A real gentleman would’ve never strong-armed a lady. Then again a real lady would’ve never found herself in an ice house at midnight with Sebastian the bodice ripper. What was she thinking? He only had one proposal in mind, and that didn’t involve any kind of church ceremony. Is that all he wanted from her? Sex? Is that why he always seemed to say exactly what she wanted to hear?
She stepped into the moonlight. The sudden brightness made her squint. With a clink of the keys, Sebastian locked the ice-house doors behind them. “I’ll escort you back.”
He was hot, he was cold. He could be decent. He could be an ass. But he wasn’t the one.
“Did you really mean it when you said you had fallen in love with me?” Chloe asked.
“I think so. But this has all been very difficult for me—”
That was all Chloe needed to hear. George must’ve written up Sebastian’s bio, because the man described as Sebastian Wrightman was not this Sebastian Wrightman. She’d thought this whole thing was real, and that’s where she had gone wrong. She was channeling Mr. Darcy when she should’ve been paying more attention to what was right in front of her.
He helped her up onto his horse. In silence, he led the horse toward Bridesbridge Place. She looked up at the moon as the horse loped beneath her. She had just narrowly escaped, and she had the full moon to thank for inducing Mrs. Crescent’s baby.
When the moon was full in England, was it full at home, too? Chloe wondered. Abigail loved the full moon. Chloe used to be Abigail’s moon, orbiting around her day and night, year after year, never faltering. Now? Now she didn’t think she could ever fall happily back into that eternal elliptical path without feeling alone and cold. Still, the moon called her home like a force stronger than gravity.
On their way to Bridesbridge, they passed the castle ruins. In the moonlight, Chloe could see how the castle had been pummeled by cannonballs. She could see the holes in the walls so clearly now. Why hadn’t she seen them before?
Still, she had to win the money. Otherwise it wouldn’t have been worth it to leave Abigail.
What was going to happen now that they got caught with Sebastian’s breeches down?
At the bottom of the stairs at Bridesbridge Place, she buttoned her pelisse up to her neck. A candelabrum dripped on the griffin-footed table near the banister. A sudden howl from Mrs. Crescent rang out, and it echoed throughout the foyer. Waves of fear and memory crashed through Chloe. She’d never forget that peppermint-green birthing room, the thirst, the pain, the joy of childbirth. Slowly, she slunk up the steps, candelabrum dripping in the one hand, reticule and fan drooping in the other.
How could Mrs. Crescent have a baby here? Without electricity? Without phones? Without relaxation music? And—why?
It was almost as crazy as thinking you could find true love on a TV show.
The closer Chloe got to Mrs. Crescent’s room, the more intense the breathing sound became. Chloe had to change her gown. What did a lady wear to a birthing room, anyway? She tiptoed past Mrs. Crescent’s half-opened door.
“Miss Parker!” Nothing escaped Mrs. Crescent, even when she was giving birth. “Come here immediately! Owww!”
Henry’s low voice, like water over river rocks, calmed and comforted Mrs. Crescent . . . and Chloe. She inched the door open. Mrs. Crescent groaned in pain. Chloe couldn’t bear to look at the birthing bed—just yet. Instead she focused on their shadows, larger than life on the blue wall. Henry’s shadow, Mrs. Crescent’s shadow, and—the camerawoman’s shadow all flickered in the candlelight like a pantomime play. Would this surreal night never end? And did this, too, need to be filmed?
Mrs. Crescent’s shadow rocked back and forth, her knees up, her hair down and scraggly. Chloe squeezed her eyes shut and buried her nose in the silky sleeve of her pelisse. She might need her vinaigrette. She set the candelabrum on the dressing table.
Henry’s shadow reached out and massaged Mrs. Crescent’s back. “Push. Gentle now. We’re almost there. One, two, three. Right. Stop pushing. Breathe. Excellent.”
His shadow turned toward Chloe and bent to check his pocket watch. “How kind of the lady to pull herself away from her diversions to help us.”
“It was hardly a diversion. It was enlightening. And I would’ve been better off here.” Chloe still couldn’t look at either of them. She curled her upper lip and talked to Henry’s shadow on the wall. Mrs. Crescent grumbled in pain.
Nothing else might have been real, but this was. Chloe pulled off her gloves, rolled up her sleeves, and looked down at her hands.
“Scrub up, Miss Parker!” Henry nodded toward a washbowl across the room.
Henry wore a billowing shirt with the sleeves rolled up and the collar open. A slight tension pulled the shirt across his broad chest and she could see the curve of his muscles. With his cutaway coat off, his tight drop-front breeches revealed a body more enticing than Sebastian’s, if that was even possible. But she was done with men in ruffled shirts and breeches, wasn’t she?
“What are you waiting for, Miss Parker? Wash up, please.”
My God, Mrs. Crescent was having a baby, and Chloe’s mind was in the gutter, even after a scrape in the ice-house with an absolute rake.
Mrs. Crescent started her breathing, and Chloe hustled to the wash table.
“Do put on a pair of latex gloves,” Henry instructed.
“Latex gloves?” The hot water scalded her hands and the soapsuds felt—real. She snapped the gloves on. She whispered to Henry, “When were these invented? Not during the Regency, I’m sure.”
Henry lowered his voice. “If you must know, Miss Parker, it was 1964. Now please come and help Mrs. Crescent relax.”
Relax? Nothing could’ve prepared Chloe for what she saw when she turned around, except gory hospital and crime shows that she never watched because she didn’t have cable.
Chloe rocked back on her boots, reaching behind her for something to lean on. Her hand awkwardly bumped Henry right on his tight ass. All manners, he pretended nothing happened.
“I offered her a sheet for modesty as they would’ve done in the Regency, but she refused.”
Chloe knew there was no modesty in childbirth. She watched Henry unroll a suede package on the dressing table.
“Obstetric kit.”
It was an obstetric kit from the Regency era. The instruments, tucked in the suede kit with a strip of leather, looked more like pruning shears, great big tongs, some sort of a spatula, and the biggest fishhook she’d ever seen.
One glance would’ve been enough to get anyone—maybe even Grace—to sign on for a life of spinsterhood and celibacy. “You’re not really going to—”
“To use these? Hardly!” He lowered his voice to a whisper as he pulled out the wooden forceps. “But this is what the OB or ‘accoucheur’ would’ve used. We’ve come such a long way in just two hundred years. No wonder one in three women died in childbirth.”
“What?! One in three—”
“Uggggggggggh!” Mrs. Crescent’s face contorted into a grimace. Red splotches and sweat covered her face and neck.
Henry handed Chloe a stack of cool, damp washcloths. She hadn’t known that one in three women died during childbirth in the Regency. It was hard to reconcile the gowns and the glitz and the romance with this horrific statistic.
She scissor-stepped over to the bedside and dabbed Mrs. Crescent’s forehead with a washcloth. Her voice wavered. “Just think, Mrs. Crescent, soon you’ll be holding your beautiful, healthy, happy baby. Your baby will know you just by your heartbeat, your voice. It’ll look up at you—”
“It’s a wonder you know so much about childbirth!” Mrs. Crescent exhaled deeply, focusing on Chloe’s torn gown barely covered by a hastily buttoned pelisse. “Whatever happened to your gown this time? It’s a fright. An absolute fright! And your hair is down!”