“Catriona.” He frowned down at her, his gaze searching. “You are not acting as your normal self. Is something hurting you?”
Only my heart.
“Nothing.” She forced a smile for his benefit. “Thank you, Alessandro. Please, all I need is some rest. My head is aching from the fall. A little quiet, and I shall be fine.”
“Very well.” He frowned down at her, looking for a moment as if he were about to say more.
But in the end, he simply stood and walked from the chamber, leaving her alone in a grim echo of what would soon be a far more permanent departure.
She waited until the door clicked closed before rolling onto her side and curling into a protective ball. Burying her face in her pillow, she wept, both with joy for the new life inside her and with despair for the man who would never love her.
*
He was goingto be a father.
Again.
Alessandro walked from Catriona’s chamber, uncertain of where he was going. All he knew was that his feet were going. His legs were striding. He was moving forward, hurtling to a destination.
A myriad of emotion assaulted him. Happiness. Awe. Fear. Regret.
Someone was speaking to him, but he was so caught up in the tumult of his thoughts, he scarcely heard their words. Female, he realized. Olivia.
He stopped halfway down the massive, spiral staircase which was the center of Marchmont, one of its crowning glories. Also, where his sister had taken a fall in her youth, so severe it resulted in the fracture of her limb. Such stately elegance, carved mahogany shining once more, and yet also the source of great grief.
How fitting.
He turned back to find thepicaroat the top of the stairs, her young face pale, her countenance worried. “My lord, how is Lady Rayne?”
Before him stood evidence of his wife’s innate goodness. This child, whom no one had loved or cared for, was now fuller-cheeked and well-dressed and groomed. She was now loved. If he had ever harbored concern about Catriona’s capacity for maternal care, it was long gone.
“She will be fine, child,” he told the girl, though he was not as certain as his words suggested.
There had been an undeniable sadness in her demeanor. She had reassured him, repeatedly, that all was well with her. And yet, her eyes had told a different story. The haunted look he had recognized deep within their blue depths had returned. This time, he very much feared he was the source.
“She is not going to die, is she?” Olivia asked, an unmistakable tremble in her voice.
Cristo.
The child’s question took the air from his lungs. Instantly, he was catapulted back to the day Maria had breathed her last. How pale she had been. How still. Just like their son.
Everything within him seized. He could not speak. Could not allay the child’s fears. Because he had seen death before. He had lost a wife to the childbed. Had lost a son. And for some godforsaken reason, he had never before contemplated the full implications of getting Catriona with child.
That she would face the same dangers and risks Maria had.
That she, too, could perish.
“Come now, Miss Olivia,” said his wife’s lady’s maid, appearing in the hall above. She cast a gentle arm about the picaro’s slim shoulders, drawing her into her form for reassurance. “Lady Rayne shall be just fine. Is that not right, my lord?”
“Yes,” he forced himself to say, but the word was like a splinter in his tongue, with a matching one every bit as sharp in his heart. “She will.Perdóneme.”
Without waiting for a response, he turned back to the stairs. Somehow, he made his way down them. Blindly, his breath arrested in his chest, his heart thumping wildly. Bleak emotions stronger than ever churned through him.
By the grace of God, he reached the bottom of the stairs without toppling down them, and without recalling a moment of how he had gotten there. But his legs had a mind of their own, and they were moving still. Carrying him to the door. As far away as he could go. As fast as he could get there.
Johnstone appeared at his side. “Lord Rayne, is something amiss?Algo anda mal?”
“Sí,” he bit out, striding past the butler, scarcely even taking note of his attempt to speak his language. “Everything is wrong.”
