God knew, the women in this room could stand to borrow some grace and serenity. Another scream forced its way through Lucy’s gritted teeth.

Sophia looked as though she would be ill. Typically Bel envied her sister-in-law’s elegant selfpossession. At times, she’d even resented her for it and longed to see Sophia—just once—the tiniest bit ill at ease. But watching her come unraveled like this… it brought none of the satisfaction Bel had imagined. And finding herself the voice of composure between them, well

—that rather flipped her world on its ear.

When the contraction subsided, Hetta pushed the bedsheets to Lucy’s waist. “Lucy, listen to me. The hard work is about to start.”

“To start?” Lucy shouted. “What the devil do you mean, to start? I know you did not just tell me, after I’ve been laboring in this bed for six hours, that we are just about to start.”

“You are going to start to push. It’s time to deliver your child. With the next pains, I want you to grasp your knees and bear down.”

Following Hetta’s instructions, Bel and Sophia helped raise Lucy to a half-sitting position. They all stood frozen, waiting, until Lucy’s low growl began again.

“All right now,” Hetta directed. “Push.”

Lucy pushed. And she pushed Bel’s ear drums together, with the splitting scream that accompanied her effort.

“No more screaming,” Hetta said, once the pains had passed and Lucy sagged limp in Bel and Sophia’s arms. “Every scream is effort wasted. You need to save your strength.”

“How long will this take?” Sophia asked weakly.

“Impossible to tell,” Hetta answered her. “Hours, perhaps.”

“Oh, God,” Lucy moaned. “Hours? I can’t do this for hours!”

“Yes, you can,” Bel told her.

“No, I can’t,” Lucy said hysterically. “I really can’t. I’ve changed my mind. Go tell Jeremy I’ve changed my mind. It’s all his fault this child won’t come out. What was I thinking, marrying a great, stubborn brute? I should have married the vicar’s son. He’d have given me runtish, compliant babies. Babies that wouldn’t take hours to—” Her rant gave way to another pained cry.

“Push, Lucy,” Hetta ordered. “Push as hard as you can.”

“One day,” Lucy panted, once the contraction had ebbed, “it will be you in labor, Hetta, and I’m going to stand by the bedside and repay you tenfold for all this heartless tyranny.”

“And you’ll be welcome to do so, Lucy, should that day ever come.”

For an instant, pain shimmered in Hetta’s eyes. She quickly blinked it away, but not before Bel saw it. Saw it, and felt it twisting in her heart. While the three of them fell to pieces, this one woman was holding them all together—and she was doing it all on her own. Alone. At the end of this day, Hetta was the only one of them who would not know the comforting embrace of a husband.

Bel closed her eyes. Behind her eyelids floated the image of Toby’s reassuring smile. On the heels of reassurance, however, trod confusion. Somewhere in the past hour, she’d stopped pleading with deities and started picturing her husband. Where were her priorities?

Her eyes flew open when someone clutched at her shoulder.

It was Sophia, reaching across from Lucy’s other side. Her eyes were wide, and she trembled. She mouthed, “I want to leave.”

Bel shook her head. “You can’t.”

“I’m scared,” Sophia whispered.

“I heard that,” said Lucy, through clenched teeth. “If I have to stay, so do you.”

“Lucy, you’re doing beautifully,” Bel said, smoothing the damp hair from Lucy’s brow. “Just think, soon you’ll be holding your baby. It won’t be much longer now. It can’t be.”

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

But it was.

After more than an hour of pushing, Lucy was pale and soaked with perspiration. “I can’t do it,” she moaned through cracked lips.

“Here, take a bit of tea.” Bel raised the cup to her lips.

“No, no.” Lucy shook her head. “I don’t want tea. I want this to stop. I want out. I can’t do this, really I can’t.”

“All right then,” Hetta said, stepping back. “Perhaps you can’t.”

“What?” Sophia cried. “But how will—”

“She doesn’t mean that,” Bel soothed. “Lucy’s doing beautifully.” Meanwhile, panic fluttered in her stomach. If even Hetta was losing confidence, they were really in trouble. They all watched as Hetta untied the apron from around her waist and went to rinse her hands at the washstand. Then she made for the door.

“Where do you think you’re going?” Lucy demanded, craning her neck to see her friend. Hetta stopped at the door. “I’m going downstairs, to tell Lord Kendall you can’t do it.”

“May I go with you?” Sophia asked, ignoring Bel’s attempts to shush her.

“What’s Jeremy going to do about it?” Lucy asked. “It’s not as though he can come up here and birth the child hims—aah!” She curled around another contraction. Bel supported Lucy’s shoulders as she pushed, murmuring words of encouragement in her ear.

“No, he can’t do anything about it,” Hetta said, speaking over Lucy’s cries of pain. “But perhaps he’d like to say good-bye.”

“Good-bye?” Bel and Sophia exclaimed in unison. If Lucy could have spoken through her pains, Bel was sure she would have made their duet a trio.

Arms crossed over her chest, Hetta strode back to the bedside. “Lucy, listen to me. Your child is breech. The chances of—”

Bel grabbed Hetta’s arm. “Don’t. Please.” They couldn’t give up hope, not yet. There were still a few saints she hadn’t petitioned.

“I know what I’m doing,” Hetta murmured. “I know Lucy.”

The contraction over, Lucy flopped back against the pillows and glared up at her friend with flashing green eyes. “Don’t you dare. I’ve no intention of saying good-bye to Jeremy. I’m still too vexed with him over this morning.”

Hetta sat on the edge of the bed and took Lucy’s hand. “Then listen to me. The babe is breech, not headfirst as it should be. That’s the reason you’re having such difficulty.”

“Good Lord.” Lucy blew a wisp of hair from her mouth. “He’s an incorrigible brat already.”

“Yes. Clearly he takes after his mother.”

“Am I going to die? Tell me honestly.”

“You know I would never lie. There is danger, for both you and the child. But when has a bit of danger prevented you from doing anything?” Hetta squeezed Lucy’s hand. “Lucy, you’re the most stubborn, foolhardy woman I know. Your friends love you despite it. Your husband loves you for it. Lord Kendall believes you can do anything. Don’t make me go down there and tell him otherwise. Don’t let him suspect you’ve given up, or you know as well as I, you’ll never know the end of it. If he’s overprotective now …”

“You wouldn’t dare.” Lucy’s eyes narrowed. “You’re a cold woman, Hetta Osborne.”

“He’ll place more restrictions on you than ever,” Hetta threatened. “He’ll treat you like a plate of glass. He’ll be so afraid of getting you with child, he’ll—”

“Never touch me again?” Lucy scoffed. “Not likely. If he were that strong-willed, we’d have never married in the first place.” She sighed up at the ceiling. “But he might hold out for a year, or two.”

“Exactly,” Hetta replied. “Lucy, you can do this. If you concentrate and work hard, and most difficult of all, follow directions, both you and your baby will survive. But if I go down to Lord Kendall right now, your pride will never recover.”

Lucy closed her eyes and lay still, breathing steadily in and out through her nose. Her dry, pale lips thinned to a line, then curled into a grimace.

“It’s all right, Lucy,” Sophia said. “We’re all here to help.”

“You can’t help me,” Lucy bit out. “No one can.”

Hetta released her hand. “Very well, then. I’m going downstairs.”

“Over my dead body.” Lucy struggled to her elbows and gritted her teeth. “No one can help me, but I’ll do it myself. I’m going to push this baby out, if it kills me.”

The supper trays went untouched. As the evening wore on, Lucy’s cries grew louder. And then fainter. The poor girl must be exhausted, Toby reckoned. He certainly was, and he hadn’t done a damn thing beyond sitting in this salon all day, talking himself into a stupor and watching his best friend in agony. He envied Isabel her manual tasks. Why couldn’t he have been put to work boiling linens?

Gray apparently shared his feelings. He prowled the room like a caged animal. “God. How much longer can this go on? I can’t take much more of this.”

Still holding down the same armchair he’d occupied all evening, Jeremy raised his head. “You think it’s difficult for you? Imagine how I feel.”

“Oh, he is imagining it,” Toby said to Jeremy. “That’s precisely why he’s so agitated. It’ll be his turn soon enough.” He raised his head and called to Gray. “When’s Sophia expecting? Late November, I’d guess.”

“December.” Gray stared at him. “How did you know? Unless… Surely she didn’t tell you?”

“No, she didn’t have to,” Toby said. “I’ve three older sisters, with ten nieces and nephews between them. I can just tell. Congratulations.”

“Can we please speak of something besides breeding?” Joss asked, propping his boots up on the side table. He leveled a gaze at Toby. “Surely there is some topic left untouched in that prodigious lexicon of yours. Think of it as practice for your career in Parliament.”

“There’s a topic. Let’s hear about the campaign,” Gray said. “How is it progressing?”

“It’s … progressing.” Toby shifted in his chair.

“Last I heard, the polls were running dead even between you and Yorke.”

“They are. But most of the electors have yet to cast their votes. They’re waiting, I expect.”

“For what?” Joss asked.

“For bribes.” Gray flicked a glance at Toby. “They want to see which candidate will pay the highest price. Am I right?”

Toby scratched his neck. “Perhaps. But they’ll wait in vain. Mr. Yorke is unlikely to engage in bribery, and you know as well as I how Isabel would react to the idea of my buying votes.”

Gray and Joss chuckled.

“Exactly,” Toby said.

Some topic of shipping or tariffs took the Grayson brothers on a separate branch of conversation.

Jeremy rose from his chair and went to the window. Toby followed him. Lowering his voice, he said, “Can I ask your advice on something, Jem?”

Jeremy grunted in assent.

“You’re in the House of Lords, obviously,” Toby continued. “Tell me, with regards to this election … what do you think is the surest way to lose?”

“To lose? Don’t you want to win?”

“No, not especially. I mean, Yorke’s served our borough for years. Parliament is his life. Doesn’t seem right to take that away from him. The man’s a friend.”

“Then why are you running in the first place?”

“Because I promised Isabel, before we were married.” Toby sighed. “She’s got this idea that if I’m an MP, she’ll have more influence in society.”