Page 71 of Tremaine's True Love
“I do not contort myself for the sake of social niceties,” Tremaine said, stroking a hand over Nita’s hair. “And I protect those entrusted to my care. My wife will not be allowed to scamper off to a war-torn country while I have breath in my body, Nita Haddonfield. Consider yourself warned.”
Nita could do with protecting. Her family had given up that cause years ago, and Tremaine looked forward to remedying their lapse. He’d even entertained the notion that Nita was marrying him in part to allow her to withdraw from her medical folly gracefully.
When Nita drew back, Tremaine let her go, though it pained him.
“Such dramatics. I have no intention of frequenting any battlefields, Mr. St. Michael. The sheep seem healthy,” she said, holding her glove out for another lamb to sniff. “They all seem wonderfully healthy despite the wretched weather. This makes me happy.”
There was that smile, the one Tremaine was learning to watch for. “Good health makes them happy too, to the extent sheep trouble themselves over finer sentiments. Will you makemehappy, Bernita Haddonfield?”
It was a day for unintended questions, apparently. Nita studied Tremaine for an interminable moment, her smile hovering shy of full bloom. Outside the byre, some old ewe bleated, suggesting George Haddonfield might be heading in their direction.
“One cannotmakeanother person happy, Mr. St. Michael, any more than one can make another healthy.”
Tremaine could not fathom where Nita’s hesitance came from, though she was imbued with more natural caution and intellectual thoroughness than many ladies of her station.
“Last night you made me something,” Tremaine said. “If not happy, then very close to it. I hope the sentiments were shared, and I hope we can share them again, soon and often.”
Last night, for all his caution, he might have made them both parents. The notion alarmed him, and pleased him, both.
“Last night was… lovely,” Nita said. “Ifeltlovely. I should feel naughty and upset with myself, and guilty of course, but I cannot. I’ve tried, and all I can feel is… lovely.”
For a time in Tremaine’s arms, Nita had esteemed herself, to use George’s word, and some of that sense lingered in her bearing, in her pleased, private smile. Victory whispered to Tremaine from the shadowy, aromatic depths of the sheep byre.
“Nita Haddonfield, if you don’t know by now that you are lovely”—also dear, kind, smart, brave,and well worth protecting—“I will consider it my greatest honor to spend the rest of my life convincing you of it.”
Flowery speeches did not impress her, though neither did they chase away that naughty smile.
She pulled on her gloves. “You are lovely too, Mr. St. Michael.”
He was besotted. “Tremaine, if we’re to be lovely together.” A gravid ewe butted him gently above the knees, another warning that George approached.
“You allowed that we could bide in Haddondale?” Lady Nita asked.
Just like that, in the dead of winter, spring arrived to Tremaine St. Michael’s heart, to his entire life.
“We assuredly can. My business interests require that I travel, but I have good stewards and factors, and you’ll want to be near family.” Particularly as the babies arrived, which Tremaine had every confidence they would.
“At the assembly then,” she said, whipping the tail of her scarf over her shoulder—no fluttering for his Lady Nita. “Nicholas can make the announcement, but let’s save discussion of the details for later, Mr. St. Michael. The weather is worsening, and I’ve yet to have my soaking bath.”
Nita swept out of the sheep byre before Tremaine could even kiss her. In her wake, two of the lambs went dancing across the straw, leaping and bouncing for no reason and inspiring the third lamb to totter to his feet.
“Your name is Lucky,” Tremaine said, picking up the tup and kissing his wee woolly head. “Your name is Lucky, and you’re for the breeding herd, my friend. Lucky St. Michael, that’s you.”
He set the lamb down to play with its fellows and marched out into the winter weather, which was, indeed, worsening by the moment.
* * *
Back in the sheep byre, Nita had stifled the urge to tackle Tremaine St. Michael, smother him with kisses, and announce to the livestock that she’d become engaged to a man she could esteem very greatly indeed.
Her intended had been by turns abrupt, bashful, endearing, and confident, but he’d given her two assurances she’d needed.
First, they could dwell in Haddondale, where her family and her patients were, and second, she need not become some indolent domestic ornament to please anybody’s sense of the appearances—no contorting herself to appease “social niceties.”
What a splendid man Tremaine St. Michael was.
Also passionate. Nita particularly liked that about him, and if she had lingering misgivings about undertaking holy matrimony with a man she’d only recently met, well, that was to be expected. They’d have a lifetime to get to know each other better.
“I do believe our youngest sisters are in the stable yard,” George said as the horses trudged up the increasingly snowy lane. “Perhaps the Second Coming is imminent.”
