Page 115 of Foolish Bride
“No. That is too harsh. I thought your mind was occupied with simpler things, but I am delighted to have discovered that you are as brilliant as you are beautiful.”
“Simpler things? Delicately put, your grace.” She laughed.
He heaved her between his thighs. “If you do not stop calling me that, I will have you right here on the steps with an audience.”
“Michael, you wouldn’t.” Her eyes were wide and her mouth agape. Standing, she straightened her dress even though it was the same one she had been wearing the night before and was wrinkled beyond a simple smoothing. She brushed out the skirts as if she were standing in a ball room. “Husband, it is time to go inside.”
“A marvelous idea, wife.” It was too much of wonderful to hold back his laugh. He rose and offered his arm.
They looked back toward the courtyard, where Jimmie held the puppy still so that his baby sister could pet the rambunctious animal.
The pup licked the little girl’s face and she screamed with laughter.
“There is a lot to do to ready the house for children.”
He would bet his heart she was making one of her lists. How he loved those lists and everything else about her. He kissed her head and gently pulled her toward their bedroom. “Later.”
She sighed deeply. “Yes, later.” Elinor took off at a run toward the master bedroom.
Letting her win this race was no hardship. He caught her at the edge of the bed and they tumbled in together.
Epilogue
From the next room, Elinor screamed a word that Michael didn’t think she even knew.
“Papa, is Mama all right?”
He looked down at Jimmie’s cherubic face and wide eyes, and ruffled his hair. “She is fine. These things take some time, and we will have to be patient.”
Jimmie nodded and propped his chin on his knees, wrapping his arms around his legs.
A cry of another kind came from down the hall, and the harried nurse rushed in with Sarah’s chubby body clutched in her arms. The young woman’s hair stuck out from under her cap, and her dress was wrinkled and stained.
“Mammaaa,” Sarah cried.
“I am sorry, your grace. I tried to keep her quiet in the nursery, but we can hear her grace, and the child will not be still.”
Michael reached for Sarah. “It’s all right, Miss Jones. I will take her. You may go and rest.”
Miss Jones cocked her head and put her hands on her hips.
“I’ll be all right with her,” Michael said. “She is my daughter after all. We will just sit here and wait for Sarah and Jimmie’s new baby brother to arrive.”
Another piercing cry erupted from the bedroom across the hall.
Sarah’s eyes widened, and she looked up at her father.
“It’s fine, sweeting.” He kissed her head, but something in his tone must not have been convincing, because the baby broke into a cry.
Michael couldn’t help but think about Markus, and how Emma had been so healthy when she had become pregnant. Now Emma was gone, and Markus couldn’t stand to even look at his infant daughter. He had become a madman, and his friends had taken turns keeping an eye on their wayward comrade.
The nurse continued to stare in doubt.
Michael stood and paced until another heart-stopping scream tore through the hallway. He handed the baby to the nurse and rushed into the birthing room.
“Elinor?”
“You should not be in here,” the midwife scolded.
