Mary Balogh - Web of Love

“You think he does not want to marry me?” she asked.

“I didn’t say that.” He squeezed her hand reassuringly. “But he needs to feel that he can do things for himself. And he needs to know that he is not spoiling your life.”

“But I have been so happy looking after him,” she said. “I have been so in love with him. I know what it is, Dom. I think I need him now more than he needs me. Oh, what a lowering thought. Is it true, do you think?”

“I’ve no idea,” he said. “I have used up my stock of wisdom for one night. But the relationship is changing, Mad. That is clear. Somehow you have to be prepared to change with it.”

She sighed. “I suppose you are right,” she said. “I wish for once life could be simple and predictable. And then I would probably be screeching with boredom. Should I go riding tomorrow, do you think?”

“Without a doubt, yes,” he said.

“Hm,” she said. “But I would far prefer to stay with Allan, you know. But enough of me. What is your problem?”

“I don’t have any,” he said.

“Don’t even try it, Dom,” she said. “Don’t even try it.”

He laughed softly. “It’s nothing I can discuss,” he said. “Not even with you.”

“Mrs. Simpson?”

“Ellen, yes.”

“I won’t pry, then,” she said. “Dom, we must be growing up at long last. We haven’t had a decent fight since we both came back to England. How dreary life gets!” She laughed and laid her cheek against his shoulder. “Are you ready for bed yet? I’m not. Shall we just sit?”

“Mhm,” he said.

It was his child. He had known it, of course. But she had finally admitted it. It was his child. And Ellen’s. There was going to be a child of his own in the world in just six months’ time. He closed his eyes and gave himself up to the wonder of it.

And she was not sending him away. He had taken a great gamble, telling her like that that he would go away the next day if she did not want him to stay. He had not planned to say that. The idea had come to his mind unbidden. But she did not want him to go away. She wanted to try to recapture the friendship they had once known.

He had three weeks. Three weeks in which to get to know her again, in which to persuade her to trust him and to like him. To feel comfortable with him.

Three weeks.

And could it be done? Could they be friends? Would they have ever been friends if Charlie had not been there between them? He knew that it was difficult for a man and a woman to be close friends without a physical awareness intruding. Could he and Ellen ever be just friends? Wouldn’t there always be something else?

And did it matter if there was something else? Would it be so disastrous if they loved too? If they wanted each other physically?

Didn’t he still love her anyway? Still want her?

But he must close his mind to such thoughts. First and foremost he needed to make a friend of Ellen. He had to do so. It was the only way he could be certain of remaining close to his child. And they could not be friends if she suspected that he still harbored any of those feelings that he had shown her quite freely in Brussels.

His only hope was to quell any love he might still feel for her.

“Sleepy?” he said to his sister. Her head jumped against his shoulder, and he laughed. “Come on, sleepyhead. Let’s get you upstairs to bed.”

ELLEN WAS SITTING on the window seat in her room, her knees drawn up against her, her cloak drawn about her for warmth. She was staring down at the moonlit formal gardens below, where she had walked just a few hours before.

She had finally admitted the truth to him. And it had, after all, been easy. She felt as if a great load had been lifted from her shoulders. He knew. She had told him.

She had also told him that she did not wish him to go away. She had had a chance to be rid of him. She did not think he would have gone back on his promise to leave the next day if she had said that she wanted him to go. But she had deliberately given up her chance to be rid of him.

She shivered and huddled further inside the cloak. She had said that she would try to allow a friendship to grow between them again. Was it possible? Could they ever be just friends when there had been that other between them? When their child was in her womb?

And did she really want his friendship? Could they be friends and be comfortable and contented again, and Charlie not there to share the friendship with them? Didn’t she need to punish herself for the rest of her life for the way in which she had betrayed Charlie with his friend?

Was that what she was doing? Was she punishing herself? But she had forgiven herself and Dominic long ago. Hadn’t she? Or had he been right a few hours ago when he had said that the wounds of Waterloo ran a great deal deeper than any of the survivors realized?

If it were not for the guilt, would she still love Dominic? Beneath the guilt, had she stopped loving him?

But no. She did not love him. She must not love him. He wanted to know their child. He wanted to see it as it grew. That was perfectly understandable, and she knew she would not be able to deny him that right. She must not complicate matters by falling in love with him again. That would be far too painful for her, and embarrassing too if he ever suspected.

He wanted them to be friends. And it was desirable that they be so. She wanted it to be so. She would try. For three weeks she would try to let friendship grow and other feelings remain dead.

She shivered again as she heard more than one set of quiet footsteps pass her room. She was not the only person mad enough to be still up, then. But she must get to bed and to sleep if she was to be fit to ride in the morning. Besides, she was half-frozen.

He had kissed her. And she had not been outraged. She had felt enormously comforted by the brief touch of his lips.

A mad thought. One very definitely not to be repeated.

ALL THE ADULTS OF THE HOUSE, EXCEPT THE dowager countess and Allan Penworth, joined the ride the following morning. Anna and Walter and Lord Agerton rode over to join them, as did Susan and two of her brothers. They were to ride inland up the valley in which Amberley Court was set.

It was a very good thing that they were to ride in a place where it would be impossible for the horses to move faster than a walk, Susan said timidly to anyone who was willing to listen. She was so very afraid to gallop, and she knew that she spoiled the enjoyment of her companions when she held them to a walk.

Lord Agerton declared that he would stay at the back of the group with her, and she could move at whatever pace she found comfortable.

“You are very obliging, my lord, I am sure,” she said, favoring him with a look of melting gratitude from wide hazel eyes.

They rode out, two abreast, past the formal gardens, across the stone bridge that spanned the stream, and turned up the valley, the sounds of the horses’ hooves muted by the masses of fallen and rotting leaves underfoot.

“There is always a very special smell about autumn,” the earl said to Ellen, with whom he rode. “I suppose it should be unpleasant, since it is largely the smell of decay, but it is not.”

“It is a very English smell,” she said. “I had forgotten it. It is strange how smells can bring back vivid memories. My father used to take me walking in the parks when I was a child. We would always walk on the grass during the autumn so that we could crunch leaves underfoot. They were happy times.”

“Are you glad to be back in England?” he asked.

“Yes,” she said. “I do not regret my ten years as a wanderer, because I learned a great deal about life that I might not otherwise know. And I had my husband for five years. I was happy. He was all the home I needed during those years. Besides, it is foolish to regret anything from one’s past. Everything that happens helps to shape us into the people we are. But I am glad to be home again. I would not wish to settle permanently in any other country.”

“But you are quite right,” he said. “People are really home, are they not? I have always been greatly attached to Amberley Court. If anyone were to take it away from me, I think I would die a little inside. But if ever I had to make the choice between this place and my wife and babies-well, there would be no choice at all.”

Lord Eden had Anna prattling at his side, telling him all about the triumphs of her Season during the spring, reminding him of her disappointment that he had not been there to see her or escort her at all, confiding her hope that her father would take her again the following spring.

“Then you can come too, Dominic,” she said, “and lead me into the first set of the first ball of my second Season.”

“I probably would not be able to fight my way past all the young bucks clustered about you, Anna,” he said.

“Oh, but I would send them all away,” she said, “so that you could sign my card first. For two sets. I wonder who it was who made the foolish rule that one can dance only twice with the same gentleman in the same evening. Don’t you think it silly, Dominic?”

“It depends on how badly I want to dance with one particular lady,” he said.

He was watching Ellen riding ahead of them with his brother. They were doing a great deal of talking and smiling. There was a certain satisfaction in knowing that she and Edmund and Alexandra got along well together. She looked happy this morning, and very lovely in her black velvet riding habit. It brought back vivid memories to see her on horseback.

They rode along a valley that was beautiful despite the bareness of the trees. The stream flowed past them on its way to the sea. The tree-covered slopes grew steeper as they proceeded, and the valley floor narrower.