… had hoped to have received a note from you by now, but of course the post is notoriously unreliable when it must travel so far. Just last week I heard tale of the arrival of a mail pouch that was a full two years old; many of the recipients had already returned to England. My mother writes that you are well and fully recovered from your ordeal; I am glad to hear of it. My work here continues to challenge and fulfill. I have taken up residence outside the city proper, as do most Europeans here in Madras. Nonetheless, I enjoy visiting the city; it is rather Grecian in appearance; or rather, what I must imagine is Grecian, having never visited that country myself. The sky is blue, so blue it is nearly blinding, almost the bluest thing I have ever seen.

—-from the Earl of Kilmartin to the Countess of Kilmartin, six months after his arrival in India

“I beg your pardon?”

She’d shocked him. He was sputtering, even. She hadn’t made her announcement to elicit this sort of reac-tion, but now that he was sitting there, his mouth hanging open and slack, she couldn’t help but take a small amount of pleasure from the moment.

“I want a baby,” she said with a shrug. “Is there something surprising in that?”

His lips moved before he actually made sound. “Well… no… but…” “I’m twenty-six.”

“I know how old you are,” he said, a little testily.

“I’ll be twenty-seven at the end of April. I don’t think it’s so odd that I might want a child.”

His eyes still held a vaguely glazed sort of quality. “No, of course not, but

—”

“And I shouldn’t have to explain myself to you!”

“I wasn’t asking you to,” he said, staring at her as if she’d grown two heads. “I’m sorry,” she mumbled. “I overreacted.”

He said nothing, which irritated her. At the very least, he could have contradicted her. It would have been a lie, but it was still the kind and courteous thing to do.

Finally, because the silence was simply unbearable, she muttered, “A lot of women want children.”

“Right,” he said, coughing on the word. “Of course. But… don’t you think you might want a husband first?”

“Of course.” She speared him with an aggravated glare. “Why do you think I came down to London early?”

He looked at her blankly.

“I am shopping for a husband,” she said, speaking to him as if he were a halfwit.

“How mercenarily put,” he murmured.

She pursed her lips. “It’s what it is. And you had probably best get used to it for your own sake. It’s precisely how the ladies will soon be talking about you.”

He ignored the latter part of her statement. “Do you have a particular gentleman in mind?”

She shook her head. “Not yet. I imagine someone will pop to the forefront once I start looking, though.” She was trying to sound jolly about it, but the truth was, her voice was dropping in both tone and volume. “I’m sure my brothers have friends,” she finally mumbled.

He looked at her, then slumped back slightly and stared at the water.

“I’ve shocked you,” she said. “Well… yes.”

“Normally, I’d take great pleasure in that,” she said, her lips twisting ironically.

He didn’t reply, but he did roll his eyes slightly.

“I can’t mourn John forever,” she said. “I mean, I can, and I will, but…” She stopped, hating that she was near tears. “And the worst part of it is, maybe I can’t even have children. It took me two years to conceive with John, and look how I mucked that up.”

“Francesca,” he said fiercely, “you mustn’t blame yourself for the miscarriage.”

She let out a bitter laugh. “Can you imagine? Marrying someone just so I could have a baby and then not having one?”

“It happens to people all the time,” he said softly.

It was true, but it didn’t make her feel any better. She had a choice. She didn’t have to marry; she would be quite well provided for—and blessedly independent—if she remained a widow. If she married—no, when she married—she had to mentally commit to the idea—it wouldn’t be for love. She wasn’t going to have a marriage like the one she’d shared with John; a woman simply didn’t find love like that twice in a lifetime.

She was going to marry for a baby, and there was no guarantee that she would get one.

“Francesca?”

She didn’t look at him, just sat there and blinked, des-perately trying to ignore the tears burning at the corners of her eyes.

Michael held out a handkerchief, but she didn’t want to acknowledge the gesture. If she took the cloth, then she’d have to cry. There would be

nothing stopping her.

“I must move on,” she said defiantly. “I must. John is gone, and I—”

And then the strangest thing happened. Except strange wasn’t really the right word. Shocking, perhaps, or altering, or maybe there wasn’t a word for the type of surprise that stole the pulse from one’s body, leaving one immobile, unable to breathe.

She turned to him. It should have been a simple thing. She’d certainly turned to Michael before, hundreds… no, thousands of times. He might have spent the last four years in India, but she knew his face, and she knew his smile. In truth, she knew everything about him—

Except this time was different. She turned to him, but she hadn’t expected him to have already turned to her. And she hadn’t expected him to be so close that she’d see the charcoal flecks in his eyes.

But most of all, she hadn’t expected her gaze to drop to his lips. They were full, and lush, and finely molded, and she knew the shape as well as the shape of her own, except never before had she really looked at them, noticed the way they weren’t quite uniform in color, or how the curve of his lower lip was really quite sensual, and—

She stood. So quickly that she nearly lost her balance. “I have to go,” she said, stunned that her voice sounded like her own and not some freakish demon. “I have an appointment. I’d forgotten.”

“Of course,” he said, standing beside her.

“With the dressmaker,” she added, as if details would make her lie more convincing. “All my clothes are in half-mourning colors.”

He nodded. “They don’t suit you.”

“Kind of you to point it out,” she said testily. “You should wear blue,” he said.

She nodded jerkily, still off balance and out of sorts. “Are you all right?” he asked.

“I’m fine,” she bit off. And then, because no one would ever have been fooled by her tone, she added, more carefully, “I’m fine. I assure you. I simply detest being tardy.” That much was true, and he knew it of her, so hopefully he’d accept it as reason for her snappishness.

“Very well,” he said collegially, and Francesca chattered all the way back to Number Five. She had to put up a good front, she realized rather feverishly. She couldn’t possibly allow him to guess what had really transpired within her on the bench by the Serpentine.

She had known, of course, that Michael was handsome, even startlingly so. But it had all been an abstract sort of knowledge. Michael was handsome, just as her brother Benedict was tall, and her mother had beautiful eyes.

But suddenly… But now…

She’d looked at him, and she’d seen something entirely new. She’d seen a man.

And it scared the very devil out of her.

Francesca tended to subscribe to the notion that the best course of action was more action, so when she returned to Number Five after her stroll, she sought out her mother and informed her that she needed to visit the modiste immediately. Best to make truth out of her lie as soon as possible, after all.

Her mother was only too delighted to see Francesca out of her half- mourning grays and lavenders, and so barely an hour passed before the two of them were comfortably ensconced in Violet’s elegant carriage, on their way to the exclusive shops on Bond Street. Normally, Francesca would have bristled at Violet’s interference; she was perfectly capable of picking out her own wardrobe, thank you very much, but today she found hei mother’s presence oddly comforting.

Not that her mother wasn’t usually a comfort. Just that Francesca tended to favor her independent streak more often than not, and she rather preferred not to be thought of as “one of those Bridgerton girls.” And in a very strange way, this trip to the dressmaker was rather discomfiting. It would have required full-fledged torture to get her to admit it, but Francesca was, quite simply, terrified.

Even if she hadn’t decided it was time to remarry, shrugging off her widow’s weeds signaled a huge change, and not one she was entirely sure she was ready for.

She looked down at her sleeve as she sat in the carriage. She couldn’t see the fabric of her dress—it was covered by her coat—but she knew that it was lavender. And there was something comforting in that, something solid and dependable. She’d worn that color, or gray in its place, for three years now. And unrelenting black foi a year before that. It had been a bit of a

badge, she realized, a uniform of sorts. One never had to worry about who one was when one’s clothing proclaimed it so loudly.

“Mother?” she said, before she even realized that she had a question to ask. Violet turned to her with a smile. “Yes, dear?”

“Why did you never remarry?”

Violet’s lips parted slightly, and to Francesca’s great surprise, her eyes grew bright. “Do you know,” Violet said softly, “this is the first time any of you has asked me that?”

“That can’t be true,” Francesca said. “Are you certain?”

Violet nodded. “None of my children has asked me. I would have remembered.”

“No, no, of course you would,” Francesca said quickly. But it was all so… odd. And unthinking, really. Why would no one have asked Violet about this? It seemed to Francesca quite the most burning question imaginable. And even if none of Violet’s children had cared about the answer for their own personal curiosity, didn’t they realize how important it was to Violet?

Didn’t they want to know their mother? Truly know her?

“When your father died…” Violet said. “Well, I don’t know how much you recall, but it was very sudden. None of us expected it.” She gave a sad little laugh, and Francesca wondered if she’d ever be able to laugh about John’s death, even if it was tinged with grief.

“A bee sting,” Violet continued, and Francesca realized that even now, more than twenty years after Edmund Bridgerton’s death, her mother still sounded surprised when she talked about it.

“Who would have thought it possible?” Violet said, shaking her head. “I don’t know how well you remember him, but your father was a very large man. As tall as Benedict and perhaps even broader in the shoulders. You just wouldn’t think that a bee…” She stopped, pulling out a crisp, white

handkerchief and holding it to her lips as she cleared her throat. “Well, it was unexpected. I don’t really know what else to say, except…” She turned to her daughter with achingly wise eyes. “Except I imagine you understand better than anyone.”

Francesca nodded, not even trying to stem the burning sensation behind her eyes.

“Anyway,” Violet said briskly, obviously eager to move forward, “after his death, I was just so… stunned. I felt as if I were walking in a haze. I’m not at all certain how I functioned that first year. Or even the ones directly thereafter. So I couldn’t possibly even think of marriage.”

“I know,” Francesca said softly. And she did.

“And after that… well, I don’t know what happened. Maybe I just didn’t meet anyone with whom I cared to share my life. Maybe I loved your father too much.” She shrugged. “Maybe I just never saw the need. I was in a very different position from you, after all. I was older, don’t forget, and already the mother of eight children. And your father left our affairs in very good order. I knew we would never want for anything.”

“John left Kilmartin in excellent order,” Francesca said quickly.

“Of course he did,” Violet said, patting her hand. “Forgive me. I did not mean to imply otherwise. But you don’t have eight children, Francesca.” Her eyes changed somehow, grew an even deeper blue. “And you’ve quite a lot of time ahead of you to spend it all alone.”

Francesca nodded jerkily. “I know,” she said. “I know. I know, but I can’t quite… I can’t…”

“You can’t what?” Violet asked gently.

“I can’t…” Francesca looked down. She didn’t know why, but for some reason she couldn’t take her eyes off the floor. “I can’t rid myself of the feeling that I’m doing something wrong, that I’m dishonoring John, dishonoring our marriage.”

“John would have wanted you to be happy.”

“I know. I know. Of course he would. But don’t you see—” She looked up again, her eyes searching her mother’s face for something, she wasn’t sure what— maybe approval, maybe just love, since there was something comforting in looking for something she already knew she’d find. “I’m not even looking for that,” she added. “I’m not going to find someone like John. I’ve accepted that. And it feels so wrong to marry with less.”

“You won’t find someone like John, that is true,” Violet said. “But you might find a man who will suit you equally well, just in a different way.”

“You didn’t.”

“No, I didn’t,” she agreed, “but I didn’t look very hard. I didn’t look at all.” “Do you wish you had?”

Violet opened her mouth, but not a sound came out, not even breath. Finally she said, “I don’t know, Francesca. I honestly don’t know.” And then, because the moment almost certainly needed a bit of laughter, she added, “I certainly didn’t want any more children!”

Francesca couldn’t help but smile. “I do,” she said softly. “I want a baby.” “I thought that you did.”

“Why did you never ask me about it?”

Violet tilted her head to the side. “Why did you never ask me about why I never remarried?”

Francesca felt her lips part. She shouldn’t have been so surprised by her mother’s perceptiveness.

“If you had been Eloise, I think I would have said something,” Violet added. “Or any of your sisters, for that matter. But you—” She smiled nostalgically. “You’re not the same. You never have been. Even as a child you set yourself apart. And you needed your distance.”

Impulsively, Francesca reached out and squeezed her mother’s hand. “I love you, did you know that?”

Violet smiled. “I rather suspected it.” “Mother!”

“Very well, of course I knew it. How could you not love me when I love you so very, very much?”

“I haven’t said it,” Francesca said, feeling rather horrified by her omission. “Not recently, anyway.”

“It’s quite all right.” Violet squeezed her hand back. “You’ve had other things on your mind.”

And for some reason that made Francesca giggle under her breath. “A bit of an understatement, I should say.”

Violet just grinned.

“Mother?” Francesca blurted out. “May I ask you one more question?” “Of course.”

“If I don’t find someone—not like John, of course, but still not equally suited to me. If I don’t find someone like that, and I marry someone whom I rather like, but perhaps don’t love… is that all right?”

Violet was silent for several moments before she answered. “I’m afraid only you will know the answer to that,” she finally said. “I would never say no, of course. Half the ton—more than half, in truth—has marriages like that, and quite a few of them are perfectly content. But you will have to make your judgments for yourself when they arise. Everyone is different, Francesca. I suspect you know that better than most. And when a man asks for your hand, you will have to judge him on his merits and not by some arbitrary standard you have set out ahead of time.”

She was right, of course, but Francesca was so sick of life being messy and complicated that it wasn’t the answer she’d been seeking.

And none of it addressed the problem that lay most deeply within her heart. What would happen if she actually did meet someone who made her feel the way she’d felt with John? She couldn’t imagine that she would; truly, it seemed wildly improbable.

But what if she did? How could she live with herself then?

There was something rather satisfying about a foul mood, so Michael decided to indulge his completely.

He kicked a pebble all the way home.

He snarled at anyone who jostled him on the street.

He yanked open his front door with such ferocity that it slammed into the stone wall behind it. Or rather he would have done, if his sodding butler hadn’t been so on his toes and had the door open before Michael’s fingers could even touch the handle.

But he thought about slamming it open, which provided some satisfaction in and of itself.

And then he stomped up the stairs to his room—which still felt too bloody much like John’s room, not that there was anything he could do about that just then—and yanked off his boots.

Or tried to.

Bloody hell.

“Reivers!” he bellowed.

His valet appeared—or really, it seemed rather more like he apparated—in the doorway.

“Yes, my lord?”

“Would you help me with my boots?” Michael ground out, feeling rather infantile. Three years in the army and four in India, and he couldn’t remove his own damned boots? What was it about London that reduced a man to a sniveling idiot? He seemed to recall that Reivers had had to remove his boots for him the last time he’d lived in London as well.

He looked down. They were different boots. Different styles, he supposed, for different situations, and Reivers had always taken a stunningly ridiculous pride in his work. Of course he d have wanted to outfit Michael in the very best of London fashion. He’d have—

“Reivers?” Michael said in a low voice. “Where did you get these boots?” “My lord?”

“These boots. I do not recognize them.”

“We have not yet received all of your trunks from the ship, my lord. You didn’t have anything suitable for London, so I located these among the previous earl’s belong—”

“Jesus.”

“My lord? I’m terribly sorry if these don’t suit you. I remembered that the two of you were of a size, and I thought you’d want—”

“Just get them off. Now.” Michael closed his eyes and sat in a leather chair

—John’s leather chair—marveling at the irony of it. His worst nightmare coming true, in the most literal of fashions.

“Of course, my lord.” Reivers looked pained, but he quickly went to work removing the boots.

Michael pinched the bridge of his nose with his thumb and forefinger and let out a long breath before speaking again. “I would prefer not to use any items from the previous earl’s wardrobe,” he said wearily. Truly, he had no idea why John’s clothing was still here; the lot of it should have been given

to the servants or donated to charity years ago. But he supposed that was Francesca’s decision to make, not his.

“Of course, my lord. I shall see to it immediately.” “Good,” Michael grunted.

“Shall I have it locked away?”

Locked? Good God, it wasn’t as if the stuff were toxic. “I’m sure it is all just fine where it is,” Michael said. “Just don’t use any of it for me.”

“Right.” Reivers swallowed, and his Adam’s apple bobbed uncomfortably. “What is it now, Reivers?”

“It’s just that all of the previous Lord Kilmartin’s ac-couterments are still here.”

“Here?” Michael asked blankly.

“Here,” Reivers confirmed, glancing about the room.

Michael sagged in his chair. It wasn’t that he wanted to wipe every last reminder of his cousin off the face of this earth; no one missed John as much as he did, no one.

Well, except maybe Francesca, he allowed, but that was different.

But he just didn’t know how he was meant to lead his life so completely and smotheringly surrounded by John’s belongings. He held his title, spent his money, lived in his house. Was he meant to wear his damned shoes as well?

“Pack it all up,” he said to Reivers. “Tomorrow. I don’t wish to be disturbed this evening.”

And besides, he probably ought to alert Francesca of his intentions.

Francesca.

He sighed, rising to his feet once the valet had departed. Christ, Reivers had forgotten to take the boots with him. Michael picked them up and deposited them outside the door. He was probably overreacting, but hell, he just didn’t want to stare at John’s boots for the next six hours.

After shutting the door with a decisive click, he padded aimlessly over to the window. The sill was wide and deep, and he leaned heavily against it, gazing through the sheer curtains at the blurry streetscape below. He pushed the thin fabric aside, his lips twisting into a bitter smile as he watched a nursemaid tugging a small child along the pavement.

Francesca. She wanted a baby.

He didn’t know why he was so surprised. If he thought about it rationally, he really shouldn’t have been. She was a woman, for God’s sake; of course she’d want children. Didn’t they all? And while he’d never consciously sat down and told himself that she’d pine away for John forever, he’d also never considered the idea that she might actually care to remarry one day.

Francesca and John. John and Francesca. They were a unit, or at least they had been, and although John’s death had made it sadly easy to envision one without the other, it was quite something else entirely to think of one with another.

And then of course there was the small matter of his skin crawling, which was his general reaction to the thought of Francesca with another man.

He shuddered. Or was that a shiver? Damn, he hoped it wasn’t a shiver.

He supposed he was simply going to have to get used to the notion. If Francesca wanted children, then Francesca needed a husband, and there wasn’t a damned thing he could do about it. It would have been rather nice, he supposed, if she had come to this decision and taken care of the whole odious matter last year, sparing him the nausea of having to witness the entire courtship unfold. If she’d just gone and gotten herself married last

year, then it would have been over and done with, and that would have been that.

End of story.

But now he was going to have to watch. Maybe even advise. Bloody hell.

He shivered again. Damn. Maybe he was just cold. It was March, after all, and a chilly one at that, even with a fire in the grate.

He tugged at his cravat, which was starting to feel unaccountably tight, then yanked it off altogether. Christ, he felt like the very devil, all hot and cold, and queerly off balance.

He sat down. It seemed the best course of action.

And then he just gave up all pretense of being well, stripping off the rest of his clothing and crawling into bed.

It was going to be a long night.