Loving Sarah (23 page)

Thinking on it, though he was glad to be married to her now, being married hadn’t been in his plans for at least a few more years, and Sarah knew this. To save her from disgrace, he’d married her, but as he’d already bedded her, it wasn’t as though he didn’t expect it eventually. He’d just taken the initiative and did it sooner rather than later.

As he saw it, their best option was for her to continue living with her family for the next few years, and he would return to stay with her as frequently as possible, because he did care for her. He cared a great deal. Now he just had to convince her that this was the best arrangement for both of them.

C
HAPTER
E
LEVEN

H
ours later, after seeing Lucky safely ashore, Sarah sat in a refreshing, hot bath with her favorite lavender-scented soap and rested her eyes as she planned what she’d say to Ren, who was in his office at that very moment questioning Ian and Lucky, and likely examining their marriage certificate Ian brought from New York.

Sarah tried to plan her reaction to each scenario that might play out once she entered her brother’s office. She didn’t think he would demand an annulment or divorce, as they were wed by a minister, but more importantly because of the scandal either would cause. As for bloodlines, Ian would be considered a superb match for her. That he was rough around the edges could be attributed to his lack of exposure to the gentler sex, and in her opinion, that made him very attractive.

As she saw it, the man needed her to help refine him and find his way socially. It was something she was quite proficient at, and as a married woman, it was her duty to make for him a comfortable home and bear his children.

She sunk lower into the tub, allowing the warm water to rise to her chin. She grinned as she wondered if he would be happy about the babe she was almost certain she carried. They both found fulfillment in their lovemaking, surely her new husband would enjoy the product of their loving. What man didn’t wish for sons and daughters? Heirs to carry on the familial legacy?

Sarah also wondered
when
she should tell him. He and Lucky planned to leave in a matter of weeks for China. Because she was never very regular with her monthly course, it was difficult to say for certain she
was
carrying, having only been late this one month. She’d felt fine once she returned to dry land and had been able to have tea and cakes before her bath with no upset stomach. So likely it was the food on the boat that had finally gotten to her.

Her maid helped her rinse and handed her a towel when she stood. As she pat herself dry, she noticed it. Upon wiping her thighs there were faint streaks of blood. She stood in shocked silence before calling for Trudy to bring her the proper undergarments.

Sarah wanted to shout in anger, needed to cry in sadness, but could do neither at that moment. Then suddenly a vice-like grip on her heart wrenched a silent scream from her just as she began to weep for her loss. She’d wanted so desperately to be with child, had even begun to feel the new life in her very soul.

A babe. A son or daughter. She’d wanted it so very much. Sarah had wanted to give her husband an heir, and now it would be many months before he returned from China and she’d have an opportunity to conceive again. Her heart burst with sadness, and even a little shame for her inability to do what all wives wished to do.

Sarah sent a note to Lia that she was feeling unwell and would remain in her room this evening. She then wrapped herself in a bathrobe and sat at her dressing table while Trudy began to remove the tangles from her wet hair.

She opened her eyes at a knock on the door and bid the person enter. Her sister-in-law came in, a sympathetic smile on her face. It was almost enough to bring Sarah to tears—yet again. She dismissed her maid. “I’ll finish brushing it dry. Thank you, Trudy.”

“I’ve put your night dress and robe across the chaise, my lady. It’s just over there,” she pointed to the soft linen sleep dress before leaving the room.

Lia took up the brush and began to work a small section of Sarah’s hair. “I used to love doing this when you were younger,” Lia said, “and I think you enjoyed it as well. I know Isabel still likes for me to brush her hair at times, and she’s at that impossible age.”

“There’s something soothing about having someone you love brush your hair,” Sarah whispered as she choked on her tears. “I’d so wanted to do the same with a child of my own. But that won’t be happening any time soon.”

Lia wrapped her arms around her from behind and met her gaze in the mirror. “It will eventually. It sometimes takes years to conceive a babe. You have nothing to fear, as long as you’re comfortable and he’s kind,” her sister-in-law said sympathetically.

“He is very kind, and we…are comfortable.” She sniffled and blew her nose yet again. “But Ian hadn’t wanted marriage yet but was forced into it because of what I’d done.”

Lia was silent a moment, as though she contemplated everything Sarah had just said. When she spoke, she had but one statement. “You love him.”

Through her tears, she replied honestly, “I fell in love with him, yes.”

“It’s interesting that you are both taking blame for your newly married state,” Lia said. “Ren believes Ian is as taken with you as I think you are with him.”

Sarah frowned, feeling the tears rising. “No. He tolerates me at best.” She cried as she related her tale from the fateful ride out to the wrong vessel, to standing a few moments earlier in the tub and realizing she didn’t carry her husband’s child.

Lia continued combing the tangles from Sarah’s curly hair. “Did you know that your captain
twice
had the opportunity to hand you over to Lucky before you reached New York and he chose to remain silent and keep you with him? That tells me he wanted you as well.”

She shook her head. “No. If anything he has resigned himself to our marriage. He said as much, making it very clear it wasn’t what he wanted. He did not want to get married to anyone yet. And I don’t want Ren to punish Ian for something he had no part in. He knew nothing of my plan to go with Lucky. It truly was an unfortunate accident that I landed on his boat. It wasn’t his fault.”

“He’s not punishing your new husband, Sarah. While he is not happy with how it all began, your brother is not angry with Ian. In fact, the four men are in his study, toasting Ian with brandy, and it smells as though they’re smoking cigars.”

Pensive silence stretched between them. When she spoke, Sarah asked, “I should like to remain in my room for the night. I cannot imagine celebrating with the way I am feeling.”

“Ren has asked to speak with you,” Lia said. “Shall I call him up rather than you go below?”

Sarah nodded. There was no getting around facing her brother. It was the one interview she was not looking forward to. “You’re certain he is not planning my departure for The Box?”

Lia smiled. “He’s not planning to send you away. Though The Box is a wonderful place to go on a wedding trip. You should convince your husband to take you next summer before he goes to China again.”

“I’m not sure how Ian will feel about returning to Scotland,” Sarah said. “He said he hasn’t been in many years. I assume it is because of the tension with the old earl. Though if his grandfather has passed, I don’t see why he wouldn’t want to go.”

“
I
t was never my intent to sail forever. Only until my predecessor cocked up his toes and I could be free to settle in one location. Then perhaps marry one day.” Ian sipped the smooth liquor and contemplated his future with Sarah. His main priority now was to protect her from his grandfather. The man might use her against him.

The duke tapped the ash from his cigar in a dish and reclined in his deep-cushioned leather chair. “You must explain to me how a harmless old man has kept you from taking root somewhere? Your grandfather frequented my club when he used to come to Town.” His new brother-in-law looked at him curiously, then at Camden sitting next to him on the settee, with Lucky across from Caversham in a matching, dark-leather wing-back. “I know the man. He is an honorable sort—a bit gruff at times—but always straightforward.”

Ian puffed on his cigar and stared into his glass. Memories of what he’d witnessed that afternoon when he’d walked in on his grandfather and his friend flooded his mind. Ian knew his grandfather’s friend as a fellow survivor of the Siege at Charleston, a junior officer at the time of the battle that sank their ship. Though he could not forget the scene he’d stumbled upon, Ian had never spoken of it. He wasn’t even sure he could now, except that he wanted to protect Sarah.

The last time he saw his grandfather, it was for his forced annual visit, the month before his seventeenth birthday, and just weeks before the start of his first term at Oxford. For the first few years of his life in England, one or the other of his aunts would accompany him on these visits north. On this particular visit, Ian made the trip on his own. The ship upon which he’d traveled had arrived several hours earlier than the appointed time, and Ian was happy because he hoped to be done with the annual tirade in time to catch that return packet to London the very same evening, eliminating an overnight stay in the man’s home.

His grandfather’s house was surprisingly understaffed when he arrived, and he initially attributed it to the servants’ day off. In hindsight, he should have known the man was deep in debt because his aunts had dropped hints at just that very thing during his most recent visit to see them. Ian let himself into the unlocked house after knocking several times and strode into his grandfather’s office, knowing if he were home, that was where the man would be. He was, but the commander was not alone.

Shock unlike anything he’d ever experienced registered in his brain, freezing him momentarily to the spot. It took a moment to comprehend what exactly he was witnessing, but there was no mistaking it. Ian was certain the expression on their faces was very much like his. It seemed his grandfather had not been expecting him to arrive early.

In his stupefied stillness, Ian watched as the old man—wearing his full commander’s uniform sans trousers and with his wooden leg strapped around his upper thigh—sodomized the man Ian knew was the old man’s friend. In his grandfather’s favor, if such a thing could be said, this other man didn’t appear to be putting up a fight. And though he might have thought the situation abhorrent, he knew such things existed. The lads at school spoke of such vulgar behaviors with little to no surprise. He just didn’t think someone as strict, disciplined, and militaristic as the old man would have been one to partake of that particular peccadillo.

He found it shocking and unnatural. Perhaps it was because he’d come from a conservative upbringing that he was shocked by the sight. It didn’t matter. The moment he recognized what was happening, Ian fled the house with the speed of a hare chased by a fox, returned the rented horse, and ran toward the docks, where he bought passage on the first ship leaving no matter the destination. As it turned out, he wound up sailing north to Aberdeen, then taking another packet the next day headed south back to London.

He started classes at the beginning of the term, and within several weeks discovered his grandfather had sent two thugs to follow him. Who knew what they would have done had they caught him? He was always watching his back, trying to stay one step ahead of the two. During his first term break, he’d gone to Lucky’s home, attempting to hide from the thugs. When classes resumed, he stayed with Lucky at his apartment rather than return to his student housing.

He had to confide some of the events of that day to Lucky when Ian asked to sleep on his couch for an undetermined amount of time, but he could never share all of the details.

He later learned that should the admiralty discover his grandfather’s affinity for sodomy, the admiralty could have his grandfather’s title and all of his accolades and medals stripped from him and be thrown in prison. He’d no longer be the hero the entire nation believed him to be.

Ian exhaled the smoke from his cigar, and with it all memories of that time in his life. He then gave his new brother-in-law the reply he hoped would placate him. “The Commander was desperate at one time,” Ian began, “but I believe we are at an impasse with regard to that threat. He was cruel, not just to me, but to his own daughters. Once a year, I was forced as a child to listen to his hate-filled orations about how my uncle, who died during our second war for independence, had such promise, a military hero, handsome and charming, and I would never compare as an heir. As a young boy, I could handle that. But when he attacked my parents, I could take no more. He called my father a traitor to the crown because he’d fought for his new country, and my mother a whore because she was the daughter of one of his servants. I could take no more. After Rugby, I’d decided I’d had enough of his vitriol and chose to never visit him again. He ceased paying my school fees and expenses. My aunts paid for all three years at Oxford, an expense neither could afford. At the time I promised to repay them, last year I did.”

“Do you feel he will harm my sister?” the duke asked.

Ian shook his head. “No, I don’t fear that. My thought is to spare Sarah his wild, hate-filled rants. They were upsetting enough to me as a young man. But to a lady….” Ian trailed off, unsure of how to convey his concern for his wife’s safety without telling the other three men what he knew. He stared into the contents of his snifter as he swirled it about. “He has an added reason to want to get even with me, because I know things—dark things—about him. I was witness to it, and I’m afraid he’d use Sarah to get to me.”