But Eve didn’t know Harry as well as Moira did.Moira scooped up her one-year-old and bounced her daughter on her hip with a broad grin, lifting the toddler’s hand to wave it at her old beau.“This is Aurora.Say ‘hello’ to the nice marquis, lovey,” she cooed in the baby’s ear.
Aylesbury took the baby’s hand in his large one and brushed his thumb across her downy soft wrist.Aurora, he thought with a slight smile.That bright red head of curls certainly did give one the impression of a fiery sunrise.“Greetings, Miss Aurora,” he said softly and was rewarded by a broad grin that showed off a charming set of dimples and eight nubby teeth.One couldn’t help but be charmed by such a sight, and Aylesbury flashed his own dimple and a broader smile in return.“She is a lovely little lady, Moira.Congratulations to both you and Vin.And another on the way, you say?”he asked with a shocking familiarity that widened Eve’s eyes.
“In September, I think,” Moira casually returned, ignoring her friend’s disapproval of such a delicate subject.“Perhaps this time, it will be an heir for my lord and for my father and grandfather as well.Come, meet the rest of the new additions.”
Aylesbury greeted the children he had previously been acquainted with: Abby’s three, Tristram, Bryn, and Corri; Evelyn’s son by her first marriage to the Earl of Shaftesbury, Lawrence, and her son, Preston, who had been a babe-in-arms at his last encounter but was now an active toddler of more than two years, as was Kitty’s son, Montgomery.Kitty’s daughter, Hannah, now nearly seven, greeted him with a polished curtsey that Aylesbury returned with a flamboyant bow, prompting a fit of giggles from the little girl before she tugged him across the room to meet the newcomers.
In addition to Moira’s charming daughter, the previous spring had also delivered another son for Haddington named Henry; a son, Alexander, for the newlyweds Sean and Coline, and a daughter for the earl of Glenrothes, Lela, who had been rather expeditiously followed by another daughter, Alice, just two months past.
So many children.Babes to mark the passage of time and the growth of family.Sisters and brothers who were kissed and coddled with evident affection by their elder siblings and cousins.
Aylesbury felt a lump forming in his throat and tried discreetly to clear it away.This, in so many ways, was what his life had been missing.Family.
An ache of longing and regrets scorched his heart and set his chest aflame.He coughed uncomfortably and shifted from one foot to another, aware that an expectant silence hovered in the room, awaiting his reaction.
“How...industriousof you all,” he said at last, and the ladies fell into gales of laughter, not at all offended by his words or tongue-in-cheek tone.
“Would you like to hold my newest cousin?”young Hannah asked, lifting the tiny babe from her cradle with tender care and coming to his knee as he took a chair with the four ladies scooping up toddlers and babes as they, too, sat.Aylesbury eyed the smallest of the babes warily.Alice was her name, a fragile confection of white lace and linen if he had ever seen one.His gaze shifted to Eve in hopes of rescue, but the countess only smiled in encouragement, keeping her one-year-old, Lela clasped firmly in her lap.
Though Aylesbury was surprised by her casual acquiescence, he could only surmise that by the time a fourth child made its way into the world, a mother was far more incautious with its welfare.She would have to be, to risk his holding the child.
Blinking, he turned back to Hannah, meeting her wide, adoring blue gaze.How did one saynoto such a face, he wondered.
How had he ever in his life been able to saynoto a pleading pair of blue eyes?
Regrets.So many regrets.
Hesitantly, he reached out and took the infant, studiously minding Hannah’s instruction on the proper handling and management of such a newborn as wee Alice.Once ensconced snuggly in his arms, the baby looked up at him solemnly—again with compelling blue eyes!—and clasped his proffered finger in one surprisingly tight fist.
He had come here in hopes of consolation, for friendship.Not for a further reminder everywhere he looked of his plight.Bloody hell, but he needed to be saved from this den of domesticity!
But there was no escape.None at all, he knew for certain when Moira’s soft burr cut through the low din of the children as they returned to their playtime.“So, Harry, what has you so troubled?”
“Troubled?”he parroted as innocently as possible.
But Moira was no fool.She’d sensed that something was troubling her dear old friend immediately but was determined to set him at ease until she could determine what was the matter.Harry wasn’t typically one to be beset by a case of the doldrums, but she knew from experience that when he was, only time, comfort, and a stiff drink would encourage him to talk.
Abby knew it as well and rose, moving to the sideboard where she poured a healthy snifter of brandy despite the early hour and returned, pressing it into his free hand.“You fairly reek of troubles, Harry.”
“Despair, even,” Moira chimed in.
“I thought it more an aura of despondency,” Kitty remarked helpfully.
“The afterglow of a scandalous evening?”Eve added, effectively informing him that they had heard about his hotheaded behavior the previous night.
All five women turned their eyes to him, and it was all Aylesbury—a peer of the realm—could do not to squirm in his seat.He looked from one lady to the next and around at the multitude of children dotting the carpet.
“Perhaps, I might speak to Moira more privately?”he asked hopefully but quickly deflated at their stalwart stares.He shrugged.“I thought not.Well, in truth, it is no secret really...”
