Page 38 of The Earl She Once Saved

“Then do it while believing you cannot.”

The next cry tore through the room. Verity held steady.

“Again.”

Mary bore down and suddenly the whole world changed as a child slid into waiting hands. Verity looked down. It was a boy, but he was still … too still.

Mrs. Weller whispered, “Oh, God.”

“No.”

Verity’s heart struck once, hard enough to hurt. She cleared his mouth.

Nothing.

“Come on, little one.”

She rubbed him. Then, she rubbed him harder.

“Come back to us.”

Behind her Mary was frantic. “He isn’t crying …”

Verity did not answer. She bent over the tiny body. He was so small, and blue around the mouth.

No, not after all this.

“Come on.”

She had said those words before to soldiers and to children, and once, years ago, to a young officer whose pulse had flickered beneath her fingers while blood ran into his hair.

Stay.

Her hands began to shake. She stopped them. She cleared the child’s airway once more, then rubbed his back.

“Breathe.”

Nothing.

Her chest tightened until she could barely draw breath herself.

“Breathe.”

The baby coughed. It was a tiny sound. Then another followed, and the room filled with the outrage of a thin, furious cry. Mrs. Weller made a sound halfway between laughter and sobbing. Mary broke entirely.

“My baby.”

Verity shut her eyes. The relief was so violent it hurt. She wrapped the child quickly, checked his breathing again, then carried him to his mother.

Mary reached with shaking arms. “Oh, my darling.”

Verity placed the boy against her. He cried once more, more quietly now, and Mary bent her face to his dark, wet head.

“My son.”

Verity turned away. She had seen this before, more times than she could count, life arriving amid blood as though death had no authority over the matter.

It should have become ordinary. It never did.