“Shhhh! Quiet!” James hissed behind him. He was being awfully stern. It was most unlike him.
“You need food, coffee and a bath.” James declared when they reached Gil’s bedchamber. He rang the bell rope, and after a few minutes, a grumpy-looking Crawford appeared. Gil let James give his valet instructions, while he slumped in an armchair, half asleep.
It wasn’t until he was drinking his third cup of coffee in the bath some time later that it occurred to him to wonder why James was trying to sober him up, rather than just letting him sleep off his intoxication. Indeed, why had James come to find him and fetch him home? He’d never done such a thing before.
“What’s going on?” His voice sounded oddly loud in the too-early morning silence of the house. James was lounging in the armchair now. And drinking coffee too. Before seven in the morning when he was never up till noon usually.
James’s gaze was level, considering. “I couldn’t let you see Rose in the state you were in,” he said at last.
“Why on earth would I want to see Rose at the crack of dawn?” Gil asked, but even as the words left his mouth, his brandy-soused brain was beginning to work, and he lurched up, spilling water over the side of the bath and splashing hot coffee on his chest.
“Something’s wrong,” he said suddenly, certain of it. “What is it?”
He could see by the expression on James’s face that something was wrong, and he stood up in the bath, water streaming off his body as he climbed out, soaking the Persian rug.
“Is it Rose?” he demanded, reaching for a towel and beginning to quickly dry himself. He was aware of his heart pounding with anxiety. James looked guilty and uncertain. “It is, isn’t it?”
“It’s the baby,” James muttered. “I’m so sorry, Gil.”
The two men stared at one another, James concerned, Gil beyond shocked.
“Has she—has she lost the baby?” Gil asked eventually. “Oh Christ, is she all right? Jesus, James, why didn’t you tell me something had happened before now?” He yanked the shirt Crawford had laid out for him over his head and reached for the pantaloons.
“I couldn’t have told you anything in the state you were in, Gil! You needed to sober up first. It wouldn’t have done either of you any good for you to go stumbling into her chamber reeking of brandy.” James paused, looking away. “It was over by then anyway. It was over by the time I came looking for you.”
Gil’s hands shook as he fumbled with his buttons. He felt sick again, but this time not from the brandy. “What happened?”
“She miscarried during the night. When I came back at four this morning, there were servants milling around outside her chamber. I told her maid I’d fetch you home.”
“Did you see her?” Gil asked shakily. “How was she?”
“I didn’t see her,” James said gently. “But her maid said she was as well as could be expected.”
Gil stared at his brother, vaguely aware that he hadn’t yet felt anything except panic. He tried to calm down, but all he could think was that he needed to see Rose. He glanced in the mirror and saw that he looked dreadful, like the drunk he was. His feet were bare, and his shirt gaped open. But he was just about decent enough to see her. At least he no longer stank of brandy. Without another word, he strode to the door that connected his chamber to Rose’s.
“Gil?” James’s uncertain voice halted him, and he turned back to his brother, whose expression was troubled. “Perhaps you should let her sleep.”
“I won’t wake her,” Gil promised. “But I must see her.”
Chapter Twenty-One
Rose didn’t so much as stir when Gil entered her chamber. Her hair spilled richly over the pillow, a dark contrast to the pinched paleness of her face. Violet shadows were smudged under her eyes like bruises. Gil carefully pulled a chair up next to the bed and sat down to watch over her.
She was so still he put his hand above her mouth and nose, hovering a quarter of an inch above, just to check that she was still breathing.
There was no trace in her bedchamber of what had passed here while he had been away. The bedsheets were smooth, and Rose’s nightgown was pristine. It shamed him that all the evidence of what had happened had been cleared away by the time he got here.
It was strange, but the baby had never been more real to him than now, when it no longer was. He had seen some hints of Rose’s pregnancy—small, subtle changes to her body—but it hadn’t been real to him yet. He hadn’t thought of the baby as a person. Just a sort of vague idea. But now that there wasn’t a baby anymore, he wondered about it, if it would have been a boy or a girl. And what had happened to its little body. Had it just been discarded? He felt intensely sad at the thought. But he didn’t want to ask anyone, least of all Rose.