mariah felt herself beginning to soften toward Spencer. Again. If William grew up with half the man's charm, they'd be beating young women away from him with stout sticks. "At least we agree on something."

"And William should not grow up alone," Spencer said, pushing his point while he felt he had the advantage.

"Alone? Becket Hall is not exactly uninhabited. For such a large house, it's nearly impossible to walk more than ten feet in any direction without bumping into somebody."

"But he'll need brothers, sisters. As a child, I enjoyed being a part of a large family."

Mariah nodded. "It was always just my father and I. It would have been nice to have a sister or brother for company at some of the more isolated posts where my father served. But wanting and having are two different things, Spence. You can't ask me to agree to.. .to be a wife to you in all things." Then she closed her eyes and ceded him some ground on their personal battlefield. Not complete surrender but definitely a yielding, an offer to renegotiate terms. "Not yet."

A wise man does not gloat when victory is in sight and a very wise man is careful to at least feign compromise. "There's a fairly good-size dressing room connected to my bedchamber. I'll sleep there for now and William will be moved to the nursery and someone will be with him there at all times. Do you have anyone in mind for the position of nanny?"

Mariah tried to speak, but found that her mouth was dry. She swallowed, coughed slightly and then nodded once more. "Onatah, of course. And Edyth, if she's agreeable, to spell her from time to time."

Spencer smiled. "There. We're being civilized. Making decisions. Or does that make me smug again, pointing this out?"

"No. Merely vaguely irritating," Mariah said without stopping to think before she spoke and then she smiled. "What will you do once the trips to Dover are no longer necessary? What is your...your role, here at Becket Hall?"

It was a good question. It would have been better, Spencer believed, if he had an answer for her. "We all just lend a hand where it's needed. I've spent many years firmly under Jacko's not quite tender tutelage, learning about the sea, and others learning about the land."
And still more, learning how to fight,
he added mentally but didn't actually say the words. "I've been gone for nearly two years and returned home wounded, so I haven't really been doing much of anything, frankly. That's why I was happy to help out with the trips to Dover. Are you going to put forth suggestions as to how I might occupy my time?"

"No," Mariah said, sighing. "But to just stay here for the rest of your life? Living under your father's roofs? Your brother Chance left to establish his own residence. Morgan left to live with her husband."

"And Eleanor stayed, along with her husband, who now seems to be Ainsley's second right-hand after Courtland, a change that took place during my absence. So what you're asking, Mariah, is if you and I are to remain here for, as you said so portentously, the rest of our lives. I take it the prospect doesn't appeal?"

"I don't know, Spence. Eleanor is very much in charge of the day-to-day running of the household and Courtland and Jack are in charge of most everything else—with Ainsley overseeing it all. I'm used to running my father's—" She'd nearly said
life,
"That is, being in charge of a household. Granted, a small one. But I was in charge. Here? Here, I'm as useless as.. .as..."

"A wart on the end of Prinney's nose?" Spencer suggested helpfully. "And if you were going to say that you were used to running your father's
life
before you thought better of it, please be contented in the knowledge that I fully understand that you aren't the sort of woman who is happy merely tending to her knitting and that I'm up for the challenge. So, what do you suggest?"

"I have no idea." She looked at him intently. "You will be the head of our small household. Those decisions rest with you."

"Ouch!" he exclaimed, pretending to cringe. "That must have hurt, saying that. Very well, I'll give what we've discussed some thought and then render my decision, hopefully with all the gravitas incumbent upon me as the head of the household. Does that please you?"

"No, it doesn't," she said honestly. "I am handing my son and myself over to a man I barely know and then trusting him to do what is right for all of us. Would you be pleased, were you to be standing in my shoes?"

Spencer fought the urge to squirm in his chair. "You're making me look at myself, Mariah, and that isn't pleasant, not when I know that as a man grown
I'm now completely superfluous here and useless anywhere else. When Chance left to live in London we had no idea our circumstances would change."
We had no idea Edmund Beales was still above ground to recognize any of us, so now I'm fairly well stuck here at Becket Hall, even as Chance is stuck at his country estate, until Beales is eliminated.
That, he did not say.

Mariah twisted her hands together in her lap as she struggled to understand what he was telling her and what he seemed to be attempting to avoid telling her. "I don't understand. Is it.. .is it a matter of money?"

Now Spencer laughed. "Money? Oh, no, never money. That has never been a problem, not for any of us. Ainsley has made ample provisions for each of his children. Agreeing to
take th
at money is something else. I would prefer to earn it, not have it handed to me on the proverbial silver platter."

At last Mariah felt they were getting somewhere, making some sort of progress between them. Her soon-to-be husband was a proud man, a man with a conscience, a man who wished to succeed on his own merits. She liked that. "That's very commendable, Spence. And how would you wish to earn that money if you are, as you say, superfluous here at Becket Hall? And what would you do with that money?"

He looked at her for a long time, wondering what she might say if he told her what he'd been thinking about for the past few years, for the entire time he was with the Army and most especially since his return to Becket Hall to see Jack Eastwood fitting so comfortably into the place he'd always thought would fall to him. Would she laugh at him? Would she be horrified?
Would she refuse to marry him?

Was it time for the truth? Yes, it was. It was time he trusted her with his dream just as he trusted her with his son. It was time to learn if the strengths she'd shown after Moraviantown extended to taking his hand and stepping out into the unknown at his side.

"Have you ever heard of a place called Hampton Roads, Mariah?"

She shook her head. "No. Oh, wait. Yes. Yes, I have. Wasn't Jamestown established near Hampton Roads? That first, failed English settlement in the colonies so many years ago?"

"I think so, yes. The entire area is now called Virginia," Spencer said, relaxing somewhat. After all, it was only his dream, not yet an accomplished fact. "A few years ago I very briefly met someone who lives in Hampton Roads. A ship's captain by the name of Abraham. An interesting man, Mariah, a freed slave. We've since corresponded, only a few times I'm afraid, before the war put a stop to our letters. But Abraham's powers of description make it almost possible for me to see what he tells me are the green, rolling hills of Virginia. Canada was green and so were the parts of America I saw, but Virginia draws me more with its warmer climate and with a friend there to greet me. I have no desire to return to the islands, Mariah, and England has never really felt like home to me. But a new land, fresh and clean and still with opportunity for anyone willing to work hard, build his own dynasty, his own future? England will give up this war soon and I'll be able to travel there, see it all for myself."