Page 89 of A Necessary Wife

“This is coming along well,” he called out to her.

“Yes,” she agreed, sitting back on her haunches and smiling at the still-brown expanse around her. “This is finished, and now we must wait for the spring.” Amelia thrust her hand out toward him, and Milo quickly rushed to help his wife rise. She groaned as she did so, rubbing her lower back. “Not a moment too soon, either,” she murmured, setting her hand on her large belly. “I cannot garden when this lad kicks so much.”

Milo nodded but wisely kept his mouth shut and a smirk off his face. Amelia was most offended by the kicking of their unborn children.

This latest was their third child together, and he hoped for a girl this time. Someone for Lucy to share her dolls with one day. But Amelia was certain it was another boy, and he dared not contradict her. She became increasingly irritated by disagreement and impatient as she waited for the baby to come.

He brought her out of the garden bed to stand under the shade of a nearby tree, where she could cool herself. Lucy crowded close to her, whispering encouragement to the baby within her belly to hurry up.

Amelia laughed a little. “Where is Adam?”

“Uncle Anthony took him fishing,” Lucy informed her, drawing back.

Amelia’s eyes flew to Milo’s. “Then where is Nathan and Grant then?”

He put a hand on her shoulder. “Grant is with the nursemaid, and Nathan is with Uncle Anthony and Adam. Don’t worry, I sent a pair of servants along to help keep an eye on them all.”

“Good, my brother can hardly manage one nephew, but two…impossible.” Amelia suddenly shifted back to rest against the tree, wincing and rubbing the sides of her belly. “Oh, please stop, darling,” she told the moving lump under her gown. “I promise to rest now.”

Amelia talked to their unborn children constantly, almost as much as she did to their living ones.

“Do you really think that will work this time?”

She sighed. “Not really, but I have to try. Sometimes it soothes them.”

“It soothes all of us to see you like this. In your garden, surrounded by our children.”

She reached out with hands covered in dirt and caressed his face. “You well and truly kept your promise on that score, my love,”

“I failed not to love you, though,” he teased.

Amelia laughed. “I made the same foolish promise to you in the beginning, don’t forget. How much better is my life with love returned?”

“We love in equal measure, my dear,” he promised, clasping her hands and raising them to his lips. “And our love will only grow stronger every day we are together.”

She blew out a sharp breath. “We are happy only because we learned to trust again.”

“We did indeed, and it was exactly what we needed.” He put his hand on her belly—just as Amelia cried out in alarm.

Milo drew back, staring at her face. “What?

Amelia glanced down. “My waters just broke.”

He put his hand onto her belly and felt a contraction.

The baby wasn’t expected for another month, or so the midwife kept telling them. “Perhaps you fell the month before, as I suspected all along?”

Amelia cried out again, doubling over and clutching her belly. “Oh dear.”

“What is it?”

“I think the baby is coming. Immediately. I want to bear down.” She started to pant and ease herself down to the ground. “Milo. This baby won’t wait.”

Milo fell to his knees beside his wife, prepared to scoop her up into his arms and rush her back to the manor and the birthing room that was ready and waiting for this day. “I’ll get you back to the house, never fear.”

She held his hand on her belly.

“We’ll never make it,” she warned, curling up and gasping as a contraction came almost on top of the last one. She fell back against the tree, gasping.