Married At Midnight Read Online Free PDF

warmth, but she would have to put a baby clout on him before he soiled everything. She carefully unwrapped his tiny limbs and put the folded cloth between his legs, securing it with an outer cloth, tied at either side. She'd practiced this on other babies, but her own newborn was so tiny and delicate that she was afraid. She'd dearly like to have one of the women from the camp here to advise her.
    Meg Fully, perhaps, who'd had a baby recently. Or Red Jess who'd had ten of her own and generally acted as midwife. These women had become her friends, though back home in Aylesbury she'd have crossed the street to avoid them.
    Meg and Jess would scold her mightily for this mad venture, though it did seem that thus far she'd avoided disaster. Both she and her baby were alive.
    The captain was coming over with the bowl and a spoon. Perhaps their marriage was the disaster she deserved. She couldn't think so. She did regret entangling him, but her child had a name now, and a respectable one.
    She put the baby down again to take the bowl, murmuring her thanks.
    He sat cross-legged on the ground by her bed, as graceful as a big cat. "There was only a crust of bread, so I broke it up into the broth. There's not much meat left, I'm afraid."
    She took a spoonful. "It's good."
    "It's not much nourishment after all that work. No wonder they call it labor."
    "I admit I am hungry." She consumed the stew with indecent speed and could have eaten more if there'd been any. She knew enough to be grateful for what she'd had. One of the inefficiencies of this campaign was in the food supply. If there'd been meat in the stew it had probably been a rabbit one of the men had managed to snare or shoot.
    She saw Mr. Rightwell find himself a corner and lie down to sleep. "You must be tired," she said to the captain.
    "So must you."
    They both spoke softly to avoid disturbing the exhausted men.
    "A little. But there's a kind of excitement. I don't think I can settle yet."
    He nodded. "Like after a battle. But why not try? Lie down, and if you don't mind, I'll lie here by you in case you need anything in the night."
    Because he clearly wouldn't rest until she did, Kate lay back on her lumpy bed and closed her eyes. She heard him moving and peeped to see he'd wrapped himself in his army cloak just a foot away and appeared to have gone to sleep.
    She rolled, too, so that she could study her sleeping baby. Such a soft little face, yet so old-looking.
    Round cheeks,
    tiny nose, and closed eyes offered no hint of a resemblance. What would he look like as he grew?
    By God, but I wish the captain was your father.
     
     
    Taking the baby with her, she rolled so she could look at the captain again, placing the baby between them. The women at the camp had assured her that she wouldn't smother a baby in her sleep unless she was drunk. She prayed that was true for she had no cradle or other safe warm spot to put him in.
    The captain looked less formidable lying down and with his eyes closed. She'd always been struck by his eyes, but now she realized they were framed by remarkably long dark lashes. His hair was dark, too, and fell in disorder around him, having escaped its ribbon. One lock straggled down over his eyes. She remembered him stroking her hair off her face many times during labor. She wished she were bold enough to do the same to him. She was not Kate the Bold, though. She was Kate Dunstable, very proper daughter of Augustus Dunstable Esquire of Aylesbury, Purveyor of Books, Pamphlets, and Writing Materials. Tears threatened. Childlike, she wanted her home and her mother at this moment...
    She pushed such weak thoughts away, studying instead the man who'd saved her. She'd never have thought him the
    kind of man to involve himself in a birth. But then, what choice had he had other than to toss her into the dubious
    care of his men?
    Suddenly, Kate lay back on the bed, painfully embarrassed. Giving birth had been the strangest, strongest, most exhilarating