Katie beamed at Bridget and lunged toward her, wrapping her up in a tight hug.
“Thank you, Bridget. You have no idea how happy this makes me,” Katie whispered emphatically.
No, I do not. But I really wish that I could.
Bridget shoved the aching thought away and gained control over her tears before Katie pulled back, and by the time the two women were face to face again, Bridget’s smile had become genuine. She had accepted that she would not share a great love with her husband. Or even a like for one another, for that matter. And that was fine; she had never felt anything about him. And yet… she felt a painful void every time she saw how happily married all her peers were.
“I am certain that this makes John quite happy as well,” Bridget offered.
Katie and the other young married ladies laughed politely.
“Oh, he certainly is,” Katie replied. “He is out with his friends celebrating at White’s.”
“Jeremy said he was meeting John at White’s,” Lydia said.
“Yes, as did Ambrose,” Petra added. “He said he was going to celebrate with a friend but would not tell me more. Now I understand why.”
“These men,” Lydia said with a sigh as she shook her head. “Always keeping their secrets.”
Needing a moment away from the chatter, Bridget did her best to slip away from the circle of women to refill her glass. Unfortunately, she barely made it to the servant holding the decanter of port before she heard Lydia call, “Bridget? Where are you off to?”
Bridget forced her plump, pink lips to once more spread into a polite smile as she looked over her shoulder at her friends.
“Oh, just a bit thirsty,” she said. Her smile dropped instantly as she turned back to the servant.
“Fill it to the brim, if you please,” she implored under her breath.
“Do not imbibe too much, dear,” Petra said, her tone laced with slight condescension. “You would not want to be in an improper state when you go home to your husband.”
“Petra,” Bridget quietly heard Katie chastise.
Bridget’s cheeks flushed with embarrassment.
“What?” Petra asked as Bridget turned back toward them. “I am only saying. She is the last of us who has not yet had a child. I am sure coming home foxed is only going to delay the gratification that comes with becoming pregnant.”
Bridget suddenly wanted to disappear. Wanted to shrink to the size of a mouse and scurry out the door. She didnotlike where this conversation was heading. She also did not like that she was not at all sure whether her husband was actually home.
“Let her be, Petra,” Katie warned. “Bridget will have her children on her and her husband’s own time. Will you not, Bridget?”
Seeing as my husband has not touched me since our wedding night five years ago, I highly doubt such a time even exists,she thought bitterly.
Bridget shivered with disgust at the memory of that night. She had gone to her marriage bed, divided between excitement and terror. Unlike her friends, who all married noblemen in their late twenties or early thirties, her husband, Warren Carter, the Earlof Winslow, was twenty-seven years her senior. With his age, she had foolishly assumed that he would handle her purity properly.
He had not. In fact, the experience had been so poor that for the first year of their marriage, Bridget had been thankful that he had not summoned her to his chambers. Then the second year went by, with hardly a word or kind look passing between them, and her gratitude had turned to fear. While it was true that she had not enjoyed their copulation, Bridget did understand that without it, she could not have what she was most looking forward to in her marriage: a child.
“We have plenty of time,” Bridget said, trying to sound as casual as possible with such a subject. “My husband has much he wishes to accomplish before we have children, and as a dutiful wife, I want to support such things.”
“Such a diligent wife you are,” Regina Parson cooed, joining the conversation.
Bridget stiffened, sensing a trap. Katie was her true friend, yes, but the others? She had never been quite sure.
“I try to be,” she answered carefully, then took a sip of her port.
“And I am sure that as a diligent wife, you supportallof your husband’s efforts?”
If Bridget’s cheeks were not red before, they were certainly so now. The heat radiating from them made a bead of sweat form on her brow.
“As many as I am aware of,” she agreed.
