Awful.
Stomach-roiling.
Agony.
That was what Izzy woke to, a sickly sensation in her belly, one she recognized from the morning after the Greymoor ball, when she had consumed far too much champagne and had awoken in Zachary’s town house, in an unfamiliar bedroom, her life as she had known it about to change forever.
“I’m dying,” she moaned, much as she had that morning, clutching a pillow to her face in an effort to distract herself from the nausea churning in her gut.
“I hope not,cariad. I need you far too much to let you go now.” The pillow was plucked from her face, and the concerned-but-breathtakingly-handsome countenance of her husband hovered over her. “Or ever.”
Heavens, he was lovely to behold, even when she was at her most miserable, about to retch the contents of her stomach up into the nearest available vessel. Or all over herself, whichever came first.
“Chamber pot,” she managed. “Please.”
He extended the porcelain basin to her. “Here you…” She promptly cast up her accounts. “…are, my love.”
That was perfectly dreadful. Her stomach heaved again, but there was nothing left. Only her humiliation in which to drown as her faculties returned.
“Forgive me,” she said weakly.
“Nothing to forgive.” He offered her a handkerchief and then dabbed at her brow with another which had been dipped in cool, lavender-scented water. “You are carrying our babe. It is expected.”
He had proven himself remarkably steadfast when she had realized she was with child. Although she was still in the early stages of her confinement, she had found herself plagued by bouts of morning illness recently, and whilst her episodes invariably left her feeling dreadfully disgusting, Zachary was ever a calm presence at her side. By now, they had developed a routine.
He whisked away the chamber pot, covering it and taking it discreetly to the hall, where it would be dealt with by a chamber maid, before returning to her side.
“What shall I fetch you this morning?” he asked solicitously. “Tea? Toast? Some dentifrice?”
“You are always so calm,” she complimented him, grateful for his insistence upon remaining at her side and tending to her rather than allowing the duty to fall to a servant as some husbands would. “You know just what to do and say.”
“One of my many talents.” He flashed her the grin that never failed to melt her heart. “Amongst others. Several involve my tongue. Others, my cock.”
His vulgarity startled a laugh from her. “I believe I am familiar with those.”
The dimple that never failed to melt her was a prominent accent to his beautifully sculpted mouth. “This reminds me of the morning after we first met. Do you recall?”
“How can I forget?” She laughed, then pressed a hand to her rebelling stomach, willing it to calm. “You said something likeI have never seen anyone shoot the cat with such vigor.”
“In my defense, it is not every day that a lady accosts me at a ball, plies me with champagne kisses, and then falls asleep on the floor,” he drawled.
“Lord.” She winced. “And then youmarriedme after that. What were you thinking, my love?”
“You were snoring,” he added, apparently for good measure.
She winced. “Ugh.”
“But to answer your question, I was thinking,” he paused to lean over her and brush an adoring kiss on her brow, “that you were the most original woman I had ever met in my life. Daring, bold, and brazen. And that I would not mind fully compromising you and making you mine.”
“Youwould not mind,” she repeated, raising a brow. “That hardly sounds like a lovestruck swain.”
“You were pining for another man at the time,” he reminded her.
“I was foolish,” she grumbled.
“And you did smell of sour champagne and vomit,” he continued.
God.It was a miracle he had seen fit to marry her at all. And to think she had believed herself the least eccentric Collingwood…
