color of Cassandra’s eyes when they were being green and not brown, and he decided that yes, this ribbon would be ideal for tying up the flowers. Unfortunately, the ribbon was attached to a bonnet, but Joshua decided that he needed the ribbon more than the bonnet did, so he pulled out his handy pen knife and sliced the ribbon from its bonnet and tied up his flowers, which still didn’t look nearly as good as bunches that she made, but he had no more time to waste, so he jogged up the steps, only to see that the door to his wife’s room was closed and her mother had just come out.
He opened his mouth to speak, but Lady Charles pressed her fingers to her lips.
“Hush,” she whispered. “She’s sleeping. She needs to rest now.”
“I need to see her.”
“She’s sleeping.”
“She’s my wife.”
Lady Charles’s eyes flicked to the sorry bunch of flowers in his hand. “But don’t wake her. Not yet.”
Then she was gone.
Silent as a cat, he let himself into the room, darkened now, though it was still light outside. She slept peacefully, in her blessed nightcap, her mouth open, a faint blush on her cheeks. He entered as quietly as he could, and put the flowers on the table by her bed, and sat in the chair. He wanted to touch her, but didn’t dare wake her.
“I’m your husband and you’re my wife and I know what that means now,” he whispered. “It means for better or for worse, and I’m going to devote my life to making your life better, whether you want me to or not.”
Then he rose, went out, and crept down the stairs to wait out the evening and the night and all the long hours until he could see her again.
Chapter 33
Cassandra awoke. The pain was gone. The blood was gone. A lantern burned; they had not left her in the dark. She was alone, in a clean shift, a clean nightcap, with clean linens on the bed. Mr. Twit was curled at her side. Nothing had changed.
As if it had all been a dream. As if right back at the start, she’d dreamed Lucy singing and dancing alone in the ballroom. Joshua and the ball and Mrs. O’Dea and the lovemaking and the baby: She’d dreamed it all, and now she would get up and get on with her life. The same as always. The life she would accept because it was the one she had.
She smelled flowers, the promise of them, but they were wrong. If this were a dream, she would smell only violets, the violets she’d picked that long-ago morning, excited by the start of spring.
No violets. Instead, laid by her bed was the most peculiar bunch of flowers she’d ever seen, a wildly mismatched and exuberant hodgepodge of blooms. It looked like something Joshua would throw together for her, if he was ever to take leave of his senses and start picking flowers. The sight filled her like a smile: He had come back.
For the baby, not for her. It was the first thing he had said. He had let himself love that baby, and he would never survive the loss, and it would send him running again; perhaps he was already gone. What could she do? She had to let him go.
She picked up the flowers. They were tied with ribbon. Emily’s ribbon. Yes, it was more likely Emily had picked them. Why on earth would Joshua ever pick her flowers?
Except that Joshua should have done it. He could have done it. Why had he not done it? The fiend!
Let him go?
Let him try!
She flung down the flowers and hurled herself out of bed, slightly dizzy, tired and sore, damp between her legs, but she was fine. Well, no, she wasn’t fine, her heart ached with the void left by her baby, but she would be fine. One day. This happened, they all said that. Sometimes babies just aren’t ready to be born.
Well, all she could do about that now was grieve and wait for her heart and body to heal, and find hope in the other women’s words. But as for him? Oh no, indeed, Mr. DeWitt. This will not do. Not this time. She was always going along with what life threw at her. Did she think she had fortitude and patience? No: It was cowardice. No more. She was not going to accept whatever life threw at her, not this time, not without a