“You are not a coward.” Charlotte kissed him. Brief and fierce, her hand still gripping his face, her tears wetting his cheeks. “You are here now. That is what matters.”
William pulled back and looked at Tommy. The baby slept on, oblivious to the upheaval around him, his fist curled againstCharlotte’s collar. William touched the child’s head, and his fingers trembled.
“He is so small,” William whispered. “I thought I was prepared. I am not prepared at all.”
Charlotte took his hand and pressed it flat against Tommy’s back. “Feel that? His heartbeat. He’s strong.”
William closed his eyes. His palm rested against the baby’s back, and his breath hitched once, and when he opened his eyes, they were bright and certain, and the trembling had stopped.
He turned to Charlotte and took her hand. “Marry me.”
Charlotte’s breath caught. “I have nothing to offer you except myself. I am a scholar with no fortune, no title, and a father who is a country clergyman. I cannot give you what your family expected. But I will work. I will find a way to provide for you and for our son, and I will spend every day of my life making certain that neither of you ever feels abandoned again.” His voice was quiet and absolute. “Marry me, Charlotte.”
The nursery was silent. Mary’s hand covered her mouth. Richard looked at the floor, his jaw working.
Evander stood in the doorway and watched a man with nothing offer everything he had, and the simplicity of it, the total absence of calculation, landed against Evander’s chest with a force that shamed him.
This was what love looked like when it was not afraid of itself.
Evander stepped forward.
“Mr. Harcourt.” His voice cut through the room, and every face turned to him. “You said you speak French.”
William blinked. “I do, Your Grace. I studied at the Sorbonne for two years before returning to London.”
“And Charlotte.” Evander looked at his sister-in-law. “You speak French as well?”
“Our governess was Parisian,” Charlotte said, confusion creasing her brow. “Mary and I both speak it fluently.”
“Good.” Evander clasped his hands behind his back. “Then here is what I propose: I have contacts at the Université de Paris through my family’s academic endowments. I will write to them this week and secure a research position for Mr. Harcourt. The salary will be modest but respectable, and I will supplement it with a quarterly allowance drawn from the Blackholm estate. Enough for a comfortable home, a nursemaid for Tommy, and the kind of life that allows a scholar to do his work without starving.”
William stared at him. Charlotte’s grip on William’s hand tightened.
“France is close enough to visit,” Evander continued. “Mary can see Tommy as often as she wishes. You will be beyond the reach of theton’sgossip, and Tommy can grow up without the shadow of this scandal following him.” He looked at William. “You will never lack for anything. I give you my word.”
William opened his mouth and closed it. He looked at Charlotte, then at Evander, and his eyes filled.
“Your Grace, I cannot accept?—”
“You can. And you will. That child deserves parents who are present and a household that is stable, and I am in a position to ensure both.” Evander’s voice softened. “Consider it a wedding gift.”
Charlotte crossed the room and seized Evander’s hand. She pressed it between both of hers, her face blotched and radiant. “Thank you. I do not have words. Thank you, Your Grace.”
Evander extracted his hand with the careful discomfort of a man unaccustomed to being thanked. “Write to your father. He will need to be told, and it is better coming from you than from anyone else.”
Charlotte turned back to William. She took his hand and placed it on Tommy’s back, so that the baby lay between them, held by both.
“Yes,” she said. “I will marry you.”
William kissed her forehead. Charlotte closed her eyes.
Evander looked at Mary. She stood by the window, with tears streaming down her face, her arms wrapped around herself, and the expression she wore was the most complicated thing Evander had ever seen on a human face.
Joy. Grief. Love for her sister. Loss of the baby she had raised. Pride in what Evander had just done.
And beneath all of it, something private and painful that was meant only for him.
He inclined his head toward the door. Mary nodded. They slipped out of the nursery, leaving the new family alone.