Free A Scandalous Marriage by Cathy Maxwell

her several times.”
    “Is she close by?”
    “Only through the woods and around the far hill. Maybe a fifteen-minute walk.”
    “Use the horse by the door. Bring her here.”
    Devon didn’t have to say it twice. Adam started for the door.
    Devon called after him, “Be careful. The animal has thrown a shoe. Don’t push him.”
    Adam nodded, but at the door, he paused. “I love her.” He stood waiting as if expecting Devon to challenge him.
    When Devon didn’t answer, the lad left.

    Devon wasn’t certain Leah had heard Adam’s declaration. Her eyes were closed, her focus on the life inside her. Devon sat on the edge of the bed and, taking her hand in his own, rubbed the tender skin of her wrist with his thumb.
    Her eyes opened. “Devon, I’m afraid. I don’t want to lose my baby.”
    “It’s going to be all right, Leah. I’ll make it all right.”
    His words seemed to reassure her. She relaxed slightly, staring at some distant point in the room, anticipating the next wave of pain.
    Even in the throes of labor, and after all that had happened between them, she still attracted him.
    Devon wasn’t surprised Adam had fallen under her spell. He, too, had been that foolish once, but that was the past.
    He was wiser now.
    The midwife, Old Edith, was a Scotswoman and one of the ugliest people Devon had ever met. Her pushed-in face looked as if someone had punched her and left the fist mark. She had more hair on her upper lip than she did on her head, but he could have kissed her when she entered the bedroom, dropped her canvas bag of supplies onto the floor, and, with calm authority, ordered him out.
    He gave Leah’s hand one last reassuring squeeze and then hurried into the other room, where Adam waited in white-faced silence.
    Each man took an opposing corner of the sitting room. The bedroom didn’t have a door. Only a curtain of off-white homespun separated the two rooms, so Leah’s soft cry as the midwife examined her was all too clearly heard.
    When Devon had been in there, he’d managed to calm her a bit. He’d reasoned that she had to ease into the pain. To try and relax. And it had seemed to work. But now she sounded as if once again she was lost in the tempest of pain and fear.
    “Is the baby really yours?”
    Adam’s young voice intruded on Devon’s thoughts. Almost as an afterthought, the young pup added
    “my lord?” in a less than respectful voice.
    Devon considered his rival. Leah could do far worse. Adam was maybe twenty, stocky of build, with golden brown hair and eyes green with jealousy. Devon had no intention of answering him. One of the few perquisites to being a viscount was the fact that one didn’t have to answer to inferiors. It wasn’t a game Devon played often, but he could when he wished.
    Adam’s face flushed a bright red as the silence stretched between them. His fists clenched.
    Devon silently dared him to try it. He wouldn’t mind a good mill to take the edge off this moment.
    Suddenly, the curtain was flung back from the bedroom door. Old Edith stepped into the room. She instinctively noticed the animosity in the room. Her glance flicked to first one, and then to the other.

    She spoke, her Scottish burr thick. “Adam, where is your mother?”
    “She left.”
    “To your aunt’s?”
    Adam nodded.
    “Good, you go there too,” the woman ordered. “I will send word when the lass drops the babe.”
    “But, I don’t—”
    “Adam, I don’t need you here.” Her words were sharper than any admiral’s command. “You are in the way. Begone.”
    He shot a frustrated look in Devon’s direction. “What about him?”
    In the other room, Leah moaned softly, a moan that ended with her whispering Devon’s name. The sound of it hung in the air a moment. Adam had his answer. He abruptly turned on his heel, threw open the door, and left the cottage.
    Devon crossed to the door and firmly shut it behind him, but not before he noticed the sky had grown darker, the clouds more