Andrew: Lord of Despair (15 page)

The voice in his head had been so loud and unrelenting through the previous sleepless night, he’d risen with the dairymaids and tooled into Town to join Astrid at breakfast.

What if he’d been more stubborn about ignoring that voice? What if the horse had sprung a shoe halfway to Town? What if a passing shower had made the roads muddy?

What if he’d died at the age of fifteen in that boating accident and never known the glory of loving her?

He brought his body over hers, noting that her stomach was convex now, where it had been flat before.

“I have missed you, Astrid.” He needed to tell her at least that.

“I have missed you as well, Andrew, terribly. And you needn’t loom up there like I’m made of spun glass. I love the feel of your weight on me, particularly your naked weight.”

“On your naked self.” On her warm, gloriously feminine, beautiful, naked self, which he absolutely did not deserve to touch, much less claim as her husband. “You must tell me if you are at all uncomfortable, dear heart. I would not hurt you for the world.”

She lay beneath him, his weight taken as much as possible on his knees and forearms, while he spent several quiet minutes kissing, nuzzling, and grazing his lips over her face, neck, and shoulders. Only when he felt her breathing slow and her body relax did he allow his mouth to settle over hers.

She opened to him on a welcoming sigh. As her tongue explored his lips and teeth, her hands gently kneaded his buttocks, urging him to rest more of his weight on her.

Carefully, he eased down, enough so his erect cock could tease and flirt with her sex. She spread her legs and brought them up to wrap around his flanks.

“Love me, Andrew,” she whispered.

“Soon. Soon.”

He’d dreamed this very scenario and woken up in an aching sweat more times than he could count, and he wasn’t about to hurry the delectable reality. He could kiss, nuzzle, and tease her like this for hours, desire at once sustained and muted by tenderness the like of which Andrew was at a loss to explain. Astrid, however, was becoming aroused, and more than anything, he wanted to give her pleasure.

He allowed his teasing to graduate to shallow, languid penetration. “I want,” he said between kisses, “to be gentle with you.”

“You are unfailingly gentle with me. That isn’t what I need now.”

Such honesty. He deepened his thrusts, holding her gaze, willing her to see that
this
gentleness felt different to him.

“Andrew.” She sighed his name, her eyes falling closed, her neck arching in pleasure. In blind abandon, her hands slipped around to his chest, where her fingers grazed across his nipples, sending tendrils of desire spiraling down to his cock, and out through his whole body. Still, he kept his rhythm slow, withdrawing and pausing before he thrust again.

A sense of burning unworthiness could give a man the most peculiar strengths.

“More, Andrew,
please
…” she crooned, locking her heels at the small of his back and pulling him into her.

He allowed his tempo to increase enough that Astrid shuddered, her breath catching, her nails digging into his hips. Her sex clutched at the length of him in hot, needy spasms as she groaned quietly into his neck. “Ah, God…
yes
, Andrew,
yes
…”

He held back. Somehow, he held back until she was easing down from her pleasure, her legs loosening their grip to rest along his flanks, her eyes again closed in repose and repletion.

And then he drove her up again, more quickly this time. His tongue thrust into her mouth, his fingers found her nipples, and his cock gave her the steady, deep thrusts that had her panting and bucking beneath him in no time. He could sense he’d taken her by surprise, and she would have been content with the softer, gentler wooing, but he kept her off balance, her defenses unorganized.

“Andrew…” she pleaded, but whether it was for relief or reprieve, he could not have said.

“Come for me, sweetheart. Come for me again.”

His self-control frayed as Astrid bowed up to get her mouth over one of his nipples. She vised herself around him
everywhere
, holding on and not letting go, until pleasure bore down on him with relentless intent.

He did not deserve this, did not deserve her, and yet, she would have him.

Thank God, for however long it took to ensure her safety, she would have him.

Andrew changed the angle of his thrusting, pressing more deeply into Astrid’s body and bringing a hand under her backside to anchor her against him. As satisfaction obliterated all else, he felt her shake with the force of her pleasure as well.

For a long moment, they lay together, warm and spent, breathing in counterpoint. Then the baby fluttered, and Andrew recalled himself enough to roll them, so Astrid straddled him.

“Married life with you has a certain appeal,” Astrid said a few moments later, sliding down to rest on his chest. “If that didn’t wake the baby, nothing will.” She commenced drawing a picture with her index finger on his chest. “May I ask you something, Husband?”

Husband.
“Yes, love?” Though he had the right now—the legal right—to call her Wife.

“Have you ever wished this baby was yours?”

He wasn’t quick enough to cover a pause in his breathing or a momentary stillness of his hands on her back. The pain of her question was all the more brutal for being unexpected. Completely, hopelessly unexpected.

“You don’t,” she supplied, disgruntled. Her pointy little chin settled against his sternum. “Do you mind if
I
wish this were your baby?”

“Sweet lady, it is your wedding day, and you should be free to wish anything your heart desires. The baby is not mine in a biological sense, but the child will be mine to love and protect.”

He kissed her temple, wishing he’d been able to see her face as he made his declaration. His words were a vow to treat this child as his own, and he hoped she understood them as such. He would protect her baby with his life; he would protect
her
with his life. As she leaned up to kiss him gently on the lips, he offered up a prayer that he would never have to.

***

“Douglas, I do not understand,” Lady Amery said, wringing a damp handkerchief between her fingers. “I simply
do
not
understand why dear Astrid would leave us like this. Did you frighten her? You can be so very stern, you know. Not like dear Herbert, or dear Henry.”

Dear Henry shot Douglas a look of fraternal sympathy. “I think what Douglas is trying to say, Mother, is that Astrid is young, she misses Herbert, and she’s overwrought with the strain of expecting Herbert’s heir. She has run off and married Greymoor as a consequence, and we can do little about it.”

Henry’s ubiquitous grin was singularly not in evidence, which was fortunate for the state of Douglas’s nerves.

“I know she’s
young
, Henry,” Lady Amery retorted. “But if she’s so young, how could she just up and marry that man without anybody’s permission?”

When he wanted to snap at someone to put some damned coal on the damned miserly fire dying on the damned filthy andirons, Douglas waded back into this most pointless discussion.

“She has achieved her majority, Mother, though barely. Unless I can prove the ceremony was a fraud, or Astrid did not consent to the marriage, our hands are tied.” He’d consulted both solicitors and barristers on the matter, and had been politely prevented from consulting an expert in ecclesiastical law in the See of the Bishop of London. The Marquess of Heathgate’s influence being what it was, that last was disappointing but not surprising.

His mother wagged a finger at him. “Douglas, this will not do. This will not do at all. If you brother were alive, he’d know what to do.”

Oh, quite. If his bloody saint of a brother were alive, Astrid Allen would be sitting on her adorable fundament, waiting placidly to bear Herbert his precious heir while Herbert finished bankrupting the family with his horses and his whores.

Which sentiment was not permitted to disturb the look of patient concern Douglas had affixed to his countenance.

“The best thing you could do, Mother, is write Astrid a cordial note congratulating her on her nuptials and asking when you might call on her to offer your felicitations. I will journey out to Enfield when she and Greymoor are in residence there, and you can be sure I will make pointed inquiries as to Greymoor’s fitness to raise this child.”

“Raise this child?” Lady Amery’s voice approached a shriek. “But the child is Herbert’s heir. Of course the child won’t be raised by Greymoor. We’re the child’s family, aren’t we?”

“Of course we are,” Henry assured her, taking her arm and leading her toward the door of the sitting room. “You must do as Douglas says, Mother, and write Lady Greymoor the most sincere, warmhearted congratulatory note you can. We’ll have a pot of tea sent up to settle your nerves.”

Henry held the door for her, then stepped back and let it swing solidly shut as his mother asked, “Lady Greymoor? Who on earth…?”

Henry nearly sprinted to the decanter. “I do not envy you, Douglas. Not one bit, not one iota. And you
are
going to join me in a drink.”

“I suppose I will at that.” Fortunately, they were in the house Astrid had recently vacated. The decent spirits were still on display.

“So what didn’t you tell our good mother?” Henry asked as he found a seat in a cushioned chair, drink in hand. “This marriage is more than a sudden affection between family members.”

Douglas took a seat in the chair opposite Henry’s before speaking, choosing his words and resenting the burden of even that effort.

“Our
dear
Astrid ingested poison some time this morning after Mother left for her calls and the housekeeper went to do the marketing. Greymoor happened along, just why or when we do not know, and found her in distress. Greymoor had the presence of mind to summon Dr. DuPont, who has assured me that without intervention, the situation could have been fatal to mother and child both.”

Henry flicked a bit of hay off his sleeve onto the carpet. “Good God. Somebody is trying to kill us off one by one. Let’s not tell Mother, shall we?”

“I must conclude, Henry, that Herbert’s accident and this accident are just that—accidents,” Douglas said as he poured himself a small measure of brandy. “Guns misfire, ladies occasionally tumble down steps, and food can go bad in any household. Viscount Fairly, however, paid a call on me this afternoon to ensure I understand that he, Heathgate, and Greymoor do not share my opinion on the matter.”

For once, Henry was not tossing back his drink as if they could afford an endless supply. “Douglas, what do you mean?”

“Whether they are simply being prudent, or whether Astrid has embellished an hysterical tale, her Alexander and Worthington relations suspect I am trying to murder her, and, of course, the child who will bear the title in my stead.”

Douglas tried to keep the indignation from his tone, but really, that all three of Astrid’s titled relations should leap to such a conclusion so quickly was… disappointing.

“Of all the nerve,” Henry spat, getting up to pace. “As if you
ever
had designs on the title! Perhaps Greymoor poisoned her, and now she’s gone and married him. God above, what would Herbert say if he could see this mess?”

Herbert would have rung for more brandy, or gone to visit his mistress, and whiled away the rest of the day visiting with the lads at Tatt’s. If in the grip of a rare bout of perspicacity, he might then have caught a packet for Calais.

“There’s more, Henry,” Douglas said. “Our dear brother was dipping heavily into the part of Astrid’s dowry that had been set aside for her widow’s portion. He all but obliterated it, and while I myself made Astrid aware of the situation, Fairly has learned of it too.”

Which meant Heathgate knew, as did Greymoor. What a cheerful state of affairs.

Henry did take a gulp of his drink before setting the glass down with a decisive thump. “The little snitch told him, of course. Why should she protect the dignity of the Allens, after all? She was only my brother’s choice of bride, and that couldn’t have meant much to her, given today’s developments.”

Douglas, initially heartened by Henry’s indignation, nevertheless again heard that one off word:
my
brother’s choice… Not
our
brother’s choice. This display of righteousness on Henry’s part was not for Douglas, who was being accused of attempted murder; it was for Herbert, who had been a good-natured, immature, thieving, whoring wastrel.

Douglas wondered why it should feel good to admit that even in the privacy of his thoughts while Henry railed on against perfidious women with too many overbearing, titled relations.

Douglas interrupted when Henry paused to refresh his drink, “I will make inquiries regarding Greymoor’s background in preparation for bringing suit to be appointed guardian of Astrid’s child, assuming it’s a boy, of course.”

“You don’t want guardianship of a girl? Even a daughter would be Herbert’s child. Mother will feel very strongly about that.”

“Of course, I would like to be guardian of Herbert’s daughter,” Douglas replied with the very last of his patience, “but lawsuits are scandalous and expensive and one must be practical, Henry. The primary reason for granting me guardianship of the child over Fairly, Greymoor, or Heathgate is so I might teach Herbert’s heir what is expected of him with respect to the estate and the family responsibilities. A female has no need of that education.”

Thank God. And yet, gently bred females were deucedly expensive to rear. Douglas silently wished Greymoor the joy of the girl’s dressmakers’ bills.

“You are up against a viscount, an earl, and a marquess,” Henry conceded. “I know Greymoor and Heathgate both cut a wide swath with the ladies until a few years ago, but then Heathgate married, and Greymoor left the country. I haven’t heard a thing derogatory about either one since I came down from university. And that Fairly.” Henry shuddered dramatically. “In some ways, he’s the scariest of the three.”