“Of course, sweetheart,” he wiped the tears streaming down her cheek. “Anything you wish.”
“Will you promise me that we shall never again be apart?”
He paused a moment. “If it is within my power, I swear we will never be parted. I have missed you as much as you have missed me. More, even.”
“Can you promise me that these wars for Edward’s throne are finished?”
In truth, he could not. There were stirrings in France that Edward had already made mention of. Tate knew that, at some point, he would find himself in France fighting for the king. But he would not tell Toby that, not now when she was so emotionally brittle.
He held her at arm’s length, gazing into her sweet face. “I can promise you that I will remain here for the birth of my fourth son and that we will live happily together for the rest of our lives.”
She wiped at her eyes. “It will be a girl.”
“I could only be more blessed. What name did we decide on again?”
“Arabella Mary.”
He nodded in recollection. “Ah, yes. Arabella Mary. And if it is a boy?”
“It will not be a boy.”
He grinned at her, knowing she had probably had her fill of little boys for the moment. “As you say, madam.”
She cocked her head, staring up into his handsome face. “It was a good attempt at changing the subject, but you will answer my question now.”
“About what?”
“Whether or not you are going to put away your dragonblade for good.”
He smiled at her and pulled her against him, feeling her big belly against his mail. “Do we have to talk about this now?”
Before she could retort, a scream went up as Dylan managed to steal Roman’s wooden sword. He toddled off as fast as his tubby legs would carry him but Roman was faster and grabbed hold of his brother, trying to wrest the toy from him. Alexander joined in the ruckus and between the two brothers, they managed to shove Roman to the ground. Like any small boy, Roman began to cry as his brothers fought over who would be the first to play with the toy.
At some point, Stephen had set Catherine down and she walked over to where her brothers were fighting; while Roman wiped the tears from his eyes, the twins started slapping at each other and the sword fell to the ground. Catherine calmly picked it up and walked away.
Tate and Toby watched with varied degrees of amusement and, in Toby’s case, exhaustion. Tate finally turned to his wife.
“Have they been like this since I left?” he asked.
She began nodding before he finished his sentence. “Since Dylan and Alex learned to walk about two months ago. This is constant.”
Tate put his hand on her belly again. “And another one on the way.”
Toby sighed wearily. “I can hardly stand the anticipation.”
He laughed softly and kissed his wife on the temple. “Perhaps one of these days we will finally take that trip to Rome I promised you so long ago,” he murmured. “That should give you respite from the chaos of our children.”
She shrugged as she watched the boys wrestle. “They are too young to be without their mother. As weary as I am, I would not want to leave them for any length of time.”
“Not even for Rome?”
“Perhaps someday.”
He smiled gently at her before moving to the writhing hoard of children with the intention of settling them down. Toby appeared as if she couldn’t take the squabbling another minute. Crouching on his haunches, he tried to reason with the twins. They responded by jumping on him, causing him to lose his balance and end up on his buttocks. As he fell back, Roman jumped into the melee and pounced on him. Tate laughed as he ended up lying on his back with three little boys atop him. Not to be left out, Catherine stood over them and swatted her brothers with the sword.
As Tate allowed himself to be pummeled by his toddlers, he couldn’t remember a time in his life when he was so completely happy. From the horrors of eight years ago to the delight of the day, every pain, every effort, had been worth the price. The road that had led him to Cartingdon those years ago had been the best path he had ever taken and he could have never imagined that the aggressive, rude woman with the strange name would become his very reason for living.
He eventually pushed himself up from the mass of boys. Toby was standing with Kenneth and Stephen in conversation a few feet away but Tate noticed that he was not alone. Catherine was standing next to him, the sword still in her hand, as she gazed up adoringly at her father.
