“No, well, I was a fool.” His finger touched her chin. “But I still thought you were beautiful in your wedding dress.”
“Of course you did,” she teased. “That’s because youwere.”
They reached their carriage and Sebastian handed her into it. “Are you all right?” he asked once they were seated inside. A year of learning her, and now he knew how to read every expression as though she was a book, and he, its reader.
“I feel a trifle unwell,” she sighed. “It is likely just the heat.”
“It is hot today.” He studied her. “Would you prefer to miss the wedding breakfast and go home?”
“And miss celebrating Olivia and Luke? Never! How could you say that about your best friend?”
“Youare my best friend,” he said, taking her hand and bringing it to his mouth. “As much as I do love them and value their friendship, my priority always rests with you.”
Her stomach lurched again, as it did so often recently. Their life had been so full, redecorating the entire house to better fulfill their needs. She had also, that spring, begun to tackle the garden.
She still had her bedchamber, of course, but it was more out of habit; every night, she joined Sebastian in his bed. His bedchamber was larger than hers, and his bed correspondingly larger. As a result, they had set to work redecorating his bedchamber, too. No longer did it merely reflect Sebastian and his life—now it bore an unmistakably feminine touch.
All these things, alongside visits to Scotland, Yorkshire, and even Italy during the winter, had probably exhausted her. A little rest would set her to rights.
A line still lay between Sebastian’s brows, and she smiled. “I’m fine, my love. I promise.”
“And if you’re not, you’ll tell me?”
“I’ll tell you.” Despite the jerking of the carriage, she pressed her mouth to his in a soft, chaste kiss. He had come so far in trusting that she would not leave him by choice. But that did not mean he did not fear losing her in some other, crueler way. A twist of fate. A force beyond his control. Just as he had lost her parents.
“There is nothing wrong with me,” she murmured.
He held her hand tightly the rest of the carriage ride home, and when they arrived, he didn’t let her go until they met up with Olivia and Eleanor rushed across to draw her best friend into an embrace.
“Congratulations,” she said, lost in her genuine delight. Olivia glowed, a flush in her cheeks that set alight her hair. She was the most beautiful woman in the world in her joy, and by the way Luke looked at her, he thought so too.
Olivia laughed. “You know, my mother thought I would never find a gentleman content to allow me to talk the way Luke does—he says he enjoys my talking, but I suspect he’s being kind.”
“I do like it,” Luke protested.
“Iamvery lucky, but I do have to sometimes remember that he has a voice too and sometimes I should pause and give him leave to speak.”
Eleanor grinned. “At least when he does, it’s not to speak about hunting or the state of the roads.”
“Oh yes, I could never have married a gentleman who bored me.” She tugged Eleanor across to a side table where there were jugs of lemonade laid out, and she poured them both a glance. “I have something to tell you, and I hope you will bescandalized.”
“What’s that?”
Olivia glanced around before leaning closer. “We did not wait until our wedding night. We ought to have done, I know, but we were already engaged and Mama left us alone and—well, it was truly wonderful. Aneducation. Now I’m even more excited for tonight.”
Eleanor laughed. How different their respective marriages were, even if they both resulted in joy. She had waited for Sebastian to consummate their marriage, and Olivia had not even had to wait until marriage. She supposed that was the advantage of marrying for love in advance of the wedding itself.
“Why did you not tell me the things a gentleman can do with hismouth?” Olivia demanded, still in a whisper. “I was almost shocked, and I grew up in America—there is very little that can shock me.”
Eleanor thought of the dynamic she shared with Sebastian. The way sometimes he brought his hand down on her before kissing away the sting—and how much it encouraged her own pleasure.
Everything he did encouraged her pleasure.
“I suspect there is more still that will shock you,” she smiled.
“Do you think? Like what?”
“Well—” Another wave of nausea washed through Eleanor, and she clamped her mouth shut in case she expelled her breakfast everywhere. This was truly awful timing. Putting her glass down,she hurried through the crowd, looking for the bathroom, or failing that, a screen and a chamber pot. Something so she would not have to vomit in front of the company.
