For a moment, she might allow herself to imagine Oliverdidfind her desirable.
He had kissed her that one time, after all.
Many times over the last two years, she had caught Oliver staring at her. And it hadn’t been with disgust. It had been with . . . could it have been withhunger?
He trembled sometimes when she touched his hand or hugged him.
He did not seek the company of other women. He had sold the remainder of his father’s businesses over a year ago and no longer went to London. And she did not think he could hide a mistress in so small a place as Woldenmere.
And this afternoon . . . had that really been a handkerchief in his other hand? It had been far too large. And there had been a bit of blue mixed in with the white.
She had a chemise with a blue ribbon for the drawstring in the neckline.
She lit a lamp and got up and went to her clothes press to look for that particular chemise. She couldn’t find it. She remembered wearing it last week, putting it in the pile of things to be washed, but she didn’t remember ever hanging it up with the other laundry to dry.
It had disappeared.
She tapped her fingertips against her mouth, trying to contain her hope.Don’t let your mind run wild with silly impossibilities, Hen.
But it was too late. She could not rein back the notion that maybe she had gotten everything all wrong. Maybe he had said he would not fornicate with her because he had thought her unwilling. He had thought he had forced that kiss on her. Or maybe he had thought her too young. All of which was nonsense, of course.
I will not impose on you.
If only she had been brave enough to say by the ha-ha, “It would be no imposition, at all. I fancy you. I fancy everything about you.”
But she had been much too intimidated by him back then. It had taken all her courage to contradict him and to assert she absolutely was going to care for Nathaniel.
And despite feeling much more comfortable with Oliver now, she still didn’t think she could come right out and tell him she desired him.
But this was ridiculous! Two adult people, married to each other, not expressing physical love. She should march into his room right now and demand her marital rights!
No, she couldn’t do that. If she were wrong and he didn’t want her . . . oh, she’d die of shame and embarrassment. The friendly, cozy fellowship they had between them—the thing that made her happiest—might vanish.
Henrietta went back to her bed but couldn’t find sleep. She’d always tried hard to be content with herself and not to spend too much time longing to be different, but how she wished right now she had been born clever so she could puzzle this out.
She must find a way to sound Oliver out on the subject of copulating with her. But in a safely roundabout manner that couldn’t possibly reveal her true feelings for him.
Could she pretend to sleepwalk into his room one night and get into bed with him? No, after two years of having adjoining bedchambers, he knew she didn’t sleepwalk.
She could ask him to take her somewhere. Cornwall. York. Anywhere. And there might be a crowded coaching inn. And only one room and only one bed. They would have to share, and she would feign sleep and drape herself over him and see what came to pass.
No. Knowing her resourceful and efficient husband, he would find another room, another bed, no matter how full the inn.
If only Oliver were a duke like her father and needed an heir for his title. But even then, Oliver had Nathaniel already. No need for an heir. No need for Henrietta to reproduce.
No. Yes.
Yes, that was it. Because shewouldlike to have babies. It wasn’t a pressing need—not nearly as pressing as her lust for Oliver—but she did want more children in their family someday. Maybe someday was now?
She’d ask him for a child. Not a bedding, but a baby. She’d see what he said.
Having a plan settled her, and she finally slept.
She waited a week. She didn’t want Oliver to make the embarrassing connection between her seeing his phallus and her asking for a baby.
She broached the subject after dinner, in the drawing room, while he read his newspaper and she embroidered.
“I want a child.”
